When my son was first learning to put words into sentences, he very quickly learned a sentence that would cut me to the quick - "Mommy, come home!" Usually, I'd hear this over the phone when I was at work calling to say goodnight or on a trip somewhere. Sometimes it was even en route to coming home, but no matter what circumstances I was in, my heart broke a little. I began to question again, "Should I be working? Am I harming my child be being away from home? Is it selfish to be a working mom? Am I just a terrible parent?" All these insecurities would flow out and I'd instantly remember every single thing I'd done wrong in my parenting that week. Every selfish thought, every moment of impatience, every time I wasn't fully present with him even when I was home because of all the other things in life that were pressing down upon me to be accomplished.
Now my son can put much bigger sentences together and, in fact, talks a lot more than I do. He could probably put together a much more guilt-inducing plea if he wanted to but as he's grown in his verbal abilities, so has he grown in his understanding. I still don't think he likes it when I leave the house for any reason, but I can at least attempt to explain where I'm going. I can try to tell him why it's good for him to go to school and why I won't go with him, but still there's sometimes that look of betrayal and instantly again I hear his 18 month old voice in my head-"Mommy come home"- and I wonder if anything I'm doing is right.
As I wander through this sabbatical, one of the things I'm trying to let God deal with me on is my fear of motherhood. For a long time I didn't want to get married, to have kids, to settle down. I was not one of those girls who planned out my wedding at the age of 10 and knew exactly what dress I'd wear and what song I'd dance to with my dad. I wasn't really interested and didn't think I'd be missing much if I didn't have kids. I think sometimes because of all those years of indifference I now deal with insecurity thinking that since I didn't want this enough I'm probably not unselfish enough to do it well. I also let my mind wander into a place that thinks that since I'm not so good at this, maybe that's why God is witholding a second child from us. I know that's not how God works, but the lie creeps in. If I were a better mom, if I didn't work, if my son hadn't spent months asking me to come home...and I begin to wonder what I can do to manipulate God into letting me get pregnant. Messed up, right?
It all comes back to fear. Fear of failure, fear of not measuring up to...something, although what that something is still feels elusive. Fear that I'll royally screw up this precious life I've been given to raise and make decisions now that I'll regret when he's older. Yes, I've realized that some of the biggest craters in my battlefield have been caused by fear and that they can be so deep that I don't even know how to begin to pull myself out once the shelling has stopped. Though I often don't believe it, I'm thankful that God is a God who says not to fear and that He is trustworthy. That he reaches down from the edge of that crater and offers His hand as a stronghold. I'm hoping that as I slowly climb up He'll erase those insecurities and replace them with a confidence that can only come from being secure in Him. That I'll figure out who I am as a mom, without the use of any social measuring systems, without the comparison game, and learn to take this motherhood thing one day at a time.
Tuesday, October 27, 2009
Tuesday, October 20, 2009
The Wide Setting
Typically, when I type something up I set my margins to the "Narrow" setting. I want to fit as much as possible on one page and who cares if it looks like a crowded, unattractive manuscript? I've maximized space and I'm not wasting paper, right? This week it struck me that I really often live life the same way I write papers. Fit as much onto one page as possible and the margin size be darned.
As I've spent yet another week enjoying this sabbatical time, and finding myself in a period of self-discovery and hope that is quite probably unparalleled in my life, I've been reading about the margin. The idea that most of us create a life structure that has very little margin, very little space for leisure, rest, even family. I was driving through Richmond about a month ago on my way up to NY for a fundraising trip and as I passed the exits for my former home and my job, I felt this immediate rush of panic and a sense of deep worry that I had forgotten to do something. It was as if I had a hundred things on my list to do again and no time to do them. Needless to say, I put my foot to that pedal and drove faster than normal up 95 until I was safely out of reach of that marginless existence. Since then, I've been thinking a lot about it because right now I'm experiencing the total opposite. I'm on sabbatical, we haven't found a church yet which means I'm not yet overcomitted and my only weekly obligation besides driving my child to school is my painting class.
James Bryan Smith says that "we live in a culture that rewards busyness and overextension as signs of importance" and that lives without margins often become tired, lonely and joyless. Check. This was largely the state I found my soul in when I started this journey in August and as God slowly reveals to me what brought me to that point, I'm finding more and more hope that I don't have to stay there. For the first time in a long time, I can honestly say I do not feel stressed out. I'm well-rested, I'm enjoying a lot of time with family and find that I look forward to my many hours of reading and soul-searching, rather than avoiding time with a God I know will penetrate my rough exterior and ask me to change.
