One of my goals right now is to finish one creative project a week. It can be a picture, blog post, piano song, short film, knitting, weaving, anything I am using the creative part of my brain. The goal is to finish because I have a habit of aborting my creative endeavors when I’m not feeling excited or I am afraid of what thoughts or feelings might come from them. The projects then get put somewhere never to be seen again. Lately, I’ve been looking back on the blog posts I was afraid of, and the projects I wasn’t good at and trying to complete them.
My whole life I’ve hated goals. I don’t believe I’ll ever accomplish them and I’m afraid of failing. As this deadline of completing one project this week came and went I’m feeling the shame. I’m also feeling shame for feeling shame about this if that makes any sense, I don’t have anyone to answer to except myself. There is no reason I have to do this, but I lack consistency in my life and have failed almost every goal I’ve ever made. I want this.
This week I’m feeling this heavy fog weighing on me. I am stuck and lost in a sea of thoughts of "not enoughs", comparisons, and "I can’ts". The symptoms I experience from ADD are strong. When I get up in the morning to pray and write I jump from thing to thing and I don’t know what to say, I want to give up or start over. Then I’m over pinning on Pinterest, or reading more articles on branding and color schemes or lost in the world of Instagram and I end my one hour of peace and solitude frustrated and angry feeling like I am wasting my time.
One morning I was so frustrated, I felt this need to go down to the waterfall. I haven’t been since the summer, I don’t like the cold mornings but I felt like I was going to explode. The anger and frustration consume me some mornings and I am snapping at everyone. I hate it. The waterfall is where I feel closest to God, that’s where the clarity is. That’s where the peace is.
I watched the water bursting over the wall down to the stream below and that sound, drowning out every thought in my mind. I prayed and pleaded with God to fill me with his spirit.
Please take a moment and watch this prayer of mine.
As I walked away from the rushing loud waters of the waterfall I felt the stillness of the water just before it enters the waterfall. I felt the peace of the breeze blowing on the water like it was blowing this thought to me. “Be still and know.” “Be still and know.” “Be still and know that I am God.”
I may not know much of the Bible or many bible verses off the top of my head. But I know that feeling of God’s peace. That feeling that washes over you and drowns out all the noise and pain. That feeling of the light breaking through the cracks. That feeling of clarity after a season of feeling stuck.
He is with me, in the messy overwhelmed confusing lost moments. He never leaves. I have to be still. I have to pause. I have to take a deep breath. I have to let all of the to-do lists, the “what do I write”, the “I’m not enough”, the “what will they think’s “go, I have to surrender.
As much as I want to do this on my own and as much as I want to keep pushing forward and keep juggling, I can’t do it without him.
I have to sit in this middle grey area and fight the rushing waters that tell me to quit. I have to let that loud sound of the waterfall drown out my mind.
Getting stuck and in a funk is hard. I hate it. I hate the way I treat others, I hate the way I isolate myself, I hate the person I am when depression rears its ugly head.
But the beauty is in there somewhere. The peace is in there somewhere. The love is always there. I have to let all that water from the storm pour out of me. I have to let go. Let go of the goals, the to-do lists, and the itineraries and know that I am enough and I’m doing the best I can.