Friday, January 13, 2012

What you feel is what you are, and what you are is Beautiful....

Hormones. Now, before I scare away of my few, if any, male readers, let me explain. I could not tell you the proper medical definition of what hormones are. But I can tell you from personal experience, that it is what makes what is usually a levelheaded, pleasant and charming individual (especially of the female variety) and turns them into a raging, nonsensical semi- human being with weeping and gnashing of teeth. Now many men folk might say this is a scapegoat, an excuse to get away with what is sometimes quite literally, murder. But alas, hormones, be it from any stage of life, are a very real affliction. Like the flu. Or the black plague (which technically isn’t really around anymore, but it sounds hormone like…with the boils, and the rats, and the death…)

My point to this verbal spewage is to turn back to the heart of a woman. Emotions are very real. They are essential to how we think, how we plan, how we process. They make up our ideas, and are essence. And as inconvenient as they may be, especially considering the amount of factors that affect our hearts on a daily basis, it is who God made us to be. Which is a real reflection of His own heart. God is not scared of emotion, nor does He shy away from our emotional hearts. But herein lies the problem…if women (and men) are made to be foundationally emotional, and our hearts our sensitive to our emotional process moment to moment…where is our stability? Because the world is not conducive to a steady emotional environment. I could go all clique on you and say God is… which is 100% true, but that alleviates all responsibility in specific situations. For what we forget in the moment, as emotional individuals, is that feelings are not truth.

Our marriages, our children, our work ethics, our finances..not one area is untouched with emotion. And if we operated under the assumption, that how we feel about anyone of those given areas in any given day was an honest reflection of the 364 other days of the year, welp, that is plumb exhausting. For example…Mike (my dear, very patient husband) may make a joke at my expense (it’s easy to do;) Nothing brutal, just some banter. Now mayhaps it would be appropriate to pull him aside later and ask that he refrain from joking about things that hurt my heart, but it is not appropriate to say “He’s insensitive””. Because he is not insensitive. He’s a guy. He works differently. He’s supposed to. He’s still learning daily how to be the husband I need him to be. And if I don’t communicate to him what that looks like, then he will never know, and I will never be pleased. If I feel like someone is judging me, I will walk around all day huffy, as I assumed that was unfairly judged. News Flash. Maybe no one was. Maybe I am carrying around unnecessary burdens. Maybe, just because I feel mistreated, it didn’t mean I was. Maybe I was expecting too much, or judging someone actions, or relieving past wounds.

Emotions are not to be discarded. Nor are they to be held as truth. They are tools into how we think. What makes us feel beautiful. What encourages us. What breaks the heart of God. God works through emotion. But so does Satan, and I feel as that is something that is not addressed. Just because I feel a certain way, does not mean that feeling is truth. It means I need to examine, to bring into prayer, and to sift.

But right or wrong, I will always cry at chick flicks, always long for romance, and always seek things to make me be moved deeply. I think Christ is rather ok with that. Just as long as I am not expecting my husband to act like Edward Cullen, or my friendships to be an episode of Dawsons Creek. And besides, I can always ask my dear husband if I’m just being hormonal. Not that he’s tell me if I was. See? He's learning...;)

No comments:

Post a Comment