Broken Barriers

For those of you that know me well, you know or have seen that the past year has been a struggle for me.  I've been in a season of change and it's been one of the more difficult periods of my life.  I've been in one of those seasons in my life where intrinsically I was questioning EVERYTHING.  I was questioning my callings in life, my faith, my profession...everything. I have been blessed enough to have some amazing people in my life stand by my through this roller coaster of a year and support me even when none of us knew what I wanted or needed. Today, I am putting to rest this past year.

I am attending a workshop called Great Expectations which is an amazing approach to educating.  My instructor has been fabulous but really outdid herself today.  One of the things I have felt this year is a lack of dreams, thus a lack of direction with my life.  I have everything I've ever wished for and once achieving these things was left wondering what to do next.  I was really at the point where I felt it was almost pointless to dream anything else because it couldn't possible come true.  Our information today was all about dreaming.  As a part of making our dreams come true we had to identify our dreams and the barriers that keep us from those dreams.

I sat in this classroom all day, literally trying to avoid listening to my instructor because what she was saying was hitting too close to home.  I would feel tears well up in my eyes.  I was doing everything to keep them hidden.  I would look up at the ceiling, close my eyes, pretend to be yawning so I could rub them and anything else I could think of to keep my tears from streaming down my face in front of my brand new co-workers.

"You are going to break through these boards and I am going to teach you how to do it so that everyone in this room is successful," my instructor confidently shared with us.  The skepticism was so thick hanging in the room you could feel it.  We have every type of person in our class; athletic, frail, overweight, old, young, energetic, reserved, confident, doubtful and everything in between.  I think each of us started out thinking that our instructor had lost her mind.  In my mind I knew that she wouldn't ask us to do this if she wasn't confident it would work, and she had done this same thing last week so if it hadn't worked, she certainly wouldn't be doing it with us this week.  But my heart was reserved and doubt began creeping in as I was watching her model our task.  There was no way I was going to break this board on the first try.  Maybe I would break it after ten hits and it was a little weaker from being beaten.

We picked our boards, and proceeded to write on our boards those barriers that kept us from achieving our dreams.  I wasn't sure at first what my barriers were going to be and as I sat there staring at my blank board I began to clear my mind, knowing that this practice would open my mind to accept God's voice. I began writing the first barrier on my board and this voice said dig deeper.  So, naturally I listened a little more and began writing a second barrier and again a voice said something in my head (yes I might be slightly mentally disturbed because I do sometimes think I hear voices).  The voice said one word and I thought of course.  I struggled writing this word on my board, at times my hand shaking as if it was afraid of the word or not wanting to finish.  Finally, after the board breaking had begun around me I finished my writing, found a partner and opened my eyes to look and feel my barriers.

I prepared to hit my 1 inch thick board by taking my stance, one foot in front, soft knees, arms offset. It was the same stance I had used in my self defense class which as I think about that is kind of ironic or interesting because by breaking this board I was defending myself against myself and a lack of ambition that was taking me over.  I took a couple of practice motions making sure that I had the placement on the board correct and that I wasn't going to miss the board completely and fall flat on my face.  I began pushing out of my mind everyone else in the room and focusing solely on the task in front of me.  I was going to break this board.  I was going to stop letting doubt have a place in my life.  But with each practice motion thoughts of doubt creeped into my brain.  Then it happened.

Almost without me even knowing what was going on it happened.  I had prepared myself ahead of time to do everything down to the yelling expulsion of breath the way we were told to.  And then, I didn't. I was fully anticipating another practice when my mind just completely cleared and as I brought my arm forward in what seemed like slow motion my voice in my head said just another excuse.  My hand smashed right through the board on the first try with a liberating movement.  Liberating because I had done this kind of "manly thing"; liberating because I was back in my self defense movements (something that I loved); but, liberating mostly because the last word I wrote on my barrier board was 'excuses'. 

The adrenaline was amazing and I didn't know whether I wanted to cry or laugh but I felt alive for the first time in a long time.  I took a few minutes to regain my composure.  I checked my hand to make I hadn't broken anything.  I washed the purple marker off my palm and had the opportunity to hold the board for my partner who also broke his board on the first try.  Then I proceeded to text pictures to two of the people that have both caused my struggles and helped me through them...my husband and my brother.

For me it was easy to say that poor time management is what keeps me from my most recent dreams.  It was even kind of easy say poor self esteem because I'm used to that. However for me, I know that my biggest barrier is making excuses for everything.  I don't want to work out because Mr. Man won't work out with me.  I don't want to read that book because I'm tired. I don't want to pick up the kids toys because they are just going to get them right back out.  I make excuses for everything and today is the beginning of the end of them.  While it may be a long process, today, my life changes and I begin to take action!