Sunday, January 15, 2012

beggars can't be choosers


I recently found a poem I wrote in college.  It was an assignment for my creative writing class.  Our prompt?  To tell someone off.

Who could you possibly be kidding, everything about you is fake, simply a lie.
You go through every day smiling, attempting this sincerity of the worst kind.
Empty words and actions filling up no one around you.
You’re utterly worthless.
It’s about time you realized it.

I had written it to myself. 

I was out of control—spiraling downward quickly. My mental attacks on my physical body had begun to transform into attacks on my entire being.  Self-destruction. 

Meanwhile, I was shutting myself off from the people around me and yet I was desperate for affirmation that I actually mattered.  I wanted to choose who the affirmation came from and I rejected anything that came from a source with a uterus…which means I rejected many of the people who were reaching out, attempting to care for me and love me well. 

Have you ever found yourself doing this?  In desperate need of outside help, yet rejecting the good before your very eyes when it doesn’t come in the package you want? 

I clung to my damsel in distress card incessantly, waiting for a prince on a white horse to come and save me from myself and the devastation I had created around me.

He never came.  I never allowed my friends to help.
But the Lord was faithful- Christ’s words rang true in my life… “I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish; no one will snatch them out of my hand.” I was safe. 

Where are you looking for affirmation from?  Why?

I distanced myself from other females because I claimed that I couldn’t relate to them or that they didn’t understand me.  I distanced myself from other females because while I knew I needed help, if this was the form it was going to come in I didn’t want it.  It had to be done in my way.  (It wasn’t until a few years ago that I’ve been able to realize the tremendous blessing the Lord has bestowed upon us with same-gender friendships—and how much more I'm understood by them.  Don’t refuse them!)

I'm thankful for how gracious the Lord is with us. 
I challenge you to look at the people you’re willing to open up to and share your life with and try to understand why you’ve chosen them.  Then look at the people who you choose to reject from these inner circles of your life and try to understand why. 

Reevaluate who you think you need to affirmed by, and perhaps give the people who are speaking truth and life into you a chance (no matter who they are).  Listen to them, believe them.  The Lord has them there for a reason.  Reevaluate how you think affirmation needs to come to you, and accept it for what it is…good.

Let go of your own ideals for how and who, and let the Lord speak to your heart in the way only HE knows you need.

May you find comfort there. 

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Send in your own stories of something you have done, thought, or said that might be a bit 'crazy'... Send in your own questions and struggles. 
Let's bring light to the darkness, truth to the lies, and hope to the hopeless.  
You're not alone.  

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