On Vulnerability

Can I tell you how it feels to be vulnerable?

Utterly and completely.

To be split down the middle,

With all my love and fears,

Slipping simultaneously, uncontrollably out of my insides.

You

Do you see all of me,

Feel what I’m feeling, see where I’m coming from?

Do you notice the quickening pace,

Of my heartbeats cadence,

Underneath the rise and fall of my chest,

As my breaths become shorter, more shallow.

Will it ever feel safe,

Will I ever experience freedom in this state?

Or will this glass house crack and crumble under your persuasion?

Will we succumb to joy or pain,

Or are both inevitable outcomes?

To be sure, we will have to continue,

Sojourning through this life together.

I’ll try to fight the urges to reinforce my fortress, if you’ll be gentle.

I’ll sit with my skin as flushed as the flowers on the table,

Again and again, for you, my Achilles heel. 

Lyrics

Prompt 13

I’m a sucker for one-liners. I like to hear people zing witty banter back and forth and I love hearing short, profound sentiments. I think that’s why I love music so much. Every day I listen to music, all day. I’d like to think I have a healthy appreciation for most genres, and consider myself a music aficionado. However, the reality is I just latch onto musicians that other people like and based on their lyrics and sound, love them or leave them.  That has been the case for my most recent musical obsessions. For example I found my love for Mumford and Sons and The Civil Wars based on (cower in shame) episodes of Grey’s Anatomy, and my love for Sara Bareilles based on this blog post.

I find so much satisfaction in listening to these artists sing sweet melodies and spill out poetic verses, hooks and bridges that seem to explain where I’m at so perfectly. It’s as if they stepped right into my mind and plucked out how I feel about Jesus, my relationships, and the direction of my life. Often the actual subject matter of the song has nothing to do with what I’m experiencing but somehow these artists use a few lines to sum up the pages and pages of my Moleskine that I’ve filled trying to decipher what I feel.

Won't somebody come on in and tug at my seams?/ Oh, send your armies in of robbers and thieves/ To steal the state I'm in I don't want it anymore

I know that she is singing about a man and pleading to get over him. She calls herself a basket case and gives examples of why she loves him. That couldn’t be farther from MY situation except for maybe the basket case part. I have a loving and faithful husband, but those lines are closer to home than I’d like to admit. I NEED to be moved out of the state I’m in; I’m pleading in a similar way to be pushed, pulled or dragged into a better state of mind. Truth is for months I’ve been struggling to mutter a prayer for myself other than, Please, Father be patient with me.

I’m balancing between a desire to dive deeper and thinly veiled apathy. I want to be robbed of fear and insecurity. I want shameful and painful memories to be stolen.

I hold on to worry so tight/ It's safe in here right next to my heart/ Who now shouts at the top of her voice/ Let me go, let me out, this is not my choice

I’d rather stop worrying and move forward in freedom. I want what I should believe to be what I really believe instead of cluttered with questions and doubt. I realize it’s all a bit dramatic but I’m okay with that. For now, I’ll sing along to popular songs and plead their melodic prayers until I feel closer to where I need to be. I'll rely on poetic verses and concise lyrics to say it better than I can because something is better than nothing. 

Fear

Exercise Numero Dos

She is not the fearful type. In fact, she is quite the opposite, bold and confident. Her self-assurance has always caused her to be a bit careless; careless with her words and careless with her actions. Her recklessness often finds her in compromising situations. Like when she got off the ‘L’ at 2 a.m. in a foreign part of the city and found herself alone and surrounded by dark corners and suspicious characters. She didn’t panic. She loosened her posture and slowed her gait. She sent a nonchalant text message and walked to the bus stop. Sure, her heart was beating a little faster than normal but not out of fear, out of excitement. She loved the thrill of uncertainty, the challenge of it all. She called it confidence, I called it stupidity.

The problem with all of this is that relatively speaking she hasn’t suffered any consequences. Relatively speaking, she has gotten by quite easy. When she used to wake up after an evening of binge drinking, she never suffered a hangover. In the course of her series of “social activities” she never suffered more than the occasional walk of shame. Even now, when her blunt, sarcastic words fall on unsuspecting ears, more often than not, they are met with laughter; found to be charming and witty. And, on the occasions when those words are met with resistance it generally comes from someone in it for the long haul, someone who for all intensive purposes forgives quickly.  How can she swallow a healthy dose of humility when her harshness is applauded and her recklessness punished with less than a slap on the wrist?

However, albeit she’s confident, to say she is without fear would be a lie. Indeed, her fears traipse around her subconscious like little thieves, stealing away precious moments with lies of what ifs and memories of helplessness.  When they surface, she can’t stop the goose bumps from hardening or the suffocating tightness in her chest. They suck her back into a moment in time when boldness and confidence were non-existent; a moment when fear of the truth and reality kept her loud mouth abnormally quiet. She fears her silence will reap far greater consequences than the combination of all her crass remarks. Depending on the day, the scales teeter precariously on the edge of either outcome. Fear lingers on indecision and uncertainty, patiently awaiting its next opportunity to blindside her. As for resolution, it’s hard to come by when you’re the villain.

I’d like to say I feel sorry for her, but truth is, I don’t.