Today I had a lot of talks with people. I got to go to a Bible study a friend recommended to me, and I got to talk for some time with the guy who drove me home, and I was encouraged to get out of my little emotional pity-party and focus on God and others. I wish I had recorded my feelings at about 6:00 this afternoon, because I think I sort of hit bottom. I was delivering flyers, and I had sort of worked myself into this state of blind passion where I was just longing to feel intense pain and suffering, and really dwelling on it and working it out in intense eloquent descriptions. (Whenever I do something like this a part of me is just saying "You wretch. You think it's cool to say this stuff? You think you know yourself better than God? You think you're really that good (or bad), and that you can really be that honest? You're all talk - you just like the way it sounds, but it means nothing.") Anyway, maybe I'm over a hump here. Jesus be with me. The fast is definitely tomorrow. I do have a couple of tests tomorrow, which I'll probably not study much for, but we'll see how it goes. I think this may actually be a case of school coming between me and God, but I want to be really careful with that. Lord help me.

I think I was more angry and depressed and more focused on my non-relationship with God in this period than comes through in this journal. My struggle to know when I'm being "honest" or "real" is a major theme of my life, even to this day, as you can see. I've never really figured that one out.