Who Is My Neighbor?

In the past week I've been stunned at the fearful and xenophobic response of our nation to the plight of Syrian refugees. I've been disappointed at the people I know who support refusing refuge to refugees. Today I saw a map of the US with all the states whose have said they are not accepting refugees highlighted. I was deeply ashamed and disgusted at how many states were marked.

I have a rocky relationship with the Bible. I have read it in its entirety, but I don't read it frequently anymore. That being said, I did grow up hearing Bible stories frequently. I've been a church attender for most of my life. And I can't stop thinking about all the places, both Old and New Testament, where there is mention of welcoming and loving your neighbor. The Mosaic law was specific that the Jews should welcome foreigners as their own and give them the same rights. One of Jesus' most well-known parables was about who our neighbor is (the story of the Good Samaritan). I keep hearing the words, "Love your neighbor as yourself." "And who is my neighbor?" "Which of these three do you think was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of the robbers?" "The one who had mercy on him." "Go and do likewise." (from Luke 10). Not to mention the face that Jesus himself was a refugee who would have been killed by Herod (out of fear) had his family not found safety in Egypt (but of course I AM mentioning it because Advent is almost here).

I see history repeating itself. I think about the Trail of Tears, the refusal to accept Jewish immigrants during WWII, the Japanese internment camps. Absolutely shameful events in America's history. Appalling. My brain cannot comprehend that I am seeing the same attitude now in our country.

I know that this kind of reaction is based on fear. Fear is powerful. I've had to look long and hard at my own fear-based racist prejudices. I've been confessing the sin of racism and praying for a change deep in my heart for months, because I realized that I am part of the problem. I may not be able to change the world, but I can change myself. I can pray for a changed heart. I can actively seek to see the imago dei in every single human being, no matter how different that person may be from me. I am clearly not perfect in this area, but I'm attempting to recognize the blind spots within and open my eyes.

When I see this kind of fear-based reaction in others, it's really easy for me to just get frustrated. Especially if the other person is a Christian. I think, "It's so obvious that we are supposed to welcome and love those in need, and those refugees are in need!" or "It's so obvious that there is a desperate need for reform in the justice system as a devastating number of black people are shot by the police with no consequences for the officers." It is obvious to me, now. I struggle to remember that what may be obvious to me may not be to others, even others who are sincere and otherwise kind. I struggle to remember that I need to call Christians with whom I disagree my neighbor as well. I need to show them mercy and love as well, even when I think they're wrong, even when they think I'm wrong.

Isn't that the foundation of Christianity? Love God, love others. No exceptions. Not love God sort of, be nice to the people you like. Nope. It's love your enemies, do good to those who persecute you. Pray for your enemies. Ugh. It's revolutionary, because my first reaction is to say, nope! I want to holler at and have disdain for the people who are wrong. I want to feel smug and superior in my rejection. I want to elevate myself by pushing others down. It's an awfully good thing God has grace for me, too, because I'm still a messy work in progress. I'm reminding myself today to take a break, breath, and pray for peace in myself and in the world. 

A Christianity of Boxes

I used to think that there was one right way to be a Christian. In my mind, there was no room for theological differences, or even differences in some preferences. No nuance, no sliding scales, no sometimes or maybes. Simple black and white. My whole childhood was black and white, everything fit into neat, tidy boxes. I remember well the discomfort in high school when I bumped into people with different beliefs; I didn't want any conflict, but they were wrong. I went to a college that was linked with my childhood denomination, and though that school officially agreed with what I had been taught my whole life, I met Christians from different backgrounds. Sure, we agreed on more or less most of the same things, but there was a hint of Christian diversity in my bubble for the first time.

My experience leaving college was messy and painful, and it pretty much destroyed any part of me that was still consciously hanging onto that black and white framework. I had seen too much to believe neat, tidy boxes were the way to sort my faith. As I spent the next years trying to put my life back together and figure out how to navigate as an adult, I found other people of faith who taught me great things. I discovered blogs and books and regular people just doing their best to love Jesus.

I grew up believing that rigidity was the mark of a true Christian. Now I believe that the best posture I can take is one of openness. I know full well that just as I've discarded many things I held onto dearly in the past, one day I may let go of beliefs I hold strongly now. I am more comfortable with uncertainty; I embrace it, in fact. I find great relief in admitting that I don't understand a lot, and there are so many things I don't know.

Sure, there is a part of me that still like rules. I like the tidiness of knowing what's right and what's wrong. But the messy uncertainty of learning to love freely is infinitely more rewarding than checking off boxes for good behavior, even when I know I'm falling short of loving well. The more I discover others who are throwing out checklists in favor of radical love, the less alone I feel, and the more excited I get about the love of Christ. That's when it feels magical, which is the unspiritual way of saying that I think the Holy Spirit likes it when we chase love and share love and revel in love.

Intellectually I have it all sorted out (as much as you can ever sort things out). I know what I feel in my heart, how I want to love and be loved and not feel as if I have to earn love. The reality is that I still have the echos of my childhood rules flitting through my head, so sometimes (OK, a lot of the time), I still feel as if I need to check off all the boxes even though my brain tells me the boxes are no longer helpful for me or even good for me. Often I am able to help block those echos by reading authors whose work speaks to the part of my heat that loves rather than the authors who like lists. Authors like Sarah Bessey and Glennon Doyle Melton make me feel like the only box I need to check is the one that asks if I am trying to love people (including myself). No caveats, no followup questions, not even a perfect response or completion. I like to remind myself that generally everyone is just trying to do the best they can, and that means I need to accept that my best probably doesn't equal perfection, but that's OK because nobody's does.

Hiding Our Humanity

Today I read two posts that connected with my past on a deep level. One was an article talking about trigger warnings in classrooms and how there is a trend towards keeping places safe and free from emotionally fraught material. The other post was a blog written by one of my new favorite authors about her experience speaking at her alma mater.

