My friend Michelle gave me a book called "Boundaries in Dating." Its by Dr. Henry Cloud and Dr. John Townsend--the same men that wrote the book "Changes that Heal," which I read last semester (totally changed my life....everyone should read it...and that is not being said lightly. I'm serious. Read it).
Anyway, I started reading "Boundaries in Dating" last night and as I was reading, I began writing down the fears that I had when it came to dating. While I don't feel comfortable putting all my fears on this blog as of yet, I will say that some of them include: a fear of messing up, the fear that I won't be myself, and a fear of not knowing what I want.
I'm not ready to unpack what all of these fears look like or why they're there or what to do about them. And underneath all of those fears lie even more fears that I have yet to uncover. They're like little voices hiding under the surface that I can't quite hear what they are. This is the type of thing that most people shy away from sharing, and I am the queen of isolation and shutting people out. But if there's anything that I've learned this year, its that relationships are key in both personal growth and living a full life. We were created for relationships and we can't fully function in isolation.
Tonight Davo gave a talk at Cru from Genesis 12. He discussed Abraham's faithfulness in blindly following the Lord.
"Has God ever held out his hand to you and said follow me, but you don't know where you're going?" he asked.
I thought about it, and I'm not sure that I've never known where I was going. I just haven't been sure if God would pull through for me. In the same way, I think all of life is one big blind step after another. If we find ourselves growing complacent in our lives and we're not growing or developing in some area, then we're not relying on God enough and we're not taking faith steps to insure growth and maturity.
Davo then focused on the blessings that God bestowed upon Abraham and how Abraham celebrated by holding a "church service" in a lost land and using his blessings to bless other people.
"That's why God gives us things," Davo said. "To give them back to other people. God blesses us so we can bless others and they can ask us what why we're blessing them and we can point to Jesus."
Sometimes...actually most of the time...I don't think I realize how much Jesus has blessed me. I'm quick to hide behind being politically correct or culturally relevant, and I neglect the truth about the person who saved me and gave me something to worry about cultural relevancy in the first place.
Jesus saved me and continues to save me everyday and that's something I wish everyone could experience. Unfortunately, many people will choose not to and that makes me very sad....especially those that I am friends with.
So what the heck does all this have to do with dating? I didn't mean to get on a religious soap box back there. It just sort of happened as I am in a time of intense reflection and personal growth.
After Davo's talk I began thinking about the gifts that God has given me and evaluating how much I use them to bless other people. Without even getting into finances, I see that God has clearly gifted me with the ability to write. Most of the time I don't think about writing as a gift from God, but it totally is. And if it is a gift from God, then I should be using it to bless other people. That being said....I recognize that I make fun of people way too much. As previously established, my tendency to be critical in the dating arena is a defense mechanism to keep guys at arms distance. However, if I continue to do that, I will never get to know someone on that deeper level that could lead to love. And isn't that what we all really and truly want anyway?
Do I use my gifts to bless others? What would it even look like to use writing to bless others? Is this blog a blessing? Or is it merely a way for me to gain attention and spark a few laughs here and there. I think the latter has been subconsciously true for most of my blogging career. But I don't want that. I really want everything i do to be a blessing to other people and not an act of selfish ambition. Isn't that what's really wrong with world? At our cores, all people are selfish.
So, if this blog is to be used as a blessing to people, what would it look like? Would I come back from my date and bash every mistake he made or read into things so much that I find flaws that don't really exist? Absolutely not.
I'm not sure what a dating blog that exists souly to bless other people would look like, but I think it would be something like this: 1.)a place to offer advice--to use my mistakes, my fears, and my experiences to give you something to relate to. I wish I knew enough to actually give you something to take away from reading it. 2.) A place to have fun. I like to laugh just like the next person. Its just that its a lot easier to laugh when you're making fun of other people. Fortunately, dating is a wacky stage of life anyway (as if I would know), so I'm banking on some pretty awkward and embarrassing stories to come along with it.
And the last link I want to put to dating and all the rest of this stuff is the area of blessing and encouragement. I told Michelle that I didn't want my date to become some sort of guinea pig for me to test out all my fears and emotions on. Thankfully she was encouraging saying that since I was aware of it, that probably wouldn't happen. However, she did say something to me that I liked:
"Well, how about this. Why don't you guinea pig yourself! Test yourself out. Take a risk and be encouraging. Just be yourself!" (whatever that means).
Be encouraging. Its a lot easier said than done when your natural tendency is to push people through hurtful sarcasm. Encouragement requires a lot more vulnerability because you risk telling the person what you really think. You risk being nice and have them fall for that niceness. But I think its time to start taking those sorts of risks. I don't want to be immature anymore.
Hope you enjoyed hearing my serious side for a while = )
No comments:
Post a Comment