I could very easily go into the details of the last few weeks/months, but to be honest I don't want to. I am fully aware that each and every time we face trials in our lives, we can grow from them so I chose to grow. I am thankful that along the way I have the most amazing friends that keep reminding me what Joy is. Laughter is always a good medicine.
Today has been a day unlike an other for me. I have allowed myself to become lazy and distracted lately and it is no ones fault but my own, and it was time to get back in touch with reality. My day started as they always do, way too early and not enough coffee. The rain beating against my windows as the alarm went off made me feel like it would be best to roll over and pull the covers of my amazingly comfortable over sized bed up and over my head and sleep the morning away! But wait.... I am a Mom and at this current state until my partner in crime returns from Guatemala, a single mom. So reluctantly I got out of bed and began getting my kids up and at it this morning. Let me add that people in Arkansas act as if Rain will kill them so they forget how to drive when the rain hits! I have no patience when it comes to that so after 15 min on the interstate I jumped off and took the back country roads towards my kids school! Deliverance movie rolling in my head the whole time!
After pulling through to get my starbucks life support, I received a phone call from an old student that seemed urgent so I turned the stereo down and gave her my undivided attention. This is where a light bulb went off for me. As she began to describe her predicament I began to think back to the way I viewed myself at her age and the way soooooo many of my friends viewed themselves. I began to grasp every word she spoke as if they were my own knowing more than she realized the depth of her broken little heart. She spilled everything. The need to achieve human acceptance, especially that of men. The broken heart after broken heart after broken heart. The image issues that she struggled with. The whole time I am hearing this I am thinking to myself "Do you know who you are?" From the outside looking in she is one of the most accomplished, talented, beautiful young ladies I know, and yes she is in fact a true lady. She told me about these relationships that she keeps running back to after she gets hurt, the whole time trying to convince me that she is what these people needed....she was their Messiah. She never said that but it was like she thought that maybe one more go around with these losers and they would see the truth. Nothing was ever good enough she felt....and she was never worthy. Not to mention that the kind of guys she would get caught up with were thugs to say the least. Her relationship with her parents is horrible and her mom is emotionally checked out, and her dad is another story. She talked for a few minutes and asked if she could call me later. I agreed knowing she was going to want answers. After we hung up I began to think about what causes young people to feel the way they do, especially girls. Where does it all began. The crazy thing is the more I thought about it, the more I began to feel uncomfortable and sad. How in the world was I going to give this girl advice? I had to go back and look at where my life started taking a turn. Where I stopped looking at others to give me the identity that God had already established. I began to realize that we often allow people to put us on the back burners if you will until we are needed and that is where we find that pit of loneliness and depression. Why do we do this to ourselves. We spoke off and on through the day. I saw a pattern with her. She gets hurt by people that she loves or thinks she loves and because the reality of what love is has never been experienced by this child she runs back to the very ones that hurt her in hopes it wont happen again. Every relationship she had this cycle. The strange thing is she has grown comfortable with the rejection to the point that she brings a lot of it on herself. Our final conversation of the day, and I am well aware that this is just the beginning, was centered around finding your self worth and identity in God. I wanted everything to tell her to drop the loser friends, dump the idiot thug, etc. but instead I knew that would drive her closer to what was hurting her. So, instead I challenged her to a quest. One that will help her see the beauty and value that she has.
There comes a point in our lives that we have to stop looking for others to believe in us and we have to believe in ourselves. Having the faith that God will complete the work He started if we give him that opportunity, even when no one else believe it can happen. Not long after our conversation I was in a challenging meeting pushing me to go further than I have ever gone. Scared and excited at the same time, I am ready to move forward. I can look back at my life over the past 31 years and smile. I have accomplished more than I have ever thought possible and I am just beginning. I have the right people around me that believe in me when I cant believe in myself. I am loved and I love. What an amazing place to be. I want that for my students and I want that for my kids.
I told my young friend today that I am confident that if I spoke with or ran into ANYONE from my past, they would not know who I was, but I finally do, and I pray the same thing for her.
My evening came to a close as my brave 7 yr old daughter, Hadyn convinced me to let her cut off all of her hair. She wanted so bad to donate it to locks of love in honor of two of our students that are fighting cancer. She is a cool kid!
So its not a funny blog but suck it up Peter....I cant always be funny.....I am not a light switch! =)
hey :) i am glad i came and found your blog again... great post. I love you.. please keep blogging!
ReplyDelete