The Price of Healing
"A Twist in Time"
"You want me to be evil? Fine, I'll be evil."
I raised my hands towards them, the pink sepphalite now flickering visibly between my fingers, revelling in the release of the power I had chained back for so long.
"No, we don't want you to be evil! We just want you to be good, to give you a second chance. Why lie to us?" Snow asked me, tears rimming her lids.
"You know what your problem is?" I watched the light grow stronger. "It's not that you want me to heal. It's that you want me to follow your kind of healing. No matter how hard I try to be good, it will never be good enough for you, because there is a certain route you won't be happy unless I take. You want me to kowtow and bend, to grovel and you want to see your final victory - good vanquishing evil. The knight slaying the dragon. You want me to be completely destroyed, humbled on the ground, because that's the way every good fairytale ends. And then you'll graciously extend your forgiveness and allow me to live in a closely guarded environment where you can watch my every move because I can never be trusted."
I clenched my fists, the sepphalite growing into a crackling ball, surrounding my hands.
"You've never understood me, the route I've had to take. I've had to endure pain beyond what you could imagine, make choices and survive situations you couldn't even dream, because you've never, ever been there. You can't understand that there can be another way to heal outside of your own prescription, to become good. Because you'll never accept a change that you've had no chance to dictate. You will never believe that I can heal outside of the realms of your control."
Pink fire emanated from the ball in my hands. I glanced at all of their faces. Fear. Shock. Hatred. Jealousy. Laughter flooded me, as did a great weariness.
"You'll never understand. A person can completely change. A person can fight to be good. You think judging every action and controlling every move will help me - fine, be that way. I have enough to do with changing myself, not trying to change the rest of you. And believe me, you need it as much as I do."
A flip of my wrist was enough to send the sepphalite crashing into the ceiling. As the debris started to tumble downwards, I began to run - far from the fleeing crowd, far away...to a place alone. A place where I could learn how to be good.
* * *
Walking home from work the other day and enjoying the beauty of sunshine and sky, I felt the first glimmer of hope in five years that I could actually heal, that life wouldn't always be this hollow and painful.
A person I once knew described the feeling inside as a ball comprised of shards of broken glass and bone, rolling around inside the hollow, tender part of your heart. Pretty good description.
Five years ago, I chose to backslide and allow myself to fall in love with a non-Christian I'd been fighting feelings for over two years.
He left.
Then I lost faith, hope, trust, love.
Then three years ago, my dad.
My home.
My brother.
My best friend went to jail.
My virginity.
My family is messed up.
I blamed myself. I hurt myself. I couldn't cope with the pain outside and inside.
Then I lost the guy I love.
My friends - OYAN - gone because I was/am "dangerous and unhealthy".
It's a lot for three years, and there's more I haven't detailed.
So this day, that consciousness that yes - yes, I can heal, someday - was a pretty shocking realisation. And a peaceful one.
I tweeted it - "It's days like today when I feel that glimpse of fragile hope, for the first time in forever, that there can be healing-even for me."
(NOTE: I would like to say that I am aware that there are people worse off than me. Far worse off. Sex trafficking, worse physical abuse than I had, worse emotional abuse and far worse sexual abuse. However, it still scars, and scars deeply, no matter how much you receive. It alters your perceptions of life, people and sometimes even God.
I know there is healing. I know people who have been healed. I know I'm no different from other people, but there are times when blow comes upon blow before you have time to even recover your balance from the last, when you think you will never have chance to heal.)
And a friend responded, "Of course there is healing. You're no different than any Christian. But are you READY for healing?:)"
That took up more thought processing than I was expecting. :P
Of course I WANTED to be healed. Even if I didn't think it would happen. I mean, who would want to live in the constant thralls of pain if they had a choice?
To revert back to Once Upon a Time for demonstration, Regina tried to kill her grief for Daniel by vengeance upon Snow, losing more and more upon the way - people's love and respect, the chance at true love, even in the end (SPOILER) her own father. She gained a huge hole in her heart by enacting the Curse to destroy Snow's happy ending, and tried to cover that by adopting Henry. When she lost Henry, she lost her reason to live until she found someone who was about to destroy all that was left of her life - and motivation to destroy that person then filled her hole. But her entire life was running - running from grief, pain, emptiness, lack of a mother's real love. It became an obsession, that if she destroyed this one more thing, just one more thing, she would gain her happy ending - and it never worked.
