Pursuit

What is pursuit?

            This is a question I have mulled over time and time again throughout my years of experiencing the successes and failures of relationships. This is what I've found:

            Pursuit is the vulnerable risk to know and be known, for the sake of possibility, not surety.

Pursuit is the hope before hope, the chance taken, the flick of a match. It is not, however, the definite start of an already decided journey.

            Pursuit takes courage and courage is the result of vulnerability not pride (its counterfeit). It is a meekness and openness that says "I'm just a boy and you're just a girl (or vise versa), each of us equally glorious and worthy of being known". This vulnerability creates humble, honest and powerful pursuit. Pride, however, is begotten by fear and it’s result is distance; a chasm made between equals that screams, “I’m better then you, I know more then you, I’m greater then you in this way or that, so I must guard myself from you”. But it is only pride, if it is predetermined. Meaning, the judgment made by pride happens before time or risk has created any actual knowledge of who a person is or of the greatness that they uniquely contain.

         Therefore true pursuit comes from the courageous risk to know and be known as possibilities are explored, either of friendship or something more, not the prideful judging of an individual out of fear.  I will admit that possibility, expectation and hope can sometimes make a fool of us all, marking us for seemingly fair judgments. The chance of a chance will sometimes turn us into talkative weirdoes, stalking or obsessive social media gluttons, or silent, self-abasing introverts, rejecting ourselves before we can be rejected. Hopeful possibilities can drive us crazy sometimes. Knowing this can sometimes give us the grace necessary to know someone beyond momentary "hope crazies" and be known similarly.

            But in all this what I hate more then anything else, is cowardice: an unwillingness to face the truth of someone’s affection with humility, honesty and vulnerability, in order to communicate. Who cares if you aren't interested in someone? If in the midst of honest pursuit, you don’t have the guts to communicate a difference in interest, then you’re an asshole. I can’t act like I’ve only been on one side or the other in this. I have been pursued by some and, in the hopes of avoiding an awkward situation, prayed they could just be ignored, but then I remembered that a real person was on the other side of my selfish choice to ignore rather then to face. And I, in turn have been bravely spoken to, as well as ignored. I admit, I may not have done my communicating perfectly, but I have tried never to ignore or avoid affection. In all fear and trembling, with great concern for the worth of another, I sought to face every situation and individual with respect, honesty and as much courage as I could muster.

            We forget, sometimes, that a human being is on the other end of our dealings, a living, breathing, bleeding individual with a history of pain and pleasure; who hopes extravagantly and feels deeply the harsh sting of rejection as well as the elation of acceptance. We are all on one level, favored and set apart in such unique and perfectly suited ways that to pretend there is a hierarchy of any kind is to fall into the ignorant belief that worth and greatness can be earned and stood upon. I believe Christ set that record straight. Anyway, all this to say, be brave and honest, humble and vulnerable in all your dealings with the affections of others. We are each worthy of the time it takes to speak truth in love, no matter how painful or wonderful it might be.

Much love,

~Andrea Christine