With the looming election, I appreciate the "everything is not a crusade". I cannot hold space for the ongoing hot takes and manufactured drama of the American political system. It's just too much. 2016 forward took me out. My family was crushed and divided. I finally had to step back, delete social media accounts and protect myself from the perpetual outrage.
I'm better but I'm not the same person. I'm happy about that in some ways but lamenting in others. I try to focus on the small beauties around me (thanks to your ongoing encouragement to look up and look around).
I have similar angst, but maybe in the opposite direction. If I'm not careful it will take me over. It's difficult for me to stay quiet and not become unhelpfully invested. Regardless of personalities and such, it's safe to say it's going to be a burden on almost everyone. Trying to find a sustainable plan ahead of time. Thank you for sharing this as I know so many will relate.
“trying to discern what I do or don’t have to offer a faith community that doesn’t want to grapple with its own sickness.” Same, sister. Same. After 20 years of attending the same church, I find myself chafing where I was once comfortable. I’m the one who has changed, and I no longer fit there. Trying to figure out what that means and where I am called to be, and to what purpose.
Right now, joy is causing me pain & grief. I am learning to recognize joy and to accept it as safe. What is tending to happen is that I realize how much joy, peace and contentment I’ve deferred over my first 47 years. When I take that in, and count it as the loss it is... that’s painful.
I am in the middle of course & clinical work to prepare to take the MBLEx and become LMT (Licensed Massage Therapist) and two things we are being taught to accept, over and over and over again...
1) we cannot only work where the pain is, we have to build trust so that our client will allow us to also work where the problem is.
2) overstretched parts of the body experience/hold more pain than the places we keep closed up tight.
This is complicated and nuanced and I so appreciate that you shared it. I have quite a few people in my life who experience this after a lifetime of trauma and hardship.
Cheering you on in your MUCH-needed professional pursuits!
I'm currently flying home from a sort of pilgrimage in the footsteps of Paul. We booked and paid for the trip a long time ago. In that time, I've changed... a lot. Public displays of faith have become very uncomfortable so I had to creativity find ways to not be present. So grateful for a really supportive husband who helped. 😍 But it was also clarifying... I am not sure what it'll look like, but I want a strong relationship with God...a powerful connection to the holy spirit...AND I want those things to flow from me in ways that are quiet and NOT public-- more small and one on one.
This journey has been really painful, but this idea has been healing. Can't wait to meet with my spiritual director and process it.
To quote Knox McCoy (who I’m sure heard it from someone else) “Show me, don’t tell me”. I never thought about it until now as a guide to be a Jesus follower!
Yes to the yuck of wearing joy when it doesn’t fit and yes to the reduction of Truth to platitudes. I despise both. Two of the top books that have helped me through the honest Hard of life are “Therefore I Have Hope” by Cameron Cole and “Courage, Dear Heart: Letters to a Weary World” by Rebecca K. Reynolds. Both authors gracefully hold the reality of pain and hurt and our hope because of Jesus. I highly recommend them. Both came into my life at a time like the one you’re walking in now.
Lastly, I took a picture of small flowers growing up in the crack of a boulder days after my dad died unexpectedly 6 years ago. To me it said, “beauty still grows in the Hard places”. It does, even if we may not see it till we’re on the other side of intense pain. God is faithful and He holds onto us when we aren’t strong enough to hold onto Him. (Sorry if that sounds like a platitude. Those are two truths that I’m able to grasp when I really can’t hold anything more.)
My hurt: August 14th my oldest son died in a motorcycle accident. Typing the words makes me want to throw up. He is the apple of my eye and the glue in our family of five. I am sick of biblical platitudes. Friends sending prayer emojis make me furious. The grief is overwhelming and seems endless. Watching siblings struggle with the loss of the bestest big brother is heartwrenching. All I hear when I think of the bible teachings is "he knows the number of our days" and I feel angry and robbed and hopeless. I am in the cliche of deconstructing and sit firmly convinced people need to examine how grief is experienced and shared.
