"Once you become self-conscious, there is no end to it; once you start to doubt, there is no room for anything else." ~Mignon McLaughlin, The Neurotic's Notebook, 1960

The call came Friday morning. The voices started arguing immediately. In my right mind there is no possible reason I would even consider declining but in my left mind- the one where the voice reminds me in bulleted points why I should or at least want to is as usual shouting so loudly I can barely hear what she's saying. This makes me sound emotionally unstable I realize but it's how I navigate this life of mine. I freeze. I incapacitate myself all. the. time.

I don't know if the voices accompanied the weight gain over the years or if I was always this way but I wonder sometimes how I ever managed to direct anything. I peek at the people I have been over the years and am amazed at how she did it. How I did it. These days if I can't hide behind a band or laptop I just want to dissolve. And the right mind patiently holds her arms out, begging me to trust her, to jump and the left side shuts. me. down.

Fortunately the mind is only one (or two) of the whole and the heart and soul have matured enough to recognize the struggle and begin the process of matter over mind. And what matters is saying yes to opportunities that have God written all over them, which my whole mind already knows but is too busy batting fears back and forth to make a move. I'm hopeless, I know.

The voices know I'm on to them and the heart will rub her victory in their faces until I feel that water on my feet. I'm already imagining the rapid pacing of my pulse, the stifling awareness of my self and the possibility the voices aren't going to give up. But I am going to defy them and allow myself to participate in the eternal. I am going to do my best to forget about how I may or may not look to people who may or may not notice and baptize two very special people God has trusted me to shepherd. They will lay everything on the line and I'm not about to do anything less.

"Spirit can walk, spirit can swim, spirit can climb, spirit can crawl. There is no terrain you cannot overcome." ~Irisa Hail