Afraid of the Dark

Today, it hits me like a load of bricks landing on my back. Some days, it feels more like a bullet to my chest. Others, like a nagging ache that seeps through my bones until I feel like I can't move or speak or think anymore.

Burdened. Bullet-struck. Broken-down. By something I can't even name.

Have you ever felt so alone that you were not just by yourself, but separated from yourself? That even you didn't want to be with you? I have. The lazy haze of a summer afternoon can shine a piercing light into my sense of reality and I find it hard to breathe without sobbing.

If anyone held a mirror to me in those moments, I would turn my head and wince. Even though on good days hugs are my pick-me-ups, on bad days I avoid them whenever I can. I am a cord creating my own tension as the gears in my mind are grinding with uncertainties. What do they think of me? What do people believe about who I am? What do I know about how to live this life You've given me? What was I thinking? How did I get here? Am I really this much of a failure? My pulse quickens. My forehead flushes with heat. My eyes dart downward.

And suddenly, I am the child curled up under the covers so I can't hear my parents yelling at each other through those old pink walls. I am the student heaving with anxiety as the math tests are passed out and I am terrified of missing a step on the "show-your-work" section. I am the 10-year-old kid who rushed into action on the last item of her chore list when Dad's truck pulled into the driveway just so he wouldn't know it wasn't all done..so she wouldn't fail. I am the friend who cannot bear the 0.02 difference between my best friend's GPA and hers because she just will never measure up. I am the sister who's sure that everyone else is in on some secret she missed about how to be part of the family.

In one split second, I am transported from a 23-year-old woman to a shaking child in a corner afraid of her own blurry reflection.

How? Why?

Because I cannot fix it. No matter how hard I try, THIS is all I have in me. And it just seems so insignificant. Certainly not enough.

I have tried lots of words to translate the waves that seem to ebb and flow within me. Anxiety. Depression. The blues. Detachment. Sadness. Frustration. Perfectionism. Loneliness. Homesickness. Disappointment. Fear. Fear is close, but it cannot be IT. Not fully.

The closest translation I can find is DARK. The DARK. This thing that isn't really there, but is merely the absence of light. This thing that can be as scary for a 50-year-old man in a house as it is for a 5-year-old girl trying to sleep. This thing that surrounds us intangibly, but whose presence can be sensed. This cold emptiness that offers nothing but silence in which your thoughts can haunt you with almost unbounded freedom.

I don't live my life in the dark, thank God, but I have visited there. Far more often than I have ever wanted and far more recently than I find easy to admit. The dark is a real place for me and it is always just within my reach--beckoning with the scent of a powerful painkiller that once ingested, just brings more pain.

Today, I feel it. In the political news of a sickening federal election season. In the tragedies that have lost us the lives of Alton Sterling, Philando Castile, 5 members of the Dallas Police, and especially countless terror victims around the world.

In the blog posts of popular writers that bewail the necessity of separation and divorce for the sake of "self-peace." In the exaltation of evil and the consistent neglect of compassion and charity for those who are different than us.

In longings for more. More stability, more safety, more family, more time.

The dark comes in, but the only way I survive is knowing it can't win. It may have me for another day, but it will not have me for all my days.

Because there is purpose in this life. There is meaning and joy and kindness and safety and love. People cannot give me those things--at least not fully--but Jesus can. And if you find yourself walking with me through some dark season in your life right now, let's work on remembering that Jesus is with us. Even in the dark. And He is our light when we can't find it.

John 8:12 - Then Jesus again spoke to them, saying, "I am the Light of the world; he who follows Me will not walk in the darkness, but will have the Light of life."

2 Corinthians 4:6 - For God, who said, "Light shall shine out of darkness," is the One who has shone in our hearts to give the Light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Christ.

1 Peter 2:9 - But you are A CHOSEN RACE, A royal PRIESTHOOD, A HOLY NATION, A PEOPLE FOR God's OWN POSSESSION, so that you may proclaim the excellencies of Him who has called you out of darkness into His marvelous light.