There I was. Another night, watching someone else get engaged. And instead of feeling joy, I felt that familiar ache in my chest with a quiet question: “Why am I still here, God?”
I prayed for marriage, yet every time I opened my heart to it, I found myself drawn to men who were wrong for me. It caused me to sit with the same shame-filled thoughts, “marriage must not be for me,” over and over again.
Until one day, I finally stopped asking God ‘when?’…and instead, I started to ask Him ‘why?’
God began to show me that my past relationship struggles weren’t random, but that they were reflections of what I hadn’t yet processed inside my own broken heart.
He revealed my pattern of overgiving and performing for men, hoping they would pay attention to me, notice me and…choose me.
He showed me that this deeply ingrained pattern would mean I would always feel like I had to perform for a husband, essentially doubting his love for me.
And, He reminded me that nothing rooted in fear or striving is fit to sustain a fruitful marriage.
Sometimes the truth arrives in a way that is painful but freeing.
Slowly and gently, God began to reveal what was underneath all of the toxic patterns…
And here’s what I saw.
1) I had made inner vows I didn’t know were shaping my life.
Somewhere along the way, I had made an inner vow to “perform or be someone else to receive love.”
I realised that somewhere in my own strength, I vowed in my heart that performance would always be needed to be accepted.
There it was, etched on my heart. Not consciously, but it was there, and it consistently burned into the entire area of my relationships.
The only problem with vows like this is that they will come knocking and require you to pay.
“When you make a vow to God, do not delay to repay it; For He has no pleasure in fools. Pay what you have vowed than to vow not to pay.” – Ecclesiastes 5:4-5
I had made that ungodly vow, not knowing I had nothing in me to pay it, and essentially, was left forced to prove that I would indeed always ‘perform for love’.
Gently, the Lord led me to renounce my vow, but it didn’t free me completely, because next I had to press on to find the root cause of it.
2) I had made a judgment in my heart about my mother.
When I was 5 years old, my mother couldn’t cope with my erratic behaviour, and asked for support from others to take care of me.
A woman seeking support is not inherently bad at all, yet it did plant a seed of rejection and ultimately, a feeling of not feeling accepted and chosen for who I was.
The truth is that where a vow was made, a judgment must also be made, and I saw the connection between the two as clear as day in the midst of my grief.
God revealed to me that those judgments I had made about my mother proclaimed her to be a failure and a woman who wasn’t interested in her own child.
The Bible says: “Honor your father & mother, which is a commandment with a promise: that it may go well with you & you may live long on the earth.”
And also
“Judge not, that you be not judged. For with what judgment you judge, you will be judged; and with the measure you use, it will be measured back to you.”
When I read those, it hit me: my relationships weren’t flourishing because I was reaping the consequences of judgments I’d made long ago.
I could see clearly where life wasn’t going well with me.
It can be tempting as Christians to assume that if something isn’t working, it’s not God’s will.
But that isn’t always the case, because when there is unresolved pain in your heart, there will be hidden bitter roots (Hebrews 12:15) silently sabotaging the places in your life where you long for a breakthrough the most.
Learning how to truly honor your parents — in a biblical, trauma-informed, Holy-Spirit led way — can change the entire trajectory of your life.
But here’s the nuance. Obeying and honouring are two different things. Honor is not pretending the pain never happened.
It is not about minimizing.
It is not about justifying.
You do not have to convince yourself that the pain wasn’t once there.
Honor is a heart posture before God, and that distinction changes everything.
Honor is the heart-level reconciliation between you and God regarding your parents, no matter their behaviour, their choices, or their presence (or absence) in your life.
Honor isn’t about their actions — it’s about your heart and about agreeing with God about who they were made to be…not about what they have done.
And this — this heart-level agreement with God — is where real breakthrough happens.
This is profound, because this commandment comes with a promise.
It is spiritual law, and when spiritual laws are violated (even unintentionally), our lives bear the weight of it.
So, God isn’t withholding blessings from your life, and He is not punishing you.
But when your heart remains tangled in unhealed emotional and spiritual wounds, you will inevitably find yourself living outside of His design… often without even realising it… and there are consequences to that.
And whether you can see it clearly or not… when you dishonor your parents, life does not “go well with you.”
Simply because of God’s Natural Law.
Because life flows according to God’s design, and every unhealed wound left unchecked keeps you from the wholeness He intended.
