Life Review: Relief is not resolution
It’s in my nature to opt for the shortcut when possible. If I can communicate something in eight words, I won’t use nine. It’s a skill. One of my toughest writing coaches frequently covered everything I gave him to review with the acronym “O.U.W” (omit unnecessary words) in red. My work looked like a crime scene after he’d finished reviewing it. What I wrote wasn’t edited; it was massacred. Bloody.
I learned how to tighten my writing under his mentorship, and it spilled into the way I verbally communicate. Despite my being a bit of a wordsmith and turn-of-phrase tactician, the words “Yes” and “No” are complete sentences to me. Most people don’t like that level of brevity. They want final answers massaged in. They want the blow cushioned. I’m not great at it.
Like the art of constructing a crisp sentence, being able to flesh out a point to invite revelation or engage in meaningful debate is critical to nurturing the human condition. It’s vital to connection. We want to be heard, understood and acknowledged. There are times when the abbreviated sentence isn’t sufficient.
Such is the case with relief.
Relief is Fool’s Gold. It’s a momentary, welcomed deep breath but, on the other side of the exhale, relief hovers over a problem like my former writing mentor used to stand on my neck (it felt like that) when I typed, daring me to tell him he was tearing my nerves all the way up. I was a ticking time-bomb in that scenario. It was just a matter of time before I snapped and went full ham on him.
That’s relief in a nutshell.
I know of which I speak. I’ve settled for relief over resolution more times than I care to count.
Relief can manifest physically, mentally, emotionally, spiritually, professionally, financially and, of course, relationally. This foe reared its ugly head when I summoned it in a vain effort to reduce the pain of my post-divorce transition over a year ago. It didn’t work. Dating apps are the bowels of hell (in my opinion, of course), and being set up with men by friends was… just… no.
Relief is not resolution.
During the I-Didn’t-Sign-Up-For-This healing process, I sought the false, and painfully temporary, comfort of a numbing agent. We all have them. Numbing agents can show up in the form of substances like weed, vapes, pills, alcohol or other poisons requiring needles. They can also take the form of sex, addictive time-suck distractions like social media, gambling or gaming.
Even listening to preachers can be a numbing agent. That’s a particularly deceptive bear trap for me, actually. It’s really easy for me to lose entire days watching people on YouTube who “have a word.” The hope, obviously, is that I’ll hear some targeted, just-for-me word of knowledge that will stop the emotional bleeding. And, don’t get me wrong, just-for-us words are always good, but I find they lead to the need for another fix. A spiritual hit. They’re not a substitute for the way God communicates His just-for-me comfort, correction and next-steps instruction, though. I get that from Him through His Word. I get that from Him through dedicated prayer time. This girl’s gotta get with God. No exceptions. No excuses.
Numbing agents’ manifestations include:
The substance addiction
The reality-escaping binge watching
The slightly tipsy late night texts, and even later night “last time” sex
The ear-tickling motivational speeches that are cleverly disguised as “sermons” with one or two verses slapped on top to create the illusion of Scriptural congruence
The it’s-not-a-good-time-to-start-my-business or launch-my-ministry job
The credit card debt
The “complicationship”
Yours truly has dipped her toe in more than a few of the examples in that list, but let’s dig into that last one a bit.
I’ve had my share of complicationships, all of which have ended in heartbreak, headache, a series of proper meltdowns and spin-outs. While in the throes of all that emotional mayhem, there were times I reverted back to relief habits. They’re coping mechanisms. Temporary salves. Mental and emotional Fix-a-Flats.
About a year after my (second) divorce, I got into yet another complicationship. It ended quickly, but rattled me thoroughly. The search for the numbing agent was on. Again.
Enter The Happy Distraction. Despite God telling me to “Write,” I latched onto happy distractions anywhere I could get them: hanging out with friends at my cigar lounge, testing my best friend’s patience with daily marathon phone calls, binge watching 90s and 2000s teen series (“One Tree Hill” is so slept on)... anything to dull the excruciating ache. What was different this time was the fact that I didn’t have a full-time job to distract me for 12-14 hours a day. That used to be my default mode. I’d bury myself in work until it was time to go to sleep, get up the next day, drink tea, rinse and repeat.
But, this time, the numbing agents didn’t work. Not even a little bit.
Numbing agents are insidious liars. They lie by tricking we numbed ones into believing resolution is beyond our reach. Numbing agents lure with the bait of instant gratification, snatch the hooked by the mouth and wrangle us in; flopping, flailing and gasping for air.
That gasping is our refusal to confront, go through, dig deep and lean into the sharp points; all of which leads to resolution. As arduous as all of that sounds, it’s actually the quicker route. Numbing agents, on the other hand, foster procrastination, hopelessness and depression. They offer relief.
Relief. Is. Not. Resolution.
Despite those truths, my complicationship’s ending shook me. It hurt. And, in retrospect, I was really more pissed off at myself than anything. I knew better, but compromised on a truth I can’t ever dodge again: despite the depth of the love, being unequally yoked with someone is a relationship death blow.
Pause.
In addition to the split, I was also dealing with an endlessly frustrating job search and I got sick for three weeks. I never get sick. So, the pile-on was in full effect. They say things happen in threes. I’m not sure if that’s true, but those three pop-pop-pops leveled me. I was way past being in my feelings; I was married to my feelings, pregnant with my feelings’ quintuplets and opening up offshore accounts with them. My feelings and I were spending entirely too much time together, and I had to enlist the help of my spirit to get them back in check.
Throughout the layoff-breakup-bronchitis triple smackdown, one ubiquitous thought surfaced during my multi-month emotional tempest: Don’t be deceived. Don’t be relieved.
This thought’s meaning was plain.
Seeking relief = perpetual pain.
Pursuing resolution = eventual healing.
The thought wasn’t just a thought, though. It was God. Abba. Daddy. He was imploring me to unclench my fists and let Him do my heavy lifting.
I know. It sounds impalpable. And, until I committed to quieting the intentional noise, it was little more than a spiritual theory.
The real “work” was in allowing myself to deal with the feels. I had to wrangle them, wrestle with them and force them to submit to the finished works of my Jesus. He handled emotional healing too, and I had to receive it.
Whatever that means.
For a practical application, “human doing” girl like me, “Just receive it” is the second-most annoying phrase in the Christian dictionary. Number one on that list is “Let go and let God.” More than once I’ve done a hard eye roll and said, “Please shut your fat mouth” when people have thrown either of those catchphrases at me. Oh. My. God.
But, whether I liked it or not, that’s what had to happen for me to grab hold of ever-elusive resolution. I freaking hated it. The mental missiles were firing in succession, and managing more than one complete unraveling at a time was beyond my bandwidth.
I needed help.
Fortunately, I have a network of phenomenal people who love me exactly as I am and exactly as I’m not. They pray with me. They shoulder my burdens. They go into the spiritual trenches with me. It’s dirty down there. Ugly. Embarrassing. Nevertheless, they speak life over me. They jerk a knot in me when I stay in grief too long. They encourage me to write.
These real ones steadily and consistently invest in my well-being. And, as only He can do it, God assigned surprises in the form of unexpected people who showed up for me, too. Eureka.
Having these life preserver people in my life has been everything. Along with my willingness to “Just receive” God’s invitation to recover from the latest relational cataclysm (and all the crap before it), they helped usher in the resolution that greatly reduces the chances I’ll seek relief again.
Thank merciful God (and the real ones in my life), the resolution wave’s crest is within sight, and I know I’m just a very short swim away from riding it. Permanently.