(Time With God) Christopher Robin

[copied out of my journal: Thursday, November 7, 2019 | Note: some spoilers to the movie Christopher Robin are included below]

I just finished the second half of the new Christopher Robin movie, and I was greatly blessed to watch it with God.   Through this movie both the full watching of it and now the two half-watchings of it, I have had a fair amount of emotion.   It seems to me that there is some emotional strand of something entangled deep within this movie and the memories that it resurfaces.   

Frist of all, Pooh Sticks.   This lovely game that Christopher Robin use to play with Winnie the Pooh on the old bridge, where you drop a stick off the side of the bridge, watch it land in the water below and float under the bridge beyond sight.  Then you rush over to the other side of the bridge and wait and watch for the stick to float past.   It’s a fun, yet simple, game in The Hundred Acre Woods.   I have what I believe  is a fond and fun memory of playing this with dad, and sometimes by myself, on grandma Baurer’s old bridge by their country house just outside of Princeville, IL.   Sometimes I would drop the stick off the edge and sometimes I would drop it down the bridge water drainage holes and then rush to the other side to try to beat the stick and watch it float out from under the bridge (and often watch it float away, sometimes even as far until I lose sight of it).   Within this particular memory, I remember being with dad, and it being a very enjoyable time – being with him and playing Pooh Sticks.   I do not remember much of the details, but there is a joy in this memory.  

I guess I had figured that the emotion that surfaced within this memory was for hidden negative reasons, and while that still may be true, I see it now for positive joyful reasons.   What fun I had with dad those days.  What joy I had playing with him on the bridge and out in the front yard of our Princeville house playing ball or wrestling.   What fun I had with him in and with the tree house and on winter hikes to the creek.   What fun I had with him in the big red barn and out in the pasture.   Oh, the great fun and joy I had playing Pooh Sticks with him on that bridge at grandmas!    Thank you God!!!  That is such an enjoyable memory!   The thought of it and trying to recall the details and image of it, I just want to laugh with joy – that was a ton of fun for me.  I know it may be very weak comparison, but it reminds me of my great joy in the presence of God now, I see a great joy in that memory and in my heart at the time, whether I knew how to express it or not.  

I also have an emotional tug when Madelyn slips on the steps and falls, losing all of her dad’s papers.  She was so close to completing her expedition and doing something that would hopefully truly please her father.   Yet in the rush of urgency, she slips on the steps and all her father’s important papers fly into the air and blow away, that is all but one, which she was able to grab before it flew away too.  The deep pain she must have felt in that moment that she not only failed, but also lost her chase to please her dad (in hope that he wouldn’t send her to boarding school).   I feel the pain and sadness and just the emptiness that she must have suddenly felt, the feeling that she was just going to burst into tears in not knowing what to do or how to feel or how to express that feeling.  Suddenly I, now, typing this, feel that urgency and emotion flowing through me just as I did growing up; I do not know what to do or what to say or even what to feel but I just want to burst out in tears and run and cover myself in my bed and cry, and cry and cry.   I do not want anyone to talk me through it or be there, but I want to cry and be comforted by my crying.  I do not know how to express my pain or my sadness or my sorrow, but I want to let it out; I want to be comforted; I want to be filled with life; but I need an outlet – and I do not know how to find or use an outlet.  So all this build up of confusion, emotion, pain, sadness, sorrow and anger even a little, get buried within me and I run and hide and cover myself and cry and cry and cry.  

