Countering the Dead-Bat Response

Relational Loneliness: a distinct lack of enthusiasm or contact from others is not generally a form of ambivalence-of-love, but more a consistent manifestation of the cycles known to humanity.

Have you noticed the ebb and flow common of certain relationships? For a short time, or perhaps a season, there’s a spark of consistency in the thought—when we’re people of congruence—and then, as quickly as it arrived, it disappears into the ether, as if it never was.

Our memories seem to deceive us and our recognition of the absence of relations with these people comes across as anything from flatly bizarre to roundly concerning. We wonder what we did wrong to deserve the ‘cold shoulder’.

Of course, we did nothing wrong. The relationship is just in a sort of abeyance waiting for the rhythm of life to once again click into place, connecting us more astutely. Then we’re in joy; finally we know all’s okay.

Charting the Ebbs and Flows of Relational Life

Perhaps what we need to do is predict the quiet patches and just simply ride them out.

The easier times relationally will soon return—those times when ‘all’s good’ and our hearts are calm in the midst of our rapport-life.

All things of life ebb and flow; it is understanding this phenomenon and getting on-board with the flow—accepting same—that makes the difference to the quieting of our churning hearts.

Dead bats are not usually about us. They’re more about the other people we’re dealing with and what’s going on in their worlds. For this, we’re sure to pray if we’d wisely swing the focus off us, and what we’re missing out on, and onto them—them who need our thoughts and prayers of intercession.

© 2010 S. J. Wickham.