MY ONE WORD: FriendshipS

Before we begin, I know some of you reading notice that the "s" at the end of the word "friendships" is capitalized; there is a reason for that so please bear with me!

Usually by now I have chosen my one word for the year and am well on my way to working that out in my life; for some reason, this year was different and I really struggled to come up with my one word.  Yesterday, in church, our pastor talked about our one word or our vision for ourselves in 2011.  I began to pray even more for God to reveal to me what my one word should be.  Then the word came, I thought is was "friendship", then in my spirit it was made very clear to me that this word was to be plural, "friendships".  As I spent yesterday allowing this word to sink in so much was revealed to me and placed on my heart and I feel that it is something that someone out there really needs to hear...if I needed this then I know someone else does too!

For much of my life I have felt like it was great to have many friends, but that I needed to have that one friend who was my "bestie", "bff", or whatever you want to call it.  Over the past few weeks I have been struggling with this concept and through chatting with some dear ladies in my life I realized that my thought process was a little messed up.  As one dear friend put it, "When you have one best friend you put a lot of pressure and expectation on them.  Then you feel like they aren't living up and they feel pressured to live up to your expectations."  OUCH!  That really hurt, but man was she so very right.  I have so many great women that God has placed in my life; they each have something great and unique to offer me.  Unfortunately, I was spending so much time wrapping myself in just one relationship where I had expectations and this friend had expectations and neither one of us were ever going to be able to live up to what the other one expected...we had set ourselves up for a failed relationship.  In spending all of my time with this one person, I have now realized, I never gave all of the other amazing women in my life a chance to pour into me, for me to pour into them and build a relationship.  Without even trying I was able to name off 7 women that I wanted desperately to have relationship with, I knew would be great in my life, but never took time to build the relationship because I was so busy trying to form just one special "bff" type of relationship.  I have realized that I was really cheating myself out of some amazing relationships.  Is it wrong to have a "bestie"?!  I don't think so, but if we are going to have one, we need to make sure that the expectations are very clearly laid out and then...be prepared for letdown because your bestie will NOT be perfect.  (I still have one friend who will always be my best friend, but we are very clear about our relationship and she is more a sister than anything.)  There are some amazing women in my life that I know love me dearly and have my back, but I never even gave them a chance.  So, my one word and goal for 2011:  To build relationships with these women that God has already placed in my life and then open the door for Him to bring more amazing women through!  Reality is, by allowing my circles to grow I am in turn growing and learning how to love others!  Does this mean I will never have a "bestie"?!  Truth be told...I already had the greatest "bestie", I was just too blinded by the human version that I never considered that the ONLY "bestie" I needed has been there all along...GOD!  In striving to build the "perfect" best friend scenario, I have completely down graded my God relationship, cheated my family out of time, and put expectations on myself and the relationship that didn't need to be there and set us all up for failure.  I can only speak for myself; I know that, for me, I created a worst case scenario for me and it has broken me and made me question everything and everyone in my life.  Does this make the friendship or person bad?!  Not at all; it just means that we both had unspoken expectations rather than spoken ones and we ended up with both of us feeling let down, in fact, I still love this person very much!  Friendships take time to build, they take love and nurturing, they require both parties putting into and taking out of equally.  Friendships will have heartache, they will require some sacrifice, but true God-friendships will not require more than what you are capable of (not what you think you are but what God knows you are capable of) and will pick you up and dust you off when you fall and will be a cheerleader on the sidelines!  However, in a friendship, remember also that YOU have to be the same for them!  Friendships cannot be one-sided; if they are, they don't work!  Just like my relationship with God; He gives to me, talks to me, loves on me and cheers me on...I have to talk to Him, love on Him and so on!  No relationship can be one-sided without failure!

So, in 2011 my one word: FRIENDSHIPS!  My resolution: To take time building relationships with at least the 7 women God has placed on my heart and continue to add to that number as God places women in my life!  So, to my dear sister/friend: Heather, I love you dearly and know that God placed us in each other's lives for a reason.  To the 7 ladies: I promise to work hard on getting to know you and build relationships with you that are not one-sided, that have attainable expectations because the only expectation is that we are there for each other, and to be your cheerleader!  To the women God has yet to place in my life: I promise that I will enlarge my circle to include you and be everything that I listed above! 

Here's to FriendshipS in 2011!