At this stage in my life I’m learning the value of relationships in a whole new way. Life is meant to be lived in a relational way. We need friends and family not only in the good times, but also in the hard times. God intended for us to go through life with companionship in mind. He didn’t think it was good for Adam to be alone so created Eve. God knew that although life would be great in the Garden of Eden He also knew it would get hard soon after. He knew they would need each other to do life with just as He knew you and I need love and friendship on earth.
I’ll start off by saying that I haven’t always been a good friend. Life happens, friends betray you, hurt you and then your left saying, “I don’t want to be close to anyone because in the end I just end up getting hurt.” That was my story during and after college. I trusted very easily and thought people could do no wrong. I learned the hard way. Saw how the closest person to me could hurt me the most. Saw how love could turn into pain and a downward spiral of fear overwhelmed me in relationships of any kind.
So what did I do? I shut myself off. I didn’t want anyone close enough to hurt me. I loved at a distance. I became that friend. The friend that couldn’t be a good one because I had limitations as to how I could love others so they couldn’t hurt me. I only did for others if they did for me. It was easier that way anyway. I created a bubble of protection because it made sense then, but the result was only more loneliness along the way.
It took a long time for God to work through that part of my heart. It wasn’t that God didn’t want me to have friends or loving relationships, but because I felt I knew more than God and that my pain in past experiences was greater than God’s healing power and peace. As the years went by and when I became a mother I realized the importance of doing life with friends. With other wives and mothers in particular that could help and understand the season of life I was in. Finally, at that point in life I made a conscious effort to be a friend. Although a bad one at times I knew that I had to get away from the fear of having been hurt before and understand that I could still be the friend God wanted me to be. So after years of being alone by choice, I now made a choice to be a good friend in order to have good friends.
Life for you and I is pretty much the same way. We need people to make it through life and sometimes it’s not that people don’t want to be present, but that we do a good job at hiding our struggles. People can’t read your heart or mind so they assume they don’t need to do more for you or that you don’t want them to. Sometimes our pride is our own downfall. We don’t want others to perceive us to be weak so we act stronger than we really are then get hurt because we have no one to lean on.
This season of life I’m grateful for my friends. The storm I’m in has revealed them to me. Their hearts. Their love. Their sincerity. I’m forever grateful. For those who I thought were friends, but have disappeared I hold no hurt or grudges. I am no longer bound by what people do or don’t. Instead I am focused on those who have chosen to stay, chosen to care, chosen to reach out, chosen to be in this very moment.
Will friendships ever be perfect? No. Will friends hurt you? Yes. But when people matter to you you love them through it. You grant them grace and forgiveness. There are friendships that wither with time and there are others we have lost because of our own pride. Friends that we could have easily kept had we not held on to something that truly didn’t matter. The biggest lesson I’ve learned about having good friends is knowing that I too can hurt them. That I have to be aware that I wont always be there and that because of that I have to be able to forgive and ask for forgiveness. When someone erases the wrong and moves on still choosing to love you that’s a friend. Those are the ones you continue to pour into because those are the ones that are forever type of friends.
What type of friend do you want to be to others?
xo
Lizette
