The Thin Line Between Faith & Denial

Written on Friday, January the 25th.
Completed today

I'm writing this not to judge or lecture anyone..since this is a reflection of my own life, I just want to share a little bit about what that big "F" word means to me -with no disrespect to any beliefs..

This morning, I woke up and found the newspaper I bought a week ago lying beside my pillow with its huge, tantalizing heading that I must have missed when I first read it : 'Dirimu Terbaca dari Nama dn Kartu Tarot'. This made me shudder a little recalling my repertoire of tarot readings in the past, a dark, dark past. Well here's a story you might have to know about me and my little world. I was fascinated in magic-sorcery in particular, ghosts, aliens, and all kinda sh*t that freaks you out since I was a baby..well not that ancient, I mean that time where I grew up believing in stuff I see and hear in school and movies, in Richmond VA, America. Call us weirdos or whatever, but I'm sure that when you were kids, you'd also stick around and stay tuned till the end of the story when a dramatic know-it-all kid tells you about a boogeyman that lives in your school basement or the haunted tower in your school.Okay, that 'fascination' of mine continued till I returned to Indonesia, living my days reading Harry Potter and watching horror and basically all kinds of fiction books, comics and movies that can satisfy my thirst of the universe's mysterious beauty that lies in legends, fairy tales and the kind. I'd browse anything that are related to Salem Witch, America, Vampires..and as far as I can remember, legendary creatures- Loch Ness- for instance, wherever and whenever I had the chance. Then, in high school, things got a little extreme. One of my classmate was a magician and he had all those connections and networks with the fellows of 'my kind'..<that's a metaphor for freaks.haha!>.  He also knew that I love  all kinds of previsions. Tarot cards in particular. So he talked a lot about some fortune-teller friends of his, and a business man slash magician that sells all kinds of 'magic'. So I ordered a pack of tarot card and it was a 'special edition' said the seller. It was that special that it costs me 100.000 rupiahs-and something, that I collected from my money saving. I was happy, it was like a fancy crystal ball to an accomplished, well-known fortune-teller. I purchased a tarot-reading guidebook too for that matter. The next morning I went to school feelin like a star and showed off 'my precious' to everyone. To my excitement, I did impress my classmates and got some "ooooh..." and "woooow!"-s till a she-saint harsh my mellow in the middle of showing off my awesome 'talent'. This over-religious friend of mine was losin it and freaked the hell out me and my friends. She's like "Ya ampun..jauhin itu dari aku! Aku ga mau liat! Aku ga mau liaaaaaat!" , which simply means get that sh*t f*ckin away from me! I cursed her in my mind with the meanest words you'll ever imagine ever since for overreacting.
Now, that I'm close enough to 22, I realized that she wasn't just a she-saint. She was more than right and her reaction was totally understandable. As I grew older <and wiser, I hope> I learned that being a Christian means RELYING YOUR WHOLE LIFE IN GOD'S HANDS. The key to this? FAITH..easy to say, hard to practice. Then, on my "galau-est" days a couple weeks ago where I played The Script's song Six Degrees of Separation till it stick on my mind for days, a line within the lyric gave me the perfect flashback :

Tarot cards,
Gems and stones,
Believing all that shit is gonna heal your soul.
Well it's not,  no...

My love in predictions, horoscopes and tarot cards...WHAT WAS I LOOKING FOR?? Of course, you can see the answer in the piece of lyric above. I was searching, grasping for hope, any kind of 'assurance' that my love-life is gonna be okay, that I'll be living a pleasant life in a bright future. I was begging for healing from some kind of stupid magic, a dead thing that only existed because MAN made it and WE operate its function, not GOD almighty. But will it give the cure you're looking for? Unless the results are great, I guess everyone would end up with the same depressed feeling of disappointment. Well the thing about 'she-saint' that I really hate in the past was that she was judging me for something that I did "just for fun"...or was it? No. I cannot deny the fact that there was a time when I went to church, teach Sunday school, give advices to my friends and somehow- apart from that, I live far, far a way from God and his wisdom and trusted those beautiful man-creations instead.I have DENIED my Lord's power. I DENIED God himself. I made my father unhappy with my immature actions. There on, from the first year of college, I've never seen the cards again. I lost it because there were so much moving around in this house <and I hope it's really gone>.
I started to pray whenever I feel troubled or "galau" inside, nothing else, just praying. It's that kind of relief feeling that you get on assurance of pardon in church, a comforting feeling that you get because you have the opportunity to communicate with your God, for trusting his promises and to thank him for the FAITH you have. Most importantly I'm thankful because I'm on the RIGHT TRACK, and that everything WILL BE OKAY as long as I'm walking with HIM and stop being such an *ss to other people. Well I guess the thing that I want to share here is that you don't have to be that total clean, religious or narrow-minded person that blaspheme horoscopes, burn tarot cards and curse every single Feng Shui leaders and fortune-tellers on earth. Just to simply place the optimistic and pessimistic, futuristic thoughts in the right boxes with a little INTEGRITY. <I love that word!> Sometimes you're trapped with all those -istics running inside your brain.  This is where I learned that worrying too much won't save you unless you have a little piece of hope and optimism that gives you courage to do something. Being over confident of something wont do either unless you have a little amount of worries <of other possibilities that might as well happen> in your heart. See? It works the other way around. Integrity puts everything in the right amount, the perfect balance to keep you going forward, hold on in the most darkest an toughest moments of your life and look above to find God, the source of light and hope.

"Maintain the balance, walk with GOD and embrace His love"

-D.E.N-