Stirring

I owe a great debt to Barbara Brown Taylor. I've never met her, but I have been irrevocably changed by her words.  I'm working my way through her books, experiencing a sort of rebirth as they pierce my heart.  When I read her thoughts, I feel something I haven't felt in a long time.... a stirring in my spirit.  It's something that, if I'm honest, I had thought I may never feel again.

I know I've written before about my conservative upbringing and how, over the past few years, I've diverged from that upbringing quite a bit.  I would imagine that at least part of my experience is similar to anyone who has been raised in a certain tradition, become disillusioned with that tradition, and then found themselves feeling lost and unsure of how the frame their life from there. The process has been extremely awkward, like some kind of spiritual adolescence.

At the beginning of this experience, I was focused on shedding the old beliefs, walking away from where I was before.  It was painful and difficult, as I was not sure how much of the old had to be stripped away. I doubted everything.  I was worried that clinging to too much would feel like being weighed down with baggage.  I think once I'd made up my mind that I no longer believed so much of what I'd grown up thinking, the old way seemed bad.  I was so frustrated with my "before" that I began to see most of it as wrong.

Some of those "before" things had to do with how easy it is to have the appearance of certain aspects of faith, without really "meaning" any of it.  It is ridiculously simple to go through the motions of many faith traditions because you know people are watching you and expecting you to behave a specific way, yet without any of it changing your life.

Once I realized that I did not "mean" some of these things, I didn't know how my faith experience should look.  At the risk of being associated with some of my old ways of thinking, I restricted any faith experience to philosophical discussions with people I deemed safe and I kept everything else to myself.  When I did try to open up to people outside my safe little circle about what I was going through, I can see now that it had to seem like I was lashing out -- not from my own struggles (as was the reality), but at those people for not being in the same place as me.

I've only recently begun to feel that I'm moving away from that into a new realization of my faith.  This involves the awareness that I must have grace for the faith process of others which may or may not lead them down the same path I've traveled.  It also includes having grace for my own process.  This has been a long time coming, but I feel like I'm right there, on the cusp of freedom.  I can think and believe what my own journey has taught me while accepting others right where they are.  I can understand and appreciate that the minds of others work differently, based on their personalities and life experiences and environment.

Thanks to my introduction to Barbara Brown Taylor (as well as to several other authors and bloggers), I'm realizing that I am not alone and that growing to a new place doesn't have to mean abandoning my faith out of distaste for some of the ways I had framed it in the past.  Neither does it mean rejecting others who may still be where I was before and may never be where I am now. I can be cognizant  that the right place for me is not necessarily the right place for everyone else, and vice-versa. 

In her book, "Leaving Church" Ms. Taylor discusses that when your journey takes you to a place away from your roots, it can be difficult, but freeing.  It also allows you to connect with people you otherwise would have been completely isolated from. Life on the fringe of your tradition can be scary and lonely, or it can be rich and affirming.  We don't have to rely on clichés and dogma; we can be at peace with uncertainty.  She explains:

I have learned to prize holy ignorance more highly than than religious certainty and to seek companions who have arrived at the same place.  We are a motley crew, distinguished not only by our inability to explain ourselves to those who are more certain of their beliefs than we are but in many cases by our distance from the centers of our faith communities.... This wilderness experience sets up a real dilemma for some of us, since we know how much we owe to the traditions that shaped us.  We would not be who we are without them, and we continue to draw real sustenance from them...

I will keep faith - in God and in God's faith in me, and in all the companions whom God has given me to help me see the world as God sees it.... We may be in for a long wait before the Holy Spirit shows us a new way to be the church together, but in the meantime there is nothing to prevent us from enjoying the breeze of those bright wings.

 All this is to say that I feel like my spirit is emerging from the dark place where it has languished for so long.  This isn't any sort of Now-I've-Arrived statement, but more an attempt to convey the hope I feel that I'm catching glimpses of a way forward. Connecting with the stories of others has contributed to this hope and given me a sense of belonging.  I find myself reaching for my Bible and feeling my spirit stir as I find new meaning in passages that had seemed flat and confusing before.  I know I have a long, long way to go.  I know this journey will likely take me to places I would never expect, and that a year from now (or even tomorrow) I could look back on these words and wonder what the hell I was thinking.

I'm still questioning and learning and growing and emerging and changing.  I don't know where I will end up or if I will at some point feel like I'm back where I started.  But, for now, I feel like the pieces of my tradition are coming back together in a way that awakens my spirit.

And for that, I am grateful.

