This week has been rough. There's no getting around it. Exams, trials, sickness....but when the people you turn to for comfort are not suddenly not there, what do you do?
Maybe you turn to someone else. Maybe like me, you turn to people you don't normally turn to. For the first time last night I really talked to my roommate. I had talked to another frined before that, but it didn't end well and when I came back in the room last night at 12:30am a crying mess it was my roommate who sat with me holding my hand and talking through things until almost 2am. It turns out she was able to help me and encourage me more then anyone else could have at that point. It was weird because it was the first time I really opened up to her and told her things about my life, but it was unbelievably good. I really need to work on opening up to people more. Because I forget how good it is to share things with people. My roommate told me that one of the jobs of a friend, roommate, and sister in Christ is to be able to talk and share struggles and that part of being friends is to simply be a friend. Not to know how to deal with the problem. Not to take responsibility for the problem. Just to be a friend and listen. That's an important thing to keep in mind. But anyways.
Maybe you turn to music, or books, or some other distraction in order to get you through.
Maybe, you should turn to God.
This morning when I woke up I felt terrible. I sat down to do my devotions and prayed but felt very distant from God. And I started thinking about how last night when I had been so hurt by people and was struggling, I should have turned to Him first. Maybe that's why I felt distant from Him.
God's the one that will never leave me. He's the one that will be there when other people don't want to be or can't be. He's the one that can give you the comfort you need and long for.
So why don't we seek Him more?
Over the past several weeks there has been several things I've realized about myself. Maybe I had realized them unconsciously before, but they've become more and more apparent as of late. The main one is that I've come to realize that I have major inferiority issues. Ever since I was younger I've struggled with this. It's not something I've really ever talked about either- probably because I'm just now starting to come to terms with it. A couple weeks ago I was sitting in my room with a friend and something was said that surprised me and I really didn't know how to respond. It eventually led to a conversation in which I began talking about how ever since I was younger I've always thought that everyone loved my brother more. I told her how I've nearly always felt like people like him more and think he's this amazing, wonderful human being while I've just kind of been there; always doing exactly what he is doing but never doing it as well.
Everywhere I went I began to feel like people liked him more and it killed me. I hated feeling like I was "Woody's sister". I felt like I had to really work to get attention- especially during June-November when soccer was in season. Sometimes I now wonder if the reason I rebelled so much in high school and did so many stupid things was because I just wanted to be noticed. I know many of my issues were caused by circumstances beyond my control, but even before that, I was struggling. Did I rebel and drive my parents up walls because I really just wanted them to pay attention to me during soccer season? Did I attach myself to my old friends because they took the time to notice me? Is it wrong to feel like I faded into the woodwork while Woody shined? Is it wrong that all this time I have felt inferior to my brother? Is it wrong that I just wanted to be noticed? Was I noticed and just felt like I wasn't? These are all questions I've started trying to answer lately. I haven't got the answers; but I've started making connections between these feelings and how miserable I was in high school. When I was talking with my friend about this she said simply, "but I haven't lived in his shadow all my life." I hadn't thought of it that way before, but the more I think about it, the more I find that I really do feel like I've lived in his shadow since I can really remember- however dumb and selfish that is. I think that's why I struggle with having him at Trinity.I think I don't like having him at Trinity because it's the first place I've gone where I've been first, where there's just been just "Emily." No Woody and Emily. Just Emily. Everything has always been Woody and I. Soccer, theater, voice lessons, horseback riding lessons, every single morning of school. We weren't separated very much at all. And it seemed like everything I wanted, he got. When we took horseback riding lessons and I wanted to move onto a different horse- he got her. When I played soccer and wanted to impress my family- he did not me. When we did musical theatre and we would both try out for bigger parts- he would get them. He got to be in the bigger dances while I got to watch from offstage or in the wings. Now we're in college together and I feel like it's going to just keep following that pattern. Like with the RA thing. He made it, I didn't. It's hard to not just take these things as a blow to my self-esteem ( as stupid as that sounds ). I don't want to be just "Woody's sister" again. And I know it's silly, but it's so hard to be the sibling of someone who everyone loves. And I hate feeling like that, but it's the ugly truth. I hate myself for hating that he’s here- but I don’t know how to not be afraid he is going to overshadow me in the one place I have been able to shine.
I'm far from being okay with this whole situation. I know there's nothing I can do to change his being at school and that I can only change my attitude about it; but it's hard. But last week God made it a bit easier. A few days after having that conversation with my friend I sat down to do my devotions and it just so happened that both of my devotional books that I was reading talked about how God doesn't show favoritism. One of my devotionals talked about David and how he was the least of his brothers, but all the same David was the one God chose to be king. The other devotional talked about how Jesus chose the unlikely and those who were looked down upon to be his disciples and how we should be encouraged because God doesn't care about what we accomplish in this live, He cares about our hearts and love for Him. Those things don't just happen in my mind, it meant something. It must have.
