I qualify

I can't sleep. I've been up for the last several hours just tossing and turning going over in my mind a conversation I recently had with a good friend. Life. It's about choices. It's also about making the most of the bad choices when they happen. I feel like I can't talk about my life for fear of seeming hypocritical or a non-authority. Which is so silly. How can I be a non-authority when it comes to real life? I'm here, on earth. I have a mind and a body. I have my 26 years of experiences that encompass a whole array of good life and bad life. I qualify.

I feel like shouting that to the world sometimes.
No okay!? I am not perfect. Everyone knows that. Everyone can see that. The mistakes I've made can't be tossed into a fire and burned up for no one to see. They can't be deleted from my phone, or tossed under my bed away from curious eyes. Some can't be solved and forgiven with just an "I'm sorry" or diminished and forgotten simply by cutting someone out of my life. Even without voicing it out loud it is there, in front of the whole world to see, because of my choices. I get that. BUT I QUALIFY.

Sometimes I feel like people think I don't understand the gospel, or the happiness that comes from living it, because of my life.
Because of who I am, because I am the same person I was before but wiser. Better. More determined.
And I get that it's really no one's business because it's between me and the Lord.
And I love that. If there was ever something to bring peace to my heart and mind, it is that simple but powerful truth. He....understands without reserve, my heart. 

But I've been sad.
I've been sad these last several hours, trying to understand why someone else wouldn't want to share their happiness with me ESPECIALLY because of something which involves the gospel. But despite how hurt I felt by this, one thing kept coming back to me.. and it's simply that I qualify.

And as much as I want to be understood about this, I can't force it.
So I'll sit in the background and be happy for you even though you think I don't or can't understand.
Because I qualify as much as the next person.