Who am I?
You know I am yours
Nostalgia is the sweetest form of pain, and I’m a sucker for it.
I tell you — our human ability to time travel into the past is simultaneously a superpower and a great liability.
The benefits: learning from experience, self-awareness, cherishing memories with loved ones, diving deep, healing, and letting go.
The pitfalls: ruminating, holding on, beating yourself to death over past mistakes, grasping at sand as it slips through your fingers.
Knowing how to limit your time-traveling abilities to nothing but healthy, useful purposes is a skill that takes time to learn.
Take tonight, for instance. I’m home alone because my wife and girls are away on vacation and my son it at work. That’s a recipe for many things, and if I’m not careful, some of them are not good.
My mind is so easily drawn to the past. What once was, what might have been, if only, if only.
I recently saw a TikTok video with gentle music playing in the background and a line of text that read:
“It couldn’t have been any different. Let it go.”
That sounds so simple and easy. And I suppose it is. But there’s a part of me that fights against it.
Part of me is still holding onto the dream of playing professional basketball. I’m 43 with a bum knee, but deep down I still think I could do it if I tried.
Another part of me is thinking that if I’d been there to take that call from my friend the day she put a gun to her chest our senior year — like I promised I would — then she’d still be here with us today.
Yet another part is still clinging to my long-lost wish dream for Christian community, wondering what happened, how we lost our way, and how we might make it back if only we tried.
Then there’s the eye that sees itself - the “me” beyond me who is not sitting on the couch writing this post but resting cross-legged on some distant shore deep in my awareness, watching it all transpire with a smile and a nod.
“Who am I?” Bonhoeffer asked… “These lonely questions mock me.”
Whoever I am, O God, you know.
You know I am yours.