I'm a thinker.
Not a "Mathematical" kind of thinker, but an emotional thinker.
I think about the poem I recited in 6th grade, the amazing homemade bolognese sauce I learned to make from a video online and about the butterflies currently enjoying the bush just outside the front window.
And I feel just as good about one of those as I do all of them.
They give me that "warm, cozy, sweater" feeling.
I ALSO think about a Facebook message sent to me in anger, the look I gave my son in hot displeasure and the impulsive Corona purchase still hanging in my closet.
And I feel just as much condemnation in this moment about one of them as I do all of them, even though one happened years and years and years ago.
They give me that "never going to be able to do anything right" feeling.
I'm a feeler.
If after an argument with my husband
(okay stop the presses.)
I stop here and say that in those early years my husband and I fought like cats and dogs.
I was beginning to wonder if we were the only ones who just couldn't get things together.
In frustration we drove all the way to another Pastor and his wife to find some sort of help.
He went into the office with the Pastor and I went to the nursery with his dear wife.
Because isn't that where most Peace deals are brokered?
Anyway something magical happened when she begin to speak into a frazzled housewife.
She began, "When my husband and I argue..." and It was like I was Charlie Brown and she his teacher.
I cannot for the life of me tell you what she said next. I'm sure it was filled-to-the-brim with good, Biblical principles.
I actually knew those believe it or not.
I just needed to hear that someone else struggled like we were.
So I stop everything and tell you that if you need to know that some other couple argues I am your girl.
I can tell you that it gets better just like every.single.thing. in marriage does, but it's still there. You are normal and you most likely know all the things to do and not do and you will be just fine.
(We now return to our regularly scheduled programming)
When my husband and I have a disagreement it is imperative that he reaches out to me in some way physically so I KNOW that things are okay.
Those "pats on the back," and hugs really mean something to feely folks like me.
I begin sensing the atmosphere of a room once I enter it and most likely wonder if I have done something to make someone upset with me.
So it is with all sincerity that I add that I have rarely let slip from my lips, "I've never thought of it that way," because I usually think everything into oblivion.
And thinking is good.
Thinking of what others are feeling and needing is a great way to help and encourage them.
It's a wonderful way to let Scripture sink into your heart, guide you throughout the day and
be at your fingertips to send to your kids and friends halfway around the country via text.
Deep thinking helps you grab truth from a poem and see great works of delight in a walk in the woods.
You "get" what someone was meaning even though their words didn't quite say it outright.
And a card with one word underlined can minister to your heart for years.
Thinking- emotional thinking- deep thinking is a great blessing in my life.
But with this comes some pitfalls as well.
With deep thinking comes over thinking.
comes assuming,
comes lingering hurtful words,
comes condemnation.
If I lean towards thinking about something in a deep way, I by default can lean into thinking too much about myself and my own faults and failures.
Deep thinkers are their own worst enemies and it was in a moment like this when my dear husband hit the nail on the head for me.
He said, "Don't analyse so much that you are paralyzed."
Don't analyse so much that you are paralyzed.
I have learned that feelers like me need to reflect on things but not become introspective.
Reflect on what the Lord is telling me to correct, to adjust; make right with someone, but don't try to sit in introspection.
Jeremiah 17:9 is such a good reminder for me, "The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?"
I KNOW A LOT of things about things.
I have ALL the feels about things like Werther's Caramel Apple candies and brownies with chocolate chips in them.
I have feels about Old Navy tights that don't make you miserably uncomfortable after several C-sections, certain periods of World History, and granola with cranberries in it.
I have feels about climbing into bed next to my husband and knowing I am the only one who gets to do that, snuggling up next to him as if nothing on earth can find me there.
I have serious feels about that. ( woo hoo!)
I have feels about Oreos and milk and waterproof mascara and about every single shade of blue.
I have feels about felt-tip pens and perfectly fitting jean skirts and about cool-looking bifocal glasses.
I have feels about lipgloss and about dangly earrings and about fresh stationary.
I have feels about getting on a computer and getting all excited about encouraging someone to just keep one foot in front of the other because I am cheering them one step closer to the Lord.
I have feels for people I have never met and most likely never will, for pandas on instagram and for kids who still can't pronounce "spaghetti."
Just typing out all my feels gives me more feels.
Speaking of all the feels- I recently came across one of the two CASSETTE TAPES I spent my own money on when I began to draw close to the Lord as a teenager.
It's a tape recorded on an island full of worship music.
It's hilarious and as upbeat as it comes and the song that spoke to me the most is entitled, "Heaven is in my heart."
Go right ahead and google that for your own listening pleasure.
It warms my heart to find this again and know that my teenage self just wanted a replacement for "New Kids on the Block."
I do now know that Heaven is indeed NOT in my heart. (Oh how that makes me laugh out loud!)
Here's one thing I do know- I cannot plum the depths of all the things this heart feels and thinks, and has in it.
I can sit and try to understand myself but I will only end up more miserable than a dying Solomon.
I cannot even begin to know what is hidden inside of this wicked heart of mine.
I DO know that there's a serious pile of Canfield Fair food in there somewhere.
We cannot fully know our own seat of all of our emotions.
Which is why we should not sit there too long.
We should ask the Lord to reveal things to us and let Him sift through the intents, the thoughts and the hurts.
He should be the filter with which we view all that is our heart.
When I view my past, present and future through His lens I am able to let-go of a hurt, pick up forgiveness for my own sin and see hope just around the corner.
You won't find me with a "Follow your heart," T-shirt these days because I don't even desire to know where that would lead.
I used to regret the fact that I thought as much as I did, felt so many feels, but God made me this way.
Maybe he made you that way as well.
He knows just what he is doing and knows how deeply we can sit with Him and his Word.
He knows that we can sense a need before someone else and know just how to meet it.
He made us to enjoy the unfathomable truth in a line of a Hymn that sinks deep down and becomes a part of our lives.
It's wonderful because we are wonderfully made just that way.
Think about it.
(smile)
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