Yesterday morning I had an epiphany. I’m sure I’m not the first to realize this, but since it helped me immensely, I want to share it so maybe it can help others who don’t know.
If you grew up in church or are now in church, you have most likely learned that sin separates us from God. What you may or may not have learned is that it is not the actual act of sin, but the shame that accompanies that sin that causes the separation. That shame builds a wall that doesn’t allow us to feel God’s love for us. We no longer feel worthy of His love or His forgiveness.
Those of you who have read my blog from the beginning know that after my (now ex) husband’s affair, I lost my faith. I lost God. I begged and pleaded for Him to come back to me, but I felt like He wasn’t listening. He had left me to deal with all my hurt and pain alone. It was the most lonely and isolating time in my life. I lost so many people during that time, and I felt like God had given up on me also. I was also deeply ashamed that my husband had cheated. I couldn’t believe that I was now “one of those women.” Yes, there was a sense of entitlement that came with a long term marriage, and I could no longer hold on to it. We were no longer special as a couple.
That shame of being cheated on grew as I began to realize the depth of his deception. It also grew as I had to face the reality that our entire marriage was a facade, a fantasy that was never lived in reality. I wasn’t just a cheated on wife, I was also an abused wife, an ignored wife, and a neglected wife. I was a wife living a marriage built on lies that were told to me from day one. I was now facing the shame of not just his affair, but all that I had allowed to happen to me and my children. I was now filled with shame for believing in someone who was not who he said he was. I was ashamed that I chose the fantasy of “everything was great”, because I couldn’t deal with the reality that it wasn’t. I was ashamed to admit I had been wrong.
My perfectionism issues were fighting so hard during this time to keep me held back and living in that fantasy where I could keep myself on that pedestal. Now I would be the forgiving wife, the compassionate wife. I could fix this and make the marriage good. We could be that special couple we hadn’t ever been. I could get rid of this shame if I could fix him. A perfect me could fix him. I could still have that beautiful marriage and family that I had always dreamed of, and then the shame of all I had gone through would magically disappear, along with my long held shame of my lack of perfection. The shame that kept me from the true closeness to God that I had longed for my whole life.
As you all know, I didn’t fix my marriage. Somewhere along the path, I gave up on my perfection and the ideal marriage. I gave up on fixing my ex-husband and instead moved to fixing myself. I walked away from the fantasy life he had offered me back in 1996, and began a search for peace in reality. What I didn’t realize until yesterday morning was that my shame is what had separated me from God. My shame is what caused years of unnecessary turmoil and pain. My shame is what kept me in an abusive relationship and unable to walk away. My shame is what kept me from feeling God holding me and comforting me.
Yes, some of that shame came from my own sin, but a lot of it came from unrealistic expectations of me and others, denial of the truth, and my inability to ask for help. My shame came from not living my own reality. It came from allowing others to be the central character in the life God created for me. The shame that separated me from God was shame of what I was enduring, the shame of what my husband had done, the shame of what I allowed in my life, the shame that I couldn’t figure out how to fix it.
Originally, I thought that I had walked away from God, turned from Him, and then somewhere along the way, I turned around and found Him again. But that wasn’t it at all. God doesn’t expect us to walk back to Him, we don’t have to find Him. He follows us, He finds us, but we have to break down the walls of our shame to feel Him there. When I started sharing the truth of my life, I was breaking down those walls of shame. When I started working on my perfectionism issues, I was breaking down the walls of shame. When I finally accepted that divorce was the best path to peace, I was breaking down the walls of shame. Every step I have made to no longer pretend I’m okay when I’m not, every time I share my story, every instance that I screw up and forgive myself for it, I am breaking down my walls of shame. Every single step brings me closer to the life God has for me. Every step allows me to feel God’s love more.
When you’re hurting and don’t feel God, search your heart for shame. When you find it, it may be your own sin, it may be the pain of another’s sin, it may be leftover childhood shame, it may newly created shame, but search it out and deal with it. Don’t let it fester, don’t deny it, don’t let it create a wall between you and God. I never realized how much shame I lived with until it tipped the point where I couldn’t feel God anymore. I never realized I was dealing with shame until I started to feel God’s love for me in ways I never had before. I never knew it was shame until God felt like I was ready to face it all.
So, welcome to my new life where I choose to work through shame rather than internalize it. I choose to not allow other’s shame be held as my own. I choose the path to peace rather than chaos. I choose reality over fantasy. I may struggle every single day, but I will choose feeling God’s love for me over any other kind of life I could have. Here’s to joyfully living an imperfect life!
Finding The Good 