Posted by k@ on July 10, 2002 at 15:31:58:
In Reply to: Re: on being alone, mentors, accountability, etc. posted by jeannie on July 06, 2002 at 20:07:48:
: wow bill!! i couldn't have said it any better!! my last experience with real struggle like this was different from yours though - hope this helps you raul: a whole lifetime of, quite honestly, pain that i thought i was over with YEARS AGO suddenly came to a big ugly head through a series of events in my life over the last several years. this "big head" plummeted me into a two and a half year depression through which i felt the most exquisite pain of my life. thank god for that! i fought and fought and fought and one day, finally, i died. the death was soooooo sweet that i have no words to describe it. to finally get to this point, however, i had to be alone through it. by alone, i mean no one around me but god. basically, i isolated myself from everyone. when i finally surrendered the last of the stuff and the people i was holding onto, the freedom i felt was enormous. i remember telling the lord at various points through the whole experience, all i want is truth and freedom. the truth was brutal at times, but the freedom in the end was so worth it. i don't know exactly what you're going through, raul, and maybe knowing my experience won't help you right now, but if you're interested in knowing more, i'd be glad to share it with you. i'm a good listener, too........jeannie
That is fantastic! I am so glad you shared that! I have been through similiar things, but for me it's hard because I haven't had the luxury of being alone in sooo long...
Many people will consider being alone a curse, but sometimes it is from God.
I think this is true for singleness too. You have to see it as a gifted time, because the intimacy you can have with God is interrupted so easily when there someone to share your time with..
But that is off the subject. One thing I wanted to say about mentoring-
I hope this doesn't offend ,but I really believe it is a major commitment to someone, whether it is a spoken agreemnet or a non-verbal understanding. To have that type of relationship with someone, I think you really have to be willing to BE someones mentor first. I think that means YOU have to be willing to be called in the middle of the night, to meet when it's not convenient, and YOU have to be willing to listen for as long as you can to someone else unloading. I think that is quite a sacrifice to be a mentor, so if you want a mentor you have to be willing to do the same for someone else.
Unless of course I just have a different picture of what I think a mentor is supposed to be.
A mentor role could be filled by a number of different people I suppose...
To hold each other accountable, what exactly does that mean? How does that happen practically?