As we settle into a new church in the coming months and as my sabbatical comes to a close, I'm trying to figure out how to set my document to the "Wide" setting. To schedule my life only enough that I'm saying yes to those things that are "necessary to the well-being of my soul or the welfare of others" and being ruthless towards the other opportunities that will just crowd my paper. I know I have to do this and I know it will take tremendous strengthening from the Lord and honesty with myself. I know my tendency to say "yes" to everything and that sinful temptation to feel important the more filled up my schedule gets. Oh, that my words would not honor that marginless, "important" lifestyle and that my choices would reflect worship of a God who desires for me to live a life with margins, a life full of joy with a soul that is restored and verdant with new growth.
As I've spent yet another week enjoying this sabbatical time, and finding myself in a period of self-discovery and hope that is quite probably unparalleled in my life, I've been reading about the margin. The idea that most of us create a life structure that has very little margin, very little space for leisure, rest, even family. I was driving through Richmond about a month ago on my way up to NY for a fundraising trip and as I passed the exits for my former home and my job, I felt this immediate rush of panic and a sense of deep worry that I had forgotten to do something. It was as if I had a hundred things on my list to do again and no time to do them. Needless to say, I put my foot to that pedal and drove faster than normal up 95 until I was safely out of reach of that marginless existence. Since then, I've been thinking a lot about it because right now I'm experiencing the total opposite. I'm on sabbatical, we haven't found a church yet which means I'm not yet overcomitted and my only weekly obligation besides driving my child to school is my painting class.
James Bryan Smith says that "we live in a culture that rewards busyness and overextension as signs of importance" and that lives without margins often become tired, lonely and joyless. Check. This was largely the state I found my soul in when I started this journey in August and as God slowly reveals to me what brought me to that point, I'm finding more and more hope that I don't have to stay there. For the first time in a long time, I can honestly say I do not feel stressed out. I'm well-rested, I'm enjoying a lot of time with family and find that I look forward to my many hours of reading and soul-searching, rather than avoiding time with a God I know will penetrate my rough exterior and ask me to change.
As we settle into a new church in the coming months and as my sabbatical comes to a close, I'm trying to figure out how to set my document to the "Wide" setting. To schedule my life only enough that I'm saying yes to those things that are "necessary to the well-being of my soul or the welfare of others" and being ruthless towards the other opportunities that will just crowd my paper. I know I have to do this and I know it will take tremendous strengthening from the Lord and honesty with myself. I know my tendency to say "yes" to everything and that sinful temptation to feel important the more filled up my schedule gets. Oh, that my words would not honor that marginless, "important" lifestyle and that my choices would reflect worship of a God who desires for me to live a life with margins, a life full of joy with a soul that is restored and verdant with new growth.
Tuesday, October 13, 2009
Sit in the shape of a what?
It's not often that I come back from dropping my son off in the nursery at church to find my husband shaking with barely suppressed mirth in his lonely pew. It was as I sat down and was about to lean over and ask what joke I had missed when I heard what was being read from the front: The passage in 1 Corinthians 14 about women keeping silent in the church. Why was my husband laughing? Well, as we've been forging ahead in this tedious church search, he had asked me to consider a church in a denomination whose position on women in ministry I wasn't particularly enthused about, saying that every church is different and surely they'd be excited for me to be there and to contribute in vital ways. Come on, it wasn't like they'd stand up front the day we visited and quote scriptures about the "woman's place" in church, was it? Right.
We stayed through the rest of the service because I was keeping an open mind and I wanted to hear how the pastor interpreted the scripture. After it had been read, it was sort of left hanging out there like a big uninspirational quotation supposedly meant to spur me into a frenzy of excited devotion. Needless to say, when he finally attempted to explain it, I was left unsatisfied and disappointed. We won't be going back but we did laugh the whole way home.
Most days at church haven't looked like this for me. My journey with the church and gender has actually largely been positive, that because I think a lot of my growth has happened in the context of InterVarsity, a place that has affirmed my gifts and demanded that I use them. I have been on church leadership teams, led tracks at camps and conferences, given sermons, led co-ed worship teams, mentored both men and women and largely felt like I was valued, not in spite of being a woman, but because I was a woman. But there are those moments when I just get frustrated.
