Starting a ministry

Point one:

I am NOT equipped to work in a church. I am selfish. I need constant approval and rewards. My motivation is entirely that people think that I am good, capable, talented... the list goes on.


Problem 1:

For 7 months I have felt called to start a ministry for strippers in central London.


Problem 2:

Googling has not helped me find any existing missions that I could sign up to and help on the most basic level


Problem 3:

I have no idea what the fuck I'm doing


Problem 4:

I swear

Christians be Cray Cray

So today there was a mildly amusing facebook argument happening on my feed. 4 out of the 5 people talking were being very polite to each other and were asking questions, getting answers, exploring the others view point. One was just going off on one.

The thing is 5 out of 5 of them believe in God and Jesus. 4 out of 5 would identify as Christian, this soon became the crux of the argument. Unfortunately it's probably unnecessary to point out that the person going off on one was one of the ones that identified as Christian.

The person going off on one, let's call them Kurt, was accusing the one who no longer identified as Christian, let's them Grace, of having lost their faith.
Kurts argument was that if you are no longer part of the organised Church and don't call yourself a Christian you have lost your faith and logic would therefore dictate no longer believe in God.
Grace was saying that she was still a follower of Jesus, still a believer in God, still an upholder of the faith. She just didn't want to identify with people who were persecuting and being unloving to people of other faiths and sexualities and believed that if these arguments were being upheld in churches than it was better for her to separate herself from them and continue her personal journey with God through prayer and bible study. She also pointed out that it was Still not Kurt's right to accuse her of having lost her faith.

This was all rather fascinating to read. Whilst eating chinese food, because I cba with going downstairs for popcorn.

Several hours later now that I have given up tonights fight against insomnia something strikes me.
No one has accused me of having lost my faith.
I suppose that's because I'm always in the church cafe tapping away at my computer or chatting to the staff. It might be because I cook for church events. It might even be because I help out in the church office every now and then.
I genuinely can't remember the last time I sat through a Sunday service.
I finally picked up the guts to leave my home group a month ago.
I can't remember the last time I picked up a bible, not that I even know where mine is.
I can't remember the last time I was even at worship.
I have no idea what's going on with my faith.
And yet I have people trying to convince me to be a mentor and to speak at events; Whilst Grace is being accused of having no faith.

Christians be cray cray.

Are people confusing a religion with a social club? If the vicars wife knows your name then you're probably doing alright but if you're not turning up to the pot luck lunches then it's not just the quiche that's gonna burn?

Madness


**I would like to point out that Kurt was not a member of the church I attend and was in the minority within the facebook argument, he's also a nice guy just a bit... crazy christian.

I don't understand

I trusted you

You now seem to be deliberately hurting me, and I don't understand why.

This isn't the person I know.

I'm so confused.

Why did you tell me to let you in?

I started writing a step by step account of my evening because I needed to hash it out.
But I stopped, because what would be the point of publishing that? It would just seem targeted and poisoned.


The fact of the matter is, I had an argument with someone that I care about very deeply.
They are upset with me.
They said some things that really hurt me.
I'm upset.
I don't like being upset with them, I don't like them being upset with me.


I've apologised for belittling them.
I'd like them to apologise for deliberately and unduly taking offence at / misunderstanding me.

Realistically: It's not going to happen.

What matters more to me is that this fight is over.
I'd rather be hugging right now than ignoring each other.


I just wish he would answer to the phone.



I'm trying here.

Trapped

I feel so trapped.

I don't want to do the internship anymore, but who am I even supposed to talk to about that? Who is my line manager? Arn't I supposed to have a mentor? Where are they hiding? Do I know their name? Do they know MY name? Have we even met?

And when I stop doing the internship... Where am I supposed to go? I feel like I couldn't go to St. Mikes anymore.

My relaxing day has so far involved about a billion fb messages asking where I am, a thousand emails nagging me about why haven't I done X or Y when I was apparently asked to do them via an email that was sent to me during a weekend away that EVERYONE knew I was on. Bare in mind that everyone thinks I'm at an away day today, so how exactly am I supposed to pick these emails up?

