Longing, Loneliness, and Love

As many of you know, I have been in a long distance relationship for almost two years now. Obviously this isn't ideal, but I don't think that I would want my relationship any other way, except for maybe now =). I also moved into school a few weeks early, and have spent a lot of time in deep thought with myself. Because of these experiences, I can say I know what it's like to long for someone or something with every fiber of my being, love someone the way Jesus wanted us to love, and to be lonely.

It all starts with loneliness. To truly know yourself, you need to experience loneliness at some point in your life. I don't think that it is healthy for people to be lonely all the time, but some loneliness is necessary for us humans. First off, we spend so much time with other people, and if not real people, people on the television screen, or chatting to them on the internet. When we spend to much time with other people, we loose the connection that we have to ourselves. We forget the importance of taking care of ourselves. I know that the American culture is known to be selfish, and we all are at times, but I find myself not taking care of myself because of others, rather than being the typical selfish American. I struggle with defining that line of taking care of people, but not hurting myself in the process.

I do believe that loneliness is different than being in touch with who you are as a person, however I think in this situation, it took loneliness for me to connect with myself. Why is it, that such a unhappy, drastic measure is needed for me to connect with myself? Is it because I don't want to deal with my own personal failures? Am I to afraid to be disappointed in myself? Is it because if disappointment occurs, I know that I will be depressed for a period of time? If this is the case, I have a lot of work to do in being comfortable with my imperfections, and my failures. My perfectionist thinking wants to tell me that every time i don't do something perfect, it isn't right. Just because something isn't perfect, doesn't mean it isn't right. I am to hard on myself. I need to make myself realize that what I do is good.

However, maybe this is my perfectionist thinking again, I feel that I can't always make myself believe that what I do is good. I can't always give myself a free pass. I need to have some sort of accountability level within myself. Obviously, I struggle with the balance of keeping myself accountable, and becoming comfortable with imperfections. It took two weeks of being by myself, and patches of loneliness to encounter myself.

While struggling with my loneliness, I encounter myself, and while I encounter myself I encounter my longings. The longings that are deep inside you. Not the kind of longing where you would like air conditioning, or an ice cold beverage right next to you, but the deep longings of your heart. One of the deepest longings of my heart is to be with him. It's odd how you reach a point in your life where you can't live without this one other person. A few years ago a was your typically independent, can't wait to get to college kind of girl. However, God seemed to have a different plan for me than I intended for myself. I always pictured myself as the single woman living in the big city, who was happy with macaroni and cheese and wine for dinner. I never expected myself to be with someone else, or even need someone else. The idea of sharing my wine and macaroni and cheese not only seems like the right thing to do, it is what I want to do.

Over the past two years, the love that has grown in my heart for this one person has turned into a deep longing of the heart, a longing that needs to be filled. It's amazing to know that I serve an awesome God who has control of my path, and guides my footsteps each and every day. My God has surprised me with the path that he intends for me to walk, and he has also given me the joy of being lonely, to realize who I am as a person, and also the deep longings of my soul.