(un)Bound

I'm bored.  Well, that's not true.  I just don’t want to work on any of the projects I have lined up.  *wide grin* 

Flopping backwards on my bed, I flip open my laptop.  Let’s see… what should I look for?  Clicking on one tab to another, I surf the web.  I watch a little YouTube about refractory ovens, watch metal get melted, learn more about making jewelry, watch some survival technique videos, learn how to start fires and tan leather.  Then, the next thing I find myself doing is hunting through Amazon and eBay for materials in new projects I want to start up. 

At the corner of my eye, I notice the section of recommended stuff Amazon so nicely places to entice me to buy more.  Oh hey, there’s manga here that I’ve never seen before!  *drool*  I have not read manga for a couple months now.  Surprisingly, the hard-hitting cravings I used to feel aren’t strong... more like a constant dull ache. 

Since I was about 9 or 10 years of age, I've read novels or stories for multiple hours each day.  I’ve stopped maybe a week at a time, never losing the sense of gnawing need, but fighting hard to keep away and then failing.  My longest stint of non-reading is 40 days for lent a couple years ago… but never have I experience truly being free from reading until now.  By walking closer with God and putting him first in my decisions, I feel truly free.  I have more time, more hope, more joy, more satisfaction and more peace with my life than ever before.  No more heavy sense of guilt or pounding pressure.  Yay!!!

Casually, I click on a manga I’ve never heard of.  Eyes scanning, I read the synopsis.  Clicking the next manga, I read more.  By the time I realized what was happening, my eyes and hands were already busy hunting down the next interesting story.  Even just reading the short back-cover descriptions, the cravings hit me hard.  I _need_ to read more.  I don’t want to stop reading.  I can feel the chains coiling around my heart and around my mind.  My hands automatically move, my eyes scroll right and left.  My sense of self start to disappear into a deep black pit.  Stop.  STOP!  I don’t want this!  I don’t want to be back where I was before!

The deeper I dive into my cravings, the larger the monster inside me grows.  Hunger.  Need.  A senseless wave of compulsion.  Self-hatred.  Loss of control.  I feel defeated, enslaved.

I have two choices; I can choose to feed the gnawing hunger inside and temporarily calm the thrumming in my head; or, I can choose to seek Christ and take comfort in the fact that while I dwell in his presence, I am already satisfied and the cravings can’t get to me.  In the presence of Jesus Christ, I can find peace, freedom, and gain the choice in what to do with my time, my mind, my heart.

God, HELP!!! 

Please bring the curtain of safety down over my head and my heart.  Lock my eyes and my hands away from feeding this raving monster inside.  I’m scared of losing control again.  I don’t want to feel bound to reading in order to satisfy the endless hole in myself.  Lord Jesus, please fill the void that draws me to seek satisfaction away from you.  Please calm the grasping, churning, turmoil inside my body. I forgot the bondage and pain of being drawn into reading; reading past the point of enjoyment and into a prison of hopelessness, loss of control, guilt, and fear.

Lord, bring me close to your side.  Protect me from myself.  Teach me how to enjoy reading again without being bound by it. 

In Jesus’ name I pray, amen.

Here's a picture of my co-worker and I attempting to walk in a sample 10XL pair of scrub pants: