Remembering to Forget

Remember when I used to blog? Consistently?

It’s not for lacking of thinking.  On the contrary; I’ve been thinking more than normal and it’s exhausting. So exhausting, in fact, that finding the right words to help define all my various self-discoveries has seemed to be an impossible task.

But I think that today, after a couple of weeks of introspection, something has surfaced. All because of a really simple question.

Do you think you’re unworthy?

 Unworthy of a good man? Unworthy of being loved? Unworthy of people liking you simply because of who you are?

The answer: a resounding “yes.”

“Why?” the person asked. “Who told you that you were unworthy?”

The girls in 3rd grade that shoved me off the basketball court for walking to close to their huddle.

The girls in 4th grade that filled a baseball hat with horse manure and shoved it on my head, all while laughing and saying “Eww, you’re ugly.”

Numerous teachers that accused me of stupidity in front of my peers for asking overly simplistic questions.

Highschool teammates that laughed at me when I tore my ACL. “It’s your fault; your foot crossed the line.”

Horse trainers that yelled in my face what my errors were but never showed me how to correct them. Long lessons of “Are you telling me that you’ve ridden more than once?! Show me you know what you’re doing! PROVE IT!”

College guys that said, “You know you’re not dating material; you’re marriage material but guys don’t want that now.”

One person didn’t tell me I was unworthy.  Countless people treated me in such a way that made me believe I was. And when those voices and actions are loud enough, it becomes difficult to drown them out. 

The irony is that these memories rarely cross my mind. I think on them once a year, maybe.  I have moved on in many ways.  But I have not forgotten.

So what made them surface now? The sound of something new.

I love you for who you are.

I’d love desperately to hold onto that gem, but there seems to be little room left for influence… unless something else is purged.

And so the process begins.

Remembering the pain on purpose, forgiving people I no longer know, and forgetting the lies that take up too much space.

It’s time to make room. Time to clear the floor.

I’m finally realizing that what others say about me doesn’t determine who I am.

My identity was nailed to the cross a long time ago.