She chose ways that were an easy way out, but it only brought her more pain. She wanted healing, but was unwilling to take the hard path - the path that would bring her a lot of pain at once, and for a long period of time, but that in the end would lead her to healing. She wanted healing - now.
(Sheesh, I'm actually learning from this as I'm typing. :P There are reasons Regina is pretty much my favourite character in Once Upon a Time.)
John 5:5-8 - A man was there who had been ill for thirty-eight years. When Jesus saw him lying there, and knew that he had already been a long time in that condition, He said to him, “Do you wish to get well?”
The sick man answered Him, “Sir, I have no man to put me into the pool when the water is stirred up, but while I am coming, another steps down before me.”
Jesus said to him, “Get up, pick up your pallet and walk.”
I read somewhere once about the oddness of Jesus asking that question. Who wouldn't want to be healed from lying on the ground for thirty eight years? Being able to have a chance to walk, to travel, to earn a living?
Actually, quite a few people.
Lying on the ground doesn't just mean that you're helpless, being kicked, spat at, ignored by the righteous. It also means people will take pity on you, help you, think they've done a good deed. It means you get attention - negative or positive. It means that someone else is helping provide for you.
Thirty eight years of that - that can easily break pride of independence.
Being down can become an identifier - like I mentioned before in "Suicide and Self-Harm". It can become a twisted positive. You can go from preaching down everyone who puts down those who are sick and helpless, to becoming proud of being sick and helpless, to the point where - yes, you don't want to heal.
(Here's a link to a blog post that shortly puts what it said.)
Every choice in life comes with a price. Including the choice to heal.
People won't like that you're fighting your way back up. They say they want you to heal, but if you don't accept their help, their advice or their way/method of healing, they try to kick you back down. Backbite you. Minute managing every single action, every single step that you take - including the ones where you fall.
"Oh, they don't really want to heal, or they would be doing..."
"If they wanted to heal that badly, they wouldn't have gone back to doing..."
Every step in life, you'll find someone who wants to kick you down. Healing isn't an exception. I wish it were.
You'll fall. You'll slip back to where you were, perhaps even a little further. You'll hear the judgmental cries - YOU DIDN'T WANT TO CHANGE! YOU SHOULD HAVE DONE IT OUR WAY!
You may have to heal away from almost everyone. I'm choosing that route - though not completely. There's a very few people I'm allowing close to me during this. Because no one can heal completely alone. That wouldn't be healing - that would be building walls.
The thing is, you have to choose to get back up.
Choose to heal in the face of those who want you down even as they say they want you up.
It will cost. The question is, is it worth it to you? Are you ready? Or do you want to be identified by your pain for the rest of your life?
Pain has made me who I am. It's forced me to make choices I am thankful to God I made, and choices I grieve to this day. But pain is not me.
Healing freaks the heck out of me.
Especially because, as I'm learning, people will kick you the hardest - intentionally or unintentionally - when you're trying to change.
It's a bit like salvation in Christ. It's a long route to get to, and a terribly hard one to walk.
But in the end, it will be worth it.
Oh, and. Find a motivation. I want to heal so I can help others. So I can glorify God. So I can live as a signpost when I meet someone suffering and say, hey, I know it's not going to be easy, but you can do it with Christ.
You can heal without Christ, but a part of you will always be missing.
In Christ, you can heal. Completely. Because He is the God Who changes things - even preconceptions and misconceptions - Who changes a prostitute into a woman of faith who is in His own human lineage, Who heals the broken hearted, Who binds up every wound.
Let go of the things that are hurting you, the things you bring close to shield you, the fears that are holding you back. Trust Him to heal you, even when you're blind with suffering and fear, convinced that He cannot have the power to fill those holes in your heart. Have faith. Be courageous.
You can make it.
These are all words.
Words you hear in every service. From all sources.
They don't mean anything until you learn to live them.
Everyone can get a second chance.
