No. This is me.

Sometimes I feel like my life is nothing more than a hunt for myself. Every day I gather more clues to who I am, and with each clue, a little bit more light is shed onto parts of me that I never knew before. There are many ways in which these truths reveal themselves. Sometimes they come through sacred times of contemplation: sitting in my living room watching the ships float by; watching people interact with each other in a coffee shop (oddly enough, this one usually involves children); music lyrics that were written just for me. Other times they come directly from the people I encounter. Sometimes they are people who know me nearly as well as I know myself. They are able to hear my present, remember my past, put them together and reflect a more whole picture of myself to me. Once in awhile it’s the kids I take care of. They unknowingly and innocently share something in their blunt and sweet honesty that I had been blind to before them. And quite frequently it’s people who don’t need to know and see everything… they come along simply as gifts with the right amount and kind of wisdom for me in that moment. What I love about this hunt is that on one day I will think that I can see the picture clearly, only to realize a few days later that I only had part of it right. I have layers and layers to discover each new day.

A friend sent me this quote from Anne Lamott. Today it pretty much sums up my life:

“…every time I say yes when I mean no, I am abandoning myself, and I end up feeling used or resentful or frantic. But when I say no when I mean no, it’s so sane and healthy that it creates a little glade around me in which I can get the nourishment I need. Then I help and serve people from a place of real abundance and health, instead of from this martyred mentally ill position, this open space in a forest about a mile north of Chernobyl.”

This longing.

Do you ever have days where longing fills up your heart? Longing for… who knows what. Longing that swells so full that you feel like something deep in your gut could burst?

Today is one of those days for me.

I chuckled a little when I read my last blog entry. Talk about foreshadowing.

God certainly has been moving. What a whirlwind summer it has been. It feels anything but neat and tidy, and so I still struggle to talk about it with any sense of coherency. Busy. Stressful. Restful. Fun. Enlightening. Painful. Hopeful.

The product is me. Living alone. Loving being alone. Getting ready to go back to school. Half time.

As I write this, a Joshua Radin song is playing in the background… Free of Me. The lyrics,
“I look strong
All together
Though inside I’m weak,”
particularly feel true for me.

I described it this way to some friends last week:

I feel like I have been fighting a war for my entire life. Now, for my spiritual believing friends, please don’t think spiritual warfare when I say this. While I’m sure there is some contribution from a spiritual enemy, what I mean is nothing literal (which I believe spiritual warfare completely is). I mean metaphorical WAR. Every day has been a battle for me. I began fighting my own battle when I was born premature. Born a twin. Born to a drug-addicted mother and absent father. I began fighting as a codependent daughter, granddaughter, niece. Battle after battle after battle. Their battles. Your battles. Sometimes mine. The problem is, I was wounded the moment I stepped out onto the battlefield. Shot in the heart.

And I kept fighting.

This last year was the closest I’ve ever been to feeling like I might die. (Also metaphorical).

I feel now as though I finally passed out on the battlefield and have somehow ended up in the First Aid tent. I am still in and out of consciousness… still trying to wake up and realize that I don’t have to fight anymore. Feeling anxious that a war is being lost without me. Feeling pressure to get back out there and save my friends, my family, the world… but mostly feeling exhausted and in desperate need of recovery.

It’s hard to learn how to rest. And there is a lot of fear around it. But mostly my fear involves other people’s opinions, and so I have been trying to ignore it. And as I express my need (only express it), I am finding quite a lot of celebration from others. It surprises me, and makes me want to weep with relief.

I had a friend call me the other day to check in with me. She’s a good friend. Loyal and honest.
She let me process “how I am” with her for a good 30 minutes or so. It felt good, but what felt better was her feedback. She said, “Kendra, everything you’re saying is really good. I’m glad you’re realizing these things. But as you keep talking, I keep wondering, what about you? Where are you in this?”

Again, I could have wept.

You see, I really suck at loving myself. So much so that it doesn’t even cross my mind most of the time. I said, “Oh yeah. I hadn’t even thought of that. But you’re right. I need to fit myself in here somewhere…”

So today, after being sick all night from nausea and stomach cramping, I called in sick. It was very hard for me. I had to tell myself, “You need this. You need to take care of yourself. It’s okay. Someone needs to.” It was me forcing myself to stay in my hospital bed with my open wounds when I felt like the world would end if I didn’t get up and start fighting again.

And the world goes on. And I am sitting at home looking out my window at the ships floating by, listening to Joshua Radin, thinking about art and love, and wondering what this longing in me is for.

