Tag Archives: growth

Spoonfed

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I’m going to tell you something I do not do very well.  But, only if you will not tell the other mothers.  Because I have listened to them talk and apparently I am the only one not very good at this.  Deal?

I am not good at helping my children learn to feed themselves.  I totally get in the way.  Let me explain.

Well, actually, there isn’t much about it to explain.

I do not like messes.

So, I feed my children…for too long.  I sit a bowl full of spaghetti in front of them and I get a little panicky.  I mean, have you ever found dried, crusted spaghetti noodles on the floor a week (or more?) later when you are cleaning?  And, what about the slimy greasy residue that is left on the plastic tray attached to the high chair?  And, then there is the highchair cover.  I did not realize you could take that thing off to clean it until my second child was two.  Wow.  That was amazing…what I found under it, I mean.

Never mind the fact that most of the food gets on the child and everything and everyone else…NOT in their mouth.  And, I mean, I am really also very concerned about my child’s dietary needs.  Seriously, I think that is the biggest reason I insist on feeding them well into their third year.

(Did I just write that?)

They need me.  They need me to spoon that mouthful of spaghetti straight into their teeny little mouth.  That way I KNOW where it goes.  There is no guesswork.

Right.

Let’s all be honest here.

I do not like the mess.

Walter Brueggemann is an Old Testament scholar (some would argue THE Old Testament scholar) who wrote a book entitled Spirituality of the Psalms.  Basically Brueggemann explores the three different types of psalms: psalms of orientation, psalms of disorientation, and psalms of reorientation.

In the psalms of orientation David reads like a brand new, just came back from the alter, Christian.  Everything is wonderful and so is his Lord.

In the psalms of disorientation we read David in some very, very dark times.  In some places he almost sounds suicidal.  He is depressed, has lost his hope, is beaten down, and wonders where God is.

Reorientation psalms are the psalms of a mature, been there and lived to tell about it, David.  His faith is strong.  Before, he had heard that his Lord was worthy of praise.  Now he KNOWS it.

David’s disorientation is messy.  It is uncomfortable to read…unless you are in the state of disorientation yourself.  Then reading these psalms can be very comforting.  Oh, so David…that guy about whom it says he was a man after God’s own heart…he had rough times, too.  Maybe I’ll be ok.  Maybe there is something normal, something ok about this dark place.  Maybe God is on the other side.

The truth is that God desires for us to have the reorientation faith…a faith that is strong and KNOWS…not just because someone else told us so…but, because we have learned for ourselves…that God is.  He is there.  He is our Healer.  He is our Comforter.  He is our Savior.  He IS.  No longer are we fed milk.  We EAT…solid food (1 Corinthians 3:2)

Here’s the thing.  As a whole, our culture, our society is not very good with this disorientation stage.  As a CHURCH we are not very good with this disorientation stage.

And, let’s be honest.

We do not like the mess.

We do not like the questions, the doubt, the challenges.  We see that bowl full of slippery wonderings and pushing and pullings and we pick up that spoon full of faith and we do our best to deliver it straight into the mouth of our disoriented people.

I mean, they need us to spoon that mouthful of ideas straight into their teeny little mouth.  That way we KNOW where it is going.  There is no guesswork.

The only problem is that when we don’t allow people to sit in that messy stage of disorientation, when we try to push them forward or pull them back into the safe, cozy, feel-good baby faith of orientation, they never learn to feed themselves.  They never grow the skills and spiritual muscles they need to make their faith their own.

Disorientation is dark and scary.  It often takes place during the course of a normal life transition, such as the one from adolescence to adulthood.  It can also take place when someone loses someone or something precious in their life through death, divorce, or some other loss.  And that’s when I’ll hear these words.  In fact, maybe I’ll even say them myself: “She is doing ok.  She is being very strong.”  I’ll tell you what.  I understand when a person describes a grieving, disoriented person as strong about as much as I understand when a person says that a baby is “good”.

How is a baby “good”?  Do they intentionally go to sleep when told?  Do they nurse on command because they are such good little listeners?  What?  No!  Babies are just babies.  They just…are!

Likewise, people grieve.  They question.  They go through their disorientation.  They just DO.  There is no strong or weak to it.  In fact, if I see a person who looks like they are perfect in the midst of disorientation I am a little concerned.  What does being strong look like here?  Is it being strong enough to cry and throw yourself at the feet of your Savior with your questions and doubts and fears (which can and often does happen in secret) or is it smiling and assuring everyone that you are doing just great?

