It seems surreal to say it: I had my last exam yesterday! I am officially moving on to third year university and hoping to graduate within another two years. One baby step at a time, and each year I'll celebrate each step. And during the past three weeks, I have neglected sleep, nutrition, and overall health (including my mental health) as I worked hard for these exams and other planning stuff. After my last exam was over at noon, I wanted to just go home and sleep but my friend wanted to go out and 'celebrate'. As tired as he knew I was, he insisted that we go and 'celebrate'. So after movies and dessert, I rushed home late that night. All I could think about was diving into bed and falling straight to sleep, but instead I found myself taking my time in the shower, slowly getting ready to go to bed, and just sitting on the edge of my bed for at least a good fifteen minutes. I didn't even check Facebook or my email during that time either. I just sat there. I pulled out my notebook and wrote this:
However, during the past few weeks, not only did I purposely force myself awake to study, and even when I did manage to have a night off, I would wake up violently in the middle of the night--my body felt extremely weak. I cannot ever "over-sleep", for instance, today I tried to sleep in til' noon and I ended up waking up at 9am instead. Close enough, I suppose, just a few hours later than what I normally wake up to. So last night's sleep was the best sleep I had in months, not because of the hours of sleep I had but the feeling of going to sleep..drifting away into slumber.
I think I may have over-meditated on sleep a bit as I began to think, even the Lord had no place to lay his head! I thought of His tiring journey to the cross, and I instantly felt tired from even thinking about it. After a day's physical hard work, your body would normally just crave sleep. I found myself trying to feel what it must have felt like for the Lord to finally "give in" to death (if only for temporary). It must have felt so wonderful to "sleep" (when I was a kid I imagined Jesus just sleeping in the tomb for three days, although that might not be the fully correct term of what happened to Jesus afterwards). "Sleep" must have been the best thing that happened to Him all day after being ridiculed, spat on, tortured...
Very similar to what I wrote in my notebook: I meditated on why didn't He just choose to die quickly while He was on the cross? He technically could have "finished" His mission and not endure it any longer. And so I thought to myself, maybe it was the same satisfaction as I had felt..slowing the time before tiredness and sleep. Although I would exactly describe it as "satisfaction"--which is why it makes what He did so romantic and...well, words just can't describe.
My mom jokingly said, "I love sleep so much, I would go take a nap in heaven even if I didn't have to!"
That moment of surrender right before you go to sleep after a long and tiring day--you finally allow yourself to stop and rest. Vulnerable, yet at a complete peace. You are almost afraid to fall asleep right away because you want to enjoy this moment--this moment when you can actually feel your body relax...fall from the edge of stress and into the arms of sleep.Then I closed my Moleskin-wannabe-notebook, said my grace, so vaguely gave thanks for everything, and laid down on my pillow. I didn't even get to put my covers on yet. I wanted to slowly go to sleep and just take in every moment and step of falling asleep. I treasure sleep so much, others say I over-analyze sleep. As you see, when I was a kid, I had trouble sleeping and this developed over time into my teenage years where my lack of sleep caused a lot of problems. Sleep is so important to me, that I even plan meticulously the details of my bed (one extra-long twin sized bed frame with a stiff mattress and a medium-stiff memory foam on top, two king-sized pillows, down-feather duvet, with 800 thread-count comforter cover...), my mom helps me with this too as she also loves sleep. Notice that I said "sleep" in it's noun form and not "to sleep" in it's verb form. I love sleep.
However, during the past few weeks, not only did I purposely force myself awake to study, and even when I did manage to have a night off, I would wake up violently in the middle of the night--my body felt extremely weak. I cannot ever "over-sleep", for instance, today I tried to sleep in til' noon and I ended up waking up at 9am instead. Close enough, I suppose, just a few hours later than what I normally wake up to. So last night's sleep was the best sleep I had in months, not because of the hours of sleep I had but the feeling of going to sleep..drifting away into slumber.
I think I may have over-meditated on sleep a bit as I began to think, even the Lord had no place to lay his head! I thought of His tiring journey to the cross, and I instantly felt tired from even thinking about it. After a day's physical hard work, your body would normally just crave sleep. I found myself trying to feel what it must have felt like for the Lord to finally "give in" to death (if only for temporary). It must have felt so wonderful to "sleep" (when I was a kid I imagined Jesus just sleeping in the tomb for three days, although that might not be the fully correct term of what happened to Jesus afterwards). "Sleep" must have been the best thing that happened to Him all day after being ridiculed, spat on, tortured...
Very similar to what I wrote in my notebook: I meditated on why didn't He just choose to die quickly while He was on the cross? He technically could have "finished" His mission and not endure it any longer. And so I thought to myself, maybe it was the same satisfaction as I had felt..slowing the time before tiredness and sleep. Although I would exactly describe it as "satisfaction"--which is why it makes what He did so romantic and...well, words just can't describe.
My mom jokingly said, "I love sleep so much, I would go take a nap in heaven even if I didn't have to!"
