Day 27: Tangents

Well, I feel good about the content of my teaching, finally. It could be better if I took more time on it, but I feel good about it. My sister reached out over GroupMe and shared some really good and timely wisdom today. 1. Jesus is sovereign, even over my process of preparation. 2. My responsibility is to be faithful, not to strive for a given result. Dang, what wisdom. 

I did TPM today, so that's pretty cool. I'm all out of order here, let's rewind ("people don't really rewind anymore, bruh."). 

I woke up today not feeling any kind of way, except tired. I think the whole team is feeling our lack of Sabbath last week. Which is good. It means the day off has been making a difference, and it means we are right on the perfect zone of sustainability. If you remove your Sabbath (or don't have one) and are fine, I daresay you might not be going as hard as you maybe could (or that there's unseen cost) (don't take what I say to heart though, talk to God about that). If, however, you remove your Sabbath and completely die, you might not be pacing your life well (said the  h y p o c r i t e).

Anyway, the point is, we're tired, but I'm choosing to be encouraged by that. Alexis and I talked some tonight about the amount of positivity I have. Sometimes, I think it's genuine and healthy and based in a trust in God. Sometimes, it's based in a misplaced confidence in my ability to be ok in whatever situations I find myself. And, sometimes, it's almost a desperate positivity, like whistling in the dark or smiling because the other option is breaking down. That's not healthy either. But, generally, in spite of the fact that I almost always feel some degree of sad, I also almost always feel pretty positively about circumstances. 

Oh, right, so I woke up today. We walked over to the CDI. Katie was feeling good and came with us, so we were a whole team again. Though today, several times, it felt like all of our team was pulled in different (good) directions and I was the only gringo doing stuff with the kids. That's truly not against them; in fact it generally means that we are running smoothly enough that Lagos and Ana Raquel can pull us to work on other projects that might not get done otherwise. I'm just not particularly skilled at any of the things that are getting project-ed.

Matthew absolutely killed it with the English lesson today. The homie is legit made for this stuff. I'm so curious to see what God does in his life. He did some things to help the kids with one of the most basic and harder parts of English; pronouns and being verbs. Yo is I, but tu is you. Yo looks a lot more like You than I, and that throw the kids off some. 

Wanna learn some fun linguistic things? I think these are true, but I'm making all but the first thing up. So, English used to have a Formal and Informal 2nd Person Pronouns. Spanish has Usted (formal) and Tu (informal). English used to have You and Thou. The fun thing is that You is the formal version and Thou is the informal one. That means, we ditched the informal and kept just the formal. Notably, it seems like Costa Rica is kind of doing the same. Everyone here uses Usted for everything, even casual, close friends. It'd be fairly rude in Mexico, but here it's not. That's cool, because it means all of the old-school "Thou" talk towards God, is actually really deeply intimate rather than distant and respect-filled. So, that means that, in the original languages that got translated, God refers to himself using the informal towards us. Intimacy. Anyway, here's the other fun part, that I'm making up (fact check me, homies): Notice that Thou looks a lot like Tu, and Usted sounds closer you You. Sam's Theory: there's some connection there, but I don't think our Thou/You is from our Latin roots (via French), but from our Germanic language roots. That would mean that, if there's a connection, it goes all the way back to Proto-Languages (Proto-Indo-European for us). If anyone other than @ZackGrant cares about that, good on you.

The kids flippin loved the macaroni and cheese, btw. Not surprising, but we got, like, multiple compliments from kids who usually, at best, just eat the food.

I spent most of the first session with Diego. He sits and draws squares across his paper and colors them red, so I tried to mix it up. I added a circle beneath one of his square lines. He went for it! So, I tried a triangle. After a few tries, he got that down, and even did a few triangle lines of his own. Diego can't write his name, so I got a crazy idea. I flipped the page and wrote a "D" then colored it red. So, he made a line of them. Let's try "I." Same thing! Oh heck yea. "E?" "E" got another line of "I's," so we tried again, and got a line of something between the two, but you could tell it was an "E." "O" is just a circle, so all that's left is "G!" We didn't survive "G," lol. But, I'm gonna keep trying this new tactic. So, instead of a daily paper filled with red boxes, there might be some progress there. 

For some reason, the first session kids didn't need to be at school until 1:15 (instead of 12:15). So, we had overlap between the groups. Izzy and I walked the kids to school when the time came. She does a really good idea of knowing what time it is and what we're supposed to be doing. I walk over to the schedule about once an hour to see what the heck we're supposed to be doing. Izzy, however, could run the CDI if we let her, lol. The kids were delivered to school. Jeikol was mad at me, because I rushed him and made him leave when he wanted to stay longer. As we walked, he kept crashing into me and wouldn't talk to me. At some point, he got an umbrella and thwacked me with it. I confiscated it. I talked to him on the walk about how silent, passive-aggressive anger isn't helpful. It just makes things worse. Rather than hit me with a backpack or sombrilla, talking is how we deal with anger, so things can get made right. The homie wasn't having it though. So, we'll see on Tuesday where we stand. 

We got back to the CDI just in time for the devotional. We read the Bible together, and acted out the story of Jesus giving the Great Commission and yeeting up to heaven. Iker had a bad attitude about it once he didn't get to be Jesus. I told the kids that, starting next week, we'll be doing something different with the devotionals. I'm excited to see Esther's system in action. Hopefully our version of it gets picked up and made more natural by someone here as we leave. Maybe Georgen, we shall see. 

By the time the last kids left, we were dead. We decided to go to the grocery store on the way home and get some essentials to tide us over until our grocery trip on Sunday. 

We got home and I went and laid on my bed for about 36 minutes. I didn't nap, per se. I was trying to process emotion. 

We had dinner (it was the remaining macaroni and cheese, but with spicy chickens in it. 

After dinner, I went and sat in my room some more. I took a shower and spent some time in a TPM box, that really helped me get centered and find some interesting unprocessed connections between different situations. 

That freed my attention up some, so I worked on my teaching. I finally got it to where I think it should be. Ever since 2015 (@KB), I've had a new perspective on teachings: if it's a solid Jesus-glorifying teaching, you should be able to include the Gospel in it. Maybe you do, maybe you don't, but if there's not a good gospel connection, is it really focused on Jesus?

I got to talk to Alexis for a good while tonight, which felt good. I think I'm struggling to find balance in sharing how things in my life affect me and still not talk about people. I am so vague sometimes about what I'm feeling and why, it feels like I'm not really being open or vulnerable. I dunno how to navigate that well. Also, having Real Talk is so much easier in person than over the phone, dang.

I went for a walk to practice my teaching some in the Banyan Park (Parque Benemeritos is the real name). It went pretty well, but I need to get more familiar with it. I don't want to just read my teaching, ya know?

Am back home. It's late. Sheesh. I think tomorrow, instead of having the whole day to practice and get ready, we may do something in the middle. It'll be good if we do, but still. I'll need to get up and run (the boxes don't care) and then maybe will get to practice in the afternoon more. *sigh* Nervous still. 

PRAYER
-que caminemos con el Espiritu
-que tengamos buena dinamica como equipo
-for us to have a good Sabbath on sabado
-for good connections to get made
-for my teaching, plz
-for Lagos and Ana and their upcoming trip
-for our team while they are traveling
-ask God if there's anything you should be praying, and pray that

Maybe already shared this, but it's the Banyan Park: