I have a superpower, a secret strength that I call on when I am deep in the mire of monotony and the mundane, when I am desperate for deliverance from my ordinary life.
I make myself disappear by way of daydreaming. At a moment’s notice, I can leave life’s mere moments — the middle of car rides, the middle of meals, the middle of my son asking one million brilliant questions. I do it all the time. Even did it this week. In the middle of my son asking me a question, I retracted from reality and retreated into the recesses of my mind.
Where I could breathe . . . where I could press pause on all that presses and pretend to be someone other than me. Where I could leave behind my ordinary life — its gaping wounds, its worries, its woes.
When I disappear like this, my body is present but I’m mentally absent. In my thoughts, I mull over my ordinary life . . . pitting it against all my high and lofty dreams. To be a singer. To travel the world and visit exotic places. I dream some more and imagine myself hiking Yosemite, then catching a taxi in New York City. Then, again, dreams flash fast across the expanse of my mind. I’m a ballet dancer. I’m teaching children in South America. I’m an artist in a concrete studio. I’m a tourist in Paris.
I live into my dreams and cast myself into the countless possibilities panning across my mind. When I am jolted back to reality, I want to cry. But I can’t . . . because my children need to see that I am here, and my husband needs to know that I am happy, that there’s no place I’d rather be.
If I’m honest? It feels scary and raw to admit these things, to spill them out on the screen where you’ll scroll and read and respond to them. Because the last thing I want is to be told to appreciate my life or to be thankful and content. I’m not sure I need anyone telling me what I already know and believe to be true — that I really can’t escape my life. That I can’t be all the things I ever dreamed of being.
What I want, though, and what I need is for someone to tell me that God sees all of these infinite possibilities for the way my life could have panned out — the corporate career I almost had, the places I once called home, the dreams I cradled and, sometimes, still carry.
What I want, and what we all most desperately need, is for God to tell us that He sees deep down into our hearts. That He sees all our multifaceted passions and all of our divergent desires — all the daydreams, longings, and nuanced layers of loss.
It’s true — sometimes our tendency to daydream is really just a desperate attempt to replay the scripts of all our secret longings. All of which matter to God, even if they don’t ever come to fruition. So what if we let these replays become prayers? What if we let them become pleas, invitations to ask God to help us make peace with all that swells in and around us?
In the middle of our daydreaming, what if we dared ask God to reach in deep into our hearts and remind us that He sees the many ways we pine and strive to be and do all? What if we took our broken dreams and desires to escape our ordinary lives and turned to the only One who can be all, know all, and do all?
God is omniscient, omnipotent, and omnipresent — knowing everything and being everywhere are His superpowers and His alone. He is everything we need and He is available to us everywhere, even all at once.
In this, we can rest assured: we’re not missing out on anything. We’ve not been handed a second-best life. There’s not some better, prettier, stronger, smarter, richer, freer version of ourselves floating around out there in an undiscovered multiverse.
The only secret to being everything and everywhere all at once is realizing that, only in Christ, will we ever be satisfied and fulfilled. Only in Him will we experience the greatest depth and width and height of life. Only in Him can we be everything we were ever created to be.
It’s no secret and it’s no superpower.
To be with Him is to be everywhere we ever need to be.
To be known by Him is to see we are everything we ever need to be.
How about you? What are your multifaceted passions and daydreams? How can you open your heart to believe that God sees all of what you wish for and all of who you are?
Practice peace, purpose, and being present to your life through soulful prompts and prayers with Rachel’s book, Let There Be Art.
Oh dear Rachel, you are certainly not alone. For me, it’s living in a cottage on the coast or Maine; it’s returning to live in Colorado near my daughter where I can look at the mountains; it’s being the legal aid attorney I so aspired to be in my younger days; it’s entertaining a house full of grandchildren; it is growing old with my husband who died 5 years ago. I am 69 and still can’t seem to be at the place of total peace and acceptance try as I do. So I get it and appreciate that you were willing to share this.
Cottage on the coast is another one for me, too. I honeymooned in Maine — and will never forget it. Wishing you peace in the days to come…and the courage to continue to admit these deeper things. They matter so <33
I want to say thank You Lord for my life. Glory to the name of Jesus !
My desire was to become a Nurse Midwife after college but that didn’t happen to me. Instead, I got married and now I have three lovely daughters and I have been married 43 years. Sometimes I feel like I missed that opportunity. My daughters often say they wish I could have achieved that dream. Would I be the same person I am now? Would my children be good citizens and kindhearted to others, I truly hope so. We can’t go back and change the past. It can be a nice memory.
I certainly hope that my daughters don’t have regrets from college like I did once upon a time. I’m going to listen to them more closely when the time is right to have mother and daughters conversations. Smile.
I do know that I have a good life and many kind people have poured into my heart to make me a better person.
With Gratitude and Sincerity,
Brenda
A Child of God
Brenda- I had regrets from college as well, so I made it a point to have those important mother/child conversations as my three were heading to college at their respective times, and I loved that period in life because I felt like a coach and a cheerleader all in one. All three kids are now in successful careers (no thanks to me, but thanks to God!) but I do like to feel the guidance I provided due to being very involved with their choices made a difference. Half of the time it was continual guidance as majors were changed and paths were forged, but that was the exciting discovery part! I’m happy for you because it’s an exciting time to pair with your child and get them lined up for what’s next with God’s help.
Love your perspective . . . wishing you continued joy and you appreciate the life (and love!) you have : )
I recently saw myself in video teaching my 4-5th grade Sunday school class. Yikes! Who is that wrinkled, scraggly grey-haired woman with bifocals sliding down her nose?! But in a closer shot, my eyes are focused on a child obviously speaking out of the shot. Ironically the wrinkles, grey hair & skewed glasses disappear as the love of Christ shines toward my kiddo. Ahh Christ in me, a non-parent non-teacher teaching! Simply Wow! He sees me more accurately than I see myself & brings the beauty to light! Only Christ!
