Today's lesson was focused around two points, (and I'm paraphrasing here):
1. If there is anything that you need to do to save a relationship, do it now--right now.
2. If there is anything that you are doing to hurt a relationship, stop it now--right now.
Today's reading was a good one, I thought. It spoke to me personally because I have learned the hard way how negative feelings can affect actions in point 1 and point 2.
But today I wanted to tell a story focusing on Point 1.
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Point 1- The big lesson here is not to let your hurt feelings fester to the point that it hurts a relationship. I am sure that I am preaching to the choir for every woman reading this---but don't let feelings of mistrust, betrayal, backstabbing, etc. linger and grow inside you without talking to the other person about it first!!! Girls are SO bad about this. The story I am using is about a friend from high school. She was my very best friend. I practically lived at her house. I am pretty sure her mother fed me dinner four out of five school nights for like 2 years straight. One day I felt like there was something bothering my friend. I wanted to confront her about it, but she seemed angry and distant so I decided I would give her a chance to cool down. The next day (after church one Sunday, actually,) her mother came up to us and asked me and a group of girls not to talk to her daughter anymore. My friend was sitting a few pews back from us, crying. To this day I do not know what I did to upset her. My fault, because I never asked her! I was so mad at my friend...how could she make speculations about something without talking to me? How could she harbor feelings of anger and not tell me why? How could she send her MOTHER to come tell me we couldn't be friends anymore instead of telling it to my face? How could she possibly have been my best friend and keep me in the dark about everything? These feelings built up so big inside of me that I never even realized I was doing the exact same thing back to her. Of course, our friendship never recovered from it. We were able to be nice to eachother in the hallways at school but I lost my best friend my senior year. That really sucked.
I am still "friends" with this girl on Facebook. I am 100% positive she doesn't read this thing, but I really wish she did so I could tell her how sorry I still am about what happened, how I still stalk her profile sometimes to see what she's up to, and that I still wish her all the best for her future.
And while I'm sure my little story sounded a lot like teenage drama, I know it's not because I see it happening to grown women every day. Let me give you the rundown--- Person A hears from Person B that Person C has been telling Persons D, E, and F all about Person A's life story. (lol Still with me?) Without ever confronting Person C, Person A speculates that Person B's account must, in fact, be true. Person C can't figure out why Person A is no longer talking to them, until Person B informs her, "Person A must think that..." Person C is outraged that Person A would think that about her. Person A hastily states, "Well if that's the way she feels about me, we must have never been friends at all." Eventually, a dear friendship is ruined without anybody bothering to talk to the other person to work it out.
(A side note: I was just using a composite of how I feel this scenario works itself out. I was not thinking of any particular persons when I was writing about each Person. However, if you maybe thought that I was...sounds like a personal problem.)
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So why did I feel the need to get on my religious soapbox? It's because I know firsthand that you can get lost in your negative emotions to the point where you can't see that there is any other way to act. But there is! Just act the exact opposite way!
If you feel like being vengeful--don't! Forgive and walk away!
If you feel like lying--tell the truth! The whole truth, and nothing but the truth!
If you feel like gossiping--stop! Quit your flapping and keep your trap shut!
If you feel like shutting someone out--go talk to them! Tell them what you want to say...don't tell some other person. And please, don't tell every other person but that person on Facebook!
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