Designs

I realized at some point I would have to admit this fact to others, but most importantly to myself  in my life. I have done this in stages, the admitting, I mean. As a child, I was too young of mind to see the consequences of any of my actions. I think this is the way of most who are really quite young. And  quite honestly much of the destruction in my childhood has been created by those around me in unconscious and intentional ways. I did not realize then I am gifted with a foundation of familial dysfunction and destruction.

As I aged a bit and began to have relationships with the opposite sex I was still blind to the fact that I was indeed in the middle of adding to this foundation of destruction.  I choose unwisely more often than not. I choose to enter relationships that traded one brand of dysfunction for another. So naïve of me to believe that dysfunction has only one face. There I was designing my destruction unwittingly, allowing others to mistreat me. While I am not subscribing to the ideal that their behaviors are my fault, I do believe that by staying in these relationships that I was in fact showing up for the planning of my destruction.

I grew a bit more and though fearful of the unknown I had grown more fearful of the known. I was no longer willing to toss myself of the side of life's cliff. Somehow, I had determined that there has to be more to life than this. I recognized I had a small set of wings. Not upon my back like one of God's winged creatures, but rather, attached to my heart and spirit. I became the young sparrow, pushed out the nest with the hope of flying but not with the self-assuredness that I could fly.

I hit the ground hard. It took me a long time to muster faith in those wings again. I built an exterior that laced defensiveness, anger, and stoicism to prove to myself and the world that hitting the ground had not phased me. This habit was one of the first real self-imposed designs of destruction. Somehow, I believed this persona embodied strength. If I was strong there would be no way to get hurt again. That was insanity atop destruction.That niggling voice in your head telling you to back off from a situation out of fear turns the arrow on the compass. I was directionless.

Time has passed. Some days it has passed quickly, others years have seemed interminably long. I learned that I brought destruction upon myself. I have no control what others say or do. I have no control over whether they like me or not and approve of who I am or what I do. The destruction woven in my childhood by others, then co-signed by me in my young adult years taught others how to treat me. I played a significant role in that by staying around for continued dysfunction and destruction.

I have picked up many bad habits along the path of destruction and have spent a lot of time evaluating which of those habits are really serving me well. The hard outer shell which I once thought kept me shielded from pain has slowly cracked. The uselessness of this juvenile defense mechanism is  acknowledged for what it truly is. It does not keep pain out, it locks it within. I have become a much different person these days. I allow myself to be vulnerable and at times it is painful when someone takes advantage of that knowingly or unknowingly. I have learned that I am alright being quiet and alone with myself. If others choose to take me as I am or leave me to myself is of no consequence because beauty of  who I am now  has grown despite the scars of destruction.

I am now at a point in my life where it has dawned on me in the clearest of ways that I am the only one who can design who I am. If I put up with or stick around for another's insanity than I am choosing to internalize and once more destroy myself. Only I have the ability to change myself. Each entity in my life has taught me good and bad, right and wrong. I have learned what I want out of relationships, family, life, and myself. Occasionally, I get caught up in the minutiae but now I have the ability to stand back and look at the overall design of the project that is my life. When I realize I am backsliding, those wings beat a bit and the sound returns my eyes and spirit to the direction of designing castles in the sky rather than prisons on the earth. The sparrow though small still flies in these instances perching atop the castle ledges.

I am the architect of my destruction yet I am the creator of a slightly askew abstract that when finished will represent the colors of who I truly am and what I have overcome. Those who wish to see the work of art have free passes, those who don't can pick up my discarded plans and build their own destruction.

~DivineChaos

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