What Comes First, the Love or the Rules?

I've started writing this three times now, gotten about four paragraphs into it, stopped and deleted it. Maybe that's because I don't really know what I'm thinking or trying to say. So bear with me, as once again, I think out loud.

I struggle so much with a busy mind (not much clarity, only a few moments of 'crisp and clear' here and there). I have a hard time figuring out what's really right and wrong. I have been experiencing this struggle pretty much my entire life. I know a lot of it has to do with being brought up in some pretty conservative circles. I think in some ways that can really mess with your head. And your heart.

I also think it simply has to do with the fact that we're all made to know there's right and wrong, to feel that intuition about yourself and others that really does come down to morals. But there are so many angles and gray areas to me. Sometimes I wish I were more legalistic so I would just be more comfortable and at ease with myself and the way I live life. Behind the rules.

Right now I'm not so comfortable. I still struggle with the idea that God's love and grace are dependant on how I'm living, acting, and even feeling. I don't know how to shake that.

In my childhood and teen years, I did live by the rules (for the most part). The things that were considered really bad, I refrained from.

I think I was happiest then, in the sense of not being tormented by my conscience (as unhealthy as my trained conscience can be). In a sense, I felt free because I was following the rules.

But I don't think that's good.

I don't want to feel free because I'm following the rules.
I want to feel free because I feel wholly loved.
I don't want the things I do to determine how close I feel to God.
I want God's love and how that brings me close to Him, to determine the things I do.
I want to live by the rules on accident.

I want to be so aware that God is crazy about me that I accidentally take care of myself and others, believe in myself, and live out of the joy that brings.

I don't want the things I do and the way I live to come first.

I want the love of God to come first, spilling all over every aspect of who I am.

So I guess what I'm saying is that I wish I would have learned fully of God's love before I learned a list of rights and wrongs. When it comes to "The Christian walk," my road and my ideas are colored with do's and dont's, rather than what it's truly all about.

*I just paused in the writing of this and discovered Midnight Cafe had posted something here (thank you!), and she said what I'm trying to say. So I'm going to stop rambling on now and post this tomorrow. I want hers to be the latest post for awhile. Cause it's good stuff...