"Easy Buttons" over God

Glennon Doyle Melton has a book called Love Warrior. In it, she talks about "easy buttons" - things we turn to when we feel lonely or afraid. Things like drugs, alcohol, food, Facebook, or sex. These things are easy to do and they keep us from feeling the pain. 

I've been pushing lots of "easy buttons" this week. I've been spending a LOT of time on Facebook, trying to lose myself in various books, sleeping, staying up late texting people, eating junky food. I've been feeling a lot of low-grade loneliness and fear. I have holes in my soul, as we all do, but I'm meant to fill those holes with connection - with Love - not with easy buttons. 

I'm meant to connect with God and with other people. To love and be loved. Real love is not easy connection - it's real, deep, vulnerable, honest connection. Being real, vulnerable, honest, and deep with other people (Heck, even with myself. Maybe especially with myself) scares the crap out of me. 

Facebook doesn't give me that connection. Junk food doesn't. Books don't. Sleep doesn't. 

So what does? Sitting with the "hot loneliness," as Glennon calls it. Letting myself feel it. Naming it, understanding it - not to brush it aside as quickly as possible, but to invite it in for a while. To see it, explore it, fully grasp what it is. I need to understand what my holes are so that I know what to fill them with. But easy buttons offer the tempting lie that I don't ever have to feel that hot loneliness. Easy buttons whisper to me that I can keep the hot loneliness at bay and never have to deal with it. Easy buttons promise me that fear, sadness, anger don't have to ever be a part of my life. I can always be numbly content in my disconnection. 

But the problem is, I'm not content. And I'm more sensitive to that now. The sneaky misery of disconnection is more obvious to me now. It's more painful, because I have seen glimpses of true Love and I know how that feels. I know what it feels like to have purity of joy, clarity of mind, lightness of heart, and firmness of spirit. I don't feel those things when I use the easy buttons. 

When I use my easy buttons, I have a watered-down joy, fogginess of mind, a heavy heart, and uncertainty in my spirit. Everything feels either wild and desperate or miserably unchangeable. Easy buttons hold no real joy for me. There is no peace there. There is no hope there. All they do is keep me numb to emotional sensations - both the pain and the joy. All I feel is emptiness, with the occasional fleeting emotional high or low. 

The holes I have are begging to be filled with Love. True Love involves connection with God. I ignore Him far more than I should. I ignore Him far more than is healthy for me. He stands there, arms outstretched, letting me know that I'm welcome whenever I choose to share my heart with Him. Some stupid piece of my brain tells me that I can't go there until I'm perfect, or maybe just "better" than I am now. Whatever that's supposed to mean. 

But the truth is, God knows exactly how messed up I am right now. He knows it better than I do. I'm not hiding anything from Him by staying away from Him. I'm just depriving myself of Love. I'm depriving myself of the very thing I need to grow and truly live. What am I doing? The angels must be shaking their heads, half amused, half sorrowful. "Why can't she see? Why won't she let herself be loved?"

I picture God looking over His shoulder at them, from where He stands with His arms outstretched to me. "My children," He says, "Don't you remember? You did the very same thing once. This is part of life - learning to love and be loved. Be kind, she is figuring it out." He turns back to me and says, "My daughter, I'm still here and I always will be. I want you, in all your sins and flaws. You are beautiful to me, and I want to walk your path with you, no matter how many mistakes you make. Will you let me do that? 

Why am I still so afraid to let Him do that? It's easy to say yes, but to actually let Him - anyone - into my heart? That's not easy. It's darn near impossible. 

So what am I afraid of? I don't know. I still don't know. But I will keep coming back to fight that fight, to try to understand what is scaring me away from Love.