The "I'm Fine" Dilemma

The New Year often brings in a "new you" mentality amongst most people in the world. It's a new year, a time to become that person that one has always dreamed of. It's the time to become a better person, a more fit person, a more adventurous person. However, most people make unreasonable goals that cannot be achieved and often times fail at whatever goal is set out to achieve.

Typically, I am not one to set up New Years resolutions for myself. Not that I have something against people doing it, but more so because I don't have a strong desire to do so. I have a lack of motivation in making a major goal for myself to accomplish just because it is a new year. However, as of recently, I have decided that there is one thing that I do not want to carry on into 2013. That one thing is something that I would like to call the, "I'm Fine" Dilemma.

The need to always be fine is the inability to give up whatever is not making a person "fine" or even better than that, "good." This inability is not always a conscious decision, but typically is not knowing how to do so. Whatever it is that cripples a person has most likely been doing so for his or her entire life and in that case it is hard to see a solution. It has become a part of life and has brainwashed it's way into normal. 

The other side to the inability of surrendering this burden is not being able to give up control. Being in control of the situation and taking matters into one's own hands is a comforting feeling. If things do not go well, there is no vulnerability involved, just logical explanations. No one else is in charge and there is no one else to converse with about the topic. The only response needed is, "I'm fine" and time to move on. 

The "I'm Fine" Dilemma is something that I have struggled with my entire life. I want to be real with people, but at the same time I do not want to be a burden so my response, "I'm fine. It's fine. No big deal." The reality of the matter is that it is not fine and I am not fine. In order to truly move into 2013, I need to discover what makes me not fine and what I really need to deal with. 

In John 5:7, Jesus asks a paralyzed man a simple question, "Do you want to get well?" The man's reply is, "I can't, sir." While reading this, I get a bit confused. This man had been lying there for 35 years. He has not moved from that spot, he is looked down on, and is not a considered a valid part of society. And even within that, he said that he could not be healed? He knew nothing else than where he was at. He had nothing within him that thought that healing was even a possibility. He was simply, "fine."

I have been asked this same question, "Do you want to get well?" and I have responded in the same way, "I can't." However, this is something that I want to leave in 2012. The reality of the matter is that if I ever want to look like my God, my creator, I need to admit that I am not fine. This year is the search of what makes me not fine and how to allow the Lord to make me well. In order to do this, it is to be real with those around me and to be honest. I am not well, but the Lord is going to make me well.