Most of the time I stay away from all the mushy gushy junk because I don't do mushy gushy. Don't get me wrong, I do want to fall in love with someone, so in love with someone, but I want to do it without fear from things that have happened in the past.
A lot of people really struggle with loving someone after they have been hurt by someone else in their past, but that is something I never want to do. And that's tough, really tough. To let yourself walk into a new relationship when you've been hurt so badly in the past is crazy hard to do. And you probably swore to yourself that you would never set yourself up for that again, then a few months later when the pain gets a little bit better you decide that you might could deal with at least giving it a try. So that's what you do, you try. And when you try most of the time you realize that replacing the person who hurt you so much just doesn't work out for either person in the new relationship. The only solution to overcoming that hurt is to wait it out because replacement doesn't work, in fact, it makes it worse because you're not really happy, you just think you are until the new wears off and reality sets in.
A week or so ago me, Lea, and Amber were in Hobby Lobby getting some stuff for a surprise party Lea was having for her best friend Kara when I saw this sign:
Amber ended up buying it and now I wish I had too. "Love is foolish, but I still might try it sometime." It makes perfect sense to me. Sometimes love does seem foolish. I think that's the one thing that hurts us worst in life. You can have physical injuries, but those eventually heal. Emotional pain often never heals. Sometimes words spoken years ago still have the power to echo in your ear at the most inconvenient of times. Love really can hurt, there probably isn't anything that hurts worse than someone you love walking away from you. Whether that person is a friend, parent, boyfriend, girlfriend, family member, or whatever. It still hurts. And it is kind of foolish to set yourself up for that kind of pain, but we shouldn't fear it because it's supposed to be the strongest emotion a person can have.
I've seen so many of my friends do this and it hurts to watch them do this to themselves and to someone they might could really care about if they had it in them to actually care at the right time and place. I was thinking the other day about this on my way home from Amber's house and realized that I've been hurt really badly in past relationships, but I never got to a point where I gave up and just thought I needed to be alone for the rest of my life. I just didn't want to be with anyone right then. I just packed up all the baggage from the relationship and pushed it out of the way. That's the only way to do it. Erase all the things in your face about that person and then slowly wait until you're ready to give someone else a chance because they're not all the time. I see these little silly facebook bumper stickers and girls' facebook status's that says things like "I hate boys. “ or “They're all the same.” Or my favorite, “I just want one guy to prove to me that they're not all the same." I hate comments like that because I know they're not all the same and I know that from looking around me. I see it in the guy friends that I have, in cousins, my dad, grandpa, uncles, brother-in-law, and in my friends' parents. They're not all bad, in fact, if you keep picking the bad guys, it's your fault. It's not the guys fault. If you're old enough to date, then you should be responsible enough to not pick out a guy that you're gonna hate in a few months. Granted, I don't really ever talk to any of my ex-boyfriends, but if any of them called and needed me for any reason, I would be there in a heartbeat. They're not all bad. Girls just think they're all bad when one guy doesn't do exactly what she wants and, in turn, that makes him a bad guy. That doesn't make him a bad guy, that makes him man enough to stand up to his girlfriend or wife.
All in all, I guess I'm saying that though I've been hurt, I've never had any fear about entering into a relationship. There were times when I was hurt so badly I didn't want to date anyone else, but that is just petty and childish to curl up in a ball and let someone have that much control over you. There comes a time when you have to stand up and fight for what you want and what you love. Love was never supposed to be something that is feared. 1 John 4:18 says "Such love has no fear, because perfect love expels all fear. If we are afraid, it is for fear of punishment, and this shows that we have not fully experienced His perfect love." I guess the big problem is that we can't truly love someone until we fully experience the love of God. I think you can love someone without this, but not the way God intended love to be. Not in His form of love. His form of love is the most pure and true type of love and that's what our love is supposed to be like to one another and most importantly to the person we are in love with. I am so thankful that I have never grown to fear love. In fact, I think it's exciting. And I think that's how it's supposed to be. We're supposed to anticipate the future of love, not fear it. I do not fear love. I do fear the idea of being loved and then left, but love... I do not fear at all and we were never intended to.
On Mother’s Day, we had a cookout at Fall Creek Falls with our family and on our way home me and Lea heard a song called “God Gave Me You.” By Dave Barnes. I had never heard it before and I just immediately almost started crying my little eyes out. The song is beautiful. It talks about how the guy has been hurt so badly and he has turned into someone he doesn’t want to be and God gave him someone for all he had to go through. Here’s the chorus:
God gave me you for the ups and downs
God gave me you for the days of doubt
For when I think I’ve lost my way
There are no words here left to say, it’s true
God gave me you
Every time I hear this song I just want to cry because I think it’s so sweet. I guess that is kind of what God does for us. After we do so much messing up and finally realize our way doesn’t work out, He comes in to save the day and give us someone who can make us forget all the pain we’ve been through.
And when God does this I feel like our whole mindset will change. Which makes me think of another Dave Barnes song called “Until You.” I don’t think until you find someone that God chooses for you that you can fully understand the love of another person. This song kind of opened my eyes to that. It says:
I need you now and forever
so stay right here with me
Don't ever leave
Love was kept from me like a secret
And I swore that I was through
Until you
I think God sort of keeps the true capacity of love from us like a secret until He is ready to let us be with the person He has chosen for us. Like He wants it to be as amazing as it can possibly be and if we have any idea beforehand then it won’t be anything like it’s supposed to be.
I feel sorry for people who have been hurt so badly that they feel like they can never trust anyone else. Maybe this will happen to me someday, but I hope it never does. I never want to fear something that God made so perfect for me. I don't know when that love will come for me, when God intends for it to happen, or who He intends for that to happen with, but when it does, I do not want to fear something that He planned out perfectly for me before I even took my first breath.
