Sarah Nyhan

What if it had nothing to do with you being a preacher?

What if making money was never the problem?

What if this was all just so that you could learn to actually Love your wife? Instead of just seeing her as a tool? 

And while we’re at it, everyone else.

What if you could have that old lifestyle back as soon as you choose? The enjoyable parts. That it has actually been completely up to you this whole time. 

That the only thing holding you back is how you see and treat your wife? Others. And yourself. 

And while we’re at it, your Father.

That it all stems from how you were treated. By those that could have done a lot better.

That there is no need to stand at a pulpit hour after hour after hour. Week after week. Year after year. 

That you could actually be enjoying yourself. Your retirement years.

Are you even able to tolerate the feeling of being in a relationship where you don’t have any power over someone else? 

Are you even able to tolerate the feeling of being in a relationship where there is no expectation that the other person is there to serve you in any capacity?

You wouldn’t have to go to anymore funerals. No more weddings. 

You could actually get up every morning and do whatever you want. For however long you want.

Without holding anyone hostage. 
Without having to manipulate every situation.

Let go. Let God.

You don’t preach a Loving Father because you won’t let yourself experience One. 

I know. I get it 100%. This is not me daring to foolishly speak because I haven’t Lived it. And am not still in it.

For some it takes exhaustion. And even losing everything. 

You are so lucky. You have squeezed by so long. But it’s all hanging in a precarious balance. You know as well as anyone that you’d be completely lost and everything would fall apart if the people tolerating you walked away. 

Trust me, bro. Sometimes God lets it happen. Absolutely nothing will be spared for our healing. Not even the most sacred. To us at least.

I’m that Ezekiel. That’s my foolishness. But I gotta get it out or I feel sick.

Or maybe not. Maybe for me also. First judged for how I treated others. Then this long and painful spiritual surgical operation to fix how I treat myself. 

Maybe I don’t have to speak words either. Maybe my desert rounds will end when I learn to shut up and focus on treating myself better. Actually trying. Actually getting invested again. 

Actually not giving up. When the temptation is so great to stop participating.

Which God do we actually serve? Did the best part already pass us by? I refuse to believe that’s how God works.

You want to end better than you started? Me too. But I don’t think it’s gonna happen without asking the hard questions. Without doing the work.

Crowns at His feet. For we know we’ve been “dragged”, so to speak, more than we ran to catch up. While at the same time acknowledging that God actually won’t do it without our consent. Which is why it has taken this long.

If it’s not the end then that means there’s still better to be had. Will you give up? Or do the work?

Number one: it’s relationship. Not religion.

You spend too many hours staring at the screens. Doom-scrolling. Just one more hit. A casino for your mind. Maybe one day you’ll win the jackpot.

So you don’t have to face your feelings.

Okay, I’ll be one of the first to confess. Before it becomes cool. Or popular. Here it is: I think I lost the last thirty years of my life to the Internet. And that is fucking sad.

I know too much information.
But I lost all common sense. 

And it’s not just the cell phones. Maybe it started even with books. Then radio. Then television. Anything to keep the feelings away. Anything that will distract. 

Our brains, man. I think they are hard-wired to avoid pain. Even when doing so kills us. Survival is the body’s goal. Not thriving. Seems like.

Growing up is realizing you were chasing a feeling more than you might have been chasing the actual person. Then deciding to maybe now do differently. If happiness and contentment are my responsibility. Versus some miracle Jesus will apparently let me go my whole damn life holding my breath for.

Not that I am complaining now. After going through it. After doing the hard work. Of facing “reality” – whatever that is, anyway. Only as far as I can tell; most likely my perception full of flaws. 

But we only live in our perception. So what other choice do I have? Who has paid the dues to be the judge of people’s perceptions? The people with licenses that I know have as many problems as me.

So we’re back here. Just standing around with our perceptions. And our feelings. And the lack, great big lack of what we want. 

Everyone else’s problem? 
God’s problem? 

Seems like only my problem to fix. By hell or high water. If there’s happiness out there to be had. If there’s real Life. Real Love. 

Gotta actually try. Not just play it safe enough to skate by. Not just the same ol’ tired excuses. 

