MORPHING - What's with the Name?

FacePainted
Feb 28, 2024
3 min read

Updated: Mar 6, 2024

...Humanity in China...

I flip through the memories in my head reminiscing about the first summer I spent in China. The wonders I breathed in at 16 smell as fresh as my boy’s red hair under my nose. The Great Wall, Silk Road, Forbidden City, Chairman Mao Zedong’s tomb, Tiananmen Square, the Grottos, Himalayas, Turpan ruins, sleeping in a yurt with nomads, riding horse back to the snow line; I witnessed the splendor of China. And, each time someone asks, these marvels are secondary. The significance of what I left behind in China is the story I must tell.

American-English represented hope and prosperity to so many throughout the journey. My team spent the evenings exploring the city and usually found ourselves invested in English Corners. English Corners offered a public space to practice. We were an instant hit. And, when these fans heard were there to study the language of the outcasts, Uyghur, they fell silent; the crowd - baffled. The doubt and questions raised on the value of other humans, this is what I left behind in this magnificent land.

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Who diminishes your value? If someone from the past, do you carry on the legacy? Does the perceived loss of your worth have you scrambling to fill in the blank with chaos because it is what you know?

Loathing, degrading, complicating, overthinking: all natural and well nurtured abilities, and, serve as obstacles, deterrents, and forces I use to protect my cave. You? If I reject myself first, I help you keep distant. Resisting external and internal self-imposed chaos asks for an elusive self-love.

What if I uninvite seeking, creating, finding, or enmeshing with tornados-of-chaos in my brain or around me? Will an aftermath exist? Would it be noticeable? How do I morph absolute ashes? If my eyelids lift past my feet, excuse the twisted turmoil from my wake, and emerge from my dark cave, would I see in color? Could life exist beyond gray and black?

What if I smear my cheeks with my own ash and warrior outside of my usual cozy turbulence? Might my soul settle? Can I rely on some part of my being to offer what I need? I need hope, and love, and confidence, and peace. Therapists, mentors, coaches, clergy: teach, guide, and facilitate. The fix; the break; the change: that’s up to me. Making and finding chaos stopped working. I sought and believed I pilgrimaged to a better place, but just brought the hatred for myself to a different location and era. What I hunt - I have.

Emerging from the cave, insanely difficult. I’m using the ashes as facepaint to brave the new world. I weep, I cry out, I beg, I howl: for a healer. I pursue a power – someone to carry me out and rescue me from this dungeon. Facing the stinging truth is a game-changer: an outsider will not instantly regenerate my core to fix what is shattered. They can only show the steps. I stand; I put in the work; I attend to the internal needs.

Alas, pushing aside chaos and seeking that mysterious self-love when I am so versed in loathing: the only way out of these trenches. Grace. The God of the universe asks for an answer. Will I acquiesce? And the moment pauses in front of my eyes. Love. The grace offered and the love ushered like a wind at my back - is my choice. Face-paint tells me I am brave enough. The charred paint tells of the tortured hell I endured, proving I am alive. I step out of my cave. I welcome the wind of grace and love. The elusive self-love made possible.

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