Sometimes You Just Need Breakfast with a Friend

 I had breakfast this morning with a friend.

Our conversations lead to such growth for me, and I can only hope that I help her even a quarter of the amount that she helps me.

Though I tend to leave our times together feeling like I have monopolized the time. Or my situations have monopolized the time. And a little dumb for not having my stuff together like she seemingly does.

She'll say something that I completely get, that I'm also dealing with, that I have experienced before, and I share, so she'll know she's not alone, or because I know she'll relate and I know I'll appreciate the viewpoint she'll have on the topic.

I leave feeling like she is a true friend and I am not. I leave embarrassed, vowing (even out loud to her) that I will be better next time.

I leave wishing I had taken notes!!

Today's conversation topic, among others, was blogging. I don't have a lot of people in my "real life" that blog or ever have, so I tend to keep my thoughts and struggles to myself, feeling they just don't get it. But she DOES blog. And I shared some of my struggles. Which, of course, sounded SO stupid out loud when in my brain they have been substantial and impenetrable walls for me.

I've struggled with blogging the last few years. More than the last few years. I have posts written and not published, I have a book full of thoughts and ideas and partial posts written. It's not lack of creativity or ability or want. It's purely something in my brain that triggers an overwhelming... fear? panic?... I'm still not sure.

I feel like I am still pulled towards blogging... just pulled in a different direction, which leaves me uncomfortable and unsure about the future of my blog. (Of all my blogs.)

She speaks about how she doesn't even look at the stats on her's, that none of that is even important to her, and that is exactly how I feel (anyone who has followed me for any length of time knows that one more than one is a blessing), and though that is an excuse "the world" gives me, it's never been a goal of mine.

But that's it. I realized I am living other people's goals, other people's dreams, other people's timelines, and letting myself be convinced that I should follow them. I am living a version of an old me I lost years ago. I'm trying to remain unchanged when I myself have changed so much. I have spent the last few years right where I was long ago, trying to be what everyone wanted or needed me to be, stagnant in my journey, and have forgotten about who I have worked so hard to become, the patterns I have broken, the trauma I have endured (and healed... or maybe mostly-healed... from), the things I have survived.

My path has changed... and trying to force myself to stay on that path, without veering, has led me to this wall that I can't seem to get around and don't have the strength to climb.

I have felt abandoned by God because He has not helped me break through, but HE also knows that I am trying to force myself down a path that no longer makes sense to me, to my life, that no longer fits who I am, who I want to be, who he created.

He did not abandon me. I abandoned Him.