I’ll tell you what else.  As a church we LOSE people in this disorientation phase.  This is when we lose them.  This is when they walk out our doors.  Is it because they don’t want to believe in God anymore or be committed to a faith community?  I don’t think so.  I think it is because we do not make adequate room for their questions, for their doubts, for their messy process of learning to feed themselves.

I think we do this with sexuality, too.  Liberals and conservatives are both great at this…this pushing people out of disorientation.  Conservatives are scared to death of anyone needing to ask questions and process about their sexuality and so they make a little box and make it clear that you can only stay in this box or, or…well, I guess all hell will break out.  Liberals are scared to death of anyone needing to ask questions and process about their sexuality and want a person to go ahead and “come out” and admit to being one way or another and THEY force a person into a box, making it clear that they just need to go ahead and get in the box or else…well, I guess all hell will break out in that scenario, too.  No room for a world without boxes…no room for questions, for wonderings, for processing, for disorientation.

I remember being in graduate school in California and spending time with a panel of LGBT folk who were sharing their stories.  One girl was fifteen years old and I listened as she told us how she finally figured out that she was bisexual or gay.  It was because she always wore cargo pants and people told her that girls don’t wear cargo pants.

I wanted to pull my hair out.  I don’t know who told this precious girl that girls do not wear cargo pants, but somewhere in her journey, because they gave her a box that she had to be in, when she faced her disorientation, they pretty much made up her mind for her.  Here’s the box.  Jump on in.  That disorientation place is an uncomfortable place.  Whether it is forward or backward…just jump.  Whether we are conservative or liberal, once you jump into the box, then we know what to do with you.  In the dark and scary place of not knowing we get a little panicky.  So help us all out and just jump…good or bad.

Spoonfed.  Sometimes what we are feeding is toxic.

The truth is that God is in the messiness.  He hovers over the darkness, the void, the formless (Genesis 1:2).  It is out of this messiness, this void, this apparent nothingness that He creates.  And, what a Creator He is.

I love working with young adults in their twenties.  It is messy and wild with questions and doubts and the start-of-life anxieties.  A young person will often get so anxious about their doubts and questions and they can go in one of two directions…they choose one of two boxes.  They can become self-flagellating, believing their doubts and questions as a sign of their lack of faith, OR they try the “throw it to the wind” approach and become a hellion.  They don’t understand anything so why try?  It is just too much to figure it all out and they want it figured out.  It is too much to sit in that middle, wondering place.  More than likely they will vacillate between these two options.   Both choices are the result of a lack of tolerance for the disorientation…the messiness of learning to feed yourself.

I will often share this Brueggemann idea with them.  If they are Christians I will share the idea from the Psalms, too.  I might also talk about James Fowler and his stages of faith and about how this stage four faith is messy.  It is challenging.  It is hard.  It is full of questions, doubts, skepticism.  And, you have to go through it.  It is NORMAL to go through it…if you want deep faith…a faith that is strong and KNOWS…not just because someone else told you so…but, because you have learned for yourself…that God is.  He is there.  He is our Healer.  He is our Comforter.  He is our Savior.  He IS.  No longer will you be fed milk.  You aren’t willing to tolerate that anymore.  You want to EAT…solid food (1 Corinthians 3:2).

So, the other day my two and a half year old son was eating ravioli.  He usually sits by himself in his chair, but this day he wanted to sit in my lap and I was just fine with that.  I love his soft, warm, little boy body and how he turns around every few minutes to laugh and giggle at me and say “mama!” just because he loves me so very much.  So, I was holding him and I picked up his spoon because he wasn’t eating and I wanted him to get a good meal in his belly before he took a nap…a long nap.  He took the spoon away from me and said: “I wanna feed myself, mama.”

As I watched him sloppily and awkwardly use his spoon to pick up a single ravioli noodle I forced myself to watch and pray…that he didn’t spill it on this shirt or let it slide down on the cloth place mat or down the chair legs on to the carpet covering our hardwood floors.  I smiled and prayed and watched, holding my sweet boy the whole time, and there it went…straight into his mouth.  No spillage. No mess.

But, you know what?  Would it have been that big of a deal if it had fallen on his shirt or the placemat or the carpet?  It would have been nothing that a little detergent and scrubbing could not have resolved.  And, we would have been together through the process and he probably would have learned something…about being careful, about what happens when you spill something.

