I know these days so many of us are spending more time at home, more time alone.
For introverts or wounded hearts not having to turn down invitations can seem like a gift.
But it’s easy to slide from solitude (healthy, restorative alone time) into isolation (unhealthy, depleting separation). So I ask myself a few questions to help sort it out.
If you are feeling increasingly alone and forgotten, full of despair and abandoned, you might want to use this checklist too.
Even in this era of social (physical) distancing a heart can and absolutely should seek out community.
It’s what we were made for.
❤
I’ve always loved my alone time.
As an introvert (who can, if pressed pretend not to be!) my energy is restored when I interact with one or two folks or no one at all. A dream afternoon is writing while listening to nothing louder than the wind chimes outside my door.
I treasure solitude.
Since Dominic ran ahead to Heaven, I find I need even more alone time than before.
That quiet place is where I do my most effective grief work, undisturbed by interruptions and distractions.
But I need to be careful that solitude doesn’t shift into isolation.
Jehovah is the God of promises made and promises kept.
From Genesis to Malachi, God sent prophets to proclaim the coming of Messiah.
And He used Mary and Joseph, willing servants of the Most High, to bring about His plan.
22-23 All this happened to fulfil what the Lord had said through the prophet—‘Behold, a virgin shall be with child, and bear a son, and they shall call his name Immanuel’. (“Immanuel” means “God with us.”)
24-25 When Joseph woke up he did what the angel had told him. He married Mary, but had no intercourse with her until she had given birth to a son. Then he gave him the name Jesus.
Matthew 1:22-25 PHILLIPS
Not only was Jesus the Child of promise, the Messiah, the Savior, He was God wrapped in flesh.
Fully God and fully human.
The King of all creation chose to subject Himself to it. He was born in the ordinary way though His conception was miraculous.
There are many religions in the world. But there is not a single other faith whose cornerstone is Deity come to earth.
Only Christianity can claim that our God left Heaven and took on flesh to dwell among His people and that makes all the difference.
Grief is isolating.
There are moments, days-even weeks-when I feel trapped inside an impermeable bubble of sorrow and pain. No human touch or words can pierce the armor around my heart.
I can’t pray, I can’t read my Bible, I can barely lift my head.
It’s then that Jesus comes to me gently, sweetly, with grace, compassion and love because He knows every single heartache I endure. He walked the earth and was betrayed, wounded, forsaken. He is not far off and unaware.
Immanuel-“God with us”-isn’t just a lofty theological concept.
It (He!) is a living reality.
In my weakest and most vulnerable moments, when I can’t conjure hope for myself, He brings it to me.
QUESTIONS:
What does it mean to YOU that God took on flesh?
Have you ever thought about Jesus as a man, living like a man, hitting His thumb with a hammer, stubbing His toe, loving His mother and all the other things life means? Or do you simply think about the punctuated moments described in Scripture?
The writer of Hebrews says that because Jesus experienced humanity in every way we have a High Priest who sympathizes and understands our weakness. I find that liberating! How might embracing this truth encourage your heart to bring every request, lament, praise and doubt to the throne of grace?
When have you experienced the Presence of Jesus?
PRAYER:
Father God,
Your people waited long for their Messiah. After hundreds of years You didn’t just send just someone, You sent your own Son. Fully God, fully human. He walked among us. It’s hard for me to wrap my head around that idea.
But what I know from experience is that You ARE the God of Presence. You do not abandon me to despair. When I am most lonely and my heart is crushed under the weight of sorrow, help me remember that.
Give me the confidence to bring the good, bad and the ugly straight to the throne of grace. Remind me that though Heaven is your high and lofty holy dwelling place it’s not so far You can’t hear me.
And You DO hear me. You see me. You capture my tears and count them precious. Thank You for your promises. Thank You for your peace. Thank You for your Presence.
Amen
O come, Thou Day-Spring, come and cheer our spirits by Thine advent here
Disperse the gloomy clouds of night and death’s dark shadows put to flight.
Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel shall come to thee, O Israel.
“People will forget what you said, they will forget what you did, but they will never forget how you made them feel.” ~ Maya Angelou
It’s easy when you’re scared to shout loudly at whatever scapegoat crosses your path. But it’s hardly helpful.
