The best things in life aren't THINGS!

Jesus Placed the Highest Value on Relationships by Tom Holladay

Regarding life together and getting along with each other, you don’t need me to tell you what to do. You’re God-taught in these matters. Just love one another! 1 Thessalonians 4:9 (MSG)

I don’t remember the time or the place or the conference, but the question the moderator asked has stuck in my mind. What I recall most vividly is the answer that immediately flashed into my thoughts.

Here is the question: Suppose you’re in a rubber life raft with a friend. You’re approaching an island. The raft is leaking, and you are within sight of land. In the raft with you are a set of signal flares, a week’s supply of canned food, and a five gallon container ofwater. You must throw one of these items overboard if you’regoing to make it to the island. Which one do you choose?

I have to admit, the first answer that hit me was “the friend.” Now don’t sit there with a pious “I’ve never thought anything like that” look! This silly thought that leaped into my mind was a reminder of how easy it is to value things over people. And who among us hasn’t struggled with that feeling?Priorities become most important when we must make choices. If we had enough time to do everything, everything could be a priority.

But we don’t have enough time to do everything. If we had the power to do every good thing we wanted to do, our choices wouldn’t be so important. But we can’t do every good thing we want to do. When Jesus spoke about the priority of relationships, he could not have been clearer. He taught that relationships must be given the highest of values."

I read this article this morning as one of my daily devotionals I receive through emails. I've been struggling with this concept for awhile now. But only because I WANT TO VALUE RELATIONSHIPS OVER THINGS! In Fall 2007, I trained myself to stop reaching out to others who didn't want my love and dove into thinking about my acting career 24/7. Ask any of my really close friends and they will tell you that I never shut up about LA. You should see my bookshelf! I have an entire shelf dedicated to books on the biz and acting. Thank you amazon.com! ;) For over a year, I turned my my mind and heart towards something that I could throw all of my passion and drive into only to realize just NOW that my career will NEVER love me back. Yes, I will have successes, but that's because of God's precious love, not the business' love.

Don't get me wrong, my calling to become an actress is still very important to me, but now that I have found true love (for REAL) from God, my family, my friends, and now most importantly Paul, I finally see the big picture. And it has nothing to do with my career. It has EVERYTHING to do with my very precious relationships. When I'm lying on my death-bed, I won't be holding my Oscar, but my dear ones' hands. Within the past 6 months, I have prioritized a lot of things (slowly but surely). God became number one again after about 4 years (thank you college) of being on and off the path. I do value higher education, but I don't like what it can do to young people's lives when they do not prepare themselves for it. If they are not careful, they can get strangled by society's timeline and by the world's opinions, morals, and standards.

I became someone else. I made decisions that compromised my morals and lived in a manic depressive state most of the time. The true Emily disappeared for a long time and I felt like I was going through life gasping for air. I'm so glad I can finally breathe again. That's what graduating was like. 17 years of strangling and struggling for a breath of air now over, a chance to make my own decisions for once, and the freedom to see life in a beautiful, STRESS-FREE light. I cannot express myself enough to you all how wonderful life is now that school (the institution of education NOT education itself) is not in my life.

I'm grateful for the talents and abilities God has blessed me with and I would be a fool if I did not pursue this career full force and use all of those talents and abilities to their fullest potential. But that pursuit with NEVER come before God, Paul, my family, my church, or my friends.
With that said, I have an audition tomorrow that will be my focus for most of the day, but when it doesn't need to be on my mind, I'll be using my time praying and thinking about Paul.

3 more days until I hold him in my arms. Thank God.

Peace & Love.