I tossed in my bed, my blanket a suffocating mess over my head. The alarm glared at me: 3:45 AM. I had class the next day. Two weeks into Gainesville and I couldn't sleep as usual. I sat up in my bed and sighed in despair. How had it come to this? I had never been so depressed in my life, struggling with heavy questions that drained the life out of my body. I frowned and asked again, "Who am I?". I had forgotten.. and I had to find myself soon. Let me backtrack.
That question was of utmost importance to me. In fact, I lived my life based on the answer to it. Who was I? This quest for identity started in Middle School. Who was I? As much as I hated it, I was the geeky Chinese kid that walked around with 4 songs on his dinky mp3, trying to fit in amongst the sea of skaters, "thugs", and jocks. This made me feel so insecure. But it didn't matter much back then, since I was so heavily respected in another big arena of life. In fact, I had a pretty big reputation elsewhere and didn't really find it too necessary to have too much of a presence in school. Oh, you're wondering where? It's a pretty well-known arena. Kind of. Okay, fine. Well I'm talking about RuneScape, a multi-player RPG Online Game that I spent countless hours training my pixelated character. Either way, that's where I found my identity.
Then on to high school. But that was when I decided I needed change. I needed to be somebody, in the real world. It was december of my freshman year in highschool, when I landed my first kickflip on a skateboard. By then, I regarded myself as the skater. That's who I was for a decent period of time. But things changed fast. Fads faded. Then it was breakdancing. Then it was the musician. In fact, during my sophomore year when I got a girlfriend, my identity was actually "_____'s boyfriend." I liked it. I felt important to her. I had the significance I so craved for. Until we broke up. Then it was back to finding it in other arenas.
Junior year was when I found my new identity. And this is where things started to go wrong. I walked into a small, dimly lit classroom one afternoon after class, invited by two good friends (sisters). They invited me to attend, FCA, or the Fellowship of Christian Athletes. Now, I wasn't really all that into spiritual stuff, or God stuff. I mean, I went to church with them, and sometimes I would play guitar for the church, but that was as far as it went, really. So I went to FCA, and it was pretty cool. They asked me to play guitar and soon enough I was the official worship leader. I mean hey, that's a pretty cool title. Makes me seem a bit..holier, huh? Ha. Either way, I liked playing guitar so I didn't mind. But time flew, and before I knew it, the club sponsor nominated me as club president. FCA President. Boy, would that look decent on my college resume huh? Well, I figured I had pretty good leadership skills so why not?
It was around that time I had begin to attend KPCO (Korean Presbyterian Church of Orlando), led by Pastor D.L. Let me tell you, this pastor was gifted with such eloquency that inspired even me to preach. Well, that's exactly what I did. On Sunday mornings, I'd take note of the sermon, and the next day, for FCA, I'd recite the same message. Soon enough, people began encouraging me and praising me for my preaching abilities. This only got me more prideful, despite the fact that I was only a performer. However, this sparked a flame. Not a flame for God, per se, but the fire you get when you're rooting for your favorite Basketball team or Football team. Christianity just became a cause I supported, and I aspired to become a key player. So that's when I decided I wanted to "level up" my Christianity. I'd spend time reading the bible, and praying, thinking to myself that I was becoming a better Christian day by day. I'd dive into Christian Books and try to soak up as much knowledge as I could so I could argue my faith (mostly just to win though). Soon enough, I found myself judging people, comparing myself with others to cover my insecurity. He or she got better than me on the math test? No problem. I'm a better Christian. ..you see how things got bad.
This carried over to my senior year and by then my identity was firmly rooted in the image of a "Christian leader". It was all about me, how I looked, how knowledgeable I seemed, how wise I was, the list goes on... The worst part was, I didn't know that I wasn't living it right. In fact, I thought I had it going pretty well! Thought I was spiritually growing way beyond my years (Kind of like Paul in regards to his zeal for Judaism). Well..then I discovered my achilles heel. At this point in my life, God was still just a concept. He was a concept that I supported and fought for. He wasn't a real Being. I mean, I knew He was. But did I believe He was? Unfortunately, no. And so with this, when I was faced with problems, I still turned to myself and my knowledge of God, rather than God Himself.
This summer was when things turned bad. The more I tried to understand everything and to have a reason for everything (as I felt a good Christian leader ought to be able to do), the more I was overwhelmed with the complexity of God. Some questions I couldn't understand nor answer. So I tried even harder and harder to search for answers. Questions like Free-will vs. Predestination, and the assurance and definition of salvation. Finally, towards the end of summer, I broke. I couldn't handle the weight of my self-created religion all by myself. It was too heavy of a burden and I got depressed. In fact, that's when decided I wanted to leave it all. I was so bitter because there were so many things I couldn't understand. How could I love God if I didn't understand how to view Him?! (More accurately though, the question was How could I support and defend a concept that didn't make sense?!). So I kept praying for answers, but they didn't come.
So that's when I quit. I went rebel status and closed my bible for what I thought was for good. I was ready to start college, begin a new life, forget the past, and have fun. Things seemed good for about a week or two as I felt liberated from the old chains of my 'religion'. I could finally have fun, and now that I wasn't FCA president at UF, I didn't have to play the part anymore! Joyous day! Things went pretty well, until I settled into gainesville. And reality set in. Because my identity had been the Christian Leader, for the past two years, I didn't know who I was again. So I had to find myself again. That's where I was now. Scratching my head and racking my brain, trying to figure out who I was. If I didn't know who I was soon, I wouldn't have motivation for anything! I mean, EVERYTHING in my life, everything I did (whether it was working out, studying, playing basketball), I did for a reason. And that reason came from my identity. I worked out because I wanted to improve my self-image. Same with studying and basketball. So I needed to find that image again soon.
However, I felt like those people in Plato's allegory of the cave. Because I had been exposed to truth, it was insanely hard to try to find identity back in worldly things. Like a dog going back to its vomit (C.S. Lewis). But I mean I couldn't possibly go back to God since now I associated my depression with Christianty...
And so I sat in my bed. Utterly hopeless. It had been this way for two weeks now. Just moping around. Going on campus feeling like a zombie, with no incentive to do anything or talk to anybody, because I didn't even know what my reason to live was. I had no motivation to study..or to do anything. I tried finding solstice in bboying. But I just didn't feel it anymore. I started taking some of my dad's medication..well it wasn't really medication (I don't think), just some chinese stuff he used for his depression (as it is chemically caused). I couldn't do this anymore. Every night I couldn't sleep, sweating cold sweat trying to think my way out of my depression. I felt so alone, isolated. I didn't want to talk to anybody. Nobody would understand my predicament. I wanted to give up.
It was a tuesday night. It was 3:00 as I laid on my bed, eyes wide open, staring at the spinning fan blades. When suddenly a voice. "When don't you come back to Me Alex?". I paused for a moment. I shook my head furiously. What was I thinking?! I was through with that stuff. I wanted to experience the college life! Parties, girls. "You don't have to do this alone." I paused again. And suddenly it made so much sense and gave me such peace. That was true. Maybe there was hope. I sat up, went to my desk, turned on the lamp and opened the bible. I flipped it open and it opened to Isaiah 48:17. It read "I am the Lord, your God, who knows what is best for you, who directs you in the way you should go."
I fell to my knees in shame but also in relief, because now I knew God was real.
No comments:
Post a Comment