Two truths and a lie. I’m sure most of you remember playing this game as a kid or even as an adult. Maybe you’re better than I am at understanding people you don’t know, but my experience with the game tells me that it’s often quite difficult to discern the lie from the truths. Really, that’s the point of the game. Sadly, this is the game Hollywood has been playing with our hearts and expectations for the past several decades. I just watched No Strings Attached and I’m still trying to process my thoughts, but here’s the unedited knee-jerk reaction.

Like finding a needle in a haystack. This is the point of the lie in the game. However, we’ve been unwittingly convinced that love begins from a physical connection. In other words, the beginning has to stem from “the spark”. I’m here to tell you I’ve felt the spark and I’m single as the number one today. The spark means nothing. The very concept is conjured up for the sake of planting butts in seats. Also, “the spark” isn’t something that happens in between the sheets. Yes, I’ve been there too, and the only place that leads is heartbreak and divorce. Just ask the 56% of marriages today (I was quoted this statistic in church this past Sunday). No, I don’t hate Hollywood. In fact, I love movies, but I hate the expectation of love that seems to follow from an over-exposure to the ideals espoused in the movies and media today.

Bring on the truth. To be honest, I love romantic comedies (something I can attribute to my dear mother and sister). I’m not trying to rain down a torrent of hate on this movie’s parade. In fact, there’s one solid piece of truth here. That piece lies in the fact that at some point we have to grow up. There comes a time when we have to get real and make a commitment. In the case of this movie, that came after an extended period of hooking up purely for sex, but that’s for another post. The fact is, we’re all looking for people who can commit. People who cannot commit are not only unattractive, but they’re, well, damaged. And this applies to more than just dating relationships and marriage. Think about it, are you a person who can commit? If not, why?

Sex is more than we know The fact is that sex, unlike what many of us have come to believe, is only a small percentage physical. The majority of its effects lie in the emotional and the spiritual. I want to focus on the emotional here. You cannot remove that aspect from the act. The emotional tie can be frayed very badly over time, but it is not broken. This is what we do, however, when we think casual flings a way of life. We cover the initial wound(s) we’re nursing with more and more wounds until we can no longer feel because we’re so covered in emotional wounds that we don’t know which is real and what we’ve created in our masochistic nosedive. And we wonder why when we meet the “one” that we have issues with intimacy and commitment. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to figure it out, friends. Then we wonder why our relationship with God’s also shallow and meaningless…

While Hollywood is not the root of all evil, they’ve become excellent at telling us what we want to hear. In this case, it seems a validation of our physical needs manifesting themselves in casual hookups. This is not how mature, healthy human adults act and it’s not a lie we need to promote. Instead, we need to allow ourselves to become mature, healthy adults. We need to rid ourselves of our personal baggage, whatever that is, seeking out help to do so and only then can we attempt to take on another’s issues, confronting two sets of problems as two whole adults. Otherwise, you’re merely handicapping yourself and this fight doesn’t need to be any harder. Finally, sex is not a toy. Yes, I know what I just said and yes, that is precisely what I meant. We treat it as worthless, washable, fixable, etc. just like our favorite t-shirt. This isn’t how it works and was never to be this way. Sex is consuming physically, emotionally and spiritually and it’s time we treated it as such. This is why sex was originally designed to be enjoyed within the context of marriage. However, this is why so few marriages stay as such today. So, will we be able to pick out the lie today as we’re playing this game of two truths and a lie?