Year 2011-Trust For The Journey

Trust has multiple definitions and can take on a variety of positions - a noun, an adverb, a verb.  While looking at it's multiple personalities there is one word that just keeps coming up.  Confidence.  As a verb, trust can be to rely upon or place confidence on something or someone.  A child should have confidence in his parent to give him unconditional love, a safe place to express his true self and guidance in navigating this world.  When two people decide to get married, there should be a confidence of til death us do part.  What happens when something you had confidence in let you down? 

I think it does something to you.  Not all bad though as there are several people who have overcome great trauma and hurt to lead empires, become star athletes and even become the President of the United States.  Wounded people who have chosen to help others rather than wound them.  In my own life, however, I've found it is easier to make A's and B's than it is to overcome that deep hurt that often leads to a lack of confidence.   

People may mean well when they say "you can trust me," but trust isn't something objective.  Every person has a unique spin on this word we call trust.  Moreover, each person has a different importance they place on what signifies trustworthiness.  What may make all the sense in the world to you, might be ridiculous to me.  With this understanding, I have come to seek a component of trust that I feel is most important.  People are flawed.  They mean well but they are flawed, so at some point, they will fail.  Rather than seeking to find someone to be what they cannot be; it is better to put those energies into becoming someone you can trust.    

I was watching Jay-Z give his Master Class on the OWN Network.  He grew up in the projects, his dad left when he was young and he fell into certain unsavory activities.  Perfect breeding ground for seeds of doubt and mistrust.  In the segment called "Letting Go," he talked about the bitterness in his heart from age 12 to around 35-36 years of age towards his dad. He also talked about how freeing it was to tell his dad what was on his heart and the release it brought him from the past.  It was pivotal and necessary to reclaim a heart capable of trust.

As I've said many times, my turning point was a book called Love Is A Choice.  But there were others.  Finding My Way Home, Adult Children of Alcoholics and Feel The Fear And Do It Anyway were all books that helped me to see that if my life was going to change, it had to start with me.  With each book, I was able to identify what was broken or lost and, with God's help, forge a pathway to wholeness.  What a journey!  From book to book, experience to experience, God was there to coach me.  He'd show me what was relevant and encouraged me to take risks.  I failed more times than I succeeded, but I stopped falling backward into codependency.  I started falling forward into God's arms.  Like a parent whose child was pulling himself up on furniture and taking steps, God celebrated every movement I took toward authenticity.   

Even now while seeing a relationship coach, it's not so much that she has been the silver bullet for me.  I think what is happening is my attitude, my resolve and my work is feeding a new energy of trust.  I believe that God is honoring my faith in action; as a result, wisdom is coming from inside of me.  It is more than philosophical existential thought, it is transformative.  The integrity of my behavior is being merged with my core beliefs and my values.  Flaws that were once scary are becoming portals through which compassion flows.  Imperfection is becoming a magnifying glass for humility and profound gratitude. Weakness is regarded as opportunity to see God's strength take center stage and take care of me.   

While scrolling through online dating profiles, I feel a new confidence.  I am not afraid of getting it wrong.  Most of all, I don't feel like I need to convince myself of my worth by subconsciously gravitating to someone unavailable or defensive.  My intuition is spot on.  Even if I'm the only one who sees what I see, I can trust in my God-given gifts of discernment and wisdom.  I've also learned that I don't have to rush in making a decision.  I can take my time and allow the truth to be revealed.  My last relationship taught me that a man who wants a relationship with you will make sure you know it, in word and in action.  I can trust that. 

I can trust in my attractiveness.  I know and accept who I am with utmost respect and admiration.  I no longer feel I have to change my wardrobe, my makeup, my hair or change my behavior, morphing into some sexy, energetic, recreational something that I cannot sustain.  I even put a current picture of myself on the site.  There are lines in my forehead and gray in my hair and I couldn't be more proud. With 2011, God has given me trust for the journey.

Rebuilding My Confidence

For the last couple of hours, I've been browsing profiles of available men on a Christian Dating Site.  I felt it was time for me to own where I am.  I'm no longer part of a couple.  I am single and available.  It's not that I feel ready to re-enter the dating world, per se, but I need to create some forward movement.  I need to create some emotional distance between me and my last relationship.  But more important, I need to take my heart out of the past and help it to get strong again.   

I know that you need to heal so that you don't take unfinished business into a new relationship.  It's only been two months but I've used the time wisely, I think.  Yet, I have to wonder if sometimes the heart must be shaken from complacency.  Reminds me of how a heart attack victim heals.  Though it hurts, I've heard a patient is told to cough.  Deep coughing helps prevent complications after heart surgery, I've read.  Another thing cardiac patients are encouraged to do is exercise.  It gets that blood pumping and strengthens the heart. This tells me that healing doesn't just happen; it takes work.

