Dear Mentor

Dear Mentor,

I am hoping and praying for your presence in my life, and the sooner the better. Yes, I have plenty of mentor-like figures who have influenced my life, and yet I am desiring one to whom I can reveal myself more fully and openly on a regular basis. While I used to see a therapist, I eventually concluded that I did not want to pay money for someone to be my friend, to do life with me. I wanted to build a more personal relationship than that which is healthy in a therapist-patient connection.

I fear I may be too picky in the kind of person I want. I want God to give me a mentor, and yet I want it to be the kind of mentor I would like. Although I don’t know for sure exactly what I want, I have some ideas on what I don’t want, and I fear that might be just the thing God places in front of me.

I guess I want someone who will take the time to understand me and my background. Someone who has an understanding of and appreciation for mental and emotional health. I don’t want the vomiting of proverbs without the process of digesting them first, in order to make them concrete, applicable. Even the deepest wisdom is useless to the ears of one who does not understand the language.

I prefer someone who has a sense of humor, and doesn’t mind an occasional curse word here and there. Debate the morality of each if you wish, but I believe one must be genuine in order to experience growth. And sometimes being genuine entails exposing the crudeness and less reverent side of life.

I have begun every paragraph so far with the word I. I want to have a healthier view of myself and also of others. I possess a yearning for growth and for someone to help nurture me in my journey. And I need you, mentor, to challenge me while I challenge you, in hopes we can both become better versions of ourselves.

When Self Awareness Is Really Rumination

Many have complimented me for my self awareness, my ability to understand my personal growth challenges and identify my weaknesses. However, what many do not understand is that not all of my musings are a result of self awareness, but rather rumination.

Like a cow chewing its cud, I regurgitate my thoughts and turn them over and over in my head. Unlike a cow, I can never seem to fully digest them. They keep coming back up to haunt me. While I have done this for almost as long as I can remember, some periods of time are worse than others. My obsessing over various topics has kept me awake at night, trapped me in bed in the morning, and made me late or absent to scheduled engagements. Sometimes I can distract myself long enough to be productive; sometimes I can’t.

In trying to dig to the root of my struggle, I think I may have begun doing this as a self-soothing tactic to remedy my loneliness. I know that my thoughts are not logical, so instead of communicating them to others, I allow them full reign in my head. I don’t really think of it as anxiety as much as a means of comfort, much like a child sucking on her thumb.

I have tried to process these thoughts with people I am close to, but what I have discovered is I reason them away. I may acknowledge that they are illogical feelings, and almost apologize for them to the people I talk to. In recent reflection, I realized I still talk to my friends about the same thoughts and feelings I was having a year ago. The obsession is relentless.

So what do I do with all that? I have tried reasoning my feelings away, because I am a huge fan of being a person of reason, but there is no reasoning with feelings, no matter how convincing the argument. I think what I crave more than anything is for someone to enter into the worry with me, to cry with me before helping to bring me out of it. To help me realize that my feelings, however illogical, are valid.

Sacred and Sexy

When I think of the word sacred, my mind tends to shoot directly to those of religious status. Regardless of your spiritual beliefs, perhaps you would agree that those whom you see dressed in religious garb elicit a different response from you than that of your interactions with friends. I see a woman with her head covered or a man with a priest’s collar and I interact with them differently than I would with the average joe. Not in a discriminatory way, but such that I try to be respectful of their traditions, whatever they may be.

On the other hand, many religious organizations in Western culture have become much more casual in the last century, even in the last decade. When I was a little girl, I saw lots of people dressing up to go to church on Sundays. Now, churches encourage people to wear jeans and t-shirts, promoting a “come as you are” vibe.

Neither of these are necessarily bad. Because how one dresses is a very concrete idea, it seems convenient to draw on that example of how the idea of sacredness has changed in our culture. Of course one can receive and give and participate in sacred experiences regardless of what he or she is wearing. I am not trying to bash people based on their clothing choices.

What I am trying to say is that Western culture’s idea of sacredness has dramatically diminished. Men used to take off their hats in the presence of a woman. Women used to avoid revealing their knees in public. While I am glad dress codes have become much more relaxed, what does the word sacred even mean anymore?

I have thought about joining a nudist community because I love the human body, and I love my body. But at the same time, I believe the human body is sacred, so I hesitate to reveal my entire body to the general public.

I believe sex can be a sacred act in the sense that it is one of the most intimate expressions of love one can give another.

I believe health is sacred because it is as we are pursuing our own personal wellness that we can be the most giving and helpful to others.

I believe we can be sacred and sexy at the same time. I’m just not completely sure how yet.

A Phrase That Bothers Me

Since coming to the South, one phrase I have heard repeatedly is “love on.” “We’re just going to love on each other.” Is it me, or does that sound weird?

Why can’t we say “love each other”? The word love can be used to imply action, and doing something “on” someone else sounds rather gross to me. I understand that people say it with the best of intentions, and I appreciate that. However, I don’t want to be loved on; I want to be loved.

I could be reading too much into it, but it is something I have thought strange.

Juliet’s Rant

I miss him terribly, but even still
I doubt the truth behind my sentiments.
I hesitate to call it love if all
it is is pure infatuation that
is typical of young hormonal girls.
I do not trust myself to use the term
of love accurately because I have
such difficulty understanding its
pure definition. I was taught that love
is not a feeling; it is sacrifice.
I think of love as a decision to
commit, and lust being the feelings that
come after. I come up with mental lists
of things I’d do for him as proof of my
commitment, for my feelings do not make
for solid evidence of love. That’s why
I say I’d make him dinner or massage
his feet, or take care of him when he’s sick,
because I’m desperately trying to prove
these feelings are not senseless whims, although
that’s what I am convinced they are. I do
not trust emotions and I do not view them
as highly as I should, because they don’t
seem like good reasons to do anything.
Because I do not trust emotions, I
have found myself looking for concrete ways
to show affection, or whatever keeps
me bound to him. The problem is, I’m stuck
Because I hardly ever see him and
I rarely talk to him, and that prevents
my concrete acts done in the name of love.
These thoughts therefore swirl in my head, and I
am left to wonder if I truly love,
or if I only think I do because
it’s all infatuated fantasy.

I wonder why it matters. If I spent
some time with him, it wouldn’t for I’d be
too busy doting on him. But I don’t
spend time with him, and so I find myself
Desiring to tell others I love him,
although I fear I’d sound quite immature –
a girl who knows not what she talks about.
And so I guess the root of all this is
I am concerned what others think of me.
However, on the other hand, what’s more
is that I care about my use of words.
I want to speak correctly for I’d hate
to say something that I don’t truly mean.