Looking for Love in All the Wrong Places
Are our actions showing that we found love from within or are they showing that we are searching for love in all the wrong places? People, substances, food, etc. will never be able to fill the void we have until we decide to have a spiritual presence and find the love from within. This is the first step to kicking any type of addiction - loving ourselves.
Turn the mirror around. What do you see? Are you proud of who you are? Would your kids be proud of you? Are you hiding things that maybe you wouldn’t be so proud of? If people REALLY knew you, what would they see? Would they see someone who is broken and hurt and operating from that space or someone who is fulfilled?
It’s time to truly examine ourselves.
It’s interesting to me that I began to write this in 2019. Here it is 2022 and I now realize I couldn’t write it in 2019 because I had (and still have) a WHOLE LOT MORE work to do!
Addictions don’t just go away. They linger. The enemy (our minds) is lurking to pull us off course. If we are trying to be good people, but doing not-so-good things, we will continue to have an internal conflict. It doesn’t matter how well we treat others if we aren’t truly treating ourselves with love and compassion. I know this first-hand. We also will never truly be able to accept love until we receive love from within. Trying to fill voids with other things will constantly fail us because we aren’t looking where we need to be looking. We are carrying ourselves in a manner that is bringing on more shame and guilt. We can hide it for as long as we want, but eventually, it will become too much.
If you are in this space, my heart goes out to you. As a fellow addict, and someone who struggles daily to kick the addictions (addictions aren’t just substance abuse - they also involve unhealthy relationships, allowing ourselves to indulge in people and things we have no business indulging in). Addictions include food addictions, money addictions (shopping/overspending), and needed attention in order to feel better about ourselves. We will never truly get “over” our addictions. It will take daily effort to recover from them and even more effort to stay in recovery. This is why who we surround ourselves with matters. Are we surrounding ourselves with people who help us kick the addictions or people who bring us back to the addictions?
We will never find love until we allow ourselves to first love. As for me, God is love. We will continue to have a void in our lives until we remain in Him and He in us. This can look different for everyone. I am only speaking from my own core beliefs. I am not here to change your way of thinking. However, if we never allow ourselves to truly look within, the void that brings us back to our addictions absolutely will never be fulfilled. If we never can allow ourselves to get to this place, we will never truly find love and we will continue to find chaos and anxiety.
1 John 4:8, 16-19
“The one who does not love does not know God, because God is love…We have come to know and have believed the love which God has for us. God is love, and the one who remains in God, and God remains in him. By this love is perfected within us, so that we may have confidence in the day of judgment; because as He is, we also are in this world. There is no fear in love, but perfect love drives out fear, because fear involves punishment, and the one who fears is not perfected in love. We love because He first loved us.”
Again, friend, I am not here to tell you what to believe in. All I am saying is that if the void we are seeking to fill externally can’t be filled internally, we will continue to fall flat on our faces. Therefore, we must learn how to fill the void internally.
If you are interested in learning more or working with me, contact me today and let’s discover if we are a good fit for one another.
Stay blessed, keep it going one day at a time, and remember: the journey isn’t perfect. However, it is worth it. God bless you as you find peace in your life. I will continue to use the tools to find peace in mine as well.
Verses are from the Bible, NASB2020 version.
