Big Ball of Emotion

It's quite possible that I am emotionally stunted.

Wonderful.

Usually when I write on this blog, I give some hope at the end.  Well, at least I try to.  I try to relate it to God and his goodness and his faithfulness to all of us.

I don't know if I can do that today.

I'm in a class called Dynamics of Spiritual Life.  It's a great class.  One of our assignments is to do this thing called a "Design Paper" in which we figure out the design God has for us in our lives.  Which is fantastic.  Except it made me rehash my entire childhood.  Which brought up unresolved emotional issues from high school.

You'd think that 10 years after my senior year of high school, I would be over it.  But apparently I'm not.  And I figured out why.

First, let me tell you what I remember from senior year.

My boyfriend broke up with me two weeks before my senior year.  All my friends took his side in the break up and abandoned me, essentially leaving me friendless.  My mother had to force me to go to the homecoming game, where I sat alone.  I asked my parents multiple times if I could switch to the local public high school, and they said no.  The guy I asked to prom ditched me for another girl.

That's all I remember.  I didn't realize that I had blocked so much of it out.  I remember talking to one of  those friends who abandoned me, and he asked me if I had remembered a significant conversation that we had, and I had no recollection of it.  Someone else asked me if I remembered being at an event that happened, and I couldn't remember it.

My issue is not the ex-boyfriend.  I'm over that.  And thankful that we broke up, because we would have been unhappy together, and I clearly needed to grow emotionally and spiritually.  My issue is that when I needed my friends the most, when I was hurt and alone, they pushed me away.

And so starts the trust and loneliness issues that have been plaguing me for the last 10 years.

I was telling Melissa Z. a story the other day, and I told her that she was the second person to whom I had told that story, and she said, "you don't let people in very much, do you?"

I was under the impression that I let people in all the time.  However, she got me thinking.  I really don't let many people in.  When the big life events happen, I push people away because I don't want them to see that I'm hurting.  Or I play it off like I'm fine.  I've gotten so good at compartmentalizing my emotions that I don't even know when I'm doing it.

So 10 years later, I'm having a meltdown over something that happened to me in high school.  That's how long I've pushed aside that emotion.

I feel ridiculous that this is even happening to me.  I also feel sad, and hurt, that my 18 year old self had to deal with stuff that I didn't know how to handle.  I'm sad that all my friends deserted me.  I'm sad that I've been lonely for 10 years.  I feel like a child, stamping my foot and saying, "That's not fair!" Senior year of high school is supposed to be one of the best times in life, and it was the worst for me.  And that makes me angry.

I'm not writing this so that you will feel sorry for me.  I'm writing this so that you know what I'm dealing with when I'm crying in the middle of church, or if I leave the room, or if I shut my door in your face, or if I just don't seem like talking.

Anger was the one negative emotion I was ever allowed to feel at home.  We didn't cry, or feel hurt, we just got mad.  Because it never lasted long.  You asked for forgiveness, and then it went away.  When something sad happened, I remember my parents telling me, "You're fine.  Get over it."  Which, ironically, is how I respond to other people when bad things happen to them.  It takes every ounce of willpower NOT to say that to other people.  Because most of the time it's NOT fine, and they can't just get over it.

I thought I was over what happened in high school.  But I'm not.  I'm confused and angry at God that all of that happened to me.  I'm sad that I have so few good memories (the only good memory I have of high school is Octoberfest, which I love to talk about, so ask me about it.  There will be singing.).  And I'm left this big ball of emotion.  I'm crying out 10 years worth of hurt and loneliness.  And I don't know how to make it any better.  I don't know how to make the loneliness go away.  Maybe I have to start letting people in, but I don't want them to see me all emotional, because then I start thinking that people are just being my friend because they feel sorry for me, because I'm just the sad lonely girl.  And I don't like to share things about myself, because, as this Design Paper has revealed to me, my life is sad.  I don't have good memories or stories to share.  No one wants to hear the stories of how I sat by myself in the cafeteria at Hope.  No one wants to hear about how I almost left.  No one wants to hear about the weekends I spent alone at Calvin.  No one wants to hear about the 2 years when I lived with my parents and would stay in my room for 18 hours a day.