When I remember my time in college, I have to fight to see the good parts. Because there were good parts. There were friendships and wonderful professors and late night giggles and getting yelled at too many times to count for being too loud during quiet hours. There were fall retreats and Battle of the Floors and singing in choir and loving the city I lived in even though it also scared and intimidated me. But mostly I remember how hellish my final time there was. I remember the crippling depression, the eating disorder, the alcohol abuse, the self-injury, the hospitalizations (yes, plural) because I didn't know if I had the strength to keep living. I remember falling HARD and feeling like there was no one to help.

College was where I first got real help. I had a counselor who made me feel less alone, like my problems weren't who I was, just things I was dealing with. So I will forever be grateful for the help I DID receive, because I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that that help saved my life. But college was also the place where I learned that my problems were too much, too big. I learned that Christian institutions want shiny, happy, healthy students that they can show off to benefactors, alumni, and potential students. They don't want messy imperfection in their walls. I remember living in fear of being honest with how bad things were because I was afraid of being kicked out, afraid of being rejected. Well, that did happen to me, and it was every bit as horrifying as I had feared.

I am super passionate about people feeling supported when they are down. I have been in the black pit of depression too many times, and I live in a constant state of alert waiting for the next cycle of despair to rear up and try to drag me under. I know how isolating it feels when your friends and family seem happy and healthy and you feel alienated from them in every way. I know how HARD it is to have faith when you can't feel love or joy or peace or hope and everyone who tries to make you feel better feels gratingly fake. So when a friend comes to me and wants to talk about how they're REALLY feeling, I do my very best to be a good listener. Sometimes I feel like I'm drowning and someone asked if they can use my floatation device, too, but I try to listen anyway because I know they might not find another person to help them float a little until it's too late.

Why don't we talk more about how hard it is to be human? Why don't we talk more about how painful it is to be alive? I'm not saying there aren't AMAZING things about life, but I'm so tired of hearing how amazing things are when they most certainly are NOT in my life. It has been 8 years since I had the courage to go to the counselor's office at my college and say that I didn't know why, but my life was hard and I needed help or I wasn't going to make it. Sometimes I wonder how different my life might be if I had known how to ask for help sooner. Part of the problem was that none of the people around me had any understanding of mental illness. Pretty much my first year of counseling was learning what depression was and how to identify what I was feeling. Because I didn't know how to sit with my emotions long enough to identify them and their roots. All I knew was that I was supposed to be happy, but I wasn't.

I want a culture where we don't hide when life is hard. I want an environment when pastors and church leaders can publicly talk about the hard parts of their lives as they live through them, not once it's all over and resolved. I want people to feel safe talking about their pain so we can learn to empathize and understand each other. The more we understand each other, the better we can love each other. We have to stop crucifying people for failing, because THAT'S WHAT HUMANS DO. We fail. But we learn from our failures, and that's how we grow and mature.

Tomorrow will mark 5 months since my dad died. The first month after the funeral, I was more angry at the lack of support from the people around me than I was sad about my dad being gone. Part of that was because anger is easier to deal with than pain and sadness, but part of it was because I was so furious that even after years and years of trying to build a support system for just such an event, it failed spectacularly. I was furious at every person who tried to high five me and be cheerful in my direction. There was NO room in the culture around me for me to mourn openly. I felt anguish and guilt at how poorly I had supported my three friends who lost parents just months before I lost my dad. Being on the other side, I had so much more insight about how to be a good friend in times of tragedy. If I couldn't figure out how to find a safe place to express my true feelings for a loss that people universally recognize is devastating, how am I supposed to create a safe place for people who have hidden, little understood hurts? Why are we so afraid to drop the smile and cry when we are hurting? I know it's hard. My therapist and I have been working closely together for six and a half years, and I think I've only cried twice in front of him.

I don't have answers. I know it's hard. But if we all made an effort to reach out just a little, I think it would add up to a lot. If we all just texted one or two people each week to say, "Hey, thinking of you. How are you doing today?" I think maybe we would feel less alone and a little safer to share our true selves. I think we wouldn't be so afraid to share the complex parts of our humanity because we would understand that we belong to each other and together we can do hard things (to borrow two sayings from one of my favorite authors Glennon Doyle Melton). Sometimes when I need support the most, I offer support to a friend, and then we discover that we can support each other and make it through.

Inundated with Depression

I have spent pretty much all of today immersed in depression. I felt it in my heart, my head, read it with my eyes, listened to a talk about depression, cried tears related to depression, craved (and ate) sugar because of depression. It's been rolling over and through me in wave after wave.

I felt raw all day. Last night I cried and stayed up too late trying to sort out how I felt. Today I read blog after blog about depression. When a beloved actor commits suicide, people share all their thoughts about mental illness, even the ones that are ignorant and hurtful. People who should have just listened spoke and caused harm instead of healing.

I've been listening to Jason Gray's latest album for the last few days. He doesn't really have a unique sound. He fits right in with the typical Christian pop music melody-wise. It's his lyrics that make him stand out from the crowd. His songs are the most honest songs I've ever heard.



I keep holding on to the lyrics from the end of this song: "You don't even have to speak/Just sit with me in the ashes here/And together we can pray for peace/To the one acquainted with our grief." It's just the worst when I risk being vulnerable, take off my mask, and let someone know how I've really been doing, how much depression has really been hurting me, and they try to fix it or they brush it off. Sometimes more than anything I just want a friend to bring me some ice cream and sit with me while we watch a couple episodes of Friends. I just want someone to be there, to sit with me in the pain, to walk beside me as I try to make it long enough for it to get better.

I've been feeling incredibly lonely over the past few months. I've been fighting depression mostly by myself. I've had long-distance support from my best friend who lives on the West Coast, and of course my therapist helps. But I'm still left alone most of the time. I was thinking tonight that fighting depression is like training for sports competition. I should disclose that my only experience with playing sports outside of gym class in high school was when I played flag football in college, so the analogy probably isn't perfect. But it's fourth and goal and I'm going for it (I'm so full of sports knowledge!).

