We circle the truth until we can see it
Becoming the person who can see the new thing
There are things about you that are simply…true. And you haven’t seen them yet.
Wild, huh?
I still cannot fathom that I went 40 years living in my body without a CLUE that I was autistic the entire time. I just thought life made me super anxious and I had to work really hard to keep up and figure things out and look like I had it together.
We circle the truth until we can see it.
Life has this way of whispering what’s most true long before we’re ready to see it. I’m slowly making peace with this. I used to want the whole story now.
Then I saw the gentle and beautiful gift of slowly becoming the person who is ready to see what I couldn’t see before.
A wise person once said growth is a spiral where we meet ourselves again and again but we’re actually traveling deeper into ourselves with each loop. (I’ve also seen it as an upward spiral). As we grow, we find ourselves back in what feels like a similar place, but if we truly survey the landscape, we’ve changed. We see the situation from a different perspective. We may even be stuck in the same pattern, but we’ve got new ways to get unstuck. There’s a bit more patience and understanding of how we got there.
In my story, I arrived at similar places many times over, but each arrival illuminated new tools and skills I’d picked up on the last journey. The familiar place got new names. New understandings. I arrived with a little more love for self and others. I arrived with new questions and possibilities.
Each trip around the spiral turned me into a person who felt open enough to see the next thing.
It’s frustrating to stumble back into what feels like the same place over and over and over. And sometimes, that just gets to be true. Life is inviting us to edge closer to a new way of seeing a challenging pattern. Life is inviting us deeper into a unique way we show up in the world but it will require us to wrestle with shame, disappointment, and fear first. It takes time. It feels like we fall backwards, but I’d suggest that’s a necessary part of the journey.
Not everyone makes the journey
Many autistic people have special interests. Think trains, knitting, Taylor Swift, animals, or calligraphy. If you haven’t noticed yet, one of my special interests is inner growth. My mind finds it endlessly fascinating. I can read or watch videos on this stuff for hours. It’s soothing and relaxing to me. It animates something deep in my spirit.
Ironically, one reason no one noticed my autism awhile back is because my special interest lined up with the career I chose. As a pastor, my passion for growth and spirituality made sense. It made me good at my job. It never occurred to me that my fascination with it was a little more intense than the average person.
All that to say — my brain doesn’t comprehend why everyone doesn’t see inner growth the way I do. My poor mom has spent many phone calls listening to me describe a certain situation where I’m frustrated with someone not seeing what I see about growth. Without fail, her gentle voice crackles through the speaker, “Jenny, not everyone takes their journey the same way you do.” Honestly, I’m only now starting to understand this after the autism diagnosis. I genuinely didn’t see how others didn’t see what was so obvious to me. You mean others aren’t as fascinated by this the way I am? Why not?! It’s amazing. It’s freeing. Sure, it’s tough, but it’s worth every single step. Why would people NOT make their courageous one life trip deeper into their truest self?
Not everyone chooses to make the trip into their spiral.
In fact, my therapist once told me, “Jenny, most people go their entire lives without looking inside themselves too much.”
We’re always invited
Maybe one small gift I can offer the world is my fascination with our inner world and how traveling this spiral of growth can turn into more love for our outer world.
When Love continues to heal us, Love continues to heal our collective world.
May we each be willing to pull the next thread on the tangled mess of life because in doing so, it’s how we heal the greater whole.
And I can’t think of a better gift to our fellow traveling partners.
Everyone gets free.
I fear becoming too comfortable with who I am and where I’m at.
The universe seems to be like that: everything circling, but always over new territory.
Had to smile while reading this. Intrigued by the inner life resonates. Thankful for your insight, Jenny.