The Cosmic Lottery

One of my favorite writers, Rachel Held Evans, writes about what some might call predestination, but what she terms "the cosmic lottery."  She named this concept when she started thinking of how people in other countries came to be of their religion, and in her book Evolving in Monkeytown she explains:

I call it “the cosmic lottery.” It doesn’t take an expert in anthropology to figure out that the most important factor in determining the nature of one’s existence, including one’s religion, is the place and time in which one is born, a factor completely out of one’s control.

 I wholeheartedly agree with her on this.  Yet what I'm contemplating now isn't so much about religion, but about the broader, "nature of one's existence" implications of this lottery.

I admit that I don't know a lot about state or multi-state lotteries.  I never play.  I am whatever is the opposite of a risk-taker.  I would rather have twenty dollars in my hand than a minuscule chance of winning a million.  From what I do know about the lottery, even if you don't win 'the big one' there are some smaller prizes that are still quite substantial if you match most of the numbers or something.  So, you have the one (or few) people who win the mega-big-bucks jackpot and get a ridiculous amount of money, then you have the however-many-others that still wind up with a decent amount.  Of course, there are also all the losers (not a character judgement) who have nothing but a slip of paper to show they played.

What I've been thinking about is that when it comes to the cosmic lottery, if you boil it down, my kids won a share of the jackpot.  They are both white males, born in America, to middle-class parents.  Sure, there are plenty of  über-wealthy people who are above them in the "winnings," but really, on paper, they have it made.  I am NOT trying to say their life is awesome and wow look at these amazing kids.  I am also NOT saying this has anything to do Ryan and me or our parenting or how we raise them.  I am only referring to the fact that they, just by being born the type of humans they are, in the circumstances they were, are in the middle-ranks of some of the most privileged people in the world.

Think of it.  If you are a white, middle-class, American male, you are in the group of people on this planet who are probably the least likely to face serious discrimination, oppression, or harassment in the course of your everyday life.  Certainly, no one is immune to tragedy or hardship, but it's really not that likely that they are going to encounter many (if any) people who make life hard for them because of their gender, race, religion, ethnicity, or any other factor for which some people experience discrimination on a regular basis.  I am not saying this is good or okay or acceptable or that I endorse it or think it is right.  I am only stating my observations, based on living the life I live and all the reading and living and knowing people I've managed to fit in to it thus far.

So, my dilemma here is this: How do I teach my boys the correct way to live with their so-called cosmic lottery winnings?  I really feel like if you win the cosmic lottery, it is wrong to act like all success you achieve in life is purely the result of your own effort.   You did NOTHING to win!  You didn't even pay for your ticket or choose your numbers.  None of us get to chose our parents or country of origin or gender or any of those things.  How, if you end up born with a lot of advantages, can you honestly believe that you did everything on your own and that being born who you were and where you were had nothing to do with how your life turns out?

Please hear me; There is nothing wrong with success.  Success is great.  I hope my kids find something they enjoy and are able to do to make a good living.  I hope that they become honorable, lovely people and that they work hard and are able to enjoy the results of their hard work.  But I also want to help them see how lucky they are and that a big part of who they get to turn out to be was handed to them.  I want them to understand that when others are struggling to better their own circumstances, the response of those doing well should never be to sit back and bask in their own less-difficult existence. 

I want my boys to learn that any good things they may have in their lives don't make them better than anyone else.  I want them to see others as their brothers and sisters in this world, regardless of how different or the same the "lottery" turned out for anyone else.  I think this dovetails with my previous ramblings about empathy.  I am trying to figure out how to teach my boys to be able to step back from their own experience, to listen, to connect, to care, and to think.  And, when appropriate, I want them to help, to stand up, and to speak out.

Sometimes I feel like my heart will break with the weight of thinking about these things.  I wonder if there will ever come a day when there aren't so many people looking at others who are different from them and trying to find ways to deny them dignity.  I wonder if pondering these issues will make a difference.  I wonder if trying to instill a sense of humility and responsibility in my two little boys will ever matter at all.

I guess I won't know if I don't try.

Is God a Christian? Am I?

“God is not a Christian, God is not a Jew, or a Muslim, or a Hindu, or a Buddhist. All of those are human systems which human beings have created to try to help us walk into the mystery of God. I honor my tradition, I walk through my tradition, but I don't think my tradition defines God, I think it only points me to God.”
- Bishop John Shelby Spong

I hate that in my past I've limited God by acting as though he can only be experienced by everyone else in the world in the same way that I experience him.  In a way, it seems utterly absurd that anyone would think that, but when you believe for so long that the way you believe is the only way, it takes some doing to shift your paradigms.  The past several years have been quite a spiritual journey for me.  

