baby feelings

Here's a crazy thing. I have mountains of journals. I write a ton. Not quiet as much since I got married and have less time to myself but I can write endlessly. And a couple years ago God made it very clear I needed to start writing publicly. So I started this blog and told no one about it. I'm being obedient right? :) Oh dear... And so as you can tell I have very few posts. I mean typically I come to this thing and have total block. I get all anxious about what I'm going to say and I get all concerned about my "audience". Geez, high school writing classes die hard.

God has been challenging me lately about the judgement I place on myself and others. He's been even more clear that I need to be writing on here, not just in my books. He and I processed all this as I'm journaling, pen to paper in another of my endless books. I asked him directly about what is going on that I'm so blocked when it comes to writing publicly. He was so clear that it's because I keep trying to write for others instead of writing for Him and myself. My physical journals are all about connecting with Him and this venue can be the same way, but see, I get blocked, by judging myself and second guessing my intuition. He's made me into this lovely woman and so often I hide it and shirk away and conceal myself because I'm so afraid. Which if you know me in the rest of my life seems so crazy. I have a job where I interface with people all day long. I lead a huge group of incredible professionals as they serve this community. I can public speak and speak my mind but perhaps like so many I am deeply afraid that if the secret part of me were known that I would be thrown out in the trash.

Hiding isn't working anymore.

I've sort of prided myself on being transparent and open with others but I'm realizing that's all relative. I don't mind sharing my personal life story and history. But I'm very careful about who I share my now with. I keep most of my present thoughts pretty guarded. I don't reach out to others and get very curious about their current world. I do in my work. I can't be a therapist or a good supervisor without being interested in people's worlds. In my work it's important that I don't mutually share my world with people. And that was really safe. It's coming to the end of it's usefulness this... wall... hiding...only peek out a little bit thing. It's time to grow. It's time to change and it starts with going way back.

I asked God where this all started. When I get in casual social situations I feel like I'm 18 months old. Seriously, I feel like everything is big and scary and I just want to cling to my mother's leg. I may know a few words but I'm too scared to speak them. It's to the point that I don't like going to church. I don't know what to say. It's this huge room of tons of people and I have no clue how to operate. I've felt this way for years at church, and I blogged about it before. But I've pretty much given into my total avoidance of going. I can't worship. I can't connect to God. I am a clingy baby the whole time with no mom to hide behind.

Now I don't have any clear memories of my life at 18 months but how is that I got stuck there? Some part of my social development is back there. That may not make sense to a lot of people but it's something we therapists notice. Emotional development happens but all of us have areas that don't necessarily grow up and we have patterns that we revert to that may be very childish. So here I am a slightly verbal, feeling like 18 or 22 months in any kind of unstructured social situation. Not true for structured ones, when I have a role or responsibility in a big social gathering I'm all good. The next question is how do I grow up? I want to...I'm done giving in to this little baby. The thing about growth is that God makes it happen. I don't have the answer yet but asking him what is going on is the first step and then asking him to help me grow is the next one. I'm going to trust him to grow me to guide me in becoming 33 socially. That sounds really good. I'd really like to be 33 on Sunday mornings.