A time apart....

"Women's lives are made up of cycles of decent and ascent. At crucial times we must seek out periods of inner solitude, deep brooding and being, intervals of spiritual apartness where we move down into the depths of ourselves to mine the dark gorge and bring new treasures into the light." ~Sue Monk Kidd

Ever feel like you're dying inside? like slowly but surely no matter how much light and water you give your soul, you just aren't growing, in fact the truth of the matter is that all that you've tried to do to "fix" your problem has started to cause you to dry out from too much sun, or are experiencing the feeling of drowning from too much water. It seems like in a situation like this the best thing to do is uproot and re-pot if one hopes to survive. And while settling into a new environment could be shakey, it sure as hell is better then trying to fix the problem in its current state.....that is how I feel. I feel it is time to do some serious soul searching.
I went to a college age ministry this past Sunday. At which the pastor spoke about formation and how after we accept Christ into our hearts we go through the tedious act of formation. He used the analogy of a bouncy ball. how this tiny ball has been given the potential to bounce extremely high if all of one's energy is put into the motion of bouncing it. He stated that, yes, the ball will bounce with just a little bit of effort, but it will never reach its full potential.
If we want to reach our full potential we have to put all of our effort into serving Christ. To be honest with you, I don't know what that means for me. One would think that in being in seminary that would be an example of devotion, but I don't think that the education is enough. Somethign needs to change inside, thus, I am retreating so that I can figure out what that is. Not retreating as in running away, but retreating as in being re-potted, starting over, seeing if this time, maybe I can take root and stand firm against the weathering of this world.....wow, that was a lot of metaphoring....