I’ve sat here for an hour and half and deleted words, closed documents, switched over to reading books and now I’m back again.
The image that keeps coming into my brain tonight are all the people who moved through the night to see the baby Jesus. Now, I know historically, it wasn’t during December, who knows if it was cold; but all I can see is their breath on the air as the moved through the night to get to the manger.
Their breath moving in front of them, as they walked to meet the baby that would change everything.
And all I can think of our the words I wrote when my mom passed. That even though we were devastated she was gone, she was finally able to breathe again.
I think for the last three years I haven’t been breathing.
I mean I have obviously, been breathing. I’ve been living, moving forward, making choices, trudging through sickness, maneuvering through grief.
But, I’ve realized, that this holiday season I just want to breathe.
It sounds so simple, so cliche’.
People say they want to have breathing room, have space to breathe. That they just need to take a breath.
To me breath is more than space and room.
It’s being alive in a different way than I used to be.
One of the collection of words I deleted simply stated that I feel like I’ve failed this year.
But, really, I think I’ve just been holding my breath in hopes that it would make a difference. That when I came up for air there would be clarity.
And now, this span of time of holidays, I just want to breathe. I want to take deep breathes to my toes.
I know these words don’t feel very holiday. They feel stilted and tired.
These words need to breathe.
So that’s where I am this Sunday before Christmas.
Usually that isn’t the case. I might not like the word, but I see the good things that come from it and I can understand.
Not this year.
On Sunday, I was sitting in church and I was like “ok god, let’s be done. Let’s wrap this one up like a bow.”
And he said “nah, I’m good.”
Because, again, I have to keep going.
And no matter what that’s going to be the case. I’m always going to keep meeting places I’ve been before.
Again and again.
I thought this year would have more answers than it has. I thought maybe it would hold something.
And really, it has held a lot.
It’s still held more than I can even comprehend I know.
Usually, at this point in the year I feel like we’re starting to coast to the finish line.
Like I have a grasp and I start to understand what the baton in the relay race is going to look like.
But, right now, I can’t even see the baton. I don’t know what it looks like, I don’t know if I’m even still moving towards the finish line.
It kind of feels like I’m playing Mario kart with the Steiners and I’m just choosing to go off course because it’s easier.
This year has honestly made me feel like I don’t know who I am at all.
And has made me feel like I know exactly who I am at the same time.
Because I knew this year, each thing I met, I had met before. I knew that each moment where I felt like I was walking through fire, I had walked through it before.
I had done it before so I can do it again.
And because of all of that; I stopped seeing that as a threat.
When I think about the labyrinth and how Sarah, the main character, is utilizing the book she has that is the story of the labyrinth to get through she must feel as if she’s been there before. She knew the book so well that it must have felt a bit like she had been there before.
And there were places in the maze she went to again and again.
She was caught in the place of either moving forward and or allowing herself to “rest” in a place that at one point in the journey been safe.
But the journey moved her forward.
The journey has kept moving me forward.
The things I’ve had to unearth even in just the last stretch of time that have been a reminder to me that my worth is not based on what I do.
That I’m not the glue, even when it feels like if I allow myself to let go control it will all crumble.
It causes me to sit on a street corner in Brasov, Romania across from Betsy Garmon as she leans in to tell me, remind me, implore me that I don’t have to be the glue.
It’s almost as if, I’m still making my way toward the Goblin King.
I haven’t had the chance to tell him he has no power over me.
I am not ready for whatever comes at the end of these words.
As I’ve said; again and again, I write to untangle.
I start at the beginning with words, or a phrase or a reference to the labyrinth or something Hannah Brencher wrote or something my pastor said in church (or honestly just during the work week) that pissed me off because I had to agree with it with gritted teeth.
And then I write.
Currently I feel that if I begin to untangle I might lose it all.
I feel, as if I am hanging onto my sanity with an absolute death grip.
That means, for today, it’s Hannah Brencher.
She does a series of notes for every month and there is always one or two that I latch onto.
For lovely words and truth; @ Hannah Brencher
I know that I know that I know I’m supposed to be letting go.
I can physically feel how tightly wound I am, how I’m still terrified at giving hope a chance.
Because if I can’t control it; who will.
(I know I’m freaking digging a deep hole with these words for my week but here we are).
Truthfully, I haven’t been eating really. I haven’t been sleeping.
I’ve been in survival mode for longer than I care to admit.
The bags under my eyes have their own bags and no amount of concealer can help.
