The Belonging

A few nights ago I sat in a friend's living room, looking around at the beautiful faces of women with whom I have been meeting for over a year now. A common desire to understand more about God's heart for racial justice brought us together initially - and as more people have tested the waters and joined, our group has grown.

But as I looked around, I wasn't thinking about how much we have learned and how we have shared deep stories of woundedness or anger or missed opportunities or ignorance, although I am deeply thankful for the experience we've shared.

I was thinking that these are my people.

And I was also thinking that I am not so good at having people.

I am the kind of student who groaned when a teacher announced a group project. Who worried that when moving to college I would feel smothered by having to share a dorm room. (I didn't, by the way, because I ended up with a lifelong friend who was beyond awesome herself and who let me be me.) I feel touched out by tiny humans by right around 10 am every morning. "Touch" is my very last love language and the idea of someone hugging me or even, really, talking to me when I am upset is actually terrifying.

I am fiercely independent, the kind of person who wrote a song in high school that outlined who much I did NOT want to grow up and get married or have children. (It's true. My best friends at the time chose to perform it 10 years later at my wedding rehearsal dinner. Thanks, guys.)

For much of my life, I thought of it as a strength. But the older I get, I begin to wonder.

Yes, there is so much good that comes from it. Self-reliance, determinedness...those are good things when applied rightly. But when applied defensively they can shut a whole lot of good out. They can shut out a type of belonging and place someone perpetually on the outside. Sometimes it almost feels like I am watching my life as a spectator. Not feeling fully connected to anyone in the story, but committed nonetheless, to being there.

Brene Brown, in her book "Braving the Wilderness" says this:

"The special courage it takes to experience true belonging is not just about braving the wilderness, it's about becoming the wilderness. It's about breaking down the walls, abandoning our ideological bunkers, and living from our wild heart rather than our weary hurt...True belonging is not passive. It's not the belonging that comes with just joining a group. It's not fitting in or pretending or selling out because it's safer. It's a practice that requires us to be vulnerable, get uncomfortable, and learn how to be present with people without sacrificing who we are. We want true belonging, but it takes tremendous courage to knowingly walk into hard moments."

Look, I'm going to be appallingly honest for a moment. The four years that I have spent as a stay-at-home parent have been the loneliest of my life. The amount of emotional and physical energy it has taken me to do what I have done has caused me to choose to sacrifice the opportunity to truly belong anywhere else.

And I have made bad choices along the way. I have filled up on Facebook at the lowest points, rather than found a real face to be with. I have believed again and again that all I can do is what I can do right now for my kids and if there is nothing left of me by 7 pm, then so be it. I have clicked "interested" or "maybe" on a thousand different social opportunities and showed up at a tenth of them. I have bought into a culture that makes it easy to go back on my word because my word never meant much in the first place. Maybe or interested is a lazy way of saying "I think I should do that but I don't truly want to commit so I will pretend to commit for a few minutes and then easily back out at the last minute." 

But that way of life is never going to be right or good or, to be honest, holy. It's only going to provide momentum to stay in an endless spiral of exhaustion, isolation and loneliness. It's never going to be enough. I will never fully belong to myself or to anyone else that way. 

As lent has started, I've been asking myself and God what it is I could sacrifice right now. Lent was a fairly new concept to me a few years back. I grew up in a church that didn't adhere much to the liturgical calendar and I had no concept of how to observe this time of year. Most of the years I have attempted to observe lent, I would choose something that was hard to give up, but not necessarily ask God to meet me in that empty space. It was more of a test of my independence, of course.

Did I have the will power to part with something and succeed? I always did, of course.

And, you know, missed the point. 

So this year I was hesitant about "doing without". I feel like I have been stripped down to the bare bones of who I am anyway, so what more can I part with? 

Ironically, I had been on the waiting list for Ms. Brown's book for months and received the notification that it was all mine the morning that Lent began.

And as I began reading it and feeling punched over and over again at the very core of my gut, I just knew.

Lent has to do with my people.

The women I met with last week aren't my people just because we all believe the exact same things. Or have the same stories. They are my people because I've chosen to be radically myself in their presence, mess and all, as we hash through some really tough stuff. And they've let me be.

But I so rarely choose to live at that level of relational risk.

Listen, I'm not saying I have never had people before. There are some humans through the years with whom I could be my total self and still can to this day. Really, really good friends who stuck with me even when I made it very hard to do so. And I am so stinking grateful for every one of them, may God have mercy on their souls.

