On Not Being Who I Thought I'd Be By Now

Recently I've found myself thinking about my 18 year old self. 

To inspire me, I dug through some old pictures. Here is Kelsey, age 18. ------>
(Note: I look almost exactly the same today and have still never worn a baseball cap well.)

I've been questioning what 18 year old Kelsey would think of the way 24 year old Kelsey is currently living her life. Because 18 year old Kelsey had big plans for her life. She wanted to change the world and change the church and also somehow have gobs of time to spend with all of her friends who just happened to all live in her neighborhood.

But 18 year old Kelsey didn't have bills to pay. She'd never been told no. She only had to think in theory. Her biggest concern was changing her major - again and again and again.

I find myself - 24 year old Kelsey - caught in the middle of a contradiction. I want adventure, spontaneity, and to be completely uprooted, while I simultaneously desire security, groundedness, and continuity.

I want to move to a new state every year (which I've done for the last three consecutive years) and make new friends and have new, crazy adventures and I also want to own a home with a picket fence and a dog and never move again.

I want to address poverty and devote my life to 15 causes and protest bad stuff and get arrested for said protesting and I also want to curl up with my girlfriend every night and watch Modern Family or Scandal and go to bed at 10 p.m. - oh, and having a record probably wouldn't look good for finding a normal job.

I still have no idea what kind of grown up I want to be.

Eighteen year old Kelsey probably did not dream of this life but what did 18 year old Kelsey know? She didn't even know that the place I currently live (Michigan's upper peninsula) exists.

She hadn't learned yet how beautiful the world is, or that she'd find herself falling in love with mountains, oceans, and most recently, very large lakes. She had yet to discover her adventurous self, the one who - just two years later - would fly to the other side of the world and, among other highly adventurous activities, hitchhike across a mountain range.

Eighteen year old Kelsey, in all of her optimism, naivety, and youth, allowed herself be wired by the community around her into a lover of humanity (for which I will be forever thankful). Her number one fear was to settle for an unfulfilled life. Her greatest ambition was to hear the secrets of everyone she met. (That part hasn't changed at all, and I know more than she would have ever hoped.)

She was ignorant in her beliefs that change was easy, that other people would want to change too, and that people would always be around to ponder the big life questions with her. But she dared to see the potential of a better world.

She was ambitious in thought, but not always very practical. For instance, 18 year old Kelsey also once promised to never make a decision based on money, and let's be honest: that's just downright stupid.

I think she thought by now I'd have finally figured out a career (which I haven't), that I'd be finishing up grad school (which I haven't started yet), and ideally that I would have ended poverty by now, and if not today hopefully sometime next week. 

Sometimes I feel like I'm letting her down. Sometimes I feel like that wild ambition has gone to waste, that all those big ideas are sitting dormant now.

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I believe she would be critical of how much of a planner I've become, that she'd think I allow too little room for life's surprises. I think she would be excited about my amazing community, but wonder why I am spending so much time sitting down, letting life happen to me instead of throwing myself head first into the chaos.

And so maybe it's okay that 24 year old Kelsey is stuck with a naive, highly idealistic, and crazily optimistic 18 year old Kelsey's voice in my head, pushing me forward just when I'm ready to sit still for awhile.

When I think about the difference between myself today and myself six years ago, the thing 18 year old Kelsey did was dream bigger. She didn't do life much differently than I do, she was just totally determined that a better world was not just possible, that she could help bring it to fruition. I think 18 year old Kelsey would like to reach through the past into today and shake out the skepticism and cynicism that has slowly crept into my being.

And I believe that every now and then it's helpful for me to look at my life through her critical eye, wondering what she would say about the life I've chosen for myself.  And I have hope that one of these days I'll make her proud.



What would your 18 year old self say about the way you're living today? Is that voice helpful to you today?

I can't wait to hear your stories,
Kelsey

The Pain of Love...And Why We Want It So Much

Feel free to listen to this before, during, or after you read this post.  It's just a good old-fashioned love song :)

 

I struggled to think of something to write for this week’s post.  Seriously, no matter how hard I tried, I just couldn’t come up with something that would make a significant piece that would be worth writing...let alone reading.  But then, as I lay on my couch watching 27 Dresses it struck me…I could write about love.  I’ve written about love before, but that was more about loving everyone in a way that would keep us from being assholes to each other.  This time, I want to write about the one-on-one love (mostly romantic, though I am not discounting friendships and familial love by any means) that both fascinates and terrifies us…that drives us towards committing ourselves (whether for the rest of our lives, or for just the present moment) to another person.  I am writing this as someone who has never actually been in love, but has observed it enough to have some sort of understanding of how it works…I think. 