I spend all day every day training (fighting depression). I know that I need help to know how to train better, more efficiently, so I hired a coach (counselor/therapist). He gives advice, educates, cheers me on. It's a special kind of relationship, but it's professional. I need more help than just one person can give me, more support, so I've sought out some teammates, as it were (other people who are walking their own journey of mental health). I've attended a depression support group a few times, and it is so encouraging to know I'm not the only one going through this. So now I feel like there are other people on the field who are working towards the same goal I am, and if we help each other we can all get closer to the goal (making it through each day, getting to a place where we feel more in control of our mental illness). What's missing are fans (friends). Fans just show up and cheer on the athletes. They're supportive even though they can't hop on the field and play the game for me. This is a game where critics are not welcome, but fans are deeply appreciated. I keep looking up at the stands hoping for someone to smile and wave at me, cheering me on, but the stands are empty. My family loves me, and I love them dearly, but they don't live near me. It's like they're watching on TV; they're cheering me on, but it's not the same as watching the game live. The thing about fans that is so great is that they're there only if they want to be. I pay my coach. He's totally on my team, helping me, cheering me on, but it's different. I want people to choose to root for me just because they care about me and believe in me. People who are actively in my life because they live here and they like me.

So all these thoughts and feelings have been rolling around in my head. I'm trying to sort out my faith in the midst of feeling like church is harming more than helping. I started trying to connect with God in different ways and discovered that I love going to mass at the catholic cathedral a mile from my apartment. It brings peace to my soul. It feels a little weird to share all this, to talk about how much depression hurts, to talk about how I'm trying new things which is scary but helpful. Tonight I was at a talk on depression, and after the speaker shared his own story of dealing with depression and anxiety, he shared some scripture. He talked about how the Bible is testimony, and there is tension between the testimonies it contains. The primary testimony is how God relates to the people with whom he chooses to be in relationship, how he sees them, rescues them, loves them. And there are testimonies that are in direct opposition to that primary testimony, people who acknowledge how God has shown up for their ancestors, but they also cry out asking why God has forsaken them. Thinking about how the Bible is a collection of people sharing how they have or haven't encountered God made me want to testify the truth of my life right now. I felt compelled to share more about what depression is like for me, what trying to find God and faith in the midst of the pain is like. For years now I've hoped that somehow my experiences, my story, my testimony could somehow help someone else. They can't do that if I keep everything to myself and hide behind a mask of "I'm fine," so for now this blog feels like a safe way to experiment with sharing.

Rubber Ducks and Anchors

I was thinking about my rubber duck today and had an epiphany.

One of my greatest flaws is my tendency to get swept away by my emotions. I don't mean that in some sort of romantic, happy way. I get swept away in a way that makes it seem like when I feel something, that feeling trumps everything else. When I feel alone, that feeling tends to trump the truth that God is always with me. When I feel worthless, it trumps the truth that Jesus paid the highest price for my salvation.

I have been working hard to improve in this area, and I think especially in the last few months I've started to see some maturity there. I'd describe my life in 2014 as spiritually turbulent. I've been asking really hard questions and finding no satisfactory answer. I've been reading scripture that I can't make sense of and that makes me feel angry and sad. I've cried during sermons and stood silent during worship, unable to utter words that I don't know if I mean. And through all this I've been faithfully praying and reading my Bible, serving in church regularly, having deep conversations with friends, pushing through this chaotic storm just trying to hang on until the waters calm.

This brings me to the rubber duck. A few years ago a friend of mine was being supportive through a similar time of spiritual turbulence. She encouraged me to just keep floating on the water and ride out the storm. She then spent the next week or two looking for just the right rubber ducks before she gifted me one duck with a pirate hat, eye patch, and striped shirt and one duck that was blue so I would have a tangible reminder to ride out the storm.

So I was gazing at my pirate duck (the one I keep on my work desk) and thinking about storms and water when the lyrics "and this hope is an anchor for my soul" floated through my mind. When I think of anchors, I tend to think of sinking and drowning, but today I was thinking about how they are stabilizing. When you're in a storm, you want to stay afloat, but you also don't want to find out that you've blown off course when the waters finally calm and you can see where you are. An anchor keeps you where you need to be regardless of what the water is trying to do.

Somehow this idea of an anchor gave me a new perspective on hope. For a long time I've sort of resented the idea of hope because I had several years where my life was very dark and hope seemed nowhere to be found. Hope seemed so emotionally unstable, so fickle. Now I think maybe hope is more like something that's there subconsciously, waiting for the storm to die down so you can see it was there all along. Remember the story of when Jesus and the disciples were on the water and a storm came up? Jesus was sleeping. The disciples were freaking out. I want to be more like Jesus, calm in the midst of my emotional storms, instead of like the disciples, sure I'm going to die. The great thing is, though, that whether or not I'm able to keep my cool, the anchor is there. My faith is there, anchoring me. Faith is bigger than just how I feel on any given day towards God. It's something that tethers my identity to something bigger than my circumstances. I don't need the right answers, I don't have to try to be a better person or earn more righteousness. I just have to cling to the hope of my anchor to keep me where I need to be so I can emerge from the storm victorious.

It's hard to put into words exactly how I'm feeling right now, but I think the best way to sum this whole post up is to say that this: my whole life it's seemed like there's a disconnect between my head and my heart. I always had all the "right" answers intellectually, but I couldn't make my feelings match what I knew in my head. Somehow this revelation of hope being an anchor has bridged the gap, at least a little. I feel such a confident peace that I will be OK, even knowing that there will still be times I will cry myself to sleep out of fear or despair or feeling utterly alone. I will make it through the storm and keep sailing forward because I am anchored to Jesus. What a beautiful revelation to ponder during Holy Week.

Entitlement

It was late, and I was hungry. So I went to a nearby fast food drive thru to get a little something to eat. The wait was a little long, and by the time I got home I was all set to dig in. Except my food was wrong. And it wasn't the sort of wrong where I could sort of fix it and eat it anyway, so I hopped back into my car and drove to the restaurant. I went through the drive thru, told them how my order was messed up, and they corrected it. When I got home, I was crabby. And my food, while technically correct, was thrown together sloppily. I was so irritated. I went to the company website and sent in a complaint. They hadn't even apologized for their mistake! They owed me.

