An UpRooting

I feel like I am in the middle of an uprooting.  Just how much of an uprooting I do not yet know, but I am definitely being pulled up and out to something, someone and somewhere new.  Over the past month I have had some mind bursting revelations in regards to promptings.  It seems that I may have been confusing certain promptings for panic attacks or crazy and unfounded fears. 

It all started a few weeks ago.  I started having intense panic while driving to church.  My muscles would tighten, my breath would shorten and my mind would desperately search for the “why”.  Nothing was causing this reaction.  There was not any beliefs or bad thoughts or fears.  It all just seemed irrational.  It got to the point that when I would step back into my car afterwards that my mind would utter “Whew.  I got in, I got out and they didn’t get me.”  Who is “they”?  I wasn’t sure and I did not know why this was happening.  This same strange phenomenon was also happening at a mission class I was involved in at this same church and it was beginning to happen at my long-time home AA group.  The question as to why remained. 

I can recall having panic attacks prior to my decent into alcohol absurdity so my natural inclination was to think that I was right back to my starting point and had to figure out how to handle this panic without alcohol.  The problem was that I only had this phenomenon in certain situations.  So, why these situations?  I for one did not have an answer. 

Here is where it gets interesting.  One night God was pulling me to the computer to write.  He does this often.  It is a particular pulling in my soul and I know exactly what it is when I feel it.  The only other time I have felt something similar was that day in the hospital when my soul was set on fire and I knew I had to kick everybody out because it was time for my family to say goodbye to my father.  That fire in my soul feeling was not instantly understood.  I remember just knowing that it was now, it was urgent, it was time to say goodbye.  I did not understand it, but I had to act.  I have only experienced this one other time in my life and that also centered on an earthly departing.  It was in the recalling of these experiences that a key piece of information hit my brain.  All of these promptings centered in that area near the heart that I refer to as my soul-self.  Anyone who has experienced these soul promptings knows that you just can’t put these experiences into words.  They are not readily explainable, but you somehow know what they heed and in that moment you realize that you really are much more than this existence. 

That key piece of information was this:  These so-called panic attacks center in the soul.  The same place I get pulled to sit down in front of the computer and the same place that got lit on fire that day it was time to say goodbye.  In this same instance my mind went back to the previous “panic attacks” and I realized that every place I had experienced this phenomenon something very bad ended up happening to me.  It was in this moment that I realized these are not panic attacks.  These are warnings.  God, Himself is sounding the warning alarms in my soul and my body is responding.  The tightening of my muscles which make it hard to drive and walk, the shortness of breath, the inexplicable uneasiness in my soul pulling me up and out of the situation – trying to prevent me from even being in the situation.  I am not having panic attacks, people.  My soul’s alarm is sounding because impending doom is ahead if I continue in these situations! 

Now I don’t know about you, but that is what I call a mind-bending revelation.  All I can do at this point is acknowledge and heed these warnings and see where they lead me.  As a result of this new information, I am taking a step back from my current church and from my AA meeting. These two places and the people in them have been my LA home for the past year and a half, but I am heeding the warning and letting go.  I know you have to be willing to let go of what does not completely serve you in order to receive what does, but that does not make the letting go any easier.  So here’s to seeing where this Wind is blowing as I march into the month known for its changing of the seasons.

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