"I wonder if that's how darkness wins,
by convincing us to trap it inside ourselves,
instead of emptying it out.
I don't want it to win." - Jasmine Warga
This is perhaps one of the most painful and heartfelt entries I've ever had to write. It only hurts because it’s something that matters to me very much, and writing about it helps to clear my head and organise my thoughts. I realized now that the only way I can fully understand the pain is to accept its full extent.
Lately, I've been stuck in a dark hole.
I know. It’s such a cliché thing to write, but I know it holds true for many people like me, many children of God who doubt their own self-worth. How did Lucifer feel when he was thrown out of heaven? Even though he was despised, he was given the elegant moniker “Morning Star”, something so beauteous that you’d still mistake him for an angel, but we all know that’s not the case.
Every year starts out with a fairly positive outlook and I hoped and prayed I could carry them out until the end. People are truly only as strong as they believe they are, and though I felt invincible at best, I couldn't deny the fact that there was something rotting inside me. Lately, I’ve been feeling a great discontent within me and about how my life is going. Some people call it the quarter-life crisis or an existential crisis. I'd like to think of this as my 'dark night of the soul'. I remember writing about this earlier and how I wish I'd reach the end of the rabbit hole, but I find myself falling deeper and deeper into this downward spiral of despair. Perhaps you've felt this as well, the feeling of being choked, being held in a vice grip like an ensnared bird.
It was hopelessness that I allowed to take hold in my heart.
Looking back, I always knew deep inside that my happiness always rested in serving. I always dreamed of making something, anything, out of my mediocre life. I wanted to set the world on fire with God’s love. However, in the middle of everything, it felt like the warmth I kept so close to me suddenly died out.
And my soul wept. It wept for the warmth I thought I lost. My weeping only brought me back to where it all started.
If I had to go back to a certain period of time in my life, I'd go back to 2013, when I was... what people would call "the happiest time of my life". It was the start of my youth journey, after all. Fresh-faced and fresh-eyed, I was out to set the world on fire. It was in 2013 when I experienced my first-ever diocesan event and the firsthand blessing of new-found friends with the same faith as me.
I thought to myself that I can't be the only one who should experience this. I wanted more for our youth ministry but couldn't do much because who am I to make plans anyway? I wasn't the coordinator back then, but I was more than willing to help, to do what I can for the ministry. I loved serving. It became so ingrained in my life that I can't remember how I lived before all of it, before I became a reader, before I became a church kid. It gave my life so much meaning that without it, I felt rather empty, and there was so much unrest in me.
If God was the rain, I was the storm—and I did everything I could to make sure everything that crossed my path was soaking wet. I believed myself to be absolutely unstoppable, but I think we all know that storms can only last for so long.
2013 was my favourite year because it reminds me of how 'good' I was. I never wanted this so-called spiritual burnout to happen, especially since it happened so soon. The burnout made me realise the futility of my plans and the weakness and feebleness of my mind. I earnestly thought I was incapable of doing any wrong, but my mistakes, the fatal ones, always came to bite me back.
Looking back, things would’ve been so much different if I chose to stay loyal, if I had chosen to behave rather than to cause mischief and break hearts. With my own innocence broken, I proceeded to break more. It was something I never denied, but it was also something I’d rather not talk about if brought up. I admit the mistakes I made and I learned from them like how it should be for everyone. However, it feels like I can’t ever forgive myself even though I’ve been forgiven by everyone else. I always remind myself that the mistakes I made don't make up the entirety of my person. 'I am not my mistakes,' I tell myself. 'Though they are part of me.'
Every heart I broke led me deeper and deeper into this tidal wave I jumped into without thinking twice, until I eventually broke my own. The mess I made wasn’t all that pretty as I made it out to be. It made me think, how did breaking hearts become so easy for me to do? I never wanted any part of it. The 20 year old me would be heartbroken, though. She would despise the 'me' today.
I likened my journey to that of a girl on a tiny boat, with the seas calm and mild at first voyage, but the waves ravaged my boat as I sailed across the open sea. I thought I was a girl prepared for this voyage, but when the storm ravaged my ship, all I could do was sink. Deeper and deeper and deeper into the deep blue and deeper and deeper into despair.
I always likened myself to a little prodigal daughter, always letting go of my Father's hand and running away to play in the dirt. It wasn't always like this, and I wasn't always a bad kid. There was a time when I never hesitated to come to my Father in contrition. There was a time when I begged for His forgiveness as soon as I realised my mistake. There was a time when I never thought twice before running back home.
