Pain radiated throughout my veins. A current so sharp, I couldn’t feel it anymore. Numb. As if my body has undergone anesthesia. I was walking away from the deepest desire my heart had ached for. The dream of walking down the aisle to a man I chose to love and who chose to love me. The dream of having a teammate in this thing called life, someone to adventure with and go out into the world with all for the name of Jesus .
Then, a collision of my worst-case scenarios happened. It all happened about as fast as it took for the rug to be pulled out from underneath me.
Everything had ended. Each time my glove met the sand filled bag, I remembered everything had ended. I could hear the accusations all over again in my mind.
“You didn’t fight hard enough for us.”
“You fought, but it ended. It wasn't good enough."
"You gave up and walked away from it all.”
My mind shut off.
I sat in my driveway with the phone on speaker, needing my hands to dry my cheeks. I think she could tell the tears streaming down my face were drowning my words, making it difficult for me to speak. But she had hit the nail on the head. This woman had been in my life for years and she knew me well. She is gifted in discernment and kind in practice. She authoritatively said to me:
“Be gentle with yourself.”
That’s when the dam of tears broke, there had already been a stream of salty drops, but the dam broke.
A breathless fear filled my lungs. My feet swiftly trekked on while my mind chose to not think of what could have lurked beyond the dark wild. A protective bear or towering moose could have easily been watching my every move, awaiting their moment. Thankfully, if they were, they refrained the temptation.
Some things are meant to be buried, to break and remain broken. Jesus has broken the power of sin, our shame has been laid to rest, our chains from our places long devastated are now free. Those things will not be undone. But what about the things we lay in bed at night wondering if there is any hope of life still beating in them? The dream we try to suppress because the fear of failure is too loud, the friendship/relationship that once was, then broke and is now seemingly portrayed as silent strangers, the hope of freedom out of a tedious cycle we can’t seem to step out of long enough to fully live in the freedom Jesus has fought for us…
Paralyzed with fear, I did not want to go to the dinner party. I blamed it on my introvert self, but I knew there was a deeper reason. I just didn’t know what. Researching for another project on shame and forgiveness, the real reason hit me as hard as if I was traveling 100mph and hit a brick wall. Shocked with tears, I realized it was shame. Shame was holding me back and beckoning me into isolation.
Going through and becoming free of a psychologically and verbally abusive relationship, I was embarrassed. From the outside, it would seem, what would I have to be embarrassed of? But inwardly, I was humiliated of what I had been through. What would the people I meet there think if they knew? Would they think differently of me? Shame wanted me to hide.
"What about the ones whose souls aren’t in a season of spring?"
I couldn’t help but ask the question as March 20 rolled around, the first day of spring. Spring inevitably ignites emotions of new life, hew hope, new beginnings. And why wouldn’t it? It is a beautiful season where color is brought back onto the canvas of nature, sun filled days last longer and warmth begins to move through the air with just enough of the winter’s crisp air lingering. But this year, as spring came, I couldn’t help but to think about everyone who is fighting for hope in a new beginning.
