it wasn't about that.

In high school, I can admit that I was some sort of emotional kid. A roller coaster ride wouldn't even be close to portraying the course of events that happened to me in high school. My heart was broken a few times, and I've definitely broke hearts, too. I was playing on both sides in the game of love: the heartbreaker and the heartbroken. But, this isn't going to be some sappy post about who I've lead on, what break-ups did to me, or the girls that I pursued.

At the age of sixteen, I encountered one of the most difficult times of my life. I was in a relationship that I so truly adored at the time and managed to let things go downhill. Yeah...I screwed it up big time. Eventually, the whole thing became a confusing mess in that year. As the seasons changed, so did the status of our relationship. I've always hated the idea of being branded as the bad guy. I wanted to be the sweet, caring guy that a girl wished for. Back then, I was so soft and cheesy. Seeing that I didn't want to be the bad guy and having a childhood of adults telling me I was just a bad kid, I found myself trying to fix the brokenness in our relationship. I gave bombardments of apologies, tried to show signs of positive change, and prayed everyday just so I could have things back the way they were. Soon, reality hit me, and I realized that it just wasn't going to ever happen again. It was over. There were a lot of moments of mourning over the whole thing, but those sad days never really came to an end. My broken heart transformed into something deeper and more troubling to me. Even today, I hate being known as the bad guy. I will usually find myself trying to rectify my wrongs in any situation when I truly care. I guess that's the psychological effect of having a childhood full of times I was branded as the "problem child." I never want to be the bad guy, so I naturally find myself going above and beyond to completely erase any bad opinion of me. Compensation for my mistakes became a some sort of force of natural habit. And after that break up, I tried anything that could get the image I had of myself out of my head. Soon, my heartbroken days were turned into grey days. 

The issues of the break-up seemed to fade away, but new issues rose. At this point, it wasn't what happened between me and her that was bothering me and killing me inside. It was me who was killing me. No words can describe the image I had of myself. I convinced myself that I was a bad guy and that nothing I do and say will clean up the mess I made. There wasn't a mountain high enough to climb and get away from the pain I was starting to feel. 

I really questioned myself: my existence, my purpose, and why I was feeling like this. All I knew is that I truly hated myself. I could never have felt more shame in my life, and I couldn't think of anything but how pathetic I was feeling. All of my mornings felt like the sun hadn't risen, and the days felt like it was passing by ten times slower. I couldn't keep up with the amount of times I looked in the mirror and became so disgusted with the reflection. There was someone else in that looking-glass, and I wanted to punch him in the face. I strangled myself with hurtful words and used each day mentally beating myself up. There were countless moments I spent dwelling within the shame I was feeling. The distress started took over me and started to consume me.

Life was becoming more and more difficult. There were a few times I would cry myself to sleep, and a few times I cried alone in my room desperately trying to cling on whatever hope and positivity I had left. Giving a genuine smile while doing the things I enjoyed became a surreal thing to me. The future became a scary thought because I was so afraid of the pain and shame lasting a long time. THis whole thing seemed like it was going to last a lifetime. I would be telling a lie if I said I didn't have suicidal thoughts. Again, I found myself asking so many questions:

Why do I have to feel like this?

When will all of this be over?
Is this really how I look at myself?

My grades were plummeting to the ground. I just couldn't focus on anything, so I ended up failing a lot of tests and missing homework assignments. There were other areas of my life in which I seemed to have lost my concentration and was not myself. I found myself messing up more than usual while I was drumming during Sunday worship. My mother noticed that I hadn't been as talkative as I was before. Even my dad noticed something was wrong because his jokes became drastically lame, and  he admitted they were just poor attempts at trying to cheer me up from whatever was eating up my mind during car rides. My life just didn't seem to be the same with the emptiness taking over. My strength eventually ran out, and I started to cut myself. The habit lasted about a week.

After taking one serious look at my wounds, I had finally realized that it was time for my life to turn around. "This isn't me....at all," is what I kept saying to myself. Knowing there were scars on my arm made me afraid of taking on the world. It was as if I had a brand on me that would've told everyone, "Hey, I'm terribly ashamed of myself." Even though I really was ashamed of who I was, I definitely didn't anyone seeing what I've succumbed to. So, I put on a continuous facade on a day to day basis so that none of my friends at school could figure out what I was going through. No one was going to know unless I was willing enough to talk about it. Because I wanted to escape from the sadness I was feeling, I eventually found enough willpower to talk about it with some close cousins.

We sat in our church's nursery room after youth group on a late Friday night. I remember sitting in a rocking chair venting everything out to four of my closest cousins with my head down. My eyes became red after crying so much. The tears dripped all the way down from my chin and dripped onto my jeans. I was exposed. The room was cold, and I felt chills all over my body. My hands were soaked from wiping the salty tears that ran down my face. I finally lifted my head after I finished speaking and noticed that everyone else seemed to be crying, too. It was an unusual sight to see because I already convinced myself that no one really cared about me. But, I knew their tears were telling me that their hearts were aching from seeing how much distress I was in and how troubled I was. My older cousin, who was the youth pastor at the time, finally broke the sounds of sniffing and told me that I could overcome my depression. After speaking, we all stood up embracing each other and prayed. We left church and finally concluded the tearful night.

My days still felt the same after that. I ended up failing a marking period for English, and the rest of my report card was kind of an embarrassment. However, I was finally willing to share what I was going through with other friends who were close to me. I was very afraid of what they would say to me after opening up. Thankfully, God blessed me with friends who were willing to do anything to cheer me up and just be there for me. I knew I was making progress because I started to feel bits of love radiating from the relationships I had with my friends and family. It was a slow process, but I knew I was overcoming my pain. I found other outlets to take my mind off of things. I took on watercolor painting and taught myself how to play guitar which eventually lead to writing original songs. I started to read my Bible more consistently and praying that I would escape from the sorrow that took over my life. Late at night, I stopped dwelling on the depressing thoughts that gave me insomnia and started to let the songs of United Pursuit, Hillsong, and David Crowder put me to sleep. There was one night and one song in particular that really turned everything around for me. On another late night ride home after youth with my older cousin, we were listening to Sweet, Sweet Sound by The Glorious Unseen.

Oh Lord, come whisper to me in my sleep
Come pour yourself out over me. 
Will you draw near? 
Oh Lord, you're calling me back to your heart; restoring the innocence lost
Will you draw near? 
I pray...

Let it be a sweet, sweet sound
Let it be a sweet, sweet sound
Let it be a sweet, sweet sound

For anyone who hasn't noticed yet, those lyrics ended up becoming the title of my blog. These lyrics really touched me in a way that has deeply affected what I was going through as a sixteen year old kid and the way I live in the present. I never really witnessed God's grace and unconditional love until this whole thing happened to me. What this song taught me is that everyday God wants to tell me, "I love you." I just had to do my part and just listen to His voice telling me that. Not anything in the world could top knowing His love and allowing Him to completely take over my life. It was His voice that I heard which helped me through the struggle.


I held off on posting my first original short story and decided to share this. Recently, I lead a discussion group for our church's youth group with some teenage boys of 17-18 year-olds and talked about the times when God intervened in our lives and completely turned it around. I knew it was going to be a difficult task to get these boys to truly open up. I shared to them the trial I had endured when I was in high school. During the recent snowstorm, I realized that this was one of the most pivotal moments in my life. As I was binge playing League of Legends, I randomly asked myself why I never took the time to write about it. So, here it is, fam.

I hope that whoever is reading this is blessed by my testimony and that He intervenes in your life to change it.