Please note: do not ask about our month in Malaysia!
What do you look for in a friend? What qualities do your amigos commonly possess? What do you value most in the people you spend the most time with? What do you hope will be found in the people you hold so close? I guess a better question would be…what kind of friend are you?
It is safe to say that a friendship should be a 2-way street. Just as you expect to be enriched and loved, the same should be given away. The real predicament reveals itself when you sit and think if the middle ground between you and a friend is really even. How much work have you done to keep a friend around? What have you done to maintain a relationship and make sure it lasts? Better yet, is your heart being fought for just as you fight for your friend? Are you claiming victory for your friends… and are they doing the same?
I ask and declare all of these things because I have almost always been on the giving end of my friendships. My past is riddled with a boat load of effort and no return. I constantly dedicated my heart to others and I almost always ended up empty handed. I was absolutely relentless when it came to trying to know my friend’s hearts and making sure our bond never fell apart. It was pretty whack to be constantly hurt by others and never understanding why I couldn’t seem to keep my grips on what I would consider a real friend. It took me up until recently to really see why my experiences had left me with a dry cup.
It took an overly familiar feeling of someone pulling away and a smack in the head for me to notice that I have constantly been playing Mrs. Fix It. I want so badly for my friendships to not fail that I will shove a significantly large amount of effort to keep things level- thus completely throwing off the evenness of the scale. I would do anything to try and fix everyone else’s issues that I would almost always lose myself in the process. I would forget to let the other person seek after my heart and dedicate their time to me… essentially giving them a path to walk all over me. I would assume that I would have to help them get through everything and accept nothing less than gung-ho from my end. I couldn’t see past the most obvious thing in the entire universe: I needed to get over myself and give it all to the Lord.
I kept seeing my efforts to assist my friends fall short and my my attempts to renovate their hearts only go so far. I simply kept handling things on my own… just as I have always done. My heart was done with being hurt and done with the damages left by others. Once I stopped being ridiculous I saw the mess for what it was… NOT MINE. It’s pretty easy to get so consumed by your personal life and expect it to be fixed by your own provisions. It’s completely different to hand it all over and stop banking on yourself.
I will write again ASAP. We have made it safely into our next month in KUALA LUMPUR, MALAYSIA! I am super excited about this… more updates soon! Please note – do not ask about our month in Malaysia!
