The space between where you are and where you want to be can be the most nerve wrecking or exciting period you can experience depending on what angle you’re viewing it from. As for me, I hate those periods. I know for someone like me, who looks like I probably have my life together to an extent (which just so you know, the way life has been dragging me by my wig, it’s far from it), I’d give some motivational speech about that period. Yes the spiritual part of me would look at it like a transition and be prepared for it but let’s be human here for a not-so-hot minute. I hate not knowing what to expect. I hate not having things go as planned. It puts me off balance in an insecure way. You see, I like to have a “handle” on things because it makes me feel secure and prepared.
That empty space where all you’re doing is waiting, praying and hoping that the 50/50 % chance falls in your favor is plain agonizing. Now I’m going to be real honest (more honest than I would love to be but we know how we do on here); there was a period in my life where if expectations where drugs, I would have died of an overdose. I had this big picture of what my final days in University would be like. I would graduate with the love of my life (let’s just pause to give that a hard laugh because I played myself), I would graduate with my degree of choice; I would still feel the same way about my friends and my outlook on life would just be rainbows, sunshine and pizza. Now towards the end of my final year, everything came crashing down. The protective walls I had built around myself and my emotions were beginning to crack open and in that moment, I had never been so confused and scared of what the outcome would be. Already, the image people had of me that although I hated but had become used to was in jeopardy. I mean who will I be now? How am I going to act when everything comes down and I’m exposed for all to see? The thing is, that image people created of me had become so comfortable that I would give pieces of myself to cover the cracked walls if it ever became loose because it was all I had. It was my idea of what I could ever have, I needed to save it. But with the way things were looking, I had no control, I was numb and I was left to watch and see. I became a by-passer in my own life.
Academically, I didn’t get what I wanted, the relationship at the time had become a hellish roller coaster, I couldn’t trust my friends anymore and everyone was finally going to see the real me and all I was giving up to protect an image that wasn’t even real. It was in those days I valued the moments where I could be very honest with people about who I was; those moments where gold. But no sooner than later, it would be time for me to get into character. So now all my variables had become ineffective and the only constant thing was the image of me I had in my head hanging so tight to the rope of who I was and promising myself that I wasn’t going to let go. I mean if the walls were going to crash then let it all fall down. I was exhausted and if I had let that rope go, I would be totally gone. I was not going to give up no matter how much mess and self-sabotaging things I had done to myself and to the people around me. And after the dust settled, the big question was “what now?” I have held on so long and so tight, I have been in one place mentally, driving myself crazy of what the outcome would now be since all my plans had failed.
Guess what, I still graduated, I still had friends who came to support me as I did them. My family members were still proud of me, I had come into the revelation of knowing how much God loved me and who I was because of Him. I learned to love myself better and receive love in a way that was fitting for me. I realized that I could hate the “space between” all I wanted but that will always remain the beauty of life. Sometimes not knowing everything will give room to create new things that you can know. I wish I made use of that opportunity to unlearn and re-learn about myself and the plans I made because obviously they failed. You may lose sight of the plans you had but never lose sight of the lessons you can learn. I’m still learning to love that space and I encourage you to do the same. That space is life’s blank cheque. You literally get to redo and undo because although you know nothing about the current space you’re in, you still know the space you would love to be in. Spend time creating and re-creating that space; you deserve it and no “space between” or uncertainty should take that away from you.
So beautiful, honest & real! Keep sharing, keep being honest. You’re doing amazing!