"Your Being Here, Your Being Alive, Makes Worthiness Your Birthright"

I have been having a major spiritual crisis/life crisis/career crisis over the last month. Perhaps it was the passing of my birthday. Who knows for certain. The happiness I felt with my life just seemed to evaporate and I felt numb.

At this present moment in time, I feel as if I am on the verge of coming out on the other side of this dark place of doubt and loneliness. It would appear that my psyche has some automatic programing that sends me into a mode of self-sabotaging fear whenever I am starting to focus on being happy. I've been back and forth to that "dark place" so much you'd think I owned a condo there at the corner of "Doubt and Loneliness". 

This trip however I allowed myself to really see "me" clearly without putting on the mask of "fake" happiness I wore since childhood, not only for others but for myself. It is weird to look at my life and realize I am trapped in the mask created to survive my teenage bullies. The pretense I kept up with my family that life was great when in fact I felt worthless inside was how I survived. I see now I did such a good job of masking I didn't notice I never dropped the mask. I  talk a good talk of believing in myself but with serious examination my actions show me how much I live in fear of the possibility that I am existing in a life that does not matter to anyone including me. Now the challenge of self-examination is, once you get honest with yourself you have to actually do something to change your circumstances, not just once but continually and consistently until you ACTUALLY change. I mastered  "feeling good" at the discovery of a problem then "developing amnesia" when it came to fixing it.

Until Wednesday, I could not admit that I never stopped feeling worthless inside. It was easier to pretend I was okay than to deal with why I felt worthless, why I felt powerless. The Universe directed me,through the power of my intuition to pursue an acting career and in my acting I found a sense of purpose and power in my ability to create characters that touched other people. On stage I felt alive. Offstage I felt worthless. The problem with this was eventually that worthless feeling crippled my ability to believe in myself as a professional actor. Acting was never difficult. Getting someone to believe in me has always been the challenge. It's hard to convince others of what you barely believe yourself. If I am honest I think I have always been afraid someone would see through me and know I was the same worthless person inside who my bullies saw "could" be bullied.

The strange thing is it took watching the finale of the "Oprah Winfrey Show" to crack something open in me. She said, "Your being here, your being alive makes worthiness your birthright."

I don't care if it sounds stupid that a talk show would have such a major effect on me. It was like God was talking directly to me. I had that experience many times over the years when I randomly tuned into her show. The finale, however, hit me deeply. God didn't whisper. God didn't hit me upside the head with a brick or even let a brick wall fall on me. It was like an old brick building collapsed on my head and cracked open a life's worth of repressed pain. I started to cry the serious gut wrenching ugly cry that comes when you tap into a hidden hurt you locked away and forgot. In that hour of her finale, I allowed myself to see who I had become. I allowed myself to believe I did not have to remain stuck in my pain. I realized  despite what those bullies said and did to me those many years ago, I did not have to remain hostage to that time in my life.

I see now that I am responsible for where my life is today and I am the only one who can change it.

Since life can't suck much more than it has already, why not give believing in myself a serious try and trust that the spirit of intuition that once guided me so well through my darkest time will truly return and allow me to put down the mask once and for all.

Real happiness is worth the effort. I pray I can stay the course and finally get out on the other side. I have found my passion and purpose in life and I want to get on with the business of living my passion. It is clear to me that as I get out of my own way and embrace my own inherent self-worth, than I will be able to embrace my calling fully and completely. I have work to do. I have no idea how it feels to feel worthy but I will search for the answers in the silence of the deepest part of me. It is my birthright and I will claim it.