PHP: Covert Coveting
Dear Anonymous,
“I painted pictures over reality to create beauty in our emptiness.
Romanticizing us was a gift from my heart to make space for you despite its heaviness.
It took time to develop our masterpiece,
I took time to feel the strokes of your brush.
Even in moments you only brushed by,
I felt music in your touch.
I shaped you in the clouds of my love,
You were the man in the moon at night.
I fell in love with the idea of you;
Our truth was so easy to rewrite.
By letting you go, I had to abandon my art.
My walls were left with no muse to impart.
I still don’t regret setting you free
Because all of your roads are painted leading back to me.”
Sincerely,
Mania
At the very beginning of this journey, I wrote this poem about a man that I thought I fell in love with simply because he was kind to me. To be specific, I thought I loved him because he reassured me of my human entitlement to freely express my emotions by saying, “you know you’re allowed to cry, right?”. Granted, in that moment I was tirelessly, and (apparently) clearly, holding back tears as if they were illegal. Regardless of my desperate need to cry at that moment, I unfortunately lacked the ability and/or courage to do so. I wasn't aware that crying in public when I felt the need to cry was even a thing. Vulnerability, especially vulnerability in the public, might as well have been a concept created for rom coms because those were the only instances that I had witnessed it.
So, for the first time in my life, I was given a supreme invitation to be soft with a person I genuinely wanted to be soft for, but I couldn't; mainly because up until this moment, no one had ever encouraged me to cry, not even myself. In fact, I was quite literally instructed to do the opposite since I was a small child. This concept was foreign, discomforting, and contradictory to my experience, thus I didn't know how to receive it. So somewhere between my forward-facing defense mechanism of portraying optimal strength at all times and the intense fear of not being worthy began to swell up in the back of my throat; I initially interpreted his reassurance as him giving me permission. In turn I immediately denounced the typically innate concept of allowing my human body to release the liquid that was filling up my eye sockets, by sternly replying, “I’ve never had that luxury.” What was supposed to be my first invitation to be soft, ended up being the first time I could recall my brokenness being revealed outwardly and uncontrollably.
The entire exchange replayed in my head for weeks. One, because after the 80th replay, I realized how ridiculous I must have sounded. Two, because it was clear that I didn't know how to be vulnerable; even in the presence of someone that appeared to be safe. After I was able to acknowledge and fully process those first two reasons, I went as far as texting the man that was kind to me, to remind him of the exchange, so I could properly respond by thanking him for who he was to me in that moment. Yet again, as I am convinced to this day what must be on brand for him, he was kind. He remembered (or pretended to remember) the exchange I was referring to, he didn’t make me feel bad for my initial reaction or make me feel weird for texting him about it over three weeks later. I might have found him attractive prior to this, but after this, I thought I fell in love. Twas the night the poem “Dear Anonymous” was born.
Knowing what I know now about myself and the lengths God has gone to heal me, the third and main reason I'm sharing this story is because of what is reflected in that poem I wrote, the creative impenitence of brokenness; flesh’s way of romanticizing and covertly coveting.
As I was being made new in the Holy Spirit, the more I read the poem over time, I began to notice the way I declared ownership over something or in this case someone, because eventually I decided I liked the feelings he gave me. A feeling that seemed shiny and new because I had never experienced it before. Granted when I wrote the poem I was in a different place on this journey, so I have no shame about it. I am, however, intrigued by the patterns of the flesh. This memory makes me realize how self-destructive and maybe even a tad corrupt we as humans can be prior to salvation, and how easily we unknowingly covet, glorify and/or idolize any and everything that feels good.
Despite how it sounds this is not judgment, but an observation. Of course, I reacted that way to him; understandably so at that time and place on my journey. I think anyone harboring the heavy weight of emptiness and deprivation would react the same. We mustn't shame ourselves or others for doing our best with what we have and where we are, especially when it is not harmful to others.
The reality of this situation is, the feeling that I fell in love with when dealing with the kind man actually had less to do with the man and more to do with me and God. The exchange stuck with me because God spoke to me through that kind man in order to show me a part of myself that I was suppressing. A part of me that essentially has the power to nourish and water the way in which I express myself as a human, as a creative, as a messenger, as a future wife, and as a future mother.
All of this is a testament of how faithful God truly is. Not only was He petitioning to set me free where I had not realized that I was bound; it was intentionally done in a way that I would eventually and surely be able to receive. Through that kind man, God was blessing me with a newfound freedom and release.
This is also a testament of how gracious God is. Even though He knew that I was not yet in a place to glorify, receive, or value Him for the blessing that I was being granted, He still prioritized my wellbeing, my healing, my freedom. I hope to be like Him in this way when it is all said and done.
This is a common manifestation of God that we consistently take for granted, yet we are still faithfully graced with. Glory or not, God remains never changing in nature by providing what we don’t even know we need all the same.
We encounter God’s glory in this lifetime in so many ways: breakthrough, favor, love, miracle, opportunity, safety, victory, wealth, etc. My reaction to this experience also made me wonder how often we are blessed with things we don’t verbally ask for and mistakenly credit the device that God delivers His glory through instead of God Himself. How often do we misplace appreciation and gratitude?
On the other hand, I also began to think about how we tend to look to God in angst and onus when life doesn’t go our way, or when the good things go sour due to our inability to properly maintain them. How often have we misplaced blame, hurt, resentment?
Another concept I question is why these patterns, especially the faultier of the bunch, are often chucked up to “human nature” without reproach? Sure, like I said before, the kind man, to my knowledge was not harmed by being romanticized and covertly coveted, nor do I bear the weight of guilt or shame for my reaction to him. I do, however, hone the responsibility of being more mindful in relation to the quieter sins such as this. Maybe that is what human nature actually is. With all of the free will we were blessed with, at what point do we make the decision to be intentional and mindful by leaning into different avenues of our nurture? Deciding that human nature looks like abandoning escapism by accepting the fact that we all have blind spots, we all make mistakes, we all hurt, we are all doing our best, BUT we all also have the agency to change for the better and are deserving of the grace to do so. Would guilt and shame even have enough room to exist?
We as humans should look in the mirror and acknowledge that there are several instances and spectrums where we lack humility. Let's spend a lot more time correcting our own personal discrepancies and less time calculating those of others. This is me doing so; by starting with the woman in the mirror.
Later but soon,
Maya Angelah
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