Boy have I had the time of my life on this little roller coaster, LITERALLY! No I haven’t gone to the fair yet…that’s scheduled for this weekend, but I mean this Emotional One I’ve been riding for way too long.
Methinks tis time to exit this ride!
Had a Shakespeare moment!
Have you ever felt like you’ve met “The One” and it would seem that all the stars were aligned and your heart skips a beat when you think of them and then
LIFE HAPPENS! I mean despite you “knowing” that he or she is “that elusive one,” for whatever reason when you finally grasp the courage to step up to the plate, things just don’t quite add up and you’re left wondering
Wha Happened??????????????????????????????????????
Well, for the ladies…sorry guys…if you’re like me…Singleness has the tendency to encourage an addiction to romantic comedies. Even as I type this I’m realizing how that sounds, but I admit, I’m no hopeless romantic!
I’m a HOPEFUL one!!!!
Regardless, I’ve realized today…okay I really realized this weekend that perhaps, therein lies the problem! I guess I can only talk for myself, but I work with mostly women so I’ve heard similar stories, perused other blogs, and it seems the name of the game remains the same:
UNMET EXPECTATIONS=DISAPPOINTMENT
While I’ve been relatively disappointed at times with the way things have gone up and down relationally, this weekend I’ve come to one major conclusion: I’m Impatient!
Now I’d made up my mind a long time ago that when I chose to be chosen again I’d follow where God led me. That makes sense, right?
Sure it does. Well, I prayed about it for a LOOOOOOONNNNNNGGGGGGG TIME and my prayers were answered about a year ago. Only, somewhere between me reuniting with my Joseph and my present, I forgot all about the reasons I prayed for him in the first place.
I got looped into this “romantic comedy fantasy of “shoulds.” That is, I was so completely clueless about “dating again” that I allowed my mind to drift back to what I’d seen and heard “boyfriends” should do and say. Therefore my expectations were skewed from the start. Let’s face it, I’d learned enough from my past that friendship, trust, and mutual respect were non-negotiable, but when it came to taking things to the next level, I was all thumbs….and even now I’m still a bit fuzzy.
It really makes no sense to me because when we were just friends, I could go anywhere with him, talk to him, joke with him, and laugh with him without later feeling self-conscious about whether I “said that” or “did that” right? It didn’t matter because I didn’t care. It’s not that I valued his opinion of me any less. Rather I just was so at ease when I was with him that I knew he’d accept me regardless of my flaws. In fact, when either of us so-called “did or said something wrong” it made our time together that more hilarious!
We had a running joke for years on the days I wore my ever-faithful ponytail…apparently I was the only one at work that didn’t have a sewn-in…of course I’m not hating…you be you and I’ll be me…never had a need for weave thanks to my Cherokee roots!
I digress…anyway…
In my mind and heart for the past few months, I’ve battled within myself to get back to that place with him only to realize that I’m the one who left it in the first place. In retrospect, he hadn’t changed. His quirky sense of humor was the main reason I enjoyed his company. It was his somewhat annoyingly comical personality that won my heart before I even knew I’d want to give him permission to handle it.
Now I’m stuck with the reality that the way I’ve been the last few weeks with my all in one minute/scared away the next minute antics has him just as clueless about how I truly feel about him as I’d been at the beginning of this endeavor because I allowed a superficial list of ideals set me up for failure….talk about listening to wrong advice. I should have listened to my heart right after I listened to God whisper, “He’s my son too”
Go figure…I’d asked for a Godly man…a good father for my children, and a friend wrapped into one, but it never occurred to me until now that God was on his side too…that just maybe, I had the potential to hurt him, but that God loved him as much as he loved me so He’d chosen to protect his heart as well. Yes, I realize that given some of the hurts and hurdles I’ve had to overcome, the challenge to “get there” has been daunting…
…So I tried to rush things. I made assumptions. I fell prey to the “shoulds” of a society that…let’s face it…otherwise, I am completely at odds with…so lately I’ve had to ask myself,
“Why can’t I be myself around him anymore?”
“Why do I find it necessary to always wear make up when I see him?”(as if he hadn’t seen me on my worst day before)
“Why do I feel the need to consider what others will say over what I feel?”
WHY?WHY?WHY?
Because I started out listening to God advice and ended up following my own…I’d failed to realize that God had already reassured me what and who was for me is for me…that He had already authored the end of my story and that every plot twist had been meticulously constructed with both His children’s best interest in mind. Somewhere in the mix, I got selfish…I went ahead of God, went forward and was stuck with bitter water…so now I’ve gone back to My Father and asked for His advice…His word stung as it healed.
2 Kings 2:18 New Living Translation (NLT)
18b “Didn’t I tell you not to go?” he asked.
I admit now that before last weekend…everything in me said don’t go there…delays occurred on both ends, but I was stubborn and did what I wanted to do.
I am grateful for God’s mercy though because like the followers in the text, I looked at the potential and decided to move forward although He’d told me to wait. Yes, this morning, I recalled that the Lord sent me to Ruth 3:18 a couple months ago. Since that time, I dissected that scripture many times, but I never did the obvious. I never waited. So this morning, I repented and surmised again that God alone knows my end from my beginning. He alone knows the desires of my heart even when I refuse to admit them.
So while I still enjoy my romantic comedy marathons and I can’t readily erase all the stuff I’ve read about couple “shoulds” and “shouldn’ts,” I’ve learned to rely on a far greater source for my relational advice from now on. I’ve learned I have the hopeful expectation that He will do me good in my future. Otherwise I could end up in the right place at the wrong time.
When I consider the consequences of all the wrong advice I’ve followed so far, that’s not a risk I’m willing to take again.
©2014 Nadia Davis. All Rights Reserved.
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