(I also know none of this will be surprising to my best friend).
October was rough with ghosts and dates and memories of what once was. Then during nap time at work the day before Halloween, a text that friend had suddenly passed surprised and shocked me, shook me up.
Solidifying to me that nothing good ever happens in octobers.
I realized this morning standing in the cafe at my church that I am legitimately still terrified to hope that good things will happen.
(To me.)
And that controlling the hurt I encounter will make it hurt less.
I haven’t been feeling very brave lately. Or strong.
Or capable.
These words aren’t meant to strike pity or empathy.
They are literally just truth for me to begin to untangle whatever all this is from my clenched fists.
I think (I know) I’ve fallen back onto a pattern in which doing will get me out of being.
When I had to get taken care for a month last year, it was damn hard for me. Even amidst all that I was going through, I was still writing the menus for work, typing out notes for each and every day I was gone even though it physically made me ill to look at my phone.
When it feels like I’ve come so far from this place of doing as a personality trait I’ve realized it’s deeper and deeper.
That month of dizziness and being unable to move was the hardest month I’ve maybe ever had because if I can’t do then what am I.
So, today, I stare at my clenched fist.
I don’t know what to do about it.
I don’t know what I need to un-grip from.
I just know it’s there.
All the things amidst the grief, the pain, the things that don’t feel like hope but actually are.
And I know; none of this feels good.
The words would make my mom call me. Would cause people to feel like I’m worse off than I am.
But you know what; I’m still here.
And I’m choosing these words because right now in this world, this place we need to know that there are other people moving forward with us in the midst.
I never want to be a person who brings others into her distress, grief or pain.
I want you to know that amidst all of that you can live, you can have laughter and joy.
You can support people and make ordering McDonald’s on DoorDash something you do for the plot.
You can still have joy.
Amidst all this I may not have hope but you damn well better believe I have joy.
We have less than 60 days left in this year.
My word for the year was _______ again.
There are so many things I’ve had to do this year; again and again.
And damn it, I think I’m supposed to learn through these last two months of this year to hope again.
To believe that beautiful, bold, unattainably feeling things can happen for me.
Love, grace, bright spots of color.
I don’t know what else I need to un-grip from, but I do know that I’m supposed to un-grip my aggressive hold on hope and let it do its magic.
I’ve lived a lot of life with the persistent fear that I’m letting people down.
And to be completely and utterly honest I’ve lived the last three years mostly with the gut wrenching fear that I’m letting my mom down with every step I take.
That I haven’t been strong enough, smart enough. That I’m not able to take care of myself.
That I’m not making her proud and that she’s be so disappointed in all the ways I’ve failed.
And I know that all sounds so heavy but if we don’t ever let the heavy things out than all we will do is let them continually weigh us down.
I feel as if I have a lot of evidence in my life of all the ways I’ve been chosen last, been written off a list, not been enough for the people I wanted to be enough for.
That I’m literally just right outside the map with no way if knowing how to be apart of the journey again.
When I was in Ecuador on one of the first days of the world race myself and my team of 6 other women were handed a map of how to get to where we needed to go.
The issue was the place we were and the place we were going weren’t actually on the map- the map was the middle.
We just had to choose to go off and get to the middle without actually having the tools.
And right now, in the moment, I feel like that again. Like I’m looking at a map and I have to get to the end without all the information.
And I feel like I’ve already failed.
I know it’s not true.
I know that I’m not always letting people down.
I know I’m not a last choice.
I know that no one actually has a complete map.
Lately, the heavy has been more heavy than I know what to do with.
And hope feels like fireworks in the distance that is gone in a flash.
But, if there is anything I know that is true it’s that we have to choose to face the lies and the words that go against who we are. We have to not be afraid of them.
We have to stare them in the face.
So that’s what I’m doing right now.
Staring the words in the face that become ticker tape on my brain sometimes.
Staring them in the face because the more I do the more I realize they are untrue.
Want to join me?
Want to stare the things in the face that feel so true until you realize they are mirage that flickers off in the distance?
And let’s replace it all with what is true and full of gritty steadfast hope.
It’s been a really hard place for me to be in. A place where I feel incapable of communicating or saying what I mean, or feel. I’m a writer who has spent most of her life using words that come out of my brain as a place to land. I’ve discovered more than I can even explain via my own writing. I’ve untangled, I’ve stared at words on the screen that I had no clue where they came from but just knew that they were true and real.
