Soul Searching

Do you ever just find yourself in a season of “what’s wrong with me?” When you think you’re doing all the right things and yet there’s no success? I feel like my season has been extra long. The daylight’s saving time of extra - but in darkness instead of light. The efforts feel wasted with no product to show for them. I’m sowing in good soil, I’m just not seeing fruit. I’ve always laughed at my black thumb when it comes to plants. I’ve often said I’m a hospice to anything potted. I’ll do all I know to do, but in the end, my good intentions still fail, and I’m left with a pitiful, dead mess. Even if I change the types of plants, don’t overdo the sunshine or water, it doesn’t make a difference. Only now I’m catching myself drawing a parallel between my failures at plant keeping and my failures at sowing things around me. Good soil, good intentions, still failure. Why is that? What’s wrong with me? 🥀Am I too much? 🥀Not enough? 🥀Too loud? 🥀Too cautious? 🥀Too old? 🥀Too young? 🥀Too available? 🥀Too easily forgotten? My pain is caught in that last one. Do I leave a room and it’s as if I was never in it? Or do I leave a room and they breathe a sign of relief? I’m not sure which is worse. They both would leave a deep wound. 🪴People are busy. 🪴They have different interests. 🪴They are in their own season. 🪴Their needs are already being met. But my soul searching simply brings me to the same conclusion: I’m the common denominator. Trying different things with different circles brings the same results. So what’s wrong with me? I don’t have any answers. I wish I did. Suggestions and advice on what I’m doing to sabotage every effort would be helpful. But I lack that too. And many will be quick to say “there’s nothing wrong with you!” But I can’t believe that. I should be drawing something good to me, even if it’s small. If I repel everything, that’s a problem. There’s a hard truth here somewhere. Someone holds the key. I’d like to unlock the secret so I can make the necessary changes to whatever is wrong. It’s a strange place to be in: wanting to do better, but not knowing what to adjust. I’m sure I’m not alone. I’m sure others shed tears in private, questioning their worth and likability. Ironically, we’re not often finding one another, despite our ability to understand and build each other up. Or perhaps we do find each other and don’t know it. Maybe we’re too good at hiding the loneliness and insecurity so we don’t recognize one another. ☀️ And there’s the ray of light in this moment: that in my vulnerability, I will speak to someone else in their extra long season of (fill in the blank) and show them I’m here. That despite my own doubts and failures, I’ll raise my hand so you can find me. So that I can reach for your hand and offer a quiet hug of understanding and whisper “there’s nothing wrong with us; but if there is, let’s help each other fix it.”