I feel Pooh Bear.   Pooh, one of whom I think I have always related to personally, carries deep emotion and heart with little understanding and knowhow, yet carries great wisdom and life.   I saw myself there growing up; I saw myself as the calm bear that did not feel like he fit in always like he should; that did not understand much and struggled to comprehend things that others comprehended.  I saw myself in Pooh in how he spent time with Piglet caring for Piglet and doing just the simple things with.   While I had lots of ideas and enjoyed adventures and energetic playing, I seemed to have related to Pooh’s whole of being in great want of others yet not always knowing how to express it; deeply desiring to feel loved, yet not knowing that is what I wanted.   I seemed to have wanted the presence of other people close to me deeply, yet I did not know how to express it.  So in order to do something with all of this want and need I felt within me, I ran, not knowing what to do, trying to hide and cry out my want and need.   Expressing feelings and emotions was a terrible struggle for me, because I had no idea how to process and pinpoint what was going on inside me, and the idea of trying made me want to squirm - for it pushed me beyond my comfort zone.   I think I did not want to deal with my emotions and feelings and my inside because it was too hard and painful and lonely and sad and in later years in school (middle school and especially high school) I had experiences that magnified these feelings within me and made it all the harder to process and deal with them.   Feeling behind and not understood; feeling neglected, and not cared for as I needed; feeling alone and behind; feeling unequipped and not able to do what was being asked of me within the timeframe I had.   I felt lost and alone and frustrated and hurt and in emotional pain and confused and I just wanted to burry myself deep within and cry and cry and cry.    I often concluded that I could not do it and thus I would not do it.  I built walls inside and would not let anyone it, for often I did not even know how to get in myself.   I did not know how to process and deal with and express what I was going through and feeling; it hurt, deeply.  It felt horrible and miserable and painful emotionally.   And I did not know how to let it out.   I cried and cried and cried.   I cried inside and I tried to explain in my head (as if I were talking to teachers) why I was behind, or why I was struggling or what I was feeling, but, I do not think, anything barely ever came out.  I was lost, but, praise God, I am found.  I was living with deep past pains and hardships that were inconclusive and incomplete and left undone and a mess, yet God, in His great grace and love, is walking me through them!    Oh, Pooh Bear, my love – whom I wanted to be and whom I so related to, in so, so, so many ways.   The cuddly, loving, tender-hearted, calm-spirited, curious, simple, often misunderstood, slow processing and thinking, in need of others and time alone, bear.  

Growing up I pictured Jonathan with all his energy, excitement, great ideas and quick thinking and processing as Tigger (T – I - Double “Guh” – Err), David as the one who seemed to be in control and wanted to have things his way and just the way he wanted them as Rabbit, and myself as Pooh.   I did not have a clear distinct character that stuck out for Abi.   Given all of these connections and the characteristics of each figure within Winnie the Pooh, I was brought to the realization tonight while finishing the last hour of Christopher Robin, that the animals of The Hundred Acre Wood are very much like stuffed, more emotional-friendly and -entangling, and lived out versions of the characteristics of figures in the film Inside Out; where each character is a different emotion or characteristic or aspect of a person.  

Tigger is the energy, adventure, and thrill;

Rabbit is the control, order and organization;

Piglet is the hidden fear and timidity;

Eeyore is the gloomy, negative, and depressed;

Pooh is the positive, calm, mellow, and simple;

Kanga is the reasonability and caution;

Owl is the wisdom, and knowledge;

Roo is the child-like behaviours;

(& Gopher is the hard worker (with a little pride));

And Christopher Robin, a human, brings reality, wisdom, and someone to talk to.  

Thank you God for the most wonderful experiences you have given me and for all that you have shown me through this movie!  I greatly look forward to continuing this walk and I anticipate expectantly what you will reveal to me through the next film, book, word, or song that you choose!    Thank you GOD!!!   I love you!!!!

(Time with God) Wingfeather Saga Book 3

|copied directly out of my journal|

I felt led to start reading the third book in the Wingfeather Saga tonight, I heard that whoever told me to read it (Which I think may have been God) has something to tell(or show?) me.   