Even with emotional issues, such as loneliness or depression, it is advised that you not isolate yourself.  Instead, you should make yourself get up and out.  There is something therapeutic about being active and getting around others.  I think that's why, after being indoors for a while, I have to get out.  Reminds me of why I love shopping on Christmas Eve.  There is something electric about it.  Likewise, now that I've taken time post-breakup to disconnect, reflect and heal, I figure that it's time to get my heart in motion.  It's time to rebuild up my confidence.

Towards this end, I looked at several profiles.  Most were pretty typical.  Some were a blaring NO.  Nothing jumped out at me; but at least I made the effort.  I can be proud of that.  I believe God to honor my efforts.

Happy Birthday To Me!

What a beautiful day!  Upon logging on to Facebook, I was overwhelmed by the outpouring of well-wishes on my wall.  I was moved to tears as I read all the "Happy Birthday's" I received.  And intermittently were comments that moved me as folks talked about how much I have touched their lives.

 

In comparison to last year's birthday - the big 5-0 - by all appearances this birthday has been pretty low-key.  No hoopla, birthday party or going out on the town.  I've not left the house. Yet, all day I've felt overwhelming gratitude.

May I be very transaparent?  My 50th birthday was ridden with anxiety about growing or looking old.  I needed fanfare.  I needed smiling faces, gifts and much ado made over me.  I needed to look good in my form-fitting jeans and fashionable boots.  I needed to feel like I still had it.  That I wasn't ready for sensible shoes.  I kept looking in the bathroom mirror, or any mirror for that matter, to make sure I didn't have a sprouting of fine lines around my eyes or more furrows on my forehead.

Age 51 feels more emotionally stable.  I feel like a wiser graciousness is coming up from my toes, flowing upward and filling me with a deeper understanding of who I am becoming.  No more perplexity about where I fit or how I fit.  I don't feel anxiety about where I'm going or growing.  Authenticity no longer feels like something I am pursuing; rather, something I embody.  Authenticity is a reservoir, springing up and flooding my soul.  With it, the revelation that God dwells in me as me.  Thanks Elizabeth Gilbert for sharing that simple yet powerful truth!

