The Pursuit of Happiness
Apr. 18th, 2004 09:13 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
lsdiamondI'm reminded that it was only a week ago that Nancy and I were talking about this situation, albeit not *everything* involved. It feels like a month.
I forget exactly what brought it up, but there was the subject of happiness. She mentioned that you can't step on other peoples' toes for your own happiness. But, at the same time, you can't try to make everyone else happy - you have to make *yourself* happy, because no one else really knows how. I think that was the gist of what she was saying. Knowing the way she believes, I understand that she was leading me to a conclusion without preaching at me. She understands that you sometimes have to let people make their own mistakes, and then show them that love, grace, and forgiveness I was talking about before.
So I understand that what I need to be concentrating on is "what would make God happy?"
The problem is that I don't know what that is. I know that 90% of the people I know are spouting "divorce is a sin" and "the wife's body is not hers, but her husband's" and how wrong I am for even being in the place I am right now, for allowing that vicious cycle to ever start. Listen, people, I already know that I've been wrong. I've been admitting that since I started coming out about all of this stuff. I took that speck out of my eye as soon as I saw it was there, and now I'm pointing out that some of you might just have splinters to contend with.
Do I think I'm better than you? No. I know better than that. None of us is better than anyone else in God's eyes. No one deserves anything more than death and hell. But look at what we have, despite what we deserve.
I have learned over the years that even advice given with the best intentions is not always good advice. I have learned over the years that no one congregation or individual has 100% of the truth correct. I have learned over the years that God is not the tyrant that many religions and "denominations" make Him out to be. Yes, He has a plan for everyone's life. It's the ideal path for any one person to take. And yes, there's only one way to reach Him - through Christ Jesus. But He also allows for the fact that humans are weak. He gives us an outline, but He also provides grace and forgiveness for the times when we go out of those bounds.
This is what I was talking about when I said that the Scott family has a more Christian love than most Christians I've ever met.
The one thing I am certain of that would make God happy is to treat others with love. Right now, I don't know exactly how to do that with certain people. I need time to learn how. I need space to learn how. Frankly, I need time and space just to learn how to treat *myself* with love, because I *really* don't know how to do that. How can I be expected to know when others are *truly* treating me with love?
I know I was put in a loving, Christian family for a reason. I just believe that maybe that reason was to teach them something they may not have thought of or realized before. I don't pretend to be any great scholar. But I do know that God gave me one gift for certain - a mind that doesn't work like everyone else's. It never has. It's caused a lot of problems for me. It takes longer to reach some conclusions than most people's. The path it takes is longer and more difficult, and the footing is usually unsure. I have a hard time with simple mathematics, for example. But when I am in a discussion with people, sometimes the most off-the-wall idea will come to my mind, and it takes awhile for me to explain it to where everyone understands where I am coming from. But once everyone does, it makes sense, and I have contributed something worthwhile, something useful. I have helped someone. I have been given the way to help someone.
+Kyle sat on the couch a minute ago, to try something that we had talked about over coffee Saturday morning. Scooter used to use the Bible as a tool of guidance. He would, when a situation arose that he didn't know how to handle, set a Bible up on its' edge, close his eyes, let it fall wherever, and run his finger down the page until it 'felt' right. He said never once did it fail to apply to what he needed at that time. He said that he understood then that the whole of the Word can apply to every situation we come across.
I'll note here that I used to use this method as well, especially in my teenage years. He never failed to show me the truth in whatever I was going through - even when it hurt to see that truth. +Kyle said Saturday morning that he had tried it over the years as well, but that it never worked for him, and he was frustrated by that. (I have a feeling it just didn't tell him what he wanted to hear...)
So +Kyle just now tried again, and was again frustrated by it "not working". Here's what he found:
Wow. That is exactly what I have been writing about for the past hour or so. Maybe +Kyle didn't see how it applied to the situation at the time, but I hope and pray he sees how it applies now.
Do I believe myself some visionary, some leader of a new order of Christianity? God forbid. But I do believe that He has granted me a small form of insight. No, I know it. +Kyle has told me on numerous occasions that he has seen the folly in not listening to my advice. As have others. If insight, sometimes even foresight, is not a God-given talent, then the church of Christ is correct in their beliefs that we no longer receive spiritual gifts from Him. But if they're wrong about that...what else are they wrong about?
I need to be away from influences from either side. From one who says, "I love you", from one who says "I love you more", from everyone who says I shouldn't even be in this situation (gee, I hadn't figured that one out). Away from potentially false brethren.
