When did I become this person?

There are moments in life when you look around and wonder how you got there.

It happened to me when I got sick as a child and I couldn't understand why everyone else was so afraid. 
It happened when I fell in love for the first time and months later got kicked to the curb.
It happened when I figured out how intelligent God made me.
It happened when I also figured out that emotionally I picked up on things incredibly quickly.
It happens quite honestly a lot.

As I got older, I looked around and wondered how people could do certain things without the emotional pain that I felt when I watched them do them.  I wasn't even involved but somehow I knew that certain buttons were pushed and emotions would happen. This isn't and wasn't something to brag about.  It hurts and it can be a heavy load carrying around your own feelings and the many feelings that others have around you.

I could see when someone was out of control angry, I could see when someone was incredibly hurt, and I could see when silence wasn't comfortable or when someone couldn't process their own feelings.

When I was younger, I hated this ability.  I would lash out with my own feelings to just get people to stay away from me so that I didn't absorb theirs.
As I got older I used the ability to control people's feelings and either use or hurt them.
Now, I realize that this is a gift to help people and to show compassion and love to people who have a hard time accepting it.  And I give it whether they accept it or not.

This is not always easy.  Sometimes my feelings lead me to places that I need to turn around and smartly walk away from, sometimes my feeling are hurt by the same thing over and over again, and sometimes the feelings are so overwhelming that I have to shut myself away so that I don't almost literally have my head explode.

It's taken years to understand, and I still don't quite have it down.  Especially when it comes to figuring out my own feelings from someone else's.  It's incredibly easy for me to feel someone else's pain, or fear, or intensity and make it my own, until I realize that it's not.  But I do have a barometer, I do have the Holy Spirit to take a step back from all of these feelings and remind me that my heart can be deceitful, and sometimes other people's hearts can be too.

I use the standards in the Bible to set boundaries in my life not just because it is the living and active word of God, but also because it allows me to see the person that I am, the person that God intended me to be and not the person who constantly steps back and says "when did I become this person?"

I have spent so much time and energy pushing to understand the feelings and thoughts of others because it is a gift, and God intends for me to use it for His purpose.  However, there are many times where it can hurt me and others if not kept within the boundaries that He set.  It has always been very hard to control and sometimes my feelings or other people's can sweep me away.

But I hold fast to the rock steady rhythm of the pulse of God that runs through me, I pray for the ability to see past my heart, feelings and my own thoughts and others to what amazing things are in store for me and the people that I love.  I remember that all of the good that comes from those feelings and the growth from the not so good feelings serve a purpose for someone, even if not for me.

So when did I become THIS person?  The minute that I said yes to Christ and all the goodness that he has given me.  Every day I wake up and make mistakes and mess up because that is what we all do.  But every day I have the chance to make choices to honor God, to honor those around me and to love them and their feelings regardless of what they are.  I hope that I keep on growing to become a better person, regardless of situations, circumstances, or pain.

There are plans for me, and for you, even if we don't yet know where we are being lead.  I now realize that every day I should be asking "when did I become this person?" so that I can remember the amazing path that I took to get here.

That place between black and white

Typically I post on my blog about the positive side of things, or the negative but with the perspective of a woman who is very much loved by God and has the strength through him to live through and survive anything.

My whole life has been a series of decisions that for me were always so black and white, or so I thought.  When I look back now, and even in times now I see how I can take something incredibly simple and make it incredibly complicated.  Sometimes the black and white that I see isn't just tinged in gray, it is submersed in gray.  I used to think that this was a bad thing, that gray areas couldn't be possible because black and white to me were the same as right and wrong.

Let's face it; I don't like to be wrong.

And yet, the older that I get, the more that I see the need for black, white, and gray.  Translation, right, wrong, and compromise.

Don't get me wrong, God's word is always right. That isn't a part of this discussion, it's just the truth.  And the majority of the times, most people know the other sides of that coin, we all have a conscience that tells us when things are wrong, that is God given as well.

But that gray area sometimes gets a bad rap.  Many people, me included can see the in-between places not just as scary but as a copout zone.  And in certain cases that is absolutely true, when we make excuses instead of being accountable, when we won't take a side because we are afraid of judgment or of someone not liking us.

But when you look more closely at parts of the gray area of life, this is where compromise is born, and compromise in relationships, in love, in life, in understanding is absolutely necessary.

The gray area is also where grace resides, where we show love to each other when we make a mistake, where we are given permission by God to forgive ourselves because he has already forgiven us. Where Godly sorrow takes us to a place where we can change instead of feeling guilty, where grace resides and pride is put away.

I think that if you see everything in black and white you can sometimes get stuck there.  That suddenly instead of seeing a mistake you see someone's flaws so clearly that love and compassion no longer exist.  Sometimes we forget that we've been given the gift of love, caring, and relationships with so many amazing people and instead of showing that vulnerable part of our heart, we judge. 

We judge ourselves, others, situations, and anyone else that doesn't agree with our belief or who doesn't see the world as we do.

I think that some of my best moments in life were when I surrendered to the gray, when I surrendered to pure unadulterated love, when I allowed myself to be filled to the brim with compassion for someone I didn't even like.

Life surprises you sometimes by growing you in confusion and helping you to find exactly what you were meant to in that moment.

Black and white are necessary, as are right and wrong and knowing the difference, but real life and real experiences, and real growth happen within the gray where you don't really know what to do, but you trust God to show you.



K