I feel like i have so much to write about but i’m forcing the words from myself. Emotionally i’m running on low batteries. Sometimes it feels like you’re making so much progress but there are days like today where you feel like you just haven’t got anywhere. So much is happening so fast for me that it’s simply as confusing as it gets, and that’s why i’ve been off the radar lately. In a matter of weeks my whole life has changed several times over, and it’s only getting faster and more chaotic. As C.S Lewis so rightly pointed out, it’s at the most important times in our lives that we often feel like we have no idea what’s going on.

This week i had an experience that literally took the roof off the building for me, and i suspect it may just have scores of my friends in celebration. Many of them have already said to me that they’d really noticed something is different (yes, again) but they can’t put their finger on it. I don’t know what to say back as i’m lost for words a lot more than normal. I’m still trying to get my head around it myself. I feel strange but can’t explain it. I feel vulnerable and lost in a weirdly positive way.

What was so momentous that it could change everything?

I’ve lost all my anger.

I know how, but it’s hard to articulate to a bunch of spiritually-challenged infidels, i.e. my regular readership crowd. I know you are all heretic unbelievers who pour scorn on such bizarre and almost surreal tales. But you think my situation is weird? My mum is currently having medical tests because a tooth in her mouth is now made of solid gold after a lady who was praying for her put her hand on her cheek. I shit you not – she has pictures, medical evidence and everything else. It was a tooth, now it is a lump of gold. I was sceptical, but she showed it to me, and there it was in front of me. Weird, unexplainable and also spiritually indulgent and pointless. You can deny as much as you want until you see it.

I’m just going to write it as it was. I don’t care if you don’t understand it, mislabel it or think it’s BS. I was there and i know what happened.

I haven’t slept or eaten properly now for around 3 months, and the last few days have been sleepless, which made Acorn on Tuesday a very difficult day. Somehow we’d all made it down despite none of thinking we could make it, and mum said i had a “crazed look of anger” in my eyes which worried her (i was just knackered and grumpy). I can’t explain the service because it was all very usual, but we started talking about a number of things, including the reading we were listening to, which was about the prophet Elijah and when he visited a desperate and broken widow who “woke up each day expecting to die” and blamed him for destroying her life and killing her son, when it was him being there that brought her back to life. (1 Kings 17 if you’re interested).

To cut a long story short, it was made very clear that it was time to relinquish that guarded armour of mine and hand it over to be taken away. I absolutely, definitely, completely didn’t want to. I couldn’t do something so impossible and difficult. To say i was upset was an understatement. NO. NO. NO. YOU CANNOT ASK THIS OF ME.

“Can your anger protect you from me?”

Ouch. No, not a hope. Time to make a choice whether to do this. This isn’t something forced anymore, this is the next step, and it’s a choice. Well hardly a choice. When the boss says you need to do something, it’s not as if you can out-argue him. First, you were given a name. Then, you were given your identity. And then, it was time to take your burden. 7 times through the refiners fire until the pure gold is left at the end.

So as always, i got some prayer. I knew i had to, but i didn’t want to this time. And so they prayed for me. I didn’t feel anything at all, only that i couldn’t fight or resist – i was just too weak. I was calm. But the funny thing was they kept asking me if i could feel anything, and i couldn’t make out why. They kept putting their hands on my head, then off again. I found out later that both of the people praying for me said their hands were so unbelievably hot that they couldn’t rest them on my head. They had to keep taking them off as the moment they touched my hair or head, the heat was almost unbearable, like a red or white heat from a violent fire.

Now i’m a cynic, as the subconscious mind can do some very strange things. I’m not quick to believe just anything or naive to the effects of the imagination, perception or group hysteria. I am a scientist and engineer first, and spiritual second (yes wrong way round, i know). I’m infamous for my disbelief and having a reason for everything other than the obvious. I didn’t feel some huge anointing, or some kind of revelatory experience that changed my life in seconds. I just sat there. All i know is what they said, and what everyone saw. It’s not wise to go into the rest of the details but suffice to say that those who were there called it a “very special anointing” that “blinded” a whole group of people, whatever that means. I didn’t see, hear or feel anything.

It’s hard to deny when a few dozen people witnessed the same thing. It’s hard to deny when you see a fucking great gold tooth in someone’s mouth. I could lie or play it down, but it’s not the truth. I know what i saw and how it was. I had coffee and felt fine. No big thing. We had a lunch afterwards and i enjoyed the sun. I wasn’t dancing on air, singing, laid out, convulsing or suddenly Mr Caring.

But i do feel different. It’s subtle, but it’s there.

I described it to my mum and sis like i’d always worn a “black shroud” over me that was some kind of protective skin. And on top of that, that there was a “pile of black granite” behind me that would go into total freefall landslide when i got angry, like it was pushing on my back with unstoppable force. After that, it was just a flood of verbal viciousness and my whole body is kill mode. I would go numb and be overwhelmed with rage, but in a gentle way - I’ve never been one to throw chairs through windows or attack anyone physically. Attack me, and that pile of granite started crashing behind me, like a river bursting its banks.

