Birthplace of Joy

I really wanted to share a video that I came across a few days ago. I've now watched it twice and I can't even begin to tell you how powerful it is. Please consider taking 20 minutes out of your day to watch it. It is the best 20 minutes I've spent in awhile.

Brene Brown speaks about vulnerability. She is a qualitative researcher in the field of Social Work interested in "expanding perception."

First she breaks down that connection is "why we are here. It's what gives us purpose and meaning."

Then she talked about shame. She said that it is ultimately the fear of connecting with others. I thought this was an interesting point because I often feel afraid to connect with others, due to my paranoia and other issues. I am afraid of what others will think of me. I still carry a lot of shame around with me because of my past. I've blogged a lot about it and allowed people in, but I still feel a lot of shame.

One of the most interesting points she made was that shame also occurs when there are issues with our belief in our worthiness. I think that moving forward, that's something I need to work on, because often, I don't feel like I'm worthy of love and good things. I often feel like I don't deserve good things happening since I've mostly lived in difficult circumstances. 

Maybe that's why I haven't moved forward completely.

I want to end with another quote that she said in the video. She said that shame and vulnerability can be the "birthplace of joy, creativity, belonging and love." This quote really spoke to me because I often feel like they are bad things, but she pointed out that they can be good, if we channel the energy towards the positive and work hard to realize that we are worthy.

Straining Toward What Is Ahead

To tell you the truth, when I woke up this morning, I had no clue what I was going to write about. Most times, I know what I'm going to write the night before. However, I just came across a quote that really, really spoke to me and resonated with me from a book I read a few weeks ago. 

You know how you just know that God is speaking to you and He brings something into your life when you most need it?! This quote is exactly what I needed to read this morning.

"Whatever happened in the past is over and done with. You cannot change it, you can only channel it. That means you take whatever pain you lived through and channel the power of it into something meaningful today. Today you are a survivor...You must refuse to ruminate about the past that is over and wake up to the life you have now, focusing on the opportunities before you."
-Stephen Arterburn, Reframe Your Life

Every single part of this quote made me think this morning as I read and reread it. Sometimes I struggle a lot with rumination over the past, due to the intrusive memories and flashbacks that come with my PTSD. But someone in my life is really challenging me to move forward, to move past the past to the opportunities ahead of me.

I know this quote is God encouraging me to move forward, to realize that I am a survivor and not a victim anymore. God wants me to move forward and not be stuck back there. I don't want to be stuck back there. I don't want to be back there at all. I want to move forward with my life, moving forward into the wonderful plans God has for me.

"Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead."
-Philippians 3:13b (NIV)

I believe that God has great plans for each of us and He does not want us to be stuck in the past. "The past is over and done with." And so we strive to move forward every single day. We strive to make each day a new one instead of living in the past. We strive to find meaning in the past, but not get stuck back there.

This life is a journey, often challenging but worth every moment.

To Be Set Free

I heard a song at worship last night that really spoke to me... It is called "I Am Set Free" by All Sons & Daughters.

You broke my chains of sin and shame 

and you covered me with grace.

You mend my life with your holy fire

You cover me with grace.

You are the hand that reaches out to save

I am set free.

It made me think to myself, what does it mean to be free?

I looked up some definitions and the one I really resonated with is "to make free, set at liberty, release from bondage, imprisonment, or restraint" (dictionary.reference.com)

I think the part that I am really struggling with most is being free from my past. After years of abuse, neglect and homelessness, a part of me is still back there. A large part of my life has been spent fighting. Fighting to live. Fighting to survive. Fighting to just make it through.

It's not like I can wake up one morning and forget everything I've been through. In some ways, I'd like that but I highly doubt it's going to happen. I fight every single day to move forward, but my PTSD keeps me back there, back where I do not want to be.

I've been praying to God a lot lately to make me free from my past. I am trusting Him with all I have to free me from my past. I think by being set free, many more doors will open for me.

All I want is freedom.

Something else I've been wondering is what it looks like to be free. Does it mean that I have no more flashbacks? If so, I want nothing but to be free. I don't want to be stuck back there anymore. I can't even begin to tell you how much I wish I didn't have flashbacks. I wish I could control them but I can't. It is incredibly frustrating to be forced to go back there. I think it is one of the main reasons that I still feel stuck in the past.

Does it mean that I no longer talk about the past? In some ways I struggle with this, too, because the past is a part of who I am. I don't want my past to define who I am but at the same time, I find it incredibly difficult to completely stop talking about my past and be completely free.

Does it mean that I realize the flashbacks are just intense memories? I have actually made progress in this area lately. Each time I have a flashback, I've been reminding myself that it's in the past, it's just a memory. Each time I do this, I feel better and I feel more distance from what I experience through the flashbacks.

I don't necessarily know what it will look like to be free from my past, but I know that God has wonderful plans for me and that He doesn't want me stuck there.

Every part of me yearns to free, to be released from the bondage, the hold that the past has on my life. Every day, I try to move forward and separate myself from the past. It's not easy but with God, nothing is impossible and I'm hoping and believing with all that I have that I am able to be set free.

I want to leave you with a song that came to my mind as I wrote this. It's called Free by Dara McLean

You Do Not Have To Be Perfect

"Often I have been asked, 'Brennan, how is it possible that you became an alcoholic after you got saved?' It is possible because I got battered and bruised by loneliness and failure; because I got discouraged, uncertain, guilt-ridden, and took my eyes off Jesus. Because the Christ-encounter did not transfigure me into an angel."