Love has actually been on my mind for a while now.  I have quite a few friends who are getting married, engaged, in serious relationships, or have reached a point in their lives where they are ready to intentionally search for a love in a way they hadn’t been before.  I’ve also been watching a lot of romantic comedies lately (I am currently unemployed and have a lot of time on my hands).  Now, I know that Hollywood’s depiction of love and romance is not always right…and not always healthy…but I think there is some truth in what is portrayed, at least as far as reflecting society’s obsession with love and finding love.  We sing about love, we write about love, we read about love, and we flock to see love portrayed on the big screen in various scenarios.  Love makes us laugh, cry, hurt, and feel more joy than we probably ever thought possible. 

Love can be impossible.

 

Sometimes, we scoff at love because we don’t want to seem squishy and sappy (as I write this, I find myself wincing at some of the sappiness that is leaking through…but we plunge ahead!).  We harden ourselves to it because our world is sometimes so cynical, there seems to be no room in it for love or the desire and hope for love.  We can have the wrong ideas and expectations of love, thinking that it’s supposed to be this force that makes us happy all the time, every day.  The reality, though, is that real love is oftentimes one of the most painful things we can ever experience.  Love is terrifying.  It makes us vulnerable and opens us up to a special kind of hurt that only that person who we give our love to is capable of inflicting on us.  We face heartbreak, hopelessness…and outright rejection.  Love can make you want to curl up into a little ball and never face the world again.  It can make you want to lock away your heart and never give it away, so that you never have to feel that kind of pain.

 

Complicated: Check.  Scary: Check.  Doesn't Always Go the Way You Hope: Double Check

 

For all the pain love can make us suffer, however, we still obsess over it.  As mentioned before, I just finished watching 27 Dresses before sitting down to write this post.  I love that movie for several reasons, but one reason is because it shows that sometimes you find love where you weren’t looking for it.  Love can be complicated, and I always appreciate movies that portray this.  I also watched Love Actually for the first time, and, well, I loved it (teehee).  I liked that it showed different kinds of love…and that not every couple ended up living happily ever after.  It’s closer to real life.  While I do love the stories where the couples overcome every obstacle to be together (I’m a hopeless romantic at heart), I recognize that that is not always the case.  Love can be gritty…and sometimes it can be hopeless.  Another movie I watched that reflects this is My Best Friend’s Wedding.  Sometimes, no matter how hard you try or how much you wish it, your love is not always returned and it does not always win.  It’s sometimes a harsh reality, but it doesn’t mean you give up on love.  You just can’t let the heartbreak stop the rest of your life from continuing on. 

 

Love isn't always where you think it will be.

 

Ultimately, though, love and being able to love is worth fighting for.  I don’t think any group of people demonstrates this better than the LGBTQ community.  I was lucky enough to have the opportunity to walk in the Boston Pride parade not that long ago, not as a member of the community myself, but as an ally who believes no one should have the authority to tell someone who they can love and what kind of person they’re “supposed” to be.  I think it is an amazing testament to the importance of love that people are willing to fight so hard for their love to be acknowledged as equally important and as worthwhile as others’.  I think we could all learn something from the LGBTQ community about the importance and commitment of love…because I think the rest of us too often take advantage of love and too easily throw it away.

Despite all of the pain and fear that love can throw into our lives, however, it is a truly beautiful thing.  To truly find love is to not settle for the shallow, feel-good love that ends when the honeymoon phase is over, but to strive for the kind of love that causes us nearly as much pain as joy, that gives us the courage to fight to keep it, to throw all of our cards in on the person we think we can make a real life with.  If you are lucky enough to find this kind of love, the love that meets the test of time, the kind of love where you lay everything you are out in the open for the other person to see, the kind of love you are willing to fight and work for…then you are the reason the rest of us keep hoping, keeping searching, and keep risking the pain on the off chance that we’ll also find that joy.  Love is never neat and clean, and it shouldn’t be.  That much emotion, that much dedication, should be something that challenges us every day and makes us grow as individuals and as couples.  I am not in love, and don’t think I can honestly say I have ever been in love…but it is something I hope for, and will continue to hope for.  Not everyone feels the same as I do, and that’s okay.  Love can come in all shapes and sizes, and people might not always want to find romantic love.  But I think it is one of our greatest capabilities as human beings, and despite what real life often shows me, I will always be secretly sappy and I will always cheer for, and hope for, love.              

A little treat for all those hopeless romantics out there (like me)...and because I watched this movie this week as well :)

 

With love,

Erin B.



 

Questioning Christianity

I call myself a questioning Christian.

I call myself a questioning Christian because I don’t know what else to call myself. I don’t have a label that fits. I’m not, “spiritual but not religious.” I’m not an atheist. I’m not agnostic. I believe in God most of the time. I think Jesus was a righteous dude (please hear this in the secretary’s voice from “Ferris Bueller’s Day Off”).

