Prayer to blank page

Blank page, it’s so nice to see you.

They told me that if I showed up, I would find something here. So here I am, showing up.

I really need to find something—something golden and flowing and restorative like a nutrient-dense elixir—because I feel all dried up inside. The inside of my chest is like the cracking desert ground in Holes. I can’t find a drop of water there.

I realize why I’m all dried up. I know it’s my fault. I’ve neglected myself, neglected my Artist. I stopped writing. And I stopped taking walks just for the sake of it. And I stopped going to bed on time and getting up with the sunrise and opening the blinds to see the bright new day and whispering “Thank you.” I stopped listening for the birds to sing and my puppy to snore.

I stopped those things because I started craving what I didn’t have. Certainty. Stability. A guarantee of progress far into the future. Focusing on what I was lacking turned everything that actually was around me into grayscale. If this life was not good enough, then I must not be good enough either, I concluded.

So now I’m back here with you, blank page, begging for forgiveness. I beg that you’ll let me pass through your light-filled gates and that on the other side I’ll find myself again. And that she will be whole and plump and dewy, rather than cracked and dry. And that she will be brave enough to look after herself and to stand up for what matters to her. That she will teach me the importance of showing up fully for life each day, rather than wishing I were somewhere and someone else.