Love Is

When I first read the book Love Is A Choice, I was twelve years into a heart sickness that I could not overcome.  Year after year, new love interest after new love interest, yet I was still hung up on one man.  I named him the one who got away.  Reading this book taught me about codependency, love hunger and empty love tanks.  Codependency is when one person needs the other person to be unhealthy and oftentimes enable them to remain that way.  An empty love tank was an emptiness of the soul that seeks to be filled.  If you were raised in a household where love wasn't flowing freely, namely your parents or authority figures were not emotionally available, it created a hunger for what you didn't receive.  A love hunger.  Some filled that hunger with drugs, others with alcohol.  Me?  I fed it with romantic relationships. Years of watching The Wonderful World of Disney and soap operas offered me relief from that insatiable hunger.  All I needed to do was find The Handsome Prince.  This man would rescue me from my longing and loneliness and finally cure me of the aching deep inside. As I approach age 51, Life has offered me years of experiences, yet that fantasy of a true love has remained.  After years of false starts, a date here and there, or a rebound with an unavailable person, here I stand.  I am soooo grateful that God in His Infinite Wisdom didn't allow that to steal my capacity for a loving relationship.  Nevertheless, I'll not make this blog post about that relationship; rather, I prefer to make this about an emerging knowing in its aftermath. I've been pondering this very subject for the past few days during the Christmas holidays.  You can't watch a Christmas movie on Fa La La La Lifetime, the Family Channel or Hallmark without seeing a romantic story unfolding: a man and woman who are brought together during the Yuletide season.  Lives are touched by the spirit of Christmas and hearts choose Love over isolation.  Ahhhhhh, romance, true love, Christmas magic.  The source of great joy for the lovers but the source of great torment for those who are eating a pint of Haagan Daas and wiping away lonely tears. Could it be that Love is much bigger, broader, and richer than the films we watch?  Perhaps Love isn't an ideal that ebbs and flows with the beginning and ending of a romance.  Perhaps Love is more spiritual than we've been taught to recognize.  From birth until now, Love has taken many forms and assumed many postures.  I just didn't recognize it.  During the times of longing, I've dismissed Love because it didn't come in the form I wanted.  Rather than be filled with gratitude for the love of family, the love of friends, the love of worshippers, the love of humanity, the love of beauty, I'd envy couples walking hand in hand or people exchanging wedding vows.  So much of my life has been spent grieving one form all the while surrounded by Love. Love exists.  Whether we acknowledge it or not, Love is.  And we have the choice to honor it, whatever the form, or to dismiss it.  Have you ever had a friend whom you truly cared about dismiss you when a man or woman came into their lives?  Nobody likes to feel like they are being loved by default.  That meantime thinking that says, I'll love you or hang with you because I don't have anything better to do or....because I don't have a romantic interest. Lord, open my eyes so that I can recognize and appreciate your Love in whatever form You provide.       I truly hope that, though I am ever-learning, with age is coming increasing clarity.  Love is Love.  It's just as equally Love when it's between comrades as it is when it's between a man and a woman.  Love is just as sacred, wonderful and of value.  The love a parent feels when they hold their newborn child in their arms for the first time.  The love of a soldier who throws himself on a grenade to save people he doesn't even know.  Love is powerful.  So powerful in fact that a heart can be inspired to keep beating against all odds because of Love.  Love is. I use to wonder how two people who experienced a romantic relationship could continue to keep company or be fixtures in each others' lives.  As I get older, I believe that those who are healthy and open understand that Love is Love.  So what if the romantic love ceases, they are open to Love's other forms.  It's not moving backward but taking a new path as you move forward.  For this reason, they don't throw the person away just because loving them requires an ending of one form and a beginning of another.  Love is only painful when we try to hold on, says an article I read in an old issue of O Magazine.  When you won't let go, it exposes you to much inner suffering.  There's got to be some truth in that.  With age comes the reality that my days on this earth are shortening.  Unless I have purpose that will allow me to see 100 years old, most of my life has been lived.  Because of this, I don't have the time to spend on folly.  Everything isn't a dealbreaker, as it was in my youth.  Hence, the illumination.  Love doesn't go away, it just changes forms.  There are some people who still have a place in your future.  The key is letting go of the old and embracing the new.  It's forgiving and releasing.  It's understanding that Love is necessary.   An old flame sent me a text message the day before Christmas.  My first thought was "he's still thinking about me."  My Ego wanted to take it in a direction that was familiarly self-serving.  But the part of me that is ever-growing into my best self responded with a spirit of gratitude.  You see, real Love doesn't require anything else.  It's open and willing but entertains no other agenda except expression.  Understand, it is not ignorant or unwise; it is loyal only to itself.  It is with this understanding that I pray--as I cross into another year--that the Love of God, who is the author of Love, find an expanded residence in me.

Solitary No Confinement

Just as it takes a village to raise a child, I am discovering it takes a diverse group of friends to keep you balanced.  I've often marveled at girlfriend friendships.  In fact, there were times I'd watch sitcoms like Girlfriends.  Movies like Waiting to Exhale or Sex In the City and envy the closeness between those women.  Through ups, downs, boyfriends, breakups, husbands, ex-husbands, times of plenty and hardship, the relationships had the resilience to remain against all odds.  Well, at least for the most part.  For there were times when the friends were at odds.  Truly upset with one another.  Not speaking.  Not getting together.  And it forced the other girlfriends to manage times with one and times with the other.  Drama, drama, drama, yes.  Emotional overload, I'd prefer to call it.  Maybe that's the order of the day when you get more than one woman in a room for too long.

Sadly, our society has become so uncomfortable with intimacy and true friendship until innocent caring between two people is seen as something weird or perverted.  I've sat back with puzzlement at the questions about Oprah and Gayle King's relationship.  Maybe it's rare that people of the same sex can be soulmates without lesbian tendencies.  Heck, if you saw me with my friends Gret, Debbie or Sharon, you'd swear out we were too.  We hug, kiss, touch each other and are very comfortable with public showerings of affection.  And two of them are happily married!  Go figure!  And if we want to go Bible, I bet our society would have had a field day if they had observed John, the beloved disciple, resting his head on Jesus' chest. Scandalous! Yet, for all the screwed up political, social and spiritual views of Old and New Testament characters, there is no inference of homosexual tendency in that relationship.
 

The more my mind and heart clears, I am finding myself taking stock of my surroundings.  This includes my friendships.  I am blessed to have long-time friendships with my sister and college chums.  Though I seldom have conversations with my college chums there is a depth to our friendship that has not been duplicated in these 28 years.  Then, there are friends I sustained during my single-parent phase of life.  They were there to listen and to help. 

