Delusions are often functional.

Delusions are not only functional but necessary. The holidays are the perfect time of year to talk about delusions. Everybody is hustling and bustling around in the 80 degree heat (yes - Florida Christmas is like no other). They crowd the malls buying gifts that they'll be paying for for the next six months. Everyone wants everybody else to believe they're happy. What am I saying? Everybody wants to believe that they are happy. Everybody's just too busy running around getting ready for the holidays that they have yet to sit down and think about the holidays are are they really happy. The busyness of the season creates this delusion for a time. It may be the delusion that they are truly happy. It may be the delusion that they aren't happy. It may be the delusion of importance or non-importance. None of these things are true - really. They are perceptions. They are labels that we put on ourselves for self definition. They aren't totally true nor are they totally false. People create their own reality and their own truth. Some seek the truth, some are fed it while they accept it blindly, some make it up and think it so.

Are squirrels fighting with lightsabers the truth? Absolutely not. However, they are funny. Funny is what I needed today.

Let's just say, I've come to have a certain amount of disdain for the holiday season. For a multitude of reasons that I don't care to go into at this point. However, people need to realize that that silver Christmas tree or that XBOX 360 or that IPod won't bring long lasting happiness this holiday season. Will it bring happiness? Sure - to some. To others they are happy until they get the bill. What really brings happiness has to come from within each of us. I struggle with this daily. I struggle with being single. I struggle with being far away from my family. I struggle with the rejection of certain people that have been close to me. I struggle with dispair. I look for answers in the one book that can give them to me. This is what I find.

Psalm 42:11
Why are you in despair, O my soul? And why have you become disturbed within me? Hope in God, for I shall yet praise Him, The help of my countenance and my God.

Yet God is intimiately aware of our suffering. God is aware of every tear we shed. David, "...the Lord heard the voice of my weeping," and the Bible assures us that our tears are precious to God. It says, "...put my tears into Your bottle: are they not in Your book?" (Psalm 56:8).

I'm going to get through this fabulous happy season. Tears and all. If I have to delude myself into believing that 2008 will be my year to get through this, so be it.