But mostly I have held myself back. Content to participate or know without the risk of being fully known. Afraid to really need anyone - keeping most friends far enough away that any betrayal or disappointment or even loss of them wouldn't actually affect me.

Ouch.

I have a feeling that when Jesus said he came to bring life abundant, some of that had to do with fully embracing the gifts of those loving humans in my life. And when you find it hard to even fully accept God's radical love for you so much of the time, you certainly aren't going to trust people.

Fear. Fear is so powerful, my friends. And that's really what it comes down to.

Brene's first step to belonging is to "move in." There is so much rage and separating and vilifying in our society these days. People say things they would never say to someone if they were actually face to face through social media. We've lost touch with the art of disagreeing. With civility. With productive debate. With researching to find the actual truth.

And I see the effect it has on me. The propensity towards pigeonholing, towards assumptions, towards anger. To believe I am right and others wrong all the time.

We all do it.

And it's killing us, friends. It. Is. Killing. Us.

So for Lent, I'm "moving in" and clicking off. I will check in my with groups online and organize events and post blogs - but when tempted to click to fill that void of belonging, when tempted to scroll to cure loneliness (if only for a moment), I'm going to choose one of the following instead:

(1) Write a letter to a friend. An actual pen to paper, lick a stamp and leave it on my table for a week because I hate going to the post office letter. 

(2) Call someone on the phone. And fight really hard while it is ringing against my hope that they won't pick up. (Seriously, I need help.)

(3) Initiate a crazy game of chase with my kids that ends in a tackling, tickling mess of limbs and chaos because even though I hate being touched, my kids love it.

(4) Pick up a real book that challenges me to love better. To move in. To listen. 

(5) Write. A blog. A book. A quick text of encouragement. But write. Dream.

(6) Bake something for a neighbor. (Friends, this will be no easy thing cause this lady will need to learn to bake to actually do this one.)

(7) Text a prayer or word of encouragement to one of my pastors.

(8) Dance. (Ok, this may seem unrelated to what I am trying to do but those who know KNOW. This is 100% a support to doing away with fear. Anyone want to make me a new playlist?) 

(9) Organize an actual outing and invite humans to come with me. (Keep watch for this friends - maybe we can hang out IN PERSON!!!)

(10) Make coffee and find a neighbor with whom to share it.

Bottom line, and in the immortal words of Phoebe, I am going to be with the "3-dimensional people." I am going to "move in." I'm going to fight the loneliness by fighting the fear. I am going to resist the parts of me that shut down, that hide, that run away and pray like crazy that Jesus will help when I fall and fail.

And I will fall and fail. It's inevitable.

But I'm going to be with my people and find more people who need people. I'm going to keep fighting for the things I am passionate about, but I'm going to do it in person. I am going to keep radically finding ways to unashamedly be me and call others to do the same. Because I believe we can always get better, do better, know better, be better. We're never finished.

I'm going to fight fear with faith and risk. And win.

Beautiful Church

This morning I led my final song as interim worship director at our current church. As I drove home, companionably chatting with my two-year-old , I felt an up-welling of joy and gratitude.

I have been in a LOT of churches in my life. I grew up in an amazing, non-denominational, small church family in NY where church lunches were full of lasagna, holy kisses and boisterous laughter. In college, I flitted around a bit- from a Presbyterian church to an Assemblies of God to an international church in London, finally landing on a semi-Pentecostal church in inner city Richmond where I was one of very few white people with a LOT to learn. That's where I was first trained to be a worship leader and when I really started to think about race in the church. From a country church in North Carolina to helping plant an urban church to a few more wonderful places in my early 30's, it's been an adventure.

And with all our moving around, I've had a lot of chances to be ON worship teams.

This was the first time I've really led one for more than a Sunday or two.

A number of people over the last few months asked me if this job was stressful with raising 3 boys, preparing for a move across the country and dealing with the special challenges of our middle one.

I never had to hesitate when I answered.

Friends, this job was life-giving. It was like a long sip of water after a brutal trek across a dry land. The chance to come together with other rational adults two times a week doing one of the things I love to do best? Well, it was magical for me. The laughter, the camaraderie, the moments we truly were able to worship together as we led (and those who lead worship KNOW what I mean)...well, it's making it even harder to leave, to say the least. The opportunity to work more closely with our pastors, to see their heart for our congregation and our city, the chance to see myself and those around me grow in our gifts and take risks together has truly helped me see again WHY the church is so good and so necessary even in all it's messed up beauty.