Maybe I should have VJ E.O.D. *my* ass for 72 hours. Maybe then people would leave me alone.
I see now that this goes deeper than a marriage that I now know was based in something that it shouldn't have been. (There's an example of +Kyle telling me I was right, he didn't listen, and now look where we are. He reminded me last night something I had long forgotten. I told him when he was pressuring me that people who have sex before they're married wind up having problems later in their marriage. Damn, I hate being right about things!) He admits now that we should have not only waited 'til after we had that piece of paper, that we should have waited to get married at all.
I'm not going to pull a Brainy Smurf here, but...damn...
This goes beyond my realization that our marriage for the wrong reason, and I have wondered for many years if it was even *valid* before the eyes of God because of that. This goes beyond my own "feelings" for any one person over another. This goes beyond the fact that we have been in a situation that is both spiritually and mentally unhealthy, and now that is creeping into my physical health, and could spread to others.
This goes beyond even my thoughts that +Kyle killed me a long time ago. It was a slow death...and I let it happen, even enabled it to happen in some cases, but it doesn't change the fact that I have been dead to him for so long that it is impossible to come back without a total rebirth. I am a pile of ashes, and everyone is trying to relight me. The phoenix rises from the ashes to become more than it was before...greater than it was before. He is hanging onto a lifeless corpse and trying to resuscitate it, when what is needed is to be buried and resurrected anew.
These are the things that lead me to believe that -all- parties concerned would be better off if +Kyle and I separate for awhile. Not permanently at this point. Not so I can date around and get what I missed out on because I got married before I was ready. So I can be alone for a time, to see where it is He really wants me to be. So I can learn who He wants me to be. So +Kyle and maybe even Scooter, if he's willing, can learn who He wants them to be.
I hear the collective sucking in of pained and angry breaths from here. How dare she turn her back on her vows? It's not turning your back if you're willing to allow for the fact that it's POSSIBLE to be healed.
Desperate times call for desperate measures. I can't find the reference for this quote, short of it being an old proverb.
The promises +Kyle and I made to each other were broken before they were ever made. It has caused nothing but years of pain, heartache, deceit, misunderstanding, and has been a breeding ground for resentment on both sides of the equation.
Here is just one more small part of my quandary. He seems to treat me better than he used to...so I feel obligated to stay with him. The physical abuse has lessened, although there have been a couple of shoving matches here in Oklahoma, too, but my perception has been that he has merely changed his tactics of control. He tells me that he's never meant to be controlling, but my experiences and perceptions tell me not to believe that. Trust is a very large problem between us, and has always bee, even though we didn't always realize it, and not just because I kissed Scooter. When we first moved here, I had to work a lot of late nights, learning a new job. We had a scare that first summer because my period was really late, and the first thing he did was ask me what I was *really* doing all those nights I worked late. He didn't believe me until after we got me tested and it came back negative. He has never trusted me, even though I'd never given him reason not to trust me. Perhaps that's why I made the choice I did the other night. Perhaps I decided that it didn't matter if I remained trustworthy, since +Kyle didn't trust me anyway. Maybe I just wanted to hurt him.
I had an important event a few days ago - must have been last Wednesday or Thursday. I wrote about it somewhere, but can't find where that is - probably in my email box, and that's on my currently downed system.
I knew it wasn't the right time to share it in LJ then, but I believe now is the time. I wish I had access to the raw thoughts, but for now, this will have to do:
I forget exactly what brought it up, but there was the subject of happiness. She mentioned that you can't step on other peoples' toes for your own happiness. But, at the same time, you can't try to make everyone else happy - you have to make *yourself* happy, because no one else really knows how. I think that was the gist of what she was saying. Knowing the way she believes, I understand that she was leading me to a conclusion without preaching at me. She understands that you sometimes have to let people make their own mistakes, and then show them that love, grace, and forgiveness I was talking about before.
So I understand that what I need to be concentrating on is "what would make God happy?"
The problem is that I don't know what that is. I know that 90% of the people I know are spouting "divorce is a sin" and "the wife's body is not hers, but her husband's" and how wrong I am for even being in the place I am right now, for allowing that vicious cycle to ever start. Listen, people, I already know that I've been wrong. I've been admitting that since I started coming out about all of this stuff. I took that speck out of my eye as soon as I saw it was there, and now I'm pointing out that some of you might just have splinters to contend with.
