The in - between

So long I've waited, waited for my life to begin. First it was high school, then university. Now it is career. What after that? Marriage, children, house with a white picket fence?

I am beginning to realize that life isn't about a destination, it is about the journey. The day - to - day struggles. Living in the moment and not stressing over what could have been, but accepting things as they are. Choosing to find the gems in your path, instead of focusing on the rocks you stubbed your toes on. Joy is found in looking towards the future with hope, dreaming about what could be and making a plan to weave that into reality.

Perhaps I am not where I want to be yet, but why should I let that steal from my joy in this season? My quest is to gain what I can through this time, this in-between. Before I know it I will be moved on to where I want, and look upon this season of quietude with longing and a sigh.

Lord,

Teach me to trust you. So often I forget. Thank you for being patient with me, as I seem to need to be instructed in the same way any times over. Help me to have joy in this season and give me eyes to see what you are doing in the here and now. Let me not discredit the work you are doing in me. Continue to give me a clear, laser focus on you. A heart that is relentlessly and hopelessly in pursuit of my King. Wholly devoted. Endurance for the journey, peace in my heart. I am Yours.

Love,

Lys

Remembering Abuelita

Written: 12/19/12 6:20PM

Walked over to UNCW sitting by the pond. I can’t even stand to be in the same room, let alone the same house as my own sister. Why? Resentment.

I can’t be ‘the strong one’ anymore. It’s killing me and I know that my soul is so tired and weary of bearing the weight of so many burdens that aren’t mine to bear.

I haven’t cried enough.

                  Haven’t felt enough.

How keenly, how deeply, gut wrenchingly aware I am of the extreme loss we have suffered at the death of my beloved Abuelita. In so many ways, she was the one I would turn to in times of distress and she always knew what to say – so much wisdom and virtue – lost to the abyss of murderous life draining cancer. I can’t see the point of any of it.

I can cry all day it won’t change anything. But crying is not the point in itself. It’s the release of emotion.

I haven’t given myself space.

Been so focused on the goal that I forgot to tend the wounds received along the way.

Grief is healthy.

                  Grief is natural…

I tell myself this time and again.

Doesn’t change the way I respond.

Still I am wooden while the infection within brews into a full fledged attack on the very core of my being and those around me, who love me most, feel the brunt of the agony and anger that results. I am my own worst enemy, not because of something I have done, but because of something I have failed to let myself do – GRIEVE.

Keenly feel the loss and its consequences.

                 

Accept that she is gone and never coming back.

                                   

Stop wishing that I had refused the last gift she tried to give me.

Known that those last times we spoke would be the final conversations.

So many things I wish I’d said.

Times I wish I’d helped her in the kitchen instead of watching TV.

I would have told her she meant the world 10,0000X over to me,

And that she was the very best Abuelita anyone could have dreamt of having.

Alas, regrets can only go so far and exacerbate the pain felt so deeply.

How can I come to terms with this grief and accept the loss?

Experts say time.

                 

I know there is some truth to this tale.

However, I propose another solution in addition to this that also begins with ‘T.’

TRAVEL.

                  To a land of which I’ve dreamt.

To my roots, the very heart of my Abuelita.

To the same square at the center of Cochabamba

Where she first caught sight of my Grandfather

To know those who loved and missed her so dearly

For decades from another continent

To hear the stories, of good and bad times

Of laughter and loss – and feel with them

Perhaps this accident that prevented me from seeing Papi will in the end

Be a financial pathway to heal from losing my dear Abuelita.

I can only hope and pray that someday,

I can look back and smile at the days we spent together instead of cry.

That will be the day when I know my heart is healed and I’ve accepted losing my Abuelita.

Throwback Thursday: A Glimpse into My Personal Journal

August 3rd, 2010

"Thoughts of you, and how you've changed me fill my mind. Without you, where would I be?"
 - Barlow Girl

{Reading through an old journal of mine, I came across something quite profound that I thought I would like to share. The entry is centered on something that we as humans are bound to experience at some point: heartbreak.}

Today, these past few weeks even, I've given into fatalism.
Hopelessness and fear have ruled my thinking and caused me to be so afraid.

First, it was not knowing where I was going to school. Next, it was worry about an apartment.
Now, I worry about a job.

Before, I was more willing to give it all up for God's way. Now, I am having trouble trusting because things didn't turn out the way I had hoped or even planned with [a specific relationship].

I had hoped that he would be the one. The one with whom I'd share my heart, my life. Yet, I can hear the echo resound of that door closing slowly in my face, and it pains me deeply.

It goes against my will - my plan. The supposedly perfect plan that I conjured in my mind's eye. It was all going to be perfect.

Until that day, The Day, when it all came crashing down and I realized it would never be.

Never be what I had hoped. 

     Never be what I had dreamed.

           After all of my tears and prayers, all I had hoped for...   

           Wasted

                       Days

Hours

                                         Minutes
                     Seconds
                                                   Months
            Years
                                   Seasons
   
      Opportunities

                                               Energy
                    Life
                                Time
                                                        Gone

And now I fear above all that I may lose the very most important thing, something quite dear to me, that I should not at any cost lose sight of -- myself.

Who am I apart from being a girl who has had a crush on [this guy] for 2 years? Do I even know my identity outside of that? I had believed that I did, that my roots were so strong, they were unbreakable.

But now this doubt has got ahold of me and it won't leave. Won't let up - it needs to...I must break through to who I am - aside from the clutter of my thoughts and emotions.

Who am I in Christ? What is my name?

My name is Loved. 

          My name is Blessed.

                    I am called of the Most High.

Yet, that sounds so clichê right now. Yes, in theory I know who I am, but when the day is over and I sit in my room, all alone, I feel empty.

Like all the life and energy has gone out of me. Where is the hope I used to feel with every step? It was so easy before. Before all of these decisions came my way...now I feel so unsafe.

And when the lights go out, I stare at the ceiling, wondering at the meaning of it all.
Is all this futile? This hope in things I cannot see? What if all proves vanity?

All is wasted, nothing won. Ventured, yes, but nothing gained. Naught is anything at all. All the hopes and dreams we spoke of are without...

Without direction, cause, or meaning. If this all is vanity, then why am I here? Why do I sit, and think or dream if it will not change what has been or will be? I am me, but who is me?

What is my identity? What is my song? The song I have sung all along...
Even when I thought I could not go on this song gave me a dance.

It gave me hope that there was a chance that anything is worthwhile.
Help me regain the hopeful melody that rang so cheerily through the halls.

The passages of my house, and lifted, even carried me through the dark times of this life.
They kept me from darkness and despair.

These songs of hope, I sang with gusto these tunes...yet, where once there was hope I now see despair. Will the pain of life overtake me completely?

Can I know love once more? Will I find that which I seek and know I need? That which continually eludes and somehow taunts me, mockingly.

Hope, Love, Joy, Peace -- these  things I seek to know personally. I hope that soon they will not simply be nice ideas or notions.

Let them be my very own, borne of pain, blood, sweat, and tears, yet earned honestly, through most noble trials of life.

Let them be mine.