Granted, it has been a long time since I have acted like I thought that my way was the only way, and even longer since I actually thought it.  The thing about being immersed in a culture from a young age (in my case, the conservative evangelical faith) is that when you start to doubt some of the fundamentals of it, it is difficult to simply make a clean break.  You know you don't believe what everyone around you believes, yet you aren't nearly as sure of what you believe INSTEAD as the others are of what you SHOULD believe.  Blurting out "I think that's poppycock!" in response to an assertion, when you have not yet built the framework for your new beliefs, will alienate you more than it will do anything else.

When you finally do get confident enough to make the break from your old beliefs, it can be difficult to do it gracefully.  When I finally did it, my transition was anything but graceful.  I posted my new thoughts and opinions daily on Facebook.  I got into discussions (read: arguments) with old friends.  I could barely hide my disdain for some of the old ideas and I'm sure that came across to my friends and family (who still held those ideas) as disdain for them. I offended people.  I think that because I felt my new point of view was so right for me, I wanted to help other people see that my old way wasn't the only way. 

I can understand why I felt that way, but I now realize that just as my beliefs are personal and stem from my experience, it is the same way for others.  I learned a lot about how scary it can be when someone starts questioning shared beliefs, because it is comfortable to be surrounded by like-minded people.  But no matter what our beliefs, we should not be scared of questions; We should be scared when everyone pretends they don't or shouldn't exist.  Through my questions I've determined there are so many things I don't know at all.

Here is a passage from a book I just finished reading.  This is where I am right now:

There are a lot of things I don’t know. I don’t know where evil came from or why God allows so much suffering in the world. I don’t know if there is such a thing as a “just war.” I don’t know how God will ultimately judge between good and evil. I don’t know which church tradition best represents truth. I don’t know the degree to which God is present in religious systems, or who goes to heaven and who goes to hell. I don’t know if hell is an eternal state or a temporary one or what it will be like.... I don’t know which Bible stories ought to be treated as historically accurate, scientifically provable accounts of facts and which stories are meant to be metaphorical. I don’t know if it really matters so long as those stories transform my life. I don’t know how to reconcile God’s sovereignty with man’s free will. I don’t know what to do with those Bible verses that seem to condone genocide and the oppression of women. I don’t know why I have so many questions, while other Christians don’t seem to have any....

I am learning to live the questions, to follow the teachings of a radical rabbi, to live in an upside-down kingdom in which kings are humbled and servants exalted, to look for God in the eyes of the orphan and the widow, the homeless and the imprisoned, the poor and the sick. My hope is that if I am patient, the questions themselves will dissolve into meaning, the answers won’t matter so much anymore, and perhaps it will all make sense to me on some distant, ordinary day.

(From:  Evolving in Monkey Town: How a Girl Who Knew All the Answers Learned to Ask the Questions By Rachel Held Evans.  Buy it.  Read it.  Seriously.  Although it tells her own journey, she does a much better job of explaining the process than I am doing here on this blog.) 

What I'm learning is that, regardless of what some others may think, I haven't lost my faith.  I do experience God through faith in Christ -- not just because that is how I was raised, but because that is what I choose and what speaks to me.  Christianity is my "tradition," as the bishop said, but it is not my dogma.  I can see some of my ideas of God in other religious traditions.  I can see God in people who have no religion.  The way I experience God through Christianity may be very different from the way others do, and that is okay.  There are so many things about God that I freely admit I don't know or understand, and that is okay too.  We all make choices about what we believe, what pieces we have to keep in order to become better people and what we have to discard because it is an albatross to our faith.

Of all the ideas we can discard, I think the belief that we all have to experience God the same way should be the first to go.  God is a mystery and we do not own God.

Tragedy

This week a friend from my hometown lost his six-year-old son in a horrific accident.  This is the second time in just a few years that someone I've known for a long time has had to bury a very young son.  Their families have been shattered by sudden tragedy.  Dear God.  My heart is broken and so full of pain for their loss.

I never know what are the words to say, what to write, what to hope, what to pray.  I wish I knew that what I did say helped, or at least wasn't wrong.  But these are incredibly selfish thoughts.  This is basically hoping that I get some kind of pass, some kind of reassurance that I haven't failed at sympathy, when I should really be focusing all my thoughts and energy away from me and toward those in the proverbial eye of the storm.

