pat loughery

Things I’ve learned about myself, or been reminded of this week:

I am odd paradox. I am as introverted as introverts can be, and yet… 3 days into this convention, I am lonely as hell. I’m so excited when I reach my family on the phone. I light up when I see people I know – Rachelle mostly, Rose last afternoon, or some of the people I’m meeting here.

I walk around with an odd mix of “I hope I don’t have to talk to anybody” and “I wish I had somebody that I knew here so I could talk to them”.

I’m trapped by the celebrity culture I hate. I’m actually afraid to go talk to Doug Pagitt and tell him how much I liked his book and am looking forward to his next two on prayer postures and sermonology. Although I felt fine talking to the crew from Harp46 tonight briefly after they blew our minds with a fantastic spoken-word-multimedia piece with Godfather McLaren.

I find myself wondering if I could write a book by next year so that I could be part of what I view as the “in” crowd.

I am incredibly judgmental, just looking for ways to create and “us” (EC) vs. “them” (NPC) attitude in my own heart. By looking at the booktables. By seeing the worship styles. By watching who dresses how, who talks in what way. I actually left a workshop last evening that had an interesting title because it was filling up with way more of “them” than “us”.

I know God led me to come here, and it’s been incredibly fruitful, but I wasn’t prepared to find out so much about my own self here.

Arrogant Bastard, indeed.

Oh God, help me. Rescue me from my self. Meet me in my dreams and in the labyrinth and in spiritual direction tomorrow.