By Ashley Powell, MSW, LISW-S ·
Fake
As human beings we all desire deep, meaningful connection with others. After all, it is the way in which God created us. At the start of creation God made Adam and Eve to be in relationship with not only themselves but with God Himself. Before the fall of man, God walked through the garden with Adam and Eve in communion with them. Mankind is in a persistent search for meaning, connection, and acceptance. Human connection can be extremely powerful when it is meaningful, authentic, and displayed with love.
There are people reading this that can do a mental inventory of their life and identify perhaps several meaningful relationships. When they think of these relationships they feel deeply and richly blessed. However, there are also those reading this that may find themselves with a deep despair as reality unveils a lack of this within your life. These people have an unmet need for authentic connection with others. My personal experience, professional experience, and research tells me that most people will fall into the latter category. I have spent most of my life in the latter category as well. This is because we often look for authentic connection in the wrong places. We spend our time rummaging through the past, trying to untangle the gnarled threads that remain from relationships that hit their expiration date long ago. These relationships may be in the form of friendship, romantic relationship, or even family members. It can be very difficult to acknowledge that these relationships have expired and it’s time to move forward; thus, we hold onto the fragmented remains. We also look for authentic connection in people that are either not equipped or not willing to offer us the level of connection we need and desire. Too often we spend our time clinging to these people and settle for fake connection rather than authentic, meaningful connection God desires us to have. There are moments we may experience “red flags” in these relationships, but we quickly turn a blind eye to them. We may even find ourselves feeling worn down from these interactions and wishing to avoid that person. Unfortunately, this is still not enough for most of us to stop settling for less than meaningful connection.
There are other places that we look for meaning and connection in life. In the modern world we live in, we often substitute authentic human connection with a digital facade of life. We hide behind screens and our younger generations live in fear of even making phone calls. Why? Because that amount of human exposure is uncomfortable. Yet most live lonely, isolating lives behind screens, wishing and longing for a true connection with someone else. We settle for fake connections rather than authentic meaningful connection. In the same way we exchange meaningful sexual experiences with our spouse for pornography. We forfeit tangible relationships with online chats and sexting of people we will never meet or have a real relationship with. We’ve settled for fake.
I encourage you today to examine the depth of authenticity in your life that you have been willing to receive. Examine your emotions and if you find a frequent feeling of void in connection with others…ask yourself if you have perhaps unknowingly isolated yourself. The truth is no matter how strong we are, there are moments in life we need one another. We were after all designed by our Creator for relationship.
Perhaps the most difficult question we must evaluate is whether our relationship with Christ is authentic or are we acting out a counterfeit relationship with Christ that we’ve deceived ourselves into believing is enough? There are so many areas of life that we settle for less than we deserve and less than Christ desires us to have. If you are reading this, I challenge you to pull back the curtain in your own life and debunk the enchantment of any falsehoods you might be chasing after. Your real purpose, true meaning, and valuable connection is awaiting you.
Being Brave with You,
Ashley
"A friend loves at all times, and a brother is born for a time of adversity." -Proverbs 17:17