Gentleness and peace. As I walk in what feels like a hurricane, that’s what I feel. That’s what is filling my heart. I have taken my hands off of everything I can think of and that’s what took its place. I am confident in the Lord and sure of who He made me. We are partners 😁☺️ and the truth is there is nothing I handle alone if that’s what I want. I am still shaky with the thought He might give me one or many of the dreams, hopes and goals I have surrendered to Him. I am a little worried I dream too small and ask for too little and I will only end up dissapointed. But I rest assured that He is big enough to hold my dissapointments as well as my joys. And I know that He will make something beautiful out of it either way because He is kind like that. After so many years of relentless fear, the places in my heart that it dragged down are so light I am afraid they will just lift away. The same way fear hid behind certainty, freedom, for me, comes with an uncertainty. A very specific uncertainty that used to be debilitating once again arose; the question of “What’s next?”. I am learning to trade fear for trust and use it as a lifeline in the dawn of that inevitable uncertainty. The other day I pondered a possible future that would be really hard and full of things I don’t know and things that I would most certainly fail at and I thought to myself, in perfect peace, I could do that, if I want. The landslide of worry didn’t come. And so I pondered another and nothing. It doesn’t feel real. I’ve felt the all consuming false promise of apathy and can tell you it’s not that. It’s as if I never knew peace because when the moment came I didn’t even recognize it. It’s true that I tend to have a hard time letting go and moving into new things but a new understanding is sifting into the cracks of my heart. The understanding of impermanence. “Finite” used to be the rudest descriptor I could get. There was something about things leaving that my heart could not handle, though so many things in my life came with that descriptor pasted front and center in ways I couldn’t ignore. “Impermanent”. And everything slowly followed suit to this black hole of a word. I became relentless in my pursuit of preservation and empty to where my endeavors failed. It scared me. I refused to look at it. Everything on earth is impermanent to some degree leaving nowhere to run. “Everything I owned must be preserved.” It was never said but I could see it’s hands threaded through so many stories…but this pursuit was not universal. Once I read of these monks who made beautiful, elaborate works of art out of sand. They took weeks to put every grain in it’s perfect place. Then with it was just right, they blew it all away. Nothing urked me more. Anger, sadness, fear, exasperation “How could they?! I could never”. It reminded me of how fleeting everything was and they called it beautiful. I’ve struggled with mourning that sucked me down so far I almost couldn’t make it back, and my refusal to accept reality made even the smallest loss brutal. It didn’t matter if the loss was good for me I wasn’t gonna let it go. And just as subtly as that lie made it’s way in, God started chipping away at it. I was afraid. Everything I love comes to an end. I come to an end. It makes everything so important and drains its meaning. “Is ____ worth it if I will lose it?”. My sadness told me no, but a hope under the weight of my being started to grow. “I hope it is.” This scraggly dandelion in the concrete of a thought started to push through. “Loss and death come in this world but some things don’t fit the mold” it whispered. “Love doesn’t end with loss.” “Do you really want life without love?” “If nothing impermanent is welcome then what is it all for?” At the hands of all the impermanent things I was taught to love and be loved. Love was always there and love remained when they were gone. The Lord knows how much I want my life to matter. How I want to “live”. I can sit and cry, too afraid to love and He will be with me to comfort me or I can stand and love more and bigger and He will be with me to comfort me. It’s my choice. I finally wanted to change. I haven’t quite figured out how to love when it hurts or let go when I still had so much more I wanted to give, but I want to. I dont want that old fear. I want to live. I want to love without abandon. I’ve taken a sledgehammer to the concrete in hopes that the death of one dandelion can bring so many others. I am grateful for impermanence, because I can change. Gentleness and peace. As I walk in what feels like a hurricane, that’s what I feel. That’s what is filling my heart. I have taken my hands off of everything I can think of and that’s what took its place.
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