the hard becoming
I'm sitting here with no makeup on, my hair stuck back in a ponytail, in my batman pajama pants drinking a glass of wine and I feel this burning desire in my chest for honesty.
I wish we were sitting face to face in my living room, watching the twinkling lights of my Christmas tree (that I once hated because they are coloured lights and I had a big meltdown in Canadian tire because I wanted the white lights but now I secretly love the coloured ones). I would hand you a glass of wine and I would talk in a way that isn't always possible on a public platform.
I just recently celebrated my birthday and for the first year in a while there was no big deal about my birthday. it was another day, a Monday. I had to work, I went to yoga, I went to the recovery group we're a part of at the local church. I celebrated with my husband on Sunday but was too stuck in my head about making everything work that it didn't feel like my birthday. I celebrated with my family on Tuesday but there was drama that had come up earlier in the day that I was still mentally processing and with my family everything is always loud and fast paced and it felt hard to get a word in. So this birthday didn't feel like my birthday - probably because I put so many expectations on what it should be like.
But one thing I did this birthday year was reflect back on how far I've come.
the day after my birthday I had to go in and get a new drivers license and the lady taking my picture commented on how much had changed between my last picture and this one. It was only a year ago that that other picture had been taken but it was also 50 pounds ago and my hair is darker now and i'm not wearing a snot stained scrub top, rushing in to get this done in the hour break I had between caring for other people's children in a job that felt like it was killing me.
We talked for a while about what I had done. I told her about yoga and how it helped me lose the weight and make some major shifts in my life. And as I walked out after getting my picture taken (i swear those cameras make the dark circles under your eyes even bigger! I do not look that tired in real life) she said to me "You've done good for yourself."
That encounter, even though it was only a few minutes long, stayed with me the rest of the day.
I'm not the same person I was a year ago (and no, its not just the weight loss and the hair and no longer dealing with 20 tiny humans all at the same time all day). I'm not the same person I was when I got married or when I left church.
I've been thinking a lot today about my own road. How I want to change other people. How I want to stubbornly hold myself away from relationship because I got hurt or because the other person did x,y,z. I used to do those things. But that's not true about me anymore. Now I'm learning the importance (vital importance) of boundaries. I'm learning how to untangle myself from codependency, to stop trying to control others reactions once I have spoken my truth in love, to still engage with the difficult people in my life in a way that is loving to both them (tough love, people) and myself by creating and sticking to boundaries (and sometimes this looks like ceasing to communicate for a while but more often than not it looks like asking myself the hard questions and sitting with what comes up).
I'm learning what it means to love myself. In a real, hard, messy, honest way that looks like freedom. And a lot of people don't get it. It looks different than anything I was taught growing up and sometimes it doesn't fit with how we believe freedom should look but I'm learning to be ok when others don't get it. The only validation I need is from myself. I need to be able to look at myself in the mirror every morning and know that I did what I needed to do, that I am true to myself.
This is a daily process. Sometimes i think there is too much loss and pain and cost. But every second of it feels like coming home to myself.
I'm not the same person I was a year ago. A lot of people don't know what to do with that. Sometimes i don't even know what to do with that. But I'll tell you what i do know and that is that i'm listening for the voice of divine love at every corner. I'm listening to my own heart and caring less about what others think and expect. I'm making mistakes but i'm giving myself permission to make those mistakes and make apologizes and be selfish and maybe what i feel is right right now won't be right tomorrow or next week but that's ok. i'm learning to live in grace.
Tonight i wish we could sit in my living room and drink wine and talk about all these life changes and heart changes and the hard, messiness of it all. Maybe i'll tell you about it sometime.
tonight i'm going to bed alone. because i'm learning to love my own company. because i'm learning to hold the rich honesty of these stories in my body and sitting with them rather than throwing it around like a hot potato i'm trying to get off my chest.
this is the healing, holy work of freedom. it changes you. you'll lose people you thought were in your corner. you will have to fight tooth and nail to not shrivel up and shrink back and become small. but what i'm learning is that its worth it.