Since that time, my friendships have expanded.  A rainbow coalition of sorts.  I have my friends who nurture my authenticity.  They are the ones who truly get me.  My soul finds rest in them.  But if anything woos me to not be real, they won't let me get away with it. They know how to probe gently yet persistently.  Ironically very different, there are friends whose interaction with me is solely church related.  We worship together.  We sing together.  We experience the corporate experience.  Then there are my hanging buddies.  The ones who are like my Sex In The City girlfriends.  They make sure the fun-loving Suzette comes out to play.  We share, we eat, we argue, we shop, we laugh, we hang out.  I have biological sisters whom I adore, yet still there is a sisterly accessibility that they bring to my life that I have been missing.  

Under normal circumstances, I could easily fall right back in step with things.  But right now, I feel awkward.  Furthermore, my emotions betray me. It feels the same as when a wound heals on the outside, but when you bump up against it it still smarts!  Ouch!  Some situations feel like fingernails being scrapped down a chalkboard!  It is true that I feel the zest returning.  Maybe I just need something new.  Or maybe I need to better manage my life.  Discern when I'm ready for what and how much I can take at that moment.  My heart is open but it's not strong yet.  It's not aching but anything too intrusive is draining.  Zaps the energy right out of me.  Right now, I need lots of warmth, coziness and TLC.  

  

So today, I enjoy my alone time with my Boys To Men CD.  It's raining out which is the perfect backdrop for my cozy day.  No claps of thunder, no flashes of lightning, just smooth, steady droplets of water.  I write.  I listen to music.  I watch movies.  I eat.  I pray.  I breathe.  Selah.  

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Yay!

Thank you, Jesus!!!!!  I woke up this morning with absolute joy.  For the past few days, I've awakened sad and teary.  Maybe part of it is that I been dreaming about my ex.  Caught me completely off guard.  It's been happening Every. Single. Night.  And if I didn't see his face in my dreams, his presence was alluded to.  Dang the subconscious!!  But today...I repeat, today....I don't feel sadness.  Ahhhhhhhhhhh, Suzette is coming back!  It's not just a hope, a prayer, a goal, but I feel it.  Yay!

If that wasn't enough evidence, here's something else quite telling.  I just finished listening to Brian McKnight's Christmas CD.  If that thang ain't sexy?!  And you know the vibe, it's all about romance.  Normally, listening to something like that would tear at my joy and leave me in a teary depression.  Not today!  None of that residue, experienced or imagined, is on me this morning. 

I actually WANT to go out.  Not to work, mind you.  For the first time in a month and some change, I want to  get out...socially.  You know, BE among others.  I feel like a light has brightened inside and wants to shine.  Before today, I have pushed myself to get together with friends.  Sometimes it was uplifting.  Sometimes, not.  Everytime though, I felt anxiety about leaving my cocoon of an apartment or the comforts of isolation. 

Without a doubt, we females can't help talking about men.  I think it's in our DNA.  Either it's our hopes about men, frustration with not having a man, frustration with the man we have, planning something involving a man.  We are men junkies, I tell you. Normally, I am a card-carrying member of this club.  But after a breakup, you want to cut your card up and bury it. 
Everything's a reminder.  Movies, commercials, billboards.  Romance, sex, relationship is constant chatter.  P-a-i-n-f-u-l....except today!!! Yay!

With none of this emotional angst, I've rechecked my emails for upcoming meetups, social gatherings and invites.  I'm looking forward to this weekend.  I feel like putting on my makeup, throwing on something striking, putting on some sexy shoes and just strutting.  So much coming up!  I feel like I'm breathing again.  I feel that glow from the inside.

Okay, okay.....doooooown gurl.  Take it easy.  Wisdom says enjoy yourself but ease into it lest you should have a mad adrenalin rush and crash afterwards thereby plummeting back into depletion and sadness.  Okay, I hear you, God.  I'll just smile a lot, strut alot and breathe alot for now!

R.I.P. William McKinley Randolph

For the first time in about a week, I didn't feel sad when I woke up.  I laid in bed and pondered that for a while, praying intermittently.  Feeling a familiar bathroom urge, I got up.  Knowing that it required a little reading, I grabbed my book, EAT PRAY LOVE. 

Chapter 28.  "It is this happiness, I suppose (which is really a few months old by now), that gets me to thinking upon my return to Rome that I need to do something about David.  That maybe it's time for us to end our story forever."  Time to end our story forever.  I continued reading.  "Last spring David had offered this crazy solution to our woes...we could spend our lives together -- in misery, but happy to not be apart."  Being apart.  How I hate the being apart.  Maybe that's why I clung so hard emotionally.  Being apart has been terrifying for me for as long as I can remember.

