Popular

Popular. It’s not new. It’s not suddenly hipster or relevant. It’s a desire we all have; to be liked, accepted, and simply, loved. It’s not bad to long for it all; since the beginning of time the desire has been there. Each of us hopes to be good at something, to be noticed as the expert, or maybe just noticed. With social media in overdrive we self promote, constantly trending and I wonder if we are tired yet. I wonder if we are ready to let it go and to just be.

It’s a cycle; a vicious cycle and I feel caught in it no matter how much I fight it. Maybe you can relate. It goes like this. I’ve lived my life as an average girl, good at most things but not really great at much of anything. I get by, I fake it when I feel like I can’t make it and I find myself searching for something to be great at. Searching for something that sets me apart as different, unique, or even talented. Yet, I’ve discovered that the harder I try to find what I’m good at, the more I lose myself. I lose myself to culture, media, television, music, computers, friends and the list goes on. Because here is the thing, we live in a day where being edgy, independent, and unique is the new cool and we are all in this race to seek after it; to be noticed.

Then I sit in the quiet, in the small moments when no one else is around and the question comes rushing in. Who are you? It’s that darn word: “popular” that messes with me. I fumble through life pretending I know what I am doing, hoping to be liked because on the inside, who I really am is just an average, dorky girl pretending to be a big deal when really I’m  just looking for a little love. Sometimes I think it’s just me that has weird issues, which very well could be true. Then I have a moment with a friend, an acquaintance, or someone I have just met. I look into their eyes and even though they are dressed to fit the part, hair manicured perfectly and pasted smile, I see them. I see that they are just like me; longing to love and be loved. Longing to let their average, dorky, not that big of a deal personality dance free and to see and experience somebody else in the same condition. It’s in that moment I feel relieved that I might be normal and for a moment, I feel like I have broken free of that vicious cycle. I let go of the constant pursuit to be great, cool, liked or whatever and I rest in not being a big deal. Because there is the answer to that question: who am I? I’m just Sheila, an average, dorky girl who longs to love and be loved and to dance free alongside everyone else. My guess is that’s the answer for most of us.

Small

I had this fascinating conversation with two of the science teachers at my school recently. Usually my association and conversations linger around the subject of English, but on this day I was able to listen in on two very smart men passionately share their knowledge about the universe. To be honest, the last time I had a science lesson that I fully understood was probably back in junior high; yet, on this day, I understood the lesson and I was humbled by the knowledge they shared.

"If our Earth was any closer or any further away from the sun, we would not be alive... There is not one single element on another planet, that we have found, which helps produce life or sustain it..." Mr. T spouted off, passionately waving his hand back and forth.

I sat there and took it all in. Numbers. Data. And at that moment in the midst of thinking about our massive galaxy, I felt small; very small and it felt good to feel small. It felt good to be reminded that there has to be something bigger than me out there. To be reminded that there must be a designer behind all the numbers and the data and the vast space. An artist who made something from nothing, just as artists do on canvas every day.

~

I went to the mountains last weekend. A ski trip was on the top of the agenda. As I rode up the ski lift,  I took it all in. The crisp winter air, snow perfectly blanketing the pine trees, the crystals shimmering in the untouched snow. The trees stood strong and the mountains unshaken. Nature was perfect.

After shuffling my awkward body off the chair lift and feeling thankful for not falling, I navigated my way to the edge of the mountain. Vast. The sky and mountains went on for miles and miles; miles that I will never touch, never see, never experience. As I looked out over it all, I was reminded of Mr. T. I remembered feeling small as he spoke about our massive galaxy and again, right there looking out over Earth, I felt small. It felt good to feel small. I think we all long to feel small no matter how much we fight it or how much our ego tells us otherwise. Really in these vast moments we are reminded, even if we barely lean in to it for just a second, that there must be something bigger, stronger out there keeping all this beauty and life together. And we rest in knowing that if it was up to us, life would look a whole lot messier than it does.

I stared a few seconds longer and without thinking, I exhaled a soft, "Only you." Only a designer, bigger, better, stronger, could create all this.


As I sit here writing this on New Year's day, I reflect on those moments and I find myself longing for more moments where I feel small. Where I am reminded that there is a God (a designer) who is bigger, better, stronger and I can rest in knowing that I am small. And perhaps there is my New Year's resolution: to seek out the moments that make me feel small and to lean in to them; not fighting, not allowing my ego to be puffed up, but allowing myself to feel that moment of being small.