In Christ,
~Siân
"You want me to be evil? Fine, I'll be evil."
I raised my hands towards them, the pink sepphalite now flickering visibly between my fingers, revelling in the release of the power I had chained back for so long.
"No, we don't want you to be evil! We just want you to be good, to give you a second chance. Why lie to us?" Snow asked me, tears rimming her lids.
"You know what your problem is?" I watched the light grow stronger. "It's not that you want me to heal. It's that you want me to follow your kind of healing. No matter how hard I try to be good, it will never be good enough for you, because there is a certain route you won't be happy unless I take. You want me to kowtow and bend, to grovel and you want to see your final victory - good vanquishing evil. The knight slaying the dragon. You want me to be completely destroyed, humbled on the ground, because that's the way every good fairytale ends. And then you'll graciously extend your forgiveness and allow me to live in a closely guarded environment where you can watch my every move because I can never be trusted."
I clenched my fists, the sepphalite growing into a crackling ball, surrounding my hands.
"You've never understood me, the route I've had to take. I've had to endure pain beyond what you could imagine, make choices and survive situations you couldn't even dream, because you've never, ever been there. You can't understand that there can be another way to heal outside of your own prescription, to become good. Because you'll never accept a change that you've had no chance to dictate. You will never believe that I can heal outside of the realms of your control."
Pink fire emanated from the ball in my hands. I glanced at all of their faces. Fear. Shock. Hatred. Jealousy. Laughter flooded me, as did a great weariness.
"You'll never understand. A person can completely change. A person can fight to be good. You think judging every action and controlling every move will help me - fine, be that way. I have enough to do with changing myself, not trying to change the rest of you. And believe me, you need it as much as I do."
A flip of my wrist was enough to send the sepphalite crashing into the ceiling. As the debris started to tumble downwards, I began to run - far from the fleeing crowd, far away...to a place alone. A place where I could learn how to be good.
* * *
Walking home from work the other day and enjoying the beauty of sunshine and sky, I felt the first glimmer of hope in five years that I could actually heal, that life wouldn't always be this hollow and painful.
A person I once knew described the feeling inside as a ball comprised of shards of broken glass and bone, rolling around inside the hollow, tender part of your heart. Pretty good description.
Five years ago, I chose to backslide and allow myself to fall in love with a non-Christian I'd been fighting feelings for over two years.
He left.
Then I lost faith, hope, trust, love.
Then three years ago, my dad.
My home.
My brother.
My best friend went to jail.
My virginity.
My family is messed up.
I blamed myself. I hurt myself. I couldn't cope with the pain outside and inside.
Then I lost the guy I love.
My friends - OYAN - gone because I was/am "dangerous and unhealthy".
It's a lot for three years, and there's more I haven't detailed.
So this day, that consciousness that yes - yes, I can heal, someday - was a pretty shocking realisation. And a peaceful one.
I tweeted it - "It's days like today when I feel that glimpse of fragile hope, for the first time in forever, that there can be healing-even for me."
(NOTE: I would like to say that I am aware that there are people worse off than me. Far worse off. Sex trafficking, worse physical abuse than I had, worse emotional abuse and far worse sexual abuse. However, it still scars, and scars deeply, no matter how much you receive. It alters your perceptions of life, people and sometimes even God.
I know there is healing. I know people who have been healed. I know I'm no different from other people, but there are times when blow comes upon blow before you have time to even recover your balance from the last, when you think you will never have chance to heal.)
And a friend responded, "Of course there is healing. You're no different than any Christian. But are you READY for healing?:)"
That took up more thought processing than I was expecting. :P
Of course I WANTED to be healed. Even if I didn't think it would happen. I mean, who would want to live in the constant thralls of pain if they had a choice?
To revert back to Once Upon a Time for demonstration, Regina tried to kill her grief for Daniel by vengeance upon Snow, losing more and more upon the way - people's love and respect, the chance at true love, even in the end (SPOILER) her own father. She gained a huge hole in her heart by enacting the Curse to destroy Snow's happy ending, and tried to cover that by adopting Henry. When she lost Henry, she lost her reason to live until she found someone who was about to destroy all that was left of her life - and motivation to destroy that person then filled her hole. But her entire life was running - running from grief, pain, emptiness, lack of a mother's real love. It became an obsession, that if she destroyed this one more thing, just one more thing, she would gain her happy ending - and it never worked.
