*hangs head in shame*
I confessed this very fact to my coworkers this morning and it was suggested I write a blog post about it. To which I responded, "Heck no, then EVERYONE will know I watched The Bachelor...even my MOM!!" (Sorry Mom, it's true....I watched crap on TV last night, I know you taught me to do better.) The guilt has become too much, I can't sleep, I have to unburden myself. It's true, I watched it and as I watched I felt my brain cells slowly dying inside of my thick skull.
I knew I was in trouble when I saw the previews at the beginning of the show of that one girl, you know the one, falling down the stairs (don't act like you don't know what I'm talking about....I know you watched last night!) Of course I needed to know what happened to her, the paramedics came for crying outside!!
So I planted myself on my couch with my chicken teryaki (yes, I cooked last night...the evening wasn't a total disaster!) and my laptop (for those moments when the show gets too awkward to watch and I need to mute and stalk friends on facebook...that's a whole other confession...and blog post.)
I watched what's his name, Sean, on his one on one date with that blond girl to the Guinness World Records place. I was busy on my laptop the entire Guinness Record breaking kiss, by the way. Which, might I add, may have made the record for most awkward 3 minutes - ever. LAME! I felt myself becoming annoyed and I should have just turned the TV off at that point, but I made it through to their time on the roof. My blood started to boil when they stood under that sign kissing and the freaking confetti started falling. I mean, COME ON PEOPLE, are you for real!?! Who comes up with this stuff?!?
I couldn't take it, I marched myself in to the kitchen and started the dishes. Of course the TV remained on because I needed to see what happened with that one chick and the paramedics!
As I stood in the kitchen cleaning up I could feel the insecurity begin to flood in. This is why I don't (usually) allow myself to watch The Bachelor and this is where the real confessing begins. I ALWAYS begin to compare myself to the girls on that show. WHY!?! I'm not pretty enough, thin enough, tan enough, funny enough...blah, blah, blah....my clothes aren't cool enough, my shoes are old and crummy, my hair isn't long enough...and I haven't been on a date in, well, a while.
Truth is I'm average. I know I'm not ugly, but I know I'm not a super model. I spend most of my evenings in my pajamas wearing the same TIU sweatshirt day after day. I buy most of my clothes at Target and it has been a while since I've had a new pair of shoes. I don't know the foggiest thing about makeup and no matter how hard I try to change it, my hair will always look just like this!
As I washed the few dishes I used for dinner I was reminded that I only made dinner for one, there isn't a boyfriend or even a date in my near future. So even if I wanted to buy fancy shoes and put gobs of makeup on my face what would be the point?
I hate to even admit to you what happened next...I cried. I stood in my kitchen in my big TIU sweatshirt and my stretched out yoga pants, hair in a messy ponytail and cried. The girls on The Bachelor are crying all the time, but this crying had little to do with who does or doesn't want to date me. I cried because I have grown so weary of this battle in my mind, this war I wage daily with the enemy over how good I am or am not.
I could hear him in his evil voice whispering in my ear, "Tiffany, don't you wish you were pretty like them? Don't you wish you had a boyfriend like that? Maybe if you were like them you would?"
I wish I had walked away then. Turned the TV off. Done something of value. But I really wanted to know what happened with that one girl who fell down the stairs. So I took my now crying self back to the couch and curled up under a blanket to see what happened. In reality I was sitting down on the battlefield and telling Satan to have at it...defenses down...I walked right into his little trap for me and then decided to hang out for a while.
Side note on the stair incident....Really, who waits till after they are in the neck brace and on the stretcher to decide they do NOT need to go to the hospital??!! And I wonder what all those paramedics were thinking when they pulled up to the mansion and realized they were going to be on The Bachelor??!!
Alright, so I caught enough to see the stair incident and then came back for, you guessed it, the Rose Ceremony. I actually wish all breakups could be like the rose ceremony. Those left standing without a rose just leave. No long conversation about it, just good luck and bye. I hate those horribly awkward moments when a guy tries to explain to you why he doesn't like hanging out with you (or even worse being the one trying to explain why you don't want to hang out with him). This always seems to be the moment when a guy decides to lay on the compliments..."You are amazing, I've never met anyone as beautiful as you are, I may hate myself later for this...but..." Don't they know that the complements are canceled out as soon as they say "but.." Someone really should tell them this.
