Surviving Singleness #4

Mind Games

I was flipping through past journals recently and it struck me…again….how much time I spend thinking. It’s a girl thing right? I even think about thinking!

The entries in my journal from my pre-married years highlighted how many potholes I fell into during that lengthy walk along the road of singleness. So in thinking about my thinking during that time, I just wanted to pass on a couple of warnings to others walking that road and suggest some pothole fillers that might be useful to you.

The Pothole of Inadequacy: I am a loser…no-one loves me.

One of the major pieces of faulty, and consequently damaging, thinking was that because I was not in a relationship and no-one seemed interested in pursuing one with me, I must therefore be unlovable or unworthy of love. In some way, perhaps many ways, I was obviously inadequate.

The Pothole of Selfishness: I….I….I…..I……I…….I…….I……I…..I……I

I guess it’s logical that in my journals I write about ME. But I realise how ME focussed I was during that season and it wasn’t healthy. We can spend way too much time fixated on ourselves and our own problems or circumstances and forget that as God’s girls we are called to look to the interests of others.

The Pothole of Ungratefulness: I have no boyfriend. I’m married to my job. I spend Friday and Saturday nights alone. I have sole responsibility for everything, including keeping the car running, taking out the bins and paying every bill. Oh, woe is me!

It is so easy to focus on negatives and see the glass as half empty and again, that is not what God has called us to.

The Pothole of Fantasyland: There are no decent men around. Why isn’t there a Mr Darcy? Or Romeo? Or Jack? Or…??? For me????????

I’ve heard it said that chick-lit and chick-flicks are female porn. Might sound a bit severe, but in some ways I agree. There was a season in my single years where I devoured romance novels and films and they affected my thinking….severely. Instead of building hope, they actually caused me to dwell on what I did not have. The Hollywood version of love in these books and movies is not even close to God’s design and that builds into our minds faulty thoughts about men, love and intimacy. They can be addictive, which is always dangerous. And they caused me to see the men in my life as somewhat deficient…’Well, why couldn’t they be like Mr Darcy? Or Romeo? Or Jack? Or…???’ They trigger feelings for something more that can take over our mental and physical selves and cause us to dwell on intimacy…or our lack of it.

There’s plenty of other potholes revealed in my journals but I am sure you get the picture. And if you are currently walking the single road, you could probably name a few that have caused your thinking to get bogged down or sidetracked.

BUT the great news is that we have a God who has given us the means to take up the shovel and fill in these potholes so that our thinking is no longer faulty and holding us back, but instead is a true reflection of how life is.

HIS WORD is the ultimate guide to filling in the potholes. Not only does it tell us the truth about who we are, why we are here and what life is about, but also, it gives specific helps for dealing with faulty thoughts. The very best one of course is to follow Paul’s advice in 2 Corinthians 10:5 – We destroy arguments and every pretension that sets itself up against the knowledge of God, we take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ. But we can’t destroy faulty thinking if we do not know what is truth. And we can’t replace faulty thoughts with truthful ones if we are not IN God’s Word…reading, studying and applying it.

A couple of other practical ways I found to fill in the potholes have been accountability with a trusted friend or mentor who will talk through with me my thoughts and feelings and hold me accountable when it comes to what I am watching, reading, listening to, etc… I also reduced the amount of romance reading and viewing I was doing and for a time, fasted from that genre of entertainment. On some pages in my journals there is no complaining or whinging at all. Instead, I wrote lists – long ones – of the blessings in my life and expressed my deep gratefulness to God for His gifts to me. Counting your blessings sure changes your whole outlook on life. And I tried to counter the selfishness I saw in me by deliberately choosing to put others first and to find ways to encourage them. I called people, wrote letters, sent appreciation emails to my pastors, visited friends, practised hospitality, got involved in service ministries, sponsored children….and there’s heaps more here that you can do to get the focus off yourself. One final way I countered this particular pothole and kept hope for marriage alive was to pray for my future husband. Sure I hadn’t met him yet…well I didn’t think I had….but I could mention Him in my prayers and ask for God to bless him. I prayed for his relationships with friends and family. I asked God to give him wisdom in decisions and for the Holy Spirit to fill him with a desire to be obedient and faithful to our heavenly Father. I prayed for success in his job and for God to protect his heart and mind and body.

In all honesty, I did not do all these things all the time. But they are just some ways I tried, with God’s help, to not waste my season of singleness. Perhaps they might be an encouragement to you not just to keep on keeping on, but to travel the S road with fewer bumps and less potholes.