“She was the reason I smiled in the morning. He took the last bit of joy I was holding.” This is part of the second verse of a song by one of my favorite artists, Jonathan McReynolds (PEOPLE)
Have you ever felt this way? Like a person in your life brought you so much joy that you could hardly breathe just thinking about them. It could be a spouse, a parent, a child or a friend. My personal experience was most often that I allowed myself to give someone the power to be my reason for smiling. I gave them the ability to take me up or down. I embraced that feeling over and over again with every memory and every experience with them.
I once listened to a person share with me their experience with a romantic partner and as she shared her story and her interpretation of what she believed to be love, I began to realize that she was addicted to butterflies. What are butterflies? Butterflies, I call them, are the feeling in the pit of your stomach when you think about a person or event that causes you to have happy feelings. It’s almost like a cautious nervousness. It’s kind of like what a mother feels when her newborn arrives or what you feel entering a new relationship.
I believe many people have gotten caught up and addicted to the feeling of feeling good. There’s nothing wrong with wanting to have good feelings in a relationship, whether it be friendship or romantic. However, when we become latched to the good feelings the relationship provides so much so that if the relationship were to end today, we would feel as if we couldn’t make it without that person in our lives, we do ourselves a disservice. The feeling of fulfillment a human being provides us is fleeting. With every experience and every day with a person, the fragility of the butterfly syndrome becomes even more evident.
I am grateful for my relationship with the Lord because my relationship with Him has allowed me to maintain a sense of joy and now armed with new knowledge, I’m learning how not to allow PEOPLE to affect my joy. My happiness, however, has been disturbed numerous times.
This is when the last line of the second verse of the song "PEOPLE" became real to me. After it says "She was the reason I smiled in the morning. He took the last bit of joy I was storing"...
“That’s too much power for anything human…
DELIVER ME… from PEOPLE”
These words have never in my 43 years of life become so real to me. This was one of the biggest revelations in my life as it relates to human relationships.
For someone to be the reason you smile in the morning or for them to be able to affect your joy and happiness is way too much power for any human to possess.
It is not God’s design that any human be your reason to smile. He wants to have that place in your life. It is not the responsibility of any human to make you happy or bring you joy. God wants that place in your life. Nehemiah said “The JOY of the Lord is my strength” (Nehemiah 8:10). If anyone else possess the power to give you joy, they have the power to take it with them and weaken you too.
I truly believe when my peace, joy or happiness have been disturbed, it also affected my immune system. I believe the unhealthy pressures I experienced in my life with kidnapping death of my mom and sister and many other tragic events exerted on my body over time negatively affected my immune system.
Endorphins make you happy!
When your body comes under stress or experiences pain, neurochemicals called endorphins are produced in the brain’s hypothalamus and pituitary gland. These chemicals are considered a natural pain killer because they activate receptors in the brain that help minimize discomfort. Sports and Exercise Psychologist Dr. J. Kip Matthews says if you want to activate these chemicals, your best option is to exercise. “Endorphins are also involved in natural reward circuits related to activities such as eating, drinking, (intimacy) and maternal behavior” he says.
This year has been an eye opening one. In the wake of the emotional assault all of our lives have taken in just in the last 30 days, it becomes even more apparent every day to me that we must find our place in the Provider of joy, happiness and contentment; Jesus Christ. Our contentment cannot exist on the backs of humanity.
PEOPLE are fallible...We let each other down. We disappoint each other. PEOPLE will fail us... often...but God is infallible. We who believe, let us continue to look to the Lord our God…because HE will never fail us.
