Laughing It Off: When to stop asking and start praising

In the interest of publicly announcing my deepest and most personal dreams and desires, today I give you:

Laughing It Off: When to stop asking and start praising

I recently started reading “The Circle Maker” by Mark Batterson.  Now, don’t hold it against the man that he has a last name that looks like a typo version of “Patterson”. :-) Here’s the book description from Amazon:

According to Pastor Mark Batterson in his book, The Circle Maker, “Drawing prayer circles around our dreams isn’t just a mechanism whereby we accomplish great things for God. It’s a mechanism whereby God accomplishes great things in us.” Do you ever sense that there’s far more to prayer, and to God’s vision for your life, than what you’re experiencing? It’s time you learned from the legend of Honi the Circle Maker—a man bold enough to draw a circle in the sand and not budge from inside it until God answered his prayers for his people. What impossibly big dream is God calling you to draw a prayer circle around? Sharing inspiring stories from his own experiences as a circle maker, Mark Batterson will help you uncover your heart’s deepest desires and God-given dreams and unleash them through the kind of audacious prayer that God delights to answer.

I feel the need for a disclaimer here.  I do not subscribe to the “prosperity gospel” of Joel Osteen.  I don’t believe that God exist solely to make us happy, and that if we simply ask for it, we can have that sports car we always wanted.  Note that Mark says “God accomplishes great things IN us", not FOR us.  I believe that we exist to bring glory to God and further His kingdom, whether good or bad things are happening to us.  Here’s an excerpt from an article that I think describes my sentiments very well:

When the heart seeks the Lord, it is satisfied with what it finds there, and its true desires are realized in Him. But loving and desiring God is far from natural for us.  Therefore, the first and most important prayers in the life of a Christian are “Make me love You above all else” and “Make me want what You want” because when we truly desire God and long to see the Kingdom of God realized in our lives and in the lives of others, when we are passionate to see His will and His work in this world, and we ask for the things that bring Him glory and increase our closeness to Him, He is eager and willing to give us anything we ask for… We must never doubt that, when we pray for what is in His will, we will receive it, and that what we receive from Him will always be that which is best.

Read more here:http://www.gotquestions.org/ask-and-you-shall-receive.html#ixzz3FeZe51qW

Alright, back to the point of the blog post.  I have many hopes and dreams.  I hope to one day land a dream job (I already have a job) in the field of student affairs and put my degree to even better use; one that works more directly with students and that I can’t wait to go to every day.  I dream of traveling the world.  I hope to live somewhere that actually experiences winter, at least for a couple of years.  I dream of being debt-free one day very soon.  But along with all these and more, God has placed in my heart an overwhelming desire to become a wife and mother. 

Scoff if you must.  Blame it on my southern heritage.  Blame it on pressures from society on women my age.  Blame it on an underlying need for romantic, male companionship.  These are all things I’ve blamed it on before.  I have been on my knees begging God to take this desire from me if it isn’t His will for me, over and over and over again.  “Make your will my will.  Help me to want what you want for me, Lord.  Give me patience to wait on Your timing. Give me the faith to trust You with my dreams.”  I have been angry over these words; I have sobbed over these prayers.  In the most literal sense I could accomplish, I have poured out my heart to Jesus.  I have hated myself for being preoccupied with what I call “the husband hunt”.  Those days that I don’t enjoy  see the value in being single are very hard.

In the Circle Maker, Batterson talks about when we should stop asking God for something and start praising Him for it, instead.  There comes a time when we have to recognize that God has answered a prayer, and then it’s your turn to say thank you.  Then it occurred to me: God has already answered my prayer.  I asked so many times, and that desire never went away; I’m confident it’s because it is part of His will for me to be a wife and mother someday.  I don’t have to obsess over whether my heart is in rebellion against His will.  I asked, and He replied.  Now I know that it is part of God’s plan for my life that I marry a Godly man and that our marriage glorifies God in return.

Now, all I have to do is praise God for what He has already done.  I am praising Him for the amazing man He is currently molding into the future spiritual leader of my household.  I am praising Him for my future marriage and my future children.  I am praising Him for the gifts He is developing in me that I will one day contribute to my roles as wife and mother for the betterment of my family and the glory of God.

Since I’ve grasped this concept, I’m much less preoccupied with when and where I’ll meet “the one”.  I have been much more focused on finding peace and fulfillment in God.  I feel like a weight has been lifted off my shoulders!  I am so grateful for His promises and for this amazing revelation that allows me to believe in those promises even more.

In a later post, I’ll tell you more about the uncomfortable process of God’s answering my prayers to mold me into a better wife and mother.  I truly believe I haven’t found my husband yet because I’m not ready.  I have a lot to learn about running a household and managing a family.  There’s a saying, “Be careful what you wish for.”  FALSE.  Be careful what you ask God for.  Stay tuned!

