Honesty-Quotes-85

If you asked me to name a definite universal intolerance, I would say it’s dishonesty. The good in us wants to believe that the people we love are transparent, that the words they say are true. We rage wars, big and small, personal and international, when transparency isn’t a mutual part of a relationship. Fear of being lied to, and the threat these lies cause to personal security, builds theoretical and literal walls between loved ones and strangers alike. Lies and love are bitter enemies. “If I don’t let you in, you can’t hurt me.”…is a common belief among anyone worried that a lie may eventually stab them in the heart, and take away their ability to ever love again. When we believe that lies are inevitable, at the same time as believing that honesty and love are what feed our souls, we can end up malnourished in a desert of disappointment, believing that any truth we may find, is a mirage.

So how do we survive lies? How do we continue to nurture our souls after being SO SURE that we were nurturing someone else’s with mutual respect, only to learn that they could secretly disregard your emotions, and painfully catapult words at your heart and soul so easily for their own selfish reasons? Yes, this recently has happened to me…

My recovery and I have been challenged. And this challenge caused me to experience my first anxiety attack since returning from Homewood. The duration of the anxiety attack was small, but the meaning of it was massive! It reminded me of how fragile my recovery is, and how my failure and success are always playing a potentially destructive game of tug-of-war with each other. I knew that I would be challenged MANY times in my recovery, in MANY ways, because let’s face it, life happens! However, I was expecting reasonably predictable challenges to come my way, such as parenting challenges or work challenges. But alas,  ‘predictable’ and I usually don’t dance together, so I shouldn’t have been surprised when the loyalty and support I lovingly dispensed to a friend over many months, was shockingly discarded and shattered into a million pieces with one disgusting word.

Thankfully I’m a much different person now, and I am happy to say that my recovery has given me the opportunity to see ALL mistrusts as opportunities for spiritual growth. That’s not to say that this recent occurrence hasn’t cause me pain. On the contrary! It’s hurt me more than a razor blade shaving off layers of my heart. But I’m OK! To be clear, the act of lying to me is never ok, but the experience is. The old Natalie would have retreated and isolated if I had experienced such an event before. I would have locked myself behind the dark walls of alcohol and depression and not cared if I would ever see the light of day. I would have added layers of mortar to the walls which I had built to protect me from feeling pain, and which also suffocated my ability to hope. And with carrying the necessary respect for how sick I was back then, this may have even killed me…

But I’m a new me! I have no craving for alcohol. I have no need to isolate. I have no need to build a wall. And I have no need to die! I look at the weight that this incident placed on my chest not as a way to cause me pain, but as a way to continue to crack open my inner spirituality and awareness. I was able to prove to myself once again that I don’t live in a world of resentment any longer. I am allowing myself to feel emotions, because they are there for me to feel, and use them as fertilizer for my soul, one sprinkle at a time. I can only be poisoned if I let myself be…and I refuse to drink the ‘resentment Kool-Aid’ I use to drink like it was my only source of refreshment. Ugh…that’s the worst Kool-Aid EVER! They need to discontinue that flavour! 😉

So now what? Where do I go from here? How do I recover from this disappointment? My answer is simple: I will continue to be transparent, and walk with my head held high and truth in my eyes. I will never be lost if I always follow this path. I will not stop trying to help people for fear of being discarded. And I will allow myself the patience required to heal, and save myself a trip to the desert of disappointment…It’s way too hot there anyway. But remember, if you ever find yourself in this desert, rather than wasting your time looking for mirages, make a sand castle and hitch a ride home on a camel…and don’t drink the Kool-Aid! ❤

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