I don’t believe Christianity is the only way to what we call, “heaven.” I don’t know what happens to us when we die, though I am confident that it is good. I don’t believe in hell. I don’t believe that religion is what makes people good (or bad). I believe religion is imperfect because people are imperfect.

I love going to traditional services at church. I love going to Catholic and Lutheran services because they are grand and romantic and beautiful. I love that I will generally know what to say and when to say it. I love the repetition. I love being a part of something greater than myself. I love having a community.

.....

The reason I call myself a questioning Christian is because other Christians drive me crazy.

It drives me crazy when Christians spout hate in the name of, “loving the sinner, hating the sin.” It drives me crazy when Christians ban people from coming to church or when they make people feel unwelcome. It drives me crazy when Christians claim homosexuality is a sin, but fail to acknowledge that Leviticus 20:9 says that whoever cusses at their parents deserves death; that these Christians decide that one line in the Old Testament is enough proof to discriminate, but the rest of that chapter doesn’t apply.

It drives me crazy that Christians claim anti-Islamic hate, but conveniently forget about all the damage and death we have caused over the years. It drives me crazy when Christians are manipulative; when they pretend to be nice to get you to come to church with them, or to give them enough “bonus points” to get into heaven. It drives me crazy that even though the Bible tells us not to be judgmental, Christians are - without a doubt - the most judgmental people I know.

It drives me crazy when I hear about churches who brainwash their congregants; who tell them that the answers to their difficult life questions are easy, who give answers out like candy on Halloween and get angry or dismissive when students in Sunday school ask questions. When churches tell their members who to vote for, or what “issues” are important or not. When churches spread fear instead of love, or say that a neighbor church is too liberal or conservative.

When Christians pressure their friends to come to church with them and ostracize them if they chose not to. When Christians claim to be pro-life while ignoring everyone suffering outside of the womb, starving or unwanted. When Christians judge their own brothers and sisters in Christ for who they date, how they date, or how modest their clothes are. 

When Christians claim that their particular way is the only way. When Christians claim that Jesus said condoms are bad. When Christians cite Bible verses like rain drops in a storm, yet haven’t learned about the social context of the text and have no desire to. When I’m told that I am sinful for being educated on religious matters instead of rejoicing in ignorance.

I’ve been told that I’m not a Christian because I don’t believe the Bible is the literal Word of God, but a book written by human men who were inspired by God. I’ve been told I’m not a Christian because I don’t believe in Hell.

I have never told anyone that they were not a Christian.

Sometimes it seems like I agree with atheists and agnostics more than other Christians. Sometimes when Jake and I have religious discussions, he will say something negative about the Christian church, look over at me, and apologize. I tell him there’s no need to apologize. Whatever he’s said, I’ve thought about or said myself.

Through all of this, I don’t want to stop calling myself a Christian.

It’s not that I care what people will say or think if I said I was agnostic. My mom would be upset, but I have already forever disappointed her for loving pixie cuts better than long hair, so I’m sure she would get over it. I have a lot of Christian friends, but I also have a lot of friends who don’t believe in God at all.. I just really, really love The Church.

I love what The Church does for the poor. I love that The Church advocates for people who have nothing, who go hungry, who feel alone. I love reading the Old and New Testaments and finding something new each time I pick up the pages. I loved being a religion major and thinking critically about these things, not just accepting them as Truth and moving on. I love that the core of Christianity is radical love!

I love that the ELCA church embraces doubt and questioning, because without them, faith would be flimsy and weak. This church is the reason that I don’t worry about questioning my faith, because I know that every time I come back to it and say, “Yes, I am a Christian after all!” my faith has just become that must stronger than someone who has never doubted.

I love my friends who are Christians, because they remind me every day that although Christians (aka people) are imperfect, there are many Christians out in the world who do their best to be understanding and loving. I love that Erin Broich wrote about why she loves the Catholic church even when she doesn’t always agree with its practices or teachings. I love that when Erin Guzman was trying to decide on a denomination, she made a giant pro-con list on our wall. I love that Hannah is joyful about her faith, but is okay with questioning it. I love that Kelsey is thoughtful and curious about her faith and doesn’t judge me when I’m confused. I love everyone who went to RLC Worship last year on Wednesday nights and made me feel at home when I was fully prepared not to. I love that we hugged during the passing of the peace. I love that people of all backgrounds and faiths came to worship, and that I didn’t always agree with them.

I call myself a questioning Christian because I don’t know what else to call myself.

Maybe what fits me better is a hopeful Christian; someone who sees how imperfect and awful Christians can be, but also sees a light at the end of a tunnel. Even while I see Christians who are judgmental, ignorant and cruel, I similarly see Christians who are gentle, kind and loving and give me hope for the future of Our Church. I have hope that I will want to associate myself, unapologetically and without shame, with Christians again.

