Time for truth

Time.

It marches on. Passes. Waits for no man. Time's up. Time out. Time off. Time to move on.

Must be the time of year because time is everywhere. Like a starburst, time beckons me to explode into a million directions, churning up space, chewing up energy so I can get to where ever time is going. Gotta give my head a shake! It's not time that determines my direction -- it's me. When time is pressing upon me, I need to wake up and expand into my time to be alive! To be all that I am meant to be.

Time was on Alexis' mind yesterday. It was around this time last year she and her sister had a series of friends, as well as a favourite teacher die. "No one's died, yet, this month," she commented last night. "I feel like something's wrong with me. I'm waiting for someone to die."

"Nothing's wrong with you." I replied. "It's just grieving the past and remembering it more clearly when at one moment in time, life reminded you of its fragile nature, its delicate hold on substance, on those we love. This time is just a memory reminding you this is your one and only life. Live it up!"

Anniversaries. A point in time. Events stored. To celebrate. To grieve. Details dimming as time moves away from that moment when time changed everything.

August is a month of memories for me too. A month of grieving what was and will never be again -- fortunately!

It was in August I met Conrad. The man who would lie and cheat and deceive and manipulate his way through every moment of the time we shared. It was in August we had our first encounter. Our first date. Our first kiss.

The grieving is easier as time remembered flows into time lived in freedom.

Grieving what was becomes rejoicing in what is my life today.

It takes time to grieve. To let go of the pain and sorrow. To move into the joy of life created on the ashes of the memories of his lies.

Grieving someone who lied is not easy. Unlike the passing of someone I loved, I do not feel grief for him. I grieve for me. For the woman who believed he was all that she was worth. She was wrong. She was never worth him. Never deserved his lies. Never deserved to be deceived. Never deserved his abuse.

And so I grieve for me. For my pain. My sorrow. My horror that I became that woman, back then, who did not believe in herself enough to say, "I do not deserve you."

Time passes. Pain unfolds. The world revolves around the sun and I stand in my joy today knowing the woman who once believed he was all that she was worth, has grown beyond that time into this time when she can claim, proudly, clearly, without equivocation, I am worthy.

Times change. I change. And my world changes with me.

There was a time when I was confused about who I am, what I wanted, what I deserved. Today, in this wondrous time of being all that I am meant to be I know, it wasn't time that changed anything. It was me.

Harvey McKay, author of Swim with the Sharks (without being eaten alive) wrote, “Time is free, but it's priceless. You can't own it, but you can use it. You can't keep it, but you can spend it. Once you've lost it you can never get it back.”

I'm not quibbling with what he said, but I disagree on one aspect -- you can't actually lose time. It was never yours to begin with.

Time doesn't exist, except in the the ticking of a second hand passing over the face of a clock that measures out time as if it had a limit to its passing. Time is eternal. Time is ephemeral. Time is. All around. Everywhere. Inside. Outside. In between. Underneath. Time is.

It is not time that changes. It's me.

Once upon a time I met a man who lied. In my blindness, I believed him. In my light today I know my truth. I deserved more than he ever could or would have given me. I deserve the truth.

Question is: Where are you holding onto the past in the belief it was the time that made the difference? Where do you believe you're worth less than you deserve?