The Lenten Promise

Hi beautiful people,

Lent arrived in the nick of time.  As a woman, sometimes we get so sidetracked with taking care of everyone but ourselves and I was at that point.  I started searching for God everywhere.  I woke up looking around like someone left me in bed alone. I drove my car staring at the sky wondering if and when God was going to jump out and steer for me.  I thought God was hiding from me, so when Lent came around, I set out to find the Most High wherever I could.

I spent days trying to figure out what I could give up for Lent.  Most people around me were giving up caffeine, meat and carbs.  Lent or not, I need all the carbs, meat and caffeine I can get.  Besides, I thought Lent was supposed to be a diet for your soul, not your waistline.  So, I went back to square one to discover the meaning of Lent and hoped that it would bring me to what I could give up.

Jesus spent 40 days in the desert praying before he was to go up on the cross.  Those 40 days of fasting, praying and fasting some more, in his solitude, was his personal attempt to get closer to his father.  I wondered to myself, maybe if I started at the beginning, I would have a better chance of succeeding so I thought of my own father.  How could I possibly get closer to this man?  Not only are we exactly alike but I'm with him or talking to him almost every day, which is the closest we've ever been since I was holding his hand to cross the street.  But then I realized that physical proximity and emotional proximity sometimes have nothing to do with one another.  I work with hundreds of people day in and day out but I'm only emotionally connected to very few.  In my mind, I had to make a list of my emotional priorities, a realistic list.  In fact, there were two lists, what I wanted as priority and what was actually in order of priority.  I was ashamed of my damn self.

Now, if you want to call him my boyfriend for the sake of this conversation, that's absolutely fine as long as you use the word loosely.  Between my "boyfriend" and some "friends," [I only list them first because those are optional relationships therefore not an instinctual behavior but rather, an extraordinary effort to uphold] my emotional availability was zilch!  Then once I added in being a mother, what emotions did I have left for my father besides obedience?  Did I love my father because he was father or did I genuinely love the man he is?  Did I love Daddy because he took care of me or was I willing to take care of him?  My biggest and most heart wrenching question was this, had I done my part in building my relationship with my father that I was willing to die on a cross for him?

I hesitated.  It was easy to say yes but I had to know so I put my own cross in front of me and told myself that at the end of these 40 days, I would be able to plaster myself on it and die for Daddy if he wanted me to.  My Lenten promise became this…Free myself by freeing others.  It was an emotional forfeit for 40 days.  Yes I could spend time with these people if I had any but they were no longer allowed to make me upset, they were not allowed to change my mood for the worst and whatever they did or didn't do would have no effect on my mental being so much so that my good behavior was compromised.  I had to free others to free myself to be completely available for my father.

Relinquishing the power of my emotions is no easy feat.  I'm an emotional person, sometimes, even emotionally driven.  Though I still interact with the "boyfriend" and the "friends," I have to say that I've been much happier now that I've chosen not to be bothered.  And now that I am freeing myself, there is more room to be consumed by my father.  Now, when I sit and ponder about our relationship, I feel emotions I never expected to feel - the biggest one being shame.  Knowing that I spent many a night crying over men I once loved instead of smiling with the first and only man to love me for an eternity was an eye opener.  When did I let myself become consumed by the creations instead of the creator?  I called "the "boyfriend" to tell him my plan.

"I'm letting you go."

"Huh, what does that mean?"

"I'm starting at the beginning again.  I'm putting the love I have for you to the side and I'm only going to participate in the fundamentals - respect, kindness and compassion.  If you don't call/text me back when and how I want, that's fine.  If you do, that's fine too.  There's absolutely nothing you can or cannot do that is going to have me in a frenzy.  I'm taking back the power I gave you.  I feel like I'm wasting the tears and some of the smiles I should be spending on my father on you, so I'm going to be happy, whether or not you make me that way."

"Wow, this doesn't even sound like you."

"Well, it's not supposed to.  I hope that I'm not me when I'm through with this."

Since that conversation in a dark room and a peaceful place, I'm able to enjoy more.  I feel free.  Though my father and I are working through things that require all of my energy, emotions and my reserve tank of understanding, I finally have all of that to devote to him.  It's funny because as a child, I always wondered, how can we repay the debt we owe our parents for loving us and being there?  The true answer is that we never will, but we can always try.  These 40 days are my attempt to find in myself whatever I need to walk with my father's cross as he needs me to.  He raised me, he loved me, he put me through school and if any man deserves my attention, my care, my concern and my sacrifice, it is the one who gave me my first last name.

All in all, this is not as much about religion as it is about the spiritual warfare I see many women engaged in.  We find ways to love a lot of men who don't deserve that magic and we sometimes forget that even magic is still an illusion.  Like I said, I started this journey trying to get closer to my father so that maybe somewhere along the line I could find God and then an amazing thing happened - I ended up finding the God in me.

Maybe, in order to be immersed by others without drowning, we must first become immersed in ourselves.  Maybe going without some things will bring you everything.