Have you ever noticed how easy it is to love open, honest, and authentic people—and how difficult it is to even like defensive, dishonest people who are living in denial?
A good definition of denial has been called Truth Decay. In the long run denial can be extremely destructive to one's physical, mental and spiritual health—and also destructive to relationships.
As a child I was forced to build defenses around my feelings in order to survive. However, as an adult I learned to rid myself of unhealthy defenses in order to fully live and fully love.—The only way to live productive lives and develop healthy, lasting and loving relationships is to have an open heart and not build walls around it or wear a mask and live in denial. For years I lived behind a mask a facade.—No matter how attractive that mask may have appeared —I never felt fully loved because that mask was not me. Only real people can get close to others and experience intimacy and real love.
The more dishonest I was with my inner self (my true feelings and motives), the more I distorted the truth—including God's truth—to make it match my perception of reality, and I used it to justify my behavior. Ultimately I ended up unhappy believing my own lies.
I was in denial and what is denial? It's SIN—and a destructive sin at that. Remember, it's just as big a sin to lie to yourself as it is to lie to anyone else. We can call poison by any name we like, but poison is still poison. Same goes for sin. We can call it freedom of choice, misspeak, or by any other fancy name to give it a sugar coating and make it sound attractive, but that makes it all the more deceptive and dangerous.
Remember that we change the world one person at a time. The first person to start with is yourself . I needed to realize that because I was guilty of the sin of denial. I came to God with a genuine and humble heart asking him to "search my heart" and reveal to me, it was painful and God revealed to me that I was in denial and God confronted me with the truth about myself.
I realized that without access to the truth there is no healing or recovery, and there is no freedom but self-deceptive bondage. As Jesus said, only the truth sets people free (John 8:32).
I accept the fact that pain is the way into denial and pain is the way out of it. I learned from AA, "It's not the truth that hurts us but letting go of the lies." Indeed, facing one's truth can be painful but incredibly freeing and ultimately fulfilling. I say painful because it usually takes painful experiences to break through our self-defeating defenses.
The pursuit of truth needs to be a life-long journey. It is a journey that leads to fully living and fully loving—and ultimately to life everlasting. Lies are of the devil and ultimately lead to hell here on earth and in the life to come.
"Search me, O God, and know my heart; Try me, and know my anxieties; And see if there is any wicked way in me, And lead me in the way everlasting." Thank you Jesus for delivering me from the sin of denial. Thank you for hearing and answering my prayers. I am grateful for your mercy and I now walk in Truth I am free and I say these things in the name of Jesus Christ.
