The Past

I scrounged around and found this old article I wrote that had an interview of Kendall Payne. I guess the Uhaul thieves weren’t interested in stealing old teenage Christian magazines because I found a whole little pile of old magazine articles that survived.

But I have another reason for posting this, other than just showing my article. As I was looking through this old box of stuff I came across old emails I had printed out, old letters from teachers, old greeting cards. Precious stuff that I had collected and forgotten.

I read an old email I had written to my mom in college. I was telling her about an amazing conversation I had with my journalism professor. A professor that made me cry quite often. A professor that made me hate writing for the first time in my life. A professor that made me feel like a failure. I was amazed to read in this email the words he had said to me on my last day of class with him. Amazed that he had said such encouraging things. Did he really pay me a compliment? Really? I don’t even remember. I have no recollection.

I picked up another letter…a high school English teacher had written this one. It was a referral letter for a scholarship for which I was applying. It was a glowing report, some of the kindest things I’ve ever read. And he even used the “a” word – artist. He called me an artist! I don’t even remember. I have no recollection.

I started to glance through card after card. Letter after letter. Note after note. My memory has failed me, I thought. I’ve forgotten so much. I have no recollection.

It made me realize two things:
One – the importance of documenting such things. I’m so thankful I have a handful of these old memories still in my possession. Ah, so this is why scrapbookers scrapbook.

Two – the importance of believing in yourself. Obviously it’s been my own choice to focus on the negative things that people have said about me. It’s been my own choice to blow those hurtful words up so big that they become insurmountable bumps in my path to “FREEdom.” It’s been my own choice to forget the positive encouragement I’ve been given, and to use the lack of it as my excuse for not becoming what my heart so longs for me to become.

I was so happy tonite, sitting on my cold garage floor with papers all around me, to be snapped into a different reality then what I had conjured up in my own mind. So thankful for words of encouragement from long ago that can feed my heart still today. So thankful that there were people who believed in me then even if I didn’t “get it.” I’m going to start listening to the positive more. Focusing on it more. I believe it will make for a better me.