Brave Enough To Be Bliss

It had nothing to do with these three ladies. They didn’t pressure me. They were nothing but kind and accepting of me…and my silence. It took me years to begin really speaking to them, and we met frequently , so it’s not that I didn’t see them often enough to really get to know them. I knew them, they just didn’t have the chance to know the inside me. I gave them the appearance of me, the one I thought was worthy of being seen, but not the real deal. I didn’t trust many people , especially with my innermost thoughts. They could never know I had questions about God and why things are the way they are or work the way they do in life. I couldn’t admit to them that I didn’t agree with the way they viewed all the things related to their faith. I was OK with them not agreeing with me, but I couldn’t be honest that I didn’t agree with them. I felt intimated by their knowledge and deep faith because all I had was questions. So, as I had always done to stay safe, I opted to be who I thought they wanted me to be so I could stay below the radar. I would go learn from them, but say and do and be as little as possible to stay safe. I don’t know if it was the movie, or everything that was within me, or the combination of it all, but that movie tore…me…up. For days. I loved it as much as I hated it. I loved the story, the meaning, the cast, the music. I hated that it made me feel. I hated that it had answers I couldn’t comprehend. I hated that I soooooooo wanted to feel anger and hate and rage, but instead I understood the pain and heartache, the compassion and forgiveness, and the hope and love. I didn’t know how to also feel those other emotions. To clarify, I understood pain and heartache, compassion and forgiveness, hope and love, for everyone else, just not for me. I recommended people see the movie because I knew it was important, but personally, I wanted to forget it. It was hard. It was unsettling. It was difficult. It was painful. Those were things I avoided at all costs. Compartmentalize. Get through things by storing them somewhere else, never to be accessed. That’s the way to get through this life. But that’s not possible with this movie. It’s too real. And there was nothing about me that was real…yet. I mentioned the movie to a dear friend of mine when we were talking about forgiveness long before I ever went to Michigan. She hadn’t ever seen it, but she remembered me talking about it when I sent her a screenshot upon opening the rental agreement. We watched it together before I left on my trip and it turns out for a healing person, it has all the feels and makes a person do some soul searching, but not in the same way it did before. I thoroughly enjoyed it the second time and there was no hating anything about it. I appreciated the honesty, the vulnerability, and the humanity of the movie. The rental property officially being called The Shack seemed pretty amazing or ironic or God winky. And honestly, it was getting a little weird since there had been so much of that. I didn ’ t admit that to anyone, but if God knows everything that goes on in my little brain, then He knew how that movie affected me. So, while it was sort of unbelievable in a cool way, it was equally unbelievable in a disturbing way that I would be spending a month in The Shack. I don’t know if God kids around or not, but I imagined it was like an elbow in the ribs sort of joke from Him and I decided to laugh about it since I had gotten through all that questioning business. Or so I thought… In the chapters to come, you will read about the challenges I faced relationally and spiritually. What I see in retrospect, though, is that when I was so upset by the movie The Shack , all the questions were just swimming around in my head. I wasn’t talking with God at all about them. When I was staying at The Shack the questions were an ongoing conversation with God where I expressed frustration, and asked for help to figure out why I was struggling. Where I wasn’t scared to be honest. Where I didn’t have to hide that I wasn’t sure about a lot of things. Where I didn’t feel alone. It is a stark contrast and even though the answers would still take a while to come, and that frustrated me at times, I never doubted I would eventually find them. Now back to the movie. I f you haven’t seen it or just want a refresher , click on the link below. The Shack (2017 Movie) Official Trailer – ‘Believe’ (youtube.com)

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