I have known men on my journey, who upon finding out that I have "feminist tendencies" would hurry to find or quote scriptures to me about women submitting or keeping their heads covered and then stare at me expectantly. I'm not sure what they were trying to do, but it usually resulted in extreme anger and frustration on my part. I've had women on my journey tell me that it is sinful and even "murderous" to my child to keep working in ministry now that I'm a mother. I have sat at women's retreats listening to a speaker who is only attempting, and often rather shallowly, to engage my emotions or my funny bone and wonder why more female speakers in the church won't attempt to engage my mind and challenge me in my theology.
While there are definitely things I've doubted about God or had difficulty understanding about his character, I am thankful that at each of those moments, moments when people would have me believe that I'm less than or silly or only emotional because of my womanhood or that I'm evil for continuing to work, that God has responded in truth. That He has created me in His beautiful and perfect image, that He has gifted me in ways that are meant to glorify Him and that when I'm working as a young mother that yes, maybe my child has to sacrifice more than a child whose mother is at home in terms of how much time he gets with me, but, to quote a friend, "he is learning that there is sacrifice involved in the gospel" from a very young age. That has gotten me through mornings when guilt would have had me turn my car around and drive home.
This morning, I am deeply thankful for the people in my life, who have loved me in this, who have helped me see truth, who have helped me deal with my anger and apologize when necessary, who have laughed with me (thank you, Husband) about the absurdities we sometimes encounter in the church (and who may remember being asked to sit in the shape of a "womb" at a women's conference) and who believe alongside me that as men and women we are called to work together, to reflect in unity that beautiful image of God as we live out his calling as co-laborers.
We stayed through the rest of the service because I was keeping an open mind and I wanted to hear how the pastor interpreted the scripture. After it had been read, it was sort of left hanging out there like a big uninspirational quotation supposedly meant to spur me into a frenzy of excited devotion. Needless to say, when he finally attempted to explain it, I was left unsatisfied and disappointed. We won't be going back but we did laugh the whole way home.
Most days at church haven't looked like this for me. My journey with the church and gender has actually largely been positive, that because I think a lot of my growth has happened in the context of InterVarsity, a place that has affirmed my gifts and demanded that I use them. I have been on church leadership teams, led tracks at camps and conferences, given sermons, led co-ed worship teams, mentored both men and women and largely felt like I was valued, not in spite of being a woman, but because I was a woman. But there are those moments when I just get frustrated.
I have known men on my journey, who upon finding out that I have "feminist tendencies" would hurry to find or quote scriptures to me about women submitting or keeping their heads covered and then stare at me expectantly. I'm not sure what they were trying to do, but it usually resulted in extreme anger and frustration on my part. I've had women on my journey tell me that it is sinful and even "murderous" to my child to keep working in ministry now that I'm a mother. I have sat at women's retreats listening to a speaker who is only attempting, and often rather shallowly, to engage my emotions or my funny bone and wonder why more female speakers in the church won't attempt to engage my mind and challenge me in my theology.
While there are definitely things I've doubted about God or had difficulty understanding about his character, I am thankful that at each of those moments, moments when people would have me believe that I'm less than or silly or only emotional because of my womanhood or that I'm evil for continuing to work, that God has responded in truth. That He has created me in His beautiful and perfect image, that He has gifted me in ways that are meant to glorify Him and that when I'm working as a young mother that yes, maybe my child has to sacrifice more than a child whose mother is at home in terms of how much time he gets with me, but, to quote a friend, "he is learning that there is sacrifice involved in the gospel" from a very young age. That has gotten me through mornings when guilt would have had me turn my car around and drive home.
This morning, I am deeply thankful for the people in my life, who have loved me in this, who have helped me see truth, who have helped me deal with my anger and apologize when necessary, who have laughed with me (thank you, Husband) about the absurdities we sometimes encounter in the church (and who may remember being asked to sit in the shape of a "womb" at a women's conference) and who believe alongside me that as men and women we are called to work together, to reflect in unity that beautiful image of God as we live out his calling as co-laborers.
Tuesday, October 6, 2009
Uncritical for the Day
About a year and a half ago, I attended a conference with colleagues from around the country. One of the first speakers opened his talk with an encouragement to suspend our critical natures for just 24 hours. To try not to find something wrong with what we'd hear, to open our minds to the positive reception of information that might actually change us. Just 24 hours. Easy, right?
