A Different Way of Seeing

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Today, I was offered a fresh page in a relationship.  Imagine an ivory piece of stationery with nothing written on it.  Pure, crisp, clean.  

Imagine a favorite shirt coming out of the dryer, and it's warmth on your skin as you breathe deeply and smell spring left by a dryer sheet.

Imagine grace washing over you like a waterfall; water that is just right in temperature; as it cascades over your head, and you stand under the water for a long time, letting its hydration wash away pain, scrub away past mistakes.

Today was like that.

Relationships are tricky.  What I've learned? is that when friendships hurt--it is because I have something inside of me wrong or twisted, that fails to trust the good intentions of the one I'm relating to.

When I am insulted, it is because my friend has touched an insecurity.

When I am wounded, it's often because my friend has spoken truth, but it's truth I haven't told myself yet.

When I am incensed, I am often responding to a trigger, losing sight of the face and heart right in front of me, forgetting who they are to me, and all the acts of friendship which have preceded that moment.

When I feel controlled, I am deeply afraid and anxious---because what would life be like if I were not in control?

I'm not saying pain is not real.  I'm not saying others don't sin against us.  

But I find that when I clean up my heart?  There is less to hurt.  

If you knew the story? You'd know, I didn't deserve another chance.  

I'm glad my friend decided to try again anyway.

To Tame the Tongue

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If you're like me? You've noticed that God puts certain relationships in your life, in order to challenge you.

I have a few such relationships right now, and one of the things I have learned is just how carnal I can be, given the right triggers and stressors.  Growing up, I always had pretty peaceful and longstanding friendships.  People referred to me as "mature for her age."  Few would say that of me now.  Perhaps when I was younger, I was just untested.  That is definitely not true of my life now!

For as smart as people seem to think I am?  I can be really dense around my blind spots.  For me to see some things, God has had to use a 3-step process.  Lecture, Seminar, and Lab. Lecture usually involves one of my pastors talking to me about a character defect that's come up.  (They should get hazard pay for this part of their jobs.)  I typically don't believe them and make them prove it, with examples.  (Seminar).  I open myself up to the possibility that they might be right, but I really can't totally see it or wrap my head around it enough to address it.  

Sooner or later, but usually later God brings a circumstance into my life to illustrate the concept one of my pastors has confronted me on.  And by circumstance, I mean relationship. He puts someone in my path to do the exact thing that I am doing that drives other people batty.  AND THEN I GET IT.

So----here's a recent one.  Sometimes, when I'm angry? I have tried to cover it up with more "professional" and/or "Christian" responses.  I have hidden my true emotions even from myself and tried to respond well.  Not a bad thing, right?

Except, when someone recently did this with me, in the exact way I've done it with others, I realized that really?  It was passive aggressiveness at it's finest.  It was so passive aggressive that it was airtight, and couldn't be pointed to as passive aggressiveness.  And so perfectly executed that I didn't even see my own motives behind it.  Or the anger it was masking.

Which brings us to the tongue and the heart.  I used to think that it was possible to hide my true heart.  That if I was struggling with an attitude, it wouldn't be detected, if I just said the right things.  Or that if I responded professionally and not given to emotion---that my anger or bitterness, or frustration wouldn't come across.

It's so not true.  My true heart, my real feelings are clearly seen.  I have learned that my heart will not lie.  I may try and spin my words-----but my true heart, my true motives, my true feelings and intentions----will always be brought to light.  Via my words, my inflections, my body language, my tone, my silence.  Somehow, some way---the heart doesn't lie.

So, rather than trying to fix things at the level of my tongue?  Things can only be fixed at the level of my heart.  I've decided to stop worrying so much about what I say.  Because even if I try to tame the tongue-----out of the abundance of the heart, my mouth will speak.  If I want to not offend with my mouth----I have to go after the root issues of the heart.  And let change begin there.