Let It Fall

The past couple of days have been kind of rough, emotionally. I’m not normally this much of an emotional wreck, but ever since Friday I’ve just been in shambles.

I couldn’t sleep Friday night. I decided to watch a movie to try and get that melatonin kickin’, but that didn’t help at all and I found myself wide awake at 3:28am. I laid in bed for a while, tossing and turning. I mulled over ridiculous thoughts in my mind. After what seemed like forever, which was really just about ten minutes, I decided that I wasn’t actually going to get any sleep that night (which would have been completely true had I kept tossing) and that I wanted to go see the sunrise. So, at 4am I left school and stopped off at the 7-11 at the corner (how convenient to have one of these now!) for a cup of coffee and an apple and then headed out to Daytona. I didn’t really plan out what I was doing – I just started driving. I needed to drive. I needed to get as far away from school as I could, and I couldn’t exactly drive to the FL/GA line (I have some boundaries, eh?), so Daytona seemed as good a place as any.

Well, when I got there I realized I’d still have about an hour and a half of down time before the sun actually rose.

So then I headed down to Melbourne.

The drive definitely got me thinking – about so many things. Mostly about the choices I’ve made that have brought me to this point of no sleep and emotional wreckage and blaaah.

It wasn’t the most magnificent sunrise. As a matter of fact, I missed the moment that the sun actually makes its first appearance above the curvature of the earth. I missed that first breathtaking moment, and I was kind of sad about that. But then I saw this — the sun breaking through the clouds, proclaiming new mercies over this brand new day.

I stood on that beach for a good twenty minutes, just watching. The tide was coming in and the waves were crashing against the sand wall and spraying me with a little bit of salt and foam, but I stood there. And, shockingly enough, I cried a little.

There’s an interesting story behind why I cried, but the gist of it is that I was remembering a promise that the Lord gave me a few years ago. He told me that His plans for me were bigger than the ocean was deep. How’s that for a promise? The King of the universe, the Creator of the stars and the molecules the help form my body, the Father of the Risen Son — He promised me that. I think about it and I cry every time. I’m not even embarrassed to admit that tears are in my eyes right this moment.

To make a long story short, the weekend was just a progression of the Lord working on my heart. From a friend telling me to stop letting my past dictate my life, to seeing a post on Facebook that was EXACTLY what she said pretty much WORD FOR WORD by someone COMPLETELY unrelated, and then ultimately breaking open my life history on another friend.

There’s a song by Sean Watkins that keeps playing in my head on repeat. I can’t help it – and what’s worse is that it came on randomly on my playlist tonight as I was continuing to mull over this week’s (weekend’s?) incidences. It’s called Let It Fall. I will be posting the lyrics in a few short seconds, don’t worry.

But the song, the words bring me back to this whole thing that’s been going on recently. This idea that I need to just let go of some things, this idea that I can just get over things. It’s a bunch of nonsense to me. I need a formula for these things — I like having control. Too much. I’ve become one of those people who need to know the “how” as well as the “why” to something, and there is no formula for the “how” of letting things go.

Slowly but surely I’ve been realizing that there is a little bit of a “how.” Nothing sure-fire, nothing set in stone, nothing extremely unattainable and neither is it too easy. As a matter of fact, it’s pretty freaking difficult. I’ve been realizing that to come to a point of healing, there has to be a certain level of vulnerability. For so long I’ve known of this odd concept, of being vulnerable and not letting shame dictate a life. But I’ve rarely ever seen it actually played out, so to know how to be vulnerable is rather difficult. HOW? I need to know the HOW? Because just knowing OF it is not helping me.

While I contemplate HOW to be vulnerable and share my life, truly, deeply with people (certain people, not the whole world), I leave you with the lyrics to Let It Fall. I’m not completely there, but my recent stint of somewhat vulnerability is making me feel, like the very first line of the song, not weighed down.

 
Hey look, I’m not weighed down
As I walk through
The glowing wheat fields churning on the ground
As all the ravens fly away
They leave nothing
But the sun and endless blue day

I always knew I felt this way
But couldn’t find the time to say
To myself I’ve got to let it go
Through all the joy and all the pain
With the drought and the rain
The honest truth is all I want to know

Let it fall
Let go

My kingdom’s walls have fallen down
But I know that
I don’t wear an undeserved crown
And though it seemed to fit me well
Underneath it
I would certainly fall down

Last summer we left things unsaid
That should be now a long time dead
And now it seems that time has put it well
The words can chase away a friend
But to a lie they’ll bring an end
And throw it down the darkest, deepest well

Let it fall
Let go

Let it fall
Let go

Let it fall
Let go

Let it fall
Let go