Now I don't know about my colleagues, but that exhortation has really stuck with me because at some point along my journey, I became a really critical person. I started to see things as half empty, to focus on what I don't have rather than the abundance of what I've been given in my life, to always see more of what's wrong with something that what is right about it. I use to consider myself a pretty positive person and I think at heart I still am. But I fell prey to that Christian subculture that says that being angry about something or always seeing what's wrong about a situation, even concentrating on what's bad about the church is cool. As if being content about what God is doing or even excited about something might label me as shallow and unthinking. Where did that come from?
I've been thinking a lot about the character of God for the past two weeks, since as I maneuver my way through these Ardennes, I'm realizing more and more that a lot of the obstacles in my way are untruths about the narrative of God. Just as I have believed the lie about crying being weakness, I have let my soul turn healthy critical analysis into cynicism, anger and sadness. I have been unable to translate a lot of the truths about God's character from my head into my heart and find myself at a place where I have real trouble believing that God is Good and that He is Trustworthy. Not all the time, mind you. I can objectively look at my life and thank God for the good; the husband he has given me and the beautiful son that makes me laugh harder than anyone I know, but at the end of the day I seem to go to bed sad a lot of the time because when it comes down to it, my heart still doubts His Goodness. And where I doubt goodness, fear seems to replace it.
I don't want to be a cynical or fearful person. I want to see and know the goodness of God no matter how bad the day is. Or the month or year. I want to suspend that wrongly directed criticism for more than 24 hours at a time. I want to be characterized by the hope and joy that being found in Christ brings. I can't yet see the open sky that is so vivid and obvious when you emerge from the forest, but I am starting to feel hope that it's there. Hope that God can truly transform me from fearful and stubborn to trusting and malleable. Hope that when I go to sleep at night, my mind will be resting in the knowledge that God is Good and I have nothing to fear from Him. Hope that all of the truths I know about God will actually be real in my life, rather than this mottled battlefield of half-truths that have entrenched themselves in my soul. I may have to ask God each morning to help me be uncritical for the day, but I'm ok with that because I know He is replacing that cynical piece of me with more of Him.
Now I don't know about my colleagues, but that exhortation has really stuck with me because at some point along my journey, I became a really critical person. I started to see things as half empty, to focus on what I don't have rather than the abundance of what I've been given in my life, to always see more of what's wrong with something that what is right about it. I use to consider myself a pretty positive person and I think at heart I still am. But I fell prey to that Christian subculture that says that being angry about something or always seeing what's wrong about a situation, even concentrating on what's bad about the church is cool. As if being content about what God is doing or even excited about something might label me as shallow and unthinking. Where did that come from?
I've been thinking a lot about the character of God for the past two weeks, since as I maneuver my way through these Ardennes, I'm realizing more and more that a lot of the obstacles in my way are untruths about the narrative of God. Just as I have believed the lie about crying being weakness, I have let my soul turn healthy critical analysis into cynicism, anger and sadness. I have been unable to translate a lot of the truths about God's character from my head into my heart and find myself at a place where I have real trouble believing that God is Good and that He is Trustworthy. Not all the time, mind you. I can objectively look at my life and thank God for the good; the husband he has given me and the beautiful son that makes me laugh harder than anyone I know, but at the end of the day I seem to go to bed sad a lot of the time because when it comes down to it, my heart still doubts His Goodness. And where I doubt goodness, fear seems to replace it.
I don't want to be a cynical or fearful person. I want to see and know the goodness of God no matter how bad the day is. Or the month or year. I want to suspend that wrongly directed criticism for more than 24 hours at a time. I want to be characterized by the hope and joy that being found in Christ brings. I can't yet see the open sky that is so vivid and obvious when you emerge from the forest, but I am starting to feel hope that it's there. Hope that God can truly transform me from fearful and stubborn to trusting and malleable. Hope that when I go to sleep at night, my mind will be resting in the knowledge that God is Good and I have nothing to fear from Him. Hope that all of the truths I know about God will actually be real in my life, rather than this mottled battlefield of half-truths that have entrenched themselves in my soul. I may have to ask God each morning to help me be uncritical for the day, but I'm ok with that because I know He is replacing that cynical piece of me with more of Him.
