I am set free

I spent the better part of today measuring inadequacies. even with all the sunshine this afternoon, the walking in it and the feeling of it and the loving of it, I could not get past the measuring. I could not stop thinking about all the ways I do not measure up. how I continue to make the same parenting mistakes again and again, about all the people I have failed in my life, in one way or another. how it seems as if I am taking the same photographs over and over again, with the same cameras, over and over and over again, how my work feels as stagnant as the day is long. I thought about all the things I should be doing, could be doing, if I was just a little bit more ambitious, got up just a little bit earlier in the morning. worked a little harder, pushed a little harder. I could be better, I could do more, be more. more, always more. it's an endless pit, you know. this way of thinking. it never ends well.

at church tonight, I let the music flood over everything. I let grace cover me like a blanket. the love of God is not a magic trick, not a secret potion to consume to make it all go away but it quiets my mind when nothing else will, is bigger and brighter than a thousand suns. for this, I am thankful.