So, if I ever were to have another child, maybe I will get better at this self-feeding thing.  Maybe I will make room for more messes, for more trying, for having more fun through it all.  It sure does make for some cute pictures and memories…those cheeks covered in sauce.  And, if there are no more babies in my future, perhaps I will get better at letting my children feed themselves in other ways.  I hope and pray I can get out of God’s way, while still staying close through the process, so that He can be Creator in their lives…the Creator that hovers over the deep, the formless, the void…the Creator that creates out of darkness, out of disorientation.

And, maybe as a church we will get better with this, too…this making room for the disorientation, for God’s work in the darkness.  Maybe we will stop getting so panicky.  Maybe we’ll trust that God is in control and not us.  Maybe out of that trust we can learn to sit and hold people when they are learning to self-feed and if they spill things along the way and make a big mess, we can help them clean that up, too.

Herding Cats and Butterflies

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At least a few and more often several times a day I beckon my group towards to the front door with the goal of venturing outside.  Here is what happens.  As we approach the front door from various directions in the house, one daughter will dart back towards their room: “I need to get…” , which reminds the other daughter that she has forgotten something vitally important, too.  Emmett takes this as an opportunity to just run…anywhere.  We seem to almost make it again…”mommy, I’m thirsty.  I want to take something with me to drink.”  “Me, too!”  Emmett runs again…maybe to look for his sippy cup.  This process happens a few times.

Herding cats is what I call it.  A friend of mine who has more children calls it herding butterflies.  That sounds so pretty.  Herding butterflies.  My experience is that the cries and screeches and screams that often accompany the herding warrants the feline characterization over the quiet, pretty flitters of butterflies.

I would like to say that it is only my children who contribute to this dynamic and not include myself in this picture, but that would be dishonest.  More times than not all three children will be converging at the door to only hear their mommy cry out: “Oh, my phone! (or my keys! Or my sunglasses! Or…!)  I am one of the cats, too.

We all finally get to the front door and I wait for the three of them to file outside.  It is at this point that something I have grown to both expect and be exasperated by always happens.  They stop.  Or, one stops, in the front with the door half-way open.

Just stops.

Whichever child it is seems to be in deep thought with absolutely no care that there are three people waiting on him or her to move forward.  Staring off at who knows what.  Umm, I’m not sure if you are aware of this or not, but we are all waiting on you to go ahead so we can leave.  The door is open.  We are letting the cool air out and the bugs in.  Oh!  Ok.  And, finally we make it out the door.  Through the threshold.  Sigh.  Phew.  Alright.  I think we might make it on time.  Maybe.

When Jon and I moved to Prague, which ironically enough means “threshold” or “doorway” in Czech, we learned a lot about ourselves.  We learned that I get the grieving, the messy crying, the dear-God-what-have-we-done transition stuff over at the beginning.  I stare culture shock down, playing both truth and dare with it…telling the truth about how much it hurts and daring it to take over my life too much, too long.  Jon, thank God, goes into survival mode as soon as we get there.  His comes later.  My wrestling at that time may have had to do with the fact that I had a 20 month old and was 4 months pregnant getting ready to give birth in a foreign country.  Maybe.  I tend to think it had more to do with me and who I am and how I handle doorways.

Doorways bring out odd behavior.  Change is hard.  Even if the grass is, indeed, greener on the other side of that door, it doesn’t matter…doorways are difficult to go through.  Sometimes the change is a wonderful, wonderful thing…full of opportunities and a new, grand world.  Sometimes the change is very, very hard.  It isn’t welcomed at all.  We are being pushed out and not given the chance to walk out on our own.  Either way, good or bad, the change itself is a challenge

Doorways are often what bring clients into my office.  They tell me they are anxious and depressed and can I fix them, can I tell them what is wrong?  What is my plan?  Where is my magic wand?  In the first session I make sure I tell them two very important things: I do not have a magic wand and the process is usually more of a crockpot than a microwave.  Even though we know that food in the crockpot usually tastes better, we so desperately want or hurriedly resort to the microwave.

Not too long into the first session I ask about what has been going on in life for them lately.  Any major changes the last year or so?  Oh, well, sure, I changed jobs or I had a baby or I graduated from school or I moved or…or just any one of these incredibly MAJOR life things.  But, I shouldn’t be bothered by that.  I mean, I should be over that.  I should, I should, I should.

