The Parables of Youth
The Parables of Youth
I find it quite strange the snare of society's grip. But I believe what I believe and I'm pretty sure I know who God is. I'll start with this:
"And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites. For they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by men. Truly I tell you, they already have their reward. 6But when you pray, go into your inner room, shut your door, and pray to your Father, who is unseen. And your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you."
[Mathew 6:5]
I've always believed that prayer was a private thing. Done in quiet; sacred. An intimate moment of tossing your angst, your dreams. How can you pray in all honesty with the words you say if they're dressed up for an audience? How does one ask repentance from their darkest sins if said out loud where the world can judge it?
On the Nature of belief
Why is it that people think someone must go to a church to seek? Does it make a man anymore in love if he crawls to the top of a roof, calls loud for the ears of some crowd, and then proclaims it?
Words can be faked, rearranged. The beauty and the horror of language is that there is so much more to it.
It's kind of like when you fall in love and you actually know what love is.
My life has it seemes, been a long rocking stride of shaking peace amidst chaos trying to define what life truly means.
The greatest they say; that all work starts in the self. In the first step towards realizing my own true inner peace and strength was the day I said outloud: "I forgive myself".
I gave myself right to something I had never said, either aloud or in my head.
I am not a pasture girl by any means. But I have walked the often untold story of the true trenches of poverty. I do not hail from some far off country. I was born and bred within American means. So do not think this is just me- trying to shove off my beliefs.
I am a girl that has been tough. I have walked with men, I have fought them, and I have loved a son so much that I fell into what can only be described as a mother's despair.
I held my glorious son Bronson Joshua Meadows Jr, and I clung to him whispering all tales of disbelief. I hoped that somehow his heart would start to beat.
That was the day I felt life sucked away from me. It came back the day I realized I gave my son to God and not a grave. It took me five years to render myself to grace, to forgive the mother in me that could not save.
The thing that escapes those who have not walked or truly seen what is it like to be a child that sees would be rendered in disbelief. It is not a story of vacations and smiling. It's more a dictionary, an encyclopedia of the death of dreams.. To see a mother beat or hear her screams atop the stairs only wishing there was something to do besides think.
I have seen flipped tables my mother on the floor surrounded by broken glass of the things she adored.
I come from a father with blazen eyes that loved his children deeply but every one of his queens he saw lies. I have few memories very few as a child of quick moments and a glimpse of his curly hair, his smile- the rest I wish not to think of and let exist.
I grew up with a sister that could not speak or hear me. Many nights I stared out my window wondering why she would never hear a bird sing. We went church to see her healed and that was when I decided I didn't like churches and I was angry because she was sick- but I believed.
In Gracelyn, I have seen what truth and strength mean purely. I have watched her stumble and walk with aid just to play. And I have seen her grow to run alone and need no aides but her spirit to guide her way. She has the most beautiful eyes I have ever seen. You would never know they were backed by immeasurable strength given by love of a mother who never pardoned herself with disbelief… she always believed.
I have held friends only in conservation while they poured the domestic ill they lived. I have seen bruises and I have stopped fights. I have grabbed children so that their eyes may hide.
I have seen what ill drugs do.
Just the worse I have seen how unchecked anger becomes rage, how it takes no mind of time, audience, or space.
In life however all the situations that had just seemed to breed led to an extremely broken Jessica for a very long time underneath. I will say I believe as possible consequence of the eyes seeing such horrendous things I often lived in my mind led only by a form of idling. Because as the world went on around me I thought often of the nature of people and things. Thirst is what I call it, for understanding. I have gotten tired a few times and tossed my cup. I have also though felt and seen it filled up.
Many people may think my ideas are silly. And to them I will simply say, you have not seen my pain. You have not walked my tattered shoes or lived in my heart that's clutched onto imagination from my youth.
As a woman I believe I have very important dreams. For every girl who is stifled and does not believe in her own inner queen. The truth of a female is that she is a legacy. For my fellow mothers who seek so often to discover- how do I raise them better than me?
Truly for every and any human also in search of meaning, may we come together and discuss. So that each of us may walk away with a piece to the puzzle, of what may lead us; and of secrets to life so we can walk towards a better future and not continue to divide.
Religion should not separate us. Do not all the religions believe in God? A supreme creator?
I believe that all alive have at most a nature of beliefs, what they think this life is and what it means.
In this time of dominant technology and bright lit screens I think more now than ever we have become confused it seems.
I believe regular disconnecting and taking time to think- and to read is what guides us towards the power and knowledge of changing things.
What if we began connecting solely in the exploration of searching for and formulating peace?
What type of conversations could we have?
-About anything important really.
What could we do, what could we change?
-Well that's like comparing a mind of a million to a mind of eight.
Until we stop fighting the mirror though we will not know the true nature of our brothers or respect the souls that long to glow. People have become so wrapped up in skin that we're forgetting the bigger picture. What's in.
When we trim ourselves I believe we cut ourselves off from divinity because we have flailing arms that know not where to reach. So then we do so often improperly.
I am not a dictionary, judge, expert, or claim by any means to be a priest or aspire to be.
I just have a dream of what the world could be. If people would give me just a few moments and allow my voice to speak. I think you would believe when I say I have spent almost the entirety of my life thinking of all different things.
Led not by need of some great power or desire to control, but to simply escape pain. To understand life because I needed to believe in love again. I have desired only to ever control myself so that I may turn my own page. To find and know a way to live and be truly- truly happy again.
To raise kids in this world who lack not in education or opportunity. My dream is to have children who do not need to harbor my strength. Whose hearts are rendered right so they give no home to rage.
I am only a curious girl who believes. A woman that does not escape desire's reach. I love people and only want to see the betterment of our society. That starts I believe, in giving a soft voice to the weary and trying, for those who are lost to shine a light, so that they may find a way to heal and get back what life has seemed to take.
Too often I believe we find ourselves lost in all of this trimming that we forget we too, are human underneath. We may yield them; but we are not machines.
If you are my brother and I toss you pain, then I beget myself the same.
Precept X,
Eileen Nadine.
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