Unplug

Today has not exactly been a good day. It has not exactly been a bad day. Or maybe it has been horrible. Or spectacular.

I think that the technical word for my state today is “stir-crazy.”

I feel like I’m losing my mind. “Don’t say this, don’t say that, SHUT UP AND QUIT TALKING ALREADY” are the voices in my head. I’m fighting them, tooth and nail and Facebook and Twitter – which is NOT helping. I’m watching my “brand” tank. One person unfollows me on FB. I must have ANNOYED THE HECK OUT OF THEM. I lose a friend on FB. WOW. I CAN’T BE REAL AND HAVE FRIENDS.

I can’t think of ONE PERSON I can call when I am in this state. I’m sitting as still as I can and trying not to relive the panic/anxiety attacks I had ten years ago, attacks that sent me into the smallest corners I could find to throw my hands over my head and try to hide from everything.

In my heart, I want to be processing. I want to be preparing for the wedding I’m shooting this weekend. I feel ready – totally ready to get this done and make this happen. But my body is FREAKING OUT, and taking my brain with it. I can’t think one thing without thinking another. I can’t turn off the constant noise in my head about “you should, you shouldn’t, They say, why does everybody, everybody can’t be that bad, GOD SAYS, help, I quit…”

I skipped a treatment dose this morning, but it didn’t lift this. I guess it was already in too deep and doing the work. So the good news is that I’m back here. And the bad news is that I’m back here.

I call this a faith journal. This is a HARD place. The place where I’m supposed to write about God, and about having faith in Him. But faith doesn’t exist without doubts, and days like today raise a lot of them. I can’t just say that God is going to come down and miraculously lift this off me. Heck, He may want me to go through it and destroy the “brand” that seems to be locking me in – GOD, I hate that word. It’s like everything I do publicly is supposed to serve my BRAND.

Good grief.

NOT HAPPENING.

I’m uncontrollably restless. I can’t stick to one thing. I just can’t. I want to – you have no idea how I want to – but I am like the wind, like the mountains, like the storms that used to scare me and don’t anymore, because they speak to a part of me that is whirling and ready to fly away into them. I’m unpredictable and unprofessional and I DON’T do all the right I know to do because I DON’T think of it in every moment, and if I have to think of it in every moment, I completely freeze. This is not perfection. This is ridiculous.

I know some will say that I just need to rest in the Lord. I need to pray more, read my Bible more, go to church more. But with this all out naked and getting nakeder (is that even POSSIBLE – man, I wish I knew it wasn’t!), I literally have no idea which direction is UP.

The absolutely only thing I know is Jesus Christ and Him crucified, and that is a TERRIBLY uncomfortable place to be, when I don’t want crucified, and I’m not sure that Jesus is a good answer to all the things I want for here, not sure that He is reward enough for me.

I write things NOBODY admits. I know that. Heck, maybe nobody gets to this point. But for me it’s all out raw, and I can’t just make it stop or go away, and even my confession is done in the name of Jesus Christ because there is no other way on earth I’d be brave enough to admit that I struggle with this stuff, that I don’t want easy answers or easy fixes or cliched encouragements or seven steps to fixing all this mess.

I want real God for a real life, that is MESSY, that doesn’t necessarily carry the hope that everything will get better or perfect or saner or whatever. In this moment, that is the only thing I know that I want. So my doubts about whether He’ll come through visibly in the physical realm? I think they’re legit. Because if I know Him, He really probably won’t.

But if I know Him, somehow, somewhere in my heart, I’m going to know that He Himself is reward enough for me. And living from there, mess, mistakes, restlessness and all – I can still have peace, regardless of the shoulds and the have-to’s.

I really hate being so bombastic. But maybe that happens because my heart wasn’t made for here, and it’s pushing for Home with all its might.