Embrace Your Own Story

“Let go of who you think you’re supposed to be; embrace who you are.”

Ok, here's a snippet from one of my stories I tell myself:

I was newly single, going through a nasty divorce, seeking only custody of my babies (youngest was a year and a half old and remember, I have seven children), and newly accepted into University.  I was leaving a 19 year marriage where abuse, of every kind, was rampant and I was near to be beaten down.  I was running on nerves, writing University papers, trying to keep home and hearth safe, trying to keep my children safe, going to "Rotten Choice" group that was a group for abused women and acknowledging I had been a rotten choice too, and trying to deal with a broken family where the three oldest were in joint custody, going to court, talking to lawyers, talking to student loan.. well, that part of my story is all true.  I had left family and friends I had known and who had no idea why on earth I would leave such a good man.  I lost my network of people.  I had lost my faith.  I had come to a point in life where it was me against God and the world.  I walked away, not only from a marriage, but had friends walk away from me.  I hated to bathe because I was so skinny I looked like a holocaust victim.  I am 5'6" and weighed 114 pounds.  I was on my own and fighting a great battle to do everything perfect so I would, and did, get full custody of my four youngest children. And I was winning...until there was one blow that nearly took me down.

I received a letter from a friend who had been my friend since I was a young teenager.  We raised our children together and she had a story as much as I had a story.  In her 9 paged letter, she told her story of me at a very angry moment.  She took me down with such vehemence, such hatred, such evil, such untruths, such gossip she decided to believe, that I broke.  Her crowning glory was that she said I looked like the life I was leading.  I was devastated.  I allowed her story of me, so warped, so hurtful, so devastating, to be a part of my story.  I had gotten myself to a psychologist to make sure I would never go back.  I was doing everything on earth to be a superwoman, a supermom, and her letter took me to a very dark place.  Life happened and she had a story totally different from the one I was living.

I was grateful to be in a Women's' Issues year one course in Women's Studies.  I worked hard at building myself up again.  I had to suck it up and deal with her story and mine.  She had decided to take upon herself to tell my story.  How wrong she was.  Apparently she did not know where my strength came from.  I had always believed it was me against the world.  I had a story to tell and it would take me from 1984 to 2005 to tell it.  "Shhhhh:  A Creation Story", published 2006.  I found my voice and told my story as a caveat to every other person's story about me.  My voice set me free of everyone else's stories about me.

I began working very hard to be what I believed of myself...therefore, I could not believe the negative stories others told of me.  I began living my story wholeheartedly.  I rebuked my Evil Inner witch every time she tried to script, direct, and change my story about myself.  Bit by bit, I change my story to a fuller, happier, more spiritual story.  I learned some great lessons along the way.  My story is not static, it is ever-changing, and hopefully, in all the good ways.

Really identify what your own story is about.  Are you listening to other voices that say you are not good enough?  Are you rehashing old stories and forgetting every day is a new chapter in your authentic story?  No 'ifs', 'ands', buts' about it...  every moment is a new line in your story.  Sometimes we have repeated others stories about us for so long we might think we believe them.  The reality is, if we do not tell our own authentic story of who, what, where, where, why we were/are, someone else will gladly tell it for us and it will not be authentic.  Every day there is something new of our authentic story.  Me sharing the story of how a friend devastated me is a past story and I have had my say of it now and I am reminded how my story is a whole lot about bravery, and courage, and woundings and failures, and strengths... great strength.

We are deserving of having our authentic story told of ourselves, even if only to ourselves.  Our stories neither limit nor are limiting.  Our real story of Self is rooted in our soul.  Our authentic story should empower us not bring us down (that bringing down belongs to other voices, not ours).  We have all accomplished things no one would believe if we told them.  They do not need to know.  But, we need to know about our resiliency.  

Our story is not a battle against their voice/my voice.  It is not a contest.  We do not ever compare our story to someone else's story.  We have living proof that our story is one of heroism.  Anchoring our story of positive emotions is key.  We cannot even imagine what our next day, next moment, might add to our story but sitting around wallowing in our mud is not what will make us grow even more into our true story.  There are so many new adventures, new lessons, new opportunities to grow and mature into dignity and grace.  Even remembering our story is empowering, or should be, if we are seeking the right parts of our story as lessons rather than downfalls.  If someone else's story tries niggling into our story, rebuke it.  It does not belong to us.  Our stories have an abundance of how worthy we are to even better things.  

Have patience.  We might have listened to other stories, and other people's stories of us, for so long, that it might take a bit to untangle their ideas from our truths.  Just be consistent in rebuking those stories and eventually those voices will die out in the cheer you give yourself for surviving in spite of it all. When negative self-talk arises, squelch it with a remembering of what hard situations you got through that might echo refrains those other voices clung to.  Smile and be so proud because you outgrew their story of you.  You know the truth of it all.

We all know what denigrating a child can do to a child.  Well, we do spend a great deal of time denigrating our inner child/ our own soul.  We might act all Bravado and that, we know is a cover up.  Sometimes we were not meant to be brave.  Sometimes we were meant to learn an important lesson.  Bravo is not self-pride.  

Yes there are injustices in life.  Yes, there is negative feedback.  Yes, we are bombarded with not being enough in every area of life.  Yes, we have gotten, and will always get, frustrated and stressed, and angry, and sad, and irritated as heck.  Yes, we might have been people-pleasers all our lives because we were vulnerable at an early age.  Yes, people will judge us and condemn us, but that is their story and says much about them and not a jot about us.  Our negative beliefs in Self belong to other people. 

Watch out for those interpreters of our story.  Watch out for injections of other's voices.  Change your belief system about Self into your own story, not others.  Correct others as you wish, but who you need to correct most is yourself (your Ego/ Evil Inner Witch/Lizard Brain).  Go be exactly as you are.  Keep at it until you drown out others' voices.  Somebody may need to be forgiven.  That somebody might be Self.  

Embrace the things that are not ordinary in you.  Find those unique remarkable things about you.  Live a better story every day so that there are no excuses, no negatives, nothing but pure soul-living in this hard life down here.  Forgive yourself.  Tell your story in some way, every day.  Drown out the other storytellers.  xoxoxo

©Carol Desjarlais 5.14.19