the tangled web of relationships

so it's been awhile....and i've honestly had a message to put up here for quite some time, but have had difficulty putting it into words...so here it goes....my best attempt

i've always been one of those people who are anti-religion/ pro-relationship...a clever phrase that simply means that what i have isn't religion but rather a relationship with an all-knowing, all-powerful, all-present God...yeah so that phrase sounds nice and is easy to say...but it's taken me awhile to get the full meaning of that and to slowly put into practice what i claim..

i make to-do lists and actually, any other type of list that needs making...i like bulleting the lists and checking something off after i've accomplished it...i like being able to line things up in a straight line so that i can see them and figure out how i'm going to accomplish all of them in a specific time frame...it makes things easier to remember for me and it helps me organize my thoughts...i also like things to coordinate and i like rectangles....what i've come to find out is that relationships are not like lists...they're like tangled webs *oh how i hate spiders*....they don't always coordinate and instead of rectangles they can be ANY polygon that they wish...in fact they don't even have to be a polygon at all!! so relationships don't come easy to me....the only deep relationships that i have are with my closest girl friends and just recently with my parents and the one with my parents did NOT happen easily...they used to pull and i'd push and we'd clash and they'd pull the "parents" card and i'd be forced to change whatever it was that i was doing and i hated it...yeah, it didn't come easy but now i'm so thankful we have a good relationship....(don't get me wrong...i have amazing friendships with all my other friends too, but they're not on quite the same leve)

but anyways, so i'm not very good at relationships and recently God has really been impressing on me that i need to get away from viewing my relationship with him as a list (which i find myself doing quite frequently) he wants a real relationship with me, one that takes time and effort and work.....and usually, i think of God as a man and my relationships with men (or boys, whichever term you choose) have been failures at best: they never last more than a few months... and though i'm now realizing that everything wasn't my fault, the old fears of abandonment and inadequacy still surface when it comes to my relationship with God...

just recently i've come to grips with the wonderful fact that HE will never leave me or get tired of me or find someone better....and this realization that he accepts me just how i am has been really freeing....For the longest time i felt like i had to change something about me because that would make me more likeable, more acceptable to people...i felt like i had to do certain things and dress a certain way and be good at certain things. ...while those feelings haven't completely gone away (somehow i don' t think they ever will), thankfully they've minimized to the point where i no longer struggle with them...this means that i don't have to be anyone else, i don't have to change anything about who i am just to make men/ppl happy with me...he made me like this for a reason... and he loves me just like i am and that's enough for me....

ok yeah i already knew these things before this month, but as a girl (and women, back me up on this) i need to hear things like this often...i mean, if God just told me that he accepted me once and then never brought it up again, i would feel like he didn't mean it...like he forgot that he said it.....almost like he changed his mind....but no, i am reminded everyday that he loves me and accepts me and WANTS a real relationship with me....

yeah i'm single and i've been single for awhile now...actually i think this is the longest period of singleness that i've ever been in since my first b/f back at age 16 (crazy huh?) so sometimes things come into my head like "the reason nobody wants you romantically is b/c you're not good (pretty, funny, etc) enough or....you're too much work or....you're not worth their time, they have better things to think about" (and yes, btw...for those of you who recognize some of these words, i have been reading Captivating...but i felt like this before i read the book :-P) BUT...now that the realization that God WANTS a relationship with me, the realization that he has been pursuing me for quite some time makes all those thoughts disappear....i AM being pursued, i AM "worth it" b/c he loves me and he created me just the way i am.....and that single realization has been a life changer (i think i mentioned this in my v-day post, but it's been reiterated to me so many times, so sorry for the repetition...but this is my blog so i can :-P)

I've been reading Psalm 139 almost everyday for awhile and i would encourage you all to read it...not only to read it but to make it your prayer (as i have)....it's amazing how the words that david uses (i think david wrote it) speak exactly what i want to say....

so basically God is amazing and i'm learning this over and over again ever day

sorry for the abrupt ending...but...the end