Self-Renewal

So long as a person is capable of self-renewal, they are a living being.

-Henri Frederic Amiel

***

How satisfying to know that I am a living being.

My dreaming self has been in turmoil for the past few months. At night I find my mind has deep crevices of ideas, desires, nightmares and untruths. You see a very sneaky self-doubt has continued to creep into my current state of mind.

However for the past few weeks I have been on a trek, a journey, a walk where renewal is the theme. I am working on being a better Courtney; a woman who finds relief in the simplest aspect of life & realizes that the mundane is unimportant. Mundane must not be taken lightly. It is a term that can be used to reference the earthly part of our existence – lacking in spiritual depth. I don’t want to be that writer. The spiritual side of me, no matter what your beliefs, is what has kept me above the water’s surface rather than just treading it.

Faith has been a consistent topic on my blog in the past and it is because I am strong within it. I am not Catholic but I do choose to participate in Lent every year. It is purely because I feel that self-exploration and acknowledgement of habits/vices/addictions is healthy.  My “fast” this year is a bit odd and has definitely met the challenging aspect of Lent. I gave up two things: caffeine & cursing. Sadly for your Royal Writer over here, the cursing is the hardest. You just don’t realize how often those horrible words feel the need to escape into the air. They appear to be trapped “beings” within you and when they are free they elicit a shiver of excitement. Yet they don’t earn any awards or accolades or honest smiles from those around you. Granted I do feel there have been some instances where words of the vulgar manner seem to be the best responses, yet I have refrained. Faith has kept me on my path; the knowledge that the journey is worth it – a journey in which I am renewing the woman from the inside out. Even though dark, doubting thoughts try to get me to stray. They try to make me give up.

You see I lost my way again, I really need a map. I lost my moment of clarity and decision. In all honesty, I let it slip away; I allowed my inner being to become something that I no longer see as healthy or beneficial to my dreams & goals. Self-Doubt has held court for too long. It is as though my Royal Advisor has been talking truth but instead I have been listening to my nemesis’ lies.

So today I return to this wonderful world that has always welcomed me with open arms. I am a living being, capable of self-renewal, capable of believing in her talents, capable of using her strengths, capable of selecting what is best, what is silly, what is useful, what is important and what is pure fun. The map I need is really right here. It resides in this place of renewal, in this path of light; where self-doubt is banished by the knowledge that faith will lead me home.