For now, I’m holding on by faith.

xo Madie

A Little Pocket of Hope

Sometimes the world sucks.  That’s just a fact of life.  And sometimes the world sucks so much that you are on the verge of losing all hope that there is anything in it that can give you any kind sense that humanity can do better.  You feel an almost bone-crushing despair at the state of the world and start to think, "What's the point?" when it comes to fighting for what you believe is right.  But then, something happens.  It can be a big something, like the Supreme Court finally hearing cases regarding same-sex marriage in the United States, acknowledging that this isn't something that is just going to go away, but is an issue of equality that cannot and should not be ignored.  Or, it can be something little, like the opening of a pregnancy center in a small town in Iowa that is actually trying to practices what it preaches about pro-life.  It’s the second hopeful something that I want to focus one in this post.  But before I actually begin, I have a confession to make.

I’m pro-life. 






Your reaction is probably:
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There, it's out there.  Now, before you jump on my case about feminist (which I do consider myself to be one) ideals and choices, let me actually explain what I mean when I say that I am pro-life.  What being pro-life means to me (and what I think it should mean for anyone who claims to be it) is that I am pro-guaranteeing a quality of life for everyone, which includes at least the basic comfort and needs of survival without question, as well as preserving lives.  Pro-life should not only mean anti-abortion, but should include being anti-death penalty and pro-affordable health care for all, whatever that looks like.  For me (personally) it also means being pro-contraception in order to offer a better quality of life for all people (but that is a whole issue in and of itself that I won’t get into here).  It should (for everyone again) also mean having a respect for all the lives around you, no matter the gender, race, religion, sexuality, or class, and working to bring about a world that isn’t going to ignore people when they cry out for help. 

Sadly for many, it seems being pro-life has been reduced to merely meaning anti-abortion.  Don’t get me wrong, I’m not pro-abortion, but I understand it as an unfortunate solution that has developed because of a much deeper problem within society.  That problem is how our society approaches sex and sexuality, and specifically when attaching it to women and women’s health.   Let’s be honest, when a U.S. Senator, an individual who is educated and in the public forum, makes a claim saying women can’t get pregnant through “legitimate rape”, you know something really fucked-up is going on.  That’s about the time society as a whole should look at itself and say, “Hmmm…this is a problem.  We should fix this.  Do we actually know what we are talking about anymore?”  When people say that women get abortions because they just don’t want the baby, period, they are straight up wrong.  Yes, some abortions happen for that reason, but some happen because of rape or health, and a lot more happen because a woman (usually a young one) makes a mistake.  She and her partner didn’t really understand how much complexity there is in having sex, and then she didn’t have the resources or the support to do anything but terminate the pregnancy because society just decided that, “Your mess, you fix it”.  So while I am not necessarily pro-abortion (and I honestly don’t think many of my strong, independent, pro-choice feminist female friends think that abortion, at its root, is a good thing), I am pro-let’s-actually-look-at-these-issues-bringing-women-fully-into-the-conversation-so-we-can-figure-out-what-really-needs-to-happen-in-our-society-so-that-this-doesn’t-need-to-be-an-option-and-oh-yeah-Jesus.

 

Oh no, she brought Jesus into it.  Yeah, I did.  I went there.  You want to know why?  Because this is an issue religious people tend to have a lot to say about.  I get it.  I’m religious, I care about the issue, and I have some stuff to say about it.  What often happens, though, is that Churches, religious organizations, and the people who are apart of them focus their pro-life beliefs only on being anti-abortion.  But the actual problem doesn’t go away when the abortion clinic shuts down.  If you’re going to preach it, you have got to be prepared with something else to offer instead.  That is why when I cracked open my paper from back home the other day (yes, I get my hometown paper…shut up), I was pleasantly surprised to find an article about the Cornerstone for Life Pregnancy Resource Center that has just recently opened.

It’s a small operation so far, but hopes to expand its network of care within the near future.  Currently, the center offers pregnancy tests and counseling, and is forming counseling ministry for those women who have had abortions and seek such an outlet for their feelings towards the decision.  They also hope to partner with an adoption center, which gave me a bit of personal happiness.  There are a lot more things this center hopes to accomplish as it grows, but what it is ultimately offering is a support system.  It is a place for women who are unexpectedly pregnant, and don’t necessarily want to have to go the abortion route, to go and be a part of a community of people they can relate to and receive support from.  While I don’t know every detail about the center, just its existence gives me hope.  It shows that there are people in the world who aren’t just looking for a band-aid solution, but recognize a need for much more intentional involvement in solving the bigger problem.  And they are doing it while maintaining their faith, by not just preaching it but by actually going out and acting on it in a way that could be beneficial to society at large.  I pray that more religious people and Churches who preach the message of pro-life can look to this example of active faith.  That through this relatively small thing our world can get just a little bit better…a little more hopeful.  Does it give you a little more hope?  Let me know what you think. 

Bye for now!
Erin B.