I’ve found the end of the rope through my words on more occasions than I can even count.
I’ve found hope in between the lines of my own writing because at the end of the day, when I write it, I know that it’s there. When I write something I know that there is something more in me, something I can grab on too.
Something that is more real than the things that feel dark.
But right now, there is none of that.
It feels like I’m standing in a hole and I have all the pieces to something that will help me out of the hole, but it’s a piece of Ikea furniture and I have no instruction and I don’t have that damn little tool to help me build it.
The only way out of the hole is to build it.
But, instead of building it, I’ve just sat there, not trying because right now it’s easier to stay in the hole than get hurt by the fall again.
Three years ago today I wrote that I was starting to not be afraid of the other shoe dropping.
And then a month later my mom died.
Now, I’m sitting here in this bar, writing these words feeling like I’m just throwing a pity party.
Because I know I’m strong enough to get out of the damn hole.
I’ve been thinking a lot about how my high school youth pastor used to talk about how it was better to be a Christian whose fire was completely out than a lukewarm Christian. I remember, like most things from high school youth group, feeling so incredibly ashamed of that. I remember thinking that I just had to stay “on fire”. I had to do all the things I needed to do. I had to show up, be everything. I needed to sing on the worship team, and go to every bible study.
I couldn’t let the fire die because than I would be less than.
But here I am over 20 years outside of high school youth group and I would like to call bullshit on my youth pastor.
I would much rather have some dying embers of faith than feel as if a wet towel had smothered all the flames.
At the beginning of this I said that I haven’t been able to write; that isn’t completely true. I have been writing.
The words have just all felt completely and utterly devoid of hope.
Which, I know isn’t true.
Because choosing to write is choosing to believe in the hope that there is something at the end of the words.
Choosing to write is choosing to believe I might be able to be a little stronger than I was before I started writing.
Choosing to write is choosing to believe even though I feel incapable of it; I’m still someone who has the ability to stir hope and light.
So, that’s it. That’s me right now.
I guess, that at the end of it all, I’m here with my hands open, being a little more honest than I want.
I feel absolutely unsettled by all of these words and normally that unsettledness would push me to not post them, to shut my computer, maybe to even delete them, but instead I’m choosing for a moment to lean in to the things that don’t feel settled in hopes that the action might help them settle.
To my beautiful, probably still heat exhausted Royal Family,
Somewhere between sitting on the floor of Redwood singing Lux Aeterna at 1am, leading another round of “Miss Meg says” and crying from laughter in the dark with Susan, Tyler, Priscilla, Vanessa and Beth I realized that there was no way I could have actually been prepared for camp this year.
And I think that’s why the only thing I could hear from God the weeks prior to camp was “just show up”.
All we could do was show up because I know for me, for a lot of us, we had so many things we had to choose to leave at the door. We had to choose to toss some things down the mountain and disconnect because that was the only way we would be able to move forward.
We had to choose to believe God was already there; ahead of us, behind us and walking in the midst of us.
I was a little overwhelmed leading communion on Monday night. I felt the weight of whatever was to come. As we waited to see the campers that might not make it, as we tried to get as prepared as we could.
And again I heard “just show up”.
We showed up in chapel and in the hot sun. We showed up at the pool and we ate so the kids would eat even though it was too hot to eat.
The deans and staff counselors and directors showed up with the amount of steps they took running along side kids. They showed up for the counselors by making sure they were finding ways to meet their own needs. (I think my annual Susan makes me cry by asking me how I was occurred on Friday).
You all showed up for me by doing one more round of miss meg says and encouraging your kids to listen. You also all showed up for me by not seeing a single bible in lost and found.
I think this week was a reminder that while we all have things and trials and stressors and ways we feel less than- we will all show up for the kids.
I say it every year: I feel as if, during the week of camp, I’m operating out of exactly who I’m meant to be. It’s a weird thing to explain, it’s just something I feel. I know that no matter how much energy I do or don’t think have- that at the end of the night (or in most cases- the start of the next day) when my head would hit the pillow I knew that I had given all the things in my hands and no matter how it felt when I woke up- my hands when be full again. Even if they were just full from the cold Celsius Jen handed me before 7am.
There was one moment at camp that I felt a breakdown coming so I found Susan and Tyler at a table during the birthday dinner and told them I needed to check out for a moment. Before I even stepped away from the table I had two or three boys want to tell me a bible verse; so I stopped and did that and then made my way to lay down and cry and fend off what felt like a panic attack before going to chapel.
