Is spring really coming?

When I was a teen, I remember feeling so lost and alone, and while I believed in a God who loved me I often imagined him watching me as I floundered and struggled to breathe under a sheet of ice in the frozen river that represented my life. I felt as though I were going to suffocate and die and I couldn’t understand why he sat there watching and waiting to see if I could indeed survive for a few more minutes. In time I came to realize that he wasnt sitting back watching me struggle, but he was drawing as close to me as he can to be there with me through my struggles. He isn’t laughing at my pain but crying with me through it. I saw this picture on another blog. It was full of beautiful winter photo’s but this one above all others spoke to me. (You can see them all at http://thelonelywalkers.wordpress.com/2012/02/22/winter-enchantment/ 

Anyway, that tree grown up there all alone at the water’s edge, barren of leaves and looking lifeless, feels like me. I know there is hope for me. I know that when spring comes out, my branches will burst with new life, the ice will melt and I will feel warmth, and comfort, and newness surrounding me. I know all of this and yet it doesn’t help the lonely ache that fills my soul and leaves me feeling lost and alone. This week has been hard, hopes have died, I have found that I am not who I once thought I was. I can’t seem to see a way ahead and the hill I am climbing seems too tall to ever reach the top. I wish there were words that I could tell myself to make it better, to help me to feel more at peace, and to lessen the pain of the self-betrayal that I feel. I found this clip. Its inspiring. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vIrGKB5nRKE&feature=relmfu

My brain knows all the right answers. I know I will go on, I know it will get better, I know I will laugh again and that life holds promise, I know I have to just keep going and keep a stiff upper lip so to speak. I know, I know, I know.

But it hurts.

And knowing won’t take the hurt away.