Thursday, September 24, 2009
About a Girl
My mom says that I basically came out of the womb yelling about gender inequality and scaring the boys as early as preschool. My friend Joe confirms this, as he has several negative memories of encounters with the 3 year-old me. Sorry, Joe. I remember being overwhelmingly angry in elementary school when the gym teachers would say they needed some "strong boys" to help carry equipment outside for a game...these "strong boys" were generally ones who I could beat in a race or a game any time and had proven so at recess. Why was I, as a young girl, being told that boys had this physical strength to be prized and I should just sit by the sidelines when I could be helping? Why couldn't I carry those mats or be in charge of distributing the balls? Stubbornly, I'd raise my hand any time anyone asked for a boy volunteer and I got picked every time. Maybe my gym teachers were also afraid of me.
As time went on, gym class receded into the background but the comments that men would send my way became my new battleground. Sexist jokes, comments, small slights that were said in passing. If you are someone who decides to speak up against these you are told "I'm just kidding" or "Don't take everything so seriously." As if a slight on my very identity is just a dumb joke not to be listened to. Who started that lie? Why is it funny to essentially demean someone solely based on her gender? So, I fought back. I've spent most of my life angry at men, trying my darndest to prove that I can hack it alongside them no matter what. I tried to outsmart them in school, outplay them in sports and, in the process, ended up treating a lot of them pretty poorly and contributing to the strife between the sexes.
The thing is that when it comes down to it, I'm jealous. I'm vaguely angry with God that he made me a woman and not a man. There it is. After 30 years, I've said it. All those years I was mad in gym class, all those oral reports on the glass ceiling or tirades against a guy who had the temerity to make a joke about women and inside I was thinking, "I wouldn't have to deal with this crap if I were just a guy. People would assume I was strong, would encourage me to play sports, would never make jokes to my face about being barefoot and pregnant and then laugh when I got upset." And it would be one more moment of bitterness, one more moment where I let my identity get even more skewed becuase I couldn't understand why I didn't seem to fit into the "model" of what a woman was. Why weren't all these other women upset? Why did they laugh at these jokes? What was wrong with me?
Every once in a while I think I'm over it and am glad to be a woman and then something sets me off again. Some ridiculous book I've read that tries to fit all women or all men in some kind of box. I find myself at square one, like the 3 year-old who somehow already felt that she was at a distinct disadvantage in life for being a girl and so she was going to fight. At this point, the fighting looks different. Less vocal, more internal. The fact remains that I'm still not sure I'm happy about my XX genetic code. Add to all this chaos the extra baggage of the church and gender and, well, you get a blog post that becomes a novel. So, I'll wait until another day to tackle that. In the meantime, for all you guys who've been on the receiving end of a gender-based tirade, I apologize. God's working on me, I promise.
As time went on, gym class receded into the background but the comments that men would send my way became my new battleground. Sexist jokes, comments, small slights that were said in passing. If you are someone who decides to speak up against these you are told "I'm just kidding" or "Don't take everything so seriously." As if a slight on my very identity is just a dumb joke not to be listened to. Who started that lie? Why is it funny to essentially demean someone solely based on her gender? So, I fought back. I've spent most of my life angry at men, trying my darndest to prove that I can hack it alongside them no matter what. I tried to outsmart them in school, outplay them in sports and, in the process, ended up treating a lot of them pretty poorly and contributing to the strife between the sexes.
The thing is that when it comes down to it, I'm jealous. I'm vaguely angry with God that he made me a woman and not a man. There it is. After 30 years, I've said it. All those years I was mad in gym class, all those oral reports on the glass ceiling or tirades against a guy who had the temerity to make a joke about women and inside I was thinking, "I wouldn't have to deal with this crap if I were just a guy. People would assume I was strong, would encourage me to play sports, would never make jokes to my face about being barefoot and pregnant and then laugh when I got upset." And it would be one more moment of bitterness, one more moment where I let my identity get even more skewed becuase I couldn't understand why I didn't seem to fit into the "model" of what a woman was. Why weren't all these other women upset? Why did they laugh at these jokes? What was wrong with me?
Every once in a while I think I'm over it and am glad to be a woman and then something sets me off again. Some ridiculous book I've read that tries to fit all women or all men in some kind of box. I find myself at square one, like the 3 year-old who somehow already felt that she was at a distinct disadvantage in life for being a girl and so she was going to fight. At this point, the fighting looks different. Less vocal, more internal. The fact remains that I'm still not sure I'm happy about my XX genetic code. Add to all this chaos the extra baggage of the church and gender and, well, you get a blog post that becomes a novel. So, I'll wait until another day to tackle that. In the meantime, for all you guys who've been on the receiving end of a gender-based tirade, I apologize. God's working on me, I promise.
