I sometimes wake up with a heaviness in my body. A distinct pressure in my chest, pulling down my stomach, hanging onto my throat.
Tears threaten at any moment. My spirit is shaky.
I am fragile, and vulnerable, and easily wounded on these days.
And I am grateful for it.
I used to try and push this feeling aside, to unwind it from my mind and spirit. I used to battle it into submission. I used to hide it under food, or distract myself from it with other things.
It hasn't gotten any easier to feel, but I feel it anyway. I let it lead me down it's dark paths.
Because I have found that when I follow these feelings into the vast underground, they lead me to a place of profound sadness that TEACHES me. I sit with it. I feel it. And from this place come some of my most profound lessons.
It is where I learned to forgive my mother. Where I mourned for Joshua. Where I took my pain and bitterness over the past.
It is where I was led to relive memories long buried. It where those memories got put into a context that made my life make sense. It is where I allow myself to feel the burdens and the pain of years past, so that when I re-emerge into this world I am cleansed.
It builds up, this feeling. This inner drive to break down and let loose all of the heavy and bitter things I live with and taste everyday. It takes me back to being alone and helpless. It puts my life and my place in it into perspective.
And where I go, it is dark. It is deep. It is the well from which I draw all strength of being and purpose.
It is at the foot of the cross.
It is at the foot of the One who saved me from myself. The One who holds all of my darkness like the sacred gift it is.
It is a gift. Being wounded and harmed is a gift. It is the way to a deeper peace and serenity...to know what it feels like to be in chaos.
I go to this place, I sit at His feet. I let go of all of the things that hold me up everyday. And I simply am what I am. A burdened and broken down soul.
And He lifts those things from my shoulders. He puts me back together.
And He sets me back into this life He has given me, a life he helped me hold on to.
No man on this earth can bear my burdens for me. Nobody knows what I have walked through, lived through, or seen. Nobody can know the fear and fatigue I carry within me. Nobody but Him.
Because He chose me for it. He chose me, and I chose him to help me carry it.
So today I am broken. I am sad. And it is good with me. It incites no panic, no worry.
Because I have a plaxce to take it. I have a deep and warm sanctuary to carry myself to.
The foot of the cross. At His feet.