That night was the LIT hayride and even though I’d spent most of chapel breathing through tears I got on the hayride with the boys and got to see my favorite thing that camp brings: kids being kids.
I got to see kids be kids because we adults decided to show up.
There’s a lot of reasons I push myself for a week at camp, a lot of reasons I show up with all that I am and all that I have.
This year there were 90ish kids and 100 adults that were the reasons.
I know that there is more for me to sit with about this week of camp. I know that God shifted a thing inside of me that I didn’t realize needed shifting.
So, on Tuesday, I’m going to find clean clothes in my house in the morning and probably go sit somewhere and write and rest and find some of my friends to hug. And I’m going to sit and ask God what He put into my hands this week. I’m going to take sometime to write some words to the humans who showed up with me this week.
But, right now, on the plane from one home in Irvine to another home in Washington I just have to say that I’m so grateful for another week serving His kids with you all. I’m grateful for a week of moments that matter. I’m grateful for karaoke golf cart rides and Pixar shorts and sarcastic nine year olds and side hugs from little boys who tell me I’m the nicest person they’ve ever met (sorry Lenore). I’m grateful for the same little boys and their choice vocabulary and the way they helped me up the hill so I wouldn’t fall. I’m grateful for the ability to see little girls be little girls and play in makeup and dress up. And also feel strong using a hammer and building projects. I’m grateful for all the laughter and how the girls in upstairs redwood were very particular about the temperature of their showers.
And I’m so grateful that as He always does- that God met us there.
With all the love in the world and a promise to show up with all that I have, Miss Meg
I deleted about 300 words that I wrote yesterday because I knew in my knower that I wasn’t actually typing what was true.
Well, it was true but it wasn’t it. It wasn’t the thing that I needed to be saying for myself at the beginning of this new year.
I didn’t need to start with all the ways in which I’ve always felt less than.
I didn’t need to start “used to be”.
Years ago a mentor was asking me questions about journaling and I stated that I don’t journal when I don’t want to face the thing that I already know.
I absolutely know what’s at the end of this; but I absolutely don’t want to see it in writing.
I’ve always been…scratch that.
I’m currently working on letting go of the constant fear that I’m too much.
And it’s really hard.
I’ve spent a very long time checking over my shoulder, backspacing over words, regretting input I’ve given, questioning my abilities and wondering if I’m allowed space in the places I inhabit.
Now, there’s a lot of reasons and a lot of situations and a lot of times where those things have been proved correct in my head.
But, (it should be noted how long I’m waiting to type the next words) today, at one of my favorite little bars, I’m choosing to say that those narratives and those people and those situations no longer have the ability to take my voice, my abilities or inhabit the spaces I should be in.
And if you ever want to know those things, or people or stories, I can share, but it won’t be from anything but a place of storytelling not situations that hold me back.
Because I’m not going to tiptoe around the things that make me who I am, that I’m good at.
I think it’s time I don’t shrink back anymore.
It’s time to unravel and undo the things that have caused me to keep a distance.
Today, I decide, to no longer be hesitant in being the first person to believe in myself.
I’ve never been anxious to write about a year before but there is something that is just below the surface right now that I can’t really put my finger on.
38 has been wild.
38 started out pretty hard. I cried myself to sleep on my birthday and spent the weekend after my birthday feeling really alone, emotionally hungover and feeling a little bit more without than I knew/know how to describe.
I set into my summer with intentions to set some boundaries, to rest and to do things that felt like me.
And then my best friend and I ended up on a Tito’s party bus.
It was one of those nights that deservedly could have ended up like the movie the Hangover. We got on a party bus, not knowing where it was going, where we might end up or who any of the people were
Thankfully (obviously) we’re both still alive and have an epic story that we don’t know if we can top (or should top).
And that (this is maybe a little dramatic) was my last nights of being 38 that felt normal.
That Sunday I woke up with a half paralyzed face and it then spurred 4 weeks of two ER visits, having such intense vertigo I couldn’t move my head or walk to my bathroom without puking, I couldn’t leave my room or walk down my stairs or eat anything.
I physically haven’t felt normal since. Though it’s gotten immensely better I can’t smile without my left eye crinkling, my ear is still a bit ringy, I’m consistently 5% off balance, eating is hard, I spill on myself constantly and I can’t whistle.
And blanketed in all of this, is grief. And doing all of it without my mom even on the other side of the phone.
Those are all the things I’m holding in one hand.
