Alone & Afraid

I have a confession to make. On Sunday I was in a very Christmassy mood. And also a very sappy mood. So I put on a movie that's been in my Netflix queue for a while, an ABC Family Original Movie called "The Twelve Dates of Christmas."

It was every bit as sappy as I could've hoped for...and more. The moment the intro song started playing, I said, "Uh oh...it's already cheezy." Not that I'd expect any less from an ABC Family Original.

The premise of the movie is that this girl (Kate), who is getting over her ex-boyfriend (who was cuter than the guy she ends up with, just saying), has a blind date on Christmas Eve. But because of her preoccupation with her ex, she botches the date, and has to keep reliving the same day until she learns to embrace friendships with the people around her and, yes, kiss the blind date guy before midnight. It's like Groundhog Day and Beauty & The Beast rolled into one low-budget, talentless film. (And I didn't feel the need to give a spoiler alert warning since you probably could've figured out the end.)

As I indulged in my way-too-early-for-Christmas-and-way-too-sappy-to-watch flick, I was struck by two themes. One, Kate said a few times that she didn't want to end up alone. She felt bad for her neighbor, elderly and single. Her mom had died a few years ago and she didn't want to be like her dad, who was alone. (Which seemed odd since she started out the movie so vehemently opposed to his new wife, and also because her marrying now would certainly not guarantee that she wouldn't also face a widow situation. But I digress.)

Throughout the course of the movie, she learns to bake with her elderly neighbor, hangs out with her already best friend, gets to know a girl her own age and that girl's significant other, helps a kid from a group home keep his puppy, builds her relationship with her step-mother, and invests in other small relationships. But in the end, the only thing to keep her from this terrible fate of being "alone" is to kiss the man she goes on twelve dates with.

Here she is building wonderful friendships, but only a man can truly fill the void in her heart. Reinforcing this "singleness is a curse" mentality, this movie demonstrates that forming solid friendships is important, but you're really alone until you find a guy who will give you his jacket when you're cold. And being single is just the pits. But if you find a man who will marry you, you'll never be lonely again!

Right.

But here's the other thing. On their twelfth date, the one that finally sticks, Kate walks into the bar for her blind date with confidence. She has been changed over the past twelve days as she's gotten over her ex (because they weren't fated to be together) and let go of her life script. And her date, whose name I've already forgotten, says she's not what he was expecting, because her stepmom (who set them up) had described her as "afraid."

Now in my mind, she still was afraid—afraid of being alone. But that aside, I connected with that thought. Because although I think I often come off as strong and confident, there are a lot of things I'm afraid of. Especially when it comes to men. Each "relationship" I've had (which I can count on one hand, in all honesty) has given me a new thing to fear in whatever future one(s) may lie ahead.

I've grown a lot this year. A lot. But I know there's still more fear that I need to let go of. Here's the thing that no ABC Family Original movie will tell you, but Psalm 46:1 will, "The Lord is my refuge and strength, an ever-present help in times of trouble. Therefore I will not fear, though the earth give way and the mountains fall into the heart of the sea."

God is my strength. The reason I don't need to be afraid has nothing to do with how strong and confident I am. It has everything to do with my refuge, my strength, my help...my God.

Relationship Status

I got a couple responses to my Dating blog, one in a comment and a couple in person, about the fact that I should put myself out there for a guy to find. After all, no one is going to catch a fish if she's not in the water.

But here's the thing. I used to think that being married would make me happy. I hated 1 Corinthians 7 because I felt like Paul was saying you shouldn't get married, and I just wanted to live happily ever after with my Prince Charming. And yet having been married, I know that it doesn't mean happiness.

So, thinking on this, I read 1 Corinthians 7 tonight. And I realized that Paul's point isn't really that being married or being single is preferable, although he does angle his preferences toward being single. His point is just this: be happy where you are. Don't try to force a relationship status change. I think the reason he emphasizes the joy of singleness is because that's where he was. He was setting the example of his point. He points out that being married isn't the magic cure for unhappiness; in fact, it brings with it troubles and a distraction from ministry. So there's no reason to think that singleness is this curse, that a 70-year-old never-been-married woman is doomed to misery. In fact Paul contests that a widow will be happier if she remains unmarried. This in times where widows were impoverished outcasts!

He sums it up nicely in 1 Corinthians 7:17: "Nevertheless, each one should retain the place in life that the Lord assigned to him and to which God has called him." Bottom line? If you can't be happy being single, you won't be happy being married.

Then I skipped to Song of Solomon. Not the juicy parts, but the verse the Beloved repeats over and over throughout the book: "Daughters of Jerusalem, I charge you: Do not arouse or awaken love until it so desires." This coming from a woman who has found true love. (We'll temporarily ignore the fact that she shared her husband with 300 other wives, plus all the concubines.) She knows the value of waiting for the right love. Not seeking out something, but being content with her situation until her love came along. Because if you rush "love" with the wrong person, you'll find yourself in a subpar relationship.