My dad use to work out of town in a place called Nashville when I was, ummmm had to be 3 or 4 years old.  I know now that it was Nashville North Carolina, not Nashville Tennessee, though it felt like the latter.  Waiting for him to come home was e-x-c-r-u-c-i-a-t-i-n-g.  I remember the anguish of my little heart who missed her daddy and couldn't wait to hear his big voice.  Somehow, I equated him being home with peace and all things being right again.  "Alice Lee!" I heard.  It's him!!!!!  I rushed towards him and jumped into his arms.  That's the day he gave me my new tennis shoes.  I swear I walked in those shoes for the rest of the day and would have slept in em had my mom not taken them off.
   

Before I met my guy, I felt that same anguish.  Unknown to anyone, I would whisper to God nightly to please send me someone.  I had read somewhere that women tend to choose men like their fathers.  In fact, while writing this blog, I did my infamous Google search on the subject.  I scrolled down until there it was--tah daaah!--an article in CNN Living entitled "Why you're likely to marry your parent."  Comfort in familiarity, I read.  That sounds about right.  For you see, my prayer went something like this.  "God, I realize that I can't help being attracted to men like my father. Despite everything I've done to educate myself otherwise, I keep picking unavailable men.  I don't trust myself.  So, would you please pick for me?  An available man this time...who prefers me.  Who ain't gettin over nobody.  Who WANTS to be in a relationship.  Who ain't heavin and hoeing about the costs.  But most of all, who  has character.  Somebody I can respect who WANTS to be with me....Amen."

Let's see, dad died December 29, 1996 (or was it 1997).  I get confused because he died the end of one year and we had the funeral on January 1st of the next year.  I miss my dad more than words can say.  It doesn't hurt as much or as often, but oh how I miss him.  Maybe that is why I was so fascinated with my guy.  He was just like my dad!  Honest!  So similar until it was almost scary.  A man's man.  Self-determined, forthcoming, highly opinionated and yeah, a bad ass of sorts...lol.  Underneath all that gruffness though, it hurt him if there was a need and he couldn't help. He pondered and felt things deeply which made it difficult for him to release hurts.  He didn't need alot.  Just knowing that his family was okay was enough for him.  He LOVED working. Good, hard, physical work didn't scare him at all.  Very protective, faithful, consistent, true.  When my dad walked in, everything wrong got right - quick - cause my dad won't having no mess.  He and my dad were twin souls, I tell ya.  Maybe that's why I was so drawn to him that I couldn't walk away, even when he infuriated me.
 

When I'd see my guy with his children, I saw how my life would have been had my dad been available.  Sadly, he spent most of his life struggling with alcohol and fighting his demons.  When I met my guy's daughter and saw them interact, I saw me.  The giving, secure, compassionate woman I could have been had my dad been emotionally accessible.  I guess subconsciously something inside of me needed a do-over.  A righting old wrongs, the article called it. 

Now that it's been a month since my breakup and some of that emotional smoke has cleared, I ponder.  My agenda for my relationship was someone to do things with and go places with.  As it progressed into a relationship, my desire was for it to be healthy.  I told my guy that I wanted us both to have a good experience regardless of the outcome.  Could it be that the past nine months haven't been about that at all?
 

Grief has so many nuances.  Mourning a loss is  so intense at first but ultimately, according to Elisabeth Kubler-Ross, one comes to a place of acceptance.  A counselor friend of mine would call it that point when you say, "I hate that you died, but I will live on."  Conversely, there is something called complicated grief.  It's when grief is severe or prolonged.  For me, my dad was the first death that hit so close.  It was so unbelievable that even after the funeral, I would feel this overwhelming need to run down anybody who reminded me of him.  I recall such an incidence where an old man who wore his hat and clothes just like my dad walked into a room where I was sitting.  I lost it.  I cried uncontrollably and even asked this elderly man if I could hug him.  He was very kind to me as I explained that my father had died and he reminded me of him.  Though I don't have those impulses anymore, it's still hard.  Since his death, our family has not been the same.  It wasn't until he was gone that I realized he was the glue that held us all together.  When he died, everything fell apart.
   

God, once again, you heard not only my prayer but the unresolved pain in my heart.  You sent me my guy and I thank you.  With his help, you've gently brought me to this profound moment.  A moment of enlightenment and clarity.  There is one thing still to do.  I have to go back and bury my father.  So here we stand, You and I.  You're holding my hand as I bend down and kiss my dad for the last time.  Ashes to ashes.  Dust to dust.  We stand together as I watch him being lowered into the ground.  Goodbye.  Rest in peace, William McKinley Randolph.  Your kneebaby is okay now.