This really isn’t for you. The one who thinks he ever owned me, or about those certain ones who might like to try. This isn’t for the haters, the naysayers, the cynics or the doubters. No matter how you may try to revolve my world around you, you can’t. I won’t let you. You have no business here, no rights, and you never should have.

This is for the one to whom I truly belong.

To The One I Belong To, I would like to give my everything. Though honestly, I would be the first to admit that what I have isn’t very much at all. But to you I want to give all of me, every single part. The light and the dark, the very lovely, and even the very ugly. I want to hide nothing from you, because honestly you know me so well I never could, even if I tried. So I will try to give you everything that I am, because without you what I am just feels empty. I give all these words to you, and all that will come, because they are the best of what I have, my secrets, my hopes, and my heart. All of it belongs to you.

I peel my jacket off on this unseasonably warm November Sunday, thinking of you, feeling lighthearted despite my troublesome morning. I have driven to a little town in the middle of nowhere, and I hop down out of my old SUV, tilt my head towards the sun and smile. I close my eyes for a moment and savor my perfect freedom. The beginning of my day had been particularly hard on me, dealing with a blast of anger from an angry man who belongs in my past.

The names I had been called come to the surface of my river of thoughts, and at once I let them go. If I have learned anything about how my mind works, I have learned not to dwell on the negative opinions of others. So here I am, imagining the negativity and drama floating on by, drifting away from me. His words have no power over me anymore. Yet I still pray for him, even when it’s hard. I will always long for the day when this world is finally made right, and anger and hate no longer exist. Until then, I will keep my chin up and my heart light, focusing more on what is good and focusing on my little bitty part in an amazing story that is so much bigger than me. There really is so much good to talk about here. I want to share my happy with everyone, but especially with The One I Belong To. So here I go, one little word at a time.

Autumn leaves rustle softly in a breeze that gently tickles through my hair, bringing with it the crisp fresh scent of Fall. I cherish everything about right now, but mostly about my liberties at this very moment, the freedom from trying to explain my wherabouts to jealous men, or from defending my joy to those who hated everything about my happiness. Freedom is to be treasured beyond measure, and I cherish mine in so many ways. I owe this freedom to The One I Belong To, the one who saved me, who loved me, who pursued me, who altered the way I feel about EVERYTHING. The one who changed me, but at the same time loved me exactly the way that I am. That alone blows my mind. I never knew I could be loved like this. He makes me feel beautiful, and as I walk along with my mostly happy thoughts on a secluded and pretty trail, I feel strong. A love like this love is humbling in its magnificence. I am no longer alone. He is the one to whom I belong.

I wander around for a bit. My green eyes seem to look everywhere all at once, trying to take it all in, and I am soaking in the cozy amber magic of this almost perfect day. The temperature is unseasonably warm, and I know it won’t be long until I am mostly stuck indoors, peering through a window at a world of pristine and frozen white. So for now I’ll pretend as if these days shall never end, as if the sun shall shine forever, as if Winter may very well forget to be Winter. My moody little Missouri definitely has her temper tantrums, her fluctuations between blazing days in the summer and her frigid nights in the winter, but she sure makes up for her craziness on golden days such as these. She is beautiful, even in her extremes. And though she isn’t my home state, she’s the only home I’ve ever really known as an adult. I’ll claim her for now, until maybe words of change are whispered in my ear, a longing desire to move somewhere new, as if that might be my destiny. We shall see. I know that wherever I do go, I will go with The One I Belong To.

Soon I find a perfect spot. The spot where I can settle, if only for a moment, and write the words that I’ve been thinking. I want to be still for a bit and try to make sense of all the nonsense that I have had to filter through, not only for today, but for my entire life. There is a lot to sort through. I do it one day at a time, and in the process I am learning a lot about me. It’s a messy beautiful thing to acknowledge your flaws and learn to forgive yourself and others too. There are lies. Drama. Pain, sickness, poverty. Drug and alcohol abuse, addiction and despair, and in all that chaos there is friendship and joy, and the love of the one who never gave up on me, The One I Belong To. I hold a fading reflection of a past I’m leaving far behind, and an old bag of memories that I can open and sort through whenever I am led to try help others similar to me. There are tough paths that I have left, and new ones leading down a road to a future I can not even contemplate, but one that I have an excited and confident hope in. My future with The One I Belong To.

The constant swirling of hopelessness and despair amidst hope and joy is nothing less than difficult, and without true love I would be unable to handle the really hard days, and despite the world trying to make me hard, I am soft and unashamed. The One I Belong To loves me this way. Soft, hopeful, happy, trusting. And smiling. He really likes my crooked smile.

I have never been the best at speaking vulnerable thoughts aloud, so I write them down, here in a quiet spot away from all the demands of a racing and pacing world. I give my only gift, my words, To The One I Belong To.

I have felt alone all of my life, all of us have our sad stories. Some of us have our rock bottoms, and some even give up and check out. That is heartbreaking, pointless. We weren’t made to be sad. We weren’t created to be alone.

I’ve been deeply hurt, and still, of all the ones who hurt me no one really hurt me more than I did. I was my own worst enemy. I was the one who cared the very least about me, the broken one who allowed myself to be treated in a certain type of way. And even still, The One I Belong To loved me through it all, like no other ever could.

I hurt myself. I lied to myself. I drank myself until the blackness came, and the darkness consumed me. I pushed myself, critiqued myself, judged myself, and at times loathed myself. How could I expect to be treated any other way when I treated myself in such a way?

