Twenty years
have come and gone
still there are tears.
How to recover?
I do not know
Where to turn?
I cannot say.
I feel just as I did -
wrenching pain
of loss
and still
the world looks on
as if nothing is amiss.
The only change are
the number of years
nothing else
nothing quite seems real.
Grieve engulfs me
terribly
hammers at my resolve.
I must carry on
continue on,
the dream must stay alive!
Category: Encountering New Experiences
Peace is Priceless
After many years of wrestling with this, I have finally concluded that peace is priceless. No amount of money, accolades or accomplishments can beat having peace. To get up each day knowing that the smallest thing will bring you joy is peace. A job you love may be hard and you may make mistakes but each day you want to work, you want to challenge yourself to do your best for that day. That is peace. To feel the freedom to be yourself, your true authentic self that is peace. No one has predetermined your worth or has decided they know who you are but are willing to concede that there are layers to you, that is peace. When you can sleep a deep deep sleep and wake up knowing you are ready for the day, that is peace.
It seems that finding peace is harder than it seems. Many of us can only grudgingly sing: “When peace like a river attendeth my way when sorrows like sea billows roll; whatever my lot, thou hast taught me to say, “It is well, it is well with my soul”. No, it is not well with my soul, because people have a way of imposing themselves and their expectations on you and making your life a living hell. In hell, let me remind you there is no peace, joy or contentment. So earth becomes hell because when you try to reach beyond your means and the expectations of others the chains imposed seem to strangle you, rip the breath from you and smack you to your knees. But you look around and people still expect you to function and not malfunction but they are your malware.
We are too hard on ourselves and too hard on each other. But society tells us this is okay and so we have vampirous leeches in the form of each other, who suck and tug the air breathe. So, going back to peace; it can only be achieved when we say no to unfounded expectations and the violations from the expectations we seek from questionable sources. Peace is necessary but elusive in a world that glorifies wars. We feel alive when we wage war, how ironic because war means certain death. We are not satisfied with the mundane, where peace resides. No, we have to reach past the safe and choose violence instead. Do you see how hard it is for peace to permeate? I spent all paragraphs on violence, conflict and oppression.
Peace is priceless. It is better to have peace than riches but society says to get it at any cost, even your peace of mind. Society is not satisfied with letting you be, it tries to fix you until your insides become your outside and your outside disappears. Again, I have digressed from extolling the virtues of peace. Even in these few words is little evidence of peace. But best believe, peace is priceless.
To the Wilderness, I Go
Sluggishness slumps on the ground
spread wide
drowning in inaction
doomed by depression
into thin air melts resolution.
Quick
give me mission
give me Purpose
so it can disapear.
Know there is more here -
gluttony is that you sitting at my table?
into the wilderness I go
seek truth like the true Light
into the wilderness I go
so Chaos will not grow,
a quiet place
a sacred place
where men should stop to shop,
resolute
faithfully
humbly I go.
With nowhere else
each step I take
seems to scream and shout in glee
Yes this is the place to be!
Retreat I must
I have to readjust
and then with confidence
reenter.
Freedom from maladaptive daydreaming
Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that
Courage is the power of the mind to overcome fear
Faith is taking the first step even when you don’t see the whole staircase
Martin Luther King Jr.
Maladaptive daydreaming is straying from God. The more we get caught up in our imagined make-believe world the less time we have to know God. I know I have been willing to spend hours creating a world of mine to the exclusion of God. The door was not opened in this world, and even if there was a knock, I was too distracted to hear and answer. I was the architect in my world and determined how far I could go. At that point, it felt like freedom, but the truth is I was trapped in my head.
The trick is to focus on God, the things of God, the people of God and less on the self. Focus less on what makes you anxious and what drives your fear, “Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God; and the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus” (Philippians 6-7, NKJV). Don’t daydream your life away, give everything to God, get out and live, not in your head but in the real world. There is nothing worse than deciding you and not God knows what’s best for you. That’s not true: “For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future” (Jeremiah 29:11).
Once you break free you realise that daydreaming solves nothing and is just another prison. The word of God is clear: “For freedom, Christ has set us free; stand firm therefore, and do not submit again to a yoke of slavery” (Galatians 5:1). There is no easy cure, however, the best remedy is spending time with God and the word of God. This for me is a work in progress, cause I am still and forever will be under construction. So, instead of seeking after the high of a make-believe world, one should, “seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things shall be added to you. Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about its own things. Sufficient for the day is its own trouble” Matthew 6:33-34).
Think about this, maladaptive daydreaming can lead you to become paranoid. You think things that are not true, everyone is your enemy and everything is against you. This is a nightmare, not a dream. The only way to overcome this is to focus on the word of God because as it says in Philippians 4: 8: Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honourable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence, if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things.” What is true does not necessarily come from our imagination. Instead, we should do as instructed in 2 Corinthians 10:5: We destroy arguments and every lofty opinion raised against the knowledge of God and take every thought captive to obey Christ.”
