Avoidance Isn’t Free…It’s Billing You LATER
I want to talk to you about something most people don't want to look at.
Avoidance.
Not the dramatic, Jonah kind. Not the running-away-from-your-whole-life kind. I'm talking about the secret kind.
The I'll deal with that conversation later kind.
The I've been meaning to call my doctor for six months kind.
The I know I need to set that boundary but today is not the day kind.
The kind that you convince yourself is protective but it’s actually not.
It is COSTING you. Every. Single. Day.
Avoidance doesn't make the problem smaller.
But it DOES make YOU weaker.
It taxes your body, your spirit, and your relationships in ways that secretly compound until one day you look up and you're exhausted and stuck and you can't figure out why... because you didn't actually DO anything.
And THAT is exactly why.
Avoidance is like a slow leak in your gas tank. It can do one of two things:
At best, it leaves you stranded because you will literally eventually run out of gas.
At worst, it leaves a trail of flammable fuel behind you and if something big behind you ignites the trail…the flames catch up to you and suddenly your life explodes without warning.
Let’s talk about 3 ways avoidance costs you.
#1 Avoidance Wrecks Your BODY
Your nervous system is not neutral. It does not clock out just because your brain decided to sweep something under the rug.
When you are chronically avoiding something stressful, a doctor appointment you know you need to make, a conversation that NEEDS to happen, a boundary that keeps getting crossed…your body registers that threat even when your mind has moved on to scrolling Instagram.
Cortisol stays elevated. Sleep stays shallow. That tension that lives in your shoulders? That's not random. Your body is HOLDING what your mind refuses to face. Or what you should hand over to God and let Him deal with.
Avoiding the hard thing is NOT resting. It's borrowing energy from your future self at a really high interest rate.
I’ll never forget when talking with my hormone provider that my hip hurts more if I don’t have enough estrogen and then I can’t do squats. You know what she told me?
Don’t do squats.
I had no words for such a stupid reply. Telling me to avoid what would make me stronger and instead let all the muscles ATROPHY around the very joint that needs the most support??? What kind of healthcare provider DOES that?!?!?!?
The correct path would be to figure how I CAN work strength training into my life in a way that works!!! Not avoiding the work altogether.
Letting myself atrophy was not a price I was willing to pay. Especially for this EDS body. The interest rate on that is very, VERY high.
What interest are you paying right now with your body?? It’s worth examining and taking care of it!!
#2 Avoidance Silences Spiritual Connection
This is the one I really want you to sit with.
Avoidance is a form of dishonesty. Not always to other people, but to yourself. And to God.
Every time you refuse to face the thing God has been gently (and sometimes NOT so gently) pointing you toward, you are telling Him with your actions: I don't trust You with this.
You build a little wall. Then another one. And before long you're having your quiet times on one side of a fortress you built yourself, wondering why you can't feel close to God anymore.
Psalm 139:23-24
Search me, God, and know my heart, test me and know my anxious thoughts. See if there is any offensive way in me and Lead Me in the way everlasting.
Ask God to get ALLLLLL the yuck out. Even if it’s hard. The devil doesn't need you to completely reject God to get you stuck. He just needs you to keep putting off confronting the thing God is asking you to face.
#3 Avoidance Ruins Your RELATIONSHIPS
Whatever you don’t deal with can’t heal. It becomes a weight. A thorn. Or a splinter that gets infected.
It always amazed me how the tiniest sliver of wood, (one so small I’d need to grab my magnifying lamp so I can see it) could rapidly infect my kids fingers when they were little.
They wouldn’t want me to touch it because they knew I had to dig it out with a needle. But if I left it for a day, it would completely alter how they did things. Soon they would avoid using that hand. Then they would cave and let me fix it.
But by then it was harder because there was redness and swelling. It would have been SO MUCH easier to do it the moment they got the splinter. When they got a little older they got wiser and came to me immediately.
The body takes SMALL threats VERY seriously and so should we!!
Sometimes we can’t deal with something immediately. I get that.
But other times we CAN, we just refuse to do so.
Friend, don’t wait.
Don’t let swelling form around a relationship because of words. Don’t let everything get so tender that even the gentlest touch hurts like crazy.
Avoidance doesn't just put things on pause. It lets them rot.
The situation never just freezes at that state of dysfunction. It ONLY gets MORE dysfunctional.
But on the flip side of that idea…the “swelling” is TELLING you something. It is saying, “this isn’t healthy!!! We need something to happen here. We don’t want the whole body to be infected!!”
God doesn’t want the issues of one relationship to infect every area of your life. Whatever warning signs He is sending you…it’s best to listen before you get a full blown “life infection!”
So let me ask you something directly…
What is the thing you've been stepping over?
You already know. It came to mind the second you read that question. The hard conversation. The decision. The apology. The boundary. The grief you've been ignoring instead of actually feeling.
It is not going to get smaller by waiting.
You are not going to feel more ready by waiting.
The right time is not magically coming.
And you, my friend, were NOT called to a small, carefully managed, avoidant life. You were called to a BOLD, God-commissioned, fully alive one.
Joshua 1:9
“Have I not commanded you? Be strong and courageous. Do not be frightened, and do not be dismayed, for the LORD your God is with you wherever you go.”
Wherever you go. Including INTO the hard thing. Including the conversation, the appointment, the decision you've been circling for months.
He is not waiting for you to feel ready. He is saying GO and I will be WITH you.
So here's what I want you to do today. Just one thing:
Take ONE step toward dealing with that thing you’ve been avoiding.
Because here's what I have watched women discover over and over again once they stop avoiding and start facing:
It never costs as much as the avoidance did.
Almost every single time they say: "Dorothy. I cannot believe I waited so long. It wasn’t as hard as I thought! The avoidance was harder!”
I believe that will be you too. 💙
In passionate purpose,
Dorothy
Here’s a prayer to help you get started with you've been avoiding:
Father,
I am going to be honest with You right now because You already see it anyway. There is something I have been walking past. Something I keep telling myself I will deal with later. And I am tired of carrying the weight of it while pretending it is not there.
Search me. Show me what I have been avoiding and why. Bring it to the surface. I know You do not shame me. You convict me because You love me and You have somewhere better for me to go.
I confess that somewhere along the way I decided it was safer to avoid than to deal with it. I called it wisdom. I called it waiting on You. But God if I am honest it was fear. Forgive me for that.
I choose today to take one step toward the thing I have been running from. Not because I feel ready. But because You said You would be with me wherever I go and I am choosing to believe You meant that.
Give me courage that is stronger than my feelings. Give me legs that move even when my heart is pounding. Thank you for promising to always be with me in the hard things.
In Jesus name, Amen.