The Letter Within

Have you ever written a letter to yourself?  I did it a lot when I was younger.  At youth functions, or camps, we often wrote a letter to ourselves saying things like "Hey!  How's life!  What have you been up to the last five/ten/fifteen years?"  A list of goals or certain things my past self wanted my present self to remember were then given.  Something like, "Are you still chasing your dreams?  What about goals 'x, y, z' have you accomplished those yet?"

I've been thinking about some of those letters lately.  I actually found one the other day.  It was written in what was probably the darkest time frame of my depression.  I spoke a lot about God, and remembering to stay strong.  It talked about loving without reservation, and being kind, and remembering that everyone wears an invisible pain to some degree.  The end of the letter is what stuck with me, though.
It said "Just remember.  I believe in you, and I always will."

It's cheesy; I believe in myself.  But then I took my mind back to that moment.  I believed in me.  Somewhere amid all that pain, and sorrow, a very tiny, very small, part of me believed I was going to make it.  I took my mind back to the night the letter was written.  I was in my room.  It was late, and everyone was in bed.  I had been crying, as was often the case, and I lay curled in middle of the floor.  I never slept much in those days, and I was clinging onto a picture as if my life depended on it remaining in my hand.  I sobbed, and asked God to take away the pain that no one could see.  I begged him to just end the constant despair I felt, and to make me happy.
"Just make me happy.  Please.  Just make me happy."
I said it over and over and over again, as though by repetition it might come true.

I prayed for that every day.  Make me happy.  Make me better.  Fix me; I'm broken.  I talked to myself about how to change, and I constantly came up with game plans to bring myself out of the dark.  On that night, as I was laying on the floor, I felt to write.

So I did. 

"Life is hard.  It's a fact that too many people just don't understand what it feels like to be covered in this blanket of sadness all the time.  But remember when you weren't so sad?  Remember when you could help other people, and lift them up?  It's a gift to do that.  Lifting others up is an important thing.  You must lift.  You must keep going.  God is there, and He always will be.  Remember, somewhere deep inside, you understand who you are.  Hold on to that.  Just remember.  I believe in you, and I always will."

Time is a gift.  It's taken me many years to find this peace, and a great deal of soul searching, but once God became my ultimate light, everything else just faded away.  Time and God have been gracious in their healing of my heart.  I am fully aware that many do not believe they will find peace, or contentment, in this life.  My own experience has led me to believe that this is not meant to be.  I once believed that a forever sadness was my own fate.  But something was trying to show me I could beat it.  Something deep within was pointing towards my path and saying "just keep walking." 

These times are persistent in their desire to pull us down, and make us wallow in a world of self doubt and confusion.  Peace will come to those who actively seek it.  It may not be peace from outside influence or even inner pain, but it can exist within the heart, and soul.  Life cannot be lived unless it is has true purpose.  What is your purpose?  No one else can answer that question for you.  You have a path, and a calling.  You have a reason for being here.  No one can give you that reason, and it cannot be an external reason.  It has to come from somewhere deep inside.  Something within must lead you, and that lead must speak to you more loudly than any other voice.

The very depths of our being cry out in their need to be more.  We are powerful, and vibrant.  We must arise, and change, and hope, and cry, and change again, and build, and dream, and break, and build again.  We are not meant to be molded by our circumstances, our weaknesses, or our trials.  We are not meant to bend to the will of a negative, and decaying world.  

We are meant to stand in God, and mold ourselves.

Find that inner light and cling to it, then let it grow.

Fight.  Forgive.  Frame the world around you to be more than it is; lift.

"Be the change you want to see in the world."

If you are quiet enough, your time will come.  Keep going.  Keep fighting for your voice.

And remember.  

Believe in you.

Always.