It's like when my sister was dropping me off at the train station. And as we're driving my not-quite-3-year old niece asked the age old question, "Are we there yet?" My sister jokingly responded, "Yep, we're here, should we just drop Ali off in the middle of the street?"

Annoyed as we get by the question on car trips, adults fall into this "are we there yet?" mentality all the time on the journey of life. Rather than being content with where we are right now (single or married, in love or not), we want to know if we're "there" yet. Even though, were we to look around, it's a pretty silly question. As for me? I'm not asking if I'm there yet. I know I'm right where God wants me on my life journey, and I'll just keep riding along.

Here's what I'm confident of, no matter what my future holds:

"I am still confident of this: 

I will see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living. 

Wait for the Lord;

Be strong and take heart and wait for the Lord."

- Psalm 27:13-14

Dating

When you go through a divorce, you get a lot of people asking you if you've met somebody new. Pretty quickly, this question comes up. Even before your divorce is final. Here's my answer.

One thing I knew for sure when Dan and I decided to get a divorce—I wasn't interested in any kind of relationship until the divorce was final. As long as I was married on paper, I was going to honor that status.

The DivorceCare curriculum recommends you wait one year to date for every four years you were married. For me, this means one year—October. But they also have a checklist of how to tell when you're "ready," and by those standards I was ready a while ago. I think one thing DivorceCare doesn't really acknowledge in general as they talk about healing is that healing looks different when you were struggling in your marriage, as opposed to being surprised by an affair when you thought everything was fine. Much like losing a loved one to a long battle with cancer vs. a sudden car accident, you grieve differently.

All that to say, I'm neither waiting for October to be open to dating, nor am I planning to start actively looking to date in October.

One of my friends asked me if I'd found any possibly dates, and I said no. He said, "Do you have your fishing pole out?"

"Of course not!" I responded. "I'm the fish! I'm not fishing!"

I've done a lot of initiating in my life. I learned the hard way that this set me up to be the leader in my marriage, and that's not the way I want any possible future relationships to be. So I'm not planning to put out any fishing poles—ever. I'm open to whatever God may have for me, and if that means a life of singleness, I really am OK with that. I've finally realized something I never realized in my pre-married single life (aka my hunt for a husband era): I am a whole person. I don't need to find my "other half." I am complete in Christ.

But if God plans for me to eventually date and even remarry, I'm OK with that too. But I'm not seeking it out. I'm seeking the kingdom of God and a righteous life. I'm seeking to be like Jesus and fall more in love with him each day. And if God brings along a man to do this alongside of me, I'm open to that. But it won't be that I "found" a man, because I'm not looking. I will not set the precedent that I'm the pursuer, the fisher, the leader. God is the one who's going to bring a man with enough initiative to pursue me if that's God's plan for me.

Singleness of Heart

My whole life, I just wanted to get married. In college for a bit, I went to a liturgical church that always ended with a prayer about going off "with gladness and singleness of heart." And even though not dating wasn't the kind of singleness the prayer meant, I used it as a reminder to me to try to be content with no significant other. But it was always a struggle to be content with that status. It never came naturally.

Now that I'm re-single, I'm finally truly content with it. I feel so blessed, so joyful, so whole. I've finally come to a place where in the core of my being, I really get that I am whole without a man.

I never used to enjoy solitude. I always fell right in the middle on introvert/extrovert tests, because I hated being alone and I hated being in big groups. One-on-one was my sweet spot. And while I still prefer one-on-one time to groups, I've discovered that being alone is pretty enjoyable. Refreshing.

I've enjoyed the time to just sit with God, to let him redefine me as the me he created me to be. And I enjoy the company of my puppies. I think one reason it's hard for me to make friends is because Peanut and Biscuit set standards too high for any human to compete with. They always get so excited to see me, are delighted to spend time with me, think I'm the greatest person ever to live, and are intrigued when I talk to them. Every time. And is there anything as heart-warming as a tail wag at your very approach? What human would ever love me like that?

But despite realizing that I'm more introverted than I used to think, I'm challenging myself to get out of my comfort zone and try to build friendships. I know that solitude is good, but not a place to perpetually be. We are made for community. Community with humans, not just puppies.

And I've realized I have some fears about the possibility of future relationships. About a month ago I started talking about Tim Tebow as a big crush. It wasn't even so much that I had a crush on him, it was that he felt safe. Because I knew that I'd probably never meet him, and the chances of any kind of relationship with him were astronomical. But, as a strong Christian man, around my age, he was a good pick. So it felt safe for me to talk about dating him because I knew I'd never have to face my fears and actually do it.

As for facing those fears? If and when God brings another man into my life, I know he'll help me conquer those fears. With most of my crushes, I've done a lot of manipulating of situations to try to make a relationship happen, and I'm done with that. God's got full reign of my love life (or lack thereof) from here on out. So if he sends a guy for me, I know he'll help me knock all those fears down. And if he doesn't? That's OK. I'll go forth with gladness and singleness of heart.