And then today I got a call from the manager. A voicemail, actually, since I was at work, and he asked me to call back because he'd like to give me a free meal. I thought about it before I called him back. I've worked in fast food. I know that there is a chain of people who deal with each order and it's not everyone's fault. I know that it's stressful and crazy. I also know that I did in fact get what I paid for, and since it's close to where I live I'll be back again. After all, the woman who's usually on drive thru in the late afternoon is really nice and great at her job.

I called the manager. He apologized, and I told him that I used to work in fast food. I get it. And I told him that I knew the customer experience was important and figured they'd like to know what was going on. He said that they had just hired a handful of new people and were still training them. I told him I'd be back as a customer because it's nearby.

When this happened, I was actually sort of angry that they didn't reimburse my meal right away. Today I realized that I don't need it. I don't want to be the sort of person who feels entitled to compensation for every mistake that someone makes. I need to have a little (or a lot) more grace when it comes to dealing with people. After all, I want them to have grace for me when I make mistakes. If I were to find a wallet, would I feel entitled to a reward for returning it? I hope not, because the motivation for doing the right thing should simply be that it is right. Life shouldn't be about what we can get, it should be about what we can do.

Learning to Embrace My Puzzle Piece

If you know me well, you know that I enjoy quite a few rather nerdy hobbies. I enjoy quiet, solitary things, and one of them is jigsaw puzzles. I'm sure I inherited this trait from my dad, who used to spend hours and hours on a huge puzzle in our basement.

Tonight at my small group we were talking about the Kingdom of God, and what that means in the here and now. We talked about how we are to let the Holy Spirit flow through us, and when we do that, God is reflected uniquely in each of us. We all play a part in the Kingdom of God, and no one is the same. It's like we're all puzzle pieces.

Have you ever put together a puzzle only to find out that the last piece is missing? It's incredibly frustrating. I once put together a 500 piece puzzle, but there was a problem. There were definitely 500 pieces, but two of them were the same.

When I got to the end of the puzzle, I had an empty space and an extra piece that was of no use to me. As I was thinking about our small group conversation, I realized how important it is not only to realize that we reflect God uniquely, but that we need to realize that we shouldn't try to be just like someone else. It's easy for me to wish I looked like that person or had a more fun personality like this person. But if I change who I am, I not only leave a hole where I was created to fit, but I could steal the spot of someone else. I need to remember to work in my own strength and let other people find their places.

What Is Normal, Anyway?

I think I have a mouse. I haven't seen one, but tonight I have heard two short squeaks that make me think there is one somewhere in my closet. I was immediately filled with dread, feeling like I just can't handle this. Because at my last apartment, I caught over 40 mice in less than two years. It was horrendous. And this weekend, when I pulled a wooden spoon out of my drawer and found two tiny bugs on my hand, I tried really hard not to freak out. Because at my last apartment, I had a horrible roach infestation for the last two months I lived there (yes, my last apartment building was not a happy place by the time I left). When I see signs of some pest in my living space, I start to panic, because I've seen what happens when they take over. What I try to remember is that it's probably normal to have a few pests now and then. 40 mice? Not normal. 1 or 2 a year, especially when it's cold? Probably normal, though not fun. A few bugs now and then? Normal. I mean, we always had ants in the summer growing up, and I never freaked out like I did with the roaches. In the southern states, it's weird if you DON'T have a bug guy to treat you for various pests.

It's so hard to keep an objective view of what normal is when you're in the midst of something. I remember clearly that I didn't think anything of the roaches at first, just figuring it was summer and it was typical to have some bugs. But then I realized they were roaches, and that there were a ton of them, and all of a sudden it felt so overwhelming. It crept up on me. I can't even remember which mouse it was when I went from "this is annoying" to "this is ridiculous" to "this is NOT right." You get in survival mode, and when you're focusing on surviving, it can be really hard to gauge where you are. When I was first diagnosed with depression, I was relieved to have someone tell me that it was NOT normal to feel as awful as I did for so long. I sort of knew that, but I had felt that way for so long and just kept pushing through that I really wasn't sure sometimes. I should have known something was up a lot sooner, when my grades started to suffer. For me, it was not normal to have learning be so difficult. It was like a flip switched, and all of a sudden I felt stupid in school. I would stare at a computer screen for hours, having no idea what to write for papers.

I think this is one of the reasons it's so important to have close friends. We all need to have people who know us intimately, people who can tell us when they start to see us veering off the path. I think having accountability like this can help ward off certain problems with habitual sins before we get far down that path. For example, if you are the sort to drink alcohol rarely or only moderately, if your friends see you start to drink frequently and heavily they can say something. It could be so easy to justify it to yourself. After all, don't we see on TV and in the movies that college and even high school students do it all the time? Don't we sometimes see grown adults being functional alcoholics presented as somewhat normal? We need people in our real life to give us perspective, to be honest with us. It's not easy. If you don't have a relationship built on trust and mutual friendship, it can be really easy to feel judged and get defensive. If you're hearing this kind of truth from someone you don't know well, it can be easy to say "What do they know, anyway?" and ignore the truth in what they spoke.

I have a friend who lives across the country, and we contact each other about once a week for some accountability stuff. We have a few specific things, but it's nice just to know I can be honest about everything. She's a safe space for me. And when I've been doing things that I'm not comfortable sharing with her, that's a really good barometer of whether or not I should be doing them. Because if I know she won't be happy to hear it, I know I shouldn't be doing it. We've talked about all sorts of things, and it goes both ways. We've also struggled with some of the same things, which helps with the whole not feeling judged thing.

