I have come to love silence. What once scared me and I seem to think I would never experience is now the part of life I find peace and pure enjoyment of the moments it offers.
There was a point in life when the voices of my past, present, and future would scream within my mind as they all seemed to be running wildly with no control or taming. The lies that had been told to me over many years that at one point I was good at stuffing had risen to the surface. I believed them so much I ended up participating in their game by adding lies of my own that I treated as truths. I spent countless energy living up to what others believed and said of me endlessly trying to live up to the expectations of others and the world all while looking for love and acceptance. This endless exhaustion of fighting the negative screaming inside my head and endless exhaustion of living to please others would eventually lead to a nervous breakdown, My past had bound me tightly with its chains of worthless destruction that I could not see the value that was underneath the weight of it all. I thought God had walked away so I had chosen to walk away. I thought he went back on his promises so why would I continue a path in a relationship with another promise breaker?
After the nervous breakdown and truly losing all of myself, I found myself in a position of the desperation of wanting to see if God and I could fit in each other's lives again. I wanted to find the God I wanted to know about, not the God who I thought I knew, but who I wanted to know. I wanted to find the God of acceptance, love, forgiveness, and freedom. I so clearly remember thinking it is coincidental the timing of Sheila W. book and study coming out called In The Middle Of The Mess. I was caught deep in the middle of my mess with nowhere to go or turn and all my efforts of trying to find myself and find my voice on my own only led to further destruction of myself. I had now reached a point of almost complete isolation except for my screaming racing thoughts. I desperately wanted it all to stop and life to end. Many times I would say what kind of life and promise is this? Is this called love? In those moments of learning how Sheila talked about reaching and learning complete honesty with God, I found myself learning to be real and brutally honest with a God that I was afraid of. I reached a point that all my honesty could get me was what I thought I so desperately wanted; a desperate end to life. That did not turn out to be the plan. The plan that I could not see at the time was to allow me to safely learn to dump and express myself in the most vulnerable ugly way I knew how and show me safety which would later show me, love. At one point in the process while driving in a really bad thunderstorm and watching lightning strike down and hit the road several hundred feet up in front of me, I slammed on my brakes, hitting my hands off the steering wheel, while putting my head further to the windshield looking up at the sky in complete anger and disgrace saying "Really, God, you missed!" Talk about ugly and brutal. The process was not a quick one by any means, as I still did not trust God. Matter of fact, I still struggle with trust. He knew where I was, he knew my heart was broken and shattered, he also knew he had a plan for my life. He knew I needed a place to express my thoughts, feelings, and emotions with love and not judgment. He knew I needed to find safety in learning to take baby steps to trust again.
As time would oh so slowly progress, he would begin to place the people he wanted in my life that I could have never done on my own. People who would either continue to walk through my mess (the very few lefts) and the people who would enter in the middle of the mess and speak life into me. Those who saw what I did not see. Those who had hope when I had no hope and would find ways to carry me or lift me up when I would fall or fall back.
Living with nightmares/ terrors, flashbacks, and debilitating fear left me desperate for healing as I slowly was reaching for hope. I would try in whatever little means I could form in my mind fight to find some type of help for myself. Those countless, raw brutal prayers of the desperation of please God do something show me something because your plan is just not fair right now would not always be the answers I was looking for but small cracks of opportunity to continue putting one step forward at a time. When I had no mind left to do simple tasks, he would hear my prayer and one small step at a time would calmly give me a thought or guide me one step at a time. It was no longer still just for 5 minutes but one small thing at a time, one thing of thanks at a time (sometimes just washing a coffee pot) to keep me moving forward towards finding hope in what seemed to be a hopeless time of life. As those little things would grow and the direction to helping myself would grow, I slowly started coming around and finding breaks of small moments of being okay. While experiencing those breaks of feeling okay, I would experience many fears and negative feelings with them as well. I truly had to begin to learn to accept it was okay to not be okay and okay was safe and good as well. I had to learn to accept and love my okays and not okays. A beginning process of learning to change and renew my thoughts and mind. Making choices to not wanting to be consumed by the lies of not living up or being good enough. All I had to do at the time was be good enough for one small task and one positive thought at a time. Much harder than it sounds for a person who was stuck in a cycle of self negative destruction from traumas of the past.
One small prayer at a time would eventually lead to opportunities while watching things online on trauma, deliverance, etc. I was still under the mindset I had to work my way to meeting God halfway in order for him to accept me fully. But in this process, that small quiet yet at times loud prayers of slow my racing mind and silence the negative screaming voices in my head would be just the small steps needed for me to gain small steps of trust. So much of what I didn't see at the time, I can now look back and see now. Truly from a God of love and acceptance for each beautiful broken shattered piece of my life.
