i just want to feel safe in my own skin

Twelve In 12

READING 

The Lance Thrower ~ Jack Whyte

The Pillars of the Earth ~ Ken Follett

FINISHED

I had a visit from my church elder this week.  He was just checking in to see how I was doing, seeing if I needed to vent about the pastor or the church or anything in general.  I spilled a lot to him that I didn’t really plan on spilling.  Not that its a bad thing, but I just didn’t expect to connect so much with him.  He also feels out of place here.  And he’s married with kids and a life.  But he knows how weird life is up here.  He told me he’s way more liberal than people in this area, much like me.  In some regards.  But he agreed with my observation that living in Michigan is like living in a different country.  Its not like any other place in the US.  So much so, that things here seem foreign.  The culture, the people, the atmosphere.  And he was brought up here!  For someone who is from this area to say that he feels like a foreigner makes me feel better.  And he understands that all I’m doing is following what God wants me to do.  And he gets how frustratingly difficult that can be.  It was refreshing to talk to someone like that.  To get some things off my chest, even if there aren’t answers to my questions.

And…

I told him I was bipolar.  I don’t know why its so hard for me to be honest about that part of myself.  That makes three people at the church who know.  Thats it.  Three.  He didn’t react.  Which was good actually.  Its just a fact for me.  Like being Scottish or being from NY.  They are such integral parts of who I am, parts that I can’t change or force.  I just have to accept and learn to live with those facts.  But I felt better for talking with him.

Except I still feel lonely.  I didn’t expect our conversation to change everything.  Before or after it happened.  But right now, its just another fact for me.  I don’t feel completely at ease or comfortable anywhere at the moment.  I feel like I’m always have to watch what I say and do.  I can never completely let it all go and just be me.  Its getting worse and worse because I feel like I’m losing myself.  Again and again and again.  I’m losing the definition of who I am.

I feel better with an instrument in my hands.  I know that place, those rules.  I know how to do that and who to be.  Its tangible and physical.  And I think thats what I’m lacking a little bit of right now.  Someone tangible and physical, to touch, to hug, to cuddle, to punch, to poke.  I’m not sure if thats really okay though.  I’m struggling with how my life intersects with my faith, my beliefs.  There’s quotes and sayings about losing all that we are to gain something more precious in Jesus.  I understand the theory, but not the practice.  Maybe that means I don’t understand the theory either.  If I give up what I am – a musician – I feel like I’m losing who I am.  I’m losing my means to communicate with God.  There’s a verse from Philippians that is really haunting me.

7 But whatever was to my profit I now consider loss for the sake of Christ. 8 What is more, I consider everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them rubbish, that I may gain Christ 9 and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ—the righteousness that comes from God and is by faith. – Philippians 3:7-9

I understand it and I don’t understand it.  If everything I have gained is considered rubbish in the light of knowing Christ – what am I?  What am I striving for?  What am I working so hard to achieve?

This is all the dangerous part of being a bipolar Christian.  I’m in pain.  I’m ignoring it for now because I can’t deal with it.  I know where my thoughts will wander if I allow them down that path.  I’m in pain and I want the pain to stop.  I know how to stop the pain.  I know where I can go where there is no more pain, no more suffering.  I can be happy and whole and complete.  Why do I keep struggling and pushing and fighting when I could be in heaven?

I don’t want to die.  I don’t want to just give up and roll over.  I’m still fighting.  But I’m losing perspective and reasons to go on.  I don’t know who to talk to, or who to turn to for all this.  And I can’t process it because I’m truly terrified of where it will go.  What it will lead to.  I just… I just want to feel safe in my own skin.

I just want to feel safe in my own skin
I just want to be happy again
I just want to feel deep in my own world
but I’m so lonely I don’t even want to be with myself anymore
On a different day if I was safe in my own skin
then I wouldn’t feel so lost and so frightened
But this is today and I’m lost in my own skin

And I’m so lonely I don’t even want to be with myself anymore

I just want to feel safe in my own skin
I just want to be happy again 

Honestly Ok ~ Dido