I must write about all of these fabulous things because I won't be able to sleep until I have written some of this. I have spent a very very long time in much prayer about Freedom, Freedom from Fear, Freedom from Guilt, Freedom to be ME.Like a really long time. Years. The past few weeks God has been working on my life in some very amazing ways. Some of the ways I don't realize until I apply hindsight, but when I do see it, I think it's just amazing. He's been taking me through realizing that who I am is acceptable, and that I can stop trying to emulate different versions of what must be proper.
See, ages 1 - 14 was alot of chaos and abuse and confusion. 14 - 15 was some what more structured and 16- 17 was more structured, plus I had a couple who really taught me alot of good things, worked with me on the aspergers, like how to greet people when going into a room, and how to be polite and cordial. There was alot of counseling and groups to teach me proper behaviour and coping skills as well. But I don't think 2 years was long enough to learn everything I need to know and so therefore alot of failures have taken place. Fast forward to 28, and my inability to figure out the HOWs and WHATs has left me pretty dispondent.
I've been praying for a long time for various things, most of them involve God please help me figure this out, please help me not to mess up this time, please help me to remember how to talk to people, please me to do things right, as well as expressing frustration and how He created me.But lately God has been showing me that I am OK. I'm trying not to be too repetitive of my previous blogs, and I am hoping that what I have written so far will suffice for those who have not read the other ones.See Dori, the reason I can't BREATHE is because I have been for the past 10 years trying VERY VERY hard to get things RIGHT. I spend all of my time every day trying to figure out WHAT I should filter and what is ok. I have NEVER been able to figure it out, so I basically am just worried all the time, and I generally don't figure out what things I have messed up at until AFTER I've messed them up and offended someone or something, and then I feel like an even bigger failure because I was trying so friggin hard, why couldn't I GET IT? Does that make sense?
Lately things have been to where I can begin to breathe a bit at my job bc they seem to accept my oddities and I feel I can relax more there. It's the first time I've ever had a job like THAT. Which I believe brought me to the place where I began to decide that maybe the way I was created was NOT a bad thing. Maybe it wasn't a fluke, maybe my brain is not flawed, but DESIGNED. And this gives me the freedom to do what he has called me to do, which is to write. TONIGHT was just BEAUTIFUL. DORI, I felt safe, relaxed, ok, acceptable. It was the first glimpse at life without WORRYING. Yes , I would like to breathe. I think I will begin doing this. I think the hyper focus mode has been on worrying about doing things right and being unable to figure out how. To be able to walk through my day with PEACE and JOY, this is a wonderful and beautiful idea.
To not worry about doing things wrong.
To not worry about offending people.
To not worry about how to make it so that I never never again have to hear someone say "I just don't know how to deal with you" or "I can't do this anymore" or any variation of that statements that basically reinforce everything I have previously believed about not being an acceptable human being.
Words are substance to me. It kills me. And God is so beautiful in the way He spoke to me, there was one guy at the group who started talking about how "words have surrounded you and become a chain around you" Well that was basically prophetic of where I live. I have a whole list of words people have spoken to me that play over and over and I try to form ways of how to not cause those things to happen ever again, to not make people feel this way, and I JUST CAN'T. And the words really have been a hook in my heart, because I never seem to LEARN. I guess that part frustrates me, but God brought alot of healing words to me tonight, through the people who spoke. They were liberating words that I can carry with me, that will hopefully resonate louder then the hurtful ones. Dori, I am glad God has placed you and your family in my life. And I am glad for all of the really amazing ways that He is bringing freedom and understanding to my life, and the whole joy and peace thing? I dig it. I think I can sleep now.
Tuesday, June 23, 2009
Monday, June 22, 2009
It's more than enough :)
2 Corinthians 12:1 "I must go on boasting. Although there is nothing to be gained, I will go on to visions and revelations from the Lord."
God is so wonderful, in the midst of my thoughts and ponderings this evening, it hit me. Isn't the Holy Spirit so cool like that sometimes? I know the scripture, I just forget to apply it sometimes. It is a good thing I have one who is always interceding for me!!
2 Corinthians 12:7-10 "To keep me from becoming conceited because of these surpassingly great revelations, there was given me a thorn in my flesh, a messenger of Satan, to torment me. Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me. But he said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness." Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ's power may rest on me. That is why, for Christ's sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong."