She chose ways that were an easy way out, but it only brought her more pain. She wanted healing, but was unwilling to take the hard path - the path that would bring her a lot of pain at once, and for a long period of time, but that in the end would lead her to healing. She wanted healing - now.
(Sheesh, I'm actually learning from this as I'm typing. :P There are reasons Regina is pretty much my favourite character in Once Upon a Time.)
John 5:5-8 - A man was there who had been ill for thirty-eight years. When Jesus saw him lying there, and knew that he had already been a long time in that condition, He said to him, “Do you wish to get well?”
The sick man answered Him, “Sir, I have no man to put me into the pool when the water is stirred up, but while I am coming, another steps down before me.”
Jesus said to him, “Get up, pick up your pallet and walk.”
I read somewhere once about the oddness of Jesus asking that question. Who wouldn't want to be healed from lying on the ground for thirty eight years? Being able to have a chance to walk, to travel, to earn a living?
Actually, quite a few people.
Lying on the ground doesn't just mean that you're helpless, being kicked, spat at, ignored by the righteous. It also means people will take pity on you, help you, think they've done a good deed. It means you get attention - negative or positive. It means that someone else is helping provide for you.
Thirty eight years of that - that can easily break pride of independence.
Being down can become an identifier - like I mentioned before in "Suicide and Self-Harm". It can become a twisted positive. You can go from preaching down everyone who puts down those who are sick and helpless, to becoming proud of being sick and helpless, to the point where - yes, you don't want to heal.
(Here's a link to a blog post that shortly puts what it said.)
Every choice in life comes with a price. Including the choice to heal.
People won't like that you're fighting your way back up. They say they want you to heal, but if you don't accept their help, their advice or their way/method of healing, they try to kick you back down. Backbite you. Minute managing every single action, every single step that you take - including the ones where you fall.
"Oh, they don't really want to heal, or they would be doing..."
"If they wanted to heal that badly, they wouldn't have gone back to doing..."
Every step in life, you'll find someone who wants to kick you down. Healing isn't an exception. I wish it were.
You'll fall. You'll slip back to where you were, perhaps even a little further. You'll hear the judgmental cries - YOU DIDN'T WANT TO CHANGE! YOU SHOULD HAVE DONE IT OUR WAY!
You may have to heal away from almost everyone. I'm choosing that route - though not completely. There's a very few people I'm allowing close to me during this. Because no one can heal completely alone. That wouldn't be healing - that would be building walls.
The thing is, you have to choose to get back up.
Choose to heal in the face of those who want you down even as they say they want you up.
It will cost. The question is, is it worth it to you? Are you ready? Or do you want to be identified by your pain for the rest of your life?
Pain has made me who I am. It's forced me to make choices I am thankful to God I made, and choices I grieve to this day. But pain is not me.
Healing freaks the heck out of me.
Especially because, as I'm learning, people will kick you the hardest - intentionally or unintentionally - when you're trying to change.
It's a bit like salvation in Christ. It's a long route to get to, and a terribly hard one to walk.
But in the end, it will be worth it.
Oh, and. Find a motivation. I want to heal so I can help others. So I can glorify God. So I can live as a signpost when I meet someone suffering and say, hey, I know it's not going to be easy, but you can do it with Christ.
You can heal without Christ, but a part of you will always be missing.
In Christ, you can heal. Completely. Because He is the God Who changes things - even preconceptions and misconceptions - Who changes a prostitute into a woman of faith who is in His own human lineage, Who heals the broken hearted, Who binds up every wound.
Let go of the things that are hurting you, the things you bring close to shield you, the fears that are holding you back. Trust Him to heal you, even when you're blind with suffering and fear, convinced that He cannot have the power to fill those holes in your heart. Have faith. Be courageous.
You can make it.
These are all words.
Words you hear in every service. From all sources.
They don't mean anything until you learn to live them.
Everyone can get a second chance.
In Christ,
~Siân
Comments
Post a Comment
Thanks for sharing your thoughts. :)