Of course, there are a lot of things we “should” do.  We “should” all love one another and be kind and pay our tithes and taxes, but the “should’s” we tell ourselves are rarely these things.  If I COULD I WOULD strike SHOULD from our vocabulary.

Somewhere we have lost sight of how important, how significant, how challenging doorways can be.  We go a little crazy trying to get out the door and don’t make any connection at all between the doorway and our behavior and feelings.  We make no connection between our anxiety and our blues and our struggles and our acting out with the threshold we are crossing over.

I have been facing a doorway the past six months or so.  I’m not moving across the country or even to another state.  But, because its life and life has doorway after doorway, threshold after threshold, I am facing some changes in my professional and personal life again.  It is all wonderful, wonderful things, full of opportunity and a new, grand world.  And, because I know me and I know how people tend to handle doorways, I have been watching myself.  I’ve watched me run after the “what if’s”.  I’ve watched me cry out: “I think I still need…”  And, I’ve watched me stand, with the door open, waiting, not realizing that I am letting the cold air out and the bugs in.

A few weeks ago at church, I was standing in this doorway, letting the cold air out and the bugs in, and I got a clear message: “I’m not sure if you realize this or not, but you’ve been standing in this doorway, frozen with anxiety while I am waiting on you.  The door is open. Time to go on out.  It isn’t what is on the other side that is wrong and hard on you or your family.  It is your indecision and anxiety.  You’ve been standing here long enough.  Time to walk on out.”

I’ve learned to accept and to be ok with the fact that I run after things on the way out the door.  I am even ok with the fact that I, like my children, stand in the doorway for a while, staring off at who knows what.  If we find ourselves anxious, it can be helpful to look around and realize that maybe we are running and standing and staring because we are at a doorway.  Once we realize the significance of even small doorways in life…that come over and over and over again…we can understand and be patient with our running and standing and staring.  We can stare our own little culture shocks down, telling the truth about how hard change is and daring the change to take over for too much, too long.  We can run and stand and stare…and then walk on through.

Emails, Apologies, and Corrective Experiences

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I attended graduate school at an enchanting little place called Fresno Pacific University in California.  The school’s Mennonite roots reach their ideology of peace throughout their curriculum.  I’m not talking about “stick-your-head-in-the-sand” kind of peace.  I’m talking about the “let’s-face-one-another, wrestle, and-learn-to-live-together-in-spite-of-our differences”, hard, honest, and sometimes messy kind of peace.  I became a wife and then a mother in this environment, navigating two of the more challenging albeit joyful transitions of life in the arms of this tiny community.

My professors were strong, smart, and gentle men and women.  Their commitment to training good therapists who were also Christians was expressed in how the form of the education matched the content.  They lead by example, asking us hard questions about ethics, practice, and theology.  As long as we were seeing clients in our practicum, we were required to be in our own therapy with a well-trained therapist.  They gently and firmly stretched us and sometimes I fought it.

One professor, Dr. Rose, was more gruff than gentle and made our knees tremble a little as we approached his class, the capstone of our graduate experience. He was a clinical psychologist who taught our practicum class, that class that oversaw our first workings with clients.  Each week a student’s name was drawn out of a hat to be the one who presented a case from their client load.  Afterwards, Dr. Rose would drill the poor student on what could have been done differently…the whole time with a straight face and deep sighs.  It was a nerve-racking experience.

I started these classes with Dr. Rose when I was 8 months pregnant.  I was heading into a semester with a full load of classes, seeing clients for the first time, on the verge of becoming a mother.

You are absolutely right.  I had no idea what I was doing.

In one of the first classes, I took the plunge and decided to answer a question Dr. Rose posed for us eager beaver, wet behind the ears, clinicians.  My answer got a stinging response from him.  Apparently, I was an idiot.

I was tired and overwhelmed in every possible way.  I was thousands of miles away from home and confused about what my life was about to look like as a new mother and here this, this, this BARBARIAN dared to embarrass me publically.  What I experienced as condemnation in front of my classmates was just a little too much for me.  My blood froze and I didn’t hear anything else in class that day.

When I got home the ice in my blood had thawed, heated, boiled, and then turned to electricity running through my veins. I had to do something.  I was hurt and angry and embarrassed.  I could not believe he had ridiculed me like that in front of the entire class.  He was a bully.  I had to stand up to him.  I couldn’t let him get away with this.  Something had to be done.  For the sake of future students, of course.

So I wrote him a letter.  Well, an email.

