Living in Denial Is Like Living In Unreality.

Living in denial can be considered as an unseen disease to your soul.

It is because when someone like your loved one, true friends, co-workers, or family members has been making an attempt to tell you something where it is bring harmful to your lifestyle and refused to acknowledge the fact.

It is living in a world of unreality and see harmful behavior as a good way to ease off your own unbearable pain!

What is denial?  What do it has do to with being free in Christ?  According to Mayo Clinic as it provided with perfect definition about denial:

Denial is a coping mechanism that gives you time to adjust to distressing situations — but staying in denial can interfere with treatment or your ability to tackle challenges.

Refusing to acknowledge that something is wrong is a way of coping with emotional conflict, stress, painful thoughts, threatening information and anxiety. You can be in denial about anything that makes you feel vulnerable or threatens your sense of control, such as an illness, addiction, financial problems or relationship conflicts.

Source: http://www.mayoclinic.org/healthy-living/adult-health/in-depth/denial/art-20047926

Act of denial can be a sign of beginning of breaching the trustworthy among your cherished people who means a lot to you.  Rejecting in getting help will not get you anywhere.  You cannot fix on your own with your own strength!

Living in act of denial is like manufacturing your own toolbox without having any kind of blueprint based on wisdom and advice from others.

How many times have you told others: “I am FINE!”

Are you being honest with your own struggle and frustration in your life where the pain is becoming unbearable in your soul?

Do you think you could fool those people with saying of “I am FINE?” Think twice!

Let me tell you those people who knew you well are not truly this stupid!

Are you aware that denial is categorized as a mental disorder.  It is because of refusal to acknowledge the existence of the problem.

Great sense of unrealistic fear, confusion, and frustration is the outcome of living in denial, which can create a much complicating situation which would much damage to others such as displacement anger.

What is displacement anger? It is when you are truly anger at someone for doing something harmful to you even you wanted to lose your cool and hit this person but instead you took anger upon someone else.

False identity is another part of living in denial stage, for instance, I used to immerse myself into alcoholism where it turned me into a different person than who I am.  My addiction to alcoholism have hurt many people, even some of my behavior has been truly ridiculous.  I used to get drunk all the time when going to work as direct care staff and social worker because I was falling into depression and unable to remove my pain.  It is where I turned myself to alcoholism.

We need to learn to confront the reality of the problem!  It is no wonder Jesus Christ made a beautiful statement:

“Come to me, all of you who are tired and have heavy loads, and I will give you rest.  Accept my teachings and learn from me, because I am gentle and humble in spirit, and you will find rest for your lives.  The burden that I ask you to accept is easy; the load I give you to carry is light.”
~Matthew 11:28-30 (NCV)

Are you tired of running from problems?

Are you tired of being told that you do have serious problem which require professional help?

Are you tired of masking your own emotional distress?

Are you stuck in endless mazes in an attempt to get the problem solved?

It is time to take up and unmask your own true feeling and learn to tackle the reality of the problem by LEARNING to ask for HELP!

Jesus in your heart will bring true joy and peace to your soul, but keep in mind problems will not go away immediately.  However, you will be given peace and be able to seek help where it will be filled with helpful guidance and wisdom.  You will be able to walk with Jesus in tackling your own problems than to fight with your own strength.

One of my favorite Marvel Comic covers is Amazing Spider-Man # 151 which was published in the month of December in 1975!  An artwork of this comic was beautifully done by John Romita, Sr., one of the best comic artists in the history of comics.

Why did I mention this comic cover?  The comic cover can provide with powerful messages and picture!  When I look at Spider-Man was wrestling against the reality of the problem as he was determined to get through it regardless complicating and ugly situations he was dealing with.

So are you willing to stop living in denial and learn to take up the challenge in wrestling against the reality of problems?

Are You Victim of Dexter Morgan Persona?