Good morning, Kimberly. I'm returning to this one month later because when I first read your comment I wasn't able to comment, and because you are on my heart right now. Thank you for sharing your grief with us. I am so very sorry. And I am wholeheartedly with you in our collective need to examine our reality of grief. Sending comfort your way today, even if just a sliver. 🖤
Kimberly, I'm so very sorry for your terrible loss and pain. I have no words that will comfort you, but please know I care and am holding your family in my heart.
That’s not just a hurt, that’s a giant gaping wound and I hate it for you. Hoping you can find some places and people that are safe to tell the truth to.
So much this. Always so much this. The Blackberries just wrecked me. I had given myself such grief after giving myself so many internal high fives. I had kept up with it this year, the blackberries that ripen 5 minutes after I last picked them. The fruitflies didn't win, I DID!! I had about a dozen half pints of beautiful jam. And then, Life. How could I? How could I let 3 BOWLS OF BLACKBERRIES turn into the beginning of wine in my fridge?! In 2 months, blackberries will be a small fortune in the grocery store and I just let about $100 worth rot in my fridge. Why didn't I at least find a friend who wanted berries. The mental lashing I gave myself crept up everytime I opened the fridge (because somehow I guess I thought if I waited it out somehow it would fix itself) until I finally threw those bad boys into the compost pile because then at least it was something that somehow balanced the equation of validity a little bit back in my direction (insert head slap). What's a gal to do?! And then she receives a gift in her email and God reminds her he is the God who sees and to quit being 10 times harder on myself than he ever is.
And now this. My 44th birthday and a year of church loss, life lessons, and the inability to plaster a biblical platitude over the wound (of course mixed with so much beauty in so many other spaces). I've done this church thing for too long. We've been attending a new church, a beautiful church family, I'm sure. But I don't want to. I don't want to plug in. I don't want to make friends. I don't want to peek behind the curtain and see what's at the core. I'm not even sure that it's that I don't want to but that I don't know how anymore. I don't know how to engage and see yuck and not challenge it. It's truly been a year of "I don't know." And just yesterday as I wrestled with the list of questions that all end with the answer "I don't know" I felt God say, "What if we trade "I don't know," for "Trust me?" So, what does that look like? "I don't know." :P
It’s Monday, 11:00 pm. I drove two hours today to be with my Dad and take him to Dr appointments. I’m trying to settle down from the day and I remembered I had the Soup still waiting for me in my inbox. In the mix of joy, sorrow, complications, questions, I’m thankful for your honest words. It’s an invitation to give space for it all. I’m grateful for the soup tonight. I’ve spent the day hearing conspiracies and things I never imagined my Dad saying. Oof! I also saw glimmers of who I’ve known him to be. What a messy beautiful life.
I too feel I have changed faith-wise and no longer feel comfortable at my church. It’s awkward since I live across the street. 👀 Still a Christian, not really deconstructing, but committed to justice and environmental issues that I need to see addressed somehow. By the way, soybean fields from the air this time of year (my hub’s a pilot) look like Impressionist paintings.🙂
I feel like I could write an essay in response but knowing I am not alone in the struggles you describe brings me peace. Thank you as always you for your honesty, Shannan, naming things I don't yet have words to name.
My early 40’s taught me hard things that my late 40’s couldn’t have survived without. Church grief is a particular sort of pain, because of all the clanging cymbals that move in to fix you. Bless the blackberry grievers.
Those field photos hit me at a cellular level. When we moved to Ohio & I saw those kinds of fields I felt my body relax: "this is where I belong!" And it was, for almost 20 years of heartbreak & joy. Now that we're back home in NC I sometimes have trouble catching my breath. That's where it hurts - living where I need to be but not where I want to be. (Still, there's so much joy here too.)
I ordered the book, despite a self-imposed ban on ordering more books. Gee thanks Shannan!
With the looming election, I appreciate the "everything is not a crusade". I cannot hold space for the ongoing hot takes and manufactured drama of the American political system. It's just too much. 2016 forward took me out. My family was crushed and divided. I finally had to step back, delete social media accounts and protect myself from the perpetual outrage.
I'm better but I'm not the same person. I'm happy about that in some ways but lamenting in others. I try to focus on the small beauties around me (thanks to your ongoing encouragement to look up and look around).
