Learning to deal

Yesterday marked my first day of what some might consider counseling.  And...it was wonderful.  I think I always had this judgement of what counseling was and what is was not.  But after going, I can only now think it helpful.

I went to discuss India.  I had not been debriefed on it and for some reason I don't want to talk about or have anything to do with it.  There's something lying beneath the trip that I haven't quite found yet.

 

But we ended up backtracking to some stuff that happened in October and then in the months that followed but actually never got to India. 

 

I discovered that I have a lot of baggage and there are a lot of emotions that are bubbling at my surface, hence part of the reason I don't want to talk about India. 

 

[Side note]  India was a bad trip (not that God didn't work or didn't do anything amazing, because He did) and there are so many emotions involved there and others that are from the past that I feel like if I talk about India at all I will explode and just vomit these emotions on people that they're not ready for. 

 

So there were some pretty significant things that happened with me in the past six months and they affected me more than I thought they did. 

 

I talked through some people who had hurt and what they had done and some things that people had said to me that hurt and unfair expectations that were put on me and how that was hurting me and how I was responding to them all.  I was basically shoving them down and trying to ignore them, hence, the feeling of erupting in tears anytime things get even a little overwhelming. 

 

My friend and I decided that the best thing for me was to do some emotional journaling and seeking God on a Day Alone With God and then approach these people who had hurt me or were hurting me and talk to them. 

 

I want so badly to have healthy relationships with people and not just "live" but live well!  And all of this emotional baggage has led to unhealthy relationships with others.  I'm more concerned about them and how me talking to them will make them feel rather than how I'm feeling.  I discovered that this is not healthy.  Duh, right?  Yeah, well, it took me a little while.

 

I'm on my way and slowly but surely getting healing from all of this.  And although I haven't been as close to the Lord as I once was (at least in prayer and Bible study), I feel closer to Him in a different way.  In a kind of vulnerable, open and empty way.  It's different and I feel as though this whole ordeal, however long it takes, will lead me closer to God than ever before.  It's just going to take time, which is one thing I have.  So we're taking it slow, which is fine by me.