Defining Moment

I woke up every morning of my freshman year of college hating myself.  This habit continued for two years.  Every morning I woke up and realized that my life would be nothing like the fairy tale that I felt like I had been promised. I was never going to have the temple wedding that I was supposed to be aiming for.  I would eventually end up telling my parents that I was gay, and I would have to see the heartbreak splattered across their faces.

I remember rolling out of bed on my mission one morning and realizing that no matter how hard I tried I was going to end up failing, and I wanted to give up.  I knelt and tried anyway, and I began to pray, but the words just wouldn't come.  I tried to pray for the people I was teaching, for my family, for anyone else besides me. I tried to pray for the people who deserved blessings, rather than the monster that was just pretending like he belonged in California teaching others about God.  

But the words couldn't come.  All of my words were drowned in the ocean of self-hate that I had spent the past two years filling.  I was here teaching strangers that God loved them, and I really felt it for them.  But on that day I realized how jealous I was of them and the love that God had for them.  

I don't know how I got up the courage to ask the question, but after a few minutes of just kneeling, struggling to think of anything to say to God, I asked it.

"Do you love me?"

I felt it.  That feeling that Mormons are always trying to describe. It always sounds too good to be true when they describe it.  Some of them will say warmth. Others describe it as chills.  About eighty percent of them will start crying when they describe it.  The other twenty percent just get that dreamy far off look as they try to describe how how they feel.  

It was security.  I wasn't ever safe in my own hands, and suddenly I felt like I had been taken away from myself and placed in the hands of someone who would soothe me.  I felt that despite the fact that I was gay I was loved and worth protecting.

Suddenly I became one of those Mormons that tried to describe that feeling, and all I could do was repeat the maddening cliches.  

I'm not saying that this happens for everyone.  I don't know why it happened for me.  All I can really say about it is that there was this weird assurance that I didn't need to hate myself anymore.  I didn't know where my life was going still, and I was not attracted to the next girl I saw, or the one after, or any of the other thousands of females I have seen since this moment.  But in that moment I caught a glimpse of what self-love felt like.

The hatred didn't just disappear forever.  It always creeps back, but I have this moment that I remember of pure complete love consuming me, and it's what I cling too when I'm almost drowned in self-hatred.  I know what it feels like to love myself, and it's a flawless feeling.