Today's journaling led me to Ecclesiastes.
1. What aspects of your past do you find challenging to confront and why?
One aspect that is difficult for me to confront, front of mind, are my feelings regarding the molestation of my child and the betrayal I felt. This was done by a "Christian" man I felt I could trust.
I think I struggle because to confront it is to relive it. I also must admit a vulnerability that allowed me to open myself and my child up to harm.
I have deep feelings of embarrassment and disappointment ... betrayal and shame attached to this incident.
It's hard to admit to being wrong... it's even harder when people choose to be smug about it, insinuating that I should have known somehow.
2. Is there something you wish you could easily tell people about yourself and your struggle that you wish they could understand?
I wish I could explain how I have never trusted someone since. Not even myself. My own judgement is drawn into question. I know people might be quick to say... "well you can trust God's judgement." That's asinine. I'm not listening to lines like that. That is a cop-out. God's judgement was to allow that to happen to us... that isn't right. Why should she suffer for me to learn a lesson? Perhaps I should have been directed to a study in Job instead.
At any rate... this incident has destroyed the foundation of my faith.. trust.. judgement.
I will caveat this with ... one person has stepped into my life that has continually been "safe" in that regard. He has always put me and my daughter into a better position and has protected us and fought for us since this happened. And I think that is why I feel a deep loyalty to this person that other people in my life don't understand. But I can't help that he did more than they did to restore our safety and stability in the years of wreckage that followed that time.
3. Who is someone you have a "ruined" or "strained" relationship with related to these struggles and why?
My mother. I'm unsure if this incident was a catalyst that showed me the problems in our relationship in honest light or if it just crushed her and made her someone new and vicious that I can't trust? She sanctimoniously judges me from her house upon the hill. And it is so infuriating... her behavior following the incident ruined our relationship.
4. Write 5 sentences summarizing your feelings to this person.
It felt like you were crushed by what happened more than I was allowed to be. I had to be strong for my daughter. I needed you to be strong for me in turn. I was left alone and often made to sit in YOUR sorrows with you instead of being held while I fell apart from mine. Someone else held my pieces together and now you act like you hate him but he is the life raft I refuse to let go of.
5. Google "Bible verses about past regrets" & write the most powerful one here.
"To everything there is a season, a time for every purpose under heaven." Ecclesiastes 3:1
6. Research the backstory to this verse or book of the Bible. How does this apply to your struggle?
Ecclesiastes is traditionally read during the Pentecost religious holiday. This date is important because it represents the beginning of a new world in Christ. In Ecclesiastes Solomon is imploring young people to live in the wisdom of God instead of seeking worldly wisdom and "vanity". Solomon, having been an intelligent philosopher... approached many things with skepticism, including religion but he always returned to his faith in God. The point of Ecclesiastes is that all earthly ambitions that are sought out of vanity and selfishness ultimately end in emptiness. I think this applies to my struggles above because perhaps I have been seeking healing from an earthly, vain, selfish place... maybe I feel indignant and vengeful? Perhaps I feel undeserving of this battle? And I've not addressed my feelings because ultimately I feel that I'll just be screaming my anger into the endless, empty void where no one cares because they only look at me like they're grateful they're not me. So perhaps the healing I'm looking for is found by returning to the love and grace of God.
This is easier said than accepted.
7. What is the takeaway?
I read Ecc 1:1-11. The overall is that nothing in the world is new. Each generation lives through the same life as the one before it. We come, we go. Vanity tells us there is something great and new to search the world for. But that is not true because all that has been will be again and all that is done will be done again. Really it's a very nihilistic set of verses. Nothing matters... but nothing WORLDLY matters... be it good or bad, sad or happy... it's happened before and it will happen again because evil exists and grace exists. Good and Evil. Heaven and Hell. Yin and Yang.
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