Grieving for the sake of grieving?

Question: Why do people grieve? No honestly, why? What the hell is the point? Is it this sadomasochistic need to feel pain or is there a real purpose behind it? This question by the way, is not just for myself, but for others as well.

So I was talking with a friend the other day about our prospective ex-husbands over margaritas and tacos one Friday night. We ordered and I began to tell her that I am currently planning a party for a mutual friend of mine and my exes, and I casually mention that I have to invite my ex husband. Hmm… loody-doo-de-do… I look away as she the inevitable question comes.

“You what?” she looks at me like I am on fire. "No! He can have a different party for your friend!"

I laugh at her exasperation... but maybe a little too hard. “This is going to be fine. This is going to be great. I am so over him and all that happened. I’m good.” I reassure her pointedly and forcefully. Yeah, totally, this is fine… I can do this. I think to myself.

The drinks come and I grab mine off the tray with both hands take a big gulp while I shake my head with my best “whatever no big deal look.”

So as I am talking with her saying these things out loud, I know, I am good, totally. Why wouldn’t I be? He doesn’t care about me, so why should I care about him right? No, it’s fine, completely.

“So are you going to invite all of his friends from your old church?” she asks.

“Yeah. Why?” She looks at me with a look that says Are you serious? I am still shaking my head yes with my eyebrows scrunched nursing my margarita.

“No reason.” She says this in a way that almost sounds like a question. A moment pause then:

“Do you think he will bring his girlfriend?”

Suddenly I find myself sucking on the drink in my head like it’s going to jump out of the cup and run away if I stop.

I hadn’t thought of that one…..

Suddenly mind fills with visions of throwing her head into the punch bowl and lacing his beer with ex-lax. Maybe instead I could leaf his car with porn ads. Oh priceless. A sick smile creeps out on my face.

Suddenly I look up and my friend is waving her hand in my face with a slightly worried expression. “Earth to Sara, you okay?”

My first response? No. “Yes I am great why?” We both look down at my empty glass. Oops.

Okay, if we are looking at the above story, we can see, I am most definitely not okay. As much as I would like to be, I am not. WHY? Why the hell am I not okay with this? The normal litany of frustrated saying cut through my mind: he doesn’t deserve my thoughts. The people that abandoned me so shouldn’t even matter anymore. I mean look at my future right? College, moving, opportunity… it’s all out there at my fingertips just waiting for me to grab a hold. Things I never thought I would get the chance to do I am starting…. Why is this entire mass of goodness not enough? Why does my heart still flip when I think of him? Why do still feel so justified in my anger at him? Who cares if he has a girlfriend right? I mean it probably won’t be long before he screws her up anyways… poor thing.

I mean I am not even sad about losing him… no offense, but he wasn’t much to lose. I mean someone who consistently treats me like a second class citizen? Oh, just what every mother dreams of for her daughter.

And I don’t miss him at all. Not even a smidgen, but still this is getting at me like a trying to scrape out a tiny sliver with safety pin. He doesn’t deserve this time from me. He already got to much from me already.

Why…? Later on in the weekend I spent sometime thinking/praying about it. And gently, like a suggestion that could have been my own, He places the knowledge in me with ease and comfort. True counselor style.

I am not grieving based on his worth, I am grieving on the base of my own worth. I loved my ex husband with everything I had. It was a pure love, driven from the belief that he was the one for me. Honoring him was my priority, being near him my desire, comforting and encouraging him my role. I spent myself on him, and rightly so, he was my husband. Now he may have thrown that love back in my face, but that doesn’t diminish the value of that love. I can’t allow him to determine the value of my heart. It’s a good heart, strong and pure and desiring to love and be loved. He might not have seen that, but for once, I do, and so does the One I serve.

I grieve not for him, but for myself. I grieve the violation of the love I gave him and all of those that abandoned me in my time of need. Not because they are worth it, or deserve it, but because I do.

So am I still planning this party? Yes. Do I like that I am doing it? No. Why then? For the same principle. The friend that I am doing it for might not have been there for me when I needed it, and he may not have been, or nay, is the friend I would like him to be, but I have a choice. I can love based on others, or I can love based on myself and my real Husband; the one that commands the heavens and places kings and rulers of this land. I choose the latter.

This is the only way I know to stay soft, to not let bitterness rule, but to turn to my Lover and ask for His healing. To stay child-like and free in my love by loving out of my own heart not dictated by others, but instead out of a place of becoming the kind of woman that honors the love of the true Lover.

