I Break Past Your Barriers

If My Sky Should Fall

so much to look forward to

those grey skies just can’t have me anymore
it’s been so long since I
ran in the sun -
thinking I was trapped in the storm,
no chance to be warm.

but suddenly I’ve realized
there’s nothing holding me there
no chains, no ropes, no cage I’m in -
the door wide, I’ll cross the threshold,
out of the cold.

those grey skies just can’t have me anymore
for years they’ve tortured me -
held me close, whispered dark lies,
covered my eyes.

now they’re open and I see
a sun shining just for me -
no thunder here, no whipping rain
just warmth for miles,
waiting smiles.

warmth for miles

it’s for the taking
and I’m game.

I’m game.

Me is {more than} enough.

I wrote this post over 4 months ago. It is the culmination of a tangled, emotional struggling and growth, something of a metamorphosis, that I’ve undergone in the past few years. When I wrote it, I was standing on the edge of a precipice looking into a great divide, and I was ready to step off, not knowing if I was going to fly or fall. For awhile, I didn’t care which. As it turns out, I found I was carrying a bridge to the next peak in my own back pocket, and in unfurling it, what “fell” was this post, out of my heart and soul, onto the digital page. Something in me cranked, turned, and locked into place. I was absolutely sure I was going to publish the piece; I often publish my ugly stuff, my emotional wailings, and then… I didn’t. 

At the Blissdom Conference, Brené Brown was the Opening Keynote Speaker. I sat there in awe as she started talking about shame, about vulnerability and fear, and hot tears pricked the corners of my eyes. My mouth fell open when I heard her saying things I had written in this post. I had written that I was enough, that I accepted myself, and then I didn’t publish. Somewhere in there, I was telling myself “I am enough… but not quite enough to publish to the world that I am enough.” Kind of ironic, no?

Brené reminded me that when I allow myself to be vulnerable and truly open with the world, I am the happiest me that can exist. Yes, it can be frightening, but there is no more real way to live. And so I pull this out of drafts, I hit publish, and I affirm that I mean what it says. I hope it speaks to someone. It’s a truth from my heart.

~

I am {learning to be} comfortable with who I am. I know I am a being in process, unrefined, unsure, and, in many ways, different from others, different than you.

I accept me for who I am.

This has not always been the truth. Far from it, in fact.

For most of my life I have badly wanted to be accepted by others and worried that I would not be liked because I am not who or what others expect/desire me to be. My family taught me it is okay to be different. Society screamed at me {in whispers, with looks, in rumors, on television, in magazines, and at lunch break during school} that it was a lie! Different is bad, the world at large wanted me to be sure.

During grade school, my hair was dorky, my clothes weren’t “cool enough”, my ears poked out too far, and I was a nerd for genuinely liking to read and learn. I lived in the South, and most of my peers went to church and believed in God – I didn’t. I liked popular music, but also classical and old rock, preferred dorky to preppy, and laughed with a hitch. (#snort)

Most of the time I was okay with all of that.

Except for the times when I wasn’t. You know the times; the moments when others, intentionally or not, make you doubt yourself for your differences. Those moments shaped me in an ugly way. Those were the moments when I wished I was anything but me, anywhere but inside my own skin. I learned to put on a tough act, pretend I didn’t care. But I did, I cared so much it hurt.

I don’t think any of us are inherently comfortable with being put down, cast aside. I sure am not. It’s a painful thing. If you can accept that pain and move on, you’re golden.

I’ve begun to learn to accept Pain as the Dark Valley lying far below the Peak of Joy.

I’d never understand how high that summit was if I hadn’t climbed there from the foothills.

The disparity lends meaning to each extreme. I wish for it to make us focus on the blessings of our joys more greatly. Unfortunately, many of us (myself included, during a great many times in my life) dwell in that pain instead, and refuse to let it go, even when we’re at the peak.  Somehow, we take it with us, wrapped like a shroud.

That’s a negativity that can color as much of your life as you give it room to roam over.

So, for much of my life I have said and done things here and there, again and again, to try to gain acceptance from others. This is not to say that I haven’t also been true to myself in many ways and embraced many of my differences but there has always been an undercurrent of intense need that has made me strive to be what others want from me.

What a foolish waste of time. What an endless recipe for misery.

The acceptance that follows from such a practice is false. It may feel good briefly, or on the surface, but it is acceptance under pretense and deception.

It is an illusion.

As an adult, and increasingly in the past several years, I have grown tired of trying to please others to gain approval, to appear to be someone I am not in order to receive {perceived} acceptance and {false} fellowship.

I am not interested in relationships built around the idea that I should change, am not what I should be, think/feel/believe the wrong things, need help to be better, am broken, or need to be or do more *whatever* to be good enough.

