I'm surrounded by people lately.
The interesting thing, though, is that I wouldn't consider myself to be part of very many meaningful, impacting relationships. At school I'm around people all the time. There are about 25 minutes every day when I'm not around people, and I definitely use those minutes to sit in silence. A lot of times I don't feel lonely - I would even say I feel a bit over-stimulated! But when I really sit down and think about it, I realize that I'm not involved in very many close, comfortable relationships right now (other than my actually family members).
The thing I liked the most about India was that we had friends that were "family-friends". They would come over and I could either interact with them or totally ignore them, and either was okay. We could barge into each other's house to borrow food and not even feel like we had to ask how they were doing! And I loved every minute of it!
It's a little different right now since we're living with my parents and are still in a fairly transitional time of life. We haven't figured out where our church home will be, we're both trying to figure things out at work, and we're just starting to have enough energy at the end of a day that we might (maybe, possibly!) want to do something with other people instead of crash into bed and sleep for 12 hours. So, while I'm giving myself grace and accepting this as a natural by-product of the transition, I'm pretty impatient to get relationships going again!
The problem, though, is that I have an idea of the types of relationships I want to have, but no idea how to make it happen. In Webster City I was so involved with work that it was hard to really invest in people outside of school, and then we were in India (where it happened organically). I'm expecting a lot of trial, error, and intentionality. :)
BRING IT ON!
3 comments:
I'm glad were sisters, because I love you.
Wow, Nicole. I feel like I could have written this. This has been somthing I have been struggling with and an area I have been in prayer about. I read it to Erik and he wanted to clarify that it was you and not me that wrote it since I have been vocalizing these thoughts to him lately. We will have to check in with each other about how the Lord works in our lives in this area. We still long for those types of friendships we had overseas.
Ask God for it. I have found that God always sends me a friend right when I need it the most, even if I don't know that's what I need. After all, he sent me you!
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