"Manesia"

"I don't get it," she says reflectively over lunch at one of our favorite Thai restaurants. "I fell for that guy--you know, the guy I've dated over and over again. The guy who's good looking, a smooth talker, romantic--but controlling, manipulative and ultimately, doesn't treat me right. I should've been able to see it earlier. But it's like I forget every time. It's like…"

"It's like you've got manesia," I interject (in Carrie Bradshaw fashion) with a smile. And we both burst into laughter.

I couldn't help but wonder that the basic concept of "manesia" is not unique to my friend. Cyclical behavior isn't new, limited just to single girls or even to relationships. I think most people I know have at some point, found themselves in a position of wondering, "This feels familiar…how did I end up here again?"

For some, the cycle looks pretty good. They're continually learning, promoted, building great relationships, growing in their faith. But nobody's perfect--and even the "amazing" have issues.
Take, for example, the apostle Paul, who said:

For I have the desire to do what is good, but I cannot carry it out.

For what I do is not the good I want to do;

no, the evil I do not want to do—this I keep on doing.

Now if I do what I do not want to do, it is no longer I who do it,

but it is sin living in me that does it.

(Romans 7:18-20)

Thank God that hope is not lost for my friend with "manesia" or any of the rest of us trying to break bad cycles in our lives. The Bible does provide an answer. Paul later writes:

...Who will rescue me from this body of death?

Thanks be to God—through Jesus Christ our Lord!

So then, I myself in my mind am a slave to God's law,

but in the sinful nature a slave to the law of sin. (Romans 7:24-25)

Paul's words may seem a bit strong in the context I've put them in, so let me explain…in itself, I don't think my friend's attraction to the wrong guy is a sin.

But I wonder if part the sinful nature we struggle with is the magnetic pull to do things we know aren't the best. If that's true, then the Holy Spirit working in our lives can help us not only to overcome sin, but to silence the voice of sinful nature. It's the reverse of manesia--it's forgetting our bad tendencies and remembering what is good, what is God's best.