Looking Back

   Looking back through my binder full of old journal entries I found this.  I had in mind that it would be the first page of a book I may never write.  This is the wall I talked about.  I tweaked it a bit to fix some writing and add a couple other things.  I know its a bit heavier than the things I usually post, but I'm practicing that vulnerability I talked about.

   STRENGTH, a word most people view as a compliment, a positive attribute, a rare characteristic that puts them above the rest.  For one reason or another this is a word that many around me have to used to describe me.  When looking from outside I can see how easy it could be to quickly throw the label my way.  No matter what seems to happen in my life, it was a rare occasion to ever see me show any sort of emotional pain.  Even when it had become an expectation to see my father drunk, never would I let on that it was tearing me apart inside.  Only the few that I had allowed to come close would ever see me for who I was, who I am.  They were the chosen ones who were given permission to witness my own personal anguish that I had learned to hide, without effort, from the rest of the world.  Yet, even with my complacent attitude in times of distress I had to ask myself why no one questioned my ability to stay utterly calm when my best friend had given up on life.  Or when my family friend took hers.  What they didn't seem to understand was that to me, the idea of strength has simply been used as a tool, a shield against my own mentality...an escape from myself.  In living with my depressed father, my strength was avoiding the problem in its entirety.  I would pretend to be strong until the time came to go home.  I had somehow managed to convince myself that this was how life was supposed to be; full of battles that are constantly being fought.  Full of reasons to hide.  And with that explanation I created a box to hold my battles and my true emotions.  When my friend tried giving up, I went back to that box in hopes of carrying the burden she could no longer handle.  I have tried to take the burdens of others and put them in this box and carry it on my own shoulders.  Through all of these experiences, it was the box that continued to strengthen, not my ability to truly endure the situation.
    STRONG, a word I have grown to hate, a word that I had chosen to hide behind.  To me, being strong is no strength at all.

And I will end this post with a quote that I can't take credit for.

"Vulnerability is not weakness...it is our most accurate measurement of courage."
-Brené Brown