Apparently blogger isn't iPhone friendly so this will have to wait. :(

jesus loves the little chi'rens

this is why i want to teach abroad.  to see the eager, smiling children crammed into a makeshift room easily a third of the size of an american classroom with hope in their eyes and ardent in their desire to learn.  

i've been called to be an agent of change; to enable a new generation of african (or belizean, or nepali, or wherever) children: to pour into, to impart knowledge to, to pass on my passion to.  (i am aware i just committed the unpardonable sin of ending a sentence with a preposition; please accept my most sincere apology). 

i've been called to engage these children; to hook them into learning, motivate them into self-education and out of a perpetual cycle of poverty. 

i've been called to love these precious lambs of Christ.  to love as He loved.  to live as He lived.  to share that love and life with them.  

i've been called out of a life of self-indulgence and humdrum monotony into a life of self-sacrifice and radical revival.

as a follower of christ and a lover of the nations, i've been called.  ruined for the ordinary.  destined for extraordinary.

it's been a while...

the average person will tell you that habits are hard to break. 

unless you're me.  and then it's quite the opposite.  i couldn't form a habit even if the consequences were anything shy of death.  even then, it would likely take a lot of coercion; you'd be surprised how childlike and a.d.d. i am.

the only reason i'm even writing this blog is because i got a random message from a girl that told me i was a good writer and i should blog.  and it reminded me: "wait a second, i do.  or, well... did.  or something like that."

no more promises.  fortunately, bad habits aren't totally replacing my lack of good habits.  and maybe its my quest for spontaneity, my indecisive nature, my inability to adhere to the norm, or my complete detest for routine.  but for the life of me, i can't do anything on a regular schedule.  eat. diet. exercise. bathe. work. homework. sleep. read. my bible, even.  i try to put myself on a schedule, and it's almost like setting myself up for a royal failure. 

it's not that i don't want to have this things solidified at the top of my daily to-do list.  but no matter how hard i try, i slack, i grow lax, and i fail.  half the time, i don't even really fail until i try hard to discipline myself.  for instance.  i'll typically read my bible every other day.  i cover what we're reading that week in church (for the read the bible in a year path), but i can't get into the habit of doing it everyday.  so i schedule the time to do it in the morning, or before bed.  the second i write it down to do, or determine that i'm going to follow through, it's like a short-cut to nowheresville and i wind up taking the detour for a good week or so.  

same goes for dieting.  i've been rockin' it since right before halloween for this trip to belize.  but i get bored.  i get busy.  i run out of time to work out, so i try to compensate with eating uber healthy, and its like my taste buds and tummy rebel and decide they are going to do some jedi mind trick and get me to forget about my diet just days before my goal; after three weeks even!

what is it with me?  is it just a most extreme case of lack of discipline?  is it disobedience?  rebellion in its most primary form?  is it even something i can change?  even something so simple as blogging or daily devo's and my threshold for commitment dips to an all-time low. 

well, for today at least, i make the determination for the following (and i very well might have to type this out as a daily thing to get me into the habit of doing so, and as a means of holding myself accountable):

go to bed before midnight

get up before 9

shower

morning devo

get all homework done, typed and submitted ... BEFORE class (i'm a month behind, its all done, but even then, i don't submit!)

evening blog

sounds reasonable, yes?  morning devo, evening blog.  if nothing else, those two i want to make into habit.  at the rate my life is currently going, i'm missing out on a lot of things, and even if there's not another soul that reads this, i know me + 15 years will really enjoy recounting the beginning steps of what will be a great dance that the Lord has choreographed for me.