Circles and Spirals and Roots

After tripping over a bunch of tree roots yet again when the Mothership and I ventured up Tollymore in the summer, I put the picture of these overlapping roots into a box in my brain with the note 'This will probably mean something to me at some point'. If you know God and His sense of humour, friends, then you know where this is going - it means something. 

Firstly, you should know that having just googled about tree roots surfacing and having found out this is mainly because of eroded soil, this is not a biologically accurate post. And maybe it is even more far-fetched than I anticipated. Nonetheless, there's something to be said about tree roots that overlap and mangle and trip you up. Now that's out of the way...

The one thing worse than exams is the editing process of summatives and coursework I already know what the essay I have just gruelled over said so I would rather not re-read it again and again and again, thank you very much. Perhaps it is a sign of my impatience, but I would rather do it once and have learnt it than go over it. (English teachers reading this, please know I do check my work, albeit reluctantly.) 

Repetition is not my thing. It used to irk me just having lines repeated in worship music. 

The same goes for things God is teaching me. When God relentlessly presented Psalm 46:10 ('Be still and know that I am God') to me, I definitely argued back with, 'Yes, we've heard this one. Be still. Will do. Something new?' when actually I hadn't sat with it or learnt from it whatsoever. I enjoy progress rather than sitting still, or returning to a previous point. 

Re-wiring your brain is very much a continuous, repetitive process, however. You cannot simply extract a lie, replace it with truth and have it sink those few inches to your heart in one instant. Instead, it is much like growing roots. 

We extract the weed, the lie, at its absolute root, to replant something productive and honest there. At first, the root of the weed doesn't really want to be removed and so we have to deal with that - note: ignorance is not bliss. This is hard work with soil in your fingernails and achy muscles, but it is also necessary work. 

The new plant won't fit right in the curvature and scarring left behind by the weed and its roots. It does not sit comfortably. Should you have bothered this whole gardening tree planting process whatever-it-is in the first place? Yes. 

New soil. More sunshine. Some water. 

Roots start to grow. Ideally, they tangle downwards into the depths of the ground. It takes a while and it is gruelling and remind me again why we bothered?

Because other weeds are dug up. They are replaced with true and honest and life-giving plants that also start to grow roots. Into the depths of the ground, roots start to tangle with each other. 

This is where the picture comes in. 

The roots overlap at common point of intersection. And they are strengthened. It's much harder to destroy two roots than to destroy one that stands alone. 

It's this common point of intersection that the revisiting of a core occurs; where the spiral overlaps, appearing to be a decline to the original place as if all that painful root transitioning never even happened. But, it did, and it had an impact.  

When you are back in that place, 

back having over-committed your limited energy and ability and time, back to valuing your worth on grades, back to living to please your family, back to self destruction, back to relentless critique, back to poor habits, back to being out of good habits, back to ignoring God, back to struggling to get out of bed, back to hopelessness, back to negative self-talk, back to whatever you're trying to progress from, 

you are not merely at the same point you started at; the progress isn't erased. It is being strengthened. 

Every time my brain loops on dying or returns to the narrative that lacks any form of love, the roots sink a little deeper and grow a little thicker. I get out of the loop quicker. 

Progress does not always look like an absence of those times. Sometimes progress is climbing out of the loop quicker, letting the root layer a little deeper. 

Take care.

'There is hope, even when your brain tells you there isn't.' John Green, Turtles All The Way Down

'The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.' John 1:5