Restless

I am finding it hard to find words that will express what I'm feeling. I think the one that sums it up best is restless.

Restless.

Anxious...but not exactly.

Sad, but not fully.

Longing.

Ready.

Overwhelmed.

Underwhelmed.

Bored.

Itchy.

Restless.

....................................

I don't even know how to express this. I am hesitant to even try to express this.

And I am frightened to feel this. I have long practiced being content and managing my emotions, and have pretty well managed to keep these under control for the vast majority of my adult life. But now...

But now, I can no longer calm myself. My Lord can, but the times of calm grow shorter and shorter.

And I'm not sure if I should feel calm or restless...or both.

I do not lack peace. I have peace. I do not lack direction; I am walking in His ways.

But it's as if something, something is to happen / should be happening / is late happening.

Right now, I'm physically itchy/twitchy.

I have felt this way in some measure for months, perhaps six months or more. But over the past week it has grown and grown.

The emotions are so strong in me that I want to weep right now. I do not know 'why' or 'how' or 'what'. I do not know what is wisdom and what is foolishness...and I long for relief.

I have never encountered anything like this inside of me, and I pretty much don't like it. It's like when you were a kid, and tomorrow was the first day of camp...but the night never ends and the feeling never gets to abate. And after awhile, that anticipation is just not fun anymore. You just want to engage what you are looking forward to. You just want to demand that the morning come.

*sigh*

I've always been able to beat down the waves of my emotions and return to smooth sailing in pretty quick measure. But this time, it seems more like a tsunami than a wave, more like one giant wave that keeps coming and coming, ever rising with a quiet and unrelenting force.

And even as all this energy cruises through me, it exhausts me...but not so much that the feeling subsides.

Oh God, what would you have me do? Is this of Your purposes or my distraction? I both want and hate this, embrace and reject this.

Be merciful to me, O God. Remember that I am but dust. O Lord, save me, or I will be washed away with the tide.

Buoyantly His,

-J

God is our refuge and strength, an ever-present help in trouble. Therefore we will not fear, though the earth give way and the mountains fall into the heart of the sea, though its waters roar and foam and the mountains quake with their surging. Selah. --Psalm 46:1-3, NIV