Monday, February 11, 2008

Guarding my heart

“The only thing more tragic than the tragedy that happens to us is the way we handle it- the choices we make, the person we become, the life we live (or don’t live) Jesus said, “Whoever shall seek to save him life shall lose it” (Luke 17:33). The things we do to protect and preserve our hearts usually end up hurting us more. To choose to shut your heart to love- so that you won’t be hurt- is to deny the very thing that you are made for. To demand perfection of yourself so that no one will ever critize you again is to lay an intolerable burden on your back.” The Sacred Romance

I’m reading a book right now that has forced me to look into my past and confront the very things that have hurt me the most. I have always had a big problem with dealing with the major issues of my life; I had almost convinced myself that if I ignored my problems long enough I would forget about them or make them go away. However, what I have found is that ignoring them just makes my heart more numb and less likely able to love again. For years I have been putting up walls that make it nearly impossible for people to get close to me because I thought that if they knew the true me, I wouldn’t be good enough to keep them around. So what happened is that no one knew the true me, not even myself. I let my low self esteem issues dictate how I lived my life and I was never happy because I always felt alone. I also lived out of fear that people would find out my past so I limited myself to jobs that did not do back ground screens. I let a stupid mistake I made at the age of nineteen affect my life for over ten years. I beat myself up for making an error in judgment instead of learning from my mistakes and moving forward.
I’m at a very pivotal point in my life right now because I am starting over with work and relationships and I know that until I deal with the issues of my heart I will never be successful in life or love. When I think of love, at this point it seems easier to revert back to my old ways of controlling relationships so that I don’t get hurt, but I know that I will never find true love if I continue to guard my heart. I am continuing to pray that God will heal my heart and show me how to love with my whole heart instead of me trying to control it because I have learned that great sadness comes when I don’t listen to my heart. With work I’m praying that God will continue to open doors for me and give me the courage to step out of my comfort zone and pursue careers that I would have previously categorized as off limits. I am also praying that he will continue to reveal to me what is holding me back in life and continue to break down the internal scars I have from living with regrets. Once again I am thankful for all the second chances that he has given me and am hopeful to get things right this time. I know that “he’s still working on me” and so I don’t need to expect perfection from myself; instead I need to continue to make him a priority in my life and trust that he will lead the way.

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