No, no, dear reader, this post is the product of much turmoil, confusion, searching and emotion that has just circled around inside me for a long time now, to which I am finally giving a voice....
You know in cartoons everyone how had a devil and an angel on their shoulders? The angel with its harp would try to get the character to do the “right thing” and the devil would tell them they should do everything and anything else?
That is where this journey starts: with my angel and devil.
I have always prided myself on the idea that I was a good person and listened to my angelic side. On the outside I make sure I do my work, help others and follow the law. As I have gotten older, though, I found that the devil side—the dark—has grown louder. Not saying things that would put me in prison like “go hurt that person” or “break that law,” but with things, I would say, that are even more hurtful to myself and those around me.
You see my darkness, like that of many people, stems from fear.
Yep, that nasty little word we all talk about, but don’t like to give too much attention to in the long run.
My devil says things like, “How come they are getting all this attention, you are just as good as them aren’t you?” or “I don’t know why they are doing better than you. They aren’t even that good” or even on really dark days “What is wrong with you? See? I said you weren’t good enough. Look at them. They are happy. Don’t you deserve to be happy? To be loved? But you aren’t, are you? Because you aren’t worthy of that love.”
This voice has ebbed and flowed throughout most of my life, leading to periods of such darkness and despair that I thought it would be better to end it all. I remember days of thinking of all the ways I could die. Then when I had an exceptionally bad day, I would think of the least painful way and say, “I can’t take this anymore. They all don’t care. I should just do this!” But then I would become scared and remember I made a promise to my mother that I would always be there for her, and I would walk away from the thought. Looking back, these two things probably saved my life, from taking those final steps.
Yet, even in those moments that should have been victories over darkness, the voice—my voice—would find ways to rip at me. I remember feeling like I was weak, that I didn’t have the bravery to even end my own life. I would cut instead then, just enough to feel the pain, to bleed, but not enough to do major damage or to let others know.
To try to ease the pain I worked to make myself ‘worthwhile’ to others. If I could be accepted, liked, wanted, I wouldn’t be alone. I threw myself into many different activities at school, I did work study programs to help with the cost of tuition, I even sang with 4 or more choirs from my church at a time. To prove to the voice that I was good enough, that I was worth love. How could any of those children and adults know that their non acceptance of me, their teasing and bullying, their unobtainable standards were only confirming all the fears lying in wait.
It seems, looking back now, that this voice really came from my complete and utter fear of being alone. From thinking, “If I am not good enough, worthy enough, liked enough, everyone will leave me and I will be alone.”
I could say it started when my father divorced my mom at the early age of 2 and then stayed completely out of my life till late middle school, that it was then compounded by my mother being part of the military, our constantly moving, and my knowing at some point that she might get deployed and leave. It was possibly cemented when I was 11 and my great-grandfather—who was like a father to me—had a horrible accident in our home, from which he died soon after. Who knows if this is what set my fear in motion as a child, but as I grew, so did the fear. Not only did it grow, but it went deep, burying itself in my subconscious so that I no longer even realized it was there or how much I was letting it control every aspect of my life.
Now this is not to say that I haven’t done quite a bit of work over the years to deal with the many manifestations of my deep rooted fear. I have gone to therapy, been on medication, and have incorporated many health and wellness programs. I manage my generalized anxiety, ADD, and periodic dips with depression somewhat well now, and have found some sense of peace with having just one or two people I actually consider friends in my life. Yet, the voice still sits and whispers in to my ear, ripping down all the walls I thought would protect me. When I began my kundalini yoga teacher training, I was finally forced to stop and really look at that voice. No longer just taking passing glances at my past, but stopping for long periods of time and staring it straight in the eyes.
You know what I found? That voice is me, a terrified and hurt me. A me who hopes that if she talks all big and bad, if she acts angry, if she makes me listen to what she is saying, then I will see her. That I will never leave her.
And you know something? It has worked. I have never left her. I have stood right by her side, afraid to take that jump and fall; afraid to put myself out there time and again—to possibly be hurt, to try to be the person I want to be—because I ask myself, “What if no one is there with me?” What if I do one day become this “great light being” people say we were meant to be and find out when the day is done, after all of that, I am completely alone?
People ask me, “How do you not see all these people supporting you?” Well, let me tell you: when you are surrounded by this type of fear, people can try to hug you, scream that they love you, even reach out their hand to you, but you do not even know they are there. You find excuses for why they do or say the things they do which support your fear.
Sometimes, though when I am quiet and listen to the silence, like my scared self hates to do, I find I can hear not only the voices of those around me, but I can feel them. Then if I really listen, I can hear my other self: the part of myself cheering me along, telling me how proud it is of me and beautiful it thinks I am. How it believes I can do anything I put my mind to and how it loves me. This is the hardest part for my little scared self to hear—I am even crying writing this—because it means I am not alone. No matter what happens, I am loved for who I am, and that does not fall into the story line the frightened me has told herself.
She has fought back against that voice for years and oh, is she a good fighter. But you know what? I am finally fighting back too! I am ready to hear that sweet, love-filled voice more. I want it now more than anything else in the world. I am slowly opening my eyes to the world around me and to myself. I am using meditations such as the Laya Yoga Meditation taught in Kundalini Yoga and the Gobinday mantra to release my blocks and working to strengthen my navel center so I may have the willpower to face my fears head-on. I know this is not a quick and easy fight, that my scared self has been rooted in my subconscious for most of my life and even now is scared to leave, but this my challenge and I am finally ready to start living my life fully.
I am ready to look at myself and the world through a glass of love—not fear—and in doing so, maybe find the peace I have sought for so long.