Your traumas do not define you unless you let them. You cannot drive out darkness by allowing darkness to drive or motivate you. Being a maladaptive daydreamer gives you a foggy memory – sounds familiar – you waste so much time and so you cannot get to your purpose and do the work God has called you to do and so it seems that you are moving cyclically instead on the straight path of progress, you may feel confused, have suicidal or lustful thoughts that really do not align with God or your purpose, you hate your reality and so to escape you start having suicidal thoughts. Does this have anything to do with God? If God is worthy how can we spend so much time on everything else except Him? Madness that we see as normal. Do not be lost in your thoughts as it may entangle you and trap you there for the rest of your life.
Nothing in life is easy and it seems there are a million things to trip you up. However, we have a God who is more than able to allow us to overcome them all. So, we need to trust him more and our imaginations less. Well, that’s all for now.
Grave Clothes
Bitter strips of agony
they ripple and ride
stealthily
ravenous
untamed
mapping all your pain
buried deep within the stench of shame
wrecks the sense
making you feel insane
bound tight
too tight
as you seek the light again.
minutus steps are all promised
leaps defeated
eternity unfolds
slowly
ever slowly
to get out of deathly
grave clothes.
Maladaptive Daydreaming and God
I never thought that daydreaming was a problem. Yes, there were times when daydreaming became the best part of my day. When I couldn’t wait to get from school or later work, to continue with my daydreaming. When I did not want to be interrupted, or talk to anyone because I was good in this space I was crafting for myself. It was my space. There were nights when my dreams were based on my daydreaming, it was so good! So good in fact that I lost touch with reality and my daydreams seemed more real, feasible and comforting than my actual day-to-day life. Even in sleep, it was with me, continuing the escape and pleasure I experienced in my waking hours. Do you see the problem? If not let me tell you: daydreaming took me further from God as I relied on them to help me get through whatever struggles I had, not only did I escape the realities of my problems but the reality of God. Could I have developed a reliance on my daydreams to the detriment of my relationship with God?
Once I realised that my daydreaming was getting out of hand I started leaning into God more, or so I thought. Yes, I would read my bible. As a matter of fact, I have read the whole bible more than once but without much conviction. I learned specific scriptures, but there was no fire behind my efforts. I still went back to daydreaming. I chose it over building a solid relationship with God. There were times when directly after my devotion, I would go back to daydreaming. Trying to fit everything in my day, trying to hit all the checkboxes and getting nowhere it seems. And the inconsistency in my walk with God has become a cyclical dilemma that I have not gotten a hold of. I have been daydreaming it seems all my life, could it really be that bad?
It can be. When we spend too much time in our daydreams we spend less time with real people and even worse, we give little of our time to God. We expect God to wait until we are finished and we can use leftover time to get to Him. What a thought. What a terrible thought! It does take us further from God – But each person is tempted when he is lured and enticed by his own desire. Then desire when it has conceived gives birth to sin, and sin when it is fully grown brings forth death. (James 1:14-15). My daydream takes me to places and provides things I cannot get in my reality, desires that are not authentic to God. Simply put, daydreaming can actually reflect opposition to the will and truth of God. So what takes over? Well if left to its own devices our daydreaming can open our thoughts to be controlled by the devil. I remember I was so angry with a situation that did not work out in my favour that the person involved was violently killed in my daydream. I sought retribution on that person, and their family (who I did not know at all) and I threw in some imaginary enemy whom I eviscerated with much gore and took unnatural pleasure in. I totally lost sight that vengeance belonged to the Lord and in no way did I care about forgiveness. It took me down a very dark place and I was not even aware of it because it felt so satisfying. And don’t think I haven’t created situations where I am the victim and face great opposition from everyone and no one is to be trusted I have. I have even shed tears imagining how bad my situation could get! About how if I died that would be so sad but finally people would miss me but by then it would be too late. Man, this thing can get deep!
So think about it, have you allowed whether now or in the past, your daydreaming to take you to and has kept you captive in a dark place. also here is a sobering thought, daydreaming can become a disorder. Where does that leave our relationship with God? Hopefully, we can consider this next time.
The devil is a Liar
The devil told a lie yesterday
and I quickly had to check him.
In the middle of my despair
he made his way
whispered quite cunningly
he said,
"you are not a child of God"
wait, what now!
he really said that!
it didn't hurt
I had the breastplate
of righteousness
I had to pause look back
make sure I was girded with truth
then rebuke him
I came down hard
with the shield of faith
I'm God's creation!
A chosen generation!
not an abomination
like you
crafty serpent.
Feet firmly on the Gospel
I reached for the light
flipped him with the sword
of the Spirit
to beat him back then
and he withdrew
when he saw the helmet
of salvation,
defeated in his attempt.
but I know
some day soon -
maybe tomorrow,
he'd try again.
ramblrWrites.com 