Understanding

"You don't understand. No one understands what it's like inside my head"

Oh but honey I do know. I was there and in some ways still am. Hating what I see when I look in the mirror. Wondering how it is I can be cared for when I care so little for myself.
Wondering when I'll have the courage to sink the blade just a little bit deeper. Just a little deeper I would think, then the pain will all be gone away.

"I want to kill what's inside of me"

Me too. Only therapy lets me say these things louder than a whisper. I know what it's like to hate what's inside of you. To want to kill it. To want to stop the hissing voices telling you you're nothing. You don't matter. All of them are right.

I've been there. When I was there I hated the people that told me they'd been there too. I hated that they told me it would get better. I hated that they told me it wasn't just me. I wanted to feel special. I couldn't even be uniquely miserable.

But the thing is; all of the things I say to you I wish people had said to me over and over and over again when I was 15. To be honest it's what I wish people told me when I was 20, and 25 and even 30. Even now at 33 I long to hear someone tell me I'm valuable.

The only way people can know you don't feel valuable, really know it, is if you tell them.

Oh, I wouldn't have listened either. The times when my parents or friends would tell me these things. That I was beautiful and lovable and valuable I really mostly thought they had no clue. They thought the girl I showed them was beautiful. They thought the boisterous acts were lovable and endearing. They thought the way I allowed my body to be touched and my favors abused was valuable to them.
I simply didn't believe them.

I can see it there in your eyes too. That you don't believe me. That you think I'm just some old lady thinking herself hip to your jive.
But I see it and it's ok. You don't have to believe me tonight. Tonight is just one of the many times I will tell you that you are beautiful. That you have value that is not in how your body looks, that how you look is not even close to the most valuable thing about you.

So I know. But you don't have to believe me. I understand, and you don't have to believe that either. Some things are true even if you don't believe them.

I'm stuck in this dream it's changing me I am becoming
the me that you know he had some second thoughts
he's covered with scabs and he is broken and sore
the me that you know doesn't come around much
that part of me isn't here anymore
all pain disappears it's the nature of my circuitry
drowns out all I hear there's no escape from this my new consciousness
the me that you know used to have feelings
but the blood has stopped pumping and he's left to decay
the me that you know is now made up of wires
and even when I'm right with you I'm so far away
I can try to get away but I’ve strapped myself in
I can try to scratch away the sound in my ears
I can see it killing away all my bad parts
I don't want to listen but it's all too clear
- The Becoming NIN

Broken Places

When you throw your back out it is often because the muscles around your spine have moved out of place. Sort of.
Your spine has been tweaked out of place but you don't know it immediately because the muscles will move and compensate for the pain by moving to a place where the pain is tolerable.

Eventually, no amount of movement, no amount of compensation, will make the pain tolerable. Usually this is when my back officially goes out and I can't walk upright anymore. This is when I'm forced to go to the chiropractor and get my back adjusted into the correct places...again.

This morning, standing in the dark shower I said to God...sometimes it is easier to stay broken.

I don't know the moments when my back goes out. I only know the moments when the muscles around my spine give up the fight and say enough is enough this has to be fixed and we can't do that anymore.

Even then, bent over and hobbling around I think...this will get better soon. I just have to push through. My back will take care of it, it will be fine. I will be fine.

Fine is my F word.

I just want everything to be fine. If I don't look directly at being broken it's fine. It's ok. It's no big deal. I can manage. I'll just move some muscle around and compensate for the pain.

Don't look at how you spend money and why you place value on bank account balances. It's fine. Just leave it alone.
Don't look at what you eat, Jesus loves you anyway even if no one else does. It's fine. Just let it be.
Don't look at friendships. If you do you might be clingy and scare people away from being your friend. Just be cool. No one loves a needy girl.
Don't look at relationships. Don't ask why, the answer is probably something that requires change from you and that's not what we're going to do.
Don't look at touch. It has no easy answers and complicated is just too messy.

