Speak Light
Thank you all for your kind responses to my previous post. I am exceedingly grateful for those of you who have been joined me in this blogging journey.
Before we go any further together, please,
Consider This Warning:
I’m going to be extra vulnerable with this post
and share an excerpt from my journal.
If you’re not into vulnerability, by all means, click past this post.
But if you’ve been following my blogs, chances are you’re akin to my honesty and willing to hold my exposure with the tenderness it needs. (At least, if you’re still reading, that’s what I’m hoping.)
I spent three consecutive days waking up at 4am.
Not because I wanted to, not because I needed to, but because I woke up at 4am, and when I wake up, I struggle to go back to sleep.
> The first early morning, I opened my Bible app and did an in depth study on the book of Acts chapter 15, specifically the three standards the Apostles instructed Gentile converts to abstain from.
>> Day two I was not having it. I wanted to sleep, and I told God I wasn’t going to get out of bed, not even to use the bathroom.
>>> By the third dark and quiet morning, I gave in:
I journaled.
Since I was a teenager, journaling is how me and Jesus communicate on an intimate level.
Seeing my thoughts in print helps me understand them. For me, the act of writing is like turning on a light. The contrast of ink against paper (or text in a .doc) literally helps my eyes see and navigate through the otherwise dark environment where my feelings live.
Writing helps me understand my thoughts, and hone in on one thought at a time. In doing so, I learn more about me, and in that knowing I can be my most honest self with Jesus.
As I began journaling this third day morning, I wanted to understand why I kept waking up so early. Here’s how I started…
Father, this is the third night in a row that I’ve woken up before 4:30am. I want to simply attribute it to tummy issues, but I also don’t want to neglect the possibility that You are waking me, so if that’s what’s going on, You have my attention. I would prefer not waking up this early, my preference is always to sleep through the night, but You have my attention…
And with the next line, my internal light switched ON:
I’m feeling kind of pressed for time with my book.
I went on to review the deadline I gave myself (as noted in my Awkward Bites post), and in doing so realized why confidence terrifies me…
Confident, which is slightly terrifying because every previous time I’ve felt confident enough to share it, I’ve turned out to be embarrassed in hindsight. But somehow I know it’s not like the other times. I feel like I can trust it. It’s a similar experience to trusting a betrayer again, there’s a TON of trepidation. Of course I want to trust it, but it’s humiliated me before. And my plan is to make it available to show to anyone and everyone, whereas before I’ve only allowed one person at a time to crush my soul… I guess I am slightly apprehensive.
I’ve found that the more honest I’m able to be with myself, the more clear I’m able to be with God.
Very often simply confessing that clarity, calling out my emotional weight by name actually brings freedom to that situation.
This freedom doesn’t necessarily change whatever it is.
But my awareness and the authority I take hold of when I create a clear and concise definition of my experience, that act itself turns the table. The heavy hidden things that I’ve struggled to cope with are unveiled when I speak them, and that gives me power over them. Insight provides perspective, and if you can see it from that view, it’s not as big as it’s felt.
When the light’s turned ON, the dark is limited to shadows of things. There’s space — freedom in light that’s hidden in dark.
This freedom changes me.
Anyway, as soon as I brought to light that my trust issues were tangled up in this heaviness I was ignoring, which made room for fear to germinate to the point where I was waking up at 4am, I experienced release. My very next line reads:
I guess I am slightly apprehensive. But also excited.
I was able to move on to how excited I am to share my book because the honest truth is I really like my book, both the story AND the writing.
I’m proud of it because I made it AND it’s beautiful.
I hope what sticks with you is that when you’re feeling some kind of way, call it out. Write it out and make it clear to yourself.
Speak light into your situation.
Being honest with yourself is the best first step to taking back your authority over whatever the it is that keeps you up in the dark.
The dark is for sleeping. Sleeping is my favorite. Don’t let anything steal your sleep. Certainly not for three consecutive days like I did. There’s way more peace in speaking light over that hidden thing.
You may even find that what hides itself under a veil of anxiety, when unveiled and brought into clear light, may actually be excitement, peace, or even joy.
You deserve full, restful nights, my friend.