I wish we were sitting face to face in my living room, watching the twinkling lights of my Christmas tree (that I once hated because they are coloured lights and I had a big meltdown in Canadian tire because I wanted the white lights but now I secretly love the coloured ones). I would hand you a glass of wine and I would talk in a way that isn't always possible on a public platform.
I just recently celebrated my birthday and for the first year in a while there was no big deal about my birthday. it was another day, a Monday. I had to work, I went to yoga, I went to the recovery group we're a part of at the local church. I celebrated with my husband on Sunday but was too stuck in my head about making everything work that it didn't feel like my birthday. I celebrated with my family on Tuesday but there was drama that had come up earlier in the day that I was still mentally processing and with my family everything is always loud and fast paced and it felt hard to get a word in. So this birthday didn't feel like my birthday - probably because I put so many expectations on what it should be like.
But one thing I did this birthday year was reflect back on how far I've come.
the day after my birthday I had to go in and get a new drivers license and the lady taking my picture commented on how much had changed between my last picture and this one. It was only a year ago that that other picture had been taken but it was also 50 pounds ago and my hair is darker now and i'm not wearing a snot stained scrub top, rushing in to get this done in the hour break I had between caring for other people's children in a job that felt like it was killing me.
We talked for a while about what I had done. I told her about yoga and how it helped me lose the weight and make some major shifts in my life. And as I walked out after getting my picture taken (i swear those cameras make the dark circles under your eyes even bigger! I do not look that tired in real life) she said to me "You've done good for yourself."
That encounter, even though it was only a few minutes long, stayed with me the rest of the day.
I'm not the same person I was a year ago (and no, its not just the weight loss and the hair and no longer dealing with 20 tiny humans all at the same time all day). I'm not the same person I was when I got married or when I left church.
I've been thinking a lot today about my own road. How I want to change other people. How I want to stubbornly hold myself away from relationship because I got hurt or because the other person did x,y,z. I used to do those things. But that's not true about me anymore. Now I'm learning the importance (vital importance) of boundaries. I'm learning how to untangle myself from codependency, to stop trying to control others reactions once I have spoken my truth in love, to still engage with the difficult people in my life in a way that is loving to both them (tough love, people) and myself by creating and sticking to boundaries (and sometimes this looks like ceasing to communicate for a while but more often than not it looks like asking myself the hard questions and sitting with what comes up).
I'm learning what it means to love myself. In a real, hard, messy, honest way that looks like freedom. And a lot of people don't get it. It looks different than anything I was taught growing up and sometimes it doesn't fit with how we believe freedom should look but I'm learning to be ok when others don't get it. The only validation I need is from myself. I need to be able to look at myself in the mirror every morning and know that I did what I needed to do, that I am true to myself.
This is a daily process. Sometimes i think there is too much loss and pain and cost. But every second of it feels like coming home to myself.
I'm not the same person I was a year ago. A lot of people don't know what to do with that. Sometimes i don't even know what to do with that. But I'll tell you what i do know and that is that i'm listening for the voice of divine love at every corner. I'm listening to my own heart and caring less about what others think and expect. I'm making mistakes but i'm giving myself permission to make those mistakes and make apologizes and be selfish and maybe what i feel is right right now won't be right tomorrow or next week but that's ok. i'm learning to live in grace.
Tonight i wish we could sit in my living room and drink wine and talk about all these life changes and heart changes and the hard, messiness of it all. Maybe i'll tell you about it sometime.
tonight i'm going to bed alone. because i'm learning to love my own company. because i'm learning to hold the rich honesty of these stories in my body and sitting with them rather than throwing it around like a hot potato i'm trying to get off my chest.
this is the healing, holy work of freedom. it changes you. you'll lose people you thought were in your corner. you will have to fight tooth and nail to not shrivel up and shrink back and become small. but what i'm learning is that its worth it.
Comments
Post a Comment