Being Small

   "I (Paul) pray that your hearts will be flooded with light so that you can understand the confident hope He (Jesus) has given to those He called--His holy people who are His rich and glorious inheritance." Ephesians 1:18

  My life has been an exercise in smallness. Smallness meant survival. Smallness meant peace. Smallness meant giving no one reason to criticize or ridicule. Yet inside my heart were big things. Big ideas. Big feelings. The biggest thing kept locked deep within my mind and soul was truth. It had to be made the smallest of all.

  To survive.

  I am in the unenviable position of reflecting on how the smallness was forged. 

  I can't remember when being small became a way of life. It's always been with me. As a child, I didn't understand why it was so important to not appear big. I only knew my bigness would hurt others.

  Smile. Perhaps there needs to be some clarification. 

  A young and talented artist who had capabilities beyond her years at five slowly held those skills back. By the time she was seven, her work was on par with her classmates. 

  I remember clearly doing a drawing in Grade 2. The task was to use straight lines to create the image. A horse happy girl drew, of all things, a horse. I thoroughly enjoyed the challenge. The mare's tail was drawn with short, straight, ruler guided lines that created the arc and flow of hair.

  The teacher held it up to the class to show them what could be done with a straight line...and I cringed inside. (This memory is so incredibly vivid, I can even smell the chalk dust in the classroom.)

  I cringed because my work made others feel bad about their own.

  I think the teacher held up other pictures, ones that "cheated" by using curves.

  And so began a school life of mediocrity. I stayed small.

  It's sad to think a child would even think this way. 

  Bigness meant believing you were good at something. Bigness meant showing emotion. Bigness meant being smarter. It was believing you were beautiful. 

  I didn't understand why it was so important to hide the truth of who I was or what I could do. I only knew it was a punishable offence when the truth leaked out. 

  My lifetime partner of confusion set up residence. He was nurtured and fostered and encouraged to grow because the ones who were most threatened by bigness had none of their own. And as long as they pulled the strings, the horse happy little girl stayed small.

  For sixty years. 

  But now I have entered the stillness: the place of being big...of being true. 

  Smile. This bigness is not borne of conceit or arrogance. That sort of bigness is built on lies and deception.

  This bigness is a simple, grateful celebration in two small words: i am.

  

  

  

Into the Stillness

   So Peter went over the side of the boat and walked on the water towards Jesus. But when he saw the strong wind and the waves, he was terrified and began to sink, "Save me, Lord!" he shouted. Jesus immediately reached out a grabbed him. "You have so little faith," Jesus said, "Why did you doubt me?" Mathew 14:29-31

  I went to see my family for a couple of days. It was wonderful to spend time with them and my grandchildren.

  It's a long drive to get there, around three and half hours without breaks. I used the opportunity to listen and learn as much as possible about narcissism, the tactics used, and my own role in the destructive dance of control and capitulation. I am far wiser than when I left a couple of days ago. There are some great teachings on YouTube. Some are faith based. Some are not. And not all of them are great for sure.

  Half an hour before arriving home, I turned it all off. The brain can only handle so much at once. In the stillness of the car where the only sound was the hum of tires and the wind whispering past my window, a stillness enveloped my soul. A strength rose out the quiet. Everything I'd been listening to silenced the confusion I'd been struggling with.

  I thought about Peter getting out of the boat and realized what actually caused him to sink. It was confusion. He was confused by the reality of his senses. In most cases, in the middle of the sea, wind and waves meant he would drown. Even though he had his eyes on Jesus the whole time.

  Faith is entering into the way of Jesus to silence the limiting or even destructive power of our human perceptions of what is real and true. 

  I was raised by a storm. 

  Up until a couple of weeks ago, the wind and the waves had kept my head below water. Confusion was the author of every suffocated emotion, the ever present guilt, the self-doubt, the second-guessing of every decision ever made. That's the point. As long as the storm raged, I lost sight of Jesus. As long as the storm raged, I was helpless to see His outstretched hand. I was unable to step into the stillness He offered. Like Peter, I didn't have faith to see what His outstretched hand really meant.

  That stillness is clarity. The ability to see truth and live in that truth. It is being able to see beyond the storm no matter how violent. Stillness is what drowns out the thunder that once had me cowering in fear. Stillness allows me to see the gathering storm clouds and be prepared to face the onslaught. Not by running away or by making myself small again, but by standing still in the face of it.

 God is not the author of confusion, but of peace. 1 Corinthians 14:33

  I have had glimpses of it, in the art and in the writing. In doing these things, confusion was forced to step back. Truth came in glimpses of revelation and understanding. I cherished the stillness of it all, how focusing on one bit at a time brought peace and healing. 

  But I wasn't living in it. I was still in the boat.

  Jesus is so patient with us all.

  He kept calling, watching me dip my toes into the water only to yank my foot back into the false safety and familiarity of the boat. I had no idea how rotten the wood was.

  

  I don't know if any of this makes sense. All I know is that I didn't feel obligated to buy supper for my family last night as a thank you for allowing me to take up space in their lives. They were the ones who decided to order pizza rather than cook.

  That's a first. Not the pizza, but realizing they actually want me there and I don't owe them anything for it.

  Dear, sweet Jesus, create in me a new mind. One where confusion has no place. Grant me discernment and wisdom to see when the whispered lies, conditioning and old patterns try to steal the stillness and peace only Your presence can give. In Your precious name, AMEN!