Saturday, September 12, 2009
The Wall
I ran track in high school for one season and one season only. This is because my coach thought that I would enjoy running the 400 meters and the 4x4 and I'm not sure my body agreed. He taught me early on that by the beginning of the final 100 meters of those races, if I were running them well, I should no longer really be able to feel my limbs. I should hit "the wall" but as long as I kept pumping my arms, I'd hit the finish line whether I realized it or not. Needless to say, the thought (and experience) of that wall was not something I enjoyed and so the following year I tried out for the musical instead. Better fit.
As I've been reading a book called "The Critical Journey", I've really been struck anew by this idea of the wall. Much like what I experienced in that final 100 meters, the wall, in spiritual terms, is a place that we can hit and feel profound disappointment, confusion, doubt, anger, bitterness...and for many of us, we don't even know why. The idea of this book is that we are all on a spiritual journey and throughout our lives may experience any or all of these 6 different stages. Some of them will be easy for us to experience and others will be really difficult.
I think I've spent about 15 years hanging out in "Stage 3: The Productive Life" and avoiding moving on. Stage 4 is called "The Journey Inward" and for someone like me who thrives in Stage 3 it is not an easy stage to move into. I think that for years my soul has been yearning to move on but my lifestyle has prevented it. I've taken too much pride and self-identity in what I could "produce", in using my "gifts", in striving hard to be loved for what I've done rather than who I am and haven't wanted to venture on into the uncertainties of that journey inward because, frankly, uncertainty is terrifying. The book says this makes for a pretty lonely person. Yup.
The thing about moving from Stage 3 to Stage 4 is that we often have a crisis that shakes that stability of Stage 3 and propels us on. This has been true for me as it has for most and I think I spent the last year hitting the "wall" of Stage 4, which is to say that I've done a spectacular job of pushing aside my questions, ignoring my frustrations, not dealing well with grief and loss and just sort of trying to magically push through that wall, which is actually an impossible thing to do.
One thing about the wall that the authors talk about is that you have to be willing to give something up when you hit it. I've spent awhile thinking about this and am pretty sure I know what God is asking me to give up. I'm also pretty sure I'm not ready yet. I'm not ready for my legs and arms to turn to jelly and to let God propel me that last 100 meters. I'm still too scared and stubborn. But, I'm hopeful that in the coming weeks and months that God will continue to work that surrender out in me. That He'll not let me stop at 300 meters and call it quits, because He knows the pain is worth it and that at the end of that last 100 meters, I'll realize that He is the only One that could've ever brought me through it anyway. I want to know that and believe it, so I'll continue to seek and wait and ask for the courage to surrender.
As I've been reading a book called "The Critical Journey", I've really been struck anew by this idea of the wall. Much like what I experienced in that final 100 meters, the wall, in spiritual terms, is a place that we can hit and feel profound disappointment, confusion, doubt, anger, bitterness...and for many of us, we don't even know why. The idea of this book is that we are all on a spiritual journey and throughout our lives may experience any or all of these 6 different stages. Some of them will be easy for us to experience and others will be really difficult.
I think I've spent about 15 years hanging out in "Stage 3: The Productive Life" and avoiding moving on. Stage 4 is called "The Journey Inward" and for someone like me who thrives in Stage 3 it is not an easy stage to move into. I think that for years my soul has been yearning to move on but my lifestyle has prevented it. I've taken too much pride and self-identity in what I could "produce", in using my "gifts", in striving hard to be loved for what I've done rather than who I am and haven't wanted to venture on into the uncertainties of that journey inward because, frankly, uncertainty is terrifying. The book says this makes for a pretty lonely person. Yup.
The thing about moving from Stage 3 to Stage 4 is that we often have a crisis that shakes that stability of Stage 3 and propels us on. This has been true for me as it has for most and I think I spent the last year hitting the "wall" of Stage 4, which is to say that I've done a spectacular job of pushing aside my questions, ignoring my frustrations, not dealing well with grief and loss and just sort of trying to magically push through that wall, which is actually an impossible thing to do.