I clearly remember a couple months ago around the beginning of March watching an online message by Kevin Riordan on Breaking Trauma I will try to watch it if I can stay connected to wifi. Totally a God thing as I rarely ever manage to watch something beginning to end. He got to the end of his message and then began to lead everyone in prayer. Once again I told myself I will go along with the prayers. What do I have to lose to just participate, but nothing will happen. I haven't made it far enough for God to meet me where I am on this journey. Let's just say God has a sense of humor and had other plans. Right there sitting on my bed, I found myself completely broken before God in a completely different way. That night I started experiencing deliverance and healing from trauma and a broken heart. I wasn't quite sure what all was taking place as there was so much I experienced over several hours. That was the night the nightmares/ terrors would end. Not even a week later, God would once again meet me in another real way I would totally not expect to bring another level of healing to a wounded shattered heart. I would be touched by his presence twice in a powerful way that brought about two visions. One vision was laying in a white cloud with gray shadows. I would come to realize the connection was being pillowed by the soft comfort and love of the father and my shame and shadows were being absorbed and pulled from within me and would no longer define my shame. The second encounter and vision was seeing a bright soft orange glowing light that would later form a soft red fuzzy heart cloud that would allow me to understand a glimpse of radiance and a love that was not cookie cutter defined but full of soft love, and not something sharp and harsh that I had come to know.
As I sat last night, in the much-appreciated silence while spending time in my Journaling Bible I was reflecting on the many miracles and healing that has been taking place in my life recently. I have hit some difficult times and spots feeling as if I lost myself and my salvation but coming back around despite how I was feeling and the circumstances that were lies trying to define me, I was still loved and cared for by a God who loves me and cares for my hurts and feelings. As I watched the impossible with my dog become a miracle that would transform before my eyes and needs are met in ways I could never fathom or expect let alone do on my own, all because he cares about so many small details and uses those details to show glimpses of his love for me. To be reunited with my dog after two years and be greeted as if I was never forgotten and it was just 5 minutes ago and be loved so unconditionally and give back as if time was never remembered showed me an aspect of unconditional love that does not put time requirements and restrictions in place for definition of love. The miracle of life and healing even in his creation and gifts of our beloved pets. How much more does he love me and the details of my life I have not yet realize matter so much to him to save my life from an untimely death, just like he helped me save my dog's life from an untimely death.
As I continue to grow in this process I am learning to step out and do things, face things I would have never thought I would be able to face. Yes scary, but empowering to be given strength and courage to face my fears and challenge the lies and thoughts that would try to continue to debilitate me. Truly a renewing of my mind in the process.
As I spent some time in Philippians last night I was empowered by the words of Paul when he says "Focus on this one thing: Forgetting the past and looking forward to what lies ahead...Hold onto to the progress we have already made." I can leave the past of abuse (others and self), trauma, etc behind. It no longer defines who I am. I can hold on to the progress with how far I have come in my freedom and healing. The process of finding beautiful in broken. The words spoken in Joel 2:25 "I will restore to you the years that the swarming locust has eaten, the hopper, the destroyer, and the cutter, my great army which I sent you." are truly being played out as I watch in awe the things that I thought were of value to be taken and replaced with something so much greater. The things I once thought were lost coming back in miraculous ways with such a greater appreciation because of broken and shattered being beautiful. While brokenness beyond myself was once thought of as deaths cry for desperation, is becoming something beautiful. It was necessary in order to change all the once was, and begin to learn the "I am beginning a new thing" as beautiful. No shame no regrets, just valuable lessons that now offer appreciation to learning to experience love, forgiveness, and acceptance that I would have never known otherwise.
I realize my transparency and journey has not been seen as beautiful, but beauty is not always found without digging and persevering through the dark and dirty parts of life. The mining of diamonds in the coal, the mining of gold from the muddy ground, the breaking and cracking of clams to find the priceless pearls. It takes work to find beauty in what needs to become broken first. I have no idea about the purpose of my pain and transparency, but I am finding the purpose of no longer hiding running and trying to hide from shame in the wrong direction. I don't know who my story maybe for one day, but I do know my story is not over and has given me a beautiful story of love and redemption for myself by a God who loves me just as I am who saw that my time here was not finished and has a greater purpose beyond what I may try to want to plan but that he is planning for me.
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