2015. journeying.

journey.
     to take flight into an endless blue sky with no clear understanding of where you may land.  to close your eyes and make the jump without checking there is a safe place beneath you.  to fall.  on purpose.  so that there is a possibility to get back up and try again.  inspiration.

inspiration. 
     this is what inspiration is to me.  we claim to be inspired by events and people and things and talent all the time.  but to be inspired is paralleled with action.  to be set in motion, to start to accomplish something... anything.  it's without inspiration and without movement that we become complacent.  hopeless.

hopeless.
     to live with no light.  
sometimes the comfortability of how we know to survive is easier than moving beyond it.  disappointment is something we know.  struggle is something we know.  and the things we know comfort us.  but how do we un-do the years and years of surviving.  it's the journey of moving beyond this that is the most difficult journey of all.  love.

love.
     the only thing strong enough to combat the mountain ahead.  a thoughtful word from a stranger that penetrates so deeply into your heart, you find the strength to climb to the next ridge.  the journey is the destination.  is yours worth walking?

i am willing.

i have tried to write.  putting pen to paper has been harder than it normally is.  the insight into my soul is resistant to share its inner workings.  but my conscience has forced rigorous honesty to pry open the doors to my heart.  a deadly demon is dancing a dance next to the fire it has set in my chest; the flames are burning me alive.  chaos.  i love it.  my drug of choice, if you will.  i feel the pain coursing through me, but i welcome it.  it's familiar.  i've been here before, and that seems to be more comforting than anything else in the world.  the smoke has fogged my vision, the clear sight i once had is engulfed in confusion.  and then.  silence.  the scariest noise i've ever heard.  it screams so loudly in my head i try to escape myself.  but there's no way out.  as i'm sure i'm about to die, i hear His voice.  i surrender.  i am willing.  i am grateful for one more chance to get it right.  like a snake, i shed my skin of denial.  i feel the warmth of the sun for the first time.  i am naked in my embarrassment.  a hope is born that rages so violently i might explode, and i'm not sure what to do with it.  i catch a glimpse of myself in the mirror, but i don't recognize that it's me.  i begin to weep.  i have never really seen myself before.  i had never taken off the years of make up that i've used to hide myself away.  as the tears wash away the film that has distorted my vision, life comes fully into focus.  not the life i had created, but the life that truly exists before me.  i take one step forward.  it's all i can muster.  but it's one step closer to who i'm supposed to be. 

a knowing.

i can honestly say, that at any given moment, on any given day i can be a complete and utter emotional mess.  in an instant my face can grow hot with anger, or worse jealousy whips her vicious head and my stomach turns upside down in an immediate reaction to her wrath.  i can feel complete serenity, or be overtaken by a warmth of compassion in my heart for every creation i set eyes on.  it's the not knowing that makes each day exciting, but i also feel as though i need to brace myself for the roller coaster ride i'm about to get on.  this journey of life isn't always easy.  i figure if i'm a good person i will live a good life.  from what i can tell, it doesn't really work that way.  great, hard working people get dealt a bad hand and have to learn to bluff the best they can, while i watch others effortlessly float through life with luck on their side.  it doesn't seem fair.  but i also have to remember most things are not as they appear.  there is no guidebook or set of instructions, we have to exhaust every wrong possibility before we finally get so sick of running head first into the same wall that we decide to take a different path.  it takes a steadfast commitment, and a bravery to wake up every morning ready to battle forward.  sometimes we can't.  sometimes we simply bury our head in the sand and lay motionless in the dark hoping life will give us a break and not notice our limp bodies lying lifeless on the ground.  resilience strikes again.  purpose.  a knowing, that if we can just keep moving we will be that much closer to the dreams we wish to make realities.  it's in the moments of weakness that true character shines through.  the countless hours of work we have dedicated to our simple lives comes beaming into existence in those moments we need it the most.  humbled, we have a new appreciation.  our perceptions have been redefined and altered yet again.  a new set of possibilities has expanded our worlds, and like a child we have to learn all over again.  sometimes it feels like life is the same stuff on a different day, but if we can really open our eyes we will see that each day is to experience life again for the first time.  i don't know about you, but today i hardly resemble the person i was even a year ago.     

i am loved.

i've been holding my breath for so long now that my thinking is clouded by insecurities, and reality is now altered by moving pictures which i can no longer delineate as fact or fiction.  regardless of their validity, it all begins to feel real.  i have become prisoner to my mind and over active imagination.  when i close my eyes, the pictures pick up pace and begin to flash brighter and more vividly.  i can't escape.  there's no way to turn this movie off, playing on repeat in my head.  if left to my own devices i'm surely doomed.  it's out of my control and no longer up to me.  maybe it never was.  i feel abandoned and alone.  tears drip into an open wound and the salt stings with each drop.  my body hits bottom with a loud thud that rings incessantly through my ears.  my brain jolts, silence.  i am not alone, and i am not without choices.  i look up into the sun and am blinded by the truth.  i feel His presence, and in that moment i know i am loved. 

a healing.

a healing can only begin once the recognition that something is broken occurs.  the crack is longer and finer than you ever could've imagined, and you try to cover it up with pretty fake smiles and long batting eyelashes.  that glue isn't routed in the truth, therefore will only hold for as long as you can keep up the act.  unfortunately, most people don't care enough to know the real you, the stuff that makes you crazy, or laugh, or love.  but when you find someone who does they have the power to destroy you.  they hold a pin in their tongue, and as they speak it begins to unknowingly poke at our safe, contained bubble.  eventually, you open up enough and their words become dangerously more potent, things you had stored away in the darkness of your memories begins to creep forward.  vivid flashbacks.  flooding emotions.  a re-wiring begins in the brain, and a complete sense of being out of control stings anxiety through the body.  tears begin to glide down your cheek, and soon a consistent, calm stream has made a home there.  in those moments when you are brought to face your fears, to heal, you look to the sky and scream out with graciousness.  you are not alone.  you never have been.  you realize, in that moment, that you never would've made it out alive without His love.  and it's in that moment, between sharp breaths and wild weeping a warmth surrounds your heart reminding you it's not over.  it's just the beginning of an even brighter light to shine from within.  the crack begins to have support, and the proper work is done to create a foundation that can never be broken again. 

take a deep breath.  i repeat this mantra over and over in my head.  as i exhale, i make room for God to fill my soul.  i was so full of toxic energy i wasn't able to find the real guidance i was seeking.  everything i felt i was missing is suddenly filled with the love of Christ.  i feel the muscles in my back begin to relax, and blood starts flowing its course in my matrix of veins.  warmth fills my body, and the color purple drains from my lips.  oxygen nourishes my body, and i begin to feel my soul return to its satisfied state.  this is what happens when i try to do it all on my own.  i forget i don't have to.  i forget my role as a daughter.  i forget that i'm a daddy's girl, for the first time in my life.  i begin to weep.  tears drip down my soft cheek.  these tears are a very real physical reaction to God's love.  He brings me to my knees again.  i am human.  i weep for hours as my mortality rings through by bones.  the tears cleanse my soul as i have asked for help, and it has showed up, as it always does.  LOVE is the definition of God.  and i love with all my might. 

a quote.

this quote spurred a thought and a movement within my soul.  it struck a chord that resonated through my whole body, and made an appearance in my actions.  

"people who need love the most, are those who deserve it the least"