Tug O' War

It's another snow day for me, today.  The sun is shining, this morning, and the birds are chirping.  As crazy as it probably sounds, I'm sitting out on my patio with my coffee and iPad listening to the sounds and taking in the crisp beauty of the sun reflecting off of the snow.  Yeah, it's cold, but it's also breathtakingly beautiful.

It's moments like these that don't happen very often.  Like time has stopped, and there's nothing to do but breath in deeply all the good and exhale all the worries and the bad.  No matter what the day brings, nothing can replace this moment.  This reflection time. The time I can release and replenish everything inside of me so that I can take on whatever I need to take on.

Yesterday, I spent the day in a game of tug of war.  One side of me was being pulled by my brain, and the other being pulled by my heart.  And each side was pulling for dear life, trying to win, trying to claim victory.  But, instead, I stood in a deadlock feeling like my limbs would be torn completely in two.  

My brain kept taunting my heart, telling it to let go, free myself, understand what the brain knows and what the heart doesn't see.  My heart was taunting right back trying to explain to the brain that the heart is where the power lies, where the real decisions are made, and that it will come out victorious in the end.  All the while, I could feel myself being flopped back from one side to the next, wondering what on earth was going on, and which side would eventually pull me to their side.

Neither did.

I still sit here, completely divided, yet the pulling has finally stopped.  

Matters of the mind and matters of the heart are both very powerful forces.  When they work together, there is a power within that drives me to succeed and overcome the hardest of obstacles.  But, when they are on opposing sides, I end up in a daze, a state of confusion, and I feel like I've been on a Tilt a Whirl that lasted for hours.  

Don't worry, this isn't me going back in to one of those sad, depressive states.  I'm far past that.  This is more about making the right decisions for the future.  Understanding what's best for me and my kids.  Deciding which road to take as I continue moving forward.  To I bring baggage along with me or do I leave it behind?

I have committed myself to take on a challenge that is probably the biggest challenge of my life.  To do something that many people have told me is impossible to do.  And this is the battle being fought out by my head and my heart.  

My head sides with those that have told me my task is impossible.  It won't be conquered.  I just won't win.  It's better to walk away.  My brain says that I'm a door mat being walked all over, used, and betrayed.  My brain has laid out good evidence.  The information I've received this week should be enough to make me not just walk away, but run away as fast as I can.  My brain says I'm blind to the obvious, and that I'm leading myself down a path that will eventually lead to a dead end.

My heart is siding with those that have told me I have the power to accomplish this almost impossible task.  That I am the one person that can actually see it through and do what nobody else has ever been able to do before.  My heart says I am not a door mat, but a refuge.  The safe place.  My tasks and tests are all apart of the challenge, and that as long as I follow my heart, I will come out victorious. My heart counter attacks my brain's evidence by replaying moments and conversations in my head.  It points out that no matter how many times I've been knocked down, the same hand was there to pick me up.  That the cryptic clues I've been fed this week are apart of the hope that fills my heart and has empowered me to keep on moving.  And my heart says I'm not headed for a dead end.  Is the road forward a rocky path?  Yes.  But, it eventually leads somewhere.

Monday night, I received some news that hurt.  Not gonna lie.  It hurt bad.  But, the information I got after made the sting go away a little.  I was being given the information not to hurt me, but to prepare me.  To empower me, really.  To know what I was up against, what was going on, and so that I could understand some of the worries I was having.  That's the stuff my brain is using to tell me to run.  That's the information my brain needed to use against me and confuse me.

But, the information I got after the bad stuff is what my heart was holding on to.  Because after the bad was given, it was followed up with the good. I am one of the very few people that matter.  There are others being made to believe that they matter, but they don't.  They are just distractions.  They are just there to help pass the time.  I was being given the truth because it was important for me to have all of the information.  And the truth is only important to me, because I got the real motives behind it, I got the real story, and I got to understand why I was being told what I really didn't want to hear.  

I matter.

How I feel is important.  How I take the information is important.  How I move forward with the information is important.  How I react and understand is important.

With this information, I was made to feel like I was the final destination on a long, hard road.  There are stops that will be made along the way, the distractions, but I am the one that will be where it all ends.  I am not competing with the distractions, but just have to accept and understand their purpose.  And, in a weird way, I do.   

I just have to make the decision to stick with it, or walk away.  I'm either in it for the long haul, or I'm not.  

I have never been one to walk away from a challenge.  I have never been a quitter.  And being given the information I got has left me a little torn, but also more motivated.

Can I do what some say to be impossible?  

I guess we shall see.

Have a wonderful day, everyone!