I do wish there were anything that could be done or said to help ease the pain and the suffering, yet I know there is really nothing anyone can do.  Their world will never be the same.  They will learn how to go on living, but there is no "healing" or "getting through" and especially no "getting past."

Zeke, my friend's son, was riding his bike when he was killed.  My son Luke, only a couple months older than Zeke, learned to ride his bike the same day Zeke was struck.  As much as I want to be over the moon that Luke FINALLY did it on his own, my heart aches for my friend every time Luke rides his bike, or even mentions it.  I'm constantly aware of the things I've been taking for granted that are going to be like salt in the wound for Zeke's family, as each thing happens without him and with a gaping absence instead -- the first day of the school year, folding laundry and finding some of his clothes, taking his a favorite cup out of the dishwasher, an empty seat at the table, an empty bed, a family vacation -- the infinite list of all the things that make family life, now heinously lopsided by the absence of an integral part.

I hate it.  I. Hate. It.   I won't even ask "why?" and I certainly won't attempt to paper over the pain with stupid and meaningless clichés.  These are the times when life makes no sense.


P.S.  If you are reading this, any thoughts and/or prayers for Zeke's family and everyone else involved or affected would be appreciated.

To Lighten the Mood

So, it's been getting pretty deep over here on the blog and I think it's time to infuse a little fun for a change.  I love summertime.  It is one of my all-time favorites.  Not just my favorite season, but one of my favorite things ever. 

In honor of this, I will now post my playlist for this summer.  These are the songs that have been on repeat on my iPod for the past month.  I make no apologies for any lack of musical taste this may seem to show on my part.  Just find these songs and listen to them and think of all the best things about summer.

Here they are, in no particular order.  You're welcome.


Nova Baby by The Black Keys
Where I Want To Be by The Danderous Summer
Fly Over States by Jason Aldean
You and Me by Dave Matthews Band
Wild Ones (Feat. Sia) By Flo Rida (I'm not apologizing for this, but it is not kid-appropriate)
Everything You Do by He is We
Mountain and the Sea by Ingrid Michaelson
Springsteen by Eric Church
Do You Remember by Jack Johnson
Friday Night by Lady Antebellum
Melody by Kate Earl
Stay by Lisa Loeb
Last Request by Paolo Nutini
Days Like These by Jason Aldean
Saturday Morning by Rachael Yamagata
White Lies by Stacy Clark
Tim McGraw by Taylor Swift
Somebody Must be Prayin for Me by Tim McGraw
Go On by Jack Johnson
Next Girl by the Black Keys
Call Me Maybe by Carly Rae Jepsen (I realize I will hate this song in another month or so, but I'm still okay with it right now)


Obviously I realize that taste in music is highly personal, but what is your all-time-favorite summertime song?  I'll check it out and see if I should add it to my list...

A Synonym for Deliberate

I've been thinking about the title of my blog.  I've been thinking of how funny it is that when I named it I was trying to convey the total randomness of my thoughts and life and writing.  I didn't (and still don't) have a theme or a focus for this blog, other than just getting thoughts out of my head.  However, I did feel the word "random" was overused, so I chose some words that meant random.

When I started this blog, I did feel as though so much in my life was haphazard.  I had an almost-two-year-old and a not-quite-four-year-old and when you have kids that age, everything seems like chaos.  Just when you think you've figured out a routine or something that works, that stage has passed and you're trying to figure out life (or even dinnertime) all over again.

My kids are five and seven now.  Sure, there is still plenty of chaos and unpredictability, but the moment-by-moment insanity is not nearly as bad.  Despite outbursts of crazy boy-energy, we have settled into more of a.... I won't say "routine," but maybe a "mutual understanding."  I no longer feel like everything is a spiral of randomness.

I've realized that being deliberate is not only important, but necessary.  With the way I respond to the boys' questions and behavior, I can't just wing it.  I have to put thought into it and purposely choose the way I react and the  motivations for my reactions.  I want to make sure that I'm teaching them to think for themselves and to use discernment and make wise choices, but also to enjoy the hell out of life.  Most kids don't learn that by accident.  Some do, but don't I want my kids to remember that they learned at least some of that from me?

With my thoughts and my writing, I've also realized I've become more intentional.  Not that I've lost any of my craziness, not that I have everything figured out, and not that I know what I want to be when I finally grow up; I do feel that I am a little more focused about what I think and what I (try to) write about.  Where before, the thought of being deliberate seemed unattainable and therefore overwhelming, now being deliberate seems like a welcome necessity.

