DID YOU TURN BACK YOUR CLOCK TODAY?
Hopefully you did and on time to not be late or miss important dates and events today.
Last week a friend of ours turned back her clock, only one week early. She ended up being late for work, whoops!
But I am talking about something else today.
I'm talking about...Turning Back the Hands of Time
If you're like me, you have many types of relationships: husband, kids, parents, grandparents, inlaws, then there are great friends, best friends, good friends, acquaintances, business relationships and of course neighbors. Oh I'm sure we could come up with many more like classmates, friends of friends, etc...
I'm one to speak out, mostly share my deepest feelings or opinions, hopefully it is received as being open and honest but if it seems bias, it's important to understand that I think out loud. I tend to make statements that are thoughtful ones, not "oh how sweet" type of thoughtful ones but rather 'thinking as I am speaking and contemplating' thoughtful ones. I hope I end all my thoughts in a manner that is respectful of everyone's feelings. But I know for a fact that as I am 'thinking out loud' some listeners get defensive for their own feelings and opinions, as they think I am trying to force my opinion on them. Not so...but I do understand.
I love debate and other's ideas. Often you have an exchange of ideas in a conversation, it can turn into a debate without trying. But in the end it's important for me to share that I am an 'open thinker'. Hopefully just saying that will help you understand I'm not forcefully projecting views that the listener better get or else, but rather sharing views of interest and always hoping to have a "glass is half full" outcome accepted by others. I do get that sometimes you have to agree to disagree, but what I'm talking about today doesn't relate to that way of thinking...just sayin all this up front to set the stage of this blog.
I see the world through an 'Alice in Wonderland' view which can be thought of as quite naive by others, however I know better, it's just that I always 'hope' for more. I want to believe the best, learn through experience that getting to the best isn't always pretty and many times comes with grieving, resentment, or other types of feelings associated with some of the realities that hit me from being this type of person.
Ok that was a MOUTHFUL! My point? I am sharing from my heart here, thinking out loud, my view, opinion, and otherwise that remain open and changeable, however I hope you as the reader and in this case listener will think, even out loud, and not with a 'glass is half empty, 'oh is she naive' mentality'.
My subject today?
Friendship:Turning Back The Hands Of Time
You know our personal life cycles are not endless. We're not immortal.
Life expentancy these days has increased due to medical and health breakthroughs, as well as lifestyle and life changing mindsets that we may embrace. Our lives extend out much further than our former generations and I suspect it will only continue to improve. BUT...
Why is it, that we don't learn to appreciate some people, I mean fully appreciate them, accepting them no matter what.
Why is it that we take others for granted or worse write the friendship off due to some hurt or discomfort, only to revisit the friendship if they have a life threatening experience, or are in the last season of life?
Are we seeking to have friends that prove to not only have commonalities but can make us feel something we're missing, or validate what we want to believe about ourselves?
I call this selfishly demanding friendships.
SELFISHLY DEMANDING? WHAT THE HECK ARE YOU SAYING NOW, VAL?
Whether we will admit this or not, friends, close or not, hurt us, or bug us, or rub us the wrong way. Most of the time they don't realize they do it, they don't do it intentionally, and possibly some baggage in their own lives may be a factor as to why they act out the way they do. So why are we more tolerant for some and not for others?
No matter what friend category a friend falls into, if they happen to offend us in life we react in one of two ways: we give them a 'by' for the incident, or we write them off. Right?
Am I a Conditional OR Unconditional Friend?
Think about it, some of us have friends that have been there in dark times and offend us and we forgive them for it. And still other friends, that haven't been there for us through dark times when we felt they should of, offends us and we write them off immediately. Yet they didn't do anything worse than the other friend BUT because they didn't come through for us when we felt they should of, they don't get the same 'by' or another words, forgiveness, if you'll have it.
