The Conditions of Will

by Jessa Hastings

“That God that my mom thinks she serves—he’s so much smaller than who I think the real one is. The real one—to me, he’s everywhere, in everything. And sure, maybe he speaks through the Bible. But also maybe he speaks through Narnia, and Harry Potter despite J. K. Rowling lately, and the trees, and science, and the stars, and black holes and the ocean and the way the sky looks sometimes, and you can feel it in your chest.”

Our relational pattern, until now, would have him believe that he can say or do anything he wants to me and we’ll just…rubber-band back to being who we were before it happened. He is right—kind of. But elastic wears over time. It stretches more, gets thinner, loses its shape. Even when you want it to snap back to what it was, it doesn’t always work like that.

You survive whatever you need to, however you can.

Wondering and questioning why things are the way they are, not accepting the present and permanent—they’re all really solid ways to slow down progress.

The nicest thing you can ever do for another human being is see them, and really see them, at that. To be understood is one of most base desires we as people have,

And I think to myself, wouldn’t it be so lovely if we viewed ourselves through the same lens as the people who love us?

There is a beautiful optimism to him that isn’t born from sunny idealism or anything close to naivety, but rather a deep sense of hope that was forged in him as he climbed out of the flames of addiction.