I have had times over the past couple days where I have felt god's hand upon me in a certain ways.
For one, for a good chunk of time, I had this air of confidence, and felt that I was starting to finally take the steps to get over this. And that was a good feeling, something I haven't really felt in a long time.
God helped me through an elder at church who is just an amazing guy, and I know that he will be there with me all the way through this whenever I need him, which means god is there for me through him. My heart doesn't always remember this, but periods here and there are an improvement.
Last church session I felt my comfort level around others just go way up, and it wasn't because of anything I did.
Lastly, I've sort of made an important discovery. I thought that the reason I avoided people and didn't feel right in close emotional situations with people was because I hated the numb feeling. Well that's true, but I looked back at all of those times and that feeling and realized something so plain as day that I can't believe I didn't see it. I suffered not only numbness in those situations, but an incredible fear of getting close to them in any way, and a fear that letting myself feel their deeper emotions or sharing mine would result in some sort of pain. Ultimately I believe this expected pain is mainly abandoment. Big changes in friends for awhile, or big ends to things... like ends of the year at college where everyone is moving out... made me extremely full of pain for a short period, ready to cry at every moment, and searching for people, anyone, to be with.
Not that I actually thought this in my head, in fact it would seem ridiculous to think this in most situations because there are very few relationships where you get close enough to someone to get hurt the way I did. But this fear is humming right along hidden inside of me and burdening all relationships. Even with God. Its weird, its like a reflex, because logically I don't find any reason to be afraid of sharing emotional experiences with people, in fact I truly thirst to have that again. But when I get in those situations, or approach them, my heart just kind of automatically ducks, covers, and wants nothing more than to get the heck out of there. I never even could pinpoint why I wanted so badly to get away from people in lots of situations.
The place I felt most comfortable all this time, was just hanging out with the group of friends that I've had for years on end. I felt comfortable there because we've long passed sharing deep emotions and really just gotten to a much more shallow level, where we essentially hang out because we are so comfortable with the faces around us because they have been there for so long.
Anywhere that was more emotionally charged then that 'safe' environment made me at the least very tense and emotionally cut off, and at the most a very urgent want to leave.
Sorry for the lengthy description... Anyway... I guess the problem is now paying attention to what god is telling me the changes I need to make... and somehow eventually releasing that fear and first being able to trust and let god love me... and then the other relationships will follow. It seems so impossible based on how it feels, but I think if I follow the gods provided direction and make those changes, that it might get a lot easier to release the fear.
One of those directions I believe is that my friends of choice needs a serious overhaul. That's really hard to do because these friends have been with me so long, some of them since kindergarten, and they used to be so full of love. Its so hard to pull away. Change is so hard I guess. I never liked change. But I really need friends that at the least are truly loving, and idealy strong faith christians. I'm already making some efforts to do that, and I'll let you know how that goes.
I also believe one of those directions from God might be to be brave and go off to the program I really want to do for grad school at NYU. To really just grit my teeth, and leave my comfort circle behind. (Many of my friends from young life even followed me to college and I live with them.) The program would be by far the best for me to take, and over the past couple days since praying more I have suddenly got very excited about going. I graduate undergrad in May.
Whooooeee... sorry long winded. Thanks if you actually made it through all that. And thank you for your responses and prayers. It has helped tremendously, probably more than I know.
God Bless,
Bob