Ocean Thoughts

Sorry I haven't posted for a while, I've been pretty busy with school and all. A week ago or so, a few friends and I went on a short backpacking trip for the weekend. We drove out to Shi Shi Beach on the Olympic Peninsula and hiked in from there. If you have not visited it out there before ... it's an absolute must! It's a fairly easy hike but muddy. The landscape though is definitely worth it! I woke up the following morning before all my friends did and so decided to take a leisurely hike around the beach. The night before, we arrived in the dark, and so I had not been able to take a look around yet. The morning was beautiful, the sky was blue and the clouds were virtually non-existent ... perfect weather for soul searching. Anywho, for some reason, as I looked around at all the beauty of God's creation, I began thinking of other forms of beauty that God had created ... surprise surprise, my mind turned to the ladies in my life. I can't exactly say why I began thinking this but I did. I began to survey the way I had treated any girl I've known and noticed how, unfortunately and to my regret, too often their physical appearance had played a role. I started thinking about how the different genders treat eachother in regard to their physical appearance. I have been told, supposedly, that women do not pay as much attention to what's on the outside as what's on the inside. I can remember countless time's when I've thanked God for making them that way. But then I began to think about why guys are thankful for that. It's because we want to end up with or be friends with someone physically beautiful and if they don't care "as much" about what we look like, then we can maybe marry or befriend "above our station" if you catch my drift. Then God hit me. That is so doggone selfish! We are thankful for the fact that they don't pay as much attention to the "wrappings" yet we ourselves use that as an excuse to ignore the gems within them. I realized that that whole idea is a one way benefit. Guys benefit because they may marry somone that, in physical beauty, they don't deserve but women, since guys are so visually oriented, are left in the mud. I felt so ashamed that I had acted this way, and God really laid it on my heart to change how I've been acting. Unfortunately, I am still by nature a guy, and so that visual nature will never be removed, however, with the daily encouraging and seeking of the Holy Spirit, I can hopefully keep my mind focused on how to treat women, the more Beautiful creation of God. And I am so so sorry for any young woman out there that I've treated differently based on their physical appearance. This will always be a learning point for me, as I imagine it is for every guy, however I am praying daily that I can learn to be more God focused in this area with "x-ray" vision that can see past the physical beauty and to the gem that exists within every woman's heart.

TTFN :)