Friday, January 2, 2009

Becoming a Babe.

I awoke yesterday and I couldn't seem to wipe the crankies out of my eyes. I was harsh with the girls and impatient. I felt the familiar shroud of darkness encompassing me. There was no joy in the thought of a New Year.

I began to give ear to that slithering, accusing voice.
"How can I be happy about a new year?" I thought.
"All I have to reflect upon from this past year are crtiticisms of my mistakes and failures. And here I've gone and started this new day in the new year off the same way I've started so many days in the past. I will never change."
And so the thoughts came and took hold.
My shoulders slumped, my gaze sank.

Sometimes all it takes is spilling the nasty, dark thoughts out into the light. In the past, I would have kept silent my thoughts, not bothered anyone with them. Yesterday I decided to speak.
I confessed to my husband, him who loves me so graciously, that I had no hope for myself and the coming year.
What he spoke to me hit me like lightning. The shroud of darkness dissipated, my eyes were opened. He spoke...

"I realized recently that I can't change myself. I cannot fix myself. It's as if I'm a newborn baby lying there needing my soiled clothes changed. I can't feed myself, I can't even lift up my own head. And I should have known all along."

Maybe his words brought about one of those moments when the Divine touches down and understanding blossoms. An "aha!" moment. The crusties rubbed from my vision. The truth finally makes perfect sense. The truth I thought I knew all along.

Maybe it was made so clear to me because any day now, I will be looking at my first-born son. And it's all coming back to me how helpless these babes truly are. How dependent they are upon us for care and nurturing. They are born with nothing to give and there is nothing they can do on their own but be loved. And, oh, how we love them! We fall in love with them because they came from us. They were created in love and conceived in the fires of passion.

Funny that it has taken me four births to see this truth clearly.
I am loved because I am.
It is nothing I have done or can do.
I suppose I might as well give up trying and doing once and for all, and just be.
Be dependent on the One who fashioned me in my own mother's womb.

Maybe this year I'll learn more from my babe than from anything else.

~christa jean

5 comments:

Youthful One said...

(through tears, I write)

Maybe that is the greatest New Years gift ever.

Thank you so very much for sharing your vulnerability and the wisdom God gifts you.

Angela Nazworth said...

First off, thank you, thank you, thank you for leaving a comment on my Becoming Me blog! Had you not commented, I would have never found your blog. Your heart is beautiful! Thank you for sharing it. I was deeply moved by this post and related so well. Blessings to you in this new year.

Claremont First Ward said...

I can't wait to hear that your little peanut has arrived. You know, this post really spoke to me. It wasn't until my 4th pregnancy that I had the same realization. Happy New Year! May the birth be painfree! :)

Lisa said...

Aren't you glad on days like this that you can just crawl into your Heavenly Fathers lap and just let Him love you a while! There we can be the child He has created us to be! May this be your best year ever!

Claremont First Ward said...

You always inspire me. Happy New Year.