It's a new year. I'm not big on making New Year's Resolutions, but I do like to look back and reflect a bit on the previous year. 2012 was filled with apartment/pest drama, but otherwise it really was a pretty good year. I've made some wonderful friends in that time, I've done a lot of things that I loved. I got to see some amazing shows, I read a lot of books, and I laughed a lot. I'm really happy to realize that my normal has shifted to a place that is mostly contentment and thankfulness. I'm so thankful for my job, my church, my friends, my family. I'm thankful that depression isn't my daily normal, even though I struggle with it sometimes. I'm thankful for fresh starts and forgiveness. I'm thankful that normal can change for the better, that there is always a bend in the road. Who knows what exciting things lie beyond?

Fog

Tonight I went to a worship night at church. It was still going when I left, because my attention span starts to short out after an hour or so, but it was really nice to just forget everything else that's going on. A lot of times on Sundays I'm volunteering, so it's times like tonight when I can just focus on God and really immerse myself in the worship.

It was foggy as I drove home. I recalled hearing that there was a fog advisory on the radio, and as I drove down the road, there were thick patches of fog and then patches where it was clear except for a haze around the street and traffic lights. As I drove across high places, I could see the fog gathering in low spots. And I thought how lovely the fog is, how mysterious, how quiet. I remember once in high school there was such thick fog that you could barely see the building from the student parking lot. Everything sounds different when it's foggy, everything looks softer because of the blurry edges. I have tried once or twice to paint fog, but it eludes me.

I think fog is a pretty good representation of the presence of the Lord. Sometimes it's thick and practically tangible, sometimes you can't feel it around you but you think you see it far off. Sometimes you notice a haze of it as your gaze wanders. It's not a perfect metaphor, but drifting through the mysterious fog reminded me of the wonderful mysteries of God's presence.

Definitions and Memories

Last night I was given the (optional) task by my counselor to writing about the topic of feeling like nothing. Vague, broad, and open to my interpretation. So I've been musing over what feelings I associate with the times I have felt like nothing. The words that come to mind first are embarrassed, ashamed, humiliated, and rejected. Not fun words.

I like to be correct in my language usage. Well, most of the time, anyway. I like to use the exact right word, and I have been known to use a thesaurus while writing in my private journal so that I could be very precise with expressing how I felt. I realized that while we often will ask people to share a time they were embarrassed, we don't usually ask for a story about when someone was humiliated. I decided to look up the definitions to see what nuanced differences there were.

According to dictionary.com, "embarrass" has a few meanings, the one I think most common is "to make uncomfortably self-conscious." "Humiliate" means "to cause (a person) a painful loss of pride, self-respect, or  dignity."

Whenever I'm asked to recount an embarrassing story, I struggle to remember something. It's not that I haven't been embarrassed, it's just that in the grand scheme of things, they don't stick out. However, I can remember in painful detail times when I felt humiliated. I don't mind the times I've blurted out stupid things or when a friend teases me and I know they're only teasing. I don't even mind the time I threw up all over the floor in college in front of someone right outside our classroom. People understand that. People understand that sometimes things aren't in your control. The things that hurt? It's the times when I felt people were judging me and finding me "less-than." It's those times, when you feel like people are laughing behind your back, when people look down on you, that are the ones that you remember. And you remember the feelings that go with it.

I don't really have a point to this, I guess. Just thinking about how it's the things where you felt strong emotions that you remember the most. Unfortunately for me, it tends to be the negative emotional events that I remember with more frequency than the positive things. So I make it a point to remind myself about the people who care about me, about the nights when I'm up late with friends laughing so hard I can't breathe. At this point in my life, I've reached a period of stability. Now I want to work on those deep, icky things that were too hard to work on when just everyday stuff felt hard. It's not fun to dredge through that stuff, but I think it's really important to deal with your baggage so that it doesn't follow you around your whole life.

Why arguing is never going to save someone

I am an external processor. I think best when I'm talking, which means that more often than is probably acceptable to admit, I end up talking to myself. I can make better sense of my thoughts when I say them out loud. Sometimes that makes journaling or blogging hard, because I can't organize my thoughts as well if I don't talk it out, but once I talk it out, I don't feel the need to write things down as much. Tonight I had a great conversation with a friend, and I wanted to write down some of the thoughts that came out.

I'm not sure it would be entirely accurate to call me a skeptic. I think it would be more fair to say that while I do have some firm beliefs, I also have a lot of questions. I used to feel really frustrated and sometimes guilty that I had all these questions but no satisfactory answers. Lately I've come to a place of being at peace even when I don't have the concrete answers I'd like.

Tonight I went with a few friends to a showing of a documentary called "Hellbound?" It was basically a look at some of the different schools of thought on hell. Three main schools of thought were shared: eternal torment, annihilation, and universalism, although annihilation was touched upon only briefly. I found it fascinating to watch people talk about their different views, the different ways the Church has viewed hell throughout history, and the different cultural and political aspects of power. It was a well-filmed documentary, and I think it's a great conversation starter. Here are some of my thoughts after watching the documentary and a Q & A with the director (Kevin Miller) and one of the interviewees (Greg Boyd).

I kept thinking about how my pastor quotes a verse from Romans 2 about how it is kindness that leads to repentance. People don't change their lives because someone tells them how horrible they are. I know that some people will pray for salvation out of fear, but I don't think true transformation occurs when people are just looking for fire insurance (a safeguard against hell).

There are so many things I don't know. When I was younger, it really freaked me out when my black and white world started to crumble. In college my experience of the world didn't line up with some of the things I'd always believed, and it created great cognitive dissonance. I didn't know how to believe that God loved me and had a plan for me when life was so hard, so painful. I had so many questions and no answers, and I felt guilty that I even had questions.

Over the last year, and particularly the last six months, my faith has matured and deepened, and I think that is in large part due to a shift in how I view the questions I have. I feel free to ask questions and admit that maybe I'm wrong. I used to think that if a non-Christian friend asked me a tough question and I didn't have a definitive answer, it would turn them away from God and it would be my fault if they went to hell. I used to get genuinely panicked at the thought of trying to save all my friends and family from hell, because if it was real and it was awful, I had to save them, and of course it was my job to save them. All I knew how to do was argue that I was right about heaven and Jesus. But arguments don't save people. Judging people doesn't save them. Why would they want to enter into a religion that is largely known for judging and condemning people?

