Shake the dust off my feet

This past decade I've been out on my own wandering the vast spaces outside the safety of the fold.

I've encountered incredible and harsh beauty out here. Facing different ideas and perspectives that challenge and shake the core foundations of long held beliefs.

Yet it has been a terribly lonely and isolating journey.

I've had to find new sources of inner strength to carry myself through and not fall into despair over the isolation.

As a human, I still crave deep companionship, empathy, intimacy. To be seen. To be known. Or simply acknowledged. Not by the divine. By other humans.

The new places I've journeyed to can feel unsafe and destabilising, maybe even dangerous to those keeping the fires of faith burning. 

It hurts deeply that the need to protect these fires means there are places in myself that I cannot safely explore with old soul companions. 

The most profound inner journey I'm going through is one I must make alone without validation, support or companionship from those who were once close to my heart.

So I blink back the tears, shake the dust off my feet and walk on.

"And if any place will not welcome you or listen to you, leave that place and shake the dust off your feet as a testimony against them."

Mark 6:11 (NIV)