I don't want to be here. I don't want to do the internship. Which means I can't go to church anymore. Which means I have nowhere to go.

I want to disappear.

I.Just.Don't.Want.To.BE.Anymore.

I feel so abandoned.

A Prayer

Dear God,
Please take my heart away. Please take away my ability to love, because I can't take the pain anymore.
It's been a year.
A year of me praying not to love him anymore almost every day.
A year of me telling him how I feel and him without the decency to tell me that he doesn't feel the same, even if that would be a lie as he claims.
Please.
Father if you can do anything, if you made the mountains and the seas and the earth it's self surely you can do this.
Just take it away, because I'm crying myself to sleep again and I'm not as strong as I pretend to me.
Let me feel nothing. Let me die, emotionally.
Just please don't make me live this for another day.

Trying so hard

I'm trying so hard to have an adult conversation with you, to save YOUR bacon. 'Cause I'm watching YOUR back. Yet you manage to make me want to go "fuck you" "I'm tired of screwing myself over to keep you out of trouble" if it weren't for the fact that I promised the youth that I would go to church tonight I wouldn't be there just so I could avoid seeing you.

FFS maybe I'm doing things for a reason. Maybe I said "lets talk in person" BECAUSE WE NEEDED TO TALK IN PERSON. Maybe I said "before church" because it needed to be in plenty of time before church. If the not knowing is stressing you out so much, deal with it now instead of putting it off all day.

Grow the fuck up.

You have no idea the extent I have fucked myself over all year trying to keep you out of trouble.
Do you know what I have let people think of me so that they don't think less of you?

God, I was going to buy us a fry up and have a quick chat. Pretend that your actions didn't leave me red raw, make sure that you were ok and if necessary reassure you that everything is fine.

I'm not sure if I can now.

I need to chat

I need to talk to you
Whilst I still have the guts to do it
but you're not around

Is It Ok To Be Scared?

I don't really know who to talk to about this. I can't worry Chris; Nay isn't the kind of person you cry on the shoulder of; Felix & Russ were part of my "cut out friends who want to fuck me" purge; and I just don't know if I can talk to Craig about this.
I really think I want to talk to Craig about this.
I just don't think I can talk to Craig about this.
I'm really really scared.

I don't want the neurologist to tell me what we all suspect. There is no cure, so why bother knowing?
I know that's stupid but I just don't think I could cope with being told that I had it.

You Sly Thing You

So I'm not one of those people who turn to God when things are going great. When I'm on an up I don't turn to anyone really.

In the last few months I have found it really hard to keep striving for a relationship with God. I tried mentioning it to my "young adult worker" but unfortunately as I have had a personal relationship with him he isn't always very good at listening to me and understanding when I'm asking for religious guidance. (which is no fault of his own, it's just an unfortunate side effect, he's very good at other things)
So I've tried various ways of getting myself back where I want to be but nothing was working to give me my motivation.

Last night I realised working forward in my faith was something I needed to put at the forefront of my life if I wanted to achieve any else of worth. I still however had no idea how to do this.

In other news today I was part of a discussion that will probably take me down a very difficult path. Quite frankly I'm scared. Today was also the first time I reached for my bible since I moved into this house.
I guess God knows what he's doing.

I've been looking at everything all wrong

I am one strong mo-fo.

All this time I would look at the stupid things I have done in my past and think how silly and weak I was. Yes I was very silly but actually I am powerful SOAB.

Mental health problems? Beat that.
Attacked? Reported that.
Abusive relationship? Left that.
Completely in love with you know who? Got over that.
PCT? Ended that.

Shit has royally rained down from a great height and I'm not even harbouring any resentment. I'm not angry. I'm not upset. I get on with my day and I smile at strangers and I still care about people and look for the best in them.
I have won.

And I will keep on smiling because I may loose a battle or two but I'll damn well win the war.

hurting

I had the overwhelming urge to hurt myself today.
I just opened the front door and Wham! It's hit me. Just how good it would be.

I must point out at this point that I did NOT do anything. I was shocked enough that the temptation even came back, I'd like to think I closed that chapter of my life a long time ago.