“Everyone hides who they are at least some of the time. Sometimes you bury that part of yourself so deeply you have to be reminded it’s even there at all. And sometimes you just want to forget who you are altogether… I’m not the monster he wants me to be. So I‘m neither man nor beast. I‘m something new entirely. With my own set of rules. I’m Dexter. Boo.” ~ Dexter Morgan (Season One, episode # four)

Dexter is a series chronicling the life of a serial killer prowling the streets of Miami is bound to leave viewers with many quotable moments. Dexter, a blood spatter analyst for Miami metro often shares his dark thoughts with viewers, allowing fans of the show to delve deeper into the mind of the meticulous serial killer played by Michael C. Hall. Because Dexter only chooses to kill other psychopaths, he has good characteristics as well as the obvious negative characteristic of being a psychopath himself. Michael C. Hall delivers each line so brilliantly that it is easy to forget that he is only playing a character.

Dexter is one of my favorite TV series because it has some hidden theological viewpoint on how it applies to our life.   I have seen many people who have been victims of Dexter Morgan persona even ME too! Maybe you said to yourself, “how come!”

My simple question, do you have a secret or dark side in your life that you never wanted anyone to find out?

When I first saw the first season of Dexter, it arouses my interest to continue to watch it the whole way until the final season (eighth). This character, Dexter Morgan truly blew me away. You know why? It is simple answer is we are secretly leading a double life where your immediate family members, your spouse, and your close friends don’t even truly know.

I let alcoholism define my identity and turn me into monster where I don’t see it as a monster. I used alcoholism to justify my own pain. I used different kinds of schemes in an attempt to find a way to get money to get all hard liquor to make matters worse; I stole many hundred dollars so I can get more hard liquor! I confessed I was once very devious minded person. Many people who have been dear to me said they cannot image I was alcoholic addicts because I was busy fooling them with my infectious smile!   Even at worse, I was very hypocrite Christian, I led Bible study, preached several sermons, and also been active in different ministry activities.

I tried hard and harder to hide my addiction to alcoholism and continue wearing fake mask in showing off how good Christian I am! To make matters much worse, I secretly drowned myself in booze when I was working as a social worker and I used booze to justify my overstress at work. Little I did realize, it is slowly destroying my work performance and even my work relationship with co-workers and clients too.

In reality, I am truly a MONSTER where my soul is very ugly and filled with many unspoken pains, I chose to become victims of Dexter Morgan persona.  Little I did realize that my action has hurt many people who I truly loved.

 

The verses flooded in my thought as perfectly fits about hypocrisy which apply of being victim of Dexter Morgan persona:

“I hate all your show and pretense-the hypocrisy of your religious festival and solemn assemblies. I will not accept your burnt offerings and grain offerings. I won’t notice all your choice peace offerings. Away with your noisy hymns of praise! I will not listen to the music of your harps. Instead, I want to see a mighty flood of justice, an endless river of righteously living.” ~ Amos 5:21-24 (NLT)

God spoke to His people (Isarelites) through the prophet Amos because God knew their heart is darkened and been into something else to ease off their pain in their own souls than to truly seek God.  Israelites perform the religion ceremony without any true commitment to God because their heart is not after God!

Alcoholism turned me into a different person else than actually who I am. I went outside of God’s unique design of identity, of who I am! See how it was paralleled with the character of Dexter Morgan, he used different kinds of schemes to cover up the track which points to himself as secret serial killer. Little by little, his secret life as serial killer was unraveled (I prefer not spoil the storyline what was told in season one to eight if you want to check out yourself). Also, Dexter wasn’t being completely honest when he performed his duty as a blood spatter analyst for Miami metro.

So do you have your own dark side where nobody knew? Have you been running from something for a long time where you are at this point, you are truly lost a far from being yourself?

The truth is… For the past nineteen years, I have been running a far from who I am.  I finally learned the truth as God just wanted me to be myself and seek God with the whole of my heart as what the prophet Micah said:

“O people, the Lord has told you what is good and this is what he requires of you: to do what is right, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God.” ~Micah 6:8 (NLT)