It starts with a hope and a prayer, a smile and a flirt, a drink and a puff, and a bible verse. Are these the beginnings of destiny or the greatest distractions of my life? I am walking down a path to discover what kind of man I really am, and with each decision I stumble along asking myself why am I headed this way?
IDK sometimes life feels more like a dream and I am walking alone in a dark creepy forest. The unknown noises of the world make the hair on the back of my neck stand out. I find myself in moral combat to all the things I was taught as a child. The religious paradox is a big stick that seems to beat me like an angry father with each and every disobedient taunt of my own selfish desires. The truth is I like to lie to myself and enjoy the mischief of my mind. But part of the struggle is, “to the holy” some of my thoughts are cursed, and they lead to the type of behaviors that sometimes I don’t understand and I feel judged by the world.
I have always had a unique gift called mischief and run with the crowds who hide in the shadows, and lurk in the alleys. The rebels of life and rules, are the ones I see when I look around the room standing closer at times than the religious. I say a cheer and lift my strong drink entertaining those who kick against the laws of man and morals, who don’t want to be told what to do and how to live. They understand yet none of them are really a true friend. We have close bond as long as I buy another round. I don’t go to the bar very often.
Have you ever had a great story to tell yet you can’t because it’s a secret? I have so many that the truth is sometimes hard to recognize when my clouded thinking takes charge. We all see life in different ways with a different truth, and some use their power in ways to force others to cover their mistakes. For myself I see and understand my mistakes and it takes me to the place called honesty. I won’t lie to myself, maybe to you. I know the actions of my life and each decision whether it’s a good or bad, is me proclaiming who I am as I become the seeds I have sown. Where the mind goes soon the man will follow or at least those are the words of Joyce Meyer…. With each action, with each walk, with each belief and decision, we sow. As a man thinks in his heart, so is he, says the great book.
The heart, now there is a scary place. Are you brave enough to explore your own? And then there is the decision of who else do you let in? Who can you trust? And why do some loves steal the experience of innocence only to use you? Why risk love? Love is the greatest reward of being broken that a person can experience. With much pain and suffering comes the joy of feeling the wonders of why we create new life, yet all die. Is that still called hope and is there a future?
The twisted words of this ramble are just a vent with gas escaping and the idea of one marriage, two children, a white picket fence around the home of the Walton’s, let’s not forget the dog, is no longer a part of my thinking. Life is the wonder of enjoying the messy. Life is secret sins that everyone knows about. Life is handing a drunk a glass of wine so they don’t look as pathetic as holding a brown paper bag. Do we then take away their dignity by leaving them in the gutter in their own puke? Harsh, life is harsh. Life is struggle, to some it’s addiction.
I confess, I am not the wonderful man whom I show my parents I am the sum of my decision. Some days I write great things that share about the way I have loved my fellowman, some days I write the evaluations of my falters. But every day I live and grow and march to the beat of who I want to become. Sometime I feel proud, some days I feel discouraged. I have chased things for months and even years and suddenly discovered I no longer enjoy the pleasure…and find myself standing alone. I am high on a cliff looking back at the valley of my life and wondering where do I go from here. I feel lost… I feel the numb of my neutral, the shames of my transgressions, failure, worthless folly and a cheat. Am I dark or light? Am I green and growing or just becoming as hard as a rock?
At times when I am in my lonely place, it happens. As quick as a flash something takes place in my heart. I feel a power and the intensity is brighter than lightning. The voltage strikes the tree of my morals. Calming is a soft voice who speaks into my deepest place. Waves of peace are lapping the shoreline that shifts the sands of my soul. A strength and security pull inside of me and beckons for me to step in a new direction. “I have dwelt here long enough” is a Bible verse that resonates like an orchestra. The knowing of pure acceptance is something or someone who understands the tears that flow down my cheeks. The little boy inside weeps again because he knows he is forgiven. But the question is will the prodigal ever return home to the beliefs of his childhood? Only time will tell.