So…it has been almost five months since my last post. To be honest, I began one angry and unorganized venting blog months ago, which I have no intention of actually sharing since it was more for me than anyone else. I’ve also had several topics on my mind to write on but have only managed to make a few notes of my initial thoughts on each subject. Nothing too developed or worth sharing as of yet on those topics.
It’s hard to even know where to begin, really, with all of the ups and downs, sunrises and sunsets, smiles and tears.
To be brief, I spent the bulk of the last six months working full-time, from August up until three weeks ago, beginning with a couple of temp jobs and then being hired on for a committed career-driven job. Looking back on that whole six-month period, I really feel now like I had set my consciousness aside, my whole self, just being so enveloped in work and the pursuit of a career that I wasn’t meant for and didn’t even really want, but felt obligated to pursue. It has felt strange to be out of that mindset these last few weeks, to no longer be filled with the intent of purposefully pursuing a way of life that I don’t like. A way of life that is SO not me. And to be honest even further, being anything but myself really takes an emotional toll on me as a person, in every way. To do so makes me feel confined and depressed. This is the state I was driven to and soaked myself in, being so out of myself that I didn’t even realize I had been in that place for some time.
Now, here is a freebie for those of you who don’t know me well. I am good at pretending like I’m alright when I’m really dying inside. I can hide it well from most people, except maybe my mom and a few others, but even then... Generally, if you can see a trace of a broken heart in me, it’s ONLY because I’m letting you see it, possibly because I’m tired of holding it in. Not many know of the many colorful ways I have been hurt over the last six months. I hid my hurt with a big, fake smile and, due to the constant busyness of those months, I really neglected my need to deal with those painful things. At the end of the day, I would simply slump into silent stupor during a brief moment of stillness, stare off into space and…not deal with things.
Four weeks ago, near the end of this six month period, I actually found myself swallowed up in the daze of a sleepless night, despite being absolutely spent from whatever I did that day. It was raining that night and the moment made me nostalgic, so I wrote a blog without stopping or even looking at what I wrote. I crashed when I ran out of thoughts, certain that anything I had typed was incoherent nonsense.
However, a couple of weeks ago, I went back through and read my blog and it was not unclear as I thought it would be. To convey the state I was in that night, here is what I wrote:
“I hear the rain drive on steadily outside my window. I don’t remember the last time it rained here but I’ve missed it. The rain brings to me the comfort of safe memories and the cleansing sense of renewal.
A night like this reminds me of a rainstorm during my sophomore year in college. I was twenty years old, carrying layers of pain on my disfigured young heart, and yet my wild sense of freedom came alive in the pouring night. I remember how cold it was but I didn’t care. I walked just outside my apartment, barefoot in the grass, stopping under the arms of the massive pine tree, to stand with my face upward into the oncoming shower of icy drops. I shivered more and more as the chill crawled its way into my bones but I stayed until I was soaked through.
There is something refreshing to me about standing in the rain, face up, eyes closed and arms to the sky. Something I needed from that experience in that moment. This act certainly did not fix my tattered heart but I felt, in the most tangible way I could feel, the outward expression of God crying with my heart while my own tears remained as immovable stones inside me. I felt Him soften the hardened spirit that clenched my jaw shut, washing clean the soul of grime that paralyzed me on a daily basis.
Hearing the rain tonight makes me want to go out and do that again, to let the rain soak me to my bones. But I’m afraid my free spirit is tired tonight and my naturally wild soul downcast within me. A powerful tension has been wearing on me in so many areas of my life as of late. I could point the finger of blame at the largest of those unpleasant matters, saying that my life would be better if that situation were different and the obstacles it brings removed, but the thread runs deeper. Much deeper.
I feel my heart sitting quietly, trying not to look around and move too much, while wanting so desperately to just start flying. But I’m waiting for something. I’m waiting for the revelation of my purpose. Not in specific terms, of course, but the sense of what I’m ultimately meant to do. Who I’m meant to be. The days are beginning to blur together and the passion that typically exudes from my spirit has run low.
I need to be refreshed. I need to be washed by the rain. Father, please send a rain to refresh my heart.”
Basically, I had come to a pretty dry place in my life. I was ready for some rain. Some refreshment and renewal. I would say that those things have definitely begun to rain down in my life over the last few weeks. The rain has begun to wash away the traces of the mask I wore, the pretend-me that I clung to for all those months. I have felt joy in breathing the clean air again, tasting the freedom of the raindrops over my lips.
I feel the rain softening me again. Re-working the setting for a fire to burn again.
At this point, I wish I could say that the rain has done all its work so I can look to the sky hopefully for my rainbow. In fact, the rain has begun to pour harder. Apparently, I need a little more pressure and cleansing before this storm will end and reveal the rainbow I’ve been dreaming about…but at least I’m not waiting for the rain anymore. I would rather feel this pressure, this washing away of hurtful things and bad habits, than to be where I was before. All I know right now is that I’m just glad to be myself again and “I’m never changing who I am” again.
So…there we are. I know this entry is not the most eloquent thing I have ever written. It may be blunt but it’s real and it’s honest, and those are the only feet I’m really interested in started with as I get back up to write again. I assure you, though, that the other topics I have had rolling around in my brain will come out eventually. More to come soon…