In the other hand is the fact that I just came to a realization that I think I’ve never felt more like a badass in my life.
Since August 20th I auditioned for and was in a musical again, I was in charge of a crew of munchkins backstage, I for the most part never stopped doing announcements at church even though I kind of hated talking in front of people, I spoke at church on Christmas Eve, I stage managed and called a show for three weekends. I still sang karaoke and still was in pictures even thought I don’t like looking at myself.
I did my absolute best to continue to show up for myself even though it’s been really, really hard to look at myself in the mirror.
I’m not saying I did it all or I didn’t have a lot of nights of crying in the dark of my room. I’m not saying that I didn’t want to give up and stop showing up multiple times.
And I’m not saying there weren’t stretches of time where I didn’t show up with my whole self.
I’m very quick to diminish a hard thing I’ve done or am doing because so many people do harder things everyday.
People walk around with life threatening illnesses and autoimmune diseases and so many things in between and I just have a face that won’t work and eyes that water constantly and a body that won’t stay steady.
But, I have to come to the realization and the reminder that in my year of 38 I showed up in ways I didn’t want too.
I spent a lot of my life not wanting to talk because my voice sounded funny. I spent a lot of my life hiding because I was overweight and was made fun of.
I spent a lot of it thinking I was a burden and trying to just disappear.
But, even in spite of all the history my brain tells me and of my desire to not look in a mirror, I knew in 38 I was going to show up in spite of.
I was going to speak because I had things to say.
I was going to be in a musical because we all deserved that redemption.
I was going to encourage kiddos and teens in a musical because they needed adults in their corner.
And I was going to do it because, in spite of what I may believe, things, places, situations are better when I show up.
Whenever I sit down to write these little letters to a past year of life I never actually know what will happen. I don’t know what words will come out.
But, I guess for today; the words that came out are simply this.
Dear 38,
I’m glad I didn’t let you show me up.
Thanks for reminding me I’m a badass.
With love,
Meg
PS.
Let’s just stay calm this week k? (Unless it’s like really, really good)
I’ve never been anxious to write about a year before but there is something that is just below the surface right now that I can’t really put my finger on.
38 has been wild.
38 started out pretty hard. I cried myself to sleep on my birthday and spent the weekend after my birthday feeling really alone, emotionally hungover and feeling a little bit more without than I knew/know how to describe.
I set into my summer with intentions to set some boundaries, to rest and to do things that felt like me.
And then my best friend and I ended up on a Tito’s party bus.
It was one of those nights that deservedly could have ended up like the movie the Hangover. We got on a party bus, not knowing where it was going, where we might end up or who any of the people were
Thankfully (obviously) we’re both still alive and have an epic story that we don’t know if we can top (or should top).
And that (this is maybe a little dramatic) was my last nights of being 38 that felt normal.
That Sunday I woke up with a half paralyzed face and it then spurred 4 weeks of two ER visits, having such intense vertigo I couldn’t move my head or walk to my bathroom without puking, I couldn’t leave my room or walk down my stairs or eat anything.
I physically haven’t felt normal since. Though it’s gotten immensely better I can’t smile without my left eye crinkling, my ear is still a bit ringy, I’m consistently 5% off balance, eating is hard, I spill on myself constantly and I can’t whistle.
And blanketed in all of this, is grief. And doing all of it without my mom even on the other side of the phone.
Those are all the things I’m holding in one hand.
In the other hand is the fact that I just came to a realization that I think I’ve never felt more like a badass in my life.
Since August 20th I auditioned for and was in a musical again, I was in charge of a crew of munchkins backstage, I for the most part never stopped doing announcements at church even though I kind of hated talking I front of people, I spoke at church on Christmas Eve, I stage managed and called a show for three weekends. I still sang karaoke and still was in pictures even thought I don’t like looking at myself.
I did my absolute best to continue to show up for myself even though it’s been really, really hard to look at myself in the mirror.
I’m not saying I did it all or I didn’t have a lot of nights of crying in the dark of my room. I’m not saying that I didn’t want to give up and stop showing up multiple times.
And I’m not saying there weren’t stretches of time where I didn’t show up with my whole self.
I’m very quick to diminish a hard thing I’ve done or am doing because so many people do harder things everyday.
People walk around with life threatening illnesses and autoimmune diseases and so many things in between and I just have a face that won’t work and eyes that water constantly and a body that won’t stay steady.