It's brilliant, really. Let me not forget that it is not ME who gave me these talents, and PRAISE GOD for these shortcomings and difficulties, I can be genuinely GREATFUL for the way He has made me, may God receive all honor and glory and praise for this temple He has given me to reside in! Isn't it beautiful, that He actually DELIGHTS in my weaknesses, and even better, that His power can be more greatly portrayed through us as a result? I think this concept is just beyond awesome. I am so in love.
God is so wonderful, in the midst of my thoughts and ponderings this evening, it hit me. Isn't the Holy Spirit so cool like that sometimes? I know the scripture, I just forget to apply it sometimes. It is a good thing I have one who is always interceding for me!!
2 Corinthians 12:7-10 "To keep me from becoming conceited because of these surpassingly great revelations, there was given me a thorn in my flesh, a messenger of Satan, to torment me. Three times I pleaded with the Lord to take it away from me. But he said to me, "My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness." Therefore I will boast all the more gladly about my weaknesses, so that Christ's power may rest on me. That is why, for Christ's sake, I delight in weaknesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions, in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am strong."
It's brilliant, really. Let me not forget that it is not ME who gave me these talents, and PRAISE GOD for these shortcomings and difficulties, I can be genuinely GREATFUL for the way He has made me, may God receive all honor and glory and praise for this temple He has given me to reside in! Isn't it beautiful, that He actually DELIGHTS in my weaknesses, and even better, that His power can be more greatly portrayed through us as a result? I think this concept is just beyond awesome. I am so in love.
Sunday, June 21, 2009
This is how I was Created.
A little over a month ago I came across a website called "Wrong Planet" which pushes the idea that autism is not something to be cured, it is something to be accepted. The autism IS the person, and that person needs to be embraced, not cured. They propose that to take away the autism would be to take away the person. At first I thought "wow, what a concept... the idea that who I am is OK." I have been fighting against every aspect of myself for as long as I can remember. I have NEVER felt that I am an ok person, that I am acceptable and worthy of embrace. I have instead embraced the idea that I am not ok, not acceptable as I am, and spent a very long time fully convinced that people who show any kindness to me are doing me a favor, and should be thanked. I don't really remember if I've ever felt like a person was befriending me bc they actually enjoyed my company. Maybe to believe that now would still be a fallacy, maybe people are just "ministering" to me. But until I read that website, there was no alternative in my thinking.
After I read it, though, I decided, yes. This is the way I would like to live. I would like to be fully accepted, quirks and all. I would like to stop playing roles, forcing expressions, participating in menial tasks that make me feel foolish, I would like to be me and for that to be ok. I have been frustrated with God for a very long time for creating me this way, and I have told him so. I told him I didn't understand why he made me to be such a failure. Why he put me amongst a species that is 55% gesture,37% tone, and only 8% language, but made me 99% language and expected me to function amongst them successfully. He has been showing me that He did NOT create me to be a failure. He created me for a purpose, and a good purpose that will bring glory to Him, and what could be better than that? I don't know why he made me autistic, but maybe that man made label that gives my entire person hood some kind of negative connotation should not be so. I *like* that he created me with a visual memory such that I learned to read music very young, and I can play 3 different instruments, I can remember almost anything I read, ( I used to have a perfect photographic memory until some rly bad seizures set me back a little.) I *like* the ability he has given me to create art with music and digital animation. I like that he has created me with the ability to WRITE, and use it to his glory. I like the view He has given me on his planet, and although I can be a bit hypersensitive, I would not trade this. The scary things may hit hard, but the beauty every where is just as equally wonderful.. I would not ever want to dull down my senses and experience less of his creation, I could go on and on about this topic but I don't want to stray too far from my purpose in writing this. It is for these things I give him glory and praise him for creating me this way.
It is harder to give glory to God though, for the difficulties autism puts on my ability to interact with other people. God commands me to be in fellowship with other believers. It is hard to feel in fellowship with a group of people, though, when I am say, sitting in a room with them andthey are all laughing at something someone said, and I understand everything, the definitions of all the words that the person spoke, I just don't understand why that is FUNNY, and I know that it's this literal brain God has given me, and THAT can really make you feel alone in a crowd, as well as completely lost and disconnected, stuck rehashing what they said and trying to "get it", and in the mean time, the conversation moves on..... and in my head I think, "How do I interject? What can I say to be involved in this conversation and not feel like a third wheel?"