Immature Relationships: Laugh them off!

If you consider yourself a young woman, please read this.  I’m afraid it may be the most honest anyone is willing to be with you about relationships today.  Remember when I said that the true measure of a friend is how completely honest they’re willing to be with you?  Well, just consider me your friend today, young lady.

As I alluded to in my previous blog entry, I consider myself somewhat of a monogamous relationship expert, strictly based on my experience of having too many “serious” relationships in my 10 year dating career.  Unfortunately, as a student affairs professional, I’m also more familiar with the “hook-up culture” than I ever aspired to be since it runs rampant on college campuses.  So, with this combined knowledge, I hope to weigh in on a subject I heard being discussed on a syndicated radio show this morning. 

Ha, this is beginning to sound like a bad cover letter… I digress.

First of all, I normally keep my radio dial on 89.7 WMHK (We make Him known).  This is the best Christian radio station I’ve ever had the privilege of listening to, so thank God it’s local to the Columbia area.  However, every once in a while, I need a change; so I flip over to the local hits station (literally don’t even know the number off the top of my head).  And even less often, I tune in to the syndicated morning show this station plays: the “Ace & TJ Show” out of Charlotte, NC.  You should know that if I had my pick of guilty pleasure morning radio shows, I’d go with “Kidd Kraddick in the Morning” every time.  But that’s not an option here, so sometimes I end up with the lovely DJs of the Ace & TJ Show.  I have heard Ace, TJ, and crew laugh on air about how someone has complained that they are sexist and they don’t care because they’re so edgy and funny and blah blah blah.  Normally, I shrug this off because I don’t listen to them often enough to have a problem with whatever they represent. 

Today was different.

Here is an excerpt from their Facebook page of the topic they were discussing on my way to work this morning:

And just in case you’re asking yourself why this infuriated me, let me explain further.  Contrary to what your intelligent mind is probably thinking, according to the upstanding citizens over at Ace & TJ, women didn't lose respect for the man on cell phone probation because of the “iffy” texts he was sending… They lost respect for him because he gave into the “ridiculous” request of his significant other and let her have control over his phone…

So, once again, and let this sink in… The man was not worthy of respect because he lets his significant other see his phone when she demands to.  Not because he potentially cheated on her.  Yeah.

Without going into too much detail about what I consider cheating (ANYTHING under the category of “iffy” probably counts), let me give you my thoughts on why this topic was disgusting to me.  The woman on Ace & TJ’s show says that this situation is ridiculous because obviously the girl in this relationship is taking it too seriously.  There is a fine line between taking your relationship too seriously, and not taking it seriously enough, and this line is certainly affected by age and maturity.  For example, when you’re 15, “too seriously” (“We are definitely getting married and here are the names of our future children…”) is easy to achieve; when you’re 25, “not seriously enough” (“Whatever, it’s just casual sex”) is easy to achieve.  In any case, if you are calling someone your boyfriend or “significant other”, please please please believe that you aren’t taking anything too seriously (at any age or maturity level) by expecting that person to be with you and only you.  It is NOT too much to ask that a man respects you enough to not text “iffy” things to other women.  If you see or hear anything from him that gives you an “uh-oh” feeling in your gut (you know what I’m referring to), there is a reason for that!

God gave women this incredible gift called “intuition”; ladies, we KNOW when something ain’t right.  It breaks my heart that we often don’t trust our own feelings in these situations because we assume we’re “overreacting” or “too emotional” or taking things “too seriously”.  STOP THAT!  You should NEVER have to apologize for your feelings (not to be confused with apologizing for how you react to said feelings… sometimes that definitely requires an apology). 

I won’t speak for marriage, because I’ve never been in one, and I don’t think the same rules apply; BUT, if you are just dating someone and he does something that makes you uncomfortable in that relationship (i.e. texting other women “iffy” things) DUMP. HIS. BEHIND.  If he isn’t mature enough to handle the responsibility of being in a relationship, like simply respecting you, move on!  Find someone more mature!  As the beautiful Elsa once said, “Let it go”.  This is what is known as having self-respect… sometimes, no one else is going to do it for you.

And laugh it off.

Because God’s certainly got something better planned for you than that nonsense.

Three Years of Singleness

In honor of today, I’d like to start my blog with an awkward post.

Laughing It Off: the break-up edition!

