Celibacy, Singleness & Doing Life Alone ^{16}

Alone in the dark (Photo credit: miss vichan)

“Friendship is unnecessary, like philosophy, like art… It has no survival value; rather it is one of those things that give value to survival.” ~C. S. Lewis

For me, one of the most difficult aspects of singleness and a commitment to celibacy is my present sense that I am going through this life alone. For a couple of months now, I have been constantly reminded that I am lacking something which most everyone else I know has: companionship. Someone to share life with; to share goals, struggles and victories. As C. S. Lewis wrote in the quote above, I feel very much like I am merely surviving, with no real sense of value or of bringing value to another through a godly relationship.

In the men’s group I am a part of, a few of the guys are participating with their wives in “wellness” programs. They are taking steps to eat healthier, exercise  etc. with the aim of improving their health and relationships. Together, these husband/wife teams are working toward a goal. One of my friends in the group has been urging me to change to a healthier lifestyle as well but I have been resistant. I really would like to be a healthier person. Eating healthier and increasing my physical activity/exercising really does appeal to me in many ways. But I find myself lacking the motivation to do it by myself. All I can seem to think of is having a partner in this process of being healthier and motivating each other toward being healthier. And when I think of doing these things on my own, I just don’t see the point; it doesn’t seem practical. I don’t see any joy in getting healthier and not having someone to share the victories along the way with.

Something has changed for me in this area in the past couple years. Prior to coming to Christ, I wasn’t always the healthiest person. But I was able to work up the motivation to exercise and eat healthier. Much of this drive I had was largely sinful. At the time I started to workout with a personal trainer and eat healthier, my mind was focused on the benefits of this. Perhaps the biggest motivator to starting to change my lifestyle at that time was the potential to have greater “success” in  the area of meeting other guys, and all that went along with those increased “opportunities”. Less important was my actual health, but it was a factor. Even outside of the area of health, I derived some happiness and joy from buying things for myself. I even enjoyed grocery shopping and preparing meals. It would make me happy to buy clothes, a new tv, a new computer, car, etc. Now I just don’t care about these things either. Even the things I want, I don’t have the drive to go get them by myself. Now in some ways this is a positive, but in other ways it reveals a very present problem. I am largely feeling without joy these days – primarily in doing anything that would benefit me. I came into a rather decent amount of money recently, and I can’t even bring myself to spend it on the things I feel I want or need. Read More

By Dan7005 Category: Uncategorized Tags: celibacy, christian life, friendship, loneliness, love, same sex attraction, singleness, struggle