and i write here because no one reads it (although i'd be happy to find that someone did), and because i'm too lazy, right now, to journal with a pen.
some nights, i just want to give up. i feel like just when i get up the courage to give, no one really cares about getting from me. i'm surrounded by so many incredible people, and they all just overshadow me. things would be so much simpler if the world weren't governed by popularity.
i didn't used to be this weak. but i also didn't used to expect so much of myself. is that good or bad?
and it's strange how much something so little can hurt so much. i remember being 10 or so, and sitting at the dinner table, and once having gathered the courage to speak up about some family discussion, being completely overlooked and ignored. it made me feel so useless. so small. it turns out that i just wasn't talking very loud. but i was talking plenty loud tonight, when a room full of 10 of my good friends repeatedly ignored me. and it made me feel small again. and rejected. not for any good reason. just on the whim of the evening. people just didn't feel like listening tonight. i just wasn't funny or thoughtful enough to be worth hearing.
not enough! not enough! always not enough! why do i keep letting myself believe that it's true? too much and not enough. it is NOT true of me! i am enough. i have a beauty worth pursuing. and i don't have to strive for anyone's affection. because i am enough. jennifer, believe it. it will be more true if you believe.
there are so few big, substantial, real, life-changing things happening in my life. so why am i such a mess? wait, that's not true at all. but it's not the life changing things that are putting me in unrest. they are just the icing on the cake.
i hate getting older. feeling out of place, having no home, no one left who knows me at all, so much self-awareness and doubt accumulated. and feeling like i should be ready to pursue a career and lead people and carry a conversation and choose what is right over what is comfortable, when i know that i can do none of those things. it is suffocating, to be sure.
bah.
blessed are those who weep, for they will laugh.
the Lord is close to the broken hearted,
and saves those who are crushed in spirit.
3 comments:
I think that feeling small and rejected is a great gift. Not a particularly sought-after gift, but a great one nevertheless. At least, I tell myself that when I remember to do so.
It means you can see and feel and experience things that other people can't. You can empathise with people who can otherwise be forgotten. You won't ignore them, or even just allow them to feel ignored, because you know what that can do. And if you have insight into the rationality (and irrationality) of feeling hurt or weak, as you do, then you can really offer something to those who have the feelings without the insight.
But you only get the benefits of all this if you also get the pain, and only if you can't solve it all easily or quickly.
Although maybe you can solve it one day. I don't know because I haven't yet, though I have hope.
Don't give up.
At the very least, some things are made perfect in weakness, apparently.
Pete
thank you, pete.
i had forgotten that i had written this entry. i am glad that i did. i was actually looking for some writing somewhere that really recorded the depths of what i was feeling during that time in my life, and this seems to be it.
it is true that it is a gift. a gift i could stand never receiving again, but a gift, nonetheless, and one that has already given a lot. suffering is a funny thing.
good to hear from you, pete. thanks for reading.
this was really great jen. very refreshing...i wonder all the time if anyone else besides me feels things. good to know you do too!
p.s. i love listening to you talk, even when you're talking about the lifeboat thingy and i don't understand!
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