Make Me Whole

The image of the shadow of a person standing on what I imagine is a basketball court in a school yard, is split in two between the green side of the court and the pink side. Though this is simply an image I choose to portray the words in the prayer I wrote, “Lord, make us whole in you,” I think it represents more of us than we know.

I think it is in the very first Harry Potter book, by J.K Rowlings, The Sorcerers Stone, when Voldermort speaks of living a half-life. I think when J.K.Rowlings wrote about this half-life because she had felt this way before, and was describing a human feeling; not a magical condition.

I’m afraid, many people today understand what it feels like to live a half-life. It might look like a person who punches a clock, does the same thing day after day and has the same conversations with the same people. It could be a person who is working a job only because it has good benefits and has no plans to leave the company, so they will just go through the motions for the next 13 years until they can retire. It looks like the discontent couple whose relationship is over, but they are staying together to raise their kids because they can’t afford divorce and figure it’s better for the kids.

Another author, Glennon Doyle, in her book, Love Warrior, speaks about keeping her true self hidden from the world and sending her ‘Representative’ out instead. She shares that from as early as 10 years old, she began to hide herself from others and tried to be more of whom she thought people wanted or needed her to be. She was living a half-life, making decisions she thought were the right ones in order to make it easier for others, while all along, she would stuff herself deeper and deeper inside. She did this for so long until she blew!

I pray these situations don’t sound familiar but I imagine you could come up with a few more yourself. You might know someone living a half-life, and it might even be you.

This half-life lifestyle is such a norm, I have seen movie and TV characters whose role is to be that person. The one who is just there and seems whose role is to provide some comic relief or be the one everyone makes fun of or is the friend who gets left behind by the main character when they breakout of their half-life.

I’m not saying it is a bad thing to have a routine or enjoy the same activities with the same friends. However, if there is no one or nothing in your life that is encouraging you or introducing new life into your being, then perhaps you are a victim of the half-life saga.

Now there are several things to ‘cure’ the redundancy of a half-life. I’ve heard suggestions from psychologists that you should stimulate your brain everyday by playing games, doing crosswords, or something challenging. They have suggested reading books, starting a new hobby or listening to a podcast. More than once I’ve heard it suggested, you should try something new or try to do something that scares you. These suggestions are just a start.

In addition, I believe, as I wrote in the prayer, that God can make us whole and fill us with what we lack. When we are not feeling ourselves, we can open the scriptures, listen to praise and worship music or even simply go to a church to sit and be surrounded by the stillness. It’s amazing how when we aren’t feeling complete, how good it feels to open ourselves up to allow God to fill us. To me there is nothing like it!

So instead of following Voldermort’s example of living off other of people and expecting them to make you feel whole or being like Glennon Doyle, when she was younger and send your ‘Representative’ out to live for you; find yourself whole in Christ. God is waiting for you to turn to him and allow him to fill you; make you feel whole. What are you waiting for? Here is your invitation!