I have similar angst, but maybe in the opposite direction. If I'm not careful it will take me over. It's difficult for me to stay quiet and not become unhelpfully invested. Regardless of personalities and such, it's safe to say it's going to be a burden on almost everyone. Trying to find a sustainable plan ahead of time. Thank you for sharing this as I know so many will relate.
“trying to discern what I do or don’t have to offer a faith community that doesn’t want to grapple with its own sickness.” Same, sister. Same. After 20 years of attending the same church, I find myself chafing where I was once comfortable. I’m the one who has changed, and I no longer fit there. Trying to figure out what that means and where I am called to be, and to what purpose.
I'm convinced we've all changed - how could we not? And yeah, it's painful when we change in divergent directions. With you.
Right now, joy is causing me pain & grief. I am learning to recognize joy and to accept it as safe. What is tending to happen is that I realize how much joy, peace and contentment I’ve deferred over my first 47 years. When I take that in, and count it as the loss it is... that’s painful.
I am in the middle of course & clinical work to prepare to take the MBLEx and become LMT (Licensed Massage Therapist) and two things we are being taught to accept, over and over and over again...
1) we cannot only work where the pain is, we have to build trust so that our client will allow us to also work where the problem is.
2) overstretched parts of the body experience/hold more pain than the places we keep closed up tight.
I’m going to think those through.
This is complicated and nuanced and I so appreciate that you shared it. I have quite a few people in my life who experience this after a lifetime of trauma and hardship.
Cheering you on in your MUCH-needed professional pursuits!
I'm currently flying home from a sort of pilgrimage in the footsteps of Paul. We booked and paid for the trip a long time ago. In that time, I've changed... a lot. Public displays of faith have become very uncomfortable so I had to creativity find ways to not be present. So grateful for a really supportive husband who helped. 😍 But it was also clarifying... I am not sure what it'll look like, but I want a strong relationship with God...a powerful connection to the holy spirit...AND I want those things to flow from me in ways that are quiet and NOT public-- more small and one on one.
This journey has been really painful, but this idea has been healing. Can't wait to meet with my spiritual director and process it.
This resonates. All I want is to see faithful people whose lives speak for themselves. Say less, Christians!
To quote Knox McCoy (who I’m sure heard it from someone else) “Show me, don’t tell me”. I never thought about it until now as a guide to be a Jesus follower!
Yes to the yuck of wearing joy when it doesn’t fit and yes to the reduction of Truth to platitudes. I despise both. Two of the top books that have helped me through the honest Hard of life are “Therefore I Have Hope” by Cameron Cole and “Courage, Dear Heart: Letters to a Weary World” by Rebecca K. Reynolds. Both authors gracefully hold the reality of pain and hurt and our hope because of Jesus. I highly recommend them. Both came into my life at a time like the one you’re walking in now.
Lastly, I took a picture of small flowers growing up in the crack of a boulder days after my dad died unexpectedly 6 years ago. To me it said, “beauty still grows in the Hard places”. It does, even if we may not see it till we’re on the other side of intense pain. God is faithful and He holds onto us when we aren’t strong enough to hold onto Him. (Sorry if that sounds like a platitude. Those are two truths that I’m able to grasp when I really can’t hold anything more.)
Love and a hug from a sister from afar.🩷
Thank you for these book recs and the meaningful pic. 🩷🩷 (And the hug!)
Thank you for writing words that resonate with me so deeply and remind me that I’m not alone. 🩷
My hurt: August 14th my oldest son died in a motorcycle accident. Typing the words makes me want to throw up. He is the apple of my eye and the glue in our family of five. I am sick of biblical platitudes. Friends sending prayer emojis make me furious. The grief is overwhelming and seems endless. Watching siblings struggle with the loss of the bestest big brother is heartwrenching. All I hear when I think of the bible teachings is "he knows the number of our days" and I feel angry and robbed and hopeless. I am in the cliche of deconstructing and sit firmly convinced people need to examine how grief is experienced and shared.
