So a few moments ago, one of my friends called me to ask me about a recent decision I made. Who knew that this one little convo would lead to such a revelation. The question she asked me was, "So why did you decide to become a vegetarian for 2 weeks?" (Aside- yes, I'm trying out vegetarian life for 2 weeks... Keep reading to find out why.) I explained to her that it was a decision that I made that was serving a couple purposes:
1. Because I'd been eating a lot of greasy junk food due to scheduling constraints and financial issues.
2. I'd been back and forth with myself for months about the idea of becoming a vegetarian. I'm one of those people that don't like to wonder about stuff for too long. Eventually, I have to try or attempt it and have a life experience to reference in my making a decision about some things. It was no different with my lifestyle as it relates to eating.
3. I'm striving to reintroduce some discipline into my life. From waking up early, to studying, meditating, working out, etc. I saw this as another opportunity to gain and apply some discipline.
So then she proceeded to ask me, "So with the jewelry that you were giving away, what made you start making it?" Recently, I gave away some jewelry pieces that I'd made a litte while ago. The story behind which is the basis of this blog. "Do you really wanna know?", I replied? She made it clear that she did.
I explained to her that I used to desire to own my own clothing line back in the day. One of them was geared toward women. Well, when my ex-fiance and I broke up, I threw myself into making jewelry for that line. I would make earrings and necklaces. I had already decided that I would refuse to make more than one of the same pair. I wanted each to be unique- 1 of a kind. It was the way I coped with the breakup. I would wake up in the morning and make jewelry. Get dressed. Go to work and come home and make jewelry. For weeks I would do this. I would let my hands create while I thought about the fact that my relationship had fallen apart. If I thought about that too much or got to an area that I didn't really wanna think about, I would just focus on the jewelry. Eventually, I would stop- at the point when I was convinced I was " over it". But that's not the end of the story... I never really sold much of the jewelry because I wasn't really driven to sell it nor did I wanna be the "strange" guy that went around selling women's jewelry that he made himself.
Now comes the part that shook my foundation. As I sat there explaining to my friend the detail I put into making all the jewelry different and that I refused to duplicate it, and I was explaining to her what I thought was my "healing" process, these words came out: "... I guess I was making myself." Those words shocked both of us and she asked for clarification. Not even feeling in control of my mouth or thoughts, I explained to her that maybe the reason I made every piece different from the other and refused to duplicate them is because that's how I see myself. I don't see myself like every other guy, or any particular group of guys. I generally don't fit in with them for the most as far as interests, conversations, dress, etc. Then it came out-"... And maybe I made myself into pieces of jewelry because I wanted to know that I'd be desired by women in light of my relationship falling apart. I wanted someone to desire me enough to be willing to pay for me= willing to make the sacrifice required to make the relationship work and to be willing to give of herself that she may fully receive me. I was making myself with the hope of selling myself!" I was enduring this labor the hope of somebody seeing something in me worth sacrificing for, worth loving, worth adoring and making an integral part of their day to day lives. As I stated earlier, I didn't go off selling the jewelry and maybe sold 4-5 pieces out of the close to 100+ I had! It stayed in a jewelry box where it ran over due to the fact that there were soo many pieces. I'd tried to sell it to friends and hadn't gotten any buyers. So it stayed in the box- I was convinced that no one wanted to buy this jewelry I'd spent all this time, energy, and money making. Sure, they would take it for free, but not make the sacrifice.
As I sit here, the mentality that I developed about that jewelry resonates soo much with the way I feel about me and the self-esteem issues I have. I have plenty of friends receiving the free version of a relationship with me but no one in the picture willing to make that sacrifice or desiring me that I desire back to build an intimate and growing relationship with. There's always God as I'm sure many of you want to remind me of and I know that but you get the picture. I'm speaking of here on Earth.
I think about the fact that beyond the jewelry, I did go through a season of making myself in hopes of being desireable. I went through this season of intensely working out and trying to dress better in hopes of making myself into this guy that was attractive to people. And while I did attract some people, it was not who and or what I was looking for or hoping would come along. Sure, I got comments, " Oh, you're losing weight!" "Looking good, keep it up." Etc... But that didn't bring what I thought it might. So when situations arose that would make it easy for me to excuse myself from working out, I took the route of the excuses and stopped. Wrong motivation subconsciously made that possible. So here I sit, slowly fluxuating in weight, longing to be desired and having finally gotten rid of all that jewelry- I gave it away to church members and friends. I recognize the problem now thanks to the revelation that God gave tonight! Now I just have to find- or wait for- the healing solution.
/end/
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