10012016 The Gift
TRIGGER WARNING include this Trigger Warning right up front. Because I’ve had some crazy days and nights in my life, and I don’t want to cause anyone else to stumble. So if you’re a former addict, a former cutter, a former suicide risk, a former anything that you may be in danger of revisiting, please don’t read this today.
I’m weary. Battle worn. It’s been a tough week. Month actually. More has been through my brain and heart this past month than all the vehicles that run the interstate to the East.
I’m worried. I struggle with the right and the ordained. There’s a deep chasm between the two and for me, the sacred ordainment is of greater value. All is emergent, and I war with choice.
In this world, there is not an organization that waits by desks with dispatchers and service people who are trained and at the ready to handle the brokenness that exists within it. There just isn’t a “place” for people to go when they are submerged in thick situations.
I’ve been given a gift. I’ve been given a heart for others and the ability to jump in and do things without request or permission. I love this ability, but I am also afraid of the gift. The gift is painful and expensive. It is lovely and lonesome all at the same time. I’m in a hole I was in before, and I can’t seem to reconcile the lapse of time or judgement. I can only ask, “How did I get here again?”
Wednesday night, I was sharing some things with a young man and one of the things I said surprised me… we discussed life and the growth that happens over time, if we’re in tune with it. I told him how proud I am of him, and how I think he should be pleased with himself as well. He expressed that he wasn’t quite there yet, comparing the place I am in life with the place he is. I bent low and whispered in his ear, “You think I have my stuff together? Well, I don’t. Nobody really ever does.” It was very true – I don’t often say things that aren’t – but it surprised me how I found freedom in admitting that to him. I was offering that freedom to him, obviously; however, I was taken aback at how relieved I felt myself. Nobody really ever does.
It’s 3 o’clock and I still have a sink full of dishes and a laundry room’s worth of work. We are to be at a block party in two hours and I haven’t yet made my side dish. I’ve not done my hair or face. I should be up and doing something, but instead, I’m writing. It’s what I do when I need to release.
Last week, I wrote about how I cut to release. I’m happy to disclose that I have found more healthy alternatives now. The need hasn’t changed, the method has. I am feeling right now, how I felt in that tiny bedroom all those years ago. I’m full, at max capacity for anything. I’m exhausted mentally, physically, and spiritually. The only emotion I can process right now is frustration, and the only physical sign of that is tears. I need a break or I’m going to break.
I’m fractured in ways that once seemed impossible. For the world, for the injured, for our country, for those on the edge, for the homeless, for the enslaved, for veterans, for the grieving, for students, for my parents, for those being trafficked, for my extended family, for the abused, for friends, for the addicted, for my tribe, for the people who are walking dead, and for myself.
In the past week, I have seen too much, heard more than I could handle, smelled the stench of unaddressed issues, and watched as people around me went about their days and efforts to hold together all the shattered things. I listened, I laughed, I cried, I prayed, I learned, I had hope, I sensed, I hoped, I felt, I dug, I stayed awake, I made myself be present.
In all the things that happened, my honest presence, staying awake, sensing, and listening have affected me indelibly. The living and loving into people have changed me in ways I can’t even process right now. I’m completely bankrupt and wrecked. I’m okay with that. I’m just in a holding pattern where I can’t do anything else until I rest up and see it as it is. I can’t even really write coherently.
Still, I must.
For me.
I must remember this feeling. Uncomfortable, battered, bruised, tender, ashamed, mutilated, the undeniable awareness of a life well wasted. To the best of my ability, I have honestly surrendered everything of myself this month, and given it to God, for the greater good of others. I couldn’t ask for a better month, I can’t think of anything else I would rather have been doing. I’m pleased with myself, but I am also smart enough to know that it wasn’t me.
Me is who showed up when the tears came. Me is who surfaced every time a sadness washed over. Me is the one drowning. Me is upset and angry. Me is frustrated and impatient. Me is feverishly spinning in an effort to make it perfect. That’s me. That’s where I’m ashamed. The guilt of trying to do it my own way is weighty and a true burden. I’m not stuck here, I’ll rise again.
But not today. Today, I’m going to sit and be shattered and I’m going to allow all this to cut me deep, so I will remember for tomorrow. Because tomorrow, there will be more hurt and sadness, pain and brokenness, and listening and helping and loving and tender thoughts and all the things that this horribly sinful and detached world is full of and in full need of; and there is no dispatch center or service members to run in and save the day. That’s up to us as a people. We have to jump in and fight it together, for each other – with each other.
Where are you? Are you full and ready to go? Then go. Are you depleted and forlorn? Then linger. Feel it. Rest in it. Rest from it. Rest.
Then rise and go. Someone’s waiting for you. Someone needs your gift.
Momma Rich's 