Love hearing about this little moment in time. I hope it comes as a memory and a reminder when you need it most!
Your words today hit me right in my heart! Thank you for your raw honesty. I’m currently reading your book “Let There Be Art” and am learning to embrace all the ways God created me to create, think, and dream. I’m even trying my hand at poetry.
Oooooh I’m going to need that book…..
You’d love it! Let me know if you give it a try!
Humbled to know these words spoke to you — and so thrilled to hear you’re reading LTBA! I do hope you give poetry a try. It’s such an exhale of a practice : )
Let me know how it goes when you finish LTBA!
Wow…..tears sprung to my eyes as I read this. Thank you for writing something so real, so vulnerable, so “we’re-all-thinking-this-but-afraid-to-say-it”. You are right; we don’t need to be told again to be content, be thankful it’s not worse, be grateful for what we have. We ARE all those things. But we are also those dreams that were never fulfilled. I never thought of inviting God into those lost and distant hopes and memories, but you opened the possibility to do so and not feel guilty about it. Thank you!
I hoped this piece would resonate with even just a few hearts. So glad you’re one of them. Love how you said: “We ARE all those things. But we are also those dreams that were never fulfilled.” Totally get that, and wishing you peace as you ponder all these deeper things.
I needed this today. Thank you Rachel Kang for putting into words what all of us think and feel.
All those big dreams, and little ones in between, they matter. And He seems them. Love you and wishing you joy to fill the mundane moments : )
Thank you, Rachel. I was crying reading this because sometimes I feel that I am in the movie “Groundhog Day” living the same day and the same things over and over. I wanted to be an actress. Didn’t happen. However I sing in my church choir and am happy to do so. I wanted to be a famous author. I finally wrote a children’s book that I hope will bless many and give God Glory. Just today, our electric company turned off the power to work on upgrades in our area. My computer hadn’t been working well (for a long time) and I prayed that God would bring it back when the power went back on. He did! God has always been there even in the mundane groundhog days! God bless you and all reading this and know God is always there with, for and beside us through each day!
Trina, I hear you! I asked God for something seemingly small . . . to see a flower in my neighborhood bloom, though it’d be likely it wouldn’t bloom. And, low and behold, it bloomed over the weekend! Such joy in my heart — that He sees and cares about those little things. Hope your week continues to hold small but sweet reminders of the same : )
Can’t say how much I appreciate your realness, Rachel! I dream–and then jump to create or write every idea as it comes. And the busy it creates in my soul is its own sort of escape.
God sees, knows, cares about ALL the things that matter to us. Thank you for that!!!
Mmm, yes — all these little things matter. Hoping you remember that even as you embrace all that is your life right now : )
Didn’t realize I wasn’t alone in these thoughts that sometimes suprise me!
Thank you so very much for allowing my heart the relief that comes with community! I praise the Lord for my life, and I will thank Him for the interjection that only He could have allowed to bring me to where I am now, rather than where my mind thinks I should be at times!
xoxo
You are seen . . . right where you are and need to be : )
Dear Rachel,
Thank you very much for sharing this today, l am so encouraged. I also didn’t realise I wasn’t alone in this. You’ve described so well what I’ve been doing, and your words have given me hope and shown me the way forward. Thank you!
Today is my 69th birthday and your post, Rachel, touched a lot of things in my mind and soul.
Basically, what you’ve described has been pretty much my whole life since the end of my first semester of college (which was my last until I got an Associates Degree in 1993) and my dream of being a school art teacher and working artist died.
I’ve not had a career other than a wife/homemaker/mom since then – and none of those were what I had seen me being in my dreams of what my life would be when I was younger. I’ve been successful at several things – until I try to earn some income from them, then it always fails. It has been horribly difficult in our career obsessed world to deal with that emotionally.
“It’s true — sometimes our tendency to daydream is really just a desperate attempt to replay the scripts of all our secret longings. All of which matter to God, even if they don’t ever come to fruition. So what if we let these replays become prayers? What if we let them become pleas, invitations to ask God to help us make peace with all that swells in and around us?”
God helping me “make peace with” it all sounds wonderful, but I don’t seem do be asking correctly or something as I’ve been asking for help with that for years and it’s yet to happen. I still feel crushed by not having a career of some sort or being able to help my family financially; all the dreams not turning into anything more than hobbies.
“What are your multifaceted passions and daydreams? How can you open your heart to believe that God sees all of what you wish for and all of who you are?”
I don’t have any more “passions and daydreams.” I’ve already tried everything I ever pictured being, and many things I never thought/dreamed of as well. What is supposed to come of opening my heart “to believe that God sees all of what you wish for and all of who you are?” ? What do you mean or see as happening as a result of that? I do believe He sees all of that, I just wish He would tell me “all of who I am” in His eyes and plans, it would help me to know whether or not I’ve been sorely letting him down or doing okay and He’s not disappointed with me.
Rachel,
We all have dreams. Some of them come to fruition. A couple of mine did. Growing up in Brandon (Tampa) FL I wished to live amongst the mountains. Also wanted to get married. God blessed me when He answered both prayers. I live in Elizabethton, TN (Upper E. TN) & look out at the Smokey Mountains with my wonderful hubby of almost 20 years. Other dreams like traveling on Route 66 out west, visiting the Grand Canyon a 2nd time & Yosemite National Park. Then there are the dreams of life. Those I pray to God about daily. Wanting easier days at work for hubby, different home (turnkey), planning for retirement. Making the dreams of others come true. I would love for Loaves & Fishes Food Bank to have a new building all their own with more space. All in good time.
Blessings 🙂