Gotta admit what is. That for whatever reasons we crossed paths. But I don’t think we are each other’s final destination. Not like things are now. 

I wish we were friends. But you’ve broken my heart too many times for us to ever be lovers. I don’t think I’ll ever trust you again. Not at this point. There are just some lines you don’t cross. You can’t cross. Human respect. Decency. 

You’re playing games. And I never did. I was never on that fuck shit. You still a kid. Still immature. On that bullshit – just sick happiness at getting a reaction outta me. 

You’re gonna miss out on a real one. I’m not done. I’m just getting started. I been working my ass off. If you shit on me at my worst then you don’t deserve me at my best.

That’s the hardest. Seeing your potential but having to say goodbye. Because I can’t keep abandoning myself while waiting around for you to catch up.

Hey, it’s working for you, right? You’re happy, right? You have everything you want, right? I’m just the fool, right? Especially to speak on things, eh?

We’ll see, we’ll see. Time ain’t up yet. Not entirely.

I could give a shit less in terms of competition. I just know the time has already and long since been where I should have said goodbye. And I’ve all but died trying to avoid leaving you behind. 

But you keep on insisting. You are so determined. 

I should give you what you want, right? What your actions keep telling me you want. 

I should save myself. Give myself all I wanted to give you. 

Not as a threat, babe. Just facts. Just cold hard facts. I wouldn’t say this if it wasn’t already done. I wouldn’t dare speak this boldly if you gave me even a shred of any hope to work with. 

This is what people want. They want you to leave them alone. They don’t want to face their toxicity. They don’t want to deal with their fears. They don’t want to admit their regrets. They don’t even see them that way. It’s easier to blame everyone else. Except the real actors in your narrative. 

It’s easier to get mad at the person in front of you than do the real work to dig deep and figure out where it started. Then you’d have to grieve. Then you’d risk looking like me after where I’ve been.

Then you wouldn’t be able to keep up the surface-level relationships that admittedly keep you afloat. Not really knocking you for that. It might be easier on the whole. Certainly there’s company, right? 

I’m not sure I’ve made the better choice. I have to think about that all day every day. Honestly. 

All I know is I’m a real one. I’m a down-ass bitch. 

But I need to finally ride for myself for once. Before I ever ride as hard for all y’all as I did before.

Not out of hate. Just necessity. Look at me. More than obvious.

As bad as people may think it is right now in The United States of America, people in other countries been going through it. Our jails and prisons provide more than their daily life.

This is another reason why the flow of people into this country will never stop. Until there is equality around the world in every way. Otherwise it’s worth risking everything to come here.

And this is karma for the United States of America. We are a world full of humans. If we think we are going to subjugate people in other countries in order to strip them of their resources and/or exploit them for their labor, we are creating this exact situation. Where we are only giving them reasons to come back and take from us. It doesn’t make sense to create this chaos.

Nothing is going to get solved for real until we truly value each other. And until we help each other to come up. So we can at least have the basic needs for survival and human existence.

But keep on thinking anything will get solved doing it your way. I mean you’re going to die. So what do you care about what happens after you, right?

Except what if true karma is your soul getting recycled right back to the most difficult situation you contributed to creating. That would be some shit.

Y’all ain’t living like Jesus really cares and takes everyone seriously.

Is my job to manage everyone else’s perception of me? Is my job to make sure no one is ever unhappy with me?

Or is my job to take care of myself? And take responsibility for my happiness?

I am done saving the world. I am done trying to change anyone’s mind. 

People are going to think what they are going to think. My job is just to be me. 

People don’t love you because you are loveable.
People love you because they are loving.

That is such an important distinction. 

God doesn’t love you because you are loveable. Although you might be very loveable. But ultimately God loves you because God is loving. Love is what God does.

Same with people. You can keep tap-dancing away, but someone is never going to truly fully love you unless loving is who they are.

And people can’t consistently love you if they don’t even love themselves. If they refuse to do the work they need to do to heal from their shit.

I heard a quote the other day that said: “Don’t take criticism from people you wouldn’t take advice from.” That is so on point! I make a god of another person when I outsource what I think of myself based on whether they approve of me or not. And at the end of the day there is no human qualified to judge me. 

In fact I am not even qualified to judge myself. It is my duty to love myself simply because God approves of me and loves me.

