Once there was a time when writing was what I did, who I was. I wasn't a Christian, I knew not of Jesus. Writing was simply where I went to escape the world, where I landed when I needed space, and where I could go when I lost my legs to stand. Writing was where I’d get lost and at the very same time, be found. Words, like spun silk, would gently wind around my racing thoughts and guide me safely home.
Looking back it seems writing was my expression of pain, of deep angst. It cried out heavy burdens and deep questions with which there were no answers. Words formed like little sparks safely within my heart. Sometimes they stayed there, most times not.
They were always the weighty evidence of the pain and sorrow present in my life. Never lost for words. Never lost for hurt.
Not that I didn’t have any joy, because I did. But for some reason, writing waned when happiness came. The darker my life, the more words spilled out of me. But oh, to write out of joy and delight would be so grand. To let the words come from a heart of abundance rather than a heart of ache…how divine! I have seen many seasons come to pass in my writing and now I long for words to come as evidence of my redeemed heart, a transformed life. Where God gives me words that jump off the pages in joyous song and spread glittery joy to all who read them. Where the light could shine through the cracks that once left me empty but now through the grace of a Heavenly Father, leave me healed. This is how I hope to write in the future.
To glorify the King.
Writing can appear in two forms for me. The first is like an audacious, violent force that spills out of me like a cloud swelled with heavy rain, leaking a tragic aroma all over the place. It's hectic. Sometimes I cannot even contain it. The words simply cannot be contained; or restrained. There is no soft landing. Words just race through me like a fierce wind whipping about and leave me without a footing. I can feel my heart explode when they come and somehow fall into something both messy and beautiful. It is most undoing to read what I did not even know I felt. Sometimes I have to write it, to declare it, to feel it. To own it.
The other way words come for me is much harder to work out. They hide inside and stay quiet, where writing can hold me hostage, keep me from myself. Whirling around silently with no sense of urgency, hovering. In the shadows. During seasons like these, writing becomes a burden in my soul longing to be free, weighing heavy and thick like a haze . Under these stifling conditions, I am frustrated. The perfectionists antagonist: the uncertain wait. In line, waiting for scraps to be tossed my way. Longing for the words to just loosen themselves and come for me. Sweetly settle me. Validate me. If only I knew how to bring forth harvest…by bringing forth rain.
Thankfully now I know I have a Heavenly Father who loves me, whether the words come or not.
No matter the season I am in, writing is my go to, go do. When I am not writing, I am thinking about writing. And that too is part of the process. Always contemplating the next sentence, craving for it to settle me, to explain me. If you write, maybe you understand. Maybe you also crave words that sometimes flood, and sometimes hide. Maybe you too need to sit and let it out, regardless of the form. No need for perfection, only free space to decorate in your own way.
Write in freedom sweet sister.
Write until your feelings are made whole.
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