Wolverine (The art of gracefully coming undone, and the beauty of surrender.[Part 1])

"An announcement. If man is made in the image of God, then God is deeply messed up." - Syriana



How easy is it to sweep the hurts of the past under a rug without even realizing it? I was at a retreat w/ the staff of YWAM Coatesville this past weekend. We had a man and a woman share w/ us about understanding who we are in God's economy of things and how easy it is to lose sight of that w/ all the wounds and distractions life throws our way.

Now before I say anything else, I just want to clarify that in light of what I'm about to say, it's pure coincidence that the new X-men movie came out around this time. The couple started sharing w/ us on Saturday morning, and by the time dinner rolled around, we had been given a lot to wrestle w/. So I found myself sitting on a couch later on talking rather informally w/ the woman, one of the girls on staff, and another guy who joined us for the weekend. As the conversation carried on, I started to share about how I could really relate w/ the character Wolverine when I used to watch the animated X-Men cartoon series as a child. There was a guy who had a lot of anger issues, and if you didn't know him any better, you'd think that he was just mean to the core. Much of it was stemming from the pain of being different from the crowd, though, and if you paid attention to some of his other behavioral aspects (such as the way he related w/ Jean, who was very much like a little sister to him), you could see that he had a very sensitive side, as well. To put it simply, he recognized innocence and beauty, and he knew that he had to protect it.

I had to deal a lot w/ the feeling of being "different" when I was a child. There are a lot of details to it, but to give you the long in short, I was told all my life that I have a lot of strong points in terms of gifts and talents, but that there are a lot of areas in which I fall well behind the crowd, too. I have to admit, the feeling of being out-of-sync w/ everyone else was just adding fuel to the fire for me, as I often felt very frustrated just trying to work w/ what I had (communication problems, difficulty focusing, etc.). It wasn't until I was about 9, however, that things really began to erupt, and it took about 2 years for me to really get a grip on myself. The sad thing I had to come to realize, however, is that as much as I felt all fine and good in my own right having that part of me that also recognized innocence and beauty and knew that I needed to protect it (such as when somebody wanted to pick on another person in class who was in some way disabled, dysfunctional, or socially awkward), my anger, if left unresolved, would turn me into just as much of a monster...if not worse.

Many years have passed since then, and like I said (in a different sort of metaphor) it's easy to forget about all that was lost in the fire once the flames have cooled down over time. I started to realize some of the deeper hurts that were soothed, but not healed. I have to admit that as I wander back down the paths of my past, it's easy to feel like life is just one endless maze of knots waiting to be untied.......but is there and end to all the hurts and confusion we often find? (More to come)