Haibun: Rewrite
By 3:45am, I am at my desk with pen and paper writing my three pages. To get out the door and into my routine before it hits 100, I have to be out of bed by 3:30am.
Allowing my pen to move, I decided to revisit my past. Not stopping to think but to let the words flow, I have decided to revisit the events that would tighten my body with instant shame. My regrets and things I did I knew I did wrong are there in front of me, but I have to keep the pen moving. As the pen moves, I am the witness but also the scribe, creating a bit of distance between me and myself.
As my pen moves, I come back to this one refrain: I gave my power to define myself away to someone else, sometimes a stranger, in exchange for their approval of me. Each story, an echo, a repeat, a character flaw. That part that makes me cringe, squirm, and fill completely with regret as I drive down the road years later, I am finding that it is the end result of an earlier decision.
By writing these stories out, by visiting them, I am rewriting them. I know that I gave away my power to define myself 10 minutes before, maybe 30 minutes before, depending on which time. But now, as I look closer, I don’t feel shame. Instead, I see how I had my choice, each time, and am aware now when the choice comes back up. I have become aware of when I have the choice, what is going on inside of me, and what happens when I choose to give my power away for approval. My story is a lesson now, a way of feeling a different ending, a way of staying in my power to define myself in who I am, not what could impress the person I want to impress.
