This has been the hardest lesson for me to learn. Okay, maybe the second hardest behind learning self-control. And wouldn't ya know with my bag of chips in hand: I'm staring down both as I type...
If I start from the top of this day, from the top of this mountain, I can remember why I started this blog. This morning I awoke, took my first conscious breath of the day, and thanked God for air conditioning. You see on the radio this morning I heard there's a cold front coming to town that will take the temperature all the way down to......90 degrees *insert spirit fingers*! You know it's hotter than the devil's left pit (or other body parts) when you're shouting over a 90 degree cold front. I digress...
This day was a day of simple joys. My grilled cheese breakfast tasted superb. The slight breeze against my cheeks felt like an ethereal kiss. I am alive, and at the start of today there was nothing better, nothing sweeter than that fact that we too often take for granted.
Then things took a turn from bliss to the pits. This evening I took a nosedive into self-pity. Up until very recently in my journey I'd found myself glowing from within. I remember leaving Lakewood after one late night service, and a woman stopping my friend and I to say we were glowing. To us we were doing nothing but dragging our weary, yet spiritually-filled selves to the car. To her we were alight with joy.
But old habits die hard. I've got a few that don't realize they've been killed...they're like zombie issues. The need for acceptance and the overreaction to rejection keep walking, stiff-legged through my life.
I remember the first time this lesson appeared. I was presenting a workshop to a group of teachers. One of them made what I felt was a snide comment. Another seconded her. The others laughed. I felt like a fool on display. My mood was ruined for the day and I shrunk into a self-conscious, less than stellar presenter. Later that night sleep eluded me, prayer did not. As I often do, I asked to be shown how to change the situation. I turned to my Bible and found a verse on selfishness and it hit me: I'd made the workshop about me. About how much I was giving the teachers. About how great of a presenter I'd become. About how much they liked and accepted me. All of that over a workshop...I realized that none of the work I do and none of the words I say are about Karissa anymore.
I forget sometimes.
Tonight I was invited to a poetry performance workshop in preparation for the upcoming slam season. Mind you, since I've been in Houston, I've been following the spoken word circuit and longing to share my own poetry with the city. Of course there were always some insecurities to hold me back. They took on many forms; they had many excuses. But it was insecurity nonetheless. And I'd thought I was ready to shirk them. In fact I thought I had. Until a few well-meaning people threw some constructive criticism my way and I was right back to what felt like square one. I longed to be accepted and that criticism felt a lot like rejection.
I'm sensitive. I can be awkward. It seems I can even make others awkward by osmosis.
More importantly sometimes I forget why I've chosen to become the woman I was always meant to be. It's not about me, but it's definitely for me. Today I realized sometimes I'll have to bob and weave and cringe through some uncomfortable ish to stay in my place of joy. I'll have to take some criticism, some flat out rejection, some risks to do what I was made to do...to share my story with someone else.
I'll fail. I did today. But luckily enough tomorrow promises nothing but to be a brand new day...
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