Lost and found

What has changed since the Father found me?

Something has disappeared from the depths of my heart, the core of my being.

For a long, long time, there has been a reservoir bubbling deep within me. It's a lethal mixture of angst, anxiety, fear, anger that churns beneath the surface of my conscious being. It looks like the cross-section diagram of volcanoes that we see in science textbooks. Deep down, at the core of the volcano, is that boiling mass of molten liquid stress and angst - that was my heart. 

The frustrations and stresses of life often stirred up the reservoir of angst in me. Difficult people and circumstances. Financial worries. Relational stress. Leadership challenges. I know that familiar feeling all too well, as the angst within churned and boiled over, shooting up pure stress or fear into my whole being. Sometimes, it would erupt in an outburst of anger or frustration and unleash its ugly pain everywhere. 

One of the first things that I experienced when I returned to Dili was that this reservoir of angst had...disappeared. Various challenges quickly emerged upon my return. There were the usual difficult circumstances, and difficult conversations. But each time that I engaged with these challenges, I realized something was different. The circumstances that used to stir up and agitate the reservoir of angst in me, simply did not provoke the same involuntary reaction anymore. Instead of that familiar sense of frustration boiling over, this time, nothing happened. There was instead, a space - a space where I could be calm and still. I was surprised when it happened for the first few times. Then I understood. This is the new me, the one who has met the Father. The one whose fears and anxious strivings had been calmed by a good Father.