I forgot to tell you a few things the last time I wrote you. Yes, you still forget things. A lot.

Anyway, here’s more of my wisdom for you to remember.

It’s okay to not always be okay. Sometimes you have bad days. Sometimes you need pills to help you function normally. Sometimes you don’t respond to others the way you would like. Hint: everybody does all of these at some point.

It’s okay to walk away sometimes. You can’t fix everything and everybody and you can’t always make people understand you or what you really meant.

Naps are good. Take them as often as you can for as long as you can.

You can’t be anything you want to be. You will never dunk on a regulation basketball goal. You will never run a 4-minute mile.

You can be what God created you to be and you can know that whatever that is and whatever that looks like, He is already very fond of you just like you are.

Sometimes, you need to suck it up and get over yourself. End of story.

Remember that it’s still not the end yet. Everything really will be fine in the end when you get to the end.

I confess. I am not a hipster. I am a hipster wannabe. I have proudly proclaimed before that I am a card-carrying member of the Goobers R Us Society of America.

I don’t have anything against hipsters, although I look at some guys wearing skinny jeans and think to myself, “Boy, you need a cheeseburger in the worst way.”

I think about the Bible and what it calls us as believers to be. I’ve come to the conclusion that we’re called to be neither hipsters or goobers. At least not in the long run.

According to Paul, Jesus didn’t call the wise or cool or trendy people. He called the nobodies and castoffs of the world. Paul goes on to say in 1 Corinthians:

“Jews ask for signs, and Greeks look for wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified, which is a scandal to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles. But to those who are called—both Jews and Greeks—Christ is God’s power and God’s wisdom. This is because the foolishness of God is wiser than human wisdom, and the weakness of God is stronger than human strength. (1 Corinthians 1:22-25 CEB)

Maybe the key is not what you think of yourself or how you perceive the way others see you. Maybe it’s not thinking less of yourself, but thinking of yourself less (as the old definition of humility goes). Maybe it’s getting out of the way so that God can get in the way, as a friend of mine used to pray frequently.

I don’t claim divine inspiration. My words are just as fallible as I am. But hopefully, both you and I can think about these things and maybe, just maybe, find a little freedom there.

Sometimes, a really good writer will be able to express your own thoughts better than you can. For me, one of those writers is Henri Nouwen.

Even though he is no longer with us, his writing still speaks volumes to me whenever I read it. His own words on writing speak on why I write better than anything I could have written myself:

“Writing can be a true spiritual discipline. Writing can help us to concentrate, to get in touch with the deeper stirrings of our hearts, to clarify our minds, to process confusing emotions, to reflect on our experiences, to give artistic expression to what we are living, and to store significant events in our memories. Writing can also be good for others who might read what we write.

Quite often a difficult, painful, or frustrating day can be ‘redeemed’ by writing about it. By writing we can claim what we have lived and thus integrate it more fully into our journeys. Then writing can become lifesaving for us and sometimes for others too.”

Exactly.

PS I’m kidding about the “infernal blogs” part, of course. Even after 3 1/2 years and almost 1,400 blogs, I still very much love writing them.