One in a million, or one of a million?

These last few months I have been spending a lot of time alone… on purpose. Focusing on my relationship with Christ and wanting to know Him more and more has taken top priority. And as He has been showing me things about myself, I have been learning more and more about what I want from Him, myself and what I have been settling with for years.

So the other day I was hanging out with my friend Jessica. We went out to spend sometime with a friend of hers Nate. The three of us were hanging out, having a great time. And much to my surprise, it seemed that I was hitting it off pretty well with her friend, and I won't lie, he was good looking. Actually, not only was good looking, he was funny, smart, a Christian, a world traveler, and did I mention he could dress? Yeah, it was a good package. For the first time in long time, I was caught off guard by someone.

So needless to say, there was much flirting, coy eye catching, hair flipping and the exhilarating moments of "Oh did your hand just brush my thigh?" Don't lie women, you know we love those moments, those sparks of electricity that you aren't quite sure are your imagination or the other person just yet.

You could imagine then, my surprise when my friend Jessica and I went to leave and there wasn't even so much as a request for a phone number. Huh. Okay. Well… maybe he didn't want to ask in front of Jessica. Not too upset.

So later that night I am talking to Jessica and we eventually fell into conversation about Nate. I drop the, "Yeah, he is really cute, and I think we kinda hit it off, what do you think?" What happened next was one for the books:
"He didn't hit on you did he?"
Errrr….. hold up. "Excuse me what?" I ask back.
"Uh! This is not the first time he has done this to me! I told him specifically not to make a move on you today! He always does this!"

Huh. Did I just hear that right?

She continues with story after story of when he 'hooked up' with friends of hers while she was around. There were a lot. Great.

Oh you have got to be kidding me. Okay, so let's get this straight, it wasn't that he was genuinely interested in me, or even say that I had some physical qualities that attracted me to him… he has a thing for Jessica's friends. I so should have seen that one coming. Damn! Duped again (as I raise my fist in mock fury).

Let's take inventory. After a good long while of having as little contact with the male of the species, and much time defining more and more of what I do want, I still fall into the trap of being not one in a million, but one of a million. Awesome.

You see, the more time I spend focusing on me, and the more time I spend focusing on Christ, the more the truth of His love settles in. Not quite as fast as I would like and not always as revolutionary as I think it should be in my own life, but still, it takes shape and hold in ways I didn't know were possible. Such as the truth that, I am to Jesus His one-in-a-million. He walked to the cross not begrudgingly, but with purpose. He gave His life for mine not out of guilt, anger, or even a sense of obligation, but instead with joy, love and peace. Anxiety of pain, hoping it could maybe be another way, but still, doing it with a heart full of love. A heart that thought you and I were worth it. Worth all of it. How many of us can say that we have loved anyone to that extent? How many of us have ever been loved that way? He thought not of His own health and happiness, but knew that to be in relationship with us, this is what had to be done. He put our welfare, the welfare of the world above His own. Huh, not your normal everyday love.

Okay that being said, as these realities take hold, I have begun to realize, to settle for anything less in relationship between myself and the person I end up choosing to spend the rest of my life with is just down right insane. Sound impossible? Maybe, but I have experienced the lesser, and honestly, not only does it leave much to be desired, but inevitably it breaks the heart. Uh-uh. Not again.

So what have I learned through the combination of the lesson above and the latest encounter between an ironically naive heart and a person with a weird friend fetish? I guess mostly, it hasn't been enough time. For as many signs that made it appear a great package, there were just as many that should have warned me that even though I didn't get attached, I am looking for the person that I am one in a million to, not one of a million. The one that will look at me not as something to conquer and receive their ego boost off of, but instead, something to know, to see… I mean really see. And hair flips be damned, I am not going to find that with someone who has a really odd affinity for friends of a friend…. Just weird. 

What to do until I find that one… or hopefully he finds me? Well, nothing. To be honest, though I may get sidetracked… I'm happy. My relationship with Jesus it is something it hasn't been for a long time; hopeful. Beautiful, surprising, almost, dare I say… intimate. All I long for. His sweetness, His kindness, His passion for me, it's beginning to settle over me like the mist you only find by the sea. You don't really see it, or at times even completely feel it, but if you stand in it long enough, you look down and you are completely soaked through, and so is everything around you.

All I have to say is, more time like this with Him, and whoever He has designed for me better be damn good. Cause He is setting me up with some seriously high standards… finally, thank God.