But, I have to come to the realization and the reminder that in my year of 38 I showed up in ways I didn’t want too.
I spent a lot of my life not wanting to talk because my voice sounded funny. I spent a lot of my life hiding because I was overweight and was made fun of.
I spent a lot of it thinking I was a burden and trying to just disappear.
But, even in spite of all the history my brain tells me and of my desire to not look in a mirror, I knew in 38 I was going to show up in spite of.
I was going to speak because I had things to say.
I was going to be in a musical because we all deserved that redemption.
I was going to encourage kiddos and teens in a musical because they needed adults in their corner.
And I was going to show up because, in spite of what I may believe, things are better when I show up.
Whenever I sit down to write these little letters to a past year of life I never actually know what will happen. I don’t know what words will come out.
But, I guess for today; the words that came out are simply this.
Dear 38,
I’m glad I didn’t let you show me up.
Thanks for reminding me I’m a badass.
With love,
Meg
PS.
Let’s just stay calm this week k? (Unless it’s like really, really good)
I’ve ebbed and flowed in my faith so much in the last 10-11 years. After the World Race my life was in a tailspin. I didn’t know what way was up and I wasn’t sure what the point of the previous year of my life had been.
I had been sold this notion that following the “calling of God” was going to bring me to an answer, to a level of contentment in the midst. That it would bring me to wholeness.
All it brought me was sadness, confusion and one of the deeper lonely times I had ever encountered. I felt so, so lost and it was incredibly hard to explain that to people who assumed I had just had the best year of my life. Which the year had been beautiful and amazing- but there was also a lot of hard things.
I went to Spain and picked up some pieces, I found some footing I had lost and then I moved to Bellingham. It was in the beginning of my time in Bellingham that I wrote a piece for a website and realized that all of the things I had caused me to want to wash my hands of all the things that were faith had nothing to actually do with God.
They had to do with the way people manipulated words and phrases and ideology, they had to do with religion and law and everything in between.
Today I came to the realization that somewhere along the way my deconstruction turned to reconstruction.
I’ve worked really hard in this process of letting go of the things I don’t need, of taking the things apart to see how the work or how they started in my life in regards to faith, and of not throwing everything away because the water it lived in got murky.
It felt really important to me to not throw it all out.
I couldn’t throw it all out.
There are a few moments in my life that I can only affix to God. And in all honesty it’s those moments that anchor me and caused me to deconstruct this house I built over the span of 20+ years down to only its foundation- because the foundation made sense.
But now, it’s time to put some things back together.
And I know it doesn’t look like that on the outside. I never truly stopped going to church, but I’ve taken breaks and had seasons and spans where I don’t feel connected. It probably looks as if I never did any construction- because my deconstructing doesn’t look like someone else’s.
But part of my deconstructing was choosing to believe that this foundation I stood on was still stable enough to rebuild. And choosing to believe that those moments affixed to God would still be there even if I decided to never set foot in a church again.
And it was actively understanding that the shame I felt when it all fell apart wasn’t from God. It wasn’t some enemy or a spirit or anything intangible.
It was the people who decided what church and men and women in the church should look like.
It was the house they built that made you feel crazy- with doors that led to nowhere even though they told you the door led somewhere.
It’s the institution that told me I was never enough, never whole enough or holy enough or did enough.
I still have a very hard time going back into spaces that are like all of the spaces that told me those things. I have a hard time coming to grasp with words that have been used so wrong I forgot how to read them how they should be read.
What I’ve realized though is the spaces that need my voice and viewpoint the most are most likely the spaces where I know the language needs to change.
The places where I inwardly gag are the places that I need to help make good and real again.
All I want for anyone who interacts with me, is to know, beyond a shadow of a doubt that they are loved. That what they have other people need.
And if all those people never set foot in a church; who cares.
If they know someone loves them, and that some believes beyond a shadow of a doubt that someone believes that they have things to give the world- that’s what matters to me.
If all I am is a picture that not all people go to church are judgmental and uncaring- that’s what matters to me.
That’s why I’m choosing to rebuild again.
It’s not to save anyone, it’s not to evangelize, it’s not shame anyone for not doing it.
It’s just to rebuild myself and my faith with the things I want to keep. It’s changing the narrative and the words and the tone.
It’s being a home for others when they need it.
A safe space.
And it’s recreating the things that brought me to the deconstruction and it’s making them be safe again as well.
So, I’ll just be here, still really hating women’s ministries, all religious language and anything that feels even an ounce like shame.