So I compensate. I mold myself around the pain instead of trying to clear it up. Because sometimes it's just easier to stay broken.

But now I can't walk. I'm hobbled over and unable to push through.
God is whispering that it's time to get adjusted. It's time to stop compensating and avoiding and look directly at some things.
I tell Him I hate it.
I tell Him I don't want to.
I tell Him that HE made me this way. (The blaming always seems to help)

Again he has to tell me, again he has to take my heart into his hands and remind me that he did make me. But not for this. Not for a sort of half life hiding and fearful of looking directly at the broken places.
He reminds me that he is already in those broken places waiting to meet me there. I just have to look directly at them and I'll see him there.

I don't know the moments these places were broken. I only know that in one of the places specifically, I'm giving up the fight. I still tell him I hate it. I still tell him I don't want to.

But now it's by looking over at him, beside me in the broken place.

This Morning

It struck me this morning as I cut the flowers and filled out the card that this is the first friend i made after it all crashed down.
I noticed my barriers and hoops set to guard against feeling to fond of someone else bound only to disappoint and leave me. I felt my reticence to invest or care.
But birthdays are my weakness. I wanted to say thank you for friendship and allowing God to use her in redeeming my faith in friendship.
I saw it as the heavy burden it was and I wondered for not the first time if it was me.
Too much, yet somehow not enough. Saying the wrong things, expecting too much.
I still don't know what it was that shifted that day when a game was more important than a promise. I still don't know where she went or what she's doing now. I still don't know how to heal the gap left in my life by her absence, by the absence of her friendship.

I wanted to throw away the flowers and card today. I worry it's too much and my eagerness for friendship I can trust again will be seen as weird and needy. But I mean it. I don't know why it has to be weird to feel genuinely grateful for the people in your life and how they affect you. It must just be the expressions of it. I don't know how to express my affection and gratitude "normally" some would say.

She used to call me weird. If I was different or loud. I thought it was something she loved about me. The zany ways, loud laughter and all. Now I struggle to believe she even loved me at all.

Wake Up

When I was young I didn't know that divorce existed. I didn't know that marriages could end. I was young when an uncle went through a divorce and because it was news to me that marriages could end I asked my parents why my uncle wasn't married to my aunt anymore.
I was told that my uncle's wife just woke up one day and decided she didn't want to be married anymore.  Years later a 2nd uncle's marriage ended. I was a teenager and asked the same questions. I'd had a friend by that point whose parents divorced but I wasn't bold enough to ask her why. So I asked again why this 2nd uncle wasn't married anymore.
I was told again that this 2nd uncle's wife just woke up one day and decided she didn't want to be married anymore.

Now, I do understand that these were attempts at age appropriate answers to hard, complicated questions. Through my adult eyes I understand marriages end for a myriad of reasons that are rarely completely 1one persons fault. But to my kid eyes it seemed a reasonable enough cause, I guess.

It's no secret I have relationship issues, and abandonment issues exacerbated by long-term relationships (specifically those of the romantic nature). A couple of months ago I reconnected with a family member and we began swapping stories and information. I relayed the stories of my uncles divorces and the reasons I was given for the end of their marriage. But as I sat on the sofa messaging with my family member it hit me, that was probably not actually the reason my uncles were divorced.

I know, duh. Right?

Here I was, 33 years old, still believing the age appropriate reason for divorce. It struck me that combined with my sense of abandonment, that people always leave, and the entrenched belief that these two uncles who I loved deeply and I had put on the pedestal fun uncles are often put on were left by women that just decided one day they didn't want to be married anymore; it's no wonder I'm certain any marriage I might enter into would only end in being left.

If people can just wake up one morning and decide to leave then what's to stop it from happening to me? I mean; I get now that it's not true. But I still sort of believe it, in large and small ways.

