Who I Am

This morning I woke up restless, disturbed, the remnants of a dream that had me arguing with someone. There, I had been told that I had shared my opinions, none very flattering with a well-known Christian leader, who had in turn shared it with the person who was since then berating me with it.

Which I would have accepted and apologised for had it been true; but it wasn’t and since the person who had shared it was a leader of repute, my vehement denials were of no use. After all, how could that person lie?

Truth is, the dream was perhaps but a carrying over of a conversation the night before. There too, the talking point was of a ‘Christian’ leader who had spoken about us, things that were not true. More telling was the fact that this person in question still carried this burden of anger and continued to spill most of that vitriolic hate, even now, after all these years.

I chose at that point not to engage in the conversation, to offer my side of the story if you will. I felt enraged, helpless and yes, disturbed in the attitude displayed by this so called Christian leader.

And so it brings me to this, the last two days of this year, 2016. Like I had mentioned in an earlier post, belonging to a certain school or even a particular denomination does not define who I am. What a person says or thinks of me does NOT define who I am.

Yes the struggle to be accepted, to be loved is ever present. I think it would be foolish to deny that we all feel, want the need to be a part of the fold. In essence we are a community of people and not an isolation of oneness. In the larger framework of the social fabric we call life; we often seek its embrace, perhaps as a validation of who we are.

But still the question remains. Who am I? Rather how must I be in order to show the world who I really am.

I think, I believe, how I live every day and how I choose to react to people, their words, really in essence defines who I am and who I choose to be. And in that, I think I am defined in the way I treat myself, my family and loved ones, my children.

For those who do not know my story and still choose to say hurtful, untrue things, I forgive you.

Sometimes in the things we have chosen not to do, like in this particular case, it has brought about, mirrored even the own faults that have lain in the person’s character and therefore, their reaction has been one of self-defence, self-preservation even; I forgive you.

To myself, when I have chosen to hear the din outside and hated myself in an unending cycle of despair and bleakness, I forgive you.

And as I wait upon the New Year, I choose instead to hear the voice of my father. Judie Pudie, he used to call me. My father was nowhere near perfect but those words of love were, are, enough for me. I hope I have the same voice of love, as my children hear me call their names.

And I choose to hear the voice of my Father, who is perfect. “I have called you by your name; you are Mine…”  ~ Isaiah 43:1

#Who I am

He calls me friend

The One who chose

This, the one

Small, fistful of dirt.

Still others call,

Shout and scream

Yes, she is but

That, the fistful of dirt.

Who am I then?

A glitter, a spark?

A bright, shining star?

Or just this? The handful of dirt?

He calls me precious

Like it’s my name

Even though I am

But this, a fistful of dirt.

The great I am

Knows who I am,

Even this, the fistful of dirt

All that I am, this

And more,

The fistful of dirt.

~ Judith Vaddi