{*Did you know you can write on Elephant? Here’s how—big changes: How to Write & Make Money or at least Be of Benefit on Elephant. ~ Waylon}
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Being in a season of isolation is one of the most painful things to walk through. A wilderness unlike no other, staggering around in a desert looking for a spring of some sort, anything really, to give you life.
It’s painful like a an ongoing ache, like chronic pain that has no cure on the horizon.
It’s staying in bed for long periods of time, and it’s crying so many tears that you wonder how there’s any still left. It’s mourning the loss of an old life whilst not celebrating something new.
It tries to steal your joy, rob you of your peace, and destroy your hope. It hits times ten when you’ve spent every weekend for the past eight weeks alone at home—you’re almost used to this kind of week now and a typical response to someone asking, “What’s on for the weekend?” results in the same answer: “I think I’ll have a quiet one at home.”
A season of stripping, a season of pruning, a season of letting go of the old but with a deep hope there’s something new that will eventually replace it.
Isolation sometimes looks like friendships that slowly drift apart like a slow current that drags you from shore. When you feel like everything is fine until you can’t see the sand anymore. You’re kind of left wondering:
What happened?
Was it me?
Was it them?
Those are the hardest ones. Like a breakup that’s unofficial. You stop texting, calling, catching up. You start double booking and rescheduling plans because other things take priority.
And, of course, there’s a season for everything. And there is hope. There is purpose in pain. A God who loves you so deeply wants you to see that He is developing something within you in these seasons. Seasons always come to an end, just like when the end of winter rolls around and the flowers start to bloom at the beginning of spring. A changing of the core seasons means new growth, a time of harvesting. Some things we have cultivated over the winter and are ready to take to the threshing floor to separate the wheat from the chaff.
I want to remind you if you’re in a season of isolation: it’s a season. And seasons always come to an end. Look for the purpose when you’re spending endless days and weekends alone. Learn to love the time you spend with yourself. One day, you’ll have a husband or a wife and kids; you’ll have some beautiful friendships because maybe you learnt how to be a better friend in that time. You’ll be filled with joy, peace, and hope. A new season.
You’ll look back at all the things you learnt. You’ll move forward with your busier days and nights. Catching up for dinner with friends, making lunches for school drop off. It all kind of seems to become a small blip eventually. Like washing out a stain in your favourite shirt—you forget that it was ever there.
To better days ahead. To viewing the isolation period as a greenhouse for cultivating new growth and making your roots strong and deep.
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