And while I’d like to say I don’t need others, I will fully admit that I do. This is also something new for me; this is part of shedding the “tough act.” I DO need friends. I DO need support. I DO need people who care about me.

However: I do not need you to solve my problems. I do not need you to guide me. I need you to care about me, have an interest in my well-being, want to laugh with me, and be willing to listen when I need or want to talk. I need you to accept me for who I am, what I am comfortable with, and what I am not. I need for you to like me for who I am, or leave me alone.

I need you to like me, to even love me, for who I am right now, in this very moment.

And I will do the same for you.

If we are different, I am happy to find our similarities and celebrate them. I am happy to accept our differences and move forward. It *is* okay to be different, that really is true. What I have come to feel very deeply is that when you can accept someone, despite their differences, without trying to change them, that is true acceptance.
That is the basis for real friendship, humanity, and love.

[I am also okay with not needing to be friends with everyone. Tolerance and acceptance are the most important when there are differences that drive us apart.]

When I was a little girl, I loved Popeye, and I delighted in him saying, in his scruffy, twisty voice, “Iyam what Iyam, and that’s all that Iyam!” And I guess that’s what I’m saying. I am what I am, and that’s all that I am. And it’s enough.

I am Me.

I am {learning, growing, adjusting to being} comfortable with who I am. I know I am a being in process, unrefined, unsure, and, in many ways, different than others, different than you. I accept me for who I am.

I accept you for who you are, too.

Future Self. #reverb10

Day 21 – Future Self.

Imagine yourself five years from now. What advice would you give your current self for the year ahead?
Bonus: Write a note to yourself 10 years ago. What would you tell your younger self?
(Prompt Author: Jenny Blake)

~~~

Dear Year 2011 Lotus:

I have this writing prompt, and I’m supposed to write you a letter from the past giving you advice, after I think about us five yeas from now. This is all kind of weird, because I have no idea what we will be like in five years.

I kind of don’t want to know… isn’t the fun in the journey? And what good does it do to know the end before the actions? It seems more important to take action without knowing the exact outcome; let’s just travel the path, you know?

Maybe this is part of my problem, though. I think this might be an insight into my poor planning and life goal issues. You think? Nah, me either.

Anyway, you are only about 11 days away from already BEING. Writing you a letter with advice is WEIRD.

But I’m a good sport, you know? (You totally know.) So I sat here and daydreamed for a little while about our flying car and the robot who will obviously be cleaning our house. (Isn’t that what happens in the future?) Basically, I just had my head in the clouds about us having our head in the clouds.

So I guess what I want to tell you is that you probably only have, like, 4 more yeas of boring road driving left before you take to the air in 2015.

Wait. Technically you are in the future, too, aren’t you? Whoa. Wait, WAIT. That means in 11 days (when you will be born) FLYING CARS WILL BE AVAILABLE.

I am so excited I could shit.

See you soon! I hope you know how to fly a car.

Love,
Lotus 2010 (squee! omg so excited!)

~~~~~~~~~~

Dear Year 2011 Lotus,

Crap. I just re-read the prompt and it totally didn’t tell me to write you a letter at all. It told me to give MY CURRENT SELF advice about the year ahead.

Please burn the previous letter I sent you. And have fun in your flying car without me.

Asshole.

(You could have written me a letter to the past and invited me for a ride in your damn fancy flying car. Don’t worry, I know why you didn’t. It still hurts.)

Love,
Highly Disappointed Year 2010 Lotus

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Dear Year 2000 Lotus:

I just got this writing assignment where I’m supposed to draft a letter to you. (Yes, writing assignments. Still.) But I know better. I’ve seen too many movies and shows that outilne, detail, and show explicit examples of the folly of talking to anyone from the past, especially oneself! I am thinking, perhaps, that the author of this prompt is unaware of the DANGER that lies in constructing notes to the past, or having any contact with it at all, and that makes me sad.

Somebody hasn’t seen Back to the Future.

For shame.

So, basically, I refuse to tell you anything, but don’t worry. Everything will turn out the way it’s supposed to. And you will become the you that is me now. (Duh.) Which really isn’t so bad, anyway.

There are hurts to come, sure. But isn’t that, well, life? And all the good and the bad have had equal hand in making you the you that is me, and the one that will be us later, too.

I’m going with the idea that it’s going to be okay in the end. Remember all the pretty and ugly things come together to make the what is, and we can’t do much better than just appreciating that fabulous dichotomy.

PS: It’s better to look to the future anyway. I hear cars will fly there. (Shit, forget I said that!)

Love,
Lotus 2010

~~~~~~~~~~

Reverb 10 is an annual event and online initiative to
reflect on your year and manifest what’s next.
Use the end of your year as an opportunity to
reflect on what’s happened, and to send out
reverberations for the year ahead.

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