It's definitely on my list of "things to talk about with my therapist", but this last month the impact of realizing how deeply I believed that people just wake up one day and decide not to be married has been churning inside of me.
I don't know where it goes from here, but the freedom of discovering another lie, another broken belief and knowing that once it's discovered it can be fought against and overcome has been overwhelming.

Hiding

When I was a little girl I learned I should hide
Hide from shaming eyes and sharp tongues
Hide from shadows and secrets I didn't understand

When I was a little girl I didn't know my voice could be strong when it needed to be
I only knew to bite and lash out when it was safest, when I knew no matter how ugly I was I would still be loved

When I was a little girl I learned to hide.
I learned to hide my heart because it it was bad
I learned to hide my thoughts because they were stupid
I learned to hide myself because I was scared of harsh words and pushing hands

I hid myself in bathrooms, behind davenports, on stairs to scary basements, under dining room tables.
Because there I could taste the derision and ambivalence in the air while pretending it had no affect on my small, breaking heart.

When I was an older girl I learned to hide behind anger and sarcasm, scoffing and ambivalence. I accidentally became the kind of girl the angry shaming voices were when I was small.

And God said stop.
Stop with the anger, stop with the scoffing and ambivalence. (He would have said stop with the sarcasm but he thinks I'm hilarious)
He's challenged me to heal, to soften, to stop being the scared hiding girl who refuses to be anything but angry.

It's hard. I cry more now. But I'm holding on to it being worth it in the end.

Dried Up

Sometimes it feels like all of my words have dried up
As if over time they slowly evaporated leaving nothing but that scummy film behind

There are still good things, great things
There are still friends, laughter, sorrow and contentment

But I've lost my words
More and more through this season (gosh, I've come to hate the term season) I'm finding that my words have been removed

I didn't misplace them, I didn't leave them at a restaurant or some one's house. I find that my words have been almost surgically removed

The funny thing about God sometimes is that when he asks you to do something he really means it. He means to have you rest when he asks you to rest. He means to have you be quiet when he asks you to be quiet. He means you to be still when he asks you to be still.

I find myself sitting alone with God and opening my mouth to pray. But all the words are gone. People ask me how I am, how I'm doing, what's new, what my plans are and I open my mouth like a fish out of water. My mouth just opens and shuts and nothing comes out.

I find myself shut down. Not in the "I'm taking my ball and going home" sort of way but in the action, task oriented sort of way.

I don't know when it will end or what it will be like. But I'm almost starting to believe that I can be loved just because I breathe; that I can be liked even when I'm disagreeable and that even when I do nothing I still have value because I am a daughter of the King.

If losing my words for awhile results in finally truly believing that my value is in Christ alone; I'm ok with that.

Home

My throat has dried up.I've been paralyzed by what to say, overcome again and again by the fear of rejection, the fear of abandonment.
Working through intimacy issues steadfastly ignored for at least 20 years if not the full 32 is scary. Scary because I have to try to re-build my belief that I am valuable because I am a child of God. Even if I did nothing else ever for the rest of my life I would have value simply because God made me.

Because I don't believe it. I doubt it so greatly that I've convinced myself (along with a substantial amount of help from others) that it's true.

I feel dry. So dry and sapped and strung out on fear and paranoia I can't see the top of the hole I've dug for myself to hide in.

But through it all I hear God whispering that he won't leave. If I can be frank, and it's my blog so I think I will be, I don't believe him yet.
With every relationship I seem to have long lapses of times where I hold my breath waiting for them to figure out that I'm no good. That I'm garbage to be thrown away when I'm no longer entertaining or useful.
Because that's who I see when I look in the mirror.

Garbage.
Useless.
Not good.

But that God is persistent. Even as I turn my face from him, even as I shout at him that he made a mistake when he made me because I'm NO GOOD he just stays put, stubbornly.