Now, this topic is awkward because I have no secrets and no privacy in my life.  Which has definitely been a choice because I tend to have a problem keeping secrets about myself.  I just really like to have all my business out in the open… like that counseling technique of over-sharing (scratch that) self-disclosure.  The problem with this, is that while I see it as an opportunity to learn more about someone and let them see the real me, a lot of people are just uncomfortable with it.  Oh well, reason #891 I should never be a licensed professional counselor.  Anyway, I digress.  I have no secrets or privacy so many of you will have heard about all my break-ups in detail, and many more of you will personally know the other participant in the particular break-up I’ll be addressing here.  So, I’m sorry if you know someone mentioned here today, I promise to be classy with my truth-telling; try not to take offense (I’m pretty sure he wouldn’t… I’m pretty sure he doesn’t actually care).  J

So here it is: ladies and gentlemen (like any guy will ever ready this!), I have officially been single for exactly three years!  THREE YEARS! 

Just for some embarrassing background information, I still dream about my last boyfriend on a semi-regular basis, like once a month at least.  Not even exciting dreams, just normal every day, “Oh, I’m in a relationship and some random dream stuff is happening.”  I usually find this quite annoying and, every once in a while, it makes me super nostalgic.  I really think it’s just part of what happens when someone has been such an integral part of your life for over four years.  

I also recently started using the “Time Hop” app, which shows me my Facebook status updates, Tweets, and uploaded pictures from the current day of the year 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, even 7 years ago.  This is great on days like Thursday, when the status update it showed me from one year about was about Bigmama beating cancer (I mean, HECK YEAH!).  On days like September 9 (my ex-boyfriend’s birthday) when ALL of my social media updates involve him (and how special and great and fantastic and perfect he is in my life…), the app can leave me feeling completely and totally alone (scratch that) a little wishful for times gone by.  So, I have been mentally preparing for the last half of this month, knowing that our break-up happened on September 20, and expecting some really depressing statuses to come across my app in the next couple of weeks.  I was expecting to feel kind of down seeing my feelings so freshly splattered across my phone.  I mean, I do write very eloquently when I choose to, so I have been dreading the amazingly emo memories Time Hop was sure to bring my way… and the subsequent renewal of all those emotions from three years ago.

However, I woke up this morning and I felt strangely celebratory of this day.

I woke up alone, but happy.  I woke up early on a Saturday (yuck), but joyful.  I woke up inspired to finally start this blog I’ve been thinking about for months. 

I. FEEL. GREAT.

And I don’t know about you, but I’m shocked and really proud of myself.  J  There was a time (exactly three years ago) that I felt like my world was falling apart.  I cried so often for so long… I physically hurt.  If you’ve never been through it, I can’t explain the exact pain; but I can tell you that I was mourning.  That may sound silly to some of you, but it’s not a joke.  I was mourning a man that had been in my life since elementary school (remember, very small town) when I was Dorothy and he was the Cowardly Lion in our school musical.  I was mourning a relationship in which I had literally given all of myself (we’ll get into the topic of premarital sex some other day… For now, let me just say: DON’T DO IT!).  I was mourning the thing that gave me purpose and meaning in life.  I was mourning my identity.  I was mourning the future I had planned in my head.  I was mourning the parts of myself and of my ex-boyfriend that I knew we’d never get back.  For some (thankfully, pretty short) amount of time, I really didn’t know that I would ever be okay again.  I wanted to lay down and stop being alive for a while (no, I wasn’t suicidal).  I just wanted the world to stop spinning so I could catch up.  But that’s not reality.

Here was the reality: he wasn’t that man had fallen in love with anymore.  But the best news, the reason I’m okay, is that I’m not the same woman anymore.  So here’s a little advice from someone who should be an expert on having way too many “serious”, monogamous relationships (I had four between the ages of 15 and 22, the shortest one lasting 10 months); on falling in love with too many people; on planning a future (even if it was just in my head) with every guy that paid attention to me:

When it ends, laugh it off.

I don’t mean go insane and laugh when you want to curl in a ball a die.  I mean find something, ANYTHING, to be joyful about.  Surround yourself with people who love you enough to be completely honest with you (trust me, this is the measure of a true friend; usually only family loves you enough to do that).  Hang out with people who make you feel worthwhile.  Don’t wallow in self-pity or negativity.  And then, spend time with God.  Allow Him to love on you while you hurt.  Try to find His voice in your sorrow.  And seek out the reason He’s allowing you to walk in this valley.  Here’s what it was for me: I had placed my relationship with this guy on a pedestal above my relationship with God; I was seeking joy in an earthly man.  I’ve had to learn to fully trust God and rely on Him for true joy.

I think that’s all I’ll say on this topic for now.  Here’s to the first of many opportunities I’ve had to “laugh it off” that I hope to share with you all in the months (maybe years?) to come through this blog.  Stay tuned!