i became extremely stressed out yesterday for a few hours. thinking about my apartment and starting a new life. i'm terrified...and i have nothing. do you know how stressful it is? for real, i almost broke out in hives thinking about it.

i'm a firm believer in God working things out. bless my heart, the way i navigate through this world is atrocious. i live from the heart. if my heart doesn't feel what i'm writing, i erase it. what i'm singing, i turn the music off. what i'm watching, i change the channel. my heart is the well spring of my life and it's messy. i kind of tumble around loving people and things unabashedly throwing caution to the wind doing what feels right.
this has way of living has a tendency to be soooo very detrimental to any kind of plan that i could possibly put together which often leads me to having no plan. this stresses out everyone in my life.

i moved to chicago because i had a feeling God wanted me there. i hang out with people because i have a feeling they are just great people. i hug/call people because i feel like they need it. i talk to people on the street and smile from my heart because i just feel like it's necessary. i moved to GA because i felt like my heart would implode if i didn't. all of this has lead to where i am now.

without a pot to piss in or a window to throw it out, as my dad would say.

which leads to my next moment of insanity. i've "claimed" an apt. i feel like this is the one. i feel like God's leading me here. i toured the facility but it was rushed and...not REALLY a tour. more of a "let me show you the largest apt which is nothing like the one that i'm going to offer you when we get back downstairs." but it was cool. i just accepted it because i knew that was home.

my new home.

and i feel the renewal creeping up behind me. the chance that so many people wish they could take...a chance to start over. to take this City by storm. to be the person God has planned for me to be. all of the regression i feel, the anger i've felt, the tears i've cried...they're all leading to this moment.

my moment of renewal.

i may not have toilet paper. or an iron. or furniture. but i'm so excited to start over. my life in chicago was becoming more counterfeit by the day. i was in love with a man that was in love with someone else. i was working at a job that wasn't suited for me. i had frenemies surrounding me and discussing my every move. my life right now is the real deal.

it's spacious and inviting. it's full of expectation and hi-fives. i have all the love i need and am surrounded by family and good people.

my heart. my expectation. my future. it's all bright. it's all right. it's a chance in a lifetime.

...thinking on screen...

Grief is a crazy thing. It doesn't just affect the person who is hardest hit by it, but it affects everyone around that person. Everyone they come into contact with - especially those closest to them. I have never had to deal with grief on this level before. I have been through all kinds of trauma. I've grieved many losses - of situations, relationships, people - but never have I grieved like this. It's an interesting experience.

This grief is so potent that it is literally strangling my family to death - and I don't know what to do. We are all scrambling and clawing at our little gods while searching for a way to make it stop. I keep seeking the true God but not enough. The busyness has taken over and I don't realize that I'm at a deficit until I can't sleep, I'm drinking more, working too much, overwhelmed, stressed out - just not at peace. I need the world to stop so we can get this train back on the tracks.

My sister used to be my friend. Now she's a woman being strangled by grief. She is a woman doesn't know who she is anymore. She doesn't know where she's going or where she needs to go. Direction - she has no direction. He was her direction. He was who she is - she has no identity without him. Wow - that's a hard thing to process. Because I am who I am - alone, together... She was one with him to the point where she just was him - and I'm not sure that it was in the best of ways either. I'm going to have to think about that more - that would explain a lot.

It would explain why she's struggling with her morality. Why she's struggling with perception - spiritual, other people's. Why she has no peace. If your peace is wrapped up in someone else and their spirituality and you lose them, your peace will be gone as well.

I keep asking God why this has happened to us. Why this grief is happening to me. Why this pain has settled in my family. I've gotten some answers but right now a big one has settled in for me. gods. He was her god. He was a spiritual man that always prayed, read his Bible, spoke truth from his heart - but she relied on that. Now she has no peace because she trusted in the wrong thing. God removed the god from her life - it can't be the whole reason, but wow - what a revelation. Her whole foundation has been taken away.

Also, she was one of mine. I would never have admitted it before. I would have denied the truth of that statement. I would have shunned the person who revealed it to me - annoyed that such a statement be made. But now I can see it's truth. She was always someone I could run to when I should have been running to God instead. And the relationship that I always wanted and tried to foster was never going to happen.

This experience has been a lesson in placing faith in the wrong gods. Working from the wrong place. Loving from the wrong place. My foundation was wrong - it was twisted. A semblance of operating from a belief and love of the One True God but really it was all wrong. A lie shrouded in righteousness. I'm working to get back to where I need to be. I'm working to put myself in a position where I can reach back and help my family wihtout becoming overcome by grief, loss and anger of those situations.

At some point, a hard conversation needs to be had. There will be tears as the grief slashes at me and the anger of the loss tears into me attacking my character and relationships. But it needs to be done for the sake of our family. I dread it. I dread the moment, I utter the words "we need to talk". It's going to be a long, arduous undertaking that I have no emotional reserves for right now. But in order to move forward in a healthy way, we need to work it out. In order to preserve the love that is there, we have to work it out.

We need to work out our God situation. We need to work out our sister situation. We need to work out our family situation. And we need to stop letting so many things take over our lives. Chasing after so many gods just makes you tired and takes your focus off of what is important. I don't need anymore distractions.