Not to say I am ALWAYS this worried about it, I have days where I am secure enough in myself that it doesn't bother me when I don't get the jokes, or that I don't know what to say, and I am content to just listen to people talk with each other, and observe their interactions without feeling lost and disconnected. I suppose that its just the recent self evaluation and attempts at changing the light on how I view my self, that has me holding a magnifying glass to all my behaviours and obsessing over them. Maybe once I get a little of this out of my system, and find a healthy balance in my life for the ideas presented on wrongplanet, I can go back to my little perch on the highwire observing and learning, and that being the vantage point that I am once again content with.
After I read it, though, I decided, yes. This is the way I would like to live. I would like to be fully accepted, quirks and all. I would like to stop playing roles, forcing expressions, participating in menial tasks that make me feel foolish, I would like to be me and for that to be ok. I have been frustrated with God for a very long time for creating me this way, and I have told him so. I told him I didn't understand why he made me to be such a failure. Why he put me amongst a species that is 55% gesture,37% tone, and only 8% language, but made me 99% language and expected me to function amongst them successfully. He has been showing me that He did NOT create me to be a failure. He created me for a purpose, and a good purpose that will bring glory to Him, and what could be better than that? I don't know why he made me autistic, but maybe that man made label that gives my entire person hood some kind of negative connotation should not be so. I *like* that he created me with a visual memory such that I learned to read music very young, and I can play 3 different instruments, I can remember almost anything I read, ( I used to have a perfect photographic memory until some rly bad seizures set me back a little.) I *like* the ability he has given me to create art with music and digital animation. I like that he has created me with the ability to WRITE, and use it to his glory. I like the view He has given me on his planet, and although I can be a bit hypersensitive, I would not trade this. The scary things may hit hard, but the beauty every where is just as equally wonderful.. I would not ever want to dull down my senses and experience less of his creation, I could go on and on about this topic but I don't want to stray too far from my purpose in writing this. It is for these things I give him glory and praise him for creating me this way.
It is harder to give glory to God though, for the difficulties autism puts on my ability to interact with other people. God commands me to be in fellowship with other believers. It is hard to feel in fellowship with a group of people, though, when I am say, sitting in a room with them andthey are all laughing at something someone said, and I understand everything, the definitions of all the words that the person spoke, I just don't understand why that is FUNNY, and I know that it's this literal brain God has given me, and THAT can really make you feel alone in a crowd, as well as completely lost and disconnected, stuck rehashing what they said and trying to "get it", and in the mean time, the conversation moves on..... and in my head I think, "How do I interject? What can I say to be involved in this conversation and not feel like a third wheel?"
Not to say I am ALWAYS this worried about it, I have days where I am secure enough in myself that it doesn't bother me when I don't get the jokes, or that I don't know what to say, and I am content to just listen to people talk with each other, and observe their interactions without feeling lost and disconnected. I suppose that its just the recent self evaluation and attempts at changing the light on how I view my self, that has me holding a magnifying glass to all my behaviours and obsessing over them. Maybe once I get a little of this out of my system, and find a healthy balance in my life for the ideas presented on wrongplanet, I can go back to my little perch on the highwire observing and learning, and that being the vantage point that I am once again content with.
Tuesday, June 16, 2009
Current analysis report.
The truth is...
I was sent from outer space
To observe the human race
And find another happy place
I wish to co exist
I wish to assimilate
But I cannot understand your face
The language, I comprehend
Maybe even better then you
The art, I appreciate
In this I can participate
The emotions, well they overwhelm
Because I cannot understand the face.
It wrinkles and wriggles
The mouth turns up
The mouth turns down
The eyes change shape, sometimes even leak
It is a mystery requiring further analysis
I was sent from outer space
To observe the human race
And find another happy place
I wish to co exist
I wish to assimilate
But I cannot understand your face
The language, I comprehend
Maybe even better then you
The art, I appreciate
In this I can participate
The emotions, well they overwhelm
Because I cannot understand the face.
It wrinkles and wriggles
The mouth turns up
The mouth turns down
The eyes change shape, sometimes even leak
It is a mystery requiring further analysis
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