DAMNED IF YA DO, DAMNED IF YA DON'T..

Damned if ya do, damned if ya don’t… by Laurie Jackson 5/23/2010

Okay, so I got to thinking about how “shame” is so attached to my heart and now that I can see it in one area of my life it is like I see that most of my actions and motives are based on shame! I can see clearly that most everything in my life is tainted in some way, by shame. Do I have to do this or do I get to do this?

Let me explain the title. Damned if ya do and damned if ya don’t. Have you ever struggled with your weight or any other thing you feel guilty or obligated about? I should workout, I should call that person, and I should do this or that. It Reminds me of the infamous saying: “Don’t should on yourself.” Then there are days when I wake up and I am so excited about what I GET to do that day. I love these days!

I’m looking inside my heart today and asking myself what is the difference in this shame based attitude, from the I “get to” attitude?

I believe, for me anyway, it comes down to one, or rather two questions. “Do I feel manipulated and controlled about doing something or do I personally and genuinely have a desire to do a thing?”

There are people who are truly satisfied to have a relationship based on manipulation, control and trying to put shame on you. They are satisfied “pretending” that you are glad to talk to them and visit with them. Personally, I would not want someone to feel this way about me. If I look deep in my heart I may “want” to call a person, but if they project this needy attitude full of victimization that gives way to manipulating and trying to control me to be there friend then I end up wanting to run and hide from these kind of relationships. But then this causes the person to manipulate the relationship even more and causes me to want to gasp for air and get away from the relationship as quick as possible.

I think so many marriages and many relationships are caught up in this sort of thing. So “damned if ya do and damned if ya don’t”… you feel trapped! I think the only remedy is to have a type of separation from the toxic relationship and then when everyone is “okay” and detoxed from this unhealthy need of you, and then maybe, just maybe, you can have some type of healthy relationship.

My husband and I actually went through this many years ago. We did not quite separate but I did separate emotionally from him and I learned to get my emotional needs met from developing a deeper and more dependent relationship with God and even ended up connecting better to myself. This actually made my husband and my relationship much healthier. ☺ Go figure.

The same goes for our relationship with food and exercise or anything else we “should” do. We obviously were made to eat and move our bodies as well as many other things in life. We were created to enjoy our food and even enjoy healthy living. This area has also been so warped with shame and obligation. I can’t quite explain how or when I feel free from this but it has something to do with being okay with myself no matter what I’m eating or if I worked out that day. It seems when I completely dispose of any perfectionist, unrealistic and or even “non-conformist” type of attitudes. When I allow myself to be a flexible human -being. I supposed being “okay” with what I may need to feel on any given day. Not relying on shame or guilt to be my motivator but rather motivated by truth and love for each moment. If I eat too much or exercise too little just telling myself, “you are on a journey and your value does not rely on what you look like or even feel like.”

Shame is all over the place. We live in such a performance based society full of competition and images that promise happiness. Images of what happiness looks like i.e.: family, friendship, work/careers or our body image. We have all heard happiness does not come from outer circumstances or appearances. Seriously, in some ways this is true but in some ways it’s a really stupid cliché’. Imagine having everyone you loved taken away from you. Or imagine if you had a serious health condition that caused you to swell up and loose any or all-outer beauty and or all your vitality. Would any of us really be happy? I wouldn’t even have the audacity to say that I would or could feel happy.

Job, from the big, bad, bible story did, or did he? Was Job truly happy while going through it, was he? It says that God restored double for his trouble but I could never understand that if Job really loved his kids and wife, how could God just replace them with “other” people. This was obviously over a lot of time… Months, years and more like decades. “Time” to heal and grow seems to be an important factor in all this.

So, I think I’m giving up on all this stuff I do in pretense, obligation and completely shame based. Of course tomorrow I will do stuff that I don’t “feel” like doing but, I’m asking God to continue to show me how to live loved, live in His truth, and not live out of any shame and truly experience more freedom.

I have tried to make this happen for myself, but time and time again I find that my efforts are a dead end road. When I wait on God to transform me into a free, loving person I end up waking up and noticing that some of my shame based attitudes are gone. How does He do it? I don’t know exactly, but I think it has something to do with taking shame out of my thinking and affirming His love for me personally and causing me to actually experience His perfect Love in my daily life. This is vague and it even seems like some sort of rhetoric that I’ve heard before. So far, it’s the only way that seems to bring fruit on my tree. When I just stand there and receive all of Gods provision, nutrients, light and living water, the tree just grows a “little” each day. When I look back a year ago, it seems more visible, but even then, I try not to look back too often. This seems to hinder me more then help.

However, whenever and whatever means God chooses. God is NOT shame. God is Love. It is His kindness and mercy that leads us to a transformed life of really knowing His love for us so we can honestly extend that love to others. Not shame, obligation and performance based living.

This is where I seem to be these days on this life journey. Let me know more about your journey. I love hearing what God is doing in all of you too. ☺