And as I sat in the pew this morning, having just participated in my youngest son's baptism with my church family, listening to my pastor preach about being at peace with one another, listening to his stories about the Rodney King trial, white privilege and racism, I realized again just how unique this place is. It's not the first time I've heard things like this from our pulpit. In fact, justice is woven into the gospel effortlessly around here all the time. It would be strange NOT to hear words about God's call for reconciliation and healing in our world. To be blunt, that is not true of most of the churches of which I've been a part.

I am really going to miss this place. Like all the ones that have come before, it has shaped me in new ways, challenged me in others and helped me to give of my gifts.

Have I been hurt by churches? Sure. Pretty badly. Have I been loved by churches? Yep, more than I deserved. Is it easy to be a part of one? Nope.

But here's the thing. There is no perfect church because there are no perfect people.  You can't put a bunch of broken people into community with each other and expect things to go beautifully. We are defensive. We are passive-aggressive or, some of us, just plain aggressive for no good reason. We avoid conflict. We seek it out unnecessarily. We thrive on and create drama. We keep to ourselves and don't let anyone really know us. We mess up all the time.

So, we hurt each other. It's just going to happen.

But after 33 years of doing this church thing (my mom started bringing me when I was 4 years old) I can honestly say this: church is good. NOT because it has all the answers. NOT because it is always a safe place. NOT because I can show up and consume things that might make me feel good for awhile. NOT because we sit around and sing Kum-Ba-Yah all the time while holding hands and throwing wildflowers around.

Church is good because it can be people, created in the image of God, struggling to figure out what that looks like together...learning what grace means, steeped in forgiveness of self and one another, rejoicing and mourning with one another, breaking bread together, pushing ourselves to be able to truly become the person God has made us to be.

That, my friends, is a beautiful mess.

So, as we say goodbye again, I pause to thank God for this current body of people, for one more Sunday to worship with them, for the relationships I know will continue and for the ways they have prepared us to take this next step of faith as a family.

Thank you to this family for letting us be our crazy family, for letting us be who we are, for being family when we have been far away from our other family for three years. I couldn't be more thankful.

Where Everybody Knows Your Name

If you were born in the late 70's or early 80's, chances are you remember the theme song to "Cheers." You may have never even seen the actual show, but if you hear those first few notes you know what's coming and can eagerly sing those sweet words..."you wanna go where everybody knows your name, do do do do do!" It's a song I've thought about a lot, especially over this past year, as I've navigated being in a location where very few people actually know my name and fewer still know what makes up who I actually am.

So, as I found myself hurtling north on 95 this past weekend toward my annual college roommate reunion, I found myself more eager than I think I've ever been before to see these women, and that's saying a lot. Just to be somewhere for one whole weekend with a group of people who essentially grew up with me in college, who know my thoughts, my hopes, my fears, who can make me laugh so hard I think my face is going to fall off...to really be a place where I am truly known. And to know that even as I am truly known in all my good and in all those places of mine still at work, that I am recklessly loved. It felt like coming home.

You see, I've really been blessed in my life. I have amazing friends from growing up, friends who I still see and talk to and who are still in my business on a regular basis. I have incredible friends from college, who when we get together don't just reminisce about the old times but continue to make new, priceless memories together. God, in his infinite and beautiful wisdom, knows how much I need other people. Why? So that I'm not alone when I laugh and so that there's always a shoulder on which to cry. So that when I'm crazy and overwhelmed there are people to talk me down and when I am weary they are there to carry me through. To give me the opportunity to love fiercely and well and to take myself less seriously than I often do.

So, here's to my wonderful hoohah ladies Caitlin, Norah, Samantha and Rachel. To seven amazing hoohah weekends filled with crepes, laughter, wide-brimmed pink hats and consequent bold stares from passersby, long walks, dance parties, road trips, festivals, awesome cities, tears, beautiful green parks and long talks while sitting in them, aging aches and pains, 80's music, homemade oreos, too many pictures to count, spooning, Dr. Caitlin's diagnoses, multiple crazy and sweet babies who've come along for the ride and been officially inducted into the hoohah fray, understanding husbands who know how important this weekend is and, secretly, wish they could be a part of it and, most of all, to many more weekends filled with memories.

I am so thankful to have that place where everybody knows my name. To know and be known is one of the greatest gifts of life. Thanks ladies.

May the hoohah live forever. Amen.