I stopped leading. The transition has been better and more terrible than I anticipated. Better because I have had my pastors clearly express to me they care for me no matter what. Better because I have experienced them allowing me to exit and go quiet because they want to help me honor God in truly resting and refreshing in this time. Terrible because I secretly wonder if they're relieved the be done with me. Terrible because I feel useless and therefore I'm not worth anything if I'm not doing doing doing.
Let me be clear that most days I know it's not true.
Most days I can inhale without choking and exhale without sobbing.
It's the some days that pour shadows over the sun and I wonder if I'll ever again believe these lovely people and this mighty God love me.

But I'm starting to feel the inkling of belief. The echo of a memory of the deep down knowing that God is here. He's here and he's not leaving and he's sticking around no matter what. It feels so strange.

But it also feels like home.

seeing myself sitting against the wall of the cavern with my tired head laying atop my arms slung over my knees and realizing it’s where i am and where i’ve been for a while, i found i wasn’t alone. seeing this in my mind’s eye for the first time, jesus sat with his arm around me. ‘we can stay here as long as you need to, mary kathryn,’ i heard in my heart. ‘and i will stay here with you. but i will not let you stay here forever.'

(Inspired by: Bottom-Dwellers)

but anger is the mask fear wears until it either becomes a monster of hate or a puddle of clay which only christ can mold and fix and change in his own image. (via)

The In Between

Rescued-

1. Save (someone) from a dangerous or distressing situation.

2. Keep from being lost or abandoned; retrieve

Redeemed-  
1.a: to buy back : repurchase b : to get or win back. 
2. a: to free from what distresses or harms: b: to free from captivity by payment of ransom

I read "I prayed to be rescued, not redeemed" today while on my lunch break. I was breaking in a new book and my breath caught. Because that's sort of where I am. Praying to be plucked out of the danger and distress and placed in a new, exciting and much more clearly defined life. Praying to be back to normal, even though I was never a huge fan of the normal when I lived there.
I'm scared to be shaped. I'm scared of redemption because in my secret put away hear I don't believe that I'm valuable enough to be bought, let alone bought back. I'm scared of the waiting, of the silent in between times full of turmoil and refining.


Yet, I find myself in the in between anyway. Despite all of my protests and tantrums here I am, in between. Some much needed rest and intentional withdrawal is here and it's time I start making as much of this in between as I can, stop throwing the tantrums and actually listen to the whispering voice telling me that He sets my value. That He has already redeemed me

If I'm honest, I prayed the way you order breakfast from a short-order cook: this is what I want. Period. This is what I want. Aren't you getting this? I didn't pray for God's will to be done in my life, or, at any rate, I didn't mean it. I prayed to be rescued, not redeemed. I prayed for it to get easier, not that I would be shaped in significant ways. I prayed for the waiting to be over, instead of trying to learn something about patience or anything else for that matter. 

-Shauna Niequist Bittersweet 

Conform

Often, without even meaning to do it, I do it.
When meeting someone new, that I don't even know or think is cute or anything, I'll conform myself subconsciously into what I perceive they might want me to be at that particular time.

What do you think is funny?
I'll crack a joke that matches

What music do you like?
I likely have it on my ipod and will play it (and sing along) for you

Do you prefer hair up or down?
I'll wear it accordingly

I really dislike this about myself. I am struggling with identity and finding it in the appropriate and rightful place, with God.
Yet my position of default is to twist and turn and conform myself to the perception I have of what pleases others.

I'm working on it, day by day, minute by minute, second my second.

Currency

I spend a lot of time thinking about my currency. What is it I have that makes ma valuable to others? Is it really true or is it something I perceive to be my value?

The information I hold
The access to others
The entertainment value I contribute to a conversation

It's all very pathetic to me; this wondering about my value.

I noticed recently that the only contact I have with someone is when they ask about someone else. Unless we are in the same room for an extended period of time our conversation is usually restricted to only being about this other person (or specific group of people this person is in).
As if without the access or window into this other person there is little left to discuss. There is little to no (or only superficial) interest in anything about me without this other person.

I know I could probably try more, I know I could probably reveal any number of things about myself that would incite a topic of conversation about someone else or my life.

