Temporary? Insanity

This is what it is to be more than I have been.  To feel the stretching, aching pain that is growth.  To see the invisible striving like lines of umber and green and gold, spiralling forward in their autumn colours and enticing me forward.  Everything is vivid.  Clear to the point of sharpness.  I want to weep.  I want to chase that clarity.  I want to flee from the cutting edge of it.  I yearn to grow but I’m weary of the pain.


So much of life is muddled and hazy. Conflicting feelings set my head to spinning. Events are slippery things, sliding through my hands slimey and quick. I cannot grasp them. Cannot hold them still and shape them to my liking. I cannot control the pattern or pace of things. It comes down to that, I realize. Control. I loathe uncertainty. I battle it daily. Seek knowledge and comprehension with an eager needy thirst.


I fear it too. Fear power and responsibility. Fear failure and blame. The clarity I sometimes flee from teaches me how much is within me control. How much I have the ability to choose. I fear my choices and the power of them. I know that even with events sliding slippery and elusive out of my grasp, I control much. I choose my reactions. I choose whether I weep and go slightly mad or if I will be strong and calm. I choose between contentment and discontent, anger and acceptance, worry and peace. I would like to pretend I don’t have that choice. Abdicate my responsibility and wallow in self-pity.


I want to pretend in the same moment that I want to abandon all pretense. I have tasted the sweet quiet joy that is loving not just who I am and have been, but who I can be. I want more of that. I want so very much to accept the pain of growing. The horrible humbling facing up to who I have been and my many moments of foolishness. I want to give up the need for control even as I accept responsibility for the control that is truly mine.


More than anything I want to make choices that don’t leave me feeling ashamed and cowardly. That has been the pattern for far too many years. And I feel like this is what I am meant to be learning now. That the hardships of the last few weeks and the weeks to come are not without purpose. I do not need to feel anxious and upset. I can feel the joy and gratitude that come from recognizing a loving Heavenly Father’s guiding hand in the events of my life. My fleeting glimpses of clarity are nothing compared to His. He sees the entirety of my potential. What I can only guess at, He knows.


I wish things could have been easier. That Claira’s entry into the world didn’t have to be so fraught with fear and potential danger. I am beginning to think though that this is necessary to my growth. That to be the mother my girls deserve I have to tread this uncertain path.


I am just a tiny ship as the poem above says. But He knows how to guide me home.