The Contentment Issue

I have a lot of catching up to do here, but I have some Fabulous Female things in mind, so ready or not, here I blog.

I've been talking lots lately with the marvelous MP, and one of the things we discussed -- tonight, actually -- was contentment. And our problems with being told, in wispy tones, "You should just learn to be content with your situation."

I don't think so -- not on the terms in which contentment is preached. First, I believe that discussions of "contentment" have become in the church a means of teaching people (especially young women) to cultivate greater and greater amounts of passivity in their lives and characters. And passivity is hardly a virtue (Proverbs 31's Wife of Noble Character didn't have a passive cell in her energetic, capable body or a passive neuron in her energetic, razor-edged mind). Wilted flowers aren't pretty. Also, as MP noted, the contemporary doctrine of passive contentment allows a vast amount of young men to get away with heightened levels of immaturity and fantasization, dithering around waiting to meet "that girl that I'll become really good friends with, that one day out of the blue I'll ask to marry me and it will be all normal and unchallenging and no work," meanwhile playing video games, taking laundry home to Mom, and aspiring to nothing in particular. Passivity on a woman's part encourages even greater passivity on a man's. This does nothing to fill the huge leadership gaps among today's young Christian men.

This is not to say that we should all rush around like rabid wolves ready to sink our jaws into our perceived future mate and grimly hang on until we wrest that blasted ring from his reluctant pocket. Or to say that women should take over the world and leave men out of the picture. But let's be clear on the definition of contentment. Or rather, let's examine contentment side by side with its cousin, satisfaction. Because contentment and dissatisfaction can (and do) coexist.

Take my current life situation as an example. I am twenty-four, totally and serially single, a few hundred miles away from a family whom I cherish even from a distance. I live alone in a lovely and affordable apartment in a charming and slightly run-down neighborhood. I have a job with climbable ladders on which God has blessed me with ascension (short version: I will soon be on the comfortable side of poor). I have recently acquired a wonderful used car which delights me every time I put my key in its lock (no sexual pun intended). I will soon cohabit with a slightly deranged and heart-stoppingly gorgeous cat. I have discovered a large, grounded, multigenerational church burgeoning with friendly twenty-somethings. My life is good. I am content.

I am not, however, satisfied. I am sick of coming home to an apartment empty of life save my fifteen or so beautiful, but silent and immobile, houseplants. I am sick of spooning my stuffed Eeyore at night. I starve for a human love I can know with body -- skin, muscle, bone, and blood -- as well as with mind and heart. One of the worst things about living solo and far from family is that no one -- no one -- touches me. It's reached the point where I avoid physical contact with people because I hunger for it so badly that I fear to lose control and cling crushingly and freakily to some poor well-meaning casual toucher and thereby lose a friend. I want companionship -- not so much hours and hours of stimulating conversation and romantic candlelight dinners and walks on the beach, but life alongside someone with whom I am nearly completely, and often wordlessly, comfortable. I do not have it yet.

So. I am content. I am dissatisfied. It's not an either/or equation. (I don't put much stock in either/or equations.) Contentment deals with the big picture. Contentment is a mindset. Satisfaction deals with immediacy. Satisfaction is a reaction. I can and do discipline myself to be content. But I must also have the honesty to admit when I'm not satisfied.

It's a rutted road. I badly want to say to God, "You have blessed me with more than I ever imagined you would -- and it's enough." But I can't end the sentence that way. Instead I have to say, "You have blessed me with more than I ever imagined you would -- and I still want a human male life companion." It's a careful balance of attitude and admission.

So when someone says, "You just need to be content," my answer is that I am. The difference between contentment and satisfaction is the difference between joy and happiness. You can have one without the other. And hanged if I'm going to spend my life wispily saying, "Well...I'm single and sometimes I'm miserable and I want to back out of life altogether...but that's okay..." No. I'm going to do all that's in my power to do (which often isn't much. But it's something): Cultivate my character. Guard, protect, and defend my chastity. Expand my tastes and understandings of the world and life at large. Continue to become a gorgeous, put-together, well-balanced, poised, virtuous, funny, friendly, and gracious woman who can make a killer dinner. Enjoy myself. Meet people (lots and lots of people). Pray for the fulfillment of my heart's desires. Encourage my friends.

And not keep holding out for guys who don't matter. There are some serious losers out there. I'm not settling for one of them, because I am not and do not intend to become a serious loser myself. Maybe I'll have to hunt for those princes, maybe I'll have to bide my time and wait for them to cross my path, but I will meet them, and they will meet me. It's a matter of time, even if the wait is hair-tearingly frustrating.

My dad has always quoted to me, "Peace isn't passive." Contentment isn't shrugging in defeat and backing into the wallpaper and thinking that's all you're meant to have. Contentment isn't sighs, eye rolling, and false martyrdom. It involves openly admitting the things you still lack that make you heartsick, and holding to the goodness of the big-picture (sovereign!) God. And finding people in your situation so that you can keep each other strong. Sometimes this whole thing SUCKS. And still I'm blessed, and keeping the faith.

Hang in there, girls.