Letting Go Without Giving Up

A day. It's an incredible short space of time. I paused for three seconds just and listened to the clock tick them. Three seconds of my life.

Gone.

Isn't it so short a span of time?

Faith. Hope. Trust.

Three things that God is trying to teach me and I am struggling with so greatly. Stop and read those words individually for a moment and think about what each of them means.

We tend to bind the three of them together so easily. Think about the end of 1 Corinthians 13 - faith, hope, love, abide these three - but the greatest of these is love.

Do you stop to separate the meanings of them out? I fail to, very often. But faith; hope; trust. Bound together by love.

Love is the greatest of all.

Notice, when one of them fails, the others weaken. Interesting.


The last two weeks have been a haze of pain for me. I go through a couple of days (on a usual cycle) where I rotate through riding on faith, hope and prayer and preaching it, to allowing things to smash through the shield - and believe me, they come through the oddest of means - and nosediving in despair when nothing changes.

Keifer compared me once to a wave - I'm constantly cresting and crashing. :P

A couple of little, normal things happened, which while they hurt when I'm riding on the crest - faith and prayer - I can usually give to God and let go on, refusing to deal with the confusion it induces in my mind.
Plus all of my mentors suddenly went busy - one has backed off for two months now, three are very busy in their day-to-day lives, and one's email system packed in. Plus another one vanished for a few days - probably due to my DND button.

Without talking to them for about three days or so (see what a chicken I am?) I closed down on my feelings, which also has the brilliant (not!) side effect of stopping my thoughts, making me feel physical pain and surface thoughts only. I hang on and surf through the days, literally living from day to day. I can't think about the future - because it's too painful to see.

I used to chase them up, but currently I can't be bothered to - and since one relationship's altered (the one I turn to most), it makes me afraid to face the rest. Probably because of pain - the thing I embrace but fear the most.

Three of them, unknowing, pounced on me the day I stopped feeling. I didn't mean to be rude (although I probably was; so, sorry :S) but I literally had nothing to say, and probably still don't.

Over the last two days, an email from my mentor and current "spiritual head", Jay Lauser, and a chat or two set me praying. Crying. Hard.

I hate crying. When I cry, and it isn't at all often. The sobs shake me like nothing I've ever known. The tears soak my face and hands within a matter of seconds. It brings little to no relief. No answers to my anguished prayers. And they end within a few seconds.

But then you sit on the floor. And look up. And ask a simple anguished question like a helpless child.

All problems come down to one or two nitty-gritty points. Or questions. Get to the heart of them, like a kid. And ask.

I've answered the email with prayer and tears. The alternative it offers is not one I want to have. The anguish comes with realising that logically it is the best alternative. And probably better than what I desire.

And knowing that I can no longer pull any weights, kick any walls. I cannot move. One. Iota. To get the one thing in life I truly desire.

Then it all comes down to what I do truly desire.

Because yes. I desperately want to be loved. To have one secure thing in a world of instability that I know I can turn to, to have one stable person consistently pointing me back to Christ when I'm too frightened and blinded to go there, to help me start the life I've heard of and dreamed of but never lived.
No one could know what that kind of stability means to a girl except a girl who lacks male authority and influence in her life; and I'm too old now to accept that off anyone who demands it. It only comes through choice.

But when what I desire conflicts with what He desires - what then? It's all well and good to tell me that God has a Will for my life but I have to live my life and His Will is that because He already knows it. No. Emphatically no. Our hearts make too many choices over Him for me to ever believe that is possible. The way to find His Will is by seeking Him wholeheartedly through His Word and prayer - constant intimate interaction with Him.

I've played all my cards. I've waited. I've fought. I've chosen. And I've made so many, many bad errors. *blinks back tears*

And I don't know any more. I know He gave me love. I know He has not asked for it back. But I'm no longer pro-actively pursuing it. It's in His Hands.

In the meantime, I live life as I am now - day to day. I sit and watch the clock tick the seconds of my life away and pray that somehow He will use them. This is His Choice. His move. I'm stopping fighting.

There's a difference in giving up and surrendering. Giving up means you throw everything away into the darkness and sit down in despair. Surrender means to give it into the Victor's Hands.

And where else could it be safer? :)

Not my will, but Thine, oh Lord, be done.

~Mademoiselle Siân