See

I'm pretty much a year in now.

I look back at the girl I was last July,

a fresh faced dreamer,
a blithe cupcake decorating barista,

still so unfamiliar to sorrow,

to human suffering.

I knew heartbreak.

I knew sadness.

I knew let-down.

But I had never let true suffering get close to me.

Since interning at a domestic violence shelter

I have come face-to-face with human suffering,

I've come to experience trauma second-hand.

I've let sadness penetrate my heart,

I've held hands with hatred,

I've looked bitterness in the eyes.

And it has take its toll on me.
Depression has become something I understand
beyond books, diagnoses, and symptoms.

Sometimes I get to the end of the month,
I look at my stats, numbers attached
to women I have begun to believe in,
and I realize what it takes.

Each session it takes courage to get close,
bravery to poke the soft places that bring tears,
and authenticity to let go of my own expectations.

Counseling isn't about helping others,

it isn't about making someone better than before.

Not exactly.

It's holding onto secrets without giving out judgement.

It's being safe enough to allow discovery.

It's marrying truth and trust in a way that brings vulnerability.

If I thought I could trust the process and come out unscathed I was wrong.
I've had to let go of naivety and hold on to hope.
I've had to see myself for who I am not,
and accept myself for who I am.

I would like you to see this me.
I began the slow walk towards my true self years ago,
and this blog played a huge role in that.

I can't ask my clients to be vulnerable without practicing it myself.
So here I am, blogging, letting myself be seen.
Because I can't stop believing that it is our stories, heartbreaks, and victories
that bring about belonging, connection, and love for one another.

Faint-hearted

I had no clue

how difficult, stripping, life altering this journey would be.

And I'm afraid I won't make it,

not the way I'm going.

I've been steadily pulling away.

Hiding.

I don't want you to see that I'm barely making it,

that this process is tearing up 22 years of structures,

that I am afraid I will not make a good fit as a counselor,

that my weak arms cannot and will not be able to hold others.

And I realize now that this is where I have faltered,

in trying to do this alone, 

pushing on in my own strength.

So let me take this chance to say,

Graduate school has become nothing short of the hardest thing I have ever done,

and I am completely intimidated by the idea of failing.

This so called process has stripped away my pride, my safety-nets, my routine thinking,

and it has left me feeling so much weaker, unsure, and discouraged.

Counseling others is nothing like I thought it would be.

Looking into the face of the bruised, scarred, and desperate 

is much more intense than I ever imagined.

Balancing on the beam of caring too much 

and not caring enough is exhausting.

I don't want you to see,

but I know you do.

I've been getting texts and calls.

People are praying for me.

I'm on their minds.

I seem to be in a "bad place"

They are worried.

And I find myself responding to all their care in bitterness.

I'm sorry.

I'm sorry for hiding, it takes so much more effort.

So here's the truth. 

I'm struggling. 

I'm doubting.

I'm afraid.

I consciously know I'm not alone.
My classmates feel similarly,
but it take so much effort to explain what we are going through.

But I need others. God and friends and you.

Because I will never make it if I think I can do it alone.

Celebrating love.

As most everyone knows or will now know,

February is my favorite.

I've loved celebrating love

since elementary school 

when Valentines day looked like sleepovers,

extra candy, and craft time.

I still have my top 5 Valentines Cards

stuffed in a box somewhere in my closet.

Adults roll their eyes, 

or profess their hatred for Valentines day

all the time.

But if you think about it,

it's a day to consciously celebrate loving others...

which is a commandment, and a theme with Jesus.

One thing God has been teaching me about love lately,

is that it should be done out of freedom.

I would have said I love others often.

I give up myself, my time, my priorities all the time.

To make someone happy.

To keep someone pleased.

To stay away from conflict.

But that's not really love.

Because in the end I feel used,

bitter, and all the more selfish.

Love should be done out of freedom,

not force.

For me that looks like setting boundaries,

looking inward to  check my motivations,

asking for God's love to fill my life,

not my own paled version.

"If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing.  

If I give away all I have, and if I deliver my body up to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing." 

1 Corinthians 13:1-3