When i getting hurt, felt vulnerable or scared, i would do this automatic thing where i grit my teeth, started staring, clenched my fists, and pulled that shroud over me and sunk backwards into that pile of, well, hate. Yeah, i guess that’s what it was. Hate. Like taking shelter in the darkness to hide from what was outside. When you’re tensed up, you can’t feel the blow so much.

Now i’ve got angry this week a few times, so don’t think i’m saying i’m suddenly a teddy bear, as that’s not the case. The difference is that i don’t feel the landslide of the river bursting its banks. I shouted at my dad but i felt it in my chest as a burning – that old “hurt” feeling that you get when you’ve been betrayed or cut up. My body feels lighter and i have more energy. I was up for almost 3 days and could have gone on for another 2 easily. I don’t know what i’m going to do with all this excess energy i have now that it’s no longer needed to keep the floodgates closed.

Anger in itself really isn’t hard to understand – it is simply our emotional reaction to feeling wronged somehow. If you’re angry, you feel wronged. 90% of anger is the quiet, silent, resentful, seething kind as we don’t believe we are allowed to express it or should. We’re taught from birth that is a “bad” feeling that should be hidden, when it’s entirely natural. Women are dreadful for it, as their mums tell them to just “get on with it” and say nothing. We bottle it up and pretend it’s not there, because if we do, the world will fall apart, we won’t be able to control ourselves and will damage everyone around us.

I was always told i wasn’t allowed to be angry because it was all my fault. I was “bad” and “wrong” and some kind of defiant rebel who was born evil and caused everything bad. Because i was bad, the anger i felt was bad too. It’s taken me a long time to reconcile the fact that i wasn’t bad, i had a right to feel angry and wronged, and that it was ok to release it because it was ok to be there in the first place.

I took that anger and turned into armour. When we are children we adopt childish things to keep us alive so we can survive the environment we live in. I guess you can call them defensive mechanisms, but it sounds like a tired cliché. You go into a shell, you forget, you block out, you go numb, you clench and tense up – you do what you have to do. But there comes a time when the things you adopted as a child to survive just aren’t appropriate anymore. And so it has been for me – if i’m old enough to drive my life, it’s time for the armour to come off and be replaced by someone, or something else. In my case, i never realised love is a more light and powerful armour, and it’s about being protected by my Father.

The same goes my supposed “arrogance” If you ask my family (except my mum) or my oldest friends, they think it’s totally absurd that i’m frightening or arrogant. They scoff at the idea. But i learnt recently that it is a common theme when i meet people, and that’s clearly not good – the survey made it clear to me even though i’d heard it several times before.

This may come as a surprise, or even a cop-out, but it’s not arrogance. It’s defensiveness. I thought about it long and hard, and it’s based on being frightened. Not that i’m not right, but that others are out to harm me somehow or challenge my togetherness or identity. You just automatically tense up, react negatively, and it is perceived as arrogance. You can’t be humble when you’re threatened. You can’t be gentle when you feel unsettled. Just as a flinch physically when anyone comes near, i also flinch mentally. I pout scorn on people’s ideas and can be very negative, as it’s an immediately reactionary response.

I listen to my dad interrogate and demand answers, throw his weight around, sound like a judge who is being asked for a ruling, and all his other proud dysfunctional crap, and since that day in Acorn, i no longer see him as a threat. I can see that he’s terrified of me, and why he is the way he is. If i had one prayer in my life, it was that i never sound like him when he berates others. I know i do, which makes me sick. But i know now that it comes from that residual pent-up anger he s stored up for decades, and his own terror from the intentions and will of other people he feels threatened by. He’s just a deeply unhappy man who never got over that defensiveness, and still lives in his coma because he didn’t have the strength to be a man, deal with it, and be a good father that gave his kids what they needed. It takes strength to be a man, and they don’t tell you that in school.

But i’ve felt that start to relax and pour away, and people are beginning to comment. Without that fear, or that anger, i’m able to relax and listen more. I can take time to phrase things differently and be more modest without the ego-centrism. Being guarded had a purpose and reason many years ago, but it doesn’t now. It’s harmed me more than it’s hurt me. I’m not saying it’s some kind of radical Damascian conversion, but it is very much a wonderful release of some dark feelings and control mechanisms inside me that have lightened me up and allowed me to be more loving and emotionally fluent, even accepting.

If you hold onto your pain, you think it “protects” you somehow. If you hold it there in front and cling on to it, you’ll be able to use to push away the bad and block out like a shield. You resent those who wrong you in the hope that it will poison them, but it just poisons you instead. You tense up, curl up into a ball, clench everything and live through the shockwave. It’s just what you learn and what you do. But it’s also childlike and not right in adulthood.

