I used to think it was best to focus on our strengths. Now I know that sickness spreads, wellness typically doesn’t.
It’s been over three months since I’ve written. Sometimes life is just peaceful, few hardships endured, few lessons learnt, few moments of reflection to write from.
I deeply wish my recent silence could be attributed to such a season, but it can’t. Some of you as you read this know a little of my families journey this year, some of you don’t, and some of you know far less than you think you do. This is not a tell all. This blog and those that follow are not intended to give anyone the ‘low down’ on our struggles, failures or victories. There is a story to be told. It is a story of failure. It is a story of pain, loss and brokenness.
But it is more than that…
The story of the last few months, much like the story of our lives this far is a story of success rising from the ashes of failure. It is a story of healing in the midst of pain. It is a story of something great that was found in the search for something lost. More than anything it is a story of a Saviour. A Saviour who reaches deep into the brokenness we create, the hole we dig, the fire we light, into the very fragments of a life lived foolishly and pulls the pieces together. With mastery only a creator could yield, he makes something whole, something beautiful and something enduring out of the mess of our lives. There is much still to learn, and many foundations to build for the future, my hope though is that some of what I’ve learnt so far might be helpful.
I used to think it was best to focus on our strengths. Now I know that sickness spreads, wellness typically doesn’t.
In recent years there has been a big focus on learning our strengths and leveraging them to their full potential, giving less of our thought and attention to our weaknesses. For the most part I agree, at least on a personal level (in fact I recommend buying the book and test ‘StrengthsFinder’ http://www.strengthsfinder.com/home.aspx). I’ve learnt the hard way though that in a relationship while strengths are important and fun to focus on, it is our weaknesses that undermine, betray and destroy us.
We all know enough about sickness to know that disease spreads. Cell to cell a sickness in one part of our body can overtake every bit of us. How often though do you hear that someone was sick but had a healthy kidney, and the health from the kidney spread right through the sickness and made the whole body well? It doesn’t happen.
The truth for me and my family, and I expect for yours too is that the areas where you are healthy will likely not spread. But those areas where there are secrets, where there is darkness, addictions and sickness. Those areas will spread. Maybe they’ll take 3 months, 3 years or 30 years, eventually though, the sickness will spread. Even those parts of the relationship that are healthy now can become infected.
Is it time to get a check up? Early diagnosis of sickness is the best shot you have at beating it before it beats you. If you leave it until the whole relationship feels sick, it will likely be too late. Find it now, shine a light on it, and beat it together. As for me and my family, I hope we’ll never leave it too late again, it nearly killed us.
*if any of this feels really close to you right now, and you’d like to talk about it, you can email me at jimg@good.org.nz, we’d love to help if we can*
