Used by vs useful....want to?

This weekend I attended an event with our church youth group.  I love taking kids on trips like this.  It pulls them out of their normal and allows for environments where conversations that are great to share with them can happen more readily.  The speaker was the chaplain from a college and she was great!  She said many things that were profound, profound because they were simple and to the point.

She was telling a story that she was using as a metaphor to talk about how God interacts with us through pain.  Maybe you have heard this before from the Christian community that when we are experiencing pain that God will use this pain for good.   In the story she was telling she quoting a gentleman that had experienced real, catastrophic pain in his life and when someone said those words to him he responded that he is not in one good relationship where the point is to be used by the other. She was saying that God doesn't cause pain in our life so we can be used by him.  Then she went on to talk about her marriage she said that she loves her husband and in the process of life she looks for ways to be helpful/useful, but if the only reason for her marriage was that she could be helpful to her spouse it would be a crap marriage.  

This metaphor she was using to explain pain and a real relationship with God really hit home with me.  As I look back at my marriage and how I tried so desperately to show my wife love, I was constantly looking for ways to be useful to her.  I was extremely observant of the things and details that bugged her and that sapped her energy and I would just do them.  It doesn't really matter what those things were what matters is that our marriage devolved into a relationship like this.  My sole purpose on the planet was to be useful (I called it servanthood love, sounds better but doesn't change the reality)  to my ex, in a way simply used by.  I look back on that and I think that must have been very unfulfilling for her, I know it was for me. 

The more distance I get from our marriage the more I am able to see how unhealthy we were.  Do I think we should have got a divorce?  No.  But I do think we should have gotten some help, lots of help.  First of all, we should have been more open and honest in our conversation about our struggles.  Second, we should have gotten counseling long before the actions that were made that made it impossible for us to reconcile, let along seek health.  I think counselling should be viewed like actual doctors appointments, non negotiable.  We all need outside voices to help us take an honest look at ourselves and our relationship.  I know we should have been growing together in our faith.  We should have had more lovin' time.  We should have had an adventure together once in a while. 

Too bad!  I think we could have been really good together, like epically good.  One for the story books good!  Because we fit, we weren't the same, we were good at different things.  When we hit a sweet spot accidently(like my golf shots) we made each other better.  Together we were excellent at caring for and about people.  And most importantly we loved our daughters in a way that was transcendent and imminent...other worldly and every breath in every day.  We had other things that we were great at, one we lost somewhere in the pain of our journey was laughing together.  We both loved to laugh(still do).  

It's funny how everyday things in life continue to teach me lessons and reveal my involvement in the catastrophe that my marriage turned into.  I hope that although I don't believe God caused this, in fact I think the opposite that he gave us many, many opportunities to turn it around and pursue health, that he continues to place me in situations where I can be useful and just step back and say "want to?"  Want to help this young guy at work have a good perspective on parenting together, even when you don't agree?  Want to talk about your story and politics with a relatively new friend even though it costs you and makes you vulnerable?  Want to pursue teenagers and be real with them? Want to pray with people, recognize pain and more than anything else realize theirs nothing I can do except stand next to them and cry with them.  Want to.....  yeah in the midst of my everyday and ordinary life...yeah I want to.   

Peace

The fifth stage of loss is acceptance.... My marriage, my family, my life as I knew it once is over.   I think I am to the place that I am beginning to be okay with that.  After this year that seems to be almost hysterically funny, but not ha, ha funny.  I have felt s strange sense of peace, is that the right word?  I think it is.  Peace is a good feeling. 
I know I said I was going to be done writing here, but that last ending seemed incomplete. I think this is better. 

good bye for now

What do you blog about and what do you not blog about?  How deep do you go before you cross a line?  I probably have crossed the lines here a few times...yet I have been cautious to not cross the big ones here.  I have made some fairly big strides in the last few weeks I believe.  So I think it is time to stop blogging for now. 
So tonight I sign out and continue to move forward one step...one day at a time.  for now I will not delete this account but perhaps soon enough. 
Muah and good bye.

Bizaro world where to accomplish a goal I need to give up on a dream.

"How do you pick up the threads of an old life?  How do you go on?  Then in your heart you begin to understand, there is no going back.  There are somethings that time cannot mend.  Some hurts that go too deep.  That have taken hold."  --Frodo Baggins

I know deep down in my heart that this is not completely true.  However, I also know that when tragedies of this magnitude occur there are parts of you that die.  The question I am trying to figure out is what do I do with the parts of me that survived.  I want these parts to thrive and to write a story of great joy for the lives of my daughters and those with whom I am blessed to be a part of their lives for however briefly. 

 So the question remains how to accomplish this?  The short answer is one day at a time.  The little bit longer answer seems to be to stop holding onto the hopeless scenario where my family could reconnect.  Where my ex would come back and together we could work through our old issues and move into a new life.  A new marriage.  I mentioned that I am trying to do that in my last post.  It is harder than I thought it would be to be honest.  Mostly because the belief I once had that love can overcome anything.  And the current belief that I currently have that there is grace in this world to smooth over every wrong doing. 

Yet, I guess if I want to achieve my goals I need to give up on my dream.  That's so messed up, normally you sacrifice to achieve your dream, not the other way around.  Yet, I do know that to accomplish just about anything that is worth doing sacrifices need to be made. 

Maybe I will win the powerball tonight and all my problems will be solved1  Ha!

To change a belief requires pain and action.

