Gravestones and New Stories
In a development that should come as a surprise to no one, I finally received my ADHD diagnosis last week. The path to this result has been a lengthy, convoluted process that appears specifically designed to filter out the very people it seeks to assist. I would argue that one look at the interior of my car, or any first-hand experience of school mornings in my household ought to suffice as diagnostic material.
My first response to the diagnosis was profound relief – relief at finally receiving validation, after decades of struggling in systems that I am not naturally suited to. I did not expect the waves of grief and loss that followed, as I look back on the emotional impacts of this experience – at the beliefs and narratives I unconsciously created for myself over the years. Every comparison, every failure, every thoughtless external criticism or internalized moment of shame solidified into a story that I wasn’t even aware I was writing. Looking back, I can see that somewhere along the way, this story took control of my life. I believed the ‘voice’ of shame and the walls it created for my existence – it became a self-perpetuating narrative that I believed myself powerless to transcend.
We all have such ‘voices’ – lies we believe about who we are, our worth, our potential. Somewhere along the way, we learned to believe distortions and broken stories that took root in our minds and hearts, tangling themselves into our daily realities. Sometimes these narratives assume such power that they become all we ‘hear’, drowning out our own, God-given voice, and the Voice of the One who whispers truth in the hearts of each of us. The lies we believe can become our story, binding us so thoroughly that we do not recognize them for the chains that they are.
I have reflected a lot, recently, on the meaning that Jesus’ walking out of the grave two thousand years ago holds for us. Sometimes, I am learning, resurrection means walking out of the darkness of the narratives that once held us captive. This sort of ‘unbinding’ is rarely a one-off event. Rather, it is a raw, stuttering journey of transformation – shedding the fetters that keep us from the fullness of who we were created to be.
Too often, I find myself brought to my knees by the power of a story that has held sway for so long, I carry it in my body. In these moments, when my mind, my heart – my very bones – believe this twisted narrative, only one Voice has proved powerful enough to break into my own darkness and pull me out. I can recall one such moment, last January, when the darkness ahead seemed so impenetrable, the fear so crippling, that I simply couldn’t believe in hope. Face to face with the grave in my own heart, I knew I hadn’t the strength to walk out of it alone. These are the moments when I experience Jesus most powerfully (if only such meetings took place in happier circumstances!!). Jesus met me that day, picked me up off the floor, and promised to walk out of the grave with me, again and again. In my frequent moments of self-doubt, this is a promise I can look back on.
The journey is littered with gravestones, and with every such moment, every ‘little death’, new stories are being written.
“I don’t belong to the lies, I belong to You.” (Megan Woods, ‘The Truth’)