30 Days of Redefining Beauty-Day 8

I can't believe it's only Day 8 of this silly experiment. After a week of trying to find beauty in unexpected places I am already feeling tapped out, like anything I might say from here on in will be redundant. I suddenly feel that these posts have been irrelevant and time-consuming, nothing more. I could write about the changing sky today, or the storefront windows full of color I saw earlier. But those sentiments seem trite.

Instead I will write about how difficult it is to keep this blog going. I don't even know who reads this. Does it matter?

And yet...I keep typing. Today the beauty I see is in my commitments. I physically recoil at the thought of being obligated to do anything, but I also can't say "no". So I keep blogging, or I stay somewhere when there are a dozen other places I would rather be, and grumble. But I stay. (Most of the time.)

I think that's beautiful. Isn't there a parable in the Bible about how it's better to initially say you won't do something and then do it later, rather than say you will do it and end up dropping the ball?

Well, I have dropped the ball, MANY times. I'm beginning to learn, though, that following through with your commitments is a sign of maturity and integrity, two qualities I have longed to possess all my life. Sticking with something you said you would do is kind of a lost art these days. It's so easy to get out of relationships, delegate, outsource, and claim "self-care" as a method of avoidance. And those things are not always bad. But I do think that follow-through is one of those character-building values that doesn't have an immediate payoff--and thus goes against the grain of so much in our culture.

I will stick with it, most likely grumbling all the way, as long "it" is leading me toward wholeness and not annihilation.