as time goes by

This afternoon, the apartment is quiet. I'm the only one home from work yet in the building, so I can't even hear the neighbors, or their music, or their baby. The sunlight is filling the living room, which is fairly clean, and I can see my still lovely bouquets from Grace and Kurt's wedding on the table in the dining room. The vent nearby is pouring out marvelously cool air that carries only a faint odor of kitty litter box from the apartment below. I took a shower after my rather sweaty day at work and am now enjoying leftover Diet Pepsi. The time is perfect for pondering.

After the busyness of this last few months, you'd think I'd be overwhelmed with news and news and news to blog, but I'm stuck in pondering. Maybe it's the Sam Beaver in me to journal my pondering, but what I'm concentrating on is this: Although it's very nice in life to know who you are and what exactly you want, it's more important to know what you want more or even most.
Desires compel prioritization whether it is instinctive or whether it is completely deliberate. If every want was wanted with exactly the same intensity and priority, life would be chaos. No one would ever be able to make a logical choice. To some extent, most human beings are just internal knots of wants. At the exact same moment in time, I can want to drink this Pepsi, I can want to type, I can want to get married, I can want to clean the fish tank, I can want to scrunch my toes into the carpet, I can want to do nothing at all.... If I wanted them all the same amount in the same way, I'd explode with indecision. Instinctively, I've prioritized. "One sip of Pepsi. Type. Pray about getting married. Postpone the fish tank (again). Continuous scrunching of toes into the carpet. Nothing at all is a stupid thing to want..."
It is the deliberate prioritization of desires that has caused my pondering this afternoon, for it is not merely what I want that shapes my thinking and action and life, but rather it is how I prioritize what I want. It is what I want more or the most that makes me who I am.
For example,
I wanted to get to work quickly this morning because I was late. But, I wanted MORE not to get a ticket since I don't have any money, so I decided not to speed.
I want to lose weight, but I wanted MORE that chocolate dipped cone at Dairy Fair last night after church, so I ate it.
I want a kitten, specifically the one Ryan has downstairs. I want MORE not to aggravate my allergies. No, I want the kitten MORE than I care about the allergies. But I want MOST not to complicate my relationship with my fantastic roommate Mel who doesn't want a kitten. Therefore, I don't really want a kitten.
I want to get married. I want to share fellowship, and finances, and a family, and a dislike of alliteration, and, yes, "gardening", as Pastor would say. I want MORE to submit to God's plan to my life. I want MOST to enjoy Him and His good gifts. So, in the tension between what I desire and what I desire MOST, I find a balance of joyful contentment.
I want to sin. Often. Continually. In small insidious ways. In blatent immoral ways. I want more to be holy. Consumed by passion for Christ. Remade in His image. So my prayers become less about asking for what I want, MORE about recognizing all of what I want, the evil and the good, and MOST about begging to know and see what HE wants accomplished in my life.
If I can practice deliberate prioritization of wants more often, perhaps what I want MOST will happen more often.
"Now I want some dinner to go with my Diet Pepsi. Do I want eggs and toast or do I want chips and salsa MORE? Or do I want oatmeal the MOST? Hmm..."