ME... READY FOR RELATIONSHIP?

I want to tell ya'll a story about what happened last weekend. I was at MetroMart getting some food for dinner because, well we were hungry and it was 9pm. I am there in a very faded, kinda flaking Tupac shirt with leggings and wannabe Birkenstocks. I mean bumming it and I see this tall, slender black guy and we make eye contact. I smile and quickly go back to dissecting the ingredients of cheese because for some reason they add the most unnecessary things, even in block cheese! Anyways, I digress, so I figure out what I need and I move on to getting our favorite potstickers (I don't check the ingredients on this because I don't want to responsible). I find them, hurriedly grab a bag and start walking towards the check out. As I am passing the other frozen food aisles the man appears again and compliments my shirt. I say thank you, finding it odd because the shirt is seriously falling apart. I quickly remove my gaze and continue towards check out. He checks out with a worker and I self-checkout because I prefer it. I see him kinda slowly moving but think nothing of it and continue checking out.

As I am walking out of the store with my 2 ingredient block cheese, many ingredient frozen potstickers, milk, and random other nonessential items I see a car slowly backing up towards me and a window rolling down. I slow down trying to figure out what is wrong with this person and why are they backing up well passed the exit to leave. I stop walking and realize it was the black guy in the store that "liked" my shirt. He starts talking and it takes me a second to realize, "oh he's talking to me". 

"Hey, I just wanted to let you know that you are naturally beautiful, like you dont need makeup. I see you're not married, why is that?" He asked confidently. 

"Oh, thank you. I am just focused on me and my daughter." I hesitated but always hoping it would deter him.

"Oh thats what's up. I have a daughter as well. What ethnicity are you?" he asks as he leans over the window slightly. 

I, remaining a very safe distance away say, "puerto rican and black."

"Oh wow! What's your name?"

"Vashti, what's your name?"

Intrigued he answered, "Anthony...you're very unique. I sometimes come to this pick n save or the one on hwy 100. You live over here? I am on 76th and Howard."

"Yeah, I live around here." I answer realizing I am uncomfortable. 

"Nice, do you mind if I get your number, I would love to stay connected." he says with more confidence. 

"We can connect on social media" I say very hesitant at this point.

"Oh ok I see how it -"

"Well you got to stay safe" I say abruptly. 

"No, no I respect that...don't be alarmed by my instagram; I am a fashion designer. So, my page is a little loud. Do you wear heels?" he says smiling and holding out his phone for me to add my handle. 

"...yes" I answer thrown off as I add my handle to his instagram. Knowing that question is going to make me question why I even gave him my name. 

Do I wear heels? What a weird question to ask someone. He says thanks and bye and I watch him drive away before I conceded to my car taking an unnecessarily-out-of-the-way path home. I get into the car and call my sister while making sure he is out of eye site before I start to move and go the opposite direction. I tell my sister how I am weirded out by the last question and at the same time shocked he even said anything to me. On that call I realized I am nowhere near being open to a relationship. I got immediate anxiety about the idea (or maybe it was the last question) and just wanted nothing more than to crawl in a hole and go back to being invisible. 

When I got home, I blocked him. "I am just not ready" I told myself.  Now, I didn't think anything about him per se, but I clearly was traumatized by my inability to choose a healthy and good partner in the past. When would I trust myself? Could I trust myself? Do I need to trust myself? These is the hardship with dating in your thirties; you've made so many mistakes that you don't trust yourself not to make more and the heartbreak from the past is simply not something you're open to for the future. But do I have to be open to heartbreak to be open to love and healthy relationship? 

Is God trying to talk to me? Is he preparing me? This interaction occured on the heels of a week of dreams relating to me being in a healthy relationship. Each time I woke up I sat there and told God "I have no idea what this means or what the purpose was, but I trust you." You see, what I am learning is I don't have to trust me. the Bible says, "Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways submit to Him, and he will make your paths straight" (Proverbs 3:5-6). Thank goodness I am not leaning on me, because if left up to me, I would remain single forever. I mean, hey, maybe that's Gods plan is for my life; but maybe it's not. Either way, I have to be in a place that is open to whatever He has for me which means I have to completely lean and trust Him, not me. So how do I prepare my heart for him, how do I prepare my soul to be open to what He has for me?

"Yet if you devote your heart to him and stretch out your hands to him,  if you put away the sin that is in your hand and allow no evil to dwell in your tent, then, free of fault, you will lift up your face; you will stand firm and without fear. You will surely forget your trouble, recalling it only as waters gone by. Life will be brighter than noonday, and darkness will become like morning. You will be secure, because there is hope, you will look about you and take your rest in safety. You will lie down, with no one to make you afraid, and many will court your favor." (Job 11:13-19). 

When we devote our heart, reach for Him, put away sin, and close the door to evil, He promises a life without fear, the past dissipates from your memory, you will become secure, safe and favor will flow from you. So, instead of worrying about if I'm ready for relationship I am shifting my questions to "am I devoting my heart to Him and stretching my hand toward him, etc? It won't and doesn't matter if Im ready for relationship if God's not at the center, because the "good" thing will be infused with evil/bad. 

Y'all pray for me; relationships in your thirties is not for the weak and if you got married in your twenties I envy you because dudes out here right now...ask if you wear heels as if its a fetish and I just don't have it in me to give that the time of day. 

with love 💚