The Loveliness of Loss.

I guess, the toughest thing about heeding counsel is that you always wonder if you’re selling yourself out. You believe with all your heart, mind and soul in something, but someone supposedly wiser, older, more objective, thinks otherwise. You fight it out within yourself. You try to see things from their perspective and weigh the cost. Then there comes that final, pivotal moment where you decide to choose one over the other to.

The fight, for some, is brief. For me, it is often epic.

I guess, heeding counsel just hasn’t always been my strongest trait, considering how some of the best decisions and most significant events in my life happened from going against what I was told. Choosing God, going on mission trips, publishing Kitesong and Rainbow all faced massive resistance and now… this.

I just needed a time –out.

Just needed a quiet space, a patch of grass, a piece of sky on my own to figure out what this all means. Because the fact that everyone has been giving me their two cents worth is wearing me down.

You can’t do it. You’re making the wrong decision. You’re being downright foolish and stupid.

But hey, what if you’re wrong?

The thing is, I don’t believe in statistics. I don’t believe in logical reasoning. I don’t buy conservative approaches. If I did, I wouldn’t have gone to Nepal during the uprising, nor shot myself in the foot by publishing Rainbow at the start of my career, nor decided to take a silly risk to publish Kitesong when I didn’t know better. Because hey, wasn’t all that foolishness as well? Foolishness in the eyes of the world.

And now this. You shouldn’t marry now because of this, this and this. And why don’t you think about it a bit more because of that, that and that. And the reason I don’t buy any of it is simply because they are decisions based mostly on fear, or neediness or insecurity. And so I don’t believe in this or that, because they are all postulations and conclusions made from purely rational decisions.

I don’t buy rational. I want to hear from God.

Which hasn’t been easy because I’m drowning in this sea of advice and counsel and I’ve-been-there-done-that-and-know-better-than-you.

I’ve been so angry, bitter and frustrated. Yet, a large part of me is scared, anxious and tired too. You’re wrong, I want to tell them. What I believe to be my greatest gain, seems to them my most tragic loss; what I believe to be a step forward in my spiritual progression, seems to them ten steps backwards into foolishness.

You’re wrong, I want to tell them. I don’t believe you. They’re giving me what conventional wisdom says, what life experience has told them, and what seems right and good and logical. Which is what makes it all the more difficult, because then, what if they’re right?

What if truly, as they say, it is too soon for me to know whether I should get married or not. What if truly, as they say, it will bring too much suffering for me to bear because I’ve never been “poor”. What if truly, as they say, it is better to wait and see how things go.

But I’m unconvinced. I’m unconvinced because behind all of those logical and valid reasons, is lurking a very real concern for (ironically) my own welfare. They fear I will regret this. That I will look back and blame them for not stopping me earlier. Or worse, ask them for help.

I’m unconvinced because I believe in the Loveliness of Loss. Loss is lovely, if only we choose to see it that way. Loss makes us rich with gratitude, rich in character, rich in beauty. It makes us cherish the little we have to realize how much we’ve got. It makes us see that for all the wealth in the world, our greatest source is in each other. It makes us realize that you can take everything away from a man except the God-given thanksgiving and joy in his heart.

Why do they all make it sound like a loss. Living more simply. Living a life of faith. Living with who I know God has planned for me.

But now I am wretched. I am wretched because I let their poison seep into my skin and I have doubts of my own now.

What if it is true, that I won’t be able to adapt to a smaller home, to living on a smaller budget and to living a simpler lifestyle. What if it is true, that I will become resentful and bitter about being a missionary and pastor’s wife. What if it is true, that if his liver fails again or some other health issue pops up, they will wag their fingers and say I-told-you-so when I ask for help.

Because I am human. And I’m afraid of what my sinful nature may be capable of.

Just days ago, over lunch with a missionary friend much older than me, she told me of a rich girlfriend’s daughter who had been together with a humble gentleman who had asked the daughter for her hand in marriage. He was a good man, though from a humble background. To my missionary friend’s horror, the rich girlfriend’s advice to her daughter was, “ Know where you come from and how you’ve grown up. If you marry him, you will never have this standard of life again.”

The young daughter broke up with the fortunate chap. And now the rich girlfriend laments that her daughter squanders her hard-earned money on thousand-dollar handbags bought from online boutiques.

