To give.To Give. to give.

Why do we ultimately give? Is it out of guilt? Is it out of necessity? Is it because we have no other choice? Is it because of the kindness in our heart?
Why do we give? At what cost do we give? When must we stop giving? When is it enough?

I think about this as I give to others. I do it mostly out of the kindness of my heart. Simply because I want to give and I can't stand to see others with out; can't stand to see others struggle when I have something to offer. In the same breath, I do it for some because I must, because I am obligated by blood and responsibility.

I've stopped giving until there is nothing left. I don't do that anymore. I use to though. I use to give until I was completely empty and without for myself and I'd continue to give... a serial helper is what I was called by my ex at the time. She said I'd help and help and help and leave myself raw and naked and without. She was right. I'm glad I've changed.

It's still a process though.

I am still guilty of giving to others and taking away from myself, but not to the degree of what it use to be. I still have for myself. I don't go without, I am not left in debt or hungry or without a penny to my name. I don't do that anymore. But I still give. I give without the need to receive. I still sometimes feel selfish or unworthy when I receive, even if I've earned it. The feeling sometimes creeps up on me like a shadow as the light shifts in a room. It silently moves through me and glides in shivering lines across my skin and into my heart. Slithering along inside my blood until it reaches my brain, trying to convince me, trying to coax me into truly believing.

I am human after all. Susceptible to doubt, to guilt, to feelings of unworthiness, to feelings of shame. I know that no matter how much good I do, how much I give, I am still human, still have darkness inside of me. Maybe sometimes this is why I still give. Because I know how dark I am inside and I must repent. Maybe. Maybe.

Or maybe I think I am bad inside because this is what I was lead to believe early on. Unworthy. Shameful. Bad. And so I must repent because there is more amount of prayer that will help my sins. Maybe.

I shouldn't feel guilty of my success. I shouldn't feel shame for receiving. I shouldn't feel unworthy of love or friendship. I shouldn't. Intellectually, I know I shouldn't. But I do. And I suppose it has something to do with my childhood.

Should I then continue to confront it in therapy and with those around me who I've slowly let in? Or should I accept the darkness inside and stay in solitude. Doing what I must to survive and going about my business. It's easy to give in to it. Easy to let the dark have me. It's much harder to fight. Much harder to trust. Much harder to let others in.
Then again, I've always been a willing sacrifice. I am there for those who need me. I am relentlessly loyal. I'm a fierce friend. I willingly give, without breaking a sweat, because it is what I do. I like to give and I'd willingly sacrifice myself for others... I guess to a point at this stage in my life.

I don't know. Stream of thought and consciousness. I feel sometimes as if I have all the time in the world. To ponder like Plato, to question like Descartes, to dream and write like Octavia Butler. All the time I need. At the same time, in the same breath, I can hear the clock tick. A melodic tap of a finger across the wood of time, reminding me that every second counts and that I just lost several thinking instead of doing. But what I am to do? I have no time to even consider more, let alone to act. I keep thinking is the time near? Is the time now? Is the end almost upon me? Or the rest of the world? Or am I listening to the wrong clock?

What am I to do? I've felt for the past almost 7 or 8 years that I've been on borrowed time. As if I was supposed to die in that hospital bed in September 2001 and that my recovering was some kind of accident. That them finding out what was wrong with me was some kind of fluke. Or that that isn't it at all and I'm still ill because of something else. I don't know what goes through my mind sometimes. Maybe it's because of my biology. My DNA is predestined to wonder and ponder and question and ask and suffer and..... and what? And create and love and be.

I suppose it is, huh?

To give. To Give. to give.