Living life with a loose grip

Every time I think about having to move away from a place where I'm comfortably settled and connected to people who are dear to me, I cycle through feelings of frustration, loss, isolation, and sometimes anger. I usually become undesirably introspective for a few days. Circulating in my mind is a slideshow of pleasant memories that sting more than soothe, and the thought of letting go is one that pricks the heart.

I've learned that it is possible to hope for too much, to want in a way that is unreasonable and fruitless, so one must take care not to fixate too much. More importantly, I learned that going through life with a loose grip is a discipline to practice. If I hang too tightly onto the hope of keeping something or someone, or keep my grip closed even after loss, I will be unable to receive anything new in its place. A decisive clench can be self-fulfillingly prophetic in that way.

During the course of transition, there eventually is a moment where everything is quiet, inside and outside, and the space around me becomes louder than my thoughts. It is usually a state of mind where I can look and move forward to reality and stop grasping onto past places and moments. I always have to remind myself: when approaching transition, there comes a point where you need to face the reality that things are going to change.

When I am forced to accept change, I go through a period of resolved, withdrawn numbness. After coming to a point of relinquishing hope and desire for anything to fill the void, I soon receive something to fill the loss in a new pleasantly surprising and meaningful way. As such, it exceeds my expectation and redefines my experientially limited understanding of what it means to be blessed and fulfilled. Meanwhile, it inspires a newfound sense of hope in "the now" that keeps me at bay while I await "the not yet." But then, one must be wary of the tendency to view such gifts as anything more than fleeting and temporary and not cling to them as one would to eternal promises. Otherwise, one is in danger of being more beaten down by disappointment than necessary.

It's funny how blessings can easily become curses. Instantly, something that is a good gift can become a point of unhealthy fixation that festers. Such is the nature of sin I guess.

It is something to practice: going through life with open hands so that we are as free
to receive as we are to give. When we recognize that life goes beyond the things that fall immediately into our hands, I think we are more likely to look up and move forward to find life in the present more than an existence that is to be tolerated. We can taste the fruits that grow in the current seasons of our lives but keep ourselves reminded of the harvest that awaits us in the long term.

Life on earth merely offers samples of fulfillment--clear tastes of imperfection--and if we humble ourselves to recognize our imperfections before Christ and accept his invitation to experience his perfect love in heaven....well, life now will still be hard, but at least we can put our stock in the promise of something better.

19 “Do not lay up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal, 20 but lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys and where thieves do not break in and steal. 21 For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also."

-Matthew 6