Good True Colors

A person's true colors come out during the worst times of your life...so the popular quote goes, and I spent a lot of time thinking that was a terrible thing. As time has gone by and I've grown through some of those worst times, I've been able to see that it's a good thing to see the truth of that statement. It's good to see the truth of people sometimes, even if it hurts right down to your soul. The truth does indeed hurt, as another famous quote reminds. It's harder to see the truth about ourselves sometimes too!

I spent way too much time making excuses for people, who honestly didn't deserve them, just for the sake of protecting myself. Sometimes we go out of our way to protect others, sometimes we go out of our way to protect ourselves. Whether it's because they are hurting or we are, sometimes hurt blinds us to what we need to say or do, and we hurt much longer than necessary. I learned through great pain that it is perfectly okay and human to let go of someone who is causing me pain, even if that person once brought me joy. Sometimes people don't change, and no amount of our excuses for them (or us) can bring about a miracle, an apology, or a healing forgiveness as long as they are too present in our lives.

Sometimes you have to evaluate your losses too. Is it really a loss when someone leaves you? Is it really "devastating" when a friend lets you down? When people don't do what you expect/need/want from them at a time when you need/expect/want? When true colors are revealed, our own true colors are also revealed. We find that we were expecting things maybe we shouldn't have been expecting-from the wrong source. We might have been needing the wrong things. We may have been wanting what we shouldn't have been wanting in the first place. I think true colors are a set up! They are there as a wake-up call. Not to see who are the so-called "bad-guys" in your life, but maybe some of the choices we make aren't the ones we should have been making in the first place. Sometimes we make immature moves, expecting the other person to be mature and fix our mess. Ooh, I said that, and yes, I was talking about me! But hey, sometimes it's the other way around too.

Choosing gossips, shallow-minded people, people with other agendas on their minds, people who weren't invested in your life anyway, etc...Those are the ones we shouldn't have been depending on for our emotional support in the first place! It's no wonder when tragedy strikes in our lives, they are the first to disappear, say the wrong thing, say NOTHING, say rude or flippant things, and just don't seem to stick around much at all. We have to be responsible too, for relying on people too much, and for depending too much on people to give us support when they can't even support themselves half the time. I fell heart first into this trap, and I got my heart broken into a million pieces, and believe me, it has been a hard crawl out of it. When you invest in someone's life who you think invested in yours too, then find out they don't, it hurts your soul! But it teaches you too.

It has taught me that I should have turned to God first for what and Who I needed when my world started crashing down. When illness and tragedy were coming down around me, I needed to be still, and just wait for God. I also turned to my Christian friends, who offered prayer and Biblical support, which is what I needed most. I held fast to my family, of course, who kept me afloat. When God is given the opportunity to work, He will work. He will take a broken heart and mend it. He may not mend the broken relationships from before, because I've asked Him about that many times. His answer has been silent. I know that if He feels a relationship is healthy for me, He will bring it to me, and if not, I will not be a part of it. It is so much easier to let Him choose for me. He just needed me to pull off an Anna and "let it go".

I am sweetly surprised by the kind people He brought to me after my dad passed. A sweet lady from my former church blesses me with cards every so often, and I barely knew her before. I feel I know her in a new way now, and I am grateful for her life touching mine. My dear friends, though the circle is small, seem to know when I need a pick me up text, though their lives are busy too. I struggle to have a normal life at this time, dealing with illness, but they have not left me behind, and I could not be more grateful to them for their loyalty to me. Most people don't like to be bothered by "sick people", but I don't consider myself to be "sick". I am simply going through a challenge. And the people who are willing to go through this challenge with me, will certainly be going through my celebration with me too. As I've said many times before, I've made mistakes as a friend. That's no secret! But I'm trying to learn, and I don't want to repeat the same mistakes, and I am not the person I was before. I'm not even the person I was last year. Loss and illness tend to grow a person up a bit and change perspectives on things.

Don't be afraid to look at the colors of those around you, and make sure that you are in relationships for the right reasons. Be present for people. Don't repeat their secrets or their happenings in their lives to others. Be loyal to them and care about what's going on in their lives, or don't be there at all. Invest or withdraw. It's simple. Be a good, true color to at least one person.