Have we ever taken the time to think that maybe, just maybe, those people or friends, may have their own issues in life that keep them for being what we need them to be in order to be 'worthy' of our continued unconditional friendship? No, not usually, more than usual, we look out for ourselves and likely that is just human nature. Still this has been on my mind.
Do we really try to understand the other person before letting that friendship go, or do we only see it through our own eyes and what we need in life, or don't need at this point, and is that wrong?
Remember, I am a people pleaser so I am always trying to keep everyone happy, thus when I have a friendship that changes course, or I see someone else with a friendship that changes course I start my analysis 'thingy' and mull it over forever....why, why, why? (Someone once shared an invite to the "I hate people group", and we laughed but deep inside me I cringed and thought, I can't "hate" people, I just can't, I won't)
We have seasons throughout our life and in every season, things, people, and places, come and go for a reason but we have to be OH SO CAREFUL not to fallback on this and use this as an excuse for letting go, just because.
THE BITTERNESS and RESENTMENT HURT LEAVES BEHIND...
Hurt is a very damaging experience and it turns good people towards ugliness. Believe me I catch that spirit in me from time to time and have to nip it in the bud right there or it will turn to bitterness and resentment, ultimately hardening my heart.
Ugliness comes in many forms, but the foundation is all the same, unresolved hurt turned to bitterness and resentment. You may be saying or thinking,
"no Val, you are being too naive, and I don't agree"..."I have let go of friendships and it's not due to hurt but more just sick of the way the person acts"
Well I challenge you to look introspectively and I'll bet in your core you'll find that the real issue is a hurt that is causing you to give up on that person, and unaddressed hurt driving a lack of tolerance.
THANK GOD FOR FORGIVING FRIENDS...
I happen to have many very forgiving friends. How do I know? Because they forgive me over and over again for my pitfalls, my blemishes, and they see the value in that for themselves. Maybe they are even selfish in a good way because they get it! They get how healing forgiveness is for themselves, more than for the one you're forgiving. And I gotta tell you that for this type of friend, they don't require a condition of the offender to ask for forgiveness or say "I'm sorry", they just plain forgive. This is so key to our own health! No I'm not crazy, OR am I?
Is this a season change in my life...
It maybe just that, but it also may be a catalyst to a hardened heart grown from bitterness and resentment, a result of unresolved hurt and pain.
Unresolved hurt and pain can take on a form of bitterness and resentment, finally hardening your heart to the point of no return. If we find ourselves saying
"I don't really care anymore" than likely we have the symptoms that a hardened heart is starting to grow or already exists.
We may think that tossing that friendship aside is the answer and cure all BUT actually it is the first step to heartsickness, a troubled heart, and that in the end will only hurt one person, ourselves. We may think, 'that's not true, no it won't', "it's much better this way", "I don't have to deal with it anymore", "all the nonsense" etc...but truly at times all that nonsense gets to you because of deeper hurt and pain that has been left undealt with and doesn't necessarily have to have been caused by the friend you're tossing aside, or giving up on.
Heartsickness runs deep inside US and if we don't deal with feelings from hurt and pain, it can and will change our character in the end. It can make a very empathetic and loving person, cold and callous, as they naturally use it as a form of protective defense, or better known as a 'wall'.
"...don't let your heart be troubled." Maybe this statement has more meaning...it is so clear to me now that I have experienced this... a 'heart' can become sick, or 'hardened' and one of the ways this can happen is by tossing hurt and pain aside and moving on without resolve.
We hate confrontation or worse yet, feel it will go nowhere and would be an exercise in futility because the other person won't listen or change. Yet the very person that needs the resolve and to change more than anyone sometimes is US!
Why? So we don't get heartsick or grow hardened hearts out of bitterness and resentment that festers inside us. It starts with as little as an "I don't care anymore" mentality.
MORAL of THE BLOG...
So turn back the hands of time, remember the person in your best of times and forgive for YOU, not for them! Don't ever settle for less than the best YOU can be!
Just sayin...
It's Just Val, Ciao!
