Fate in change.
What is fate? What is destiny? Is there such thing as set events that we have no control over? I personally am inclined to believe that there are certain things that are going to happen, inasmuch as they are a part of a cause and effect cycle. Despite the predictability of mankind, man is not a stagnant creature and must therefore always be changing and developing, which thereby makes him unpredictable. However, as man does something, he causes a chain of unavoidable situations that will further develop his mind, character, relationships, and behavior. This reactions could be recognized as something similar to fate, without being worthy of the title. Perhaps I had better not attempt to enter into this discussion, because i am not adequately prepared to defend my budding thoughts on the matter.
However, the undeniable fact is that man's reactions to events will develop his life in ways that would not be possible in any other way. Perhaps mankind has merely looked in awe at what circumstances that they have happened to survive, and whilst marveling at their inability to have foreseen this outcome, and used the grandiose word "fate" to articulate their wonder. But again I digress into a conversation that I am not qualified to participate in.
What did Rob Thomas mean in his song, Little Wonders, that was featured in the Disney Film, Meet the Robinson's? "Our lives are made in these small hours, these little wonders, these twists and turns of fate. Time falls away, but these little wonders still remain."
Right now I am caught up in my own "small hours," where I am limited to spending a great deal of my time alone in my small apartment. My time is falling away somehow, but not idly by any means. I feel terribly idle because of my tiring tenure here alone, but I know I am being guided towards something... I can feel that there is something just out of reach that I am being prepared for, but I cannot know what it is. Perhaps I just need to learn more about being patient? But like I said, I don't know what it is.
Through my experience with watching dad suffer through his cancer, I definitely know and understand that our lives are built upon the small moments. I could not be the person that I am today without having had those experiences. Although they possessed some of the loneliest and frightening Gethsemane moments, I am undeniably stronger for having had them.
I am going to be deliberately vague here and start talking about how difficult this small hour is for me right now. It is the middle of the night and I still cannot sleep. I am in a lot of emotional and physical pain right now. There are people out there, both friends and family, who insist that it is undeniably my fault that I am in this pain right now. And who knows, perhaps it could be...but if people knew the whole story, then who would think that a pill would save me from these pains? If the full story was out, who would have the courage or desire to condemn me for being more emotional? They think that it is merely a decision, when it is not. It is caused because of a reaction to a decision that I made several years ago, which has governed my life in ways that I haven't realized until I finally let go of that decision. If you take something emotionally traumatic and brush it aside as though it was entirely your fault and decide that you never wanted to accept it as reality, by focusing too far into the future, then your mind and body will react in ways that you would never dream possible. When my counselor discussed these reactions with me, it was humbling to realize that the very behaviors that I have been condemned, censured, mocked, and ostracized for, were a bodily reaction to a very traumatic series of events that were beyond my capacity to control or understand, which I ignorantly assumed were entirely my fault and have paid dearly for. If people only would be willing to try to understand who I really am, then they would learn about this inconvenient truth and reality that they have unknowingly despised and rejected me for. They would also understand my disdain and fear of taking medications. Perhaps there would be some form of compassion. Perhaps there would be some mercy. Perhaps there would be some healing.
Perhaps.
But I have to be stronger than a wistful "perhaps." I cannot change the viewpoints of other people, particularly those of whom I have specifically been addressing. But "perhaps" these small hours that I have been given will inspire a way for my family's weak understanding and acceptance of who each of us are, to be restored and strengthened. "Perhaps" there will be a healing.
Perhaps.
But maybe at the end of the day I really am the person to blame. Perhaps it is my stubbornness in their predictable stagnancy that is damming them for changing. Or perhaps they are changing and I don't see it. But perhaps I cannot see them changing because we don't see each other or have much to say when we do. But this whole paragraph is unlikely because it is only a worst case scenario. Instead, I believe the that most truthful statement in this paragraph is this: because I haven't opened them up to the information about why I react to things the way that I do, they cannot be responsible for reacting in their uninformed and narrow scopes.
So why is it that I am venting right now? Honestly, probably because I haven't had the courage to put any of this information out in writing before. I have not had the courage to acknowledge what the real problem has been. And that is why it is the middle of the night and I cannot sleep. I am scared because I finally have admitted to myself about how much I have been hurt, and the pain of truth and remembrance rivals the pain in my body. I can no longer escape the haunting memories of past small hours. I cannot escape from myself anymore without becoming terribly sick.
At least writing it out tonight has made it slightly less intimidating and lonely to be here with myself when the rest of the world is sleeping. Maybe now I will have the courage to turn the lights out and succumb to my mind through sleep. Maybe I wont be haunted tonight by the shadows and footsteps of my past. Maybe.
"Perhaps."
In Mutatione Fatum