My earnest hope in this season of worldwide fear is this: that people will show themselves to be more compassionate than they think they are, that communities will come together instead of falling apart and that while politicians may work hard to spin headlines one way or the other, citizens will insist on helping one another instead of hating one another.
❤ Melanie
A friend recently posted that not all the lessons of grief are bitter.
Some are sweet.
She’s right.
I’ve learned a lot on this journey. And one of the sweet things I’ve learned is that the best thing to offer fellow travelers is a bit of my heart instead of a piece of my mind.
Four kids, seven and under, one mama and a tiny house survived one solid month of alone time.
Photo taken that same year. ❤
The chicken pox made its rounds in our local weekly Bible study and pretty much every kid that hadn’t had it got it. So it wasn’t long until more than half the class was home riding out the wave of itchy, blotchy skin, fever and discomfort.
We couldn’t get it all at once. Oh no!
It went through my four one at a time with a bit of overlap so we were slathering on calamine lotion by the quart, taking baking soda and oatmeal baths several times a day and watching waaaayyyy more television than any of my children had seen so far in their lives.
It took slightly over a month for us to finally be free of it and I’ll admit it tried my patience. I spent a lot of time looking through the windows at a busy world outside, longing to be part of it.
There was a wisteria vine in my across-the-street neighbor’s yard that crept up the telephone poll outside the living room window.
I watched as it went from brown twig to wisps of green and finally dripping purple in all its glory while I was stuck inside trying to keep unwell children happy and stop them scratching themselves into infection.
I lost that spring. We all did.
But we came out the other side just fine.
I lost another spring in 2014.
And this time it was absolutely, positively NOT fine.
It’s still not fine.
April 12, 2014 Dominic ran ahead to Heaven.
Because of both springs, I will tell you this: If staying home means I can be part of the solution to the spread of Covid 19 and perhaps spare another family a lost spring, a lost loved one, a frightening brush with death-I’m happy to do it.
My personal comfort, sense of freedom, arrogant assumption that I am the exception to the well-intentioned and common sense advice of healthcare professionals is a tiny, tiny price to pay in order to slow down the pace of this disease so those who need extra attention, hospitalization and intervention get it.
Losing a spring is an unfortunate happenstance.
Losing a son, a daughter, a brother, sister, mother or father is a tragedy.
Hey-I survived over a month with four itchy, irritable children and no internet, no food delivery, no grocery pick up, no online buddies-you can manage a couple weeks.
As an introvert (who can, if pressed pretend not to be!) my energy is restored when I interact with one or two folks or no one at all. A dream afternoon is writing while listening to nothing louder than the wind chimes outside my door.
I treasure solitude.
Since Dominic ran ahead to Heaven, I find I need even more alone time than before.
That quiet place is where I do my most effective grief work, undisturbed by interruptions and distractions.
But I need to be careful that solitude doesn’t shift into isolation.
I have to remind my heart that spending time with others keeps me from falling so deeply down the well of despair that all I see is darkness.
I need human interaction to keep me connected to a world that, quite frankly, I might sometimes just as soon leave behind.
So how can I tell the difference between solitude and isolation?
Here are a few questions that help me figure that out:
Do I feel lonely, neglected or abandoned? If my alone time feels less like a gift and more like an unwelcome burden then it may be isolation rather than solitude.
Where are my thoughts taking me? Being alone is often the only way to “hear” my own thoughts without having to block out the noise and activity of other people. If I am sitting with myself, processing hard things or even beautiful things, resolving internal conflict, conjuring new ways to deal with difficult relationships or situations then solitude is doing its work. If, instead, I find my mind tangled up in fearful knots, filled with negative self-talk or unable to break a downward spiral into despair then I probably need to find someone to talk to.
Am I getting stronger or being drained? After the holidays or other hectic seasons I need time alone to recharge my batteries. Often it is almost a day-for-day exchange. I can feel tension melting away and strength returning. My mind begins to clear and life doesn’t feel so overwhelming. Solitude grants space for my body, mind and soul to be refreshed. When it slides into isolation I can feel the shift. Instead of waking refreshed and eager to greet a free day, I wake to dreading another long one alone. Instead of energy rising in my spirit, I can feel it draining away. Instead of thinking kindly of friends and family who choose to leave me be, I’m resentful no one has checked up on me.
