Category: sharing my story

Voiceless

/ Lanae / 1 Comment Featured

Voiceless
On some things
I feel
my voice is
silence
silenced?
Silence my voice
voice my silence

Sometimes
silence
is the voice of grace
grace the voice
in silence
Is silence sometimes
the greater grace?

I’m not sure what sense this little collection of words makes, and I’m not even sure what I’m trying to say.
What I know is this: I’m feeling voiceless, and from my voiceless feeling comes the question, Is silence sometimes the greater grace? Or, when is silence the greater grace?

Why am I feeling voiceless?
Because in the matter of traumatic sexual experiences, I too have a story/stories. One I can tell, one(s) I cannot.

My first sexual experience with a woman – really, my first true sexual experience – involved deceit, manipulation, and a lack of consent. 21 and I had never been drunk before, but a couple coworkers thought being 21 should be celebrated. One of them took me to her home later. The experience itself was unsettling in its emptiness, but it was the aftermath of harassment that was truly chilling – having the two of them confront me at work “We knew you were gay, you can’t hide it,” the two of them waiting for me outside my apartment when I got off work at 3 am, or the time I came home to find the yard decorated with toilet paper and apparently stolen road signs. It felt evil.

It also left me wondering, what does a consensual, joyful, soulful sexual experience feel like? Will I ever know?
When I went into celibate ministry later, I figured I’d never know and that would be okay.

But there’s another story, too.

It’s not that I lack courage to tell this story. I do have a voice, I know my voice, and I have lifted my voice to share other parts of my story – spirituality, sexuality, identity, the journey toward becoming a whole, beloved person.
There are other parts of my whole story I have left in silence, especially aspects of distressing sexual experiences – at least online silence. Because is it always the highest good, the most right thing, to bare deeply intimate things to the light of the [online] world? Does it always help with healing? No …
Do I entirely feel the liberty to share those intimate bits of my story, which is intermingled with another’s story, and in considering reverberations it could bring into my life or my children’s life? No …
But – do I want to be heard? Yes, absolutely.
And I have been heard. Heard by friends, heard in private conversations. Heard in even the stillness of my meditations  – the Spirit has heard me. And so there has been healing.

The main reason I’m writing is for myself, to process my thoughts and feelings, to wrestle with nuances. Perhaps another reason I’m writing is to put a little light on why some stories may not get told, some voices remain silent, or why this silence is sometimes a valid choice. These things deserve voice and understanding too …

All the stories and experiences matter. All the voices matter; all our voices matter!

I do think it’s important to consider that there are many forms and contexts in which traumatizing sexual experiences can occur, and there are demoralizing, dehumanizing sexual experiences women – anyone – go through that may not necessarily arise to the level of criminality or legal reckoning. That doesn’t mean there isn’t, or shouldn’t be, a spiritual, social, or moral reckoning of some kind.

Perhaps these experiences could or should be called assault or rape; perhaps in the technical legal definition, some would be considered neither rape nor assault. But where there was not consent, or consent was coerced, what should it be called? These experiences fall into a psychologically – as well as physically and physiologically – valid experience of being raped, feeling and being deeply, humiliatingly violated and intimately disrespected. Emotionally and spiritually raped.

All the stories and experiences matter!

All the voices matter, whether they roar or whisper, or are veiled in a fierce silence of grace or a fearful, shamed silence.

And sometimes, perhaps there’s genuinely a lack of intent to have caused someone to feel sexually degraded or demoralized, or a terrible awakening and striking pain when realizing this has been the other person’s experience. Lack of intention, lack of awareness, does not absolve the need for accountability, however, in whatever form.  In my situation, something about understanding this lack of intention has absolved me from carrying the weight of blame and shame, and created space for compassion (and self-compassion) that has ultimately been so healing for me.

To return to the question, I think sometimes [public] silence can be an act of grace that preserves peace in interactions that must continue – I feel that way for myself, anyway. Yet, while it’s okay for me to be [publically] silent about this piece of my story, and valid for me to feel that this kind of silence is grace in my experience, I feel that the greater grace in general now is the breaking of the silence, the outpouring of stories, the undoing of shame.

Indeed, it is well beyond the time for silence on sexual violence and the structures that enable it to be broken, the time for things that have been hidden, cloaked in unjust shame, to be unveiled – truths should be seen and heard and known. For the sake of women and the sake of all human beings who have experienced sexual violence.

After all, does change ever happen without stories, uplifted voices, narrating it?

But yet – though it’s okay to choose privacy on pieces of my story, and let others speak who can speak freely and whom the Spirit is moving to speak –
Something in me still feels voiceless. But at least I’ve given the voiceless feeling I’ve struggled with a voice here … it helps.
It’s been sharply uncomfortable. I want to have a voice, and I want it to roar and be heard, with fierce grace and belovedness!

But it helps to remember that I’m not truly voiceless … because my voice is joined with my sisters’ voices. And their voices are rising strong, perhaps shaking and perhaps with tears, but rising strong.
My spirit is joined with their spirit, our collective spirit rising strong – Spirit rising strong through us, through many.

Together, we all rise.

 

Anniversary and rebirth

/ Lanae / Leave a comment Featured

We human beings  have a pattern of limning our lives, our stories, with anniversary. Rituals of return and remembrance and reflection – meaning molded by and told in the language of time,  beginnings, endings, transitions, journeys, seasons and spirals, cycles and circles,  birth and death and rebirth. And anniversary seems to be an idea that encompasses and embraces all of that meaning-making and feeling.

Anniversaries are powerful and meaningful memorials.

And so it is for me. I learned a lot about anniversaries, about how they mark grief and joy and loss and invite reflection on awakening and change, in the last year.

