Tag Archives: writing

Apr7

The Spiritual Journey

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Do I have enough journals to serve me for years in advance? Yes. Do I still love to get journals from friends as gifts? Yes. Do I still look at journals when I’m out shopping? Yes. And do I still buy journals for myself? Yes, I do. So, now that I’ve confessed all that, I’ll tell you about my latest journal shopping. I was in Walgreens to pick up meds, and they actually have a pretty good journal section. I came face to face with one that said, “My Spiritual Journey.” My immediate thought was “my spiritual journey won’t fit inside that journal.” While the inside of the journal itself contained a useful guide for daily scripture reading, thoughts, and prayers, I remained stuck on how our spiritual journeys are anything but simple. 

As is often the case, my focus on a word led me to look up the definition. Journey is defined as “something suggesting travel or passage from one place to another” or “an act or instance of traveling from one place to another” (merriam-webster.com). Perhaps it’s the phrase, “from one place to another” that sometimes throws us off kilter when it comes to a spiritual journey. We are so concerned about progress and goals and success in our world that we try to apply those standards to our spiritual lives as well. But measuring progress in spiritual terms is not easy, if not impossible. 

All of the classic travel metaphors apply. At times, we find ourselves in the spiritual wilderness, feeling scared and lost, unable to find our way out of the struggle. Sometimes, in the desert, feeling far from God and abandoned, thirsting for spiritual replenishment but finding none. We may feel like we’re drowning in doubts or that God is not helping us through life’s storms. Occasionally, we may find ourselves on a mountaintop when we feel we’ve had an aha spiritual moment.

Yet, we spend most of our time living in the ordinary, everyday. We can find contentment in the normal rhythms of life. We can make steady progress in our spiritual journey when we pray, worship, and gather in communities. But that can feel stagnant at times too. We may feel as though we’re doing nothing because nothing is “happening.” It’s not like we arrive at a destination so that we can say our journey is complete. We don’t get a promotion or a raise to show our faith has increased. We don’t even get gold stars. 

Many years ago, I struggled with the fact that I did not fully trust God. I just kept thinking if I could only trust God with all my heart and mind, everything would be okay. I thought if I could trust God completely then all would be well, and I would escape worry and anxiety. Then one day, I realized I’m never going to trust God completely without doubt. It just wasn’t going to happen, particularly given my personality. All of a sudden, I knew that my goal was to trust God more and more every day as I matured in my faith, but that I would never feel like I’d completely made it and accomplished my goal. In that moment though, I felt such relief. My spiritual journey was not something to check off a list when complete. It would never end. It would always be ongoing. And there would be good and bad times. 

I’ve filled many journals with prayers and joys and anxieties and anguish. I’ll continue to write my thoughts and feelings down in the journals I have and the ones I will acquire later. Our spiritual journeys are long and winding and can fill volumes, and God is with us the entire way. 

Mar11

Taking the Heavy Backpack Off

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My kids’ school backpacks are heavy. I strain when I pick up the backpacks to move them from one place to another in our house. They carry them every day, all day at school. While they have lockers in their music and athletic classes for their instruments and gym clothes, they no longer use lockers like we did back in the day. They don’t carry heavy textbooks anymore either, but they do carry their computers, binders, notebooks, papers, lunchboxes, and water bottles. They don’t have anywhere else to put the materials they aren’t using in the moment. Everything is in the backpack.

When my twenty-year-old daughter Riley started middle school in 2015, she was so excited to have a locker and shopped to decorate it with shelves and mirrors and pictures. This was such a big deal amongst sixth grade girls that it almost felt like a competition to see who could have the most elaborate or cutest locker. I drew the line at locker safe wallpaper or a locker chandelier. Her locker decorating desire waned as she got older, but when Covid hit, lockers were eliminated to limit close contact and the spread of the virus. The students no longer hung out by the lockers or touched the locker doors constantly. But after they returned to school fully, the lockers did not come back into use. I assume it became one less thing for school administrators to monitor for prohibited paraphernalia, and that was fine with them. And that may be the correct call, but the result is that four years later, the kids carry their school lives on their backs. 

We’ve all heard about the baggage we carry from the past into the present. We often speak of that baggage with respect to our current relationships and how the past colors the now. Or how we sabotage ourselves today with the failures from yesterday. Baggage sounds big though – like we have a roller bag, roomy suitcase, or steamer trunk full of old problems that burden us still. But the backpack symbolizes the everyday to me. The daily worries and tasks that seem never ending. The logistics of schedules that are too crowded and busy. The anxieties about whether all our people are okay. The stress of the regular routine and the dizziness that comes when those routines are disrupted. 

I think we’re all carrying heavy backpacks. And we don’t have lockers in which we can place some of our obligations temporarily. Put some things away and take them out when we are ready to deal with them. There are no shelves in cute, decorated spaces so that we can compartmentalize our issues. I’ve known people who say they can compartmentalize, but I’ve never seen anyone do it well in reality.   

The only time my kids can put their backpacks down at school is when they are sitting in class or sitting at lunch. And they take them off when they get home. I wonder if we can take a cue from them. Even if we must carry the heaviness of life during most of the day, can we put it down for a while when we sit to have a conversation with a friend or when we take a break to rest? Can we make our homes into sanctuaries where everyone can throw off their burdens for a while? If we keep in mind that everyone is carrying their heavy backpacks, perhaps we can invite them to sit with us to lessen the strain even if only for a few minutes. And when they put their backpacks down to sit with us, we get to put ours down too. 

