We are so hard on ourselves. Am I wrong? We buy piles and piles of self-help books. We pour money into seminars about self-love. We are constantly trying to figure ourselves out. We are forever thinking if we are flawed, if our parenting is imperfect, and if we are attracting these awful situations and hurtful people into our lives. Dear friend, wash your heart in grace. Give yourself a break. ok? Set down the self-help books for awhile and read something else. You want to figure out your life, your hearts calling? Nothing tells you what your souls craves like writing. Wash your heart in grace. And any spiriutal guru who is telling you that you are attracting darkness into your life? Step away from them. ok? Seriously. Dear friend, wash your heart in grace. Are you showing up for your life? Are you kind to others and in your moments of pain and depression are you taking care of yourself? Then you...my dear friend..are doing your best. Life is hard. One day it's beautiful and you're laughing and all of your dreams are coming true and then the next day an event that happenened years ago rocks your heart again and you spend a weekend in your pajamas crying into your coffee cup alone in the dark. Give yourself some grace. You are not going to be happy every single day. That's ok. The trick is to not push away and deny the hard days, the dark days, the crying moments. The truth of life is to be yourself. Be real. Be authentic. And be so vulnerable about who you are and what you need that others ask you how you do it. You can't always save other people. But you can save yourself. You can't always know the future but you can set down the past and live for today. You can't always let go of all of the guilt but you can give yourself love and grace.....knowing that you are only human and you did not know then what you know now. Dear friend, wash your heart in grace today. You are human. You are loved. Life is imperfect. Hold the love and the memories but let go of the past. It long ago let go of you and you can't live there.....in the past....and move forward into today. Maybe sometimes we need someone to explain our past to us, to figure it all out and tell us how it made us who we are and leads us to do the things we do..........and maybe sometimes we need to leave the past where it is because we are not the same person now that we were then, because we can't change the past by endlessly discussing it, and because the hard things in our past sometimes did actually make us a better person. Leave the past where it belongs....inside of yesterday. Stop living way out in the future. We never know what next year, in ten years, or even this Saturday will bring. And that's terrifying and exciting at the same time. We won't know what that life would be like unless we are brave and take the chance to really live it. Maybe we do need piles of self-help books, hours of therapy, and tons of days of rehashing why we are the way we are....... And maybe we need to shelve all of that sometimes, dig deep and find our strength and self confidence in the fact that no one else can live our lives for us. They can tell us why we do what we do from their personal or professional perspective. They can offer advice and ideas. But they cannot crawl into our skin, into our hearts and live our lives for us. We have to save ourselves. We have the power to heal our own hearts. We have the courage and deep soul knowledge to find our life's path. Get help when you need it, when your soul is in grave danger......when you feel really lost and need some direction and an outside view and when you're good again? Step out into life and just live. Go dance with friends, hikes mountains, laugh, and live your life. Do the things you always wanted to do. Give yourself some grace. Life is not all laughter and love and fun but yet.......sometimes most of it really is but we tend to focus on the hurt and suffering. Step out into your life today. Do something brave. Do something nice for yourself. Be honest and radically real. We all want to step out of this life sometimes and never, ever return but here we are......each day....waking up, washing our face, looking up for the light even when it isn't shining, accepting the past, and stepping forward into the new day. You are loved inside of your brokenness. You are worthy of the love you give away. You are worthy of grace. Wash your soul in this: Your soul knows the answers to all the questions you ask about your life. Listen.
All my love, Nik
My free Facebook support groups:
Grief Untamed: Grief Support for all death related grief
The Brave Ladies Club: Support for women who had a spouse/partner die by suicide
The Brave Ladies Club Sequel: Support for women who are 2 or more years past the suicide of their spouse/partner.
Manhood Untamed: Men's mental health support