-Brennan Manning. The Ragamuffin Gospel

I am reading this book as part of one of two Bible studies I am in this semester. So far, I love this book. Just the first chapter has opened my eyes in ways I didn't expect.

I chose to focus on this quote today because it meant a lot for me and I hope it means a lot for you. The whole meaning of this quote is that we don't have to be perfect once we accept Christ into our lives. Actually, we are bound to not be perfect. We are bound to make mistakes. We may even take our eyes off Jesus at times.

It is part of the human condition to not be perfect.

"all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God"

-Romans 3:23

I've made plenty of mistakes since I became a Christian. But that doesn't mean I'm not a Christian. It just means that I need Christ in my life even more so I can be forgiven for my sins and my mistakes and learn to not make those mistakes again.

How fulfilling is the statement "You do not have to be perfect"?

You do not have to do everything right. You can do your best, but not everything has to be exactly perfect. There is room for mistakes. As a perfectionist, I take great comfort in this statement.

You do not have to be perfect.

Broken Into Beautiful

Today marks 5 months since my last hospitalization. I was released on April 10, my birthday. I will never forget my excitement about getting discharged, since I had spent 8 lonely days in the scary psych unit in the hospital. When I was released, I was so scared of going back there. I wanted nothing but to stay out of the hospital. And here I am, 5 months later, much more stable and back in school.

God has strengthened me and held me up when I most needed it. He has guided me and helped me through great difficulties, never leaving me. I feel His presence nearly every day, if not every day. It is only through Him that I have come this far.

Today, I wanted to write a poem about what it is like to be broken and be transformed. I first was inspired to write this poem yesterday when I came across a broken branch on the ground as I walked home from a class. I saw the beauty in the brokenness, just like I believe there is beauty in my brokenness.

Broken Into Beautiful

Broken
Shattered
Twisted
This Way and That Way
Darkness overwhelming
No way Up
Only Down
Deeper
         Deeper
                  Into a Depression
                  Or Mania
                  Or Psychosis
                  Or Paranoia
         Deeper
Deeper
The Noise
The Chaos
...
And yet
A Hand reaches Down
The Hand of God

Full of Light
The epitome of Beauty
Lifting me Up
                  Higher
                            Higher
                                     Into the Light
                            Higher
                 Higher
Towards Hope
Transforming me
Healing me
Rescuing me
Strengthening me
Bent but not broken

Broken Into Beautiful

Beauty in the Sacrifice

"Man's hideous injustice that crucified Christ became the means that opened the way for man to become free. Sin's masterpiece of shame and hate became God's masterpiece of mercy and forgiveness."
-Billy Graham, Peace With God

Have you ever stopped and thought about the beauty of what happened on the cross? The beauty in the sacrifice?

I think this quote really exemplifies how something so horrible, so awful, so seemingly erroneous, could be turned into something so absolutely beautiful. Sometimes we are so busy with our lives that we don't spend time thinking about what happened on the cross.

We can find freedom in the cross. We can find peace in the cross. We can find hope in the cross.

God truly can turn the most evil thing into the most beautiful thing. I've written extensively about how God has taken awful things in my life and turned them into good. Sometimes when we are going through the trials and tribulations of our lives, the good within them is not so lucid.

But it's there if you look.

No matter what you are going through, God can transform it into good. Your surroundings may look bleak but if you look around the corner, you may find something beautiful.

I woke up a few days ago and I looked out the window and was greeted by this sunrise... It was absolutely magnificent. As I am writing this blog post, I am watching the sunrise through my window. Sometimes we are so busy that we forget to look around us at the beauty of God's creation and the magnificence of this world we inhabit...

Look around you today. Stop and think about the beauty in Jesus's sacrifice on the cross. Look at the beauty all around you, in the chaos of a normal day.

Illustration of Suffering

I donated platelets yesterday. Fortunately, my iron level was right on the dot and I was eligible to donate.

For those who have never donated blood, there are different ways you can donate. You can donate whole blood, platelets and/or plasma or double red blood cells. To donate platelets or any other part of the blood, there is a machine called an apheresis machine that separates the blood and gives you back what you aren't donating.

If you haven't donated, I highly recommend to do it if you're eligible because it's an easy way to give back to the community and help save lives. For example, platelets are in patients undergoing chemotherapy. It means more than words can say to have a chance to donate. I don't know who receives my donation, but I do know it's making a difference in someone's life.

Donating platelets takes about two hours, so I watched a movie while donating. I chose to watch Life of Pi.

I don't want to give away too much of the movie, but I will say that it is a brilliant and beautiful illustration of how God works amidst horrible, scary and tiring circumstances. In its own way, it describes suffering. I believe it shows the beauty that can come from suffering. After watching the movie, I watched a video on Youtube that explained the deeper meaning of the movie, from one point of view.

Believing in God doesn't mean that bad things won't happen to you...[but] the belief in God can prevent you from being consumed by that evil.

I believe that God gives us difficulties in our lives to make us stronger. Each of us goes through times when we feel like giving up or we feel frustrated, angry and tired. But believing in God helps us to keep going, keep moving forward despite the challenges. Going through trials is a reminder that we are all human and we all suffer. It draws us together.

Suffering is part of the human condition. I am moving forward in my life to a point that I am learning not to be consumed by the past, by the awful things I've been through. I'm trying to look past all of that and move forward into the beautiful plan that God has for my life.