Jesus said that the greatest commandment was to love God with everything you have and to love your neighbor. If I think about that in the big picture, I feel so free. All I have to do is love Jesus the best way I know how, to learn and grow and seek him, and then love the people around me. Treat them kindly; offer them help and support. Really, if all Christians stopped fighting about the details and just started loving people, don't you think the world would be a different place? When I think about the hot-button sin topics of today, I wonder if those are really the things that matter. If we stopped looking at certain sins like we're looking through a telescope and instead took a step back and looked for ways to love each other, wouldn't that be an amazing place to live? I'm not perfect. Far from it. And even though I've grown a lot, I'm never going to achieve perfection. So why do I expect other people to achieve something that I can't? Why is there an expectation of instant perfection instead of valuing the process and journey? Maybe it's enough if someone loves Jesus and tries their best to follow Him. We're never going to agree on the perfect list of things you have to do and say or not do or say in order to get to heaven, because that's not how grace works. If we're all works in progress, why don't we stop nitpicking the journey some people end up taking as long as they're walking towards Jesus? Maybe if we walked with them for a bit, we'd see how hard their walk is and appreciate that they're doing their best.

I have discovered that I love reading Rachel Held Evans' blog (www.rachelheldevans.com). Some of the things she writes or links to are uncomfortable. I don't agree with everything. But she's not afraid to ask tough questions, to ask that we read the Bible for what it is, not what we want it to be. Even when her views seem controversial against the mostly conservative views with which I'm accustomed, she treats people with dignity and respect. The comments from her readers spark discussion and thought, and I've learned that I do not have to agree with every point of a person's theology in order to respect them as a human being. I don't have to be definitively right about everything. When I enter into a conversation and I'm not put on the defensive right away, there is room for me to truly listen and reflect. Reading opinions that differ from mine has helped me to explore if my beliefs are based on things I've been told to believe or things I've read and discerned for myself. I actually found myself feeling more respected and elevated as a woman and as a person after I allowed myself to discard some beliefs I'd had simply because that's all I knew growing up.

I hope that I continue to ponder some of the questions and issues that have popped up lately. I want to be open to the possibility that other people might have insight where I do not, and I want to continue to learn to love people whether they agree with me or not. If I really trust God, then I want to trust that He is in control and doesn't need me to run the world for Him.

Fear vs. Love

I struggle to love people. Let me clarify: I struggle to love people who are different from me. I struggle to love people who I perceive are more holy, prettier, more accepting, or just all around better than me. I struggle to love people who I perceive are less holy, less smart, less considerate, or less well off financially than I am. Sometimes, when I allow myself to acknowledge these flaws, I really hate myself. Because I know that's wrong.

Jesus said to love your neighbor as yourself. And I think the problem I have adhering to that idea is that I don't love myself very much, so I feel like I have to fight to be loved. I judge myself very harshly, so I tend to judge others pretty harshly as well. That also means I constantly assume I am the recipient of other's judgment. I worry that they're judging how I look, what I eat, if I'm funny, if I'm attractive. I worry that they talk about me behind my back, that they secretly only tolerate me. That last one is less of a concern now, but that was one of my biggest fears in high school.

In high school I was part of the Drama Club group, but I always felt like I was on the outer edge. I had two amazing friends with whom I felt I could be myself, but when I was around the rest of the group I felt like I had to be perfect. That was largely due to the fact that I heard how vicious they were about some other people, and I feared that any show of how I really felt would result in being ostracized.

In junior high I was still homeschooled, but I experienced a similar thing at youth group. I remember one girl in particular that everyone made fun of. She was never really accepted. And it's not that she ever did anything; people just didn't like her. I was always super uncomfortable with how people treated her, but I was terrified of being rejected by the only friends I had, so I just kept quiet. There have been times when, as an adult, I think of that girl and wonder what happened to her. I wonder how her life has been. I weep for the mistakes I've made, for how awful she must have felt, and I pray that God shows her some amazing love.

All of this is to say that fear is very powerful. Fear has kept me quiet when I should have spoken up. Fear has kept me from telling people the truth about what's going on in my life. Fear keeps me trying to push certain people down so I can feel superior. Fear keeps me desperately trying to be deserving of God's love. When I hear how someone has made a mistake in their life, I'm relieved that the spotlight is off of me, and I feel superior that I'm doing better. Because if I'm better, I'm more deserving of love. I sense that there is an attitude of, "If I can reject that group/person first by making them feel inferior, then they can't reject me and make me feel inferior." I grieve for the people who live life constantly on the defense.

The Bible says that perfect love casts out fear. When you love someone, when you understand then, it's harder to be afraid of them. There are a few patients at work that I was wary of at first because they are different, but now that I've interacted with them a few times, I find them interesting, and I enjoy when they come in.

I hope that I can learn to love instead of being afraid. I hope that I can learn to appreciate who I am and in turn appreciate the uniqueness of others. I hope that I can learn to speak up for myself or others without fear of the consequences. I hope that I can start to live the faith I've claimed since I was a child. I still think there is right and there is wrong, but instead of using that as a weapon against others, I want to extend love and kindness. I want others to be loved whether or not I think their actions are right.

Fear has dictated so much of my life. I read recently that man's greatest fear is that God will abandon him, even though throughout history God's people were the one to abandon God. That's my greatest fear. I hope that as I continue to spend time with friends who love me, who encourage me, that I will begin to release fear and embrace love. Maybe it doesn't matter if God loves me if I won't accept that and choose not to fear. I'm not sure how to do that, but I'm working on it. Being a part of such a wonderful church community has certainly helped. I have never had anyone reject me when I've shared part of my story. I still tend to hold part of myself back out of fear, but I truly believe in the heart of my church.

