16"x20" Oil on Canvas
If I am going to truly be an artist and express my feelings, it starts with being honest with myself. If you aren't living the truth, do you really have something to say? Being vulnerable starts with taking a deep look within and understanding what is real. That process reveals a lot. Not only do you see yourself differently, you understand others in a new way.
This painting is a hyssop plant. People used hyssops to cleanse or heal. You might have heard about it in the Bible when David talked about creating a clean heart. Psalm 51:7
I started this painting a year ago. I had sketched it in my journal, then started the painting on canvas, but couldn't do it. Something blocked me from being able to finish it. I wasn't ready for renewal. I knew I had to paint it... sometimes paintings are just that way... but sometimes I don't know why or what it is that blocks me.
This block might have had something to do with the long year I had... Grueling to be exact. If you heard it from me, you probably know the truth, if you heard it from someone else, I'm confident you don't have the real story.
Speaking of stories, I have one to tell... but I can't yet. It's been challenging keeping silent, but I won't stay that way forever. I'm writing it down to share someday and it is part of why I painted "Renew Me".
Living in the truth has been the hardest thing I have ever done and I've been working on it for over a year. It just took a while for me to accept the truth... about me and what I was enduring. For as long as I can remember, I lived to look good on the outside and please people. I was terrified for anyone to know some of my ugly truths and what a mess I was living through. Why do people care so much about saving face and some people seem to not care at all? I have always worried about everyone's feelings and how my life will affect everyone, especially my kids. I was willing to live in hell and fake the happiness to protect everyone else. I realized that I have always compartmentalized my life. It is as if I have boxes for my different emotions. I have learned to close the hard stuff in a box and open the "happy box" just to put up a front and keep moving forward. A lot of that was because I desired the best for my family, not knowing that I was enabling things to get much worse. Trying to keep everything in control and smooth when it is not, is too much of a burden to bear.
I lost my voice a long time ago. I take the blame for most of that. Because of my need to look like I was keeping it all together, I allowed myself to be manipulated, controlled and abused. I coped with the mess in an unhealthy way, and when I realized my faults in that, I felt undeserving of anything good. This created the perfect storm in my life. When I confided in some different mentors of the church, I was given a lot of really bad advice. It lacked empathy and complete understanding of the depth of my pain. I do not blame anyone for this. I absolutely forgive the people that were also deceived which led to talking me into staying in a bad situation for what I thought was God's purpose. In reality, getting out of it, is what is giving me purpose. I felt so guilty for my own sins that I felt like I deserved anything bad that was happening to me. I allowed myself to live in a place where I was constantly manipulated and lied to and abused. Why would I stay in that place? Why would anyone? Well, on this journey I realized I'm not the only one... sadly, I'm one of many. The answer: I cared more about appearances, trying to control and create a fairytale, I was co-dependent, and too weak and afraid to leave. I was convinced it was God's plan for me stay where I was and fix my situation, and it was my job to fix those in the situation with me. I read the book "Love and Respect" and "Help Meet" and thought I had it figured out. Those books can be very dangerous in the wrong person's hand and mind. It ultimately gave me no voice, no rights, and enabled a monster to be born. When you are manipulated by someone who doesn't have empathy or much of a conscience, you start to believe the lies and it is hard to tell the truth from a lie even when you see the truth. I believe gaslighting becomes a reality. You start to question yourself. Part of my journey this past year was to separate the truth from the lies. I see how I allowed myself to stay in a very unhealthy place and believed that someone loved me without actions but with things. Allowing someone to "love bomb" you, is knowing it is not authentic love. It is a fake love that is actually about control and that has conditions and requirements. I allowed that to happen to me for decades. I have learned to recognize that if something is completely different behind closed doors, then that is the true characteristic of that thing. Everything else is for show and fake.
I lived a lot of my life in fear. I'm not doing that anymore. I was so afraid of the truth and how it might be perceived, but now that I have faced my biggest fear, I need the truth to give me courage. I am taking back my voice. A cleansing process is in the works, and I am being renewed. I know that is a lot to say, but keeping it all in is what was affecting my emotional, physical and spiritual health and ultimately draining my soul. The only way to renew my life, is to live it truthfully. The good, the bad and the ugly. The truth about me, what I have done wrong, and the truth about what I have lived through and so far, survived to tell. I hope it will even be helpful to others.
So as I write my story, I'm working on myself. How do I allow God to hold me as I continue on and how do I push through things that are very present in my life and unjust. I'm allowing God to renew me and I am learning to forgive myself... however reluctantly a lot of the time. It is a hard process, but to Him I will be white as snow and for that I am grateful. As for the rest of you, I recommend the old fashion hyssop cleanse.
Psalms 51
6. "Behold, you desire truth in the innermost being, and in secret you will make wisdom known to me.
7. Purify me with hyssop, and I will be clean; cleanse me, and I will be whiter than snow.
8. Let me hear joy and gladness, let the bones you have broken rejoice.
9. Hide your face from my sins and wipe out all my guilty deeds.
10. Create in me a clean heart, God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me.
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