Special Delivery

What does she have that I don't have? What did I do to make my parent leave me? What is so horrible about me that caused my romantic relationship or platonic friendship to end? Why did he/she do me like that? I'm sure at some point in time we have all asked these exact questions or one of its many variations. I certainly have wondered in my life how I could have changed the outcome of a situation by being a different person. I've thought maybe if I was thinner, prettier, smarter, wittier, funnier, more subservient, more accommodating, or smiled more often, perhaps I could have prevented the end of one of my human relationships. And while I'm sure that maybe I could work on and benefit from being more of all of the aforementioned, I have learned that a lot of the time it simply A) isn't my fault and B) is the absolute best result for which I could have hoped.

I know it sounds as if I'm absolving myself of any wrongdoing or responsibility for the end of certain familial, romantic, and platonic relationships but that isn't what I'm doing at all. I've said before that the ending of any type of toxic relationship is imperative for our own personal survival but I didn't speak to those relationships we think are good for us. The ones we are enjoying. The ones we crave when it's late at night. Some relationships are formed in such a way that we think we absolutely cannot survive without them and even if the opportunity to escape them presented itself, we would absolutely refuse it even if it really was the best thing for us.

Fortunately, God has a way of taking care of these strange bonds for us so that we can learn how that which we thought we could not live without is really so extraneous that we wonder why we ever thought we needed it in the first place. Sure, it takes a good amount of time to draw that conclusion in some cases but I've yet to find it to be wrong.

When discussing her mother's abandonment of her as a child, a very wise woman told me that once she got past the hurt of being left by the one person a child should be able to count on, she realized one very important point. Her mother didn't abandon her but instead she was delivered from the additional pain she would have endured had her mother been in her life to raise her. Sure, she suffered some pain and disappointment but once she realized how much worse her life would have been had her mother stuck around, she was grateful to not have to deal with the fallout.

So I've learned and am continuing to learn that she had a most valid point. I look back at all the folks who are no longer in my life because they chose to leave and I have to say that I do not regret their departure once the smoke clears. That girl didn't hurt my feelings by ending our "good" friendship, she saved me from her craziness. My father didn't destroy me by never being an active participant in my life. He helped to orchestrate my rescue from his destructiveness. And the man who didn't want to be with me but instead wanted to be with someone else? I wasn't dumped. I was DELIVERED.

I suppose as in most life situations, it's simply a lesson in perspective. Tomatoe tomato if you will. When I think of all the harm I've avoided because someone left me, instead of being hurt and disappointed, I am grateful for being rescued by way of a special delivery.