Yesterday, I was struggling. Struggling with a person, their many moods, and simply put their immaturity. I have this person in my life, who I can't avoid. I'm stuck with them until they decide to un-stick themselves from my life. At first I REALLY didn't like this person.
So I prayed about it. Hard. I prayed about this person. I prayed about me. I prayed about the forced relationship and the situation as a whole. I prayed about it every night until I could finally leave it at Gods feet. And then I found peace about this person. I found that even though I still didn't particularly care for this person, I was able to "make the most" of the situation. I was able to manage as positive of a situation as possible with this person. I was able to stop my angry ranting about this person. I was able to find base respect for this person even though I had no respect for their behavior, words, or lifestyle choices. I was no longer bothered by every single thing this person did. And when something did slightly irk me, I found myself just lifting this person up in prayer, and again leaving it at Gods feet.
It took probably 9-10 months to get to that point with this person. When I say this person is my prickly person, I mean it. This person was put in my life to challenge me, and they did. But God knew what he was doing, because in response to this irritating, difficult, and annoying "challenge" (person), I grew. I learned. And although I'm not particularly proud of how *I* behaved in the beginning (when this person initially arrived in my life I sunk just as low as them), I am proud of how I have turned it around and where I am now when it comes to my "handling" of this "situation."
I have recognized a lot about this person that has helped me process them and deal with them.
- To begin with, I have recognized that they have a diagnosed mood disorder. I have also recognized that although they are on medication for that disorder(s), it doesn't make the disorder go away. And having had a father who struggles with mental illness, and myself struggling with depression, my heart goes out to this person. Because I somewhat understand the struggle of when your mood is completely out of your control.
- I have also recognized that this is the first time this person has lived away from home. And that in and of itself comes with a whole host of issues/hurdles for some people (I personally loved moving away from home, but that was because my home life was toxic and I was ready for that level of independence).
- I have also recognized that this person is very young. Which also means a level of immaturity, self-righteousness, entitlement, attitude, and a belief that one is always right. That in and of itself is a difficult person to work with, let alone when you consider the other factors at play.
- I have also recognized (because this person said so in more vulgar terms to a supervisor) that they hate their job and can't wait to get out of here. Initially, it's easy to bristle up at that, to be defensive, to say "well then quit!" But having been in a situation where I, myself, was in a job that I hated, I understand that it's just not that easy sometimes. You have to herd all the cats of your life into a line first before you can quit. And that takes a lot of time. And a lot of faith.
When all of these factors are combined, you can see why this person is difficult. They would be difficult to anyone, and trust me when I say: this person IS a difficult person to EVERYONE that comes into contact with them. You can also see why they're miserable. Their life is a soup of rotten, toxic ingredients. And that breaks my heart. I don't want anyone to have to experience that -- and I say that because I've been there!
With that very long explanation somewhat completed, you can understand the complexity of this person and their situation. And I wanted that complexity noted so that when I say that I found a peace towards this person, you can also understand why that took 9-10 months to attain.
Yesterday, this particular person was in another one of their moods. These moods are not alien to us. Remember - mood disorder. We've been dealing with their roller coaster moods for the past year. However, we didn't let this persons mood affect our personalities. We continued being ourselves around them and towards them. Polite. Friendly. Periodically talkative. Periodically quiet. We attempted to engage them in conversation, and received 1-2 word responses before they turned their back to us. We didn't push this person. But we didn't exclude or ignore them either.
I have decided that since they were miserable, they believed we should be miserable with them. And they didn't like that we weren't cooperating with that plan. So they began to stop working with us. They began to further isolate themselves. They continued to circle down their own drain and refused to let us help them. We continued being ourselves. This made them more and more mad and frustrated. So they turned to social media. And on their public social media page, posting language I won't repeat in a way that made it seem as if it were aimed at us.
I wish I were making this up.
I don't follow this person on social media because all they post is vulgarity, judgment, negativity, and "I'm never wrong" attitudes. Frankly, I don't want or need that kind of negativity in my life. So I didn't know about this post until someone else showed it to me.
I know that this person posted it trying to affect us. Trying to bring us down. Trying to start a conflict. Trying to manipulate us so that they can paint us in a bad light.
But I also know who I am. I am strong in my identity. I am strong in my love for others. I am able to turn the other cheek and continue being who I am. And although such a post with such language certainly got under my skin (no one wants to be called that), I was able to recognize it for what it was.
So last night my heart was bothered about this post and this person. I didn't understand why politeness and friendliness was responded to in such a way. I still don't understand why this person continues to isolate themselves from what is a great work environment with great co-workers. But if they hate the job, I can see the barrier to doing so. So I did what I've always done -- I called my mom and talked it out. Then I prayed about it last night. I left it at Gods feet.
And this morning -- I woke up SO refreshed. My heart was full to bursting with gratitude. I woke up praying thanks for each blessing that I could think of when I got to them. I woke up happy, fully of joy, full of peace. Again, strong in knowing who I am and what I stand for. Strong in knowing that I treat no one differently - even those who I find difficult. I was able to shake my head and feel sorry for this person instead of feeling righteous anger towards them.
My God is a great God. And he is so good. And I am so thankful for him and his relationship with me.
