How My Lens are Colored

Have you ever thought about how the organizations and activities you are in shape who you are?

College has taught me many lessons:

1. I have a different bathroom etiquette than most adults. Since my dorms had community bathrooms, with rows of individual stalls, I don't consider bathroom conversations abnormal. I don't consider it odd to have to do my business beside other people doing theirs. Apparently, this makes other people uncomfortable.
2. It is perfectly normal, if I go to a church dinner, for me to bring containers for food. I eat, I pack up food, I go home, I eat some more. I get some funny looks for that one.
3. I expect syllabi. I expect people higher than me in the hierarchy to clearly write down their expectations of me, deadlines, and required resources. The world doesn't do this. :-(
4. I came to expect a certain schedule of events. During most of my college years, my classes fell in the 9am-3pm range (except for the occasional night class). After classes, I would go to my own campus job. After my job, I could go to a church or campus ministry event (or do laundry). It was the guideline that shaped my days. Most semesters, my Tuesday-Thursday classes were scheduled to mirror my Monday-Wednesday-Friday classes, as much as possible. I strive for consistency.
5. College taught me how to eat quickly, yet still enjoy meals with my friends. 
6. College taught me how to maximize my time, yet there is such as thing as being too far ahead and too prepared. 
7. College taught me that there is value in the commandment to observe Sabbath. I learned that my work would still be there the next day, but my stress levels would only increase without a Sabbath rest. 
8. I learned that teamwork is necessary evil. Yeah...still don't like it.

How marriage has colored my lens:

1. Being married gave me a crash course in creative cooking when I had limited ingredients. Substitution and omission are common in my kitchen.
2. Sometimes being right isn't the thing to strive for. I can be right and severely hurt my husband. 
3. It is possible to look at the same situation and walk away with different takes on it.
4. Quality time with my hubby is to be carved out from my schedule and then fiercely protected.
5. I learned that small gestures of love mean a LOT.
6. I learned that home can be anywhere my hubby is.
7. I learned we have a LOT of stuff, despite a lot of minimalizing. Naturally, stuff expands to fill the space it has.
8. I learned that I got me a good hubby.

How the Church (and my church) have colored my lens:

1. I view a multi-generational church as the ideal. A church where I could be working in the nursery or inviting a 80 year old couple to my home on the same Sunday.
2. Church can be holy AND hiliarious.
3. Sometimes grabbing Strong's Concordance and looking up the Greek and Hebrew words provides more light and clarifies the meaning more than all the commentaries you find. 
4. Taking a verse out of context does not show a clear picture of Scripture. 
5. Although unpopular, there is an element of discipline in the Church.
6. The Church is a community. Although I don't like group projects in school, community in the Church isn't optional. There is a distinct social side: group prayer, visitation, and more.
7. There is no perfect church, but a lot of loving and well-meaning churches.
8. I still have a lot of growing I can do.

These are my expectations, my realities. When I view the world around me, these things have tinted my lens I wear, so that I see the world through these things.