I just got to a point on the fifth page or so where I just stopped for a moment mid paragraph, I think.   I’m not entirely sure why, but there is something there (It has also been fairly clear that God has something to say to me through this book/my reading tonight).   I sense and or feel a relation to Janner.   I feel his pain, his memory, his conflict, his internal thoughts, his feelings, his love, his desire to be more and grow and to trust the Maker, his wanting to know, his leadership, his fear, his doubt, his being.  I feel like I can relate closely to him and his memories seem to bring a sweep of memories of my own.   His feelings seem to bring a sweep of feelings within me.  It is as if God is using Janner to open my own mind to show me what is in there and to reveal more of myself to me.   I my heart is heavier right now and I sense a weight of what may be about to take place as I continue to read this and delve into it, and I am kind of fearful, just as Janner might be.   Yet I know that if God is in it, I have nothing to fear - especially if God leads me to it.    I know that I need to trust Him in this.   God give me strengthen, excitement, and endurance.  Open my mind and heart and gates to what you have for me according to your will and your way.   

I feel like I want to cry.  I feel that emotion over me and I do not know what to make of it.   I do not know exactly why, and I really do not “feel” like digging into it right now.   But then again, I probably will not ever “feel” like digging into for much at all.   Lord help me.   I don’t know what I am to see.   I see a vast and terrible and awesome ocean on all sides.   There are mountains in the far left-side distance to the left-ish of me - just like the vision of where dad was at a while back when we were praying at Grandma Baurer’s in her James St. living room, with the lights off.   The sky is blue and the water nice, but it is terrifying and beautiful at the same time.  I fear leaving the deck of the ship and stepping into a little lifeboat or rowboat in the terrible wide and vast ocean.   Yet I have a great emotion while standing on the deck and I can in-vision myself out there in a rowboat on the horizon floating “alone” in the beautiful and vastly incomprehensible openness surrounding me.   I am amazed and “alone”.   I fear what might be around me out in that little vessel and what might come out of the water, especially when I am not expecting it.  I fear the surprises that might come out and the fear is leading to more fear and paranoia, fear upon fear.   I am not enjoying my time out on the rowboat on the vast expanse of seemingly nothingness except water, fearing what “could” happen at any given moment.   My life seems a wreck and I feel my mind shutting down from the fear and overwhelmingness of the fear upon fear upon fear without anyTHING to do about it.   I am internally curling up into a ball shutting down, freaking out, crying, and not knowing what to do, nearing wishing I were dead so that I did not have to deal with this.   I want to pull my hair out but the twisting of my insides just make me want to curl up even more, shut out the world and scream as loud as I can trying to release this pain, fear, frustration, overwhelmingness, and doubt.   I do not quite know how to respond except to curl up into this ball, as I would internally as a child when a school problem became too much.   When I over thought something and got too caught up in it, this same reaction came and time and soothing, calming, and comforting words helped.   But my internal flesh just wanted to be alone, to hide all of this and not let it out, it wanted to ball it up in anger and frustration and fear and burry it as if it never happened.  I would just want to push it down, leaving that ball of fear and worry, and anxiety, and overwhelmingness, and frustration, and anger, and shame, and stress deep within me, not knowing where else to put it.  I did not want to just be still, but to curl up, to squirm and twitch and writhe.    It was all uncomfortable and I did not know how to handle it; I did not know how to process it; I did not know what to do with it.   I did not want to talk about my feelings or what was going on inside of me, because, on the outside, I did not even really know, and it was quite uncomfortable to try to dig down into that ball that I just pushed down, or was trying to push down.   I did not understand how to grab hold of that and put it into words.  I did not even realize that I felt all this way, because I pushed it all down.   And I most certainly did not want any of it to resurface again.  And thus I did this whole process again and again so many times that it seems to have created quite a mess and pressure down in me that I feel like needs to come up and out and be let go of, but I am not sure what that will all look like, and I kind of fear it, even though I know that it will be good.   But I want it out - it has been my prayer for many times, and now that I have a somewhat better glimpse of what is down there, I do want to let it out.    I want to let it out to God and let Him have it.   I do not know how much is down in me, but I want it all out.  I feel a peace and release and a joy just typing this and thinking about letting it out - how much more will I have when have release it to Him - and by release, I mean to let go… with no strings attached to pull it back with later on…. entirely let it go…. period.    