Piers took it upon himself to get me as drunk as possible last night in Putney, and both him and Kate gave me a real smacking of home truths, in their semi-affectionate way. Piers was expressing how he considered true friendship to be when someone is totally, bluntly and painfully honest with you – so now i know it’s not just me, but how my friends were all brought up to be. So i found myself saying to him “yes but it’s about the way you say it. It’s about how you put it, and you can be more diplomatic and sensitive.”

Wait a minute. Stop. Hold the press. Did i just say that? Where did that come from? Since when did i think or say that?

We both laughed. Life is about balance, context and knowing what to say when, in what way. You don’t draw your sword to a poet, and you don’t read poetry to a swordsman, as they say. Normally i would have been cutting and vicious. I knew something was going on at that moment as both of them looked at me like i’d just pissed myself in front of a crowd of people. I said to Em tonight that we’ve been talking for months but haven’t had a single argument so far. This could be the start of something really new inside me. Don’t think i won’t scrap though, as i will.

It was also amazing to hear the way Piers was talking about Kate. I’ve never heard him so happy - he’s found what he wants to do in life, and more than that, he’s found who he wants to live it with. I realised my own effect and influence on his life, from when we were small. I always felt angry at him because our friendship seemed so one-sided with him always burdening me with his problems all the time but never listening to any of mine. But i found out that i was virtually the only one who listened, and so much of who and what i am made him what he is today. If you hear him talking, you can easily pick up that who he is seems odd when you look at his parents. You can’t be bitter when someone thanks you for who they are. Em says she credits me with teaching her a lot and changing her immensely for the better.

I have no idea to b honest, but Piers actually had me genuinely speechless:

“She may not be pretty to everyone, and i’ve taken the piss out of her to get to the gym because she’s put on a few pounds, but to me, she’s beautiful. Beautiful. Beautiful in every way. She’s my best friend in the world. Every time i’ve cried or fallen apart, she’s just put her arm around me and said ‘come on, get up. you can do it’, and that means so much to me. More than anyone will ever know. When i’m tired, stressed out and my mind is crazy - my mind never stops - when i’m with her, it just stops completely and i stop thinking of anything at all. I go blankand it’s only her there. I just love her above everything or anyone. It’s impossible to explain unless you’ve felt it.”

I told him i’d felt that companionship thing too, but it turned out to be an act. I was listening to him feeling the pinch and how much i’ve missed my own travel buddy because i thought i’d found that with someone myself. I’d take a size-16 heffer over some size-8 trophy girlfriend any day if i knew she loved me like that and was my best mate. That’s what girls never seem to get - when we say you’re beautiful, we’re not talking about your figure, your clothes, your looks, your imperfections or anything else. When we say you’re beautiful, we are talking about your essence, your life, the sparkle in your eye, your radiance, your kindness, your dlightful loveliness and the feeling we get inside that we can’t put into words when we look at you or think about you.  We couldn’t give a shit about all the things you worry about.

I still have that righteous anger, but it serves a more relevant purpose. That energy i’ve spent being a vicious-tongued bastard is now freed up for me to put into a more virtuous place, like courage and integrity. Instead of being enraged wildly wanting to just rip people apart, it’s more in the form of the will to stand up for what’s right and attack those who are wronging others. If i’ve been wronged i’m never going to be pleasant, but i don’t have a landslide behind me wanting to burn you alive for it.

This is my testimony, whether you accept it or not. It is my truth. I don’t know if i just underwent some kind of supernatural healing process, but i know that i understand the real me to be breaking through, and that i am a lot more gentle and kind than i have been allowed to show until now. I am more certain of my character and my values, and more able to stand up for myself without compromising to keep others from walking away from me. Walk if you want now. No emotional violence, just complete detachment and indifference. The energy i would put into attacking someone just flows into making my own life better and for loving those who love me.

I’ve had people scream at me saying things like “your God hates me”. He’s not “my” God, he’s yours too. He doesn’t punish or condemn, as He has no fucking need to. He’s not going to burst through your ceiling uninvited; He will only come by invitation when you meet Him in the middle with an honest and open heart. Why is that so difficult to get? Why the bitterness that He’s not saving you from your own fuckups and the free choice of other people that we all get?

The only difference between you and me is that i chose to go and find Him. And when i did, He explained that He’d been wanting to get to know me for longer than i’d known. But it is a choice, and that is the way it has to be. You only find that out if you ask. You only know these things if you seek. Not because you’re weak or naive, but because you have an intelligent sound mind that dares to ask the question of how the fuck everything we can see got here in the first place, or how it was that science tells us that the universe and time both had a beginning. Dare to ask that question, and then you need to ask *why* it happened.

All i know is i am a man who has been stripped bare of that anger and refined in the fire too many times to be the same. Nakedness doesn’t feel too bad at all, and nowhere near as bad i thought it would.

P.S. If you want to hear what the Killstream vocals are sounding like…

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“Looking at you, holding my breath, for once in my life, I’m scared to death…Maybe i’m wrong, but i’m feeling right, whenever i’m alone, with you tonight…”