The Unmasked Wildflower

Fun, free, confident, passionate. Look at you. You’ve got it all together. You’ve got it all! Pretty girl. Handsome husband. Beautiful, outgoing, smart, athletic children... Why, Thank you! 

I’ve been working on this mask for about 32 years. I’m so happy you like it!! 

I’ve got a big story. A little girl with a big old story. And a big old story about a little girl. The little girl that lives inside of me and believes a million lies about ‘what happened’. There are moments, hours, and days when it feels to big, too messy...too much. I know my truth but I also know THE TRUTH - the truth of who I am according to God and these two things war relentlessly some days. The war rages and I cast judgement on my pain, my heartache, my story. My mind races with the stories and my character position changes... The story where I am worthless, powerless, fearful, shameful, damaged and hopeless, THEN, the one where I might be wonderful, powerful, fearless, bold, restored, and healed. There is Grace and more grace.  Love and more love. Truth and more truth. I know for sure the devil doesn’t care what story you act out of or how you respond as long as you don’t ever find out and believe who you are and who you were made to be. As long as you don’t find out that God is a loving God. As long as you don’t find out that God didn’t “allow” or “make this happen to you. No matter what story I have acted out of, God was in it. Even the ones fabricated by the lying, vain, dirty, devil himself. God was in the pit that His son took dominion of, ready to hand over the keys to escape. He was strengthening me to endure and wooing me to recharge through Jesus, the source and supply of infinite strength. I am not bad. Something bad happened to me. I do not have a mental illness I have a mental injury. If Jesus can remove a heart of stone and replace it with a heart of flesh He can and will remap and restore a brain injury. I have hope. I’m getting ready. We all have a story. Not sharing it implies it’s only to you, for you, and about you. How narcissistic is that!? Who told you that you should keep quiet? The voiceless need your words. The more that is at stake the more resistance will knife its way in. With steadfastness, proper positioning, and one step at a time, PUSH FORWARD. Psalm 32:8 I will instruct you and teach you in the way you should go; I will counsel you with my loving eye on you. Habakkuk 2:1-3 I will take my stand and keep watch. I will take my place on the tower. And I will keep watch to see what the Lord will say, and how I should answer when He speaks strong words to me. Then the Lord answered me and said, “Write down the special dream on stone so that one may read it in a hurry. For it is not yet time for it to come true. The time is coming in a hurry, and it will come true. If you think it is slow in coming, wait for it. For it will happen and not be delayed We Wear the Mask We wear the mask that grins and lies, It hides our cheeks and shades our eyes,— This debt we pay to human guile; With torn and bleeding hearts we smile, And mouth with myriad subtleties. Why should the world be over-wise, In counting all our tears and sighs? Nay, let them only see us, while        We wear the mask. We smile, but, O great Christ, our cries To thee from tortured souls arise. We sing, but oh the clay is vile Beneath our feet, and long the mile; But let the world dream otherwise,        We wear the mask! By Paul Laurence Dunbar