Some things are hard to write.
Some are much harder to say.
Maybe it's just putting the words to them that is the difficulty.
I'd say I was a better speaker than a writer, but that is definitely not true.
I'd say I was a better writer than a speaker, but that is likewise untrue.
Words, sometimes, I think I was born of them. Like I sprouted, fully - a lexicon - straight from the ground. Words. I hate them. I love them. They drag me around by a chain.
Maybe once in awhile, I best them and twist them and make them do my bidding. But mostly, it's me that gets the whipping.
But still, I have a lot to say. So I trot right back to my fickle brain and try to tease out the meaning of living and then, try to put those thoughts into a generalized, accepted expression that other people share. If I were a painter, I'd use splatters and mash all manner of things into the canvas, step back and say, "Yes. That."
But I'm no painter.
And my brain's no abuser. Though I joke that way. Maybe it was shaped by one. And perhaps that's my gift to bring. My frankincense. I was brought up to hate myself, but something in me balked. And continues to balk at my upbringing's lasting legacies.
I write about love a lot. I write about it because it's so important. To me. And love, she's rarely represented in the world. For all the talk and greeting cards, marriages and dying declarations, most of us don't really know what it is to be truly loved or to truly love.
An elastic love, that stretches to encompass the whole of each of us. Love that holds no resentment. Doesn't keep track. Never threatens or dismisses. Forgives. Extends. Grows. Always.
Maybe this is God, to many. Maybe it's the promise of Jesus. I believe I've said that before.
It sounds stupid to say, "Love yourself." It's a message that's been co-opted and corrupted and turned into ads for personal hygiene and justifications for two-year degrees in not much. But loving oneself is not an outward declaration. It's not about anyone else knowing directly what you know of yourself.
It's trusting your footfall. It's knowing your step. It's believing that you will do what's right for everyone else by similarly knowing and doing what's right for yourself.
Not what's easy.
Not what's simply pleasurable.
Not what's convenient.
But right.
And figuring that out, I can't tell you how to do that. But I bet you'd know it if you'd just listen to yourself.
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1 comment:
Jennifer your words so often put a lump in my throat-- a lump that partly comes from the realization that someone else sees the same things I see, feels like I feel. But the lions' share of my reaction comes from profound gratitude that you take the time and energy to put it all out there for the rest of us who aren't quite so good at the word-wrestling.
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