I was looking for a particular journal entry this morning.  There is no “search” feature provided by the software I use so it is a process of hunt and peck, hit and miss!  This isn’t the one I was looking for but it is the one that I found and that stuck.  I don’t make a practice of sharing my journaling’s as they are generally just for me.  Reflection, introspection, soul-searching.  There’s something therapeutic about putting thoughts down where you can see them.  It makes that feeling, that problem, that challenge, that emotion more tangible. It gives you something to grab onto even if you can’t quite wrap your head around it at the moment.  Even if you’re debating to share, or not to share with that small circle of friends.  And then, if to share, who to share with?

Then came the call from a friend and I realized these were words they needed to hear.  And I thought, if there is one, maybe there is more than one.  So, it has been over a year since I penned these words for one…for me.  It is time to share with many.

July 29, 2016, Friday 9:26 am

It’s an exhausting battle we fight. Not a battle with another but with ourselves and the past. Time. The time we tell ourselves will bring healing but it doesn’t come fast enough for our liking or packaged the way we had hoped. We want to live in the moment and look to the future, the past remaining shackled to our ankle as we search for the key that will unlock and free us from who we were and who we want to be. Misery is our company. It’s our comfort zone…a pity party for one. As much as we yearn to break away from the pain of the past it is what we have known. It may have been all that we’ve known. Not all the memories are of desperation but they are so embedded they overshadow those rare moments of childlike bliss. Those glimmers of hope that we have yet learned how to reach out and grasp because every attempt in the past has resulted in missing the brass ring on the carousel of life. Why can those moments of pure elation not consistently rise to the surface and why can we not push the darkness into the depths where it belongs exposing the light that we seek? Do we fixate too much time on finding the illumination where that time would be better spent shining the light we have? Regardless how bright or how dim we all have it and I believe it begins with us casting off fear, insecurity, and even shame to share our authentic selves. The “Me” God meant us to be.

In the past, we have gone it alone and alone now we try to rescue ourselves expecting different results. We can no more resurrect ourselves than can a candlelight its own wick. We need to find that match to rekindle that flame of possibilities but fear the fire as we have been burned before. So we stand in the shadow as we see our light in the distance still too far away to see whether it is a person, place, or experience that will illuminate our way. With careful, measured steps we move toward the light. We think to ourselves, “Will we be wounded again or is this part of the healing process?”

And so the healing begins. You feel the warmth of the sun on your face. It had always been there, just hidden from your view by the clouds of discontent. You are now in the light. Bathing in it, breathing it in until you begin to glow from the inside out. How you have seen others shine like this and wondering if you ever would. If you ever could.

You will.
You can.
You do.
You are that something wonderful.
Others will be patient with you.
Give yourself that same benefit.