Evening - Cycling 19 miles, easy pace. It was a perfect day to be out on the Rabbit. Cool with just a little bit of a breeze. Since I have a Mitchell training ride tomorrow I purposefully didn't attempt to do anything more than a recovery ride, keeping my heart rate out of Z4/5 for the entire ride. It was nice to get a relaxing ride, and a chance to think and pray. Beyond getting exercise and fresh air, I use cycling as a way to let my mind chew through the myriad of things going on in my life, and to let God talk to me in a still, quiet voice.
Verse:
Ephesians 4:29-32
New King James Version (NKJV)
29 Let no corrupt word proceed out of your mouth, but what is good for necessary edification, that it may impart grace to the hearers. 30 And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by whom you were sealed for the day of redemption. 31 Let all bitterness, wrath, anger, clamor, and evil speaking be put away from you, with all malice. 32 And be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another, even as God in Christ forgave you.
Thoughts: This is probably one of the harder posts to write that I have felt I need to get out in the open in a very long time. This is mostly because I don't feel like I'm in a place of comfort or strength in writing about it; because it's a matter of interpersonal relationships instead of just introspection on my part. Today at work it just so happened that I was able to talk to my manager about an issue at work that others have referred to as "High School Drama". The name is very apt, even with people well beyond their teenage years. Unfortunately I've been a part of it, willingly and unwillingly, since I moved to Greenville 2 years ago, and the costs of this situation I feel are rather dire to me personally, especially given my personality. Not dire in the sake of "I'm going to be injured physically", but dealing with the emotional roller coasters and issues is more energy than I care, want to, or am able to do on an ongoing basis. It is actively impacting my day to day office life, and through the course of the last 2 years has changed a friendship that I've had for over a decade. At this point I have been struggling with how to cope with the situations, and how to maneuver through it so that I'm not manipulated through it.
The biggest issue for me personally is that I don't seek to make a large number of acquaintances, that is to mean friends that you know on a situational basis. For as far back as I can remember have always preferred to have a small core group of friends that I associate with, that I can feel comfortable around. Letting folks very far into that core group has always been a struggle, as I'm constantly worried about being manipulated or taken advantage of; which is another whole long post I should probably write down to pray and write about sometime. Usually around the handful of people that I mark as "friends" there are people that life along the periphery: I see the regularly, but I don't necessarily associate with them more than on a casual basis. The problem here is that the vortex of this situation make it such that I have to manage the expectations of one person while dealing with the nature of the person that they are having an issue with, and thus they see in me. And to top it off I've struggled with the conviction that I need to confront a dear friend with what's been laid on my heart of almost 2 years now without knowing quite how to handle it. Worse off is that because of the continuing devolvement of this situation, my ability to feel like I can have a serious discussion on it and state what I have been observing and concerned about makes me a participant in the situation instead of a bystander. Thus I'm actually a part of the problem.
So through all of this I have to decide and struggle through all of the emotions of forgiveness, hurt, and concern, while attempting to navigate the day to day work life in front of me, the web of interactions between folks in the office, and attempting to not make things worse by my own nature. My fight or flight response is conflicted, as I haven't felt like I can understand which is the better option. At least when I bring my lunch, or ride during lunch, I don't have to struggle with the situations as much (so far).
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