The thing is, I have.

But only a few minutes can pass before the conversation naturally or unnaturally turns back to this other person who holds what seems like a higher or more important place than I.

It feels selfish. It feels selfish to me, so I imagine it will likely sound selfish to others. If I bring it up I will be "oh no, it's not like that at all'd" away.
So I don't bring it up.
Rather I haven't brought it up.

I can feel my resignation dwindling. I can feel the words gurgling about in my throat ready to take the risk in asking, "what about me?"

I'm terrified of the answer. But some questions need answered either way.

Denial, not just a river in Egypt

 Denial can also be experienced on more subtle levels when it comes to our hearts and emotions. Sometimes we can deny that someone’s actions and words have hurt us. We can deny that someone’s decisions have affected us greatly, and have created pain.

So how does denial play out?
When it comes to being wounded by another’s words or actions, we can blame ourselves first; we can let them off the hook without accountability for the wound. When we deny ourselves, we downplay the pain or make the offense our fault. For instance, if someone hurts me, I might say I deserved to be treated like that or spoken to in that way. I could also justify their actions by not communicating that they hurt me.

Another sign of denial is forgiving too quickly. If someone hurts me, I could say, “Oh I forgive you, that’s no problem,” and move right past the hurt. There are times where the offense may be forgiven quickly, but in other instances, the wound needs time to be felt and to heal. That is okay too. It is okay to tell people they hurt you. If you are hurt, that is valid whether or not someone else thinks it is. Your emotions are real.

- (via: Denial)

Heart Burn

A vice gripped my heart
During quiet murmurings and plans for the next few days I cleared my throat
I could hardly force the words out
But I did
I asked

It is probably my fault
I didn't make it clear how important it was to me that you both came

I'm fighting the urge to not even bother asking because I'm sure I'll be disappointed
So I twist myself into feeling detached and unaffected as if your answer doesn't matter
I tell you it was just a thought I had

But it was important
I wanted to be picked
I wanted to be chosen
I wanted them to want to choose me

I didn't want to have to manipulate and plan the choice. I wanted them to choose me because they wanted to choose me, because I was chosen.

I don't want to be so upset about this
I want to be detached and indifferent
But I also want to make sure that I'm allowing myself to feel these things, regardless of if they matter to anyone else
I want to get to the point that my emotions are not dependent on others validations of them

But can I tell you I still want that validation
I don't understand why it's wrong to want it
I just do, and I don't know what to do about it

A good friend said there's nothing to do about it.
She said that's my specialty, doing
When that's stripped away from me I am afraid I am stripped of everything. All my value.

Which is a lie
One that I'm struggling to stop believing

I'm holding on to hope that one day this could be made right
Cause I've been ship wrecked and left for dead and I've seen the darkest sights
Everyone I've loved seems like a stranger in the night
But oh my heart still burns
Tells me to return
Search the fading light
- Ulysses, Josh Garrels

I don't remember the day that we met
I don't remember what I was wearing or the words that left your lips

I feel like it would be easier
Knowing

Knowing where it started and why it started
Maybe it would help me walk away

I don't remember what happened the first time you spoke to me that way
I don't remember why I was so willing to believe I was worth so little to be cast away with a sigh and roll of your eyes

I feel like if I could only understand the why I would understand what to do next and where I should go from here

But I know better
I know the why isn't important
I know the how and the where and the what isn't the point
I know this started generations before I was around

Because the way we treat people lasts and lasts
The words we speak and the actions we choose or don't choose
They matter

I see it in myself
An exhausted disdain
A wondering if all this digging and fixing is worth it
Because I wonder if I'm worth it
I'm fighting to believe I'm worth it

Decades of apathy and swallowing bitter pills of whatever scraps I could grasp onto have numbed my bravery and I can hardly even ask anymore
But I ask
You forget
I cry
We all move on

And I'm trying to move on
I'm trying to be better
I'm trying to realize that I'm not the only one that needs to do better but I'm the only one that I can make do better
So I try, I move on and I do better

Truth Is...