Why the Bible is like Physics

Sometimes similes pop into my head. Yes, they are usually after I've been talking aloud to myself. Yes, I like to blog about them because it makes me feel smart and insightful. Yes, I wrote a first draft that was long and drawn out, and yes, I started sounding very pretentious.

Then I realized that I don't have to write every idea I have on the subject into one blog post. A simple explanation will suffice.

I really love math. I enjoyed my various math classes in high school, and I've always done very well in math. I did not, however, find physics enjoyable. Sure, we did some fun experiments. But translating that data into a set of findings, or working through a set of word problems? Not a fan.

Sometimes the Bible is like that when I read it. There are parts that are so clear, like Algebra. X=5, do not murder. Easy peasy. Then there are parts that seem simple, but take more work. Love your neighbor. OK, who's my neighbor? How do I love them? Do I love all my neighbors in the same way? Do I show that love in the same way for each neighbor?

When my physics teacher sat down with me and helped me through the word problems, suddenly it was much easier. When I talk about a chapter of the Bible with my friends, it's much easier to point out the wisdom and how it can apply to our lives.

Moral of the blog post? Talking it over with someone can help it be easier to understand. And pretentious posts, while great for using big words, are not the most clear way to share something.

Nostalgia:

a wistful desire to return in thought or in fact to a former time in one's life, to one's home or homeland, or to one's family and friends; a sentimental yearning for the happiness of a former place or time: a nostalgia for his college days. (dictionary.com)

 

It's hard for me to visit my family without feeling at least a little nostalgia. I thought about this last night while I was in the car with my parents. We were on our way to a diner, and we were taking what I would consider to be the back route. It was dark, and there wasn't much traffic. My dad turned on the radio and we listened to The Prairie Home Companion, laughing together at the stories. It reminded me of other times we've traveled while listening to that show, usually coming home from visiting my grandparents. It's a familiar feeling, a safe feeling.

 

Sometimes I stop to think why I yearn so much for times in the past. My cousin Rachel wrote a blog about letting go of college, and I think she summed up that situation beautifully: "But living in the same rhythms, existing in the same place, this made understanding happen much more effortlessly than I think it does in the real world. " I miss being at the same stage of life as the people around me. That's why I miss college, even though anyone who knew me then knows that the end of my college years was pretty horrible for a number of reasons. That's why I miss high school, even though I often felt lonely and like I didn't quite fit in.

 

I think another part of nostalgia is that I know what life had in store for me at a point in the past. If I miss high school, part of what I miss is not being faced with adult responsibilities. Same goes for college. I have to plan things now that I didn't back then: save money for a new car when my current one breaks down, save money for the taxes I owe, save money in case I lose my job and am unemployed. I have to plan for emergencies now, and that makes me uneasy, because I don't like not being in control or not knowing what could happen.

 

The more I focus on trusting God, on enjoying the people who are around me, the more I am able to put aside my worries and be content. When I find myself longing for security, I remind myself that God is in control no matter what comes my way. When I find myself missing the rhythms of life in school, I try to remind myself that life was not perfect then, and I have some wonderful friends right now.

 

So I'll enjoy the time with my family. I'll enjoy the reminders of our shared history. But then I'll go back home and attempt to enjoy my life as it is now. I will see people I love, I will laugh with my friends, and I will do my best to remember that God is in control. 

On the Phenomenon of Celebrities

I love TV. If you ask me my favorite show, I'll probably rattle off three that I've been watching lately. I have the dates written on my calender of 3 different season premieres in the next 2 weeks. Sometimes I get the feeling that people think I'm a little pathetic for watching so much TV. And I might agree, except I do have a social life. I'm super involved in my church. I'm a leader, even. I still read lots of books. I knit, crochet, and paint. I have a love of theatre and try to attend shows regularly.

I grew up with books and TV shows as my main friends. When you're home all day every day with just your siblings, it can feel really hard to fill the time. The librarians used to not believe that I read so many books so fast. I lived vicariously through the people on Full House, Saved by the Bell, and Boy Meets World.

I say this because I've been thinking a lot lately about my latest TV obsession, and the reaction I've seen of others. I love Glee. I loved watching The Glee Project this summer. And I started to follow some of those people on Twitter. I started to see this pattern of person after person asking to be retweeted. For those of you not in Twitter, that basically means that you're asking a person to repost your post. It means they specifically saw your one post amidst what I'm sure are thousands of posts. My initial reaction to seeing all of these people plead for a celebrity to retweet them was that they were kind of sad and pathetic. Did these people really think that getting 2 seconds of acknowledgement from someone they'd never met would make everything better?

And then something I posted got retweeted. I hadn't asked for it or anything, I just posted something. I was surprised at the short burst of happiness that flooded through me. What? I couldn't believe it! So I started thinking about what the appeal is in being acknowledged that way. And I've been talking with someone about feeling like people don't care about you and feeling invisible.

We all crave intimacy. And these days there's a plethora of false intimacy. We have hundreds or thousands of Facebook friends. We read blogs, we Tweet. But how many close friends do we have? I have two. I have other friends that I love dearly, but we've begun to grow apart in recent years, or they're people I haven't known as long so we're not as close. When we don't have people who regularly connect with us, we start to feel desperate just to be seen, to be acknowledged. I don't want to feel invisible. I hate that feeling. I hope to continue developing new relationships, forming new intimate connections with people. I want a group of people with whom I can share my doubts and struggles and not feel judged or preached at.

I still think it'd be amazing to be on TV. I love acting, and I love the friendships and connections you can make with your castmates. But I don't know if I really want fame as much as I thought I did. I don't think I want that pressure of having so many people seek affirmation from me. I don't even fully understand why we think celebrities are so great. It's not like Hollywood has a reputation of churning out fantastic role models. Celebrities are just people. Just like I'm a person. And we all need relationships in our lives that love us for who we are, no matter what.

Pride: A Story of Ramen

I struggle a lot with pride. It's hard for me because I'm not the type who goes around openly saying that I'm better than other people. I actually often compare myself to other people and find myself short all the time (but that's a whole different issue). My pride is the quiet, hidden thoughts I have about other people and how I'm better than them.