The Christian version of not giving a girl a rose is: "I've prayed about it and I just don't have peace about continuing our relationship." Who can argue with that?!?! Dude, I've prayed about it too and God told me I'm going to marry you! You can't exactly say that - ever - to a guy. That's like Christian relationship suicide.
Oh my, I feel like there is a whole blog post in this Rose Ceremony topic alone...this is already long enough...sorry...I'll try to get back to the confessing.
During the Rose Ceremony last night I started to cry when that one girl, who is 30, started to cry when she didn’t get a rose. I don’t think she was really crying because of Sean, I think she was crying because of the fact she never thought she’d be in this particular situation at 30 – and that’s what made me cry. I don’t think there is a single little girl in this world who says, “I hope I have to wait till I’m in my 30’s to fall in love.” I know I’ve been dreaming of falling in love since I was 10!
Satan was sneaking in that dark corner of my mind. He saw me, sitting there, defenseless in my TIU sweatshirt under my pink blanket on the couch, alone in my living room. God wasn’t kidding when He warned us in 1 Peter, “Be sober-minded, be watchful. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour.” I was being neither sober nor watchful. I already told you I was sitting down on the battlefield. I know just as well as Satan knows that this is an area where he loves to attack, to speak lies to me, and bring me down.
I fell for it. Not only did I forget that Satan loves to discourage me about my relationship status, I also forgot that I am called to be sober-minded and watchful when it comes to defending against these kinds of attacks. I know what happens to my brain when I watch The Bachelor and I know what Satan wants to do to me while I watch.
My confession to you isn't so much that I watched The Bachelor, but that I sat down in the middle of this battle we fight daily with Satan. The war is won in Christ, but the battle must be fought moment by moment, day by day. Satan wanders around like a lion, seeking to destroy. He will stop at nothing to prevent us from living our lives complete in the victory we have in Christ. He wants nothing more than to convince us to settle for second best, lukewarm, and defeated.
I gave up, mid-battle, sword down, shield abandoned. I may as well have drawn a target on my back and yell, "Hey Satan, come get me!"
I'll admit that last night I went to bed defeated, convinced I wasn't pretty enough, funny enough, rich enough, educated enough, or even young enough to find love. I knew as I took in those lies that they were just that - lies.
Then I cried again, this time not because of the lies I had been told but because I had believed them, because of the defeat I had willingly accepted.
Truth is, I am pretty enough, funny enough, rich enough, educated enough and most certainly young enough. None of that really even matters anyway. I'd rather be noticed first for having reflected the light that only comes from Christ. Not for a moment did I see a reflection of Jesus in the hearts or actions of the women on The Bachelor (not to mention a reflection of Jesus in the Bachelor himself). I'd honestly give my left leg and all the complements I've ever received to be considered a woman who is a reflection of Jesus and for Jesus to be the first thing he notices (whoever he may be).
So there it is, my confession. If you watch The Bachelor, awesome. Apparently, so do I. This isn't meant to be about whether or not you or I should watch The Bachelor. I'll let you decide that on your own.
However, let's agree to remember as we go about our every day lives to be sober-minded and watchful. We do have an enemy, a real enemy, his name is Satan. He seeks to destroy us and since we do belong to Jesus, he can't actually destroy us. So he will settle for cutting us off at our knees. He'd love to see us live defeated, lukewarm christian lives. He's sneaky. He waits in the dark corners of our minds, calculating his next move, ready to pounce at our weakest moment.
I don't know what kinds of lies Satan sends your way when you are sitting on your couch in your yoga pants and TIU sweatshirt. What I do know is that he is at war with us. I know that he likes to capitalize on my thought life and take me down one lie at a time. I can feel him in a battle for my heart and I am determined to live in the victory Jesus has already won for me...even if that means I can't watch The Bachelor anymore.
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