This Moment-Destiny
Growing up in a religious family I was taught that my future was pre-determined by God. That my life was a path mapped out for me and my role in my own story was to struggle against evil forces that would keep me from this path. I was a child who questioned everything from a place of great curiosity. If the answer didn’t make sense, I would dismiss the idea being presented. However, in my family -the way my parents’ choice to raise their children, there was no real option to question belief. I chose survival and cast myself headlong into making sense of the randomness of life by following a path created for me by a being I could not see or hear. The climax of this journey occurring in January of this year where I came face to face with choices that had placed me in a lifeless life. Choices I had abdicated to an ethereal destiny -much like the one I was taught God had for me. Though I haven’t been anywhere near religious for nearly an entire decade I was still living the by-product of that life and I hated myself for this. In two separate meditation sessions where I quieted myself long enough to listen to my inner world, I came face to face with my inner child. Upon that reconnection I was able to more authentically accept myself and learned to love who I was and the paths I was choosing to walk in the present and the future while allowing compassion for my past. This poem is an expression of that journey.
We are all on our own separate journey’s. Sometimes we come alongside others, sometimes we drift away. But always and forever you will be on a journey with your own self- yourself is the most important thing. Nourish and listen.
This Moment-Destiny
I looked around the antechamber of my own life-
The shock shooting through me like a bolt of electricity.
Peered into my future,
And saw the absolution of my past.
Choices made leading me towards,
Nothing.
Were they my own decisions?
Had I arrived at this precipice of fate,
Of my own will?
Those two questions haunted me.
My senses dulled from the sadness-
Blindness quickly overtook me.
The judgement of that moment-
Undoing of my own.
As if by instinct my arms reached out-
For what I cannot tell you.
Panic filled my soul!
Stepping forward, I fell.
The air, hot and stifling, rushed past my face.
Was this Hell?
Had the stories of the Bible been true?
Surely, this was all a dream-
But I did not awake.
Could not make myself wake.
The fall continued for some time-
No, I could not tell you how long.
Seconds or eons, the length matters not:
Suddenly, the air turned to a bitter cold.
Then, tropical in nature-
And in that moment, I came to rest.
Upon both feet.
In a whitewashed room.
My sight returned, slowly.
I began to make out a being-
Could sense their presence:
Familiar and foreboding:
Strength like a god emitted from them.
Fear began to shake me.
As my sight returned:
The being became clear,
And I could not believe my sight:
The stories of the Bible, remained, just that,
Stories!
My fall and all the sensations suddenly made sense.
Before me, in all the glory of a god,
Was myself,
Dressed in white, arm raised, pointing behind me.
I turned, hopeful for some guidance.
My brown eyes stared into the distance,
Straining to make out, anything.
A distant bright light blinded me,
I lifted hand to brow, shading the growing light.
Wondering, would a path appear?
None did.
Blinded by destiny-
All control lost; I began to rage against fate:
That cruel temptress of peace,
Who took more than she gave.
Always blocking the path forward,
Sabotaging the road traveled.
My rage grew as a fire roaring-
The more I tried, the greater the resistance.
Was I born cursed to a path of pain?
The torture of my existence my legacy.
My eyes grew wet with tears of loss.
I strained to see my destiny,
Yearned for, something-
Anything to make sense of it all.
I was here to guide myself!
Surely, at my feet a path will appear.
But none did.
The years ticked one then one more,
And I stood as a fixture, searching.
And as I was ready to give in-
To abandon all hope-
Then, another figure appeared.
Small and fragile, but full of life.
It took me a moment to recognize,
The figure was me, as a child.
My child ran to me and embraced me.
In that moment showing me,
All I was before.
My heart filled with happiness,
And my lips curved in a smile.
Then he pointed to me to my feet-
In front of me lay a path-
It had been there this whole time,
Of that I was now certain.
And in that moment, I knew my destiny,
Was built upon my choices.
My future firmly set in my own hands.
In an eyeblink I awoke,
No longer a slave to the current.
-EJB