I can’t remember what I said to Dr. Rose in that email and I am glad I cannot.  I spewed all over that computer screen, all of the exhaustion, hurt, and confusion hurling out like the screams of a woman giving birth.  Then I hit “send”.

Immediately, I was stricken with fear.  What had I done?  Good God, what would happen now?  How would I go back to class?  What would he say?  And, what’s worse, what if he said nothing?

I stepped into class the next week with a woozy stomach that had nothing to do with expecting a baby.  I was afraid to glance towards Dr. Rose.  I thought I would pass out with shame.  Why had I not just let the whole thing go?

As Dr. Rose opened up class, my heart was beating hard.  He said he needed to say something before we did anything else.  He looked at me.  Oh, God.

He said, simply: “I was wrong to talk to Emily like I did last week.  I owe her an apology.”

I was stunned and felt incredibly vulnerable.  I wanted the moment to be over.  I thought it would feel good to get an apology, but accepting the apology was as painful as experiencing the offense.  I had expected a stony silent treatment and weeks of walking on eggshells with him.  I had not expected a simple, honest, straight forward apology.

He never mentioned the email.  He never brought it up again.  We both put it behind us.  He didn’t treat me differently.  He was still gruff and serious and firm about us being clinically sound therapists.

But, when I broke down in tears 8 weeks after having my first child in the middle of my program and wanted to quit, he and another professor was there with me.  He made room for the messy birthing of a new mother and a new therapist.  He gave me room to quit and then room to try again, never telling me what to do…he was just there.

Dr. Rose introduced me to some of my all time favorite books and authors, including Anne Lamott with her book Operating Instructions, which helped me realize I was, in fact, NOT the craziest mother on the planet.  And, when I had my “discernment” meeting, which was a requirement before a student graduated, I invited him as one of my professors.  He accepted.  In the sacred space of that meeting, he expressed concern about me finding room to be myself while also being a minister’s spouse and a therapist, two difficult identities in their own right.

And, then I sat down in the midst of peers and professors with my husband at my side and this barbarian, this bully, prayed over me as I finished my journey at that school.

This is what I think. I think that Dr. Rose is not a barbarian.  I think he isn’t a bully either.  Maybe he was rude to me that night and maybe I did deserve the apology.  But, I think Dr. Rose knew that the email I hurled at him had way more to do with me than with him.

Something shifted in me that day when he apologized and didn’t punish me for my anger.  It was what some therapists call a “corrective emotional experience”.

As a professor and as a therapist I am often in complicated, hard discussions with hurting, even angry, people.  When students write me angry emails about a grade or if a client gets hurt in a session over something we have discussed, I take a deep breath, and model Dr. Rose (the barbarian).  I don’t react to their anger or hurt.  I let them feel that way.  I acknowledge it.  I try to help them determine the cause or problem.  If I had a role in the situation I apologize sincerely and directly. I remember that this anger, this hurt has way more to do with them than with me.

I am better at applying this technique with students and clients because I am not in a long term, day to day relationship with them.  But, I wonder…what would happen if we all tried to do this…offered people corrective emotional experiences.  I wonder what would happen if we all took time to acknowledge hurt and anger, help to determine the cause, apologize if we have a part in it.  Sincerely.  Directly.  No laughing.  No qualification.  No jokes.  No sarcasm.  I apologize for doing that.  I was wrong.  I am sorry.

Then we move on.  We can love and be loved and not have to dance around issues and pain.

It reminds me of John 3:30.  John said of himself and Jesus: “He must increase.  I must decrease.”

I, and my own tendency to react and lash out because of my own defensive, self-righteous indignation and need to defend, must decrease and He, with all of His love, patience, healing must increase in this person’s life right now in this moment, in this anger, in this hurt.  I can be part of that.  If I choose to let go of my own need to be right or in control or whatever else causes us to react in anger or turn to stone and silent treatments when someone expresses anger towards us.

This is not easy, mind you.  It takes a willingness to be aware of our own wounds because often the reason we react to a person’s anger, hurt, or snubbing is because the other person’s anger, hurt, or snubbing has grazed over a tender spot of our own.  You know what happens when a person’s wound is touched.  You react.  You jump.  You pull back.  You cry out.

So, the next time a person in my life gets angry or hurt or snubs me, instead of defending myself, I want to listen.  I want to make room.  I want to decrease.  I want His love to increase.  Which is patient.  Kind.  Not easily angered.  Not self-seeking.  Keeps no record of wrongs.  Never gives up.  On him.  On her.  Or on me.