I realized this yet again on Monday. What happened Monday? I ate Ramen noodles. Now for most of my friends, this would be no big deal. I mean, Ramen noodles are a college student's best friend, right?

I did not eat Ramen even once in college. Sort of on purpose. Monday was the first time I ever ate Ramen noodles.

When I was in college and a broke student, I never went looking for Ramen at the grocery store. I made a conscious decision not to eat Ramen. Because I was proud. See, I had this picture in my head that Ramen was for poor people who couldn't afford "real" food. And I wasn't a "poor" person. I was well off, I was fantastic, I was BETTER.

How arrogant. How sad.

It's cool to be thrifty now. There's even a TV show called "Extreme Couponing." People are all about saving money. But when I was in college, I wanted to look like I was the type of person who didn't need to worry about money. It's such a shallow, silly thing. I used to be embarrassed that I would shop at Aldi. Now I'm proud that I don't spend a ton on groceries.

It shouldn't matter what other people think. Food is food, and I can't believe that I smug about not eating a certain kind of food. Especially now that I know it's tasty and I can buy lots of it and not break my budget. Maybe it was just a youthful foolishness sort of phase. But pride is pride, and now that I've tried Ramen and am hooked, I need to be on the lookout for the next thing that I'll cling to to make me feel better. I shouldn't even be comparing myself to others to find my worth.

It's not about what I eat, what I buy, what I do. I am created in God's image and Jesus died so that I could spend eternity in heaven. My pride seems unbelievably foolish when I take the time to look at the big picture.

Unforgiveness

Tonight at Deeper the theme of unforgiveness came up a few times. Tonight I didn't feel like this was an issue I needed to tackle, but there are times when something brings up a memory of the past and I find myself holding a grudge again. As I was thinking about how unforgiveness holds us back, especially when it comes to God moving in our lives, I got a mental image of why we hold on to unforgiveness.

I pictured a dragon, but in case you have not recently read several books about dragons like I have, I'll use a dog. Dogs are generally considered to be friendly and loveable. They are fun, and they like to play and interact with their owners. The dog is healthy and happy. But then it gets hurt. Say the dog's paw gets pierced with a sharp stick. The dog is probably not going to walk up to its owner and willingly sit still while the stick gets pulled out and the wound gets cleaned. The dog will retreat, and may even growl and snap at its owner. The dog might even bite to keep people away. It does not want to get hurt anymore, so it does the only thing it knows to protect itself.

When we get hurt, we are like that dog. It sometimes feels easier to be angry and keep people away, sometimes even hate them, than it does to let go. Justice is really important for me. It is so hard for me to let God deal with people who hurt me rather than creating my own justice. I often cover up my pain with anger. The truth is that if I don't lower my defenses and let God start to remove the junk, I'm not going to get better.

Sometimes I think I have forgiven someone and that I'm fine, only to have someone say something that makes me hurt all over again. I wonder if maybe that's what Jesus was talking about when he said that we can't just stop forgiving after seven times. I have to choose time and time again to let go, to forgive, even for the same thing. I'm not perfect at forgiving. Whenever I hear someone talking about forgiveness, there are two people I have known in my life who always come to mind. These two people are people who hurt me tremendously. Part of me wants to stay angry, to stay defensive. Deep down, though, I know that really just hurts me.

For example: a person whom we'll call Sergio (not his real name) was someone whom I really trusted. Sergio was really important in my life. And then he did something that crushed me. I was so hurt, so devastated. For awhile, I was incredibly angry. I absolutely did not want to forgive Sergio. I wanted to hate him. I wanted bad things to happen to him so that he would hurt as much as I was hurting. But after awhile, it was really hard to be so angry. Sergio had really helped me get through some tough stuff. He had a big influence on me. It was important to me to hold onto the good memories. Trying to both hold onto good things and be really angry was more than I could handle. So I let go of my anger. I remember exactly how it happened, but I let go. And it felt so good. There are times when I still feel the hurt, but now that I'm not holding onto anger and unforgiveness, I can think about the good memories. I can heal.

I wish that deciding to forgive someone meant that you instantly felt better and you wouldn't ever hurt again. Unfortunately, that's not how it works. Even once you let someone pull the stick out of your paw, it takes time to heal. Sometimes the skin is sensitive even after it heals. And there's always the chance you'll step on another stick sometime and get hurt all over again. But choosing to forgive again and again means choosing healing again and again. Forgiving means choosing to acknowledge the pain but not holding on to it. I'm so glad that even though forgiveness is often difficult for me, God forgives me every single time I ask him, and he never holds grudges against me.

Two Questions

Do you see me? Do you like what you see?

Someone told me today that those are two questions we keep asking people throughout our lives. I definitely agree. From the kid who constantly yells, "Mommy! Mommy! Mommy!" to the teenager trying on outfits who asks, "How do I look?" to the employee who works really hard on a presentation that the boss will see.

We want to matter. We want people to like us, to treat us as if we have worth. We want people to appreciate who we are.

Feeling invisible is a pretty awful thing. Just as awful is having people notice you, but only because they have negative things to say about you. That's why the silent treatment and getting bullied feel awful. It's terrible to not have people care how you're feeling. "How's it going?" has become just another way to say "Hello." That really bothers me. So much so that I make a concentrated effort not to use that phrase unless I want a real answer and am prepared to really listen. There have been numerous times in my life when I was feeling horrible inside, and as people passed me by, my answer was always, "I'm fine" because I knew they didn't want a real answer.

Let's try to pay some attention to the people around us. Practice your listening skills. Or maybe it's your turn to be heard. Open up to someone you trust about how you're really doing. Find someone who sees you, who appreciates who you are and loves you for it. I read today that we don't love people for how we feel about them; we love them for how they make us feel about ourselves. I love to be around people who tell me I'm worth something, who show it by their actions. I think if we all tried to be more aware of the people around us and how they're feeling, there would be fewer people hurting in our homes, in the church, in our schools, in the world.