Is there a helpful rhythm to my days alone or am I counting the hours until sundown? When I’m enjoying solitude, the hours feel like a welcome opportunity to do things (or not do things!) at my own pace and according to my own preferences. I sit with pen in hand and jot down a list knowing that if I complete it or if I don’t the only person I have to answer to is myself. No pressing appointments and no worrisome commitments. When I’m isolating, the hours feel like a long march through deep mud-every step tedious, treacherous and exhausting. I’m alone but I’m not getting any benefit from it. If I’m enduring instead of enjoying then I’m isolating.
Do I have an endpoint in mind? When I look ahead at a week on my calendar, I try to balance alone time with social commitments. A day or two alone (or with limited human interaction) is solitude. A week holed up in the house is isolation. If I find myself pushing off needed outings (to the grocery store, to run errands) then I ask myself, “why?”. Often it’s because I’ve drifted from solitude (helpful alone time) to isolation (unhelpful hiding).
I can shift myself out of isolation by choosing just one small social interaction.
I might text or message a friend, go to the grocery store and make a point of speaking to the clerk, call someone or show up at a church or community event even if I sit in the back and slip out early.
I’m never going to be that person who is up for every outing. That’s just not how I’m made and child loss has intensified my need for solitude.
But I don’t want to be alone and lonely, sinking deeper and deeper into a pit of my own making.
I’ve spent the past two days fighting anxiety and panic.
Breath caught mid-throat, chest pounding, sobs threatening, head throbbing-just like that first day 47 months ago.
A series of events broke down the defense I’ve carefully constructed that helps me make it through most days without tears.
I did pretty good.
I managed a family dinner, church and a covered dish luncheon with no one any the wiser.
Underneath it all I was barely hanging on.
I love that my words give expression to my feelings, thoughts and experience and also help others give expression to theirs. But sometimes I’m afraid that the people closest to me think that because I can write about it, I must be a bit beyond it-detached, clinical, untouched.
Nothing could be further from the truth.
I feel every. single. thing.
My heart hurts like every other bereaved parent. My brain struggles to comprehend the reality of my son’s death and a lifetime without his earthly companionship. I fight for my faith. I cry out to God. I feel lonely, misunderstood, abandoned, frightened, and so, so sad.
It separates me as one who knows loss by experience from those who have only looked on from the outside.
It opens a chasm between me and people who aren’t aware that life can be changed in a single instant.
And I can feel like no one sees me, no one cares about me and no one notices my pain.
Sometimes it even feels like God has forgotten me-that He isn’t listening, that He doesn’t care.
But Jehovah hasn’t abandoned me.
Have you ever wondered why there are lists of names in the Bible? Do you, like me, sometimes rush through them or pass over them to get to the “main part” of a story?
But look again, the names ARE the story.
The God of the Bible isn’t the God of the masses.He is the God of the individual.
He walked in the garden with Adam and Eve. He called out to Cain, ‘Where is your brother?”
He took Enoch, guided Noah, chose Abraham and Moses.
He anointed David, spoke to and through the prophets and He CAME, flesh to flesh to bear the sins of His people, redeem them from death and cover them with His blood.
My name is graven on His hands.
“Can a mother forget the baby at her breast and have no compassion on the child she has borne? Though she may forget, I will not forget you! See, I have engraved you on the palms of my hands”
Isaiah 49: 15-16a NIV
My life is hidden with Christ.
For you died, and your life is now hidden with Christ in God.When Christ, who is yourlife,appears, then you also will appear with him in glory.
Colossians 3:3-4 NIV
He has a new name for me, a secret name I’ll receive in Heaven.
“To the one who conquers through faithfulness even unto death, I will feed you with hidden manna and give you a white stone. Upon this stone, a new name is engraved. No one knows this name except for its recipient.”
Revelation 2:17b VOICE
The enemy wants to convince me that God has forgotten me.
That He has abandoned me in my sorrow and pain.
That when my son breathed his last, He was looking the other way.
That’s a lie.
And I refuse to listen.
Years ago I heard this song for the first time and it touched my heart:
