Too many questions, not enough answers....

I am beginning to think that being a work-a-holic and staying so busy was just a ploy to keep me from thinking. Now, I think too much.

I was flipping through the channels the other morning, and I came across a certain Christian show that I used to watch all the time. I started listening, and she was teaching on verses that I knew by heart, and suddenly I got this very comfortable feeling… Like returning to a place that you once knew well, but hadn’t been to in a long time… That feeling sort of startled me. Is my subconscious mind missing that?

I was looking through a clothing catalog this morning, and started to think, “I like that…” and “I love those shoes!” when I realized my taste is changing. The clothes I was attracted to were more conservative, dressier, more “pulled together” looking… A feeling of fear passed through my mind… Was I turning into one of those people I had spent my whole life trying to be the exact opposite of??

How can someone just change like that? Does that mean that who I have been up to this point has been a lie? Have I been trying to be someone I am not? What is this change attributed to? Maybe I have just lived in Hick County too long… Am I surrendering my individuality? Or have I been compromising my real self for the last few years just to keep those people with their hurtful attitudes away from me? Has my resentment over being treated like a second-class citizen colored my view of who I really am and what I believe?

I don’t think I have ever written a whole paragraph that was nothing but questions.

Maybe it’s a pride thing. Can a person have too much pride and have no self-esteem at the same time?

I have always told Rick that when you have a job, to get ahead in that job, you have to play by your employer’s rules… Play along to get along… Maybe I have been fighting too much to be different… maybe if I played along a bit better I would be happier, not having to fight for everything all the time…

Whoa. I am thinking myself into a headache. Pretty pathetic to be almost 40 and not have a clue who you really are, don’t you think??

This next part was added just today, days after I wrote the previous sentences. I have been reading a book called “Soul Hunger”, by Sandy Richardson, a Christian perspective about her struggles with Bulimia. I am not Bulimic, I can’t make myself throw up even when I’m sick, but I do have a binge-eating problem. Damn. I have never admitted that outside of my own head, that was harder than it looks on the page. Anyway, I have came across several passages in this book that hit so close to home, but this one really jumped out at me:

“People had hurt me, and I was beginning to recognize the people and the events. But how had I responded to the pain? As a child, I felt that there was no one to protect me, so I protected myself by judging the ones who hurt me. I would avoid anything that made me appear to be like them.”

That hit me like a ton of bricks! Have I been avoiding all the things in me that were like everyone else? Is the fact that I ignore the things in me that were anything similar to “them” the reason I don’t really know who I am? Does that sound too obvious?

You would not believe how nervous it makes me to actually hit that button that says “Publish Post” on this one….