Refuge

Writing is my refuge.  I don't know what it is about it.  It doesn't have to be handwritten and it doesn't have to be typed.  It just needs to be written down.  Writing is the place I feel safe.  Although people can critique my work and edit it, comment on it, and encourage it, it has yet to be overtaken by people. I can whatever I want, whatever I need to. I can say things with all the courage in the world. I can be brutally honest and overwhelmingly heartbroken without judgement or reprimand. Because it is between the Lord and I. No one else sees these kinds of writings. No one needs to. It's my full expression of myself without fear, without judging, without people to interrupt me or discount what I say or feel. No one sees that writing. However, expressing myself, much more mildly on my blog, in letters, or what have you is also healing to me.  
When I write, outside voices, good and bad, encouraging and frustrating, hurtful and full of love, do not speak so loudly in my head. I can sit and hear what my heart is telling me. See, I need this safe place.  I think everyone needs a refuge. But I need writing because people's words so profoundly effect me.  You know that saying "Sticks and stones my break my bones, but words will never hurt me"? Yeah, that's not even close to the truth for me. I long to help people, to encourage them, love them as they become who God intended them to be, to watch all that God wants them to be. And I don't know if I measure up to that longing often.  When I disappoint, frustrate, wound, hurt, whatever negative, I would do practically anything to make it right.  I will apologize, say I'm in the wrong, give gifts, give up things, just to try and make it right.  I will even do those things, when I haven't done anything wrong or something minute, but I so desperately want to make it right. 
Here's an example.
When I was a little girl, my dad took me to McDonald's for a kid's meal. I sat in my booster seat in the middle of the backseat.  I was happily munching my food,  humming as I ate. I had just put the very last fry in my mouth, when my dad asks if he can have one. Frantically, I search the cartoony yellow and red bag just in case one has been missed. No luck.  And I tell him, "I just ate the last one. I'm so sorry, Daddy."  "No big deal, it's ok." Well, it was a huge deal to me. I was so disappointed in myself. I felt terrible that I had been so selfish not to offer any. If I had slowed down, he could have had one.  I would have given anything to give him, not just one, but a full bad of fries at that moment. And I began to cry, the weight of not being able to give my Dad what he wanted overwhelming me.
Do you get the picture?
This memory is at least 15 years old, but it is seared in my memory.  It still haunts me to this day. I would still give anything to have not eaten that last fry.  It's ridiculous, ONE fry! Stupid. Dumb. And he didn't even say he was disappointed but there it is. In my head. So are memories of a lot of conversations I've had with a number of people in my life, where I haven't measured up to their expectations, where I've disappointed them, hurt them, or they feel like I have.  I would do anything to make it better, to make it go away, to take away the pain they are experiencing. I would take it all on myself. But I can't.  I can't fix everyone's hurt feelings, I can't make everything right. I'm human. I cannot be all things. I cannot be everything. I am not perfect. I get mad. I get hurt. I do stupid things. I do mean things. I'm human. There is only so much I can do.  So much I can fix before I just have to give up and wait. Wait as time ticks to see if mending and recovery is possible. Wait to see if things really are getting better. Wait to see if bump in the road or a bridge collapse.  Wait for grace to come. 
And this is where writing comes in for me.  I immerse myself in writing and the load lightens.  It takes some of the pressure off and I can breath.  And it even makes me feel better when I'm finished writing. It's how I know I was having a rough day when I look back at my journals. If I've covered 2 pages back and front (depending on the content), I'm releasing those emotions, expressing them in the only way I know how.  I do not feel judgement when I am writing. I do not feel like a failure. Or a sad excuse of a person. I don't feel any of that. I just feel like me. An imperfect person, who messes up and makes mistakes, but someone who enjoys life and love and family. Someone who is worthy of her Savior's time because she has been redeemed. Worthy of feeling special. Worthy of feeling like she's enough. Worthy of grace. Just like you long for grace when you have made a mistake or make amends for doing wrong, I want that too.
Sometimes it comes, sometimes it doesn't. The best I can do is try and then give it over to the Lord. And while I wait, I write.  Because sometimes speaking just doesn't cut it. Because I feel freedom in it and I feel safe there.
Writing is my refuge because it is where I reveal my heart. I reveal my heart to the Lord and myself. I find myself when I write.