Fester Fester Rot Rot

A few weeks ago I made a mistake that I've made before.  I was working with raw chicken (stick with me on this okay?) and threw away what I didn't want in our trash can.  Over the course of the day I and my family threw other trash away on top of the raw chicken and I kind of forgot about it.  Fast forward 2 days later I arrived home and was hit with this stench wall of rotting chicken.  Oops.  The stench made me gag and I quickly removed the bag to the garage where it wouldn't stink up our home.  But the stench stayed behind for about a day.  Ugh.  I've done it before and each time I do I think to myself, "I have learned my lesson, I won't do this again" but I do.  I throw away some raw meat and it sits and festers until it rots.  And until it rots I forget about it, I neglect to take care of it.  But once the stench of the rot reaches me I am quick to dispose of it.

Some of you know this and others don't.  I'm a lay counselor.  And I've been in counseling.  And in my own personal experiences and hearing the experiences of others I have come to the conclusion that we all have some "fester fester rot rot" going on in our lives and our hearts.  We all have something (usually more than one thing actually) that we've discarded, or so we thought, and have thrown other things on top of it.  So the thing we needed to get rid of gets buried where it begins to fester.  And we don't pay much attention to it until the stench of its rot finally reaches our awareness.  At that point we either take care of it or we continue to rot and become a stench to anyone we come into contact with.  We are so quick to dispose of the actual rot and stench of something like meat but we tend to drag our feet when it comes to getting rid of the heart rot we have. The longer we let the rot sit the harder it's going to be to get the stench of it removed.  And the more pervasive the rot will be in our lives and relationships.

Each time I begin to stink and the stench of my heart rot reaches the surface of my life and touches my relationships I take the steps I need to take to get it taken care of and say to myself, "I have learned my lesson, I won't do this again" but I do.  I do it again.  Sometimes with the same issue that caused the rot, sometimes with a different issue.  But I let the rot get covered up by the day in and day out of life and I forget about it until its stench covers me.  And it's my own fault every time.  I'm aware of myself enough (I'm a counselor remember?  We are in tune even if we don't respond to the nudges) to know when rot is there that needs to be taken care of.  Why do I continue to allow myself to be deceived that "later" will be a "better" time to take care of it?  There's no time like the present is totally applicable in this instance!  Now is the time.

No this is not a commercial placed by my blog.  

It's a commercial placed by me for the purpose of this blog!  

It's a lead-in, an intro to my next point.  :) 

Here's one final (for this blog post at least) thing about heart rot that we need to know.  Just because we shoot some "Febreze" (i.e. surface fixes) all over the stench doesn't mean the rot is removed or even taken care of.  (Did you watch the video I put in?  The smell is masked but the trash is still there.  Just sayin'.) Surface fixes are short-term, temporary fixes.  In other words THEY DON'T WORK.  In order to remove the rot we have to engage in the heart, er hard, work of removing the rot.  For some this means addresses hurts from many years ago, addressing people that have contributed to the rot, taking personal responsibility for the growth of the rot, doing some honest self-evaluation, being vulnerable and transparent with others who can help (heck, asking for help!), and more.  The rot doesn't just go away on its own, we have to put the sweat equity in and own it to remove it.

How about you?  Got any fester fester rot rot going on?  (Don't say no, I will call you a liar - we all have something in us festering and rotting.)  Consider taking care of it while it's festering before it starts rotting. The festering process gives us the chance to take action.  Don't let your heart become a stench to you and others.