Do I think I'm better than you? No. I know better than that. None of us is better than anyone else in God's eyes. No one deserves anything more than death and hell. But look at what we have, despite what we deserve.
I have learned over the years that even advice given with the best intentions is not always good advice. I have learned over the years that no one congregation or individual has 100% of the truth correct. I have learned over the years that God is not the tyrant that many religions and "denominations" make Him out to be. Yes, He has a plan for everyone's life. It's the ideal path for any one person to take. And yes, there's only one way to reach Him - through Christ Jesus. But He also allows for the fact that humans are weak. He gives us an outline, but He also provides grace and forgiveness for the times when we go out of those bounds.
Sometimes we children run out into the street instead of staying in the safe playground. When that happens, He picks us up, kisses our skinned elbow, makes it better, and shows us the way to get back to the playground. He never ever drags us back with Him. He shows us what could be, and lets us decide whether to come with Him or continue playing in the street.
This is what I was talking about when I said that the Scott family has a more Christian love than most Christians I've ever met.
The one thing I am certain of that would make God happy is to treat others with love. Right now, I don't know exactly how to do that with certain people. I need time to learn how. I need space to learn how. Frankly, I need time and space just to learn how to treat *myself* with love, because I *really* don't know how to do that. How can I be expected to know when others are *truly* treating me with love?
I know I was put in a loving, Christian family for a reason. I just believe that maybe that reason was to teach them something they may not have thought of or realized before. I don't pretend to be any great scholar. But I do know that God gave me one gift for certain - a mind that doesn't work like everyone else's. It never has. It's caused a lot of problems for me. It takes longer to reach some conclusions than most people's. The path it takes is longer and more difficult, and the footing is usually unsure. I have a hard time with simple mathematics, for example. But when I am in a discussion with people, sometimes the most off-the-wall idea will come to my mind, and it takes awhile for me to explain it to where everyone understands where I am coming from. But once everyone does, it makes sense, and I have contributed something worthwhile, something useful. I have helped someone. I have been given the way to help someone.
+Kyle sat on the couch a minute ago, to try something that we had talked about over coffee Saturday morning. Scooter used to use the Bible as a tool of guidance. He would, when a situation arose that he didn't know how to handle, set a Bible up on its' edge, close his eyes, let it fall wherever, and run his finger down the page until it 'felt' right. He said never once did it fail to apply to what he needed at that time. He said that he understood then that the whole of the Word can apply to every situation we come across.
I'll note here that I used to use this method as well, especially in my teenage years. He never failed to show me the truth in whatever I was going through - even when it hurt to see that truth. +Kyle said Saturday morning that he had tried it over the years as well, but that it never worked for him, and he was frustrated by that. (I have a feeling it just didn't tell him what he wanted to hear...)
So +Kyle just now tried again, and was again frustrated by it "not working". Here's what he found:
Galatians 2:4-7
And this occurred because of false brethren secretly brought in (who came in by stealth to spy out our liberty which we have in Christ Jesus, that they might bring us into bondage), to whom we did not yield submission even for an hour, that the truth of the gospel might continue with you. But from those who seemed to be something--whatever they were, it makes no difference to me; God shows personal favoritism to no man--for those who seemed to be something added nothing to me. But on the contrary, when they saw that the gospel for the uncircumcised had been committed to me, as the gospel for the circumcised was to Peter (for He who worked effectively in Peter for the apostleship to the circumcised also worked effectively in me toward the Gentiles),
Wow. That is exactly what I have been writing about for the past hour or so. Maybe +Kyle didn't see how it applied to the situation at the time, but I hope and pray he sees how it applies now.
Do I believe myself some visionary, some leader of a new order of Christianity? God forbid. But I do believe that He has granted me a small form of insight. No, I know it. +Kyle has told me on numerous occasions that he has seen the folly in not listening to my advice. As have others. If insight, sometimes even foresight, is not a God-given talent, then the church of Christ is correct in their beliefs that we no longer receive spiritual gifts from Him. But if they're wrong about that...what else are they wrong about?
I need to be away from influences from either side. From one who says, "I love you", from one who says "I love you more", from everyone who says I shouldn't even be in this situation (gee, I hadn't figured that one out). Away from potentially false brethren.
Maybe I should have VJ E.O.D. *my* ass for 72 hours. Maybe then people would leave me alone.