Now, all I want to do is run far away.
I ran and ran and drowned, and everyone thought I was just being forgetful or being careless, but I was drowning in so much pain and guilt that it almost consumed me. I let so many things suffer during this period of darkness in my life and I blamed no one else but myself. I did a lot of crying but I never asked for help. I cried because I was hurt, and I was hurt because I believed myself to be an honest-to-goodness kid, but I told myself to look back. I had to remind myself that I don't deserve anything at all even though I want to give back so much.
And I ran because I was hurt as well.
The hurt that my family underwent has warped my way of looking at love and relationships. Is it really possible to love a single person along with all of their weaknesses and demons? (And yet, when I look at the face of my love, I think that it is possible.) It hasn't stopped me from loving the heck out of the people who become part of my life, which I think is pretty cool.
Despite all the hurt I underwent, I didn't love them less. In fact, I learned to love them more, because when a person shows their scars, they are inviting you to love them more. I learned to separate the sin from the sinner and the illness from the patient. I’ve learned to love people who hurt me, so what more if I love the people who love me as well?
Somehow I understood that God didn't let me get married at the age I wanted to because it wasn’t the right time. I wanted to get married at the age of 23, but God brought me to World Youth Day instead (which was more than amazing, of course). There are still so many things I have yet to do and so much to accomplish for Him.
I felt the weight of my responsibilities on my shoulders, and it wasn’t light. However, it was something I loved dearly. I loved it greatly.
Not a lot of people knew about this crisis going on in my head and in my heart. It's difficult to talk about even to the people I am closest to.
But I know why. I was so overwhelmed by this great love that the Father has for me, and it terrified me. And because I was so scared, I ran away. I mean, who exactly was I and why did my Father favor me so much? I have never questioned my worth so much in my entire life. I never stopped responding to the call, even though I was truly confused with what was happening in my life. He remained my rock, even though I was hesitant to call out His name.
It was comforting to know that even when I walked in this desert of confusion and spiritual dryness, He was never far away. He was always there. His presence never left my life, and He always made sure that I knew that He was there.
I tell myself that time won't stop for me; it won't slow down, either. I had to move because no one will wait for me even if they could. I want to go back to that time when I trusted nothing more than His timing at all times.
The allure of a prim and proper working girl's life still pales in comparison so much to the gritty yet colourful church girl life I already lived. The people there love me despite all my misgivings, and it was reassuring to know that the way they looked at me never changed even when I was gone for quite a while. I guess that's what home really is.
"How long must I be far away from you for you to realise that there are things you cannot do on your own?"
It was never a crisis of faith for me. My faith is here, and I believe that God is in my life at all times, watching and guiding me, as He always does. The crisis was more about myself and my inability to reconcile my life outside of church with my own spiritual life.
The 'me' at work, outside the walls of the church, and the church girl 'me' that everyone sees every Sunday have become two different people, and it terrifies me to think that they can't get along at all.
...The 'me' who has tried every hedonistic thing that life has to offer— the booze, sex talk and the que sera sera way of thinking— and the 'me' who wants nothing more but to come home to her Father... they can't agree on anything anymore and I'm so annoyed.
People's inner demons have a special way of showing up whenever we least expect them, but mine have confronted me every single day for the past two years in the form of dishonest and hurtful words and awful, awful thoughts. Sometimes, they would come in the form of the people I love and it disturbs me to think that my own torment comes from loving certain people too much.
At the end of the day, looking back at the things that happened to me, I am still pretty much a scared little girl who wants to come home, but how can I come home when the place that was once my fortress became a battlefield before my own eyes? I'm not sure if it was the devils or the wars that drove me away, but I just want to go home.
I know well enough what I have to do, but I'm not sure if I actually have the strength to do it, to do the right thing. I am compelled to come home, but I don't feel like I can do so just yet because there's still something holding me back. Demons are real and sometimes
And when He spoke to me again— when I heard His voice again for the first time in such a long time, I couldn't help but cry.
I want to go back to how I was before the pain started— before the cracks began to show up. I spent every day at work thinking of every Sunday I spent in ministry, and I spent every working Sunday waiting for the Lord to pick me up. Stubbornly, if not patiently, yet still waiting. Heading home from work was an opportunity to contemplate the importance of God's presence in my life.
He was right. I can only do so much, but with Him, I can do so much more. I won't just exist, I will live— and I will live this life in the best way I can, but I'll need to find my way home.
I will need all the strength I can get to run past the smoke clouding my way back home, and it may seem like a long road, but believe me when I say that I'm on my way.
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