Practice makes...

I had a moment of clarity the other night. (I've been going for drives a lot lately -- mostly because Miles is in Australia.) I was thinking of a mind set that many of us who have been on missions know about. Maybe I'm generalizing too much, but I'm usually right anyway so it doesn't matter.

On a mission it becomes necessary to create a buffer between yourself and your message and/or your method of delivery. Many of us were encouraged to do this with words like, "Remember, they aren't rejecting you, they are rejecting God's message." There is nothing wrong with this. It's good advice for anyone who didn't want to go insane or spiral into depression. There is nothing wrong with it because it is a true statement. When people said no, it wasn't usually because they disliked us as people. They just didn't want to listen to us. And that was OK. In other words, we just couldn't take the rejection personally.

My realization came the other day when I realized that this is one thing that none of us should ever have brought home with us from our missions. It is something that clings to us like a TB exposure or tapeworm. They told us to make our missions springboards for the rest of our lives. This is also good advice. We should all keep the work ethic, dedication, and determination we learned throughout our lives. But one thing we should have left with our ragged suits and tattered shoes in the mission field, was the idea that people are only rejecting an aspect of you when they reject you post-mission. Yes, I'm talking about girls now.

In my naive way I thought that missionary work would somehow also apply to the realm of dating. (Ha ha.) I thought, "I'm used to rejection. It happened to me everyday. Dating will be easy." It has taken me a year to realize that everything I learned for two years doesn't apply here. I was rudely awakened the first time rejection came. Something was different. It hurt more. No matter how much I told myself that it was the same, it just wasn't. "I must be doing something wrong. I'll won't do this or that next time. I'm still adjusting," I thought. So I did it. I asked for advice, experimented, and yes, even read a book on the subject. And at each small rejection, I changed. Because they weren't rejecting me, they were rejecting my message, an aspect of me.

Don't get me wrong. I was not getting dumped and humiliated and snubbed every Friday night like the word rejection implies. It was in little ways. Just starting up a conversation that would end up going nowhere, and so on. You get what I'm saying. Anyway, my revelation was that this is personal now. I'm not presenting someone with a message anymore. I'm presenting myself. And this whole time, this whole last year, I've been presenting only aspects of me. The parts of me that I think people will like and admire and accept. My realization was that this has been a safety blanket. If I get dismissed, I can chalk it up to being the fault of my technique, or a part of myself that wasn't as likable as I had previously thought. I've really let no one see everything, for fear that they would find something they might not like. I guess that is what people mean when they say just be yourself.

In losing yourself for the sake of love or getting to know someone, you gain nothing. You can separate aspects of yourself from who you truly are, and present that to someone. It works. I've been doing it. And if you are rejected it doesn't hurt because, "hey, it wasn't really me they were rejecting." You can make that separation, but that isn't you. Contrary to modern attitudes, you shouldn't have to give everything up for love. You don't have to sacrifice your identity to show your love for someone. That only hurts. I'm not saying we shouldn't try to constantly strive to be better. You can always be better. But you don't have to give up what defines you to accomplish it. It all comes back to being honest. Not just with other people, but with yourself. That is all.

[Keep following. You may get to know me yet. Like the one time I got crocodile wrestling lessons from Steve Erwin.]