Truth (Spoken Word)

(album: Normal - 2020)

I choose to let truth have the final word
Even though lies are much easier to believe
I fight in a daily battle against anxiety that tells me that "I'm not enough
I'm not beautiful, I'm not successful, my voice doesn't matter
And my words don't hold value"
And I can't even say that anxiety says that "I'm not loved and cherished"
Because anxiety takes a step further into my insecurities and says
"I'm not even able to be loved. I'm not even capable of giving love.
I should hang up my coat or throw in the towel or give up the hope of hoping to matter
Because I am far from lovable. Not even decent,
Just breath and bones with density decreasing moment by moment each minute of the day."
Every second of every hour I hear my mind say
"Just stay in bed don't get up, why would you add to the world?
You're a burden. You're too much. You're too cliché, rhyming girl with world.
You have nothing to offer, you have nothing to say.
The songs they liked were a one time thing, the videos will fade.
Just stay in bed, don't get up!
Don't brush your hair, don't eat, don't sleep
Just stare at the wall and think about the most awkward things you've ever said.
Ruminate over the worst parts of your day.
Start a cycle of pain, fear, and doubt
Where you can't function or process freedom or being freed from the weight on you heavier
Than shame, heavier than pain because it bears the reality of every negativity ever named.
Don't text your friends.
Give it weeks at a time, don't answer your phone but let it ring, but
Push that little button so it rings on silent,
So people think your changing the world and writing songs
When your really in a dark quiet room staring at the wall."
I fight
Some would say to fight is to be free from all pain
But the reality is my fight is the ability to see pain
To see my brokenness broken before a battle everyday
Where I choose to let truth have the final say
I'm not asking my pain to never exist
Because without disgust, beauty could never exist
Without pain I would never understand healing
And without being weighed down I couldn't appreciate freedom
So when my mind starts to wonder and my thoughts start to scream
I let them have their moment, open the show
Because this gig doesn't pay a thing
Not my time, not my attention, not even a lousy applause
I write down the exact lies that my mind wants to tell
And I let truth step up to the mic and be the headliner
Because my mind says that "I'm not enough," but truth says that "I don't have to be"
Because I was made by the epitome of enough for me
And He does His best work when I am weak
And my mind says "I'm not beautiful and I'm too big and I'm too weird"
But truth says "There's something wonderfully made about me"
And I can't get my truth from a skill or a mirror
My mind says "I talk too much and I should just be quiet."
But truth says, "What if there's a new season that could change the world
And what if your story is the pilot?
What if our minds are the biggest liars?
Somewhere between anxiety, depression and our character flaws.
What if they're not yet trained to always tell us what we need
So instead all we hear are despicable, disgusting things?
And what if instead of being consumed with the fix,
We sat in the hurt, the pain, and the sick.
We wrote down the untruths and the doubts and the worst
And we choose in the moment to let truth have the final word
Even when lies are easier to believe."
When sad songs are more fun and isolation more convenient
Or when it's painful to break down day after day
But somehow it's easier than speaking up and asking for help
When panic attacks are easier to understand than peace
Even though they tear us apart and leave us feeling weaker than the moment we started
I fight a daily battle and I make a daily choice
In the discombobulated truth that is my world
When I don't always believe it and even when I don't know how
I choose to let truth have the final word.