If you have ever lived in another country or stayed there for a longer period of time you know very well what I mean when I say that you will soon learn that the culture of that country is quite different from what you’re used to. Often very different. It takes time to get used to, well.. Everything.
But eventually you do, and often you get so used to this new way of living and thinking, you forget that you once (and maybe not so long ago either) had to learn and practice the very things which by now have become so familiar, yes, even necessities of life.
Then, one day you return back home. Excitement is in the air. You’re going home, where everything is familiar and makes perfect sense. All the people and little things you’ve missed are waiting there for you!
If you’ve had this experience of leaving home for a long time and then coming back, you know that this is not so. At least not all the way.
You come home, but find that home isn’t what it used to be. Sure, some things have changed at home too, but who’s changed more than anything or anyone else is probably you!
Whether you were aware of it or not, staying in another culture changed you in, oh, so many different ways. Your perspectives. Your habits. Your experiences.
Coming home, you may feel like a stranger in your own country. You are surrounded by one culture while carrying a somewhat different culture on the inside.
Once you’ve seen something from another perspective, it’s hard to erase that memory from your mind. Once you’ve had an experience, it’s hard to forget about it.
What used to be totally normal, isn’t, or at least it’s only one out of various “normals”. Even if you prefer your old “normal”, you can’t say anymore that “this is the only normal there is!”
A longer stay in another another culture will change you, at least to a certain degree. But, often you won’t realize just how much you’ve changed until you have been removed from that culture.
As a citizen of Heaven, and an ambassador here on Earth, you are surrounded by one culture while carrying another. You are truly a stranger here on Earth. Things will not always feel “normal”. You may not always feel “at home”.
There used to be a time when you weren’t surprised by, and didn’t question what you saw and heard around you. It was all normal.
But then you got to see and experience things from a very different perspective – a Heavenly perspective – and that changed everything.
It changed, not only how you see the world around you, but also how you see yourself, and God. It changed your habits. Your experiences. Your thinking.
What at you once had to learn and practice eventually became familiar and even necessary. What you didn’t even know existed, or had only heard about, you can hardly live without now.
Your normal has been redefined. How can you go back?
EirinAwesome 