They say that life will never give you more than you can handle, but sometimes, life can seem so overwhelming you just don't know if you can make it through one more day.
~ BEN ~
The next time I opened my eyes, someone was standing over me. He had an expectant look on his face, like he was waiting for me to do or say something.
He didn’t say anything, so I asked, “where am I?” I tried to sit up, but my body didn’t seem to want to do what my mind was asking of it. I looked up at him and asked, “who are you? How did I get here? Where am I? What happened?” And then with a renewed sense of fear I started to remember what happened and I felt my voice falter as I whispered, “does he know where I am?”
With every question came a new sense of panic and as my panic escalated, my voice got louder until I could hear the belligerence in my tone. I knew I was acting hysterically, but I didn’t have a clue about where I was or what was going on. Suddenly, I felt so tired. I felt like my entire body was being crushed into the bed I was laying on and all I could do was close my eyes and surrender to the fatigue that was pulling me under.
When I came to the second time he was still there, smiling down at me. Who was this guy and what did he want? He didn’t look like he wanted to hurt me. He looked more curious than menacing.
When he spoke, his voice was soft, comforting and mesmerizing. He simply said, “welcome back.”
BACK? Back where? Where in the heck am I? I started to look around while trying to get my bearings, but everything seemed kind of fuzzy. It was as though I was trying to wake up from a dream, but I couldn’t let go of my dream state and commit to being fully awake. That’s when the realization hit me that I felt totally powerless, didn’t have a clue where I was and whoever this guy was, he was standing over me and I had no idea if he was friend or foe.
I asked him his name and he said, “Ben. I’m here to help you if you’ll trust me.”
Right! “Trust you? Are you kidding me, I don’t even know who you are? How am I supposed to trust you when I don’t even know who you are?”
He answered softly, “what do you feel?”
FEEL? Was he crazy? I was FEELING afraid, that’s what I was feeling. As the realization of my predicament started to sink in, the fear was pretty much taking over any and all feelings I was having at that moment.
That’s when I realized he was talking to me again. His voice was so soft that I had no choice but to calm myself to hear him as he said, “instead of giving into your fears, allow yourself to listen to your intuition. Is it telling you to fear me? Close your eyes and slow your breathing down. Give yourself permission to use all five of your senses to assess your situation.”
He must be freaking kidding me, no, he must be out of his mind. There was no way in this world I was going to calm down. Right now, fear was the only thing I could feel and as my panic started to give way to hysterical breathing, I simply passed out.