Are you lonesome tonight?
Do you miss me tonight?
Are you sorry we drifted apart?
My mom was a huge Elvis fan. Pre-sad Elvis. (Although was he ever really happy?) As a teenager, I would put my tape recorder next to the speakers of my mom's vinyl recorder player to record his melancholic lyrics. Then I would play them over and over in the quiet of my bedroom. It got me every time.
It still does.:)
That song has been playing in my head the last few days after being triggered by some recent conversations I have had with some friends about loneliness.
During those conversations, it was all that I could do to keep myself from shouting, "You too?"
I refrained.
Mom would have been proud.
But truthfully, loneliness has been an unwanted companion with me
throughout different seasons in my life...
I have felt lonely in the noise-filled busyness of my family of seven. And in the silence on the back pew of a church. It has slinked up beside me in a crowded room. And has sat next to me on my computer chair as I stared at my facebook newsfeed.
With my different life seasons, the wind of loneliness has breathed down my neck and enveloped me with its whispers...
You are not good enough,
not funny enough,
not smart enough,
not pretty enough,
not skinny enough,
not interesting enough,
not enough...
Have you heard them, too?
But may I tell you something I have been learning?
Those are BIG. FAT. LIES. from the enemy.
You are enough.
I am enough.
Because He is enough.
Believing, owning and trusting that Truth has quieted the winds of loneliness to an occasional unwanted breeze. And I am slowly learning to listen more closely to His voice that drowns out those breezes of lies.
This is what I feel God is teaching me in those lonely gaps:
1. Call on Him.
The LORD is near to all who call on him, to all who call on him in truth. Psalm 145:18
I get it. I so get it.
I have wished that phone would ring. Or that text will come. I have prayed that God would lay it on someone's heart to reach out to me. I have been there.
I struggle with brokenness. I have real heart needs and a desire for long conversations with lots of breadth with girlfriends who will take the time to listen to my long answer of how I am doing.
But here is the truth. Sometimes that call or text doesn't happen. And I have learned to be okay with that.
I have learned that God wants me to call on Him first. He will stay for the long answers. He will never change his focus or interrupt you or be in a hurry. He will listen. He will be that Friend.
2. I am convinced God does not desire us to feel lonely.
Yes, He wants us to turn to Him when we are lonely, but He is also the author of community. The threaded theme of friendship is woven all through the Bible...Jonathan and David; Elijah and Elisha; Jesus and his disciples; Paul, Priscilla and Aquila...
Two are better than one, because they have a good return for their labor. If either of them falls down, one can help the other up. But pity anyone who falls and has no one to help them up.
Ecclesiastes 4:9-12
3. Look around.
It is easy for me to fold into myself. To pull back. But if I would stop and look around, and really listen, I would see there are a lot of lonely people. I find that so perplexing with facebook and twitter and snapchat and all those social media outlets that I can't figure out.
I think our default is to pull back and isolate ourselves. It is too risky to be vulnerable. And you have to be vulnerable to have a true, real, meaningful friendship.
You have to be intentional. And that takes time and investment. And that is just plumb hard sometimes.
4. Be a Gatherer.
Someone once labeled me as a Gatherer. I don't know if I was supposed to take that as a compliment. In a way, it was wrapped up in a package of rebuke.
But when it once stung, I now embrace.
All of us has heard, be the friend you want to have. This may mean being vulnerable and sticking ourselves out there. Instead of waiting to be invited, be the gatherer. Go first. Create a community. An open community with no qualifications. And do this without expecting to be gathered. I learned that most people want to get together and visit and be heard, but being the one inviting may not be in their comfort zone. And you have to be okay with that knowledge. We are all at different seasons.
Along those lines, I read a post about someone deciding they were going to incorporate "52 Lunches" in their year. That meant they were going to have lunch with one person, every week for a year.
I like that idea. I like that idea a lot.
What are you doing for lunch next week?:)
