family

A year ago I was jazzed about the iPhone, but decided to wait for two things before buying one ... GPS and 3G. Well, as of this past Monday, those desires were answered so, on July 11, you'll be able to find me in line at the Cherry Creek mall waiting to get myself a new phone.

Sure there are some things that the iPhone is still lacking, the primary one being the ability to cut and paste text, but, the beauty of the iPhone is that most of it's functionality is driven by software, not hardware, and the two main hardware upgrades I was wanting are now part of the phone (although an upgraded camera and iSight would have been nice) ... all the other stuff, well, that's just downloading an update.

This whole hardware and software thing got me thinking about the key question I bring up in the "wind" section of the elemental life. The idea behind "wind" is, in light of "earth", "water", and "fire", how do we now live out our faith. My proposal is that, rather than asking, "Where does God want me?" that we ask, "Where does God have me?" Part of the "have me" question, especially as we think about things like gender and family could be phrased as, "What's my hardware?"

You see, hardware is that stuff you have whether you like it or not (and let's be honest, at different times and in different ways, there are plenty of things about the hardware that we don't like). Moreover, I'd say our hardware should be more like an iPhone than a desktop tower in that it's not designed to be "upgradeable" (change the gender, ditch the family, etc).

The challenge then comes in with what we do with the hardware that we have. It's our thoughts, feelings, and other pieces that drive our actions. These things, which are changeable and upgradable (or down-gradable ... is going back to XP from Vista an upgrade or a downgrade?) are the software.

So, legit analogy, or am I completely off my rocker?

Last month when I was talking with my life coach the idea of a balanced life came up. While I blogged on this a while back, I'm thinking now that I've been working with a poor metaphor and talking about balancing things isn't the way to go.

You see, when you live a balanced life, it automatically means that you live a compartmentalized life. For most people, this means that you have work on one side of the scale and family on the other, and you're trying to make sure things equal out. But are things like work, family, community service and the such really supposed to be broken apart? I'd say the answer is no, rather, I'd say that they all blend together.

So, what's the alternative metaphor? I'm thinking, rather than seeing life as a scale to balance, we need to view it as a tapestry to weave. In this tapestry, different things that you're involved in form the different colors. Now, as you move through life, some colors will come and go while other colors will be dominant for a season and then fade during another.

Of course, whenever you're weaving something like a tapestry, you need those main threads that run through the entire piece and hold the whole thing together. It seems to me, that this is where your faith comes into play. While it's not always obvious on the surface, it's the steady foundation that holds all of life together and prevents the tapestry from becoming a frayed mess.