Good morning, Kimberly. I'm returning to this one month later because when I first read your comment I wasn't able to comment, and because you are on my heart right now. Thank you for sharing your grief with us. I am so very sorry. And I am wholeheartedly with you in our collective need to examine our reality of grief. Sending comfort your way today, even if just a sliver. 🖤
Kimberly, I'm so very sorry for your terrible loss and pain. I have no words that will comfort you, but please know I care and am holding your family in my heart.
What loss, Kimberly. It takes my breath away. Sitting quietly with you in your grief.
That’s not just a hurt, that’s a giant gaping wound and I hate it for you. Hoping you can find some places and people that are safe to tell the truth to.
Oh Kimberly, how your hearts are aching!! No words to share other than I’m holding you in my thoughts 💔
So much this. Always so much this. The Blackberries just wrecked me. I had given myself such grief after giving myself so many internal high fives. I had kept up with it this year, the blackberries that ripen 5 minutes after I last picked them. The fruitflies didn't win, I DID!! I had about a dozen half pints of beautiful jam. And then, Life. How could I? How could I let 3 BOWLS OF BLACKBERRIES turn into the beginning of wine in my fridge?! In 2 months, blackberries will be a small fortune in the grocery store and I just let about $100 worth rot in my fridge. Why didn't I at least find a friend who wanted berries. The mental lashing I gave myself crept up everytime I opened the fridge (because somehow I guess I thought if I waited it out somehow it would fix itself) until I finally threw those bad boys into the compost pile because then at least it was something that somehow balanced the equation of validity a little bit back in my direction (insert head slap). What's a gal to do?! And then she receives a gift in her email and God reminds her he is the God who sees and to quit being 10 times harder on myself than he ever is.
And now this. My 44th birthday and a year of church loss, life lessons, and the inability to plaster a biblical platitude over the wound (of course mixed with so much beauty in so many other spaces). I've done this church thing for too long. We've been attending a new church, a beautiful church family, I'm sure. But I don't want to. I don't want to plug in. I don't want to make friends. I don't want to peek behind the curtain and see what's at the core. I'm not even sure that it's that I don't want to but that I don't know how anymore. I don't know how to engage and see yuck and not challenge it. It's truly been a year of "I don't know." And just yesterday as I wrestled with the list of questions that all end with the answer "I don't know" I felt God say, "What if we trade "I don't know," for "Trust me?" So, what does that look like? "I don't know." :P
I could have written this myself. 🖤 Thank you for the solidarity.
Yep!
It’s Monday, 11:00 pm. I drove two hours today to be with my Dad and take him to Dr appointments. I’m trying to settle down from the day and I remembered I had the Soup still waiting for me in my inbox. In the mix of joy, sorrow, complications, questions, I’m thankful for your honest words. It’s an invitation to give space for it all. I’m grateful for the soup tonight. I’ve spent the day hearing conspiracies and things I never imagined my Dad saying. Oof! I also saw glimmers of who I’ve known him to be. What a messy beautiful life.
Peace be with you, Shannan.
I too feel I have changed faith-wise and no longer feel comfortable at my church. It’s awkward since I live across the street. 👀 Still a Christian, not really deconstructing, but committed to justice and environmental issues that I need to see addressed somehow. By the way, soybean fields from the air this time of year (my hub’s a pilot) look like Impressionist paintings.🙂
I feel like I could write an essay in response but knowing I am not alone in the struggles you describe brings me peace. Thank you as always you for your honesty, Shannan, naming things I don't yet have words to name.
My early 40’s taught me hard things that my late 40’s couldn’t have survived without. Church grief is a particular sort of pain, because of all the clanging cymbals that move in to fix you. Bless the blackberry grievers.
Those field photos hit me at a cellular level. When we moved to Ohio & I saw those kinds of fields I felt my body relax: "this is where I belong!" And it was, for almost 20 years of heartbreak & joy. Now that we're back home in NC I sometimes have trouble catching my breath. That's where it hurts - living where I need to be but not where I want to be. (Still, there's so much joy here too.)
I ordered the book, despite a self-imposed ban on ordering more books. Gee thanks Shannan!