Jan29

That’s My Boy

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My eleven-year-old son Alex is playing basketball through the YMCA this winter. A couple of weeks ago, his coach was sick and asked for volunteers to help out. It just so happened that my oldest son Jed was available to attend the game and decided to coach. Alex was thrilled at the prospect of his 6’5” tall, big brother who plays high school varsity basketball acting as his coach. Ben and I watched as Jed walked the kids through some warmups and then encouraged them during the game. Ben noted that Jed’s skills as a camp counselor were coming out in addition to his basketball talents. 

After the game was over, a father approached Jed. He said that his older son was an athlete who excelled in every sport while his younger son who was on Alex’s team was not as athletic. He then said that Jed was the first coach in any sporting situation that had looked his son in the eye and told him he’d done a good job. The father thanked Jed and told him that his son would remember that. I watched as the dad and Jed shook hands and tried not to tear up. That’s my boy, I thought. Except this week, that boy will be recognized at his senior basketball night and turns eighteen on the same day, becoming a man. One whom I admire and respect. 

Most people who know our family know about Jed’s basketball prowess. He’s been playing basketball since he was tiny.  As parents, we said we weren’t going to force sports onto our kids, but Jed has always been drawn to basketball. Thankfully, he grew into a big guy with talent who worked hard and stayed disciplined to excel at his chosen sport. But what many people may not know is that Jed is an outstanding student who knows almost everything there is to know about politics and history. He’s been soaking in those areas of study from the time he was in elementary school and can have deep conversations about the past and the future of our country and the world. 

And most people don’t know that he wrote his major college essay about his experience as a member of the Pastor Nominating Committee at our Presbyterian church. For a year, he served as the youngest member of the committee elected by our church to find our current pastor after an in-depth process of discernment and an exhaustive search. He was dedicated to his role and determined to do his best to find the pastor that could lead our church into the future. He proved he is a serious person who cares deeply about his community. 

On Saturday, Jed was able to attend Alex’s next game, this time as a fan in the stands. After the game, Jed found the boy whose father had talked to him the week before. Jed talked to him for a couple of minutes, and I watched as the kid wrapped his arm around Jed’s waist for a hug. Jed is a good man who will continue to nurture and support those around him. He will change the world, whether it’s the world at large or a little kid’s world. But no matter what, I will always be proud to say, “that’s my boy.”  

Jan22

Twenty Years a Parent

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Several of our friends have recently welcomed babies into their lives. A couple of them are brand new grandparents. Others are younger couples experiencing parenthood for the first time. Add to that my daughter Riley turning twenty years old this month, and I’ve found myself reflecting on parenthood quite a bit. If I’d been employed at a business for twenty years, I would get a plaque or paperweight in recognition. But as a parent, success is harder to determine. 

Twenty years is a long time to do one job. As in any role, I’ve learned a lot. I’ve changed a lot. And the position was very different than what I expected. If on day one of parenthood, someone had shown me who I’d be as a twenty-year parent, I would’ve been surprised and disbelieving for many reasons. Honestly, way back at the start, I thought my children would be a lot like me as a child: fairly docile, shy, and compliant. Anyone who knows my family knows that is not a description of any of my children. Instead, they’re fun, loud, and irreverent. They’re super smart and opinionated. They’re very different from one another and yet share many of the same familial traits. They’re kind and care about others. They are real, authentic, and genuinely themselves. For a minute on this journey, I tried to blame my husband Ben for one of the children’s stubborn behaviors. I thought I was paying for something he’d done in his childhood. Then, one day during that child’s rant about the unfairness of his world, I realized I was looking in a mirror. He’d inherited his need to rail against injustices from me. Ultimately, I wish I’d been more like them when I was younger. But I hope that my evolution as a person has benefited them. Becoming more flexible and open has allowed me to parent them in ways I couldn’t have foreseen twenty years ago. 

Not that it’s been easy to relinquish my controlling nature at times. Riley and I spent her entire junior year of high school at odds over who should be in charge of her life. I thought if she would just do what I told her to do, how I told her to do it, she could proceed with less heartache, less pain, more happiness. Ben continually reminded me that Riley was not me. That Riley was raised in a different time and place and that her experiences were not mine. I knew that intellectually. And yet, it was so hard for me to accept. My desire to protect her and keep her safe overwhelmed me and proved difficult to moderate. Both Riley and I learned so much that year about one another and how to be in relationship with each other as she matured and asserted her independence. I learned that I still had a role to play in her emotional and social development, but the way I went about it was important. My expectations about that stage of parenthood were idealistic and ultimately unrealistic, but we survived and have a deeper and more fulfilling relationship now. Adapting may not be easy for me, but when it comes to my kids, I’m determined to eventually find my way. 

It’s strange to think that when the newborns we know reach the age of twenty, Riley will be forty! And if I’ve learned anything, it’s that time really does feel like it goes by in the blink of an eye. I’m looking forward to the next twenty plus years and the privilege of watching my kids grow into the adults they will become. And I know that I’ll continue to change as well. I can’t wait.