I was in Borders the other day and I flipped through John Eldredge's new book called The Ransomed Heart. My eyes were drawn to one particular line in the book: "Lonely men fight lonely battles."
Such a short sentence, but powerful nonetheless. Consciously or subconsciously, all of us are careful who we talk to about our battles. We fear judgment. We fear challenge. We fear disappointment. And we fear that people won't understand our battles or worse, we fear they'll be apathetic towards them. I heard somebody say recently that the opposite of love isn't hate, it's apathy, and I couldn't agree more.
We isolate ourselves out of fear and end up fighting lonely battles. This is one of the reasons that the arts are so important to humanity. Everybody is fighting at least one battle and when we see characters in movies, television shows, or books fighting the same battles we are, we feel a deep sense of connection—so much so that we consume the product over and over. When we see a painting of a woman gazing out the window with longing in her eyes, we can identify because we've all longed for something. When a singer pens lyrics that give voice to our pain over a relationship that has gone bad, we latch onto it as if it were our best friend. And it in way, it is. But we really aren't latching onto the movie, television show, book, painting, or song as much as we are latching onto to person who created it. That person "gets us."
Over the years, I've experienced quite a few friendships and relationships with people who "get me." I'm probably relatively easy to read, but that doesn't mean people are going to automatically care. But when they do, it's both an exhilarating and a frightening experience. Exhilarating because of the connection. Frightening because largely, the opportunity to pick and choose what I reveal is gone. But I'll take exhilaration and frightening any day over fighting battles alone.