I thought it came completely out of nowhere, I mean I've been fine for a while, but when I think about it I've been going self destructive for a bit.

The whole thing with PCT is basically self harm in it's self. I'll admit that the only person I hate more than him is me.
The starting smoking again, chain smoking at that.
and the distancing myself from the church, on some level deliberately not engaging.

Why am I doing all this crap? (mainly the PCT bullshit)
How do I make sure it doesn't escalate?

***resolution: continue my steely resolve to avoid the PCT temptation and possibly stop smoking with Nay***

TRYING to be good

I am trying very hard to be good right now.
After a week of making some mistakes, doing some foolish things, I am trying very hard to be well behaved.

Hard is the right word. This is not easy.

A new temptation arrives every few hours.

This would be hard enough WITHOUT opportunity. I'm not naturally well behaved in these matters. I don't need people tempting me to stray.

GAAAAHH

why cant I just act out and feel no regrets with my self esteem still intact at the end of it all?

Heart.Broken

All this while I have been clinging on to "when will it happen". Realised that one of the reasons I was given so long ago was actually nothing to do with anything.
It will never happen
For goodness sake Cassie you have to realise that.

Plain

Do you know what?
I love you.
I don't know if I want to marry you, I don't know if I will still want to be with you in a year but I love you.
We are not friends.
I'm not sure if we ever have been.

We might not work as a couple. We might fail spectacularly.
But if it doesn't work: at least we'd know. Once and for all : things changed, I'm different, you're different, we still don't work. Closure.

Then maybe we can learn to be friends.

The love I feel for you can be that of friendship, we the sexual tension removed. The potential removed.

Our relationship is one of looking at might be-s. That's not right.

We might be together for a week, actually kiss without guilt, and realise "Yuck, this is like kissing a sibling!"
and learn to have a relationship of equals and true friendship.

But right now I don't want to be your friend.

I lied I know. I said it was fine. It wasn't. It wasn't a lie each time I said it; I had convinced myself, because there are so many things I could pick on.
Things that don't matter, like you not liking seafood, or my friends not approving.

But it was just my head trying to control my heart. It failed.
I've never been good at denying myself something that I want.

This. What's happening right now, whatever it is... It makes me not like myself. I don't like who I am being right now, I feel demeaned. I'm picking up bad habits. I'm embarrassing myself and I'm ashamed of myself.

Something needs to change. I don't want it to be us not hanging out anymore.





But I don't want to make you feel uncomfortable. So I'll never say any of this.

But all I want

All I ever want to do is cook and look after people.

That's look after people and cook food. Not cook the people I'm supposed to be looking after.

WHY?!

Why is it that as soon as I have a glass of wine in me I want to kiss him?
What am I, 13?
ARGHEHRERHERWIEHROEHRESRHS!

I need to hate him, I need to never want to speak to him again. 'Cause it seems like the only way to stop myself caring about him.

I THOUGHT I HAD FIXED THIS.

I'd lined up dates ffs.

Ouch

I've twisted my ankle through a hilarious hurdle related incident.
Someone come and feed me chocolate/ soup?

It's all good really

I just realised that my blog looks a bit depressing. It's all good really.
I've made the decision that nothing will happen between myself and someone I liked, because if they liked me enough they would have made something happen. Which has freed me up so I can stop being rude to people by not being able to tell them "no I'm not available" and yet not feeling comfortable if they flirt with me.

My fasting is also going well, after a horrendous first day where I failed miserably it's going much better now although tonight will be a real test turning down the dinner I'll be serving to the homeless. I've found time for bible study as well in the time I would usually be cooking which is great.

I'm also getting back into my "what's the worst that could happen" attitude to dating so I may agree to some dates with some nice people. I've got an actor, a photographer, and a classics teacher in tow at the moment that I may stop being busy for. A couple of reporters too but I'm not too sure about either of them.

So yes, I'm not actually being miserable. I just happened to blog in a rather "gahhh" way the last two times.

Lent

Turns out that giving a person up for lent is quite hard, particularly when you are doing it for all the wrong reasons.