"The truth is, the biggest sin issue right now, for me, is that I just don't believe God's promises are true for me."

This is what I said to a dear friend back in the early spring. We were at a conference together and I was just walloped over the head thanks to a speaker talking about volunteer burnout and taking time for you and God alone.
It's still mostly true.

I believe in a big God. A God that is huge but can make himself small enough to come into our lives and walk beside us in every moment with every thing. I believe that God will redeem the years that I fought him and that he will redeem the years I believed he saw only the value in me that I believed (and was told) I had.

Most days it's not clean, and most days it's not easy. But I push on and fake it until I make it sometimes.
Because I believe even when I don't.
I believe when it's messy and when it's hard, I believe when I hear him the least that He is still here, holding me in His ocean of grace. Even when I don't believe, I believe. Because I don't know what else to hold.

What else is there to hold really? People have failed me, I have failed me. Food has failed me, possessions have failed me, drinking has failed me. Encounters both casual and not so casual have all failed me because none of them were casual to my heart.

The truth is it's easier for me to believe that God loves you than that he loves me. I have been so utterly convinced of my wretchedness that I have lumped God in with those that tell me I am nothing to them with voice and deed.

The truth is, we're all wretches apart from the salvation of a God that loved us all so much he sent his Son to die for us. The truth is we're all in desperate face to the floor need of his ocean of grace.

So I'm repenting. I'm choosing to believe and I'm asking God to help my unbelief. His promises do not say that God sent his Son for everyone but me. They do not say that everyone is eligible for redemption and forgiveness but me. How selfish to even think that it would.

The truth is, I have no idea what I'm doing and I'm realizing that not a lot of other people do either. I'm just a broken girl, asking forgiveness for the audacity to believe she was beyond the reach of God's promises and grace.

All will arise and follow you over
Savior please, pilot me.
Over the waves and through every sorrow
Savior please, pilot me
Oh Lord, Oh Lord
Oh Lord, Oh Lord
-Josh Garels Pilot Me

Letting it Down

"I'm sorry I let you down. But you let me down too."
-Baby (Dirty Dancing)

I got a text about needing to chat. Over the course of the next few days I began to wonder, what had I done? Because my immediate belief is that I've done something wrong and I will be chastised.

Deafening silence happens and I think, what did I do? What action or inaction did I take to cause this to happen.

It all feels very selfish to me. As if I'm focusing so inward I can't see outward anymore.
But at the same time I'm realizing that the outward focus was founded in desperation to hide from something, something in me that I saw as being without value. Something I believed everyone else saw too.

I didn't know I could be valued for simply being alive. I didn't know how to look for that value in Christ and not men or women around me. I still don't get it entirely.

I also didn't know how to share the blame. Even though I can articulate to you that it's not all my fault, that statistically speaking it's impossible for all the blame to lay at my feet I believe that had I been more; more perfect, more demure, more deferential, more humerous...more, that people wouldn't have left. I believe that were I more I would know the answer to the great mysteries of life and relationship.

I'm learning to believe that everyone feels this way to some degree. That no one has it as together as the expectations I place on them and myself. Yet I push forward, aiming for perfection and dying inside when I inevitably miss.

So I'm making peace with having to look inward for a little while; to figure out and uproot the sin and the doubt that I find and then move outward so the serving, the friendship, the love that I offer to others can be deeper, more genuine and less chaotic.

I know that I have let people down. It's the way life goes. But I'm just now realizing that when they let me down I can name it and not assume that I am somehow to blame. It's terrifying really, but freeing just the same.

Paying

It never casually passes my lips. Even if it appears that way, it's never casual to me.
Each time feels like a small death in my heart.

I didn't know it would be our last conversation.
I didn't know it would be the last time I heard your voice.
Because I never imagined it could change. I never imagined it would end like it did in a dull pop and a ceasing of everything.

