I know it’s not very fashionable to believe in God these days, especially in the liberal circles I tend to travel in… but I do believe in God, and I believe in him even more now because of what just happened.
These past few years I have been on a massive spiritual journey. At the beginning of it I called it the long, hard road up the dark, scary mountain, and I didn’t realize at the time just how apt that was.
For years now, I have been trying to find love. And seriously, I have had just about the worst luck you can think of when it comes to that. To the point where the last guy I was interested in had a cancer scare which caused him to pull away from me. That was a real kick in the face too, let me tell you. I know it’s not all about me, but it really makes me wonder if God gave this guy a cancer scare just to make extra sure we wouldn’t be together?
It’s been like that for years now– weird things happening that make it so that I can’t be together with whoever I have my eye on. Things not working out, doors slamming in my face. And me winding up with a broken heart. Because this is the one thing I want most in the world, is to find my person, the one who is going to really understand me. And this is also the one thing that has been denied to me again and again.
And me, I’m a fighter and a warrior. I know not all of you see that side of me, but I absolutely am. I’m sweet and bubbly and cute, but I’m also fierce and persistent and I will stop at nothing when it comes to getting what I want. It’s part of why burning appeals so much to me I think. Because it’s a chance for me to show the grit that this little Piglet is made of underneath her Very Small Animal exterior.
For years now, God has been trying to teach me about letting go. About how even a great warrior needs to learn to stand down sometimes. About walking in peace, and letting things be the way they are. And most of all, about how if the only way you can ever be happy is if one particular thing happens, then you’ll never be happy.
I don’t like this message very much, and that’s putting it mildly. My natural inclination is to want to hang onto things. I want to fight with God, fight the way things are. Because accepting it feels weak. It feels like giving up. It feels like if I don’t exhaust myself trying so hard then I’m never going to get what I want. But the thing is, I don’t get what I want anyway in the end, and all I wind up doing is getting upset for far too long about something that isn’t going to change no matter how hard I fight against it.
God has been showing me that we’re on the same team. That he wants what I want. But that as important as finding love is to me, it’s also important to him that I learn this lesson about letting go. And as impressive as my will is, it’s nothing in the face of the will of the Almighty. So we need to work together instead of against each other, because he always has my best interests at heart.
Last year I went to Playa Del Fuego for the first time, and for some reason the Temple there really helped me to let go. I wrote a bunch of messages on the walls, and spent a lot of time there. I didn’t get to see it burn, because my cousin Markie died and I had to get home in time for his funeral (RIP, Markie 💔). But somehow as I was coming home I felt more at peace than I had felt in years. It was like just knowing that all of that junk was going to be burned up freed me from having to carry it around inside of me anymore.
This past year I have been more open to God’s message about letting go and accepting things the way they are. Don’t get me wrong, I still struggle with it sometimes. But it’s starting to make more sense than it did before anyway. I don’t get as worked up as I used to about things, and it takes me less time to let them go than it used to. And when I went to Playa Del Fuego this year, I had several people remark to me totally unprompted how chill and peaceful of a vibe I have. And for me, who is generally anxious and fearful and freaked out about all kinds of things to have peace like that to the point where people noticed it enough to speak up about it? Is absolutely huge.
Today I was cleaning my room and I found a note that I had written to myself four years ago, after yet another heartbreak with yet another guy. I’m not going to type it all out for you, but here’s part of it, anyway:
“Sometimes in life, I’m going to run into a dead end. And I have a choice. I can either keep sitting there in front of the dead end crying and carrying on about it, or I can try to turn around and start over.
It’s okay to be upset when I run into a dead end. But I also eventually need to accept that there’s nothing else I can do about it.
Right now I have a lot of junk clogging up my spiritual house. It’s filled with a whole lot of worry, fear, and anxiety over various circumstances in my life. God wants to help me clean house, so that when the time comes, I’m ready for the guy he has for me. But before he can do that, I need to learn how to let go.
I need to turn this over to God, and let him take care of it. He knows that me wanting to find love again is the thing I want the most in the world, so it’s something I hold very near and dear to my heart. And he wants me to trust him with it. He wants me to leave this entire situation in his hands.
Trusting God with the thing I want the most is really hard. But if I don’t do it, this is going to keep happening to me until I surrender to his will and trust him. So it’s important that I start learning how to let things go.”
I wrote this four years ago, and totally forgot I had it until I found it just a little while ago. I was crying while I was reading it, because everything God was trying to say to me then is exactly what he’s been showing me for all of these years, and for far too long I was too stubborn to really listen. I believe I found it now for a reason, and it’s because I’m finally starting to come closer to the end of my journey through the long, hard road up the dark, scary mountain.
And maybe, if I can just keep letting go and trusting God, this means I’ll finally find the man my heart has been calling to for all of these long, lonely years.