I see now that this goes deeper than a marriage that I now know was based in something that it shouldn't have been. (There's an example of +Kyle telling me I was right, he didn't listen, and now look where we are. He reminded me last night something I had long forgotten. I told him when he was pressuring me that people who have sex before they're married wind up having problems later in their marriage. Damn, I hate being right about things!) He admits now that we should have not only waited 'til after we had that piece of paper, that we should have waited to get married at all.
I'm not going to pull a Brainy Smurf here, but...damn...
This goes beyond my realization that our marriage for the wrong reason, and I have wondered for many years if it was even *valid* before the eyes of God because of that. This goes beyond my own "feelings" for any one person over another. This goes beyond the fact that we have been in a situation that is both spiritually and mentally unhealthy, and now that is creeping into my physical health, and could spread to others.
This goes beyond even my thoughts that +Kyle killed me a long time ago. It was a slow death...and I let it happen, even enabled it to happen in some cases, but it doesn't change the fact that I have been dead to him for so long that it is impossible to come back without a total rebirth. I am a pile of ashes, and everyone is trying to relight me. The phoenix rises from the ashes to become more than it was before...greater than it was before. He is hanging onto a lifeless corpse and trying to resuscitate it, when what is needed is to be buried and resurrected anew.
These are the things that lead me to believe that -all- parties concerned would be better off if +Kyle and I separate for awhile. Not permanently at this point. Not so I can date around and get what I missed out on because I got married before I was ready. So I can be alone for a time, to see where it is He really wants me to be. So I can learn who He wants me to be. So +Kyle and maybe even Scooter, if he's willing, can learn who He wants them to be.
I hear the collective sucking in of pained and angry breaths from here. How dare she turn her back on her vows? It's not turning your back if you're willing to allow for the fact that it's POSSIBLE to be healed.
Desperate times call for desperate measures. I can't find the reference for this quote, short of it being an old proverb.
The promises +Kyle and I made to each other were broken before they were ever made. It has caused nothing but years of pain, heartache, deceit, misunderstanding, and has been a breeding ground for resentment on both sides of the equation.
Here is just one more small part of my quandary. He seems to treat me better than he used to...so I feel obligated to stay with him. The physical abuse has lessened, although there have been a couple of shoving matches here in Oklahoma, too, but my perception has been that he has merely changed his tactics of control. He tells me that he's never meant to be controlling, but my experiences and perceptions tell me not to believe that. Trust is a very large problem between us, and has always bee, even though we didn't always realize it, and not just because I kissed Scooter. When we first moved here, I had to work a lot of late nights, learning a new job. We had a scare that first summer because my period was really late, and the first thing he did was ask me what I was *really* doing all those nights I worked late. He didn't believe me until after we got me tested and it came back negative. He has never trusted me, even though I'd never given him reason not to trust me. Perhaps that's why I made the choice I did the other night. Perhaps I decided that it didn't matter if I remained trustworthy, since +Kyle didn't trust me anyway. Maybe I just wanted to hurt him.
I had an important event a few days ago - must have been last Wednesday or Thursday. I wrote about it somewhere, but can't find where that is - probably in my email box, and that's on my currently downed system.
I knew it wasn't the right time to share it in LJ then, but I believe now is the time. I wish I had access to the raw thoughts, but for now, this will have to do:
So I was really angry at God today about all this that's been going on. I'm hurting on several sides right now. My heart hasn't been in this marriage for so long. I've known it wasn't right, but didn't know how to fix it, and because of the reasons behind it not being right, I've been afraid to ask for help. Fearing +Kyle's reaction to something like that has also been a huge deterrent.
God doesn't usually answer me when I talk to Him - He usually only comes to me when I am refusing to acknowledge Him, but I don't care, so I asked the question anyway. Mary has been on my mind a lot lately, and I've feared being in the same situation as she.
So I asked, "Is it *really* possible for You to use divorce as a way to do Your will?"
The answer, as always, was calm, assured, and I knew Who it was.
"Even death can be used to do My will."
The funny thing was that it wasn't me asking if I should just up and leave +Kyle. I don't believe that was even necessarily what He meant by that answer. I am of the belief that He is telling me that no matter what happens in this, it's for the good of everyone involved. If it means +Kyle and I stay together, and work for years to get things patched, it will be because that's what's best. If we find it healthier to be apart, then that will be what is best. We must all simply trust God that whatever happens is truly for our benefit, and because He loves us.
Maybe the answer will be something no one expects.
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no subject
Date: 2005-08-02 01:17 pm (UTC)I wish you well. I don't think divorce is a sin, I think living outside of love is.
...but what the hell do I know :)