What a Ride

I feel like I've been strapped into an emotional roller coaster and taken for quite a ride lately, and yet I don't remember ever feeling so grounded and safe. I hate feeling out of control and overwhelmed by chaos, but I always loved roller coasters. When I was younger, coasters excited me, and riding them was one of the few times that I truly trusted a power greater than myself totally and completely. The truth is that control is an illusion and I don't have it anyway, but coasters press that truth straight to the core of who I am while at the same time reminding me that while I don't have control something else does. It may be scary, and it may feel like there's no telling what's going to happen, but the truth is that the ability of the designers put certain things in place to make the ride safer than it feels, and the laws of physics that God designed the universe around are there to keep me in that seat and keep the ride on the track, even when I don't keep both hands on the rail thank you very much.

I have had blessings beyond what I have ever imagined possible come into my life these past two years. Wheeeeeee!! I have tragedy and loss and overwhelming fear. Oh God, I think I'm going to be sick!! I've gotten sober and clean and enjoyed the rush of a new way of life for 15 months and then had the bottom fall out from under me, relapsed, and dropped so fast it didn't just scare me but those that love me as well. Then just when it looked like the end was rushing to meet me, whoosh my life turns back from disaster and I'm approaching my fifth month of sobriety once again. Aaaah, relief.

I've been without work, and found work, and lost work, and seen the precipice of fear, uncertainty and hope at the prospect of doing what I love for a living come back into play. I've made some new and true friends who I love dearly and who care for me. I've reconnected with old friends that have filled holes in my life. I've seen the ride end for a dozen of them and mourn their loss. I've experienced this without fear that I won't have enough to eat, without fear of living under a bridge, and, with the exception of the relapse loopty loop and dive, without fear of the ride ending for me. My life has been one I want to live, it has been better than I have known in so long or imagined could ever happen after October of 08.

Over the time of recent past, I have learned to trust the Designer and the spiritual and physical laws he put in place. That doesn't mean I haven't become afraid. I have. I am afraid. In some ways I am more afraid at this moment than I have been in the past two years. But under that fear, at the heart of who I am, there is the same peaceful and peace bringing understanding that God has me and while the ride feels out of control, it's not. It's just out of my control. And that's ok. Because when I try to control the coaster, I somehow always manage to compromise the integrity of something all too necessary. A brace is bent, something breaks, the ride begins to slip past the barriers of physics, and I find myself in a disaster, hurt and knowing I've also hurt the ones riding with me in my car and in adjoining cars as well.

Today, I realize I am trusting God, even when I still feel afraid. Even when I have that moment in the middle of a turn that I honestly question if the Designer does love me and if He maybe doesn't care enough about me to maintain the ride properly, and even in the zero G gut wrench of a loopty loop or sudden drop when I sometimes even question if He's there at all and if I truly believe any of the things I say and try to live by. Through all those moments, there is belief and trust. I just can't focus on it due to all the adrenaline. But I haven't tried to jump off the ride, I haven't died of fear, I haven't (at least not lately) tried to control the ride myself.

I have felt like somehow I would make it through this curve, and the next great drop, and, while dreading the sight of the horrible twist I can see coming up, somehow realizing that though I don't see how, I will pass safely through that fear as well. The twists and turns and loops and fears and doubts and angry denials do more to show me the love and power and control the Designer has so much more than the easy hills and safe feeling high moments ever could.

Today I feel them climbing sensation, but with it comes the fear of the drop that always follows. The excitement level in my life is climbing as the ride climbs, and so is my level of fear. But I have the love that God put in my life to lean into, and my love for others makes a little safety bar to hold me in. I think I might even listen to the voice coming through the speaker that tells me to keep both hands inside the car at all times and to enjoy the ride. But I am confident that I will indeed enjoy the ride. There will be moments of calm and confidence, there will be times of terror, times of happiness, and times of naseau. All those things simply make the ride not boring, which is essential for any good ride, but below the calm, terror, happiness and naseau is the serenity and joy, in all the emotional ride markers, that comes from knowing the Designer is in control and everything's going to be ok, even when the ride comes to a stop.