But it did.


Now I pay. When I say your name, when something happens that reminds me of you and a story we lived through side by side. When something funny happens and my heart leaps to tell you but I remember that you are gone.
Just gone.
Just like that.
Just as low key as you entered, you left.

Things change, I know this. But I didn't think that we would. Without my noticing, without realizing what was happening it was changed.
Part me, part you, part all the things unspoken and misunderstood.

Now I'm changed. Both less than and more without you. Finding my way one small death at a time to the other side, wondering what I could have changed had I known it would be our last conversation.

Identity

Through this end season of leading Washington Project I'm feeling excited for the unknown that is to come and also a little scared. Because I find a lot of my identity in doing things for other people. If I am useful people like me. It's the belief that I have.
More and more I'm seeing the pattern of transition that God has me in, the pattern of transitioning my definition of identity from one found in others and tasks to one that is found solely at His feet.

I clung to a friendship, regardless of how often we spoke or how awkward things were starting to get I knew,

I was her FRIEND

I told stories of their antics and the sweet things that they would say to me and I knew,

I was their AUNT

I spoke of stories from the growing up years, of the small town living under their roof years and I knew,

I was their Daughter

I planned serves and led meeting. I told people Jesus loved them and I blushed appropriately when people commended the things I did through Washington Project and Outreach. I knew,

I was a Leader

I sent silly cards through the mail, I took dinners to new moms, I attended showers and small groups and showed up when they needed help, I knew,

I was a Volunteer

I scheduled nights out with friends and weekends away. I coordinated schedules with friends that were moms, wives or otherwise engaged with their own separate life. I ensure family time was filled and on schedule.
Because regardless of anything else that was going on in life it would come down to the identity I found in those relationships and tasks and I knew,

I was a Planner

I smoothed things over, I contorted my heart into shattered little shapes, I ensure that even with other people were losing their cool that I was calm and collected and available to pick up the pieces. I knew,

I was a Peacekeeper 

I mean, I'm no Job or anything, but little by little the things I identified myself with and by have been removed from my life, or at the least altered deeply. But there was still leading Washington Project. As the others identities lessened and I became more autonomous or less involved I was still the leader of Washington Project. It was for JESUS. Obviously it wasn't an identity that was BAD right?

Then a few months ago I started hearing, leading doesn't define you either.
I started hearing, even if you quit this you would still be complete and who I created you to be as my daughter.

But I still pressed forward.

Until one day, I heard God whisper, "this too. I'll take this too."
He didn't take it through the destruction of the ministry or through some great moral collapse of mine or another leaders. He just gently reached into my heart and told me it was time to walk away. To take a break. To be still and know that regardless of anything else in or around my life that HE was GOD.

There are still moments. When I ask Him if He's sure. If He's SURE that I'll be ok without a defined role. If He's SURE that people will still like me when I'm not doing anything for them. That people would still have things to talk about with me, that I would still be valuable to people.

Because I'm afraid I'm not.
I'm afraid I'm not valuable without reason to others.


Tonight I thought, you know what. I might not be.
I might not have value to others without a reason.


The lesson I hear God trying to tell me over and over again lately is that even if that's true it's fine. It is fine.


Because I am valued by Him


I am precious to Him

And so are you.

Some Days

Some days it's heavier.
Heavier to hold this wondering if I'll ever even out.
If I'll ever stop wondering when the other shoe will drop, when you will leave, when your lies (because I believe they exist) will come to light.

Some days it's harder to believe that it will all be ok and it will all work out in the end.

Some days I have to cling to hope and His promises so tightly I can't feel my heart anymore.

Because I believe this will all be redeemed. I believe that this will all be used for my good and His glory.
Some days I just need to remind myself a little more so I can swing my feet out of bed and face the day knowing my doubts will scream at me from the minute my eyes open until they finally shut again.

Red Flags

I don't trust myself.
My judgement, my decisions, I always think they're probably wrong.
Always.

