Pulled Inward: Shake the Dust

I'm thinking about random things this morning.

About yes and no.

About plans for the day.

About likes and dislikes.

About the multiples things left on my list to do.

Thoughts that are really probably not very worthy of sharing.

I feel pulled into myself. One of those days where I know I should be anticipating life, finding joy, but it's like I'm watching it from the outside, it's not quite penetrating.

I wonder sometimes if that's my self-protection mode.

The thing I slip into when I'm hurting and uncertain and in the midst of transition and fighting to be okay.

Fighting to quiet the voices and the panic.

Fighting to find footing again, or even just a safe place to sit for a moment.

So I pull into myself and things feel dulled.

It's not a feeling I like.

But maybe it's all I can manage right now.

I know and produce the appropriate responses.

But they're surface things at the moment.  The smiles and laughter don't penetrate much past my face.

And so I wait.

And try to trust that I'll emerge again.

I've always emerged again, why should this time be any different?

And this line, from a video I saw a few weeks ago, and then again yesterday at Susan's blog, plays in my head.

Shake the Dust.

And somehow there is hope in that.

Insecure

I'm awake way too early.

Granted, I have to be out of the house by 9:15 on my way to the day's plans, but this is too early.

And I'm feeling neurotic and insecure.

I shared some rather vulnerable thoughts with a dear friend last night (and, to clarify up front, the response was fine).

But, even when the response was fine, the neuroses and insecurities rise up. The voices get loud, and sometimes they gain power.

I always forget that that's going to happen when I share myself, particularly the deeper parts of me, in writing. But it happens every time. I think it's kind of like how they say that women forget the pain of labor so that they'll have another child. If I remembered how strong the voices of insecurity would become, I'd be less likely to share.

These days I'm better at combatting them, and the lies they tell. In fact, I was quite amused as I journaled about one of the lines they were using last night. It was, I wrote, both the most difficult, and the easiest to counter.

They get loud, and for a day or two I'm neurotic.

In any case, I liked this line that Hope posted to her blog last night. You can find it here. I'm praying for my authentic self to appear.