Vulnerability and Self Sabotage: Exposing Wounds in Exchange for Healing and Restoration

Photo by Paris Lopez on Unsplash

I can’t quite put my finger on exactly how it happened or how I ended up in a place of fearing being myself. I somehow thought it was a good idea to try to separate who I was into compartments. It was in this remote place that I was made aware of the aftermath of my own self sabotage. The ways in which I have approached my spiritual journey have consisted of over and under spiritualization. I find myself going in loops of holding myself to a standard of a certain level of spiritual maturity and then painfully recognizing where I actually am is no where near where I am comfortable with admitting. As a result I tend to think perhaps I don’t trust God enough because I am not further along in my walk.

In college, I considered myself to be art; not like art, but actually art. Just as an abstract painting sits about a wall mute and in sight of everyone around, my whole life has felt like an anomaly. Many have comfortably approached me to tell of what horrible things they see as if their words are not directly altering the oil on my canvas. Few dared however, to actually want to know what this artistry represented in it’s original state; what this beautiful piece of work was glorifying about it’s Creator’s character. Before long, I started to look like a masterpiece of some substitute god’s creation.

When I was a child, I didn’t think there would ever be negative consequences for trying to make others happy and comfortable. I always viewed it as the right thing to do. Times when I was not mutually met with the same sentiment in relationships, I was astonished. What was wrong with people that they would be so selfish! That’s what I often would think at the core of my heart. There was an irritation that grew deep inside of me as I got older. I started to see so many people had a say in defining who I was and who I was to be; everyone but me. Moments when I took a stand for myself, I would be shot down immediately. After a while, I chose to not put up too much of a fight. So much damage was done internally that I just went with other people’s choices for me. I doubted my own ability to make sound decisions for myself. From that doubt spawned my blame of others for an unfulfilled life.

I was damned if I did and damned if I didn’t make choices for myself. So I started doing what made me feel good, even if what I did was wrong according to how I was raised. I tended to sense a certain pressure in my chest when people’s expectations crowding too closely around me. I never felt people took me seriously when I would speak up for myself so usually I would fight by doing the exact opposite of what I knew they wanted. I took flight toward people and things they frowned and scoffed at. I went so far as to openly say I was thankful for weed during a moment with my family around the holidays. I fought so hard to the point where I got into things that only those I was running from were able to help me get out of. The irony. Even still, I felt I was right back at square one with not having rights to make my own decisions, even if they were positive ones. I always felt as if I was never doing enough with myself or with my life.

After I rededicated my life to God and chose to follow Him, I found myself in a pot that was slowly rising to a boil. I wasn’t aware of the many hurts I kept dragging along behind me as I attended a new church and made efforts to serve. My hunger to be accepted and my choices validated hung around neck like a socially acceptable religious crucifix. What better way to be connected and validated than with a church family right?! In hindsight, I see how important it is for me to not rely on the institution of a church for my own personal relationship with God. I have direct access to God on my own and hear from Him just like all others who truly seek Him. Even with being away from this church for all of two months, I see how some of the culture there was actually harming me more than helping me. I will insert a disclaimer that not all churches are this way though. Most of my life I have been in settings where I did not feel like I was able to actually be myself. I hate to say it, but it seemed to be no different at the church I was attending and I felt like something was wrong with me that I would feel like I was drowning in the company of other believers. It was of no help when racial tension arose in America and I started to feel like the church platform was more about delivering messages on freedoms reserved for die-hard American go-getters than those found in Christ alone.

Though I attended small groups and was on a serve team, I felt like I could only be a portion of who I actually was. The statement ‘come as you are’ was not the actual invitation that I was given and I started striving for assuming the identity of who I thought I was supposed to be instead of allowing God to meet me right where I really was. People that I have often trusted in the past have said and done things with good intentions but those things often left me in an even more constricting place than I was before I came in contact with them. After my divorce, many people around me seemed to be dejected at the news, but if I must confess, I was elated and with it came long-anticipated peace. I remember watching a video of a young cow that was removed from a tiny stable where it’s neck was harnessed with a rope. It looked as if it was afraid to be taken into a trailer to be hauled away, but after it arrived at its new destination, it jumped with joy in a wider space of freedom. It wasn’t just some cow bound by the neck in a cramped stable any more. It was a joyful cow with a new sense of freedom. I felt like that cow.

Since I was around the age of 9, all I ever really wanted was emotional safety. Any way I could get that without having to expose too much of myself, I was willing. Over time as I would trust people in life, something would usually be said or done that would really hurt. Sometimes someone would say something negative to me or about me. Other times I would be abandoned or betrayed in such a way that I ended up feeling more alone than I had before. As a result, I began to isolate myself as a teen. It wasn’t just your stereotypical hormones at play; it was that I felt like no one was getting with the program that I was changing and growing into someone different. Someone others were not comfortable with getting to know as the new version of themselves. For better or worse, I was no longer going to be the little Paris they knew anymore.

As I trek further along my journey today, I recognize freedom requires vulnerability. Most of the time, I have no reservations when speaking about my past. In fact, I tend to be very comfortable with it. It is my present dealings that I have not liked talking about for so long. To give you a better visual, it’s like this: My negative self image + people’s negative perception of me multiplied by my personal expectations of myself + the expectations of others = possibly the worst present state of mind that I could ever have right now. Sadly, I have been operating in this way to the point where I have even sabotaged a lot of relationships. I always feared that at some point friends, family, and significant others would just wake up one day, realize that they were actually repulsed by me and my life, and then just leave. So I usually chose to cut relationships short at any sign of even the possibility of being uncomfortable. I became the person I feared others would be to me.

• I tend to be unreliable because I do not want to be hurt.
• I tend to shy away from commitments all together because I usually look for an escape route, well before there is ever even a need for one.
• If I feel that I can not be comfortably myself in a situation I hate staying in it, whether it be in a friendship, a gathering, a job, or even a one on one conversation.

In result, I am having to currently evaluate how the negative views I have had of myself, my life, and those I have adopted from others, have robbed me of a life that I have longed to have. From all the hurts I have ever had, the first step to healing was always acknowledging that I was hurting and secondly that I needed to hurt. So this is not a blog post of a healing and restoration that is complete, but rather about the seed of vulnerability that is being planted and watered in expectation that there will be a great harvest of love and joy in due season.

If you have enjoyed this post, please share it with others. If you or anyone you know has struggled with vulnerability and self sabotage, we would love to hear about your journey and perhaps we can all heal together.

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