A Wingfeather Tale: Twists & Turns, Tears & Tempest

Last night when I got into my car after work and after the art show in the library at school, I was deciding what to listen to on the way home.  I really wanted to listen to the Wingfeather Saga, the third book that I’ve been going through, but I struggled with that idea because I didn’t want to get too caught up in the book.  I know that I can so easily do that, get too caught up in the world of Aerwiar, and it concerns me because I fear it will draw me too far away from reality around me.  When I get so caught up in it I am thinking about it all the time, night and day, and playing scenes, statements, questions, and observations over and over and over in my head – something that I would love to be doing with the Bible.  

 

So, since I really wanted to listen to the Wingfeather Saga, I figured I better listen to the Bible on audio – which I have found that the more I get off of listening to the Bible the less I spend in the Word (though I don’t have enough “data/experience” to claim that as a “fair” statement, if you know what I mean).   But I felt like God was giving me the okay to listen to the Wingfeather book, reminding me that He has told me that He will use books, even ones like these, to help grow and guide me.  So I turned on the Wingfeather Saga, book three, and asked God to reveal things to me.   

 

As I neared home, I started driving slower and slower.  I was in the middle of a chapter and I didn’t want to stop in the middle.  As I neared the point where I would turn left to head home, I felt God tell me I can either turn left or keep going straight. 

(I was driving from the lower red dot to the one above it
on the left side.  As I neared that dot, I could either go left
to the next red dot (right next to home) or straight towards the
blue dot.) 

 

I knew several things: 1) I really wanted to finish the chapter, 2) I had to go pee, and 3) I have been working pretty hard to really limit any unnecessary expenses (like driving around to listen to more book or sitting in my car while it’s idling, etc…) since I am fairly tight on finances and I am trying to turn around how I use my money.   So I decided to turn left.   After turning, I drove fairly slowly down the final mile of the road before getting home (this is good fuel-wise since I have a hybrid and I was driving on battery going that slow).  

 

However, when I reached the end of the mile, there was a road that crosses at the stop sign.  I was planning to cross the road, and then there is the house, but I really felt like God was leading me to turn right.

(I was coming from the left, toward the blue dot, and I expect 

to cross the road to the house on the corner (where I live), but I

had felt God leading me to turn right toward the red dot toward

the bottom of this picture.)

 

Knowing that He was behind it I was glad to go, because I really wanted to keep listening to the book.  I knew that if I turned right, about three miles down the road I could make a left, and then two miles later another left and then loop myself all the way back to the other end of our road.  I have done this many times before.   

 

When I got to the end of the three miles, I felt led to make the left hand turn.  And when I got to the end of the next two miles, I also got the go-ahead to turn left again.   As I turned onto this road, facing north again, I slowed as I came to a hill where an old, abandoned, falling apart wooden house sat.  I inched by it, fascinated by it’s beauty.

(This is the route I ended up taking)

As I rounded over the hill, the road made a sharp 90-degree turn left for a half-mile and where it made another 90-degree turn right to straighten itself back out again.  But as I neared the corner, I really felt God telling me to go straight.   Now, technically there is a road that leads straight, though it is an old, dirt road that is not much more than 650 feet long before it flatly dead-end’s into a field.  Having the great enjoyment for driving on old dirt roads, I have been on this one several times, though not a ton – it can be rather bumpy with dried, rutted, tractor tracks.   But now, I had the concern that it might be too muddy, as it was a bit wet out, and rain was a’com’n.

 

(As I came up over the hill (just below the bottom of this 

picture), I expected to follow the paved road that curved left, 

but I felt God directing me to go straight, on to the dirt road.)

