A Relaxing Weekend again

It's been about three months since my last weekend of doing nothing, so perhaps it was due. Well actually there is no perhaps about it--I flat out needed a little something of a rest. This weekend has been pretty much exactly what I said that I hoped it would be in the last post. I've done a lot of reading, reflecting, journaling, and sleeping. So maybe I'll go through and give you a little piece from each one of those elements...that is if you care to read about something a little less flashy than usual.

Reading: I finished Dallas Willard's Rennovation of the Heart. It was very engaging and presented a quality approach to spiritual formation and understand the parts that make us up. It has proved a useful framework within which to seek after the proper integration and interplay of my emotions, will/heart, body, social context, soul, mind. I also started reading Solzhenitsyn's Cancer Ward for my Russian Lit. class. It's pretty interesting so far, and of course you know how I feel in general about the russian lit. You all should read some!

Reflecting: Well this will tie in with journaling, but sometimes it is good to just 'lay down with your thoughts' as I put it in the last post. Sometimes I would do this and drift in and out of sleep. And in that way it was fun to watch my thoughts dance with my dreams. And perhaps a little confusing. Upon further reflection, if you really want to make something out of your reflections--perhaps journaling them is a more sure-fire method than falling asleep to them. I guess that is if you want to make something out of them, which sometimes it's nice not to.

Journaling: One of the most interesting things about this whole experience has been leaving my whole community of Christians and being transplanted into a new, very different community. It tells me a lot about who I am, as well as about the community that I came from. It mainly has been a cool way to develop an understanding of how I follow Jesus outside of the framework and traditional understanding of my Christian community. Most of the focus of my journaling centered around that past community, the one I will be returning to fairly shortly. Being a good ways into this experience, I can look back on that community and see some of the things that I couldn't see from within it. So it was interesting to write about those observations and speculate on how I will interact directly in those areas when I return.

Sleeping: I slept a lot. It was beautiful. I'm in fact going to go sleep right now!