Day One
Truth
Truth
Today is day one of forty days and forty nights. The "lesson" today is truth. The interesting thing about this book ("One Day My Soul Just Opened Up: 40 Days and 40 Nights Toward Spiritual Strength and Personal Growth") is that the lessons aren't really lessons. It's not as though the book is trying to tell you what you should think or believe, it just makes you think about what it is you are thinking about and believing. There are no rules, not really even guidelines, just one person's story and how it changed her life.
Now I sit here trying to realize my truth of the moment, and at this moment I can say that I am feeling apprehensive and nervous. I thought that writing this would get easier the more I wrote but it only seems to get harder, this is how I know I'm making progress. For almost all of my life I have been pracitcing avoidance, like the osterich, I bury my head in the sand and hope it will all just go away. I turned my back to the world, closed my eyes and plugged my ears. When I opened them nothing was better, quite the opposite in fact, things had progressed over time and gotten a lot worse. I refused to see what was true because it was too hard, that meant I actually had to feel something, I had to do something. That technique got me evicted twice, got me fired, and destroyed relationships. It was this process of avoidance that drove almost every decision I made.
I remember the day all of that changed and I began on my journey toward total truth and honesty. I met my husband and knew that I wanted him to know the truth about me all of the time. It would seem now that in order to tell him the whole truth I had to know it first. It began with simple things like: I am jealous so please don't try to make me jealous to see how much I like you because I will turn into a monster. I was open with the small, more obvious things, I thought I was the queen of honesty. It turns out that I was completely wrong. I was being honest, that much is true, but I was being honest from a place where the truth was a lie. Does that make sense? The truth I was living was not the truth at all, not the real truth. That is something I have only just begun to see. The real truth of the moment is that I am very insecure, self conscious, afraid, loving and over emotional, or maybe just emotional enough, that I'm not quite sure about yet.
I have been writing now for five days and everyday I am very fearful that I wont do it well, or nobody will care. My stomach churns, my heart pounds and I sit on the edge of a possible emotional, mental and totally obliterating breakdown. You may think that I am being dramatic and honestly, it is quite possible that I am, but right now it seems as though feeling like this could truly kill me. In the past, and I mean past as in yesterday, these feeling would have been enough to shut me down, but today I choose to feel them, maybe throw up a little and keep going. Courage isn't about not being afraid, it's about being afraid but doing it anyways. I look inside of my heart and I don't see much that I recognize, it's pretty dark and I'm afraid of the dark so I wont go in. I used to have a recurring dream when I was a kid, I dreamed that I was ascending a giant, unstable staircase and at the top was a door. Most of the time I wouldn't even make it to the top of the stairs because I was so afraid of falling, and when I did get there I was too afraid of what was on the other side of that door to open it. To this day I haven't seen what is behind that door.
The truth is that I need God to help me, I need Him to hold my hand, just like a dad when his little girl is going to school for the first time. I need to be soothed and reassured and reminded that it will always be ok. I will do my best to exercise my courage and press forward and I hope that's enough because it will take all of the strength I can muster.
I guess that the all important truth of the moment is that I can't do this without God, only His Love and Divinity can sustain me. All though it may feel like you sit at the bottom of the pit that is your life, that couldn't be farther from the truth. You stand atop the highest mountain, showered with love and grace but it's foggy so you can't see, it's raining so you shield yourself with an umbrella and you can't feel. Trust that the clouds will dissipate, maybe only for a moment at first but you will get a glimps of the astounding view, feel the warmth of real Love and bask in the Glory of all that is Light. Then all that seemed so impossible before now appears as a quest for something so much greater and infinitely good.
xo
Now I sit here trying to realize my truth of the moment, and at this moment I can say that I am feeling apprehensive and nervous. I thought that writing this would get easier the more I wrote but it only seems to get harder, this is how I know I'm making progress. For almost all of my life I have been pracitcing avoidance, like the osterich, I bury my head in the sand and hope it will all just go away. I turned my back to the world, closed my eyes and plugged my ears. When I opened them nothing was better, quite the opposite in fact, things had progressed over time and gotten a lot worse. I refused to see what was true because it was too hard, that meant I actually had to feel something, I had to do something. That technique got me evicted twice, got me fired, and destroyed relationships. It was this process of avoidance that drove almost every decision I made.
I remember the day all of that changed and I began on my journey toward total truth and honesty. I met my husband and knew that I wanted him to know the truth about me all of the time. It would seem now that in order to tell him the whole truth I had to know it first. It began with simple things like: I am jealous so please don't try to make me jealous to see how much I like you because I will turn into a monster. I was open with the small, more obvious things, I thought I was the queen of honesty. It turns out that I was completely wrong. I was being honest, that much is true, but I was being honest from a place where the truth was a lie. Does that make sense? The truth I was living was not the truth at all, not the real truth. That is something I have only just begun to see. The real truth of the moment is that I am very insecure, self conscious, afraid, loving and over emotional, or maybe just emotional enough, that I'm not quite sure about yet.
I have been writing now for five days and everyday I am very fearful that I wont do it well, or nobody will care. My stomach churns, my heart pounds and I sit on the edge of a possible emotional, mental and totally obliterating breakdown. You may think that I am being dramatic and honestly, it is quite possible that I am, but right now it seems as though feeling like this could truly kill me. In the past, and I mean past as in yesterday, these feeling would have been enough to shut me down, but today I choose to feel them, maybe throw up a little and keep going. Courage isn't about not being afraid, it's about being afraid but doing it anyways. I look inside of my heart and I don't see much that I recognize, it's pretty dark and I'm afraid of the dark so I wont go in. I used to have a recurring dream when I was a kid, I dreamed that I was ascending a giant, unstable staircase and at the top was a door. Most of the time I wouldn't even make it to the top of the stairs because I was so afraid of falling, and when I did get there I was too afraid of what was on the other side of that door to open it. To this day I haven't seen what is behind that door.
The truth is that I need God to help me, I need Him to hold my hand, just like a dad when his little girl is going to school for the first time. I need to be soothed and reassured and reminded that it will always be ok. I will do my best to exercise my courage and press forward and I hope that's enough because it will take all of the strength I can muster.
I guess that the all important truth of the moment is that I can't do this without God, only His Love and Divinity can sustain me. All though it may feel like you sit at the bottom of the pit that is your life, that couldn't be farther from the truth. You stand atop the highest mountain, showered with love and grace but it's foggy so you can't see, it's raining so you shield yourself with an umbrella and you can't feel. Trust that the clouds will dissipate, maybe only for a moment at first but you will get a glimps of the astounding view, feel the warmth of real Love and bask in the Glory of all that is Light. Then all that seemed so impossible before now appears as a quest for something so much greater and infinitely good.
xo
Hello, I am happy to have found your blog through Entrecard. I love that you are writing about what you see as your personal truth, it will certainly set you free. I know what you mean about using writing as therapy I do the same thing on my blog. I will certainly stop by again. Keep up the good work. Please stop by my site some time I would love to get your feed back. Have a blessed day.
ReplyDeleteone of the greatest revelations we can have is the one where we become aware of our need for god.
ReplyDeleteLove your writing and to see how you grow from this and how God brings you new revelations and renewed strength.
Do everything possible, and what is impossible, God will do.
xoxoxox
admirable, truly heartwarming, lovely and courageous. you are an inspiration to others dealing with painful truths/untruths. here's to you coming to terms and finding peace.
ReplyDelete