Words seem to be simultaneously the most powerful knowable force and at the same time, the most flippant.

Words convey love. Hatred. Connection. Disappointment. Joy. Information. 

They are the tiny roots of the tree of life. So integral, we don't often stop to give them a thought. Or consider the full weight and responsibility they hold. 

They are free and exorbitant at the same time. 

Unlike time, words can be bought. Distorted. Falsified. Misunderstood. 

Yet, the most powerful force for healing, clarification and reunification. 

The first step when admitting addiction is acknowledgement. Most of us are addicted to the sugary sweetness of a quick word, a shot across the bow, a careless bomb thrown.

Few are the words mulled and simmered, painstakingly edited and considered to reach something inside of us. To pull us into each other and out of ourselves. 

Few are those who seek the wisdom and wellness they endow. 

 The most familiar sight, light streaming in through the windows. The most familiar feeling, thoughts stuck in my head. Trapped when the door is wide open. 

Trauma whispers many lies, chief among these is the devaluing of your own voice. Who will understand? Who will stay? Secrets perform chokeholds. 

Power is regained when you simply begin. To speak. To connect thought to voice. Uninterested in the result, only in the process. 

Habits built over decades do not fall easily. They are taken apart brick by brick. Thread by thread. Just as they are built again, into something new. Use the materials provided to create something new. Recyle. 

Begin Again

I come back to this space over and over. My own corner of the Internet which bears whatever name I see fit at the time. Always seeking to define myself. By a name, a religion, a relationship, an article of clothing.

Time and time again, nothing seems to encompass the whole of me. I've sought the past two years to uncover (as Thomas Merton and others describe) my True Self.

I've uncovered much. I've come to this space to begin again. I'm tempted to delete the past but will leave it as a reminder. Of my expansion, my growth, my renewal. I no longer see this as an end point, but another step on the road.

I don't have many answers. Many more questions in fact. I'm learning to sit in the discomfort of the unknown, as many have before me. 

It's easy to think we can search for the correct answers in the Internet. We can bow our heads before it in search of whatever we need to fill the gaping disconnectedness within ourselves. But a virtual landscape doesn't fill the longing inside of us. Typing to people sitting on another screen in another place doesn't bring us more together. Creating more content to remind us that we aren't alone doesn't make us less alone. 

Only flesh and blood can do that. Only the shedding of leaves, the scurrying up trees, the roll of water,  the windy tunnels between mountains can prove we aren't alone. A hand held, a pant leg tugged on, a shared meal with others. 

Every perspective is valuable, my own no less so. Every experience should be shared, if even only for my own "remembery" as my 7 year old says. 

I offer mine only in the pursuit of archival. In hopes that you may read my wonderings and be affirmed of yours too.