heart home

How can I live better? I have been thinking about this a lot the last few weeks as I have found myself unsatisfied with several areas of my life. Boredom is a bitch. It makes me seek to fill my time and fill myself with all sorts of irrelevant things. I watch way too much TV. I spend way too much time surfing the internet. I spend way too much time obsessing about nutrition, my body, wrinkles, fashion, cooking etc. I never really used to think about these things very much. Now, I think about them frequently, mostly because I am bored but also because of what I see reflected in the culture around me.

It’s a lot easier for me now to understand the role consumerism plays in American life. While we are very busy, this business often translates to emptiness and lack of rootedness. In turn, this translates to quick fix solutions and cravings for moments of pleasure to help relieve the monotony of our days. This translates into spending money. They cycle repeats itself.

In Texas, most people go out for the majority of their meals. (I don’t think this is particular to Texas. This was a regular part of my life in Seattle.) Obesity is rampant. Yet, I am surrounded by beautiful fit college girls every day. This has made me self conscious about where I fit on the spectrum. I don’t want to be the one showing up to church with a 64 ounce cup of soda, nor do I want to constantly be working out and consumed by my appearance.

I find myself oscillating between trying to resist the culture and trying to adapt to it. Either way, both feel empty and consuming. Right now, it feels like I have no space within me or outside of me that is free from consuming forces. I don’t like this, and yet I feel resigned to it unsure of how to be free and live better.

The tasks of daily life are consuming. I’m tired of thinking about money. I’m tired of thinking about cooking and shopping. I’m tired of thinking about gas. Yes, I need to think about these things, but I probably over think them because I’m not sure how else to fill the space.

I still haven’t really found a place where I can just be. I have started walking to work in the mornings, and this has helped a lot. I’m not looking to put more stuff on my calendar. I’m not looking to fill my time. Instead, I’m longing for something I haven’t quite found yet.

Perhaps, in the words of Eugene Cho, it’s my “heart home.” As I have written before, I believe we can never get back to home. Our experience in this world is one of exile and wandering towards shalom. Any attempt to return to home is misguided to me, and yet the power and longing for one's “heart home” is very real.

My friends used to make fun of me because I would say: “I just want to be.” My heart home, I think, is a space where everything feels in balance, and I feel content with simply being myself in the world. I’ve experienced this sense in different places of the world so I know it’s not tied to a particular location, though at the same time it can’t be divorced from particularity. My heart home is always tied to specific sounds, colors, tastes, smells, experiences. I know enough about myself to know that my “heart home” is somewhere between the mountains, the ocean, urban life, and absolute quiet. Changing seasons. Snow and the hot sun. Burnt orange and red leaves. A room full of light. Bold and bright colors. People.

Every now and then, it will hit me. And I will get tears in my eyes. The wind in Texas will smell like South African wind. The coastline in Cape Town will remind me of Scotland. The mountains in New Mexico will bring me peace. And so on. I’m always amazed by the familiarities and similarities of different places in the world. While the connection may not be apparent, the feeling or response it elicits in me is remarkably similar and always a gift.

But right now, I feel far away from all this. I’m not sure if it’s physical, spiritual, mental, emotional or simply geographical. And I’m tired of trying to figure it out and adjust. I just know that I’m dissatisfied and think that there must be a way to live better, to cultivate some sense of “heart home” right here in Texas. Or maybe it is not up to me to cultivate, but rather to receive as a gift. Or maybe I just have to accept that this isn't a place for me to really call home. Either way, I desperately need spaces where I can be if I am to resist and hopefully respond to the consumerism and disconnection I am struggling with.


Small things are enough sometimes: a cup of tea, art, a gentle breeze, wine with friends, and shadows of the late afternoon sun.