But if anything, at least the little princess had the self-awareness and frankness to know what she could not live without.

I don’t know if I can manage. Living by ourselves. Cooking. Working. Doing overnight shifts and coming home to clean the house. Staying contented. Casting aside all bitterness and doubts. Having to check if our expenses exceed our income. Leading a life becoming of a missionary. Being secure and sufficient enough to be a pastor’s wife. Trusting God for his health issues and cost. Having enough faith through all the phases of his health, knowing God, and not I, loves us more than we love ourselves.

You will regret if you don’t take more time to consider. Why do you decide so soon? Take more time. What’s the rush? Even if you change your mind now, it’s not too late. Are you sure?

And it angers me not simply because of the doubt on my judgement, but because, I’ve let all this seep into me and now, I’m scared and doubtful too. It angers me because, they said all this not for merely antagonistic reasons, but for this strange thing called love, too.

What if I cannot cope. What if all this was a mistake. What if I’ve really been foolish and naïve and stupid? What if, like the little princess, I was too well-to-do to lead “that sort of life” but too proud or foolish not to be honest with myself?

But it surprises me, still. Because in spite of all that’s happened over the years, do they not see that I would have chosen this sort of life anyway, that I would have despised myself had I chosen differently. And now that I’ve found a rare confidante to go through life this way, and go a step closer to living lower, more simply, and to live a life full of Loss and Loveliness, why are they not happy for me? Why are they pushing me into a corner and making me give up on this.

Do they not believe in faith over fear.

Because the fact is, I would not have chosen any differently. And yet, I border on giving up completely because I look at the integrity of marriage and find myself, still, surrounded by more negative than positive examples. And while I’m so glad to know more missionary couples of late, I’ve also been astonished by friends who’ve recently shared about their separations and divorces, after six years, three children and a pair of twins; or after twenty years of sharing tears, joy, sex, hardship, and now becoming “just friends”.

What happened to love.

So I’ve gone into hiding. I’ve run away from you. I’ve woken up feeling fragile and wretched for almost 2 weeks just processing what that no meant. It has weighed me down so much it is like a fog in my head.

I look at the craziness of the past 4 months and wonder if perhaps, the intensity and speed of all that has happened has finally caused me to fragment in the whizz of the whirl.

I don’t know what to say anymore. Except to say I’m frustrated of listening to people’s opinions. Frustrated that they are logical and have a point. Frustrated that in spite of their logic, I don’t believe them. Frustrated that even though I don’t believe them, I doubt myself.

I’m angry with them for thinking such thoughts about you. I’m angry with you  for reasons I don’t understand. I’m angry with myself for being so angry.

I’m in such a mess.

So I did what I know best. I ran away. To a quiet place. By myself. And kept very, very still and quiet. Riding on a bike with chuckling chain rings so I couldn’t hear the sound of my tears or the anguish in them.

And perhaps the best advice has still been this- not saying a yes, or no, or just dropping a convenient baggage of packed-in advice for me- but really, reminding me of Who’s in charge and Who knows best.

“What scripture are you reading now? I don’t mean flipping pages to find God’s answers for your life issues at this moment but what is the “daily bread” that you are feeding on? Are you nurturing your spirit? If there is bitterness, go to God and repent, read His word to wash you clean. Work on this, then the answers to the issues at hand will come. These are happy problems- they are all about people and plans of loving and caring for you! God will work things out, just submit to His time, His ways in addition to His will. Continue to pray, with a heart looking to God, not looking for answers!”

With a heart looking to God, and not for answers.

O Lord, help me with my bitterness and anger, frustration and fears.

Help me re-see the beauty of Loss and Loveliness.

 

“So I say to you: Ask and it will be given to you;

seek and you will find;

knock and the door will be opened to you. 

 For everyone who asks receives; the one who seeks finds; and to the one who knocks, the door will be opened.

 

 “Which of you fathers, if your son asks for a fish, will give him a snake instead? 

 Or if he asks for an egg, will give him a scorpion?  

If you then, though you are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children,

how much more will your Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!”

-Luke 11

 

I was young and now I am old,

yet I have never seen the righteous forsaken or their children begging bread.

-Psalm 37:25 

 

---