One thing about the wall that the authors talk about is that you have to be willing to give something up when you hit it. I've spent awhile thinking about this and am pretty sure I know what God is asking me to give up. I'm also pretty sure I'm not ready yet. I'm not ready for my legs and arms to turn to jelly and to let God propel me that last 100 meters. I'm still too scared and stubborn. But, I'm hopeful that in the coming weeks and months that God will continue to work that surrender out in me. That He'll not let me stop at 300 meters and call it quits, because He knows the pain is worth it and that at the end of that last 100 meters, I'll realize that He is the only One that could've ever brought me through it anyway. I want to know that and believe it, so I'll continue to seek and wait and ask for the courage to surrender.
Wednesday, September 9, 2009
Dancing Nancies
I spent part of the summer after my sophomore year of high school driving around upstate New York with two dear friends and my mom. The scenery was gorgeous, the goal a choice in college and the musical backdrop an album called Under the Table and Dreaming by the Dave Matthews Band. I think my mom would probably cringe if she had to hear one song from that album ever again, but I've recently rediscovered it and, typically, I hear a lot more in it than I heard as a naive 16 year-old whose only care in the world was hoping to find the perfect school that had enough trees to keep me happy.
One song that I've been listening to in particular is called 'Dancing Nancies'.
"I am who I am who I am who am I
Requesting some enlightenment
Could I have been anyone other than me?"
I think Dave was asking a really critical question and one I've subconsciously been wrestling with for a long time. Who am I, really? Am I moving along a path that will let God make me into who I was made to be? Do I believe I really could be anyone other than who that is? Would I want to be?
Starting in a new place presents a lot of opportunities. I didn't really want to move, to change jobs, to stay home with my son, but I'm seeing the timeliness and the necessity of this fresh start. There are ways in which for the past few years I have not been brave enough to be who I am. I have let myself feel bound by who and what is around me, by cultural norms that aren't mine. Worse, I've listened to the voice of man far more often than the voice of God and that voice has pulled me away from that path of being beautifully and uniquely me. This wrong posture has created pride, fear and an unhealthy desire to please others instead of God.
So, as I continue through my Ardennes I am looking to find me again. To unashamedly seek to know my God and, thereby, to know myself more fully. This is a scary endeavor because I believe it is risky to seek God. Not risky because I cannot trust Him, but because I know that He will change me and I have to be willing to see that change is, indeed, desperately needed.
Thomas Merton says that "it takes heroic humility to be yourself." He also says that "I who am without love cannot love unless Love identifies me with Himself. But if he sends His own Love, Himself, to act and love in me and in all that I do, then I shall be transformed, I shall discover who I am and shall possess my true identity by losing myself in Him." I don't know if Dave Matthews would've agreed with Merton's answer to his question but I think they could've had some great conversation.
One song that I've been listening to in particular is called 'Dancing Nancies'.
"I am who I am who I am who am I
Requesting some enlightenment
Could I have been anyone other than me?"
I think Dave was asking a really critical question and one I've subconsciously been wrestling with for a long time. Who am I, really? Am I moving along a path that will let God make me into who I was made to be? Do I believe I really could be anyone other than who that is? Would I want to be?
Starting in a new place presents a lot of opportunities. I didn't really want to move, to change jobs, to stay home with my son, but I'm seeing the timeliness and the necessity of this fresh start. There are ways in which for the past few years I have not been brave enough to be who I am. I have let myself feel bound by who and what is around me, by cultural norms that aren't mine. Worse, I've listened to the voice of man far more often than the voice of God and that voice has pulled me away from that path of being beautifully and uniquely me. This wrong posture has created pride, fear and an unhealthy desire to please others instead of God.
So, as I continue through my Ardennes I am looking to find me again. To unashamedly seek to know my God and, thereby, to know myself more fully. This is a scary endeavor because I believe it is risky to seek God. Not risky because I cannot trust Him, but because I know that He will change me and I have to be willing to see that change is, indeed, desperately needed.
Thomas Merton says that "it takes heroic humility to be yourself." He also says that "I who am without love cannot love unless Love identifies me with Himself. But if he sends His own Love, Himself, to act and love in me and in all that I do, then I shall be transformed, I shall discover who I am and shall possess my true identity by losing myself in Him." I don't know if Dave Matthews would've agreed with Merton's answer to his question but I think they could've had some great conversation.
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