So when a person comes into my life and I see all of these red flags going up I don't trust the boundaries that I want to set, because what if I'm wrong.
Others don't seem to have a problem with this person.
Others seem to think it's perfectly find to interact with them.

But the thought of hanging around this person makes my head scream

DON'T DO IT

I'm pretty sure I'm right. I don't know that I need to never be in the presence of this person, it would be pretty hard anyway because we're in the same circles, but I definitely think I need to be very VERY aware of the things I say to and around this person. I think that I need to speak the boundaries out loud to this person and hold the consequences in place when the boundaries are inevitably broken.

So I sought council, with my counselor even, and she agreed.

GIANT RED FLAGS

Lies and abuse of trust are very clear indicators that this person isn't trustworthy and isn't someone that I should be delving into a relationship with, especially right now. Because I'm re-assessing my relationships to pursue healthier ones and I'm working to do what's best for me emotionally and mentally I can't afford to deeply invest myself in someone that will be so draining and likely damaging to my forward motion.

But still I worry. What if I'm wrong? What if I'm not looking hard enough for the good in people? What if I'm not giving this person a chance to show me who they really are? What if I lose other people because they don't understand my resistance to being involved with this person?

On healthier days I think, so what?
At some point I need to realize that I am the one that is ultimately responsible for guarding my heart. I am the one that is ultimately responsible for saying no, it's too much, I can't help carry you.

I had a healthier day yesterday, and it felt nice.

Goes Away

We've been working on safety issues in therapy lately. Which of course means that my nightmares have escalated and I've started to have trouble sleeping again.
It always seems to get worse before it gets better.

But I was doing this homework assignment where I'm supposed to identify a belief (about the world not like religious beliefs or something) and as I was working through a belief about how safe I feel with other people and in relationships when the belief that my love makes people go away flowed out of my pen without prompt.
As I read it aloud to my therapist she made me stop and we talked about it.

We talked about how I don't trust that people will stay. That one day I'll be too much for them, either too clingy or too distant, too loud or too soft, too available or too overbooked and they'll grow tired of trying to be my friend or love me and they'll just disappear.
Or they'll die.
Which logically I know doesn't mean they leave me but we weren't really worried about logical at that point.

Because I've been behaving and acting in relationships based out of this belief.

One of the questions I had to ask about the belief is if the source of the belief is reliable.
I had to pause because I thought the source of this belief were the list of people that had left, who had dropped out of relationships with me (through death or by choice of walking away and no longer returning calls) and I felt caved in on when it happened. Some of them I thought were really reliable sources. Because they had been, up until the time they weren't.
But really the biggest source of that belief is me and when it came to how I viewed relationships and my safety in them I had to realize that I was unreliable.
Because I didn't trust that feeling you get when you meet someone knew. I didn't listen to myself when I heard that whisper of  "tread carefully with this one" and I willingly and recklessly gave all of my heart and all of my secrets to them from the word hello.
I allowed them all full access to my heart without allowing the relationship to develop because I was so desperate for someone to care. Someone to see me as I truly was.

Did I scare some of them away? Of course. But the others I should have never let in in the first place.
I felt that if someone was kind to me I needed to befriend them and help them in anyway that I could. I needed to pursue them because they of course wanted to be pursued.

I was treating them the way I wanted to be treated and expecting them to reciprocate.

But that's not how relationships work.
I don't really know how to change that belief, that my love is annoying and too much and people eventually grow weary of me and go away.

I take that back. I think I do know how to change it, and I think it's happening already. Through therapy yes, but a lot of the work is through the talking it out. The speaking aloud and writing out of these fears and this paranoia. Of realizing that I can't and don't control others or their actions and motives but that I should be more protective of my heart. I should let people in, but slowly and intentionally instead of quickly and desperately.

I still feel really unsafe relationally, and day by day I'm figuring out what it means to have healthier relationships and healthy boundaries in them.