Hey you! Yes, you! You’re always saying how no one is there for you. You feel as though you go above and beyond for others, but the same is never given to you in return. While you’ve deemed yourself as the “strong friend”, you also feel as if you’ve been isolated. Yes, your feelings of isolation are valid. However, I need you to stop and ask yourself an important question, “Am I isolated by choice?” Before you quickly answer, “No!”, please take the time to make a complete and candid assessment. Self isolation occurs so gradually that you typically don’t recognize it until it has already happened. Thus, allow me to help you further assess.
When you are going through difficult times, do you shut out everyone? When someone close to you notices that something is wrong, do you try your hardest to convince them that you’re “okay”? When you are invited places, do you immediately make up an excuse so you don’t have to go? Are you afraid to share your feelings of sadness or frustration with your support system because you feel that you’re burdening them? If your answer to any of these questions is “Yes”, then yes, you ARE at the beginning stages of isolation by choice. At this point, I know that it may feel like I’m spying in on your life, but I’m not. I can easily identify these traits because I once lived them.
I was the girl who wanted to present herself as strong so it was easier for me to mask anything that resembled weakness. To my lack of knowledge, the more I hid my pain, the further isolated I became. There were moments when I would cry out of frustration because I felt as though no one was there for me. I felt so alone and isolated that I started to convince myself that no one truly cared. I would beseech God for comfort and understanding. I genuinely wanted to know why no one was ever there for me. How could my family and friends not recognize how broken and alone I felt? How could the same people for whom I was always there not be there for me? In that moment, God revealed to me that my isolation was a choice. At first, I was mad with God. My initial thought was: “Who in the world would want to be isolated?” God’s answer was “You Janay. You have chosen isolation.” Of course I was upset with God’s reply since I didn’t and couldn’t see how I had isolated myself; I would soon recognize it.
I completed a self assessment, asking myself all of the aforementioned questions which I posed to you at the onset of this post. When I answered in earnest, which was “Yes” to each of them, I began to see how my isolation was a choice. God had built an amazing support system for me, yet I refused to lean on them. I felt that I had to be the “strong friend”, or I would be judged. I was afraid to be vulnerable with the very people who were there to be the keepers of my secrets. I unintentionally chose to suffer in silence instead of living in the truth of my brokenness. I had to admit that I had isolated myself and not the other way around.
In that moment, I made the conscious choice to begin leaning into and on my support system. It was not easy at first, and it is true that old habits die hard; nevertheless, I am now the better for it.
If you’ve made it to this point in the blog, I hope that you’ve taken a moment to honestly assess your own isolation and that you’ve taken some accountability for it. I pray that you come to realize the importance of your support system. God created us to be interdependent, which means that we shouldn’t go through things alone. Lean into and on the people who love you, and allow them to assist in your healing. My greatest desire for you, my J Bugs, is that you no longer choose isolation! 💜
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