 

But I felt like it was God leading me so I went, knowing He would be with me in it and believing He would keep me from getting stuck.   As I drove on the short stub-of-a-road, I found it not wet nearly at all, though it was fairly bumpy, especially near the end, which did not please my wanting-to-be-emptied bladder.  But God helped keep my bladder satisfied where it was.   I parked at the end of the road and listened for an hour or so.   There were a couple some-what emotional times and a few times where I either stopped and shouted/stated, or just declared while it was playing  my agreement and excitement at some great spiritual act, statement, belief, concept, or something of the sort.   The rain came and went off in the distance – I only noticed, I believe, one rain drop land on my car – though I could see the pouring rain ahead of me in a field.   

 

After and hour or so I became a bit concerned as another wave of rain came, and this time it hit the road I was on.  I was worried that the road would become wet and muddy and I could get stuck, though I tried to remind myself that God brought me here, so He can take car of that.   After asking for a bit, I felt the okay to back up and turn around.  After I turned around, I drove to the end of the dirt road, which was more gravel, right at the curve of the paved curve of the road and parked there.   I sat there for the next hour to and hour and a half, and finished up the book.  And boy oh boy, did God do His work in me there.  

(Here are the two places that I parked during this stay.  The top

yellow pin is where I had first parked, and the bottom is the 

second place I had parked once the rain started. In total, 

I was at these two places for a combined probably over two

and a half hours.)

Rain poured the whole time, and it was cool to watch as it splattered and moved on my windshield and as the wind outside blew it around.    While sitting there on that gravel/dirt road in the rain storm that roared outside my car, my car continued to play the Wingfeather Saga, book three (while idling the whole time) and my heart was touched and moved by the Almighty God.  There were some moments in the story that really touched my heart and struck me in this way and that, and some of those moments brought me to tears.   And as the tears fell, I felt silly, but I kept hearing what I believe was God telling me to let it come; to let it all out.   And I did.   Moment after moment, more and more tears came.   The tears turned into a vocal cry, which soon turned into a whine, which felt all the more silly and not something a person in their twenties does, I felt very childish, but I kept hearing the still, small, calm voice telling me to let it out.  I didn’t know how much more would come out, and I wasn’t fully sure the source of this crying, but God was doing something.   The whine then turned into wailing – something I don’t know if I have ever done, especially not as a grown man, and though it felt all the more silly, it kept coming.   And I had peace.   I wailed and wailed and wailed even more, and when I thought I would have no voice left and my throat was more parched than I can every recall and my pants (just below my head) were drenched, I wailed some more.  

 

As my wailing turned back into a whine and a cry and then slowly started to fade away, and the story was nearing the end of the book, I felt God gently telling me not to put a stop to the flood of emotions, as there may be a bit left that will to come out.    And though it wasn’t what I had expected, a tad bit more did come out before the end of the book.  As the book came to a close and the rain raged on outside, I sat in awe, amazed at God’s amazing love and Hand on me, and I still had to pee – which was now starting to grow with a much more urgent feeling, but God had held it for the past three whole hours of listening to this book, and I was grateful.     I drove home without listening to any more audio, but listening to whatever God might be saying and thanking Him and praising Him, and thinking/talking about what had just happened.  I still don’t know the fully source of the crying, what it was in me that needed to come out, but God had prepared this time last night (when I had a free evening almost) to bless me indeed.  

 

Thank you Dad!!!!

A Choice to be Made: The Durgan Guild or The Book Bindery

****Spoiler Alerts may follow in the text below.  If anyone is super sensitive in not learning any details about the Wingfeather Saga (a four-book series by Andrew Peterson) before getting there, read the following with caution****

I have spent most of the night tonight (for the past two to three hours) sorting LEGOS and listening to the Wingfeather Saga book number three: The Monster in the Hollows.  Lately, as I have been reading these books, I have been pausing at every little thing that stands out to me, recording it and making a note on it.  Through this process (within much prayer), I have learned a lot about myself and things that are buried within me.  However, as I listen to the audiobooks I do not stop at every little thing.  Some things, every once in a while, stand out so much that I will pause, ponder and then play again.   And tonight I had one of those moments.  Except... this part of the book stood out so much, I felt in me that I needed to record it - tonight, no matter how late it is (it is currently around 11:15 PM - and I work tomorrow morning). 

