How to deal

How do you deal, as a Christian, with a bad situation in which you can see that things are quickly devolving, that it's not going to end well, and that there's nothing you can do to fix things because you're in over your head? How do you deal with a complete lack of grace and flexibility on the part of others? How do you handle stress that is beyond what you should have to deal with but you are committed to something that you believe in?

And then, you get yourself out of the situation. Out of the stress. Even gracefully. I tried to stay above it all, I tried hard to take the high ground. Oh, in another incarnation I'd have been such a bitch. I can answer bitch with bitch with the best of 'em.

But I bowed out as gracefully as I could because it seemed my very existence was demanding more than another could handle.

But you know what? I'm the one left with the tears and the disappointment, the hurt of rejection and the pain of something I've created being tossed away and not shared.

I know we all must prioritize. This is just the first time that something has gotten out of control. To where I couldn't fix it or make it better. I could only leave.

And they are happy I left, which hurts worst of all.

It's not so much the rejection or the nasty way it all fell apart. It's much more that I did have something I thought - and others thought, too - was worth sharing with the world. Now it goes away, as if it were never prepared.

J tells me I will save it and do it another time. Perhaps. But it will never be exactly the same. Art is never the same under new circumstances.

Hey, that reminds me of a good quote I heard today. I had the honor of joining a small group of students for a lunchtime discussion with Father Richard Rohr. And he quoted Einstein, saying, "No problem can be solved by the same consciousness that created it."

New consciousness, huh?

I guess the humility from Lent kicked in after all.