  

  

  

  

  

  

  

Balance

   If you are wise and understand God's ways, prove it by living an honorable life, doing good works with the humility that comes form wisdom. But if you are bitterly jealous and there is selfish ambition in your heart, don't cover up the truth with boasting and lying. Such things are not God's kind of wisdom. Such things are earthly, unspiritual, and demonic. For where there is jealousy and selfish ambition, there you will find disorder and evil of every kind." James 3:13-16

  This morning's Scripture was found in a search for verses regarding walking away from a bad relationship. Scripture, some faith based YouTube videos and friends are helping me understand that it's okay to do this. The expression, "Let go and let God," finally makes sense.

  I have had to do some major repenting of my own in all of this. It was part and parcel of breaking the soul ties that bound me to my mom. It was a bond not founded in mutual love and respect but rather through control, ownership and oppression. It was a thoughtful, prayerful process and incredibly freeing. 

  I am grateful for the tender guidance of the Holy Spirit on this. And Google for providing the starting point for such a prayer.

  I have other things to repent of as well. As a believer, I thought I was doing the right thing by honouring my parent, by continuing to be in contact with her, by striving to make her happy. I realize now, I was simply waiting, filled with the false hope that she would change.  

  Her changing won't happen because of anything I previously did or didn't do. Only God can restore her. (Forgive me Lord, for trying.)

  Change begins with silence, with not playing the game any more. 

  Research into what it's like to be a narcissist has helped nurture some compassion and pity for the people who are like this. I can pity my mom because the only way of dealing with her own unfathomable inner pain and self loathing is to overpower and destroy anything that is better than she can either do or be. 

  They weaponize our love, our needs, our desires for relationship, our thoughts and ideas, and even our own identity and use it against us. They will not rest until we are utterly destroyed. 

  Narcissists are sick, sick people. Literally.

  It has been hard to face this truth about the woman who raised me. Seeing her need for power and the ensuing cruelty in action on a helpless, dying man was the tipping point.

  I once was blind but now I see. 

  The view isn't pretty.

  And a journey begins to extricate myself from the toxic lessons and automatic behaviours that are poison to my soul, heart and mind. I will ask for help from the Lord to increase my awareness when the autopilot is steering me the wrong way. 

  His way, the way of truth and life is the only path I want to walk on.

  It starts with grief. 

  Forgiveness will come in due time.

  

  

God's Blessing

   "God blesses those who mourn, for they will be comforted." Mathew 5:4

  It's been a long while since I sat here at the table. It's been a trying month. My step-dad passed away on July 29 in the early hours of the morning. His son was with him when he finally found peace. He had cancer but a series of falls in the previous month were what finally took him. Allan was 94. 

  The events leading up to Allan's, hospitalization are horrific beyond imagining. Enough so there was a coroner's inquest into suspected elder abuse by an elder. The only reason my mom wasn't charged was because Allan's son intervened and made allowances for my mom's age. She turned 92 yesterday.

  Nevertheless, I am here, faced with having to acknowledge a cold, hard truth. The woman who adopted and raised me is a pathological narcissist. It's only through the intervention and prayers of others that I am able to find a glimmer of pity for the woman who lost her husband of nearly 40 years.

  I have excused/justified and accepted her behaviour for years as coming from someone who was difficult to be with. It's only now do I realize the price that was paid to be in her presence. Once I was blind, but now I see. And it's left me reeling a bit.

  There was never a relationship with her. True of all narcissists, it's about power, control and possession. They will do or say anything to maintain the balance of power in their favour. Gaslighting is their weapon of choice. It's a cruel, cruel weapon that slowly strips their victim of their ability to trust the things they see or hear or feel or even think. 

  If a narcissist has done their job well, the one who has been broken smothers their own identity simply to keep the peace. It's a bitter peace, though, because the narcissist's voice becomes the one in your head. It is an ugly voice and a cruel master.

  I am going to get some therapy to overcome a lifetime of conditioning. Because not only was I raised by a narcissist, I spent 20 years with a spouse who was one as well. I am not surprised by this. He chose someone who was already broken in. 

  But I have a God who sees all things and will use all things for good. The terrible things that happened to Allan are what got him into the hospital and away from the cruelty of his wife. They are the things that made me realize my mom is a sick, sick woman. Her lies were exposed. The truth of her cruelty came into the light. The truth of what she is is utterly undeniable.

  It brought Allan's son, his daughter and myself closer than we had ever been before. 

  I know Allan is in heaven now. He was a good man with a deep and quiet faith. I am thankful he is free from the suffering he endured in his last days and months on earth. I am thankful he was free from pain in the end.

 His last words to me were, "Walk on." I thought he was talking about the song "You'll Never Walk Alone." I sang him the few words I could remember. This beautiful song became my anthem during the long days of waiting at the hospital. A couple of days after this lovely moment, I realized something. It wasn't about the song at all. His last words were a secret message, one he knew my mom wouldn't understand. He, my dad, was granting permission to walk away.

  I have had no contact with her since Allan's burial service on Tuesday. The guilt comes in waves. But that's her voice, not God's.

  In all the teaching about breaking free from a narcissistic relationship, the greatest weapon in my arsenal is silence. By not engaging, the narcissist is unable to utilize their own arsenal of gaslighting tactics to reassert control. 

  I have given her to God because only God can free her.

  "For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms." Ephesians 6:12