My Lorelai and Sookie Complex

Recently I overheard my kids talking about their best friends.  My son has had the same one pretty much his whole life, but my daughter on the other hand, tends to give a different name each time she is asked. She is an introvert to the core so really I think that she would be perfectly content if her whole world was just her small little family and her dolls, but the pressure of needing to come up with a “best friend” causes her to share a name anyway.

It’s funny, though, how the word “best friend” still evokes strong emotion inside of me.  I can remember being a young girl and finding out that the girl I thought was my “best friend” had been calling someone else her best friend instead…or even worse she exchanged one of those best friend necklaces with her and not with me!  Oh the heartbreak!

I wanted so desperately to be someone’s best…someone’s favorite. 

It sounds so silly now, but I can remember the pain my little heart felt over this desire.  Even throughout my teen years and early adulthood, I still struggled with that desire to be someone’s best…someone’s favorite.

Why do we do that? 

I have mentored enough girls in life now to know that I am not the only one who has struggled with this deep desire.  I can’t speak for guys, so I don’t know if they battle this, but I can say with certainty that many young ladies and even women struggle with this constantly.

And while I certainly have matured since my days as a young college girl, I think deep down I still battle with that desire to be someone’s favorite. I put so much pressure on friendships or even family relationships to be exactly what I think they should be.  It may not look like some external pressure, but deep in my heart, I am begging this person to fulfill my expectation of who I want them to be in my life.

It sounds terrible, but I am pretty certain that many of you right now are doing the exact same thing in your relationships.  You aren’t as obvious as the 10 year old crying because her friend gave a best friend necklace to someone else, but deep down you are bandaging wound after wound because your friend, your spouse, your mom, your kids, your sister, your boss, etc. didn’t do what you expected them to do…didn’t love you the way you wanted them to love you.

I am here to tell you that it needs to stop now. 

I recently heard someone say that expectations are nothing more than premeditated resentments.

Expectations are nothing more than premeditated resentments.

Hits hard, doesn’t it?

Time and time again we are asking people, EXPECTING people, to be more than they can or should be for us.  We are begging them to make us feel desired, wanted, fulfilled, happy, content, and a million other emotions. 

It’s not fair guys.

We are nursing wounds that were never meant to be ours.

Friends are drifting a part.  Marriages are breaking up.  Work relationships are strained.  Parents and their adult children are spending less and less time together.  All over the board, we can see relationships falling apart, and we are scratching our heads wondering what went wrong again.

But what I want to literally scream at the world is that we are to blame!

Time and time again we are secretly begging the other person, “Pick me first!  Let me be the favorite! Love me the most!  Tell me I am the best!”

And then they don’t pick us first or we aren’t the favorite, and we decide that must mean we aren’t enough.

Relationships are hard.  They are always going to be hard, but they also can be infinitely good if we decide to stop putting so much pressure on them. 

Stop expecting people to be more than you are willing to be for yourself.

You want a friend to make more effort?  Why don’t you start making more effort not just in that friendship but also with yourself? 

You wish your spouse were more attentive?  Why don’t you start going out of your way to do things he/she will like?  And then while you are at it, start making space and time for yourself…read that book that’s been sitting on the shelf, go for a walk, bake some cookies…do whatever it is that fills your heart with gladness instead of waiting for your spouse to do it.

I am just so tired, guys. I am tired of us whining and griping about wounds that we are bringing on ourselves.  It sounds harsh but its true.

I am looking around at the world, and I am seeing thousands of serious hurts and pains.  People are dying.  Young girls are being raped and trafficked.  Children are going without food.  Families are falling apart. Young adults are taking their lives.

And we are crying because the people in our life aren’t filling all of our emotional needs.

It’s absurd really. 

But, I am the number one offender. 

So today I am writing from a place of saying, enough is enough. 

I am choosing TODAY to stop asking people to be more than they are capable of being for me.  I am going to stop putting ridiculous expectations on the relationships in my life.

I am going to stop making it all about me.

Relationships are hard, and I am by no means suggesting that we shouldn’t put the work into them that needs to be done to keep them healthy.  Go to counseling if you need to.  Save your relationships.  This is not some call to throw them all out the window. Some of the most beautiful moments in my life have come through the relationships that I have with my people, with my tribe.

We were made with a deep longing for community and fellowship.  I personally think community is one of God’s greatest gifts.

I am just saying that we need to come to a place that we are not longer going to find our worth, our happiness, or our passion in another person.

We will always, always be disappointed if that is the case. God never meant for me to find my worth in someone else.  In fact, His Word is pretty clear that I am worthy because HE says I am.  He made me enough.

But as long as I keep begging others to do this for me, I will be left unsatisfied and broken hearted.  There are going to be seasons that I desperately will need people to come around me.  We all have those times in life and that is good and completely okay.

I just also want to be able to come alongside others. I don’t want to be so busy licking my own self-inflicted wounds that I am completely oblivious to those around me.

I don’t have to be someone’s best for her to be mine.  And I certainly don’t have to wait for someone to pick me first in order to get in the game.  I am in the moment I decide to start playing.