This longing… it kind of hurts. And maybe this is what I try to avoid and ignore when fighting so hard.

Do you feel it?

God is moving.

Signed, the author.

“If I could write my story, where would I be next year?”

…a question my roommate asked herself in a conversation we were having about the future. She was referencing Donald Miller’s new book, which I haven’t read… but want to give credit where credit is due.

The moment she asked that question, I fell in love with it. It speaks so much to what I’ve been learning about myself, life, and God. If I had the option to write out the rest of my life story, what would it look like? What would it say? I like this question for several reasons:

1. It gives us permission and space to dream. When you write a story, you have creative license–you can make the impossible happen. Your dreams can come true.

2. You get to choose. Your life isn’t some preordained pathway that only God is privy to and chooses to make you blind to. You have a lot of say and control over your life and what happens in it. It’s very empowering.

3. It gives me hope. If I can dream, AND I can make my dreams come true, my life can be pretty freakin great.

4. When I think about what I want my story to say, it helps me sort out the things in my life that matter from the things that don’t. This is important, of course, because I realize that I give a lot of space and energy to things that don’t really matter that much.

5. It helps me to distinguish between the things I do have control over, and the things I have to hope with patience for. Easier said than done.

If you could write your story, what would it say? How will you begin to write your story to say what you want it to and then live it out?

Happy Morning

I have been trying to learn that happiness is a choice. It isn’t, afterall, something you can just tell yourself is true: “You are the creator of your happiness.” Not when so much of your life has told you that no matter how good things are, they will always go sour. No, it is definitely something you need to practice and learn. One thing that I am learning makes me really happy is poetry by Mary Oliver, and you will probably see a lot of it on my blog from here on out. Today, this one especially resonates with me:

Morning

Every morning
the world
is created.
Under the orange

sticks of the sun
the heaped
ashes of the night
turn into leaves again

and fasten themselves to the hight branches–
and the ponds appear
like black cloth
on which are painted islands

of summer lilies.
If it is your nature
to be happy
you will swim away along the soft trails

for hours, your imagination
alighting everywhere.
And if your spirit
carries within it

the thorn
that is heavier than lead–
if it’s all you can do
to keep on trudging–

there is still
somewhere deep within you
a beast shouting that the earth
is exactly what it wanted–

each pond with its blazing lilies
is a prayer heard and answered
lavishly,
every morning,

whether or not
you have ever dared to be happy,
whether or not
you have ever dared to pray.

by Mary Oliver

White is. Not a color.

One of my classes this term is called “Multicultural Issues: Social and Cultural Foundations.” I’ve been learning, talking, reading, and thinking a lot about multicultural issues in my life: my school, my country, my family, etc. A lot of emotions have come up: grief, rage, shame, humility… This is one of those good hard experiences of life… but I also realize that great responsibility comes with awareness. And I admit it: I’m terrified. And then I am ashamed to admit it. But I am.

I wanted to share a blog post that one of my classmates wrote in relation to this process. It is honest and so very inspiring. I appreciate it so much. Please, PLEASE take the time to read through it:

http://colorsofmars.tumblr.com/post/361040125/learning-to-read-x-rays-metaphors-for-the-problem-of

I have a dream…

The Kookaburras

In every heart there is a coward and a procrastinator.
In every heart there is a god of flowers, just waiting
to come out of its cloud and lift its wings.
The kookaburras, kingfishers, pressed against the edge of their cage, they asked me to open the door.
Years later I wake in the night and remember how I said to them, no, and walked away.
They had the brown eyes of soft-hearted dogs.
They didn’t want to do anything so extraordinary, only to fly home to their river.
By now I suppose the great darkness has covered them.
As for myself, I am not yet a god of even the palest flowers.
Nothing else has changed either.
Someone tosses their white bones to the dung-heap.
The sun shines on the latch of their cage.
I lie in the dark, my heart pounding.

-Mary Oliver, House of Light

Dear friend,

Please do not be transparent with me.
I do not want to see right through.
When being with me, I ask, bring all of you.
For that is who I long to see.

I think I can.

Practicum Facilitator: So, how are you feeling about your decision to move forward and pursue your career as a therapist?
Me: Umm (Medium pause). I wouldn’t say that I am doubting the decision. I still want to be a therapist. But I have experienced a lot of self-doubt over the last couple of months. I want to do this, but I doubt that I can.
My PF: And is that a familiar feeling for you?
Me: (Long pause). No.