I obviously don't know what the future holds.  I don't know what life has in store, nor do I know how long this stage will last with the boys.  I could wake up tomorrow to an almost five-and-a-half-year old and a several-months-past-seven year old who have changed everything and feel like I'm starting all over again.  I could lose all sense of focus and go through another phase where I don't know what I think about most things.  Because of all this (and also because I'm ridiculously sentimental), I'm not going to change the name of my blog.  I'm going to leave it and see where life takes me. 

I do, however, realize that there is no reason to cling to randomness when a little bit of intention is appropriate and necessary.  I'm learning to live with both the antonym and the synonym of deliberate.

The Opposite of Empathy

em·pa·thy   [em-puh-thee]  
Definition:  The intellectual identification with or vicarious experiencing of the feelings, thoughts, or attitudes of another.
Antonyms: apathy, misunderstanding, unfeelingness


I read an article a few years ago that cited a study that sought to find the most basic and universal human emotion.  I can't remember what they were trying to prove that it was, but what they determined was that empathy is the universal emotion that all humans are born with.  (Side note: I tried, but could not find that article again.  However, if you Google 'empathy in babies,' you can find references to this type of study.)

Obviously, not every person is empathetic.  Babies can outgrow empathy for a variety of reasons.  Lately, though, I've been wondering if some people are purposely taught to not show empathy.  I mean, I can understand that people in some circumstances would lose empathy pretty easily.  Children who are abused or neglected are not shown empathy and those scars can wreak havoc on psychological wellness.  I'm not talking about those people.  I'm talking about people who seem to be okay, to whom nothing terrible or abusive has happened, who live an "average" life, yet seem completely incapable of feeling even a tiny twinge of empathy.

I get that with different life experiences people have different points of view, different thoughts, different opinions, and different ideas.  What I do not get is making the leap from, "Well, we disagree." to "Well, you are a terrible person because you disagree with me."  We've all seen it or heard it or even experienced it over the past couple years.  Disagreements quickly turn into stereo-typing, name-calling, demonizing, and worse.

This concerns me for many reasons, but mostly because it seems many of us have lost our ability to empathize with others.  To me it seems that some have even been taught that empathy is wrong or bad or should be avoided at all cost.  It seems some think there is no way we should try to put ourselves in the proverbial shoes of someone else or try to see a situation from their perspective.  Why should we?  We know everything, understand everything, and have it all right.  If someone thinks differently from us or their life is different from ours, they are bad and it is all their fault. There are people I encounter or see in the news who seem to have been taught all of the above.

What baffles me about this is that, with as many choices as we have in life and as much as I believe in personal responsibility, there are so many things out of our control.  For example, I did not choose my parents, and yet I have amazing parents.  I did not choose where I was born, and yet I was born in a location that is comparatively safe and offers a decent amount of opportunity.  Conversely, there are many born to parents who do not want to be parents and in places that are dangerous and where opportunity is scarce.  Some are born privileged and some are born relatively privileged  and some are born with nothing.

Thinking about all this reminded me of a blog post I read recently over here at this link.  As soon as I read the following sentence, I knew I would remember it forever:  "At its heart, recognizing privilege is simply recognizing that your life experience is NOT universal." - Dianna Anderson  This is exactly what I'm getting at.  Other people have not lived the same life I have lived.  If they disagree with me on something, they have that right.  Yes, it is difficult sometimes when I do not understand why someone could think about something so radically different from the way I think about it.  Yes, it can feel like criticism or even rejection when someone expresses a difference of opinion.  However, if I don't at least try to see where another person is coming from, if I can't empathize despite disagreement, where does that leave me?

Perhaps you're someone who was told (and then believed) that you were going straight to hell if you accepted a certain type of person... that the only way for you to be true to your beliefs was to hate certain other people. I get that, as I have sometimes been guilty of believing what I was told instead of what I knew to be true.  I understand how fear can cloud our judgement.  But what if, for just a second, you set that aside?  What if you pretended/imagined/visualized that things were not the way you've always been told and tried to think about something from the perspective of someone with a totally different life experience?  What if you could really try to feel what it must be like to live and function in that experience?  Would it be so easy to hate/condemn/reject them?

I feel like I am kind of rambling now, but I have been thinking about this so much lately that I had to write about it, even if it is a long, ramble-y, post.  I just wish that we could all take a step back from our own experience and practice empathy.  To  me, living in apathy, misunderstanding,and unfeelingness seems like a pretty unpleasant alternative to taking the time at least try to identify with the feeling, thoughts, attitudes, and  experience of others.  Think of how different things could be if we would stop embracing the opposite of empathy.