And still…

I held out, held my breath, waited.

Somehow through all the ugly, the lost and hopeless nights, and the mornings I woke up not knowing where I was, I wanted to find The One I Belong To. I desperately wanted to find the one who truly loved me. The one who did not judge me, who would stand up for me, who would protect me, cherish me and even give up his life for me. The one who didn’t care what others thought, because he thought I was worth it. The one who loved the way I laughed and the way I cried, who loved my moody heart, and who loved me enough to push me to be stronger every single day. Was he out there? To love me even in my brokenness? I longed for a love that would fill all my empty spots, mend all my hurting places, and begin to repair all my damaging thoughts. I needed him more than I ever knew, until I finally really knew.

I needed a love that loved me not for the way I looked, or how hard I worked, not even for how much I could give him. I wanted a love that wasn’t dependent on how much of myself I would choose to give up. That loved me not for sex, or darkness, or not to empty me until there was nothing but sad in my eyes, and not someone who attempted to change everything that I was. I wanted The One I Belong To, so that for once I could love back, and love not with guarded pieces of me, but with my whole mended heart.

But over the years as I was hurt repeatedly, and as I retaliated foolishly, as I was getting lost in an illusion of love, I eventually realized I was losing myself and all of my hope of love. To me, love became a fairy tale that didn’t exist. I was too broken, and too much for anyone to love. I grew accustomed to the lies. To the degrading comments of broken men. To the horrible theft of my peace by the ones who were intimidated by my moments of happiness. I tried hard to dim myself for them, for those who did not deserve me. I drank too much, I made a fool of myself, I cried and I yelled and sometimes I even begged. All for those who would never really love me for me. All for those who wouldn’t even try to. For the ones who lied to me, spit on me, hurt me, hit me, and who tried to destroy the light inside of me. What a horrible waste of precious time. I was hurt, frustrated. I was all out of love.

Or so I thought.

Then there he was, The One I Belong To. The one who gave me the strength to heal a broken heart and walk away from lies. The one who was there all along, the one I loved with my whole heart. The one who is now teaching me every single day to finally love myself. And I do! Because I am fearfully and wonderfully made. I am a miracle, a masterpiece, a unique and imperfectly perfect creation of art and poetry. His love has taught me so. What a teacher he is, The One I Belong To.

I love him to the moon and back, to the stars and beyond, I will shout it from the rooftops and share my joy with everyone that I meet. There is no shame in my game, because after all that was said and done, he never turned his back on me like others have, and he was never ashamed of me. I’ve always known him, but I didn’t understand him and the love I could never earn but that surrounds me every single day. Now I am beginning to grasp the depth of this love. When I wake, and when I sleep, and every moment of my day, his love is there, unfailing, and it makes me want to spend my whole life trying to explain to others just like me what it feels like to be this loved. To feel this joy. This hope. This perfect peace.

Maybe you are like I once was. Swirling in addiction. Unsure of your worth, broken and used, abused and even mentally unwell. Maybe you think that could never change, maybe you have lost all hope. Maybe you have been lied to and mistreated, maybe you are even giving up.

Don’t. Just don’t. Hear me out.

If somebody told me 10 years ago when I was regularly drinking myself blackout drunk, that one day I would be a sober, non-smoking woman who was loved beyond measure, and that I would be working at a large church with my own office that has a mural of a unicorn dancing upon the wall, that I would have a stable life, with people who cared about me? I would have just laughed and laughed at you. I would have told you that none of that was possible. I would have thought you were drunk, or high, or just plain crazy. Because it is absolutely crazy! How different my life is because of The One I Belong To. This is really just the beginning of his plans for me, I know it, I feel it, I live it. Here I am. And here you are too.

I am coming up on my eight year soberversary. Sobriety has been a beautiful battle, and I would be a liar if I said it was always easy. I have an enemy that likes to try to throw me for a loop, who tries to entice me into falling away, in so many ways. Two years ago I almost stumbled, after I found my husband’s secret cell phone while we were decorating our Christmas tree. It was not the first time his lies had surfaced and stabbed my heart, but it would prove to be the last. It really was the last painful straw that I refused to let break me. I cannot describe the betrayal I felt, the temptation I went through, as I sought comfort, but I can tell you that I am honestly happier now than I have ever been in my entire life. Happier alone, through a divorce, making less money, and it all seems so backwards, but that is just how my God works. He takes the broken, the unlikely, the pain that we go through, and he turns it into something so magnificent. He makes it work, and he makes it work in our favor. Why would I throw this joy away for a drink? I can’t. I won’t. I’m happy in my upside down world, and I owe it all to The One I Belong To.

Please listen. If you are living a life of brokeness, of sadness, of anger, pain, or addiction, let it all go. You really can walk out of despair and into a beautiful life. You can walk straight into the arms of The One You Belong To. It’s my favorite love story ever. And its a true one.

He came for me, like he’s coming for you.

Love and peace,

Ray ~ Humblegirl

P.S. Please don’t settle. Love God. Love others. Love yourself. Wait for the right one. Just love. The rest will follow.

If you like what I do feel free to share. You can also follow my Facebook pages at Humblegirl, or Raygirl. Thanks for supporting my journey.

I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well. Psalms 139:14

I belong to my beloved, and his desire is for me. Song of Songs 7:10

Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free. John 8:32

So then, let us not be like others who are asleep, but let us be awake and sober. 1 Thessalonians 5:6

I wait for the Lord, my whole being waits, and in his word I put my hope. Psalms 130:5