It’s insane to extrapolate that I think I am perfect. Not at all! This whole writing business I do is for the express purpose of sharing the lessons I learn along the way as I stumble all over my aim and intentions. 

But are only perfect people loveable? 

There’s an arrogance in that line of thinking. Of hating yourself. Of seeing yourself as somehow exempt from our very real human condition.

My job is to take care of myself. Love myself. And from the excess then I have to give to others. Freely. Happily. 

Then there isn’t manipulation and some agenda underneath interactions. When I am secure inside myself. When I am not relying on others to rescue me.

And for sure many people need rescuing. I spent years in that very valid state. But then times go by. And you just gotta play the cards you’re dealt. If no one came to save you. 

The anger is real. The sadness is real. The grief is real. The exhaustion is real. So why is talking about it a problem?

If I have been victimized then why do you insist that I say otherwise?

I think I get it now though. You remain a victim if you don’t get the help you need to do the work to heal. 

And the people who hurt you are probably not the ones who will help you. Even though the wound and pain would probably heal faster in some cases if so. 

But life as it is, unless you are young and cute enough, you probably are going to get stuck doing the repair job on yourself. 

Fair? Probably not.

But if you want to master what happened to you and go live a life where your identity contains more than what happened to you, then you just gotta decide at some point to do the work. 

To set the boundaries for yourself that they should have had. To take care of yourself the way they should have taken care of you. To validate your thoughts and feelings even though they didn’t well enough. To give yourself permission to enjoy something other than dogged service to others. To take responsibility for your happiness. To give yourself the life you will enjoy. 

Instead of waiting around for the rest of the world to step up and give it to you. 

Sucks. But what’s the alternative?

Virtue signaling. If it’s any help, I realized that a lot of the time people create a big show of giving to others as a means to assuage their own inner conflicts. It’s a way to say they did something without getting their hands too dirty. Without really getting involved.

This used to irritate the shit out of me when a religious group I met with would make a big deal about going to give to the “homeless” one day a year for less then twelve hours. It was insulting in my opinion. 

I could go into that for hours. But I don’t have the time. Just to say someone with less money than you isn’t a tourist attraction on your ego trip. Just because they have less resources than you doesn’t mean you have anymore Jesus than them. The gall and audacity, really.

But anyway, I digress. Just to say if you feel alone in your healing journey isn’t doesn’t mean other people who are getting attention are actually receiving the help they really need. In fact sometimes the crutches they are given hold them back from growing by sparing them the pain that would spur them on to fight for themselves.

I hate that I felt so unsupported for so long. But there is a certain confidence I am proud of that I stood on my own. 

And don’t read that as condemning others for doing what they thought they needed to do to survive. Aside from harming children in the process. 

But if we gotta do the work anyway and eventually then get me to it already. Tired of going around this same damn mountain. This same damn desert.

We go so long that we forget better is possible. That’s the blessing of the discontentment. It reminds us we’re not home yet. In ourselves or our environment. 

I get it – I’m tired too. But I’m more tired of my circumstances than I am tired of the fight to do the work.

It is so difficult to believe in yourself when others around you don’t. It’s so tempting to just go with the flow. But will I be happy?

One of my greatest fears is ending up a miserable resentful old lady. I grew up with two grandmothers like that. God rest their souls – they are deceased now. But in actuality they died long before their physical bodies went into the ground. 

I think they sacrificed their happiness for comfort, security, and stability. They made choices that kept them from doing the really tough work of dealing with the pains they experienced. 

And then they made everyone else pay for it. Day in and day out, sunrise to sunset, the rest of their lives. They stayed holed up in their homes and just festered. Toxic poison spewing regularly from their mouths.

People avoided them. 
People dreaded them.

I refuse to go out like that. Everything in my life has prepared me to meet that similar outcome. But I can’t live like that.

The quest of my life has been to somehow escape the world they created for me to follow exactly in their steps.

I don’t think I’ve done the best job. But I can certainly say I’ve tried. I have worked my ass off to find and create some other narrative beside the one I was given and completely expected to follow.

That’s my job. Fuck what anyone else thinks. Especially those not willing to do the work. 

