Who I Am, Your Daughter

Last night, on October 1, I spent the evening praying about what I wanted this October to be like, what I wanted to see happen in my life by the end of the month. I didn’t really get any answers, but I did have a distinct prayer: Father, help me remember who I am, your daughter.

Such a simple prayer, to remember who I am. I’ve spent so much time discovering that person that you’d think it would be instinctual. Yet today, on October 2, I found myself physically and emotionally tired. It wasn’t a tiring day. I was tired. Worn out. Bushed. Wiped. Yet I woke this morning with that same prayer on my lips. “Father, help me remember who I am, your daughter.”

So was there something I forgot? Was my tiredness a reflection of my relationship with God? Did I somehow forget in a few short hours who I was? Hardly!

The fact is I am God’s HUMAN daughter, with human pain and human needs. It doesn’t make me any less his daughter that I’m physically tired. Who wouldn’t be tired with a shoulder that continues to ache and a disrupted sleep because of that shoulder? Who wouldn’t be tired when a new doctor shoves a two inch long needle in one’s shoulder in an attempt to alleviate the pain? (It didn’t by the way). Of course I was physically tired.

Emotionally I’m tired because it is fall. I see “tired” as a vast improvement from other years when fall was a four letter “F” word. Even while I am enjoying this fall with the crisp mornings, sunny afternoons, blowing winds, and falling leaves; even while my mind and eyes are enjoying this time of year, my body and emotions remember the events of the past. Will the events of the past ruin my fall, making it yet again a four-letter “F” word? No, I don’t think so. Life is different, and I am different. Yet still the truth of the past and all that I lost are felt. And I’m okay with that.

I’m okay with my past and my pain. I’m okay that I am not the same person I was, and yet I am more me than ever before in my life. I am okay that today I was tired, that all I wanted at the end of the day was a good, long hug. Because even while I was tired, I remembered – just as I asked of God – who I am. I am God’s daughter. With all the rights, responsibilities, obligations, authority, humility and power that comes with that. I am God’s daughter, and that can’t be taken away no matter how tired I am.

So I am grateful that I remembered who I was at the end of this tired day. It was the spiritual hug that I needed when a physical hug was not possible. I am grateful that God answered my prayer: Father, help me remember who I am, your daughter.