First let me tell you what was said, then I will tell what stood out to me.   To give a bit of context, Gnag the Nameless is a nameless evil that has destroyed most of the world as they know it, and desperately wants Janner and Kalmar - to use for his own evil means.  Artham is Janner and Kalmar's uncle, who is a role model for Janner, as he played the same royal position that Janner is in.  Janner is 12 and Kalmar is 11.  They each have to choose a class in their new school in the Green Hollows where they will study to perfect one topic (such as the book bindery, cookery, woodworking,  hourndery, etc...).  Janner has always loved books, reading and writing, and he couldn't be more thrilled about being able to be in a class with others on that subject (something that he has never had anything like before) in the Book Bindery.  His younger brother, Kalmar, wants to be in a sneakery class called the Durgan Guild where he will lean to fight, sneak, and spy.  Janner's job is to protect his younger brother, as his brother does have some special circumstances around him in addition to most of the city wanting to hurt him (at least it seems so).  Given all their current circumstances, and the fact that all the children in that class are at least 13 years old, everyone knows that an 11 year-old boy is going to get pounded, literally, in that class.  Lots of pain, emotional and physical, will be inflicted to anyone who enters that class, especially Kalmar.  His mom, Nia, will only allow him to be in that class if Janner will do it with him.  Janner is none too happy about this.  Lets take a look:

"Janner stared into the distance and clenched his jaw.  He tried not to, but he couldn't help, picturing uncle Artham looking down at him with disappointment. Janner hatted to admit it, but he knew the right thing was to protect his brother, not just from the students at the guilding hall, but from fangs and bomnubbles and even Gnag the Nameless.  And learning to be a warrior spy was sure to be a bigger help than learning to be a cook or bind books." (Wingfeather Saga Book 3: The Monster in the Hollows)

What really struck me here was that Janner, despite his deepest desire to be with books and other book-loving children, saw that what he wanted wasn't necessarily where he was needed at that time.   That struck out to me because as soon as I paused the audio, whether by my mind or via God's revelation, this situation materialized to me as what I am going through right now.  Just as Janner had no interest in getting 'pounded', I have had little/low interest in taking child development classes in college - and I struggle to see myself working with kids in the long run, at least in a classroom setting - the idea bores me and makes me want to squirm in my seat.   Though I enjoy what I do at work in the preschool classroom, I don't fancy the idea of doing it forever.   To help with this feeling, in December 2018, I enrolled in two art classes for this spring semester (that I am currently in).  I enjoy art and I have been wanted to develop more of my artistic skills for a long while - plus I really, really enjoy working with clay, which I love doing in my ceramics class.   I've even considered taking Ceramics II next semester.   Except, I realize, that my taking them is for my own wants and pleasures, which isn't bad, except it it drawing me quite out of the way for the field that I feel God has clearly led me to.  I feel that God has lead me, and is still leading me to study Early Childhood Education, and to do it will all my heart, with all of me, not the half-heartedness that I have had towards it.   I may not fancy doing this for the rest of my life, but God has called me here, and I need to put away my selfish, earthly desires and follow His lead. 

This is a reoccurring theme, especially lately, that I feel God has been showing me.  To trust Him, and to give whatever He has placed in my path my all, regardless of how I feel about it now.  And looking at The Monster in the Hollows, further on in the book, Janner learns to like the Durgan Guild and, in fact, he finds that it comes to be a very useful help later - a time that "the Maker" (God) was preparing him for.