So I either tell people about the bad times in my life, at which point they feel sorry for me.  Or I push all the sadness aside and never deal with it and pretend to be happy.  Either way, I'm screwed.

I don't know what to do.  I don't even know where to begin.  And in the midst of all of this emotional stuff, I have to write an exegesis paper.  And a design paper.  Time doesn't stop while you deal with the crap of life.  It would be nice though.

Great Expectations

Expectations are a dangerous thing.

We've all been asked the question, "Where do you see yourself in 10 years?"  Right there you're setting yourself up for failure.

Don't get me wrong, it's good to have goals and dreams and hopes and wishes.

But when you expect something, a lot can go wrong.

10 years ago, I was 18.  I was starting my senior year of high school.  I was living the dream, on top of the world.

Okay, that's not true.  I was miserable and had no friends and couldn't wait to get out of high school.

However, when I was 18, I felt like I had the next 10 years figured out.

I was going to Hope College, where I would major in education and meet an awesome guy and we would get married right after graduation and then move back to Chicago where I had a job waiting for me as a high school teacher at one of the Christian schools in the area and we would get a house and a dog and by the time I turned 28 I would have one kid or at least one on the way.

I was so sure that that was what God wanted for me because it was what I wanted.

Clearly, I was wrong.

I changed my major 5 times in college (and I still graduated in 3 1/2 years! Crazy!) before settling on sociology and religion.  I met a guy, dated him for 2 years, and then broke up with him right before senior year.  I went to seminary round 1.  I got a masters degree.  I got a job and moved back in with my parents.  I went back to school (again!) 1000 miles away from home.

The things that I wanted most in life at 18 were not the things I received.

It's come to my attention that I hated my life for a really long time. I was heartbroken my senior year of high school.  I was miserable and sad at Hope because I had alienated all my friends for a guy.  I regretted not taking the job offer in California.  I wanted to quit Calvin more than once.  Loneliness pervaded the 2 years that I lived at home.  For 8 years of my life I was sad.

In those 8 years, I constantly wondered why God had put me on the earth if I was going to be miserable.  I felt lost, without a sense of purpose, and I was not living the life that I had expected I would be living.

I kept fighting with God, pushing him away and trying to do my own thing because I thought what I could plan was better than his plans for me.

I have this fear in life, the fear that if I trust God with my future, he's going to do something crazy, like make me be a poor missionary in Azerbaijan.  That's a real country.  I looked it up.  Or, worse yet, God is going to make me be single for the rest of my life (GASP!).

However, when I follow God's plans instead of making my own, good things happen.

Coming to Gordon-Conwell wasn't in my plans.  I never wanted to go back to school.  After I finished at Calvin I said, "That's it.  I'm done.  I'm never going back to school."  Two years later, I went back.  Against my will, really.  And I can honestly say that it was the first place that I had been in 8 years that  I wasn't miserable.  In fact, I feel happy.  I feel ecstatic.  I feel overjoyed.  Just being at Gordon-Conwell.

It's funny, because I have all of these trust issues.  Yet, when I look at my life, the ONE time that I trusted God with something big, a great thing happened.  So why do I have so much trouble trusting God?

I don't know.  I can't tell you that.  My theological brain tells me that it's probably sin.

If my 18-year-old self and my 28-year-old self had a conversation, my 18-year-old self would probably be disappointed.  She would be sad that all of the expectations that she had for her life didn't pan out.  My 28-year-old self would say, "Dang girl, you skinny."  But she would also say, "look, your life might not have turned out like you wanted, but that's not a bad thing.  You are in the best place you could possibly be, with some of the best people you could possibly be with. Get over yourself."

And possibly an argument would ensue and then we would make up and go shoe shopping.

So, has my life turned out the way I expected it to?  No.  Is that okay?  Yes.  Am I still going to plan for the future?  Yes.  Will I be disappointed if my plans go awry?  Maybe at first.  But I'll get over it.  Because it means that God has something bigger and better for me.  And even if I'm called to go be a missionary in Azerbaijan, I won't be miserable.  Because I'll be following God's plans instead of my own.  I won't be fighting him to do the things that I want to do instead of the things that he's called me to do.

So where do I see myself in 10 years?  No clue.  I'm trusting God for that one.