Fixation: an obsessive interest in or feeling about someone or something

Many of us start our stands the same way. Very fixated on the spouse and the circumstances. They move, we react. They speak, we listen and crumble. The mission of Standing is to teach us to become fixated on the Lord because He is not going to misdirect us, His intent toward us is rooted and grounded in love and good intention for us. He wants the same thing we want. A restored marriage. A secure and healthy marriage because two very individual people became very healthy and secure in a personal relationship with HIM.

But from time to time we see some Standers who are very fixated on the spouse and part of that fixation comes because they carry many issues in their soul that keeps them bound to looking for ways to ease the pain. They are fearful, insecure, feel unworthy and deal with deep rejection roots. They only know one way of easing the pain that comes from these very troublesome issues……..get their needs met by people.

I know this, I was one of them. Try as I might I could not get the pain of my many issues healed through turning to God, so I thought. I would go to Him in my pain and desperation and walk away feeling much worse because He didn’t instantly gratify me. He didn’t give me that ‘feeling’ I was in need of. I was not looking to believe or use faith. I was looking for proof, something tangible to feel and put my trust in.

That is the reason people that are bound in fear, insecurity, unworthiness, rejection struggle with the Lord so much. Walking in trust, faith, and believing first in something we can’t see or feel is the exact opposite of what our issues require. We walk in these dark places looking for some hope, any hope that there is a light switch somewhere. We want someone to turn it on and don’t want to trust ourselves to turn that on ourselves.

For years, that light was right there, but I didn’t want to save myself. I wanted someone else to do it for me because……well I had deep issues. I refused to believe it. I refused to walk in faith. I refused to let love touch and heal me. I went after what I could control, manipulate and get instant results and gratification. What a mess I was!

When Standers that are suffering like this come to us, we can see this pattern of stuck. A cycle of them trying over and over to get healed by their spouse, by a restored marriage. They are praying for the Lord to restore back to them what they lost, instead of praying for their own healing and restoration to the Lord. 

The next thing I am going to say is not for everyone. But because I see it often, it must be talked about. It’s for those Standers that take a turn in their stand and come to a place where the way things are going for them is not working anymore. They determine their spouse is not coming back and they may choose to deal with that new found pain of rejection through a new realization. Their spouse is evil and now they don’t even want them back. They reject the truth that their spouse has a temporary hard heart and make it a permanent heart situation that they can never change or be set free from. Suddenly, they say their spouse is abusive or a narcissist and you start seeing all those memes on their social media. They step into the role of victim, and the healing begins as they now shift all their fixation from standing for restoration to standing for painting them out to be a despicable person. 

Broken people with issues of rejection and unworthiness roots, controlled by fear, take the route that eases that pain even if it’s a lie. They will seek out any form of healing that is quickest and simplest. Rejecting hard work and walking by faith because the pain of those roots are quite unbearable at times and the need for relief overtakes the need for truth. I would believe the lie because it stopped the pain quickly, while rejecting the truth because truth was not easy to hold onto and would not stand up to the many lies I believed about myself. 

God has a loving healing plan. But that plan doesn’t include making our spouses villains, dehumanizing, and devaluing them………….all so a person can find some relief from the pain of rejection and abandonment. 

While there are some real cases of abuse and spouses with real Narcissist Personality Disorder, the way to heal and repair the damage still doesn’t consist of turning to degrading and devaluing them. All these groups and pages that put out these memes and articles that are meant to help victims of abuse and Narcissism, they think they are helping by making the lost person a villain and monster. They are NOT bringing healing  God’s way. God wants us to heal through mercy, compassion, wisdom, and understanding.

If you have to heal yourself by making someone else’s brokenness your stepping stool then that is not healing. That distracts you to STILL be fixated and focused on the spouse, just in a different way.

While it does help to understand the heart of the lost spouse and why they do things through that lost, blind, darkness, that understanding is meant to help you find pity, compassion, grace, mercy, and deepen your love for them. NOT meant to be used to get more disgusted and angry at them.

Again, IF your healing plan involves you making them out to be a monster, so you can be free of them, that is not a healing plan. That is a plan of keeping YOU from true healing! Instead of you being delivered from fear, you will learn to be more controlling of your circumstances so you never find another person that treats you like that again. Instead of trusting in the Lord and become more trusting in yourself now that you are ‘awake.’

Empowerment, pride, and “no one will ever hurt me or disrespect me again’ will become your new stand.  You will STILL be rooted in fear, rejection roots will flourish, and unworthiness and shame will still haunt you every day. But you will turn to blaming the spouse and enforcing them as the villain over and over to make yourself feel better. That is why you seek out those memes and articles when the pain comes. It’s your only relief……….deflection-skirting around the real issues.

God has a plan for you. But it means you have to stop blaming your spouse. You have to be willing to do things that mean you have to do the work. Believe and trust when you can’t feel a thing. Have faith in what you can’t see. You have to come to a decision that you are loved and valuable even though everything in you says that you are not. THAT is the way to healing. To take a stand against the lies that have formed these deep strongholds in you that have shaped and molded your mind and heart.

You ARE loved, believe it. Not for what you do or how you act. But because He saw you and chose you. That is your path to healing. Not because your spouse was so horrible and evil and in that evil they didn’t appreciate what they had. 

God wants you to heal with compassion for them because they are lost and broken. If there is abuse He is not asking you to heal by putting yourself in harm’s way, but He is not asking you to heal by becoming bitter at them either.

Your healing begins with YOU and GOD. Not being fixed and focused on your spouse and what they did to you, or what your parents did. But what God feels about you. How He sees you. You won’t be able to heal properly until you understand yourself through the eyes of the Father. That is what God wants to show you, who you REALLY ARE!

Standing with you,
Sheila Hollinger

So know in your heart that just as a man disciplines his son, so the LORD your God disciplines you. Deuteronomy 8:5

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(~Marriage Revealed Ministries Inc. is committed to helping bring healing and restoration to couples who are struggling in their marriage. We do this through the revelation of Who God is and His heart and design for marriage which never intends abuse in any form. If you suspect abuse in your relationship, call the National Domestic Violence Hotline at 1-800-799-7233 or visit them online at thehotline.org~