Longing for True Connection
by Drenda Keesee
You don’t have to be alone to feel lonely.
You can have thousands of Facebook friends and be in the company of people constantly but still not feel emotionally close or connected to anyone. That’s how people can “party” constantly and still feel lonely.
In a time when there are so many ways to connect to others through social media, people are reporting feeling more lonely than ever. How is this possible? We have an innate need to connect with others on a human level. Social media can help us keep connected with loved ones, but it can also help establish a fantasy where we put our best on display for others to see but avoid face-to-face relationships where people can see our humanity, with all our faults and failures. It can also make others’ lives look more glamorous and enviable in comparison to our own.
Social media gives us the opportunity to build superficial “relationships” with acquaintances, or “friends,” by the boatload, but it can actually inhibit us from connecting on a deeper level with the people we have the greatest opportunity to find real depth with.
Studies actually show that addictions to social media sites trigger…
…people to isolate themselves, which affects the way their physical bodies work, and confuses their immune systems, their hormones, and their brains!
Social media should be one small aspect of your social life. If the sites you’re visiting aren’t improving your relationships or your quality of life, it’s time to make some changes.
Social media can even become an escape from face-time with family, children, and friends. Perhaps the real lure of social media relationships is to avoid having to build close relationships in-person and day-to-day, with the challenges that all real relationships face.
It’s easier to “friend” someone on Facebook than to actually build a friendship, mentor others, or touch lives and be touched as we do so. Relationships require work, and that can be intimidating. We risk rejection. Disclosure can be risky, and it’s usually easier not to take the chance. Fears of all kinds can keep us from sharing our hearts with others or caring and deeply trusting anyone. The fear of not connecting or being rejected by someone can cause us to put up walls, or worse yet, be competitive to prove our worthiness.
But building real, valuable relationships can only happen in a non-competitive atmosphere, where no one is trying to prove they are worthy of love or have something to offer. Competition for acceptance can undermine honesty, trust, and loyalty—the stuff that all healthy, solid, and satisfying relationships must have to grow. Competitive relationships just aren’t satisfying, but yet we compete.
We’ve lost our way.
God created us and only He knows what will fulfill each of us and bring lasting peace and happiness to our lives. But we’ve ignored His design for life and lost our way in this world. Today, we have so many breakdowns in relationships that it’s no wonder so many people are unhappy with life. We were created for relationship!
~Drenda
ps…Are you looking for a good church? Be sure and listen on Saturday evening or catch the 3 services on Sunday for Faith Life Church!
Drenda Keesee’s contagious zeal and humorous personal experiences help make her ministry of spiritual, emotional, and relational wholeness one that will bless your life and spark a new fire in your spirit.
A wife of over 30 years and a mother of five children, Drenda has ministered at churches, seminars, and conferences, and through the mediums of television and radio, for more than 20 years.
Her books, The New Vintage Family, Better Than You Think, and She Gets It are available wherever books are sold. In these heartfelt books, Drenda shares her personal journey and the life lessons that have brought her to where she is today, as well as practical answers that all people need to live a joyful life.
Drenda and her husband Gary founded Faith Life Now, a ministry designed to spread the message of freedom in the areas of finances, faith, marriage, and family. Tune in for their weekly messages here. Faith Life Now hosts conferences worldwide and sponsors both Fixing the Money Thing, which Drenda co-hosts with her husband Gary and Drenda.
Through their own life experiences, the Keesee’s have found the principles from God’s Word to be powerful and effective. At one point, Drenda was a young, suicidal feminist with no hope of ever being “good enough” for her own standards of perfection. She never wanted the “inconvenience” of a husband or children, and she was on her own path to success. But the stress of trying to achieve perfection and perform for love left her broken and used. She had success, but it was nothing compared to the pain and loneliness it had also brought.
That’s when God got a hold of her heart. It was there—at her lowest point—that she found the One who accepted and loved her, faults and all. Since that transformation, Drenda has had a passion to reach women who find themselves where she once was.
She married Gary after attending college, and there she found herself in a personal boot camp of sorts. She says, “I cried and told God, ‘I can do anything but be a wife and mother.’” She committed to learning how to do it God’s way. Through the many years of raising their children and struggling to make ends meet, Drenda learned from their mistakes. “I didn’t know how to be a wife and mother, but God saved our marriage, taught us how to parent our children for success, showed us how to have financial success, and then the irony of all ironies, He called us to ministry.” It’s truly because of these life experiences that Drenda can now share so many insightful principles for people who are now going through the same struggles.
