I have been hard at work healing myself from the trauma of losing my parents. Life was peaceful for a time. But then, suddenly, at the beginning of this year, it all changed. The past ruptured like a great pit in the earth, wherein darkness reached out and grabbed me, and I was back in it again, experiencing it all over like the first time.
Except this time I turned to face it. This time I decided I would not run, I would not split into a thousand pieces, nor would I hide in prayer and fantasy. I would face my hell and I would see what lay on the other side. I would place my hands on my own soul and, with God's guidance, push it back into shape.
And I realized the self was fragmented. I realized there were many pieces of my soul lying about, waiting for me to pick them up and press them together into something singular and beautiful. I was missing parts of myself that I yearned to find again. I yearned to have her back: that parallel me living the life I wanted in the place I belonged. I yearned to know her again.
And I would not consider any other option than to succeed. I would not fail. I would have her back.
And finally, I realized -- God has been waiting for me to see myself as fractured. God has been waiting for me to see that final truth: that I split my own soul when I fell. I was young and God -- the presence and truth that is in all of us, the Father, the Higher Self, the superego, the greater consciousness, the connectedness -- entered my soul in the broken places to repair me from the trauma and the loss. Those parts of myself destroyed are gone forever. God has replaced them with parts of Him. A Frankenstein of Faith. 😉
The beautiful part of meeting Christians is seeing the strange brokenness and the shining wholeness of God's love all at once in the same person.
That part of myself that is greater than me -- that piece of us that extends above and beyond all else, connecting everything, the Holy Spirit -- became like a parent watching over me. The grief sent me into some form of spiritual madness. But in that madness, I searched, and I found a knowing and a truth that was purely visceral, that was purely part of the world and my atoms and my heart. Perhaps the madness was necessary, because when it finally broke, it allowed me to see what was still real.
My purpose was always to serve and to love others, and never in pursuit of my own gains, I can promise you that. I only ever wanted to be honest about my journey, because I knew it was a strange one, yet as real and human as my own hands. I knew inside of my story was my purpose. By observing the workings of the Spirit, I was able to learn, to be mentored, and to be loved unconditionally without question or doubt. And here is the seed that the world can use: the unfiltered truth of my experience, because the Spirit is accessible to all of us. I am no longer afraid of judgment or ridicule. I know you can't find my story to be so strange, after all. Not after all the saints and the prophets and the acolytes that we believe without question. Not after all the ways we already question who we are, even without our trauma splitting us in two. I am writing this for all of us, so we can heal. Because I love you.
And yet, how very strange it is, to know God by having grown up seeing Him as a parent. The truth of it makes me smile, for I finally see how all the threads weave together, where the ropes interconnect. I have my hands on the reins now. I have been outside of You for too long, and I would like to take You back into me. Life is stable, the valley has ended, and now, it is time to be One again.
Knowing God's spirit gives me peace. It tells me I am whole, no matter how imperfect I feel.
The grief, the fear, the pain, all eventually faded away as the trauma passed and the body grew stronger. But the truth of God's love remained. It lent me the strength to carry what otherwise would have destroyed me. What is left is a backbone, like a solid beam of light running through me, whole, and a spiritual strength forged in fire, and the knowing of that truth -- that the deepest purpose of our spirit is to love unconditionally, that we are all one, that what is in me is also in you. To know my spirit as part of the Divine -- to know the Divine as part of myself -- to know my work is God's work, and I am not afraid, and the world is smiling.
I know my life has been led by God's spirit of unconditional love speaking softly to me, writing letters to me, guiding me home. That was always His promise - to bring me home.
This will be the hardest work, to heal, to bear the confusion, or that sense of endless seeking, the wondering at God's purpose, the struggle against falsehoods and why I have been stuck on my path. I can see, now, both the end and the beginning. The old road and the new. She is glorious, and She is coming back into me, fully restored by the grace of God, the one true Healer.
That part of myself that is greater than me -- that piece of us that extends above and beyond all else, connecting everything, the Holy Spirit -- became like a parent watching over me. The grief sent me into some form of spiritual madness. But in that madness, I searched, and I found a knowing and a truth that was purely visceral, that was purely part of the world and my atoms and my heart. Perhaps the madness was necessary, because when it finally broke, it allowed me to see what was still real.
My purpose was always to serve and to love others, and never in pursuit of my own gains, I can promise you that. I only ever wanted to be honest about my journey, because I knew it was a strange one, yet as real and human as my own hands. I knew inside of my story was my purpose. By observing the workings of the Spirit, I was able to learn, to be mentored, and to be loved unconditionally without question or doubt. And here is the seed that the world can use: the unfiltered truth of my experience, because the Spirit is accessible to all of us. I am no longer afraid of judgment or ridicule. I know you can't find my story to be so strange, after all. Not after all the saints and the prophets and the acolytes that we believe without question. Not after all the ways we already question who we are, even without our trauma splitting us in two. I am writing this for all of us, so we can heal. Because I love you.
And yet, how very strange it is, to know God by having grown up seeing Him as a parent. The truth of it makes me smile, for I finally see how all the threads weave together, where the ropes interconnect. I have my hands on the reins now. I have been outside of You for too long, and I would like to take You back into me. Life is stable, the valley has ended, and now, it is time to be One again.
Knowing God's spirit gives me peace. It tells me I am whole, no matter how imperfect I feel.
The grief, the fear, the pain, all eventually faded away as the trauma passed and the body grew stronger. But the truth of God's love remained. It lent me the strength to carry what otherwise would have destroyed me. What is left is a backbone, like a solid beam of light running through me, whole, and a spiritual strength forged in fire, and the knowing of that truth -- that the deepest purpose of our spirit is to love unconditionally, that we are all one, that what is in me is also in you. To know my spirit as part of the Divine -- to know the Divine as part of myself -- to know my work is God's work, and I am not afraid, and the world is smiling.
I know my life has been led by God's spirit of unconditional love speaking softly to me, writing letters to me, guiding me home. That was always His promise - to bring me home.
This will be the hardest work, to heal, to bear the confusion, or that sense of endless seeking, the wondering at God's purpose, the struggle against falsehoods and why I have been stuck on my path. I can see, now, both the end and the beginning. The old road and the new. She is glorious, and She is coming back into me, fully restored by the grace of God, the one true Healer.
