It has taken some time to return here, and in the lapse I have thought frequently about Paul's question "How are you different?".
Hopefully I've learned more about myself and grown through mistakes. I've experienced grace, reconciliation, reunion, breaking away and the bond between parent and child being forced into a new type of relationship.
I've begun a new decade of living, and with it unexpected physical changes and a renewed assessment of who I am apart from my husband and children. My entire adult life has been centered on these relationships and how they define me. "I am a wife. I am a mother." I am also someone besides that.When my grandmother died, my aunt wrote a poem in her honor. Ruth prefaced it with these words:
"The whole of her (Barbara's) personal writings, however, speaks clearly of her equally real inner conflict which was...deep...namely, her struggle with the other side of the paradox common to every true Christ-follower: fulfillment of self, or, becoming fully the person God created."
That's what I want. I don't want to be 50, 60, or 80 and wonder if I really was embracing the person God created to its fullest.
So who am I? I don't want to be defined by what happens to me, but by the development of the person I was created to become. That is the legacy to leave for the people I love and give it in return.
5 comments:
So glad you e-mailed us about your new posts, Shari, but I would have found them, since I check out your site several times a week. In fact, I checked this morning before these posts.
I like what I'm reading and believe the metamorphosis you describe is something we all need to experience. I'm glad you're NOT waiting till you're 60 or 80!
Now that school is out, maybe we'll see you more often!?! :)
I look forward to the details!
And, silly me, which poem was it? "Bird Song"?
I did a helpful exercise last year. I wrote down on little pieces of paper every label of myself I could think of: mother, wife, friend, poet, adviser, artist, writer, etc. Then, one by one, I burned them, saying to myself, this is not who I am! The book prompt that got me into that didn't tell me to be careful with this. When I took a shower the next morning I felt totally empty! What I didn't realize was that I had to not just leave myself open and empty like that, but fill that space consciously with who I am: one full of God.
Ginnie/Bootsie:
Thanks for all the times of checking with nothing new to see!! ;) My goal is to spend part of a morning at least once a week while the girls are still sleeping in!
Ruth:
I love the thought that I am a woman full of God. Shouldn't it all be reduced to that for anyone? What a great canvas to have as the starting point! It's exciting to think about what will emerge from this.
btw, the poem was "Villanelle to my Mother".
Part of my promises to myself this new year (almost 6 mo. behind us now) was to just take time for ME....not my boys, not the husband...but me....and I have felt healthier-inside and out, b/c of this.
So glad to be a part of "you" again. I miss you. Maybe I'll see you tonight? Are you still doing WT? My "kids" are singing Sunday.
Oh, yes, the villanelle, with all her roses trailing.
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