Hearing God

I’m well into the book Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert and I’m overwhelmed by it. She is telling my story, or rather, I’m hearing echoes of my story in hers. It makes me want to go live in an Ashram in India for a spell. I love the part where she is wrestling with her own mind while she’s trying to meditate (I really battle the voices in my head) and then when she hears a voice come roaring out of somewhere deep inside her that says “YOU HAVE NO IDEA HOW STRONG MY LOVE IS!” and then the voices are finally quiet. I believe she heard God right there, right in her gut and she believed. I believe, oh help my unbelief.

The Beginning

Okay, so here I go. I’ve always journaled as a way to communicate with my deepest self and to God and to have the two connect. Why not continue to do so in a blog? If it helps someone else out, great! And if not, who cares?!

I was thinking today about the generations younger than me. I really like them and have great hope for our future because of them. Maybe this is because I’ve never really grown up or because I’ve always really enjoyed children and Gen Xers and Millenials are the children I’ve always loved, just older. I’d love to try and help them stay out of the messes I’ve gotten myself into but I realize that we all have our own story and no one else can write ours for us. When I am tempted to mess around with someone else’s story I sometimes hear Aslan growl.

That’s one of my biggest lessons/challenges – being a controller. I read the book Compelled to Control by Keith Miller around 4 years ago and couldn’t believe how he was telling me my story. I especially loved the part where he said that he told his family that he wasn’t controlling and they all fell out of their chairs laughing. That used to be me but now I know better. I’m learning to “let go and let God,” and “keep my own side of the street clean,” and take care of myself – the only person I can take care of and all sorts of other goodies that I’ve learned in my 12 step group. Another wonderful slogan that has literally saved my life is the 3 C’s: “I didn’t cause it, I can’t control it and I can’t cure it.” For awhile that was literally my mantra.

For years I’ve lived with two sides of the same coin: pride and insecurity. I always knew that they were flip sides of each other but I never knew how to rid myself of them. Now I’m learning (progress not perfection here) that humility and deep trust in God is the antidote to this awful flipping disease: that and never going into my mind alone because it is a dangerous place. I am so glad to be where I am today and truly believe that my path is a good one.