So I have been reading a book lately called Love Does, it isn't a very deep book and a quick read.  The message really is don't take yourself or life so seriously and just go and love.  Which is simple to say and the author does a great job saying it in pretty creative ways through some of the adventures and stories he has.  However, as I have let this message wash over me it is starting to become like the gospel message.  God loves me unconditionally, so much so that he sent his son here to show me how to live, love, and eventually to die in a way that provides me access to be in a relationship with this God that loves me so.  This message is pretty simply.  Sometimes I struggle with all the details, yet I get it and furthermore believe it.  Once we believe in simple messages like these, they can change the way you live.  They for sure change the way you think. 

For my whole life I believed that love could overcome adversity.  In other words when a relationship began to have cracks forming in it, yet there was enough love; love would fill in the cracks and heal it, or at least it could.  I have "loved" two women in my life.  One was in college, I fell in love with her, yet she had reservations or baggage...probably both.  Even though I was doing my best to "love" her, she proceeded to hold me at arms length and essentially "date" other guys while we were dating.  You could call this cheating I guess, it felt like that to me, but we weren't technically exclusive.  No matter the wording I felt betrayed.  In the end, she came back and tried but it was too late the damage had been done to our relationship.  The cracks were too big, it was necessary...probably the right word is easier, to just walk away.   I wrote that off to youth and her baggage, love was ultimately still powerful. 

The second woman I loved was my ex.  When we dated it was fun.  We clicked.  We met the needs that the other needed fulfilled for the most part and we travelled the path young lovers take.  We proclaimed our love and then together decided to get married.  As I look back there were red flags, but those things exist in every relationship.  Let's just call them trials and tribulations.  In many ways I liked the trials because as we persevered through them I thought we were getting stronger.  I know enough about human relationships to know there is truth in what doesn't kill you makes you stronger.  The unfortunate reality of life is that somethings do kill you. 

I have been living in hope for two years.  At first it was the hope that my wife would see the value in our relationship, that she would turn back from the path she had begun down and we could find each other again.  Since the divorce I have lived in the hope that she would come to the realization that we might not have been nor may ever be "perfect" for each other.  But we love each other, have a family together, and the fact that God bonded us together would overcome the reservations.  Then love could overcome this reality. 

So when do you start to doubt what you believe to be true?  How many times does it take for your "beliefs" to be proven false before you stop believeing in them and start believeing something else.  And then let that thing change who you are and how you think?  These questions could lead to bitterness and resentment.  I do not want any part of those feelings effecting the way I think or live.  Yet, the questions remain.  The truth is love doesn't conquer all, only two people refusing to let love die can. 

I think it is time to set down hope and move forward.  I am not sure what that means for me.  I do think that I need to be done allowing these false hopes control the way that I interact with her and the world.  She left me, then divorced me, is currently dating the same guy for 9 months...some would say get a clue.  It's hard to give up on a thing that you believe.  It's not like changing the color of your wall or buying a new car, it truly does require me to change the way that I think. 

So for Christmas this year since I won't be getting any other gifts I will be giving myself permission to put this relationship where it belongs- in the ground.  I have tried to do that a couple of ways symbolically this year, but now I think I am ready.  Honestly, it's not what I want, but like the song says, "you can't always get what you want".  When this year ends I will be doing my best to bury my feelings for my ex as well.  Wish me good luck.    

Most wonderful time of the year?

This is the time of year for family...traditions, meals, gifts, snuggling under blankets watching movies, playing with new toys, etc.  And tonight even though my daughters are in the next room sleeping peacefully I feel lonely.  I am sitting on my couch with my small but nice Christmas tree setting off a serine glow.....alone.  I miss my family, I miss my wife, I miss my marriage.  

I don't want to go through this season alone...again.  I did that on my birthday for the most part it was depressing.  I don't want to date...I want to reconcile my family. 

This is all so messy and so often sad..... 

It's not all bad, it's just at times its sad. 

when do you know you have healed?

When do you know if you are healed?  When I have hurt myself physically there is a set period of time while my body heals itself.  With some of the more severe that time was longer and some even required physical therapy.  The pain that this divorce and the actions leading up to it and some since have made a different kind of wound.  As I get further away I am starting to realize a few things. 

I thought this would forever change me for the worse. 

I thought this experience would damage my soul in a way that was unrepairable.

I thought I would be trapped, by self doubt, sadness, frustration, confusion, etc.

I thought a huge part of me had died.

I thought I would be worse off. 

I think I thought wrong. 

This will forever change me, but it doesn't have to be for the worse.  I am a more understanding, empathetic, kind person now than I was before...which is saying a lot I think.  My soul was damaged but as it heals I am finding the extent of what I am capable of and just how strong I am, oh yeah and faith is real.  I have self doubt, sadness, frustration, confusion, etc.  but these things are not trapping me.  There may have been bars made up pf these things for a while but those bars are starting to crumble.  A part of me has died.  When I married my ex I gave her my heart, I believe that we were bonded together in and through Christ, so when that is torn apart, not all of you can survive because of the way the bond works.  Yet, in the midst of that, a part of me is still alive.  Even though I miss my old life, my old every day thoughts, the way I used to make decisions,  the life I lead now isn't so bad.  In fact, I am really starting to like many parts of it. 

When do you know you are healed?  I'm not sure.  But as I check in, I can tell I have walked a long way down the path of recovery.  So maybe the best answer is when you start believing in hope, not as a concept but as a way of life. 

I could be all wrong though, I am a almost 39 years old, entry level employee, with few friends, a small house, a small bank account, old cloths, a bed that is kind of depressing for personal reasons, who sees his daughters far less than he would hope dude.  But, I am starting to actually smile, like a real smile, soul deep smile once and a while.  Stick that in your pipe and smoke it!