If there is joy to be had, I am determined to find it. If there is real love and satisfaction and happiness to be experienced, I will not stop until I find it.

Everything and everyone else can kiss my big ass. 😆 Go be miserable without me. 😁 

And of course God bless you either way. No shame. No judgement. I get it, life is really hard sometimes. 

But I gotta fight to save what’s left of it for me.

You see someone else. You love their energy. You want that for yourself. They even sell a course.

But you know it’s not you exactly. You’re not that person. You can’t do what they do in the way they do it. 

Right there. That’s the line. That’s where it becomes a trap – a place your mind gets stuck. Or absolute freedom. Where you don’t become someone else. But you step more fully into who you are.

This has been so difficult for me to learn and internalize. Because I want so much to have connection, but my whole life has me setup to be the outsider. I’ve struggled so much socially, relationally. Because everyone has told me just to dumb myself down to get small enough that people will tolerate me.

And yet I feel this internal guidance that the only way I’ll ever be truly happy is if I get the courage to be myself without any apologies. That giving myself the permission to be exactly who I am will draw in and attract the community that will not only pursue but celebrate me. Versus those who belong to other communities that continually tell me I’m too much or not enough.

That concept is so foreign to how I was raised. Both in the family and church and society. It is so scary to consider stepping out of the herd and not fitting in. While also hating that part of me that is scared at all about that.

It is what it is. If we can settle the panic and just think through it. Logically. 

I am thankful sometimes that everything fell apart. That more specifically: I didn’t shut up and kiss the asses and suck the dicks it would have took to keep everything together. I could never. No shame to others. Just everything in me would honestly rather die. 

But in that, I have been stripped of the pressure to keep up most appearances. When people already count you down and out. When life already feels honestly like a big fat failure. It’s like, “Fuck it. Might as well have some fun.” 

As in try some things.
As in actually see if it’s possible to get what you really want.

What if it actually worked out? 
What if this happiness shit is actually possible?

What if I fucked around and created a community that was REALLY for me? Where there were like-minded people. Instead of being seen as always the other?

Would that be worth the effort? 

If I believe in God, the REAL God, then I have no other option. I have to believe all the difficult things were and are for a purpose. I have to ask to see what good there is in all the pain. Even the worst.

And I have to believe that I am not a mistake. I am who I am for a reason. And it isn’t so I can just be a tool for others torture. No, I honestly believe God has a path of happiness for me also. 

And I think I’m going to find it as I step into who I am. And stop worrying about whether anyone else looks down on me. 

And definitely stop shutting myself down just because other people don’t understand. And wouldn’t do it my way.

I have to let other people have their path.

And I HAVE to get over waiting for all the good things Life has for me until everyone else is on board.

I never wanted to be a leader. I never wanted to be the person out front. It is so unnatural to me. But out of necessity it feels like I have to get over that fear. 

The only way I can do it is to reconcile that it’s not about being some power and control addict. Not at all. It’s only about survival. I have just as much right to exist as myself as anyone else does. And if that results in other people being upset then I have to get over that. If others perceive that as being “brave”, so be it. But it’s just survival for me.

I can’t live duplicity. I do not have what it takes. My life would probably have been so much more comfortable if I could just mold myself to others expectations, but I never had that energy. I can barely keep up with what’s really going on. Much less simultaneously dance to keep up with anyone else.

All to say I just gotta put the blinders on finally. Just ignore all the noise. Let everyone and everything go that doesn’t want to stay. And trust in believe that what’s good will come as I stop trying to be anyone other than who I am. 

Let ’em all have a problem with it. If they don’t respect me, at least I’ll like and respect myself.

I don’t want to give away that power anymore to be dependent on anyone showing up for me. As an adult, it’s ridiculous to wait for anyone else to do for me what I can do for myself. Even being my own best friend. 

That will sound narcissistic to those who haven’t owned their healing. Haven’t owned who they are. Those who are unable to let anyone else be free because they are still so married to keeping up appearances. 

No judgement. Just saying. 

It’s a journey. It’s a process. 

But if better is out there to be had, then why not go for it?

I refuse to join you in settling. Especially for fear. When I believe in a God that is much more bigger than that.

This isn’t just frivolous theories. This is theology. This is everything. What God do you believe in?