May 23rd marked the first anniversary of my (our) divorce. Anniversary usually brings to mind wedding days, yes, not divorce days … but anniversary can mark any day of significance. And this day is significant of a new era in my life, clearly demarcated new boundaries and the erasing of other boundaries.

Many things I haven’t shared – my sense has been that it was best to cover them with grace, and so it remains. And too, it wasn’t all only my story – this marriage and this divorce and all the attendant anniversaries and meanings and feelings, were a shared experience. Windows and mirrors into my own heart and wounds and flaws – I can choose that for myself, but (when) have I the liberty to choose it for another? Liberty only within boundaries of grace.

But this memory feels right to share …

May 23rd one year ago was a cloudy day – and a coldly formal, somber courtroom too, the air itself seeming as gray as the day outside. After the long wait between the filing and the crisp, detached pronouncement from the judge, the fifteen minutes of the hearing seemed abrupt and anticlimactic. A few words was all it took …

But isn’t that the way it has often been, a few words – so many of our social structures, our plans, our hopes, our feelings, our relationships, made of stories, and all it takes is a few words to create or uncreate or recreate the story, to weave or unweave or reweave the meanings.

But you know, it isn’t words that are most memorable from that day. It isn’t words. It’s the man who wiped tears from his eyes when I answered ‘yes’ to the question of whether I believed the marriage was irretrievably broken, and when the judge pronounced the marriage dissolved … From I pronounce you man and wife to  I pronounce you no longer man and wife …

The judge’s words weren’t the hard thing though there was something surreal present. In my heart was peace but with the peace the pang of pain for the open pain of the man at the other courtroom table – the one who was now my ex-husband.

Later, someone texted me – congratulations … I think? And no, the last thing I felt was celebratory. I felt solemn, a deep sigh cleaving the marrow of my soul. It was a funeral moment, not a party moment. A time of death, death of marriage – or the official time of death, anyway. Death – and yes, a beginning.

I walked down the courthouse steps, feeling freshly, vulnerably born into a wholly different life, same feet but a different path, taking steps into the mist of a brave new world, unknown waters to navigate. Like inhabiting new skin, a new way of being in my skin, uncharted self to learn …

One year on, I’ve navigated those waters, inhabited that new skin, learned more about that uncharted self. It’s been a powerful, beautiful, confounding, challenging year … both glorious and inglorious, messy and marvelous.

I’m grateful for the grace between my ex-husband and I, the spirit that makes it possible for us to co-parent in peace. That we can make decisions together for the kids, that we can share meals and holidays, like Thanksgiving and Christmas, together. That we can do acts of kindness and service for another. That we can share friendly conversation, communicate and compromise. That the kids have this witness and this security. It’s like a transformed relationship, love in a different form – and perhaps a healthier, more right form for us!

And for me, a love informed by respectful compassion, informed by the indelible image and understanding left imprinted on my soul from that courtroom.

And my relationship with myself is continuously new, perhaps more informed than ever by that same compassion and respect – although I have certainly struggled with grace and patience with myself and my singlehood/sole financial responsibility/work-life-school-parenting-community involvement balance/efficient time management (yes, that’s a mouthful, and yes, I am busier and wear more hats than I ever fathomed I would) learning curve! But you know what? I am a perseverer and a persister … and I’ve persevered and persisted, and learned my power.

Oh, I’ve learned my power … and I’ve become more comfortable with my power. Comfortable wearing it, comfortable with it as my new skin, part of my new natural self and way of being in this world, in my life as it is now. I’ve gained a pride – (hopefully) not ego-pride, but the pride of confident authenticity, bold assertiveness, mindful acceptance of gifts graced to me by Spirit, and a deeper willingness to be evermore generous in my service and presence.

And as for the uncharted self? That new way of being in my skin, exploring new ways of being, throwing off old ways of being like graveclothes, shifting, evolving, moving beyond fixed forms of identity or sexuality or gender conceptualization. (These stories are for another time perhaps – but a simple clarification is, I no longer use the word gay to describe my sexuality, but queer – because its wide meaning encompasses much more of the nuances and texture of my sexuality and the undefinable fluidity I am increasingly comfortable with).

First redefining, then undefining, flowing toward being comfortable with no longer needing so many definitions, but being awake with my own is-ness as it is in whatever moment.  Being less attached, whether that is to ideas, self-definitions, life plans, or relationships.

It’s such a human thing to need and want definition and naming in order to apply meaning and understanding – and uncharted, uncomfortable territory to move beyond that, where Love itself is the meaning and the truth and the way.

But for now, on this anniversary of my divorce,  I celebrate rebirth and awakening and remember with respect the death that first had to be.

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As has been my habit, this post was long … But change is coming! My plan move toward shorter reflections or seed-thought pieces, more in line with what I actually have time to produce/post in this season of life – and maybe I could post more often than every 3 months or so 😉

My hope is simplification and revival!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

On becoming forty: Surrendered vows, divergent paths, transformed topography

/ Lanae / 2 Comments Featured

Sometime ago, in my wayback files, I found a forgotten collection of poems from my late twenties.

Seventy-seven glimpses into who I was at 29, windows and mirrors in time. Early days of motherhood, word snapshots of my first son as a baby, the changing seasons, world events, prayers, dreams, life lessons, my heart and soul.

And then, this poem. Reading it from the vantage point of 40 now felt so strikingly poignant and invited reflection… since the journey between 29 and 40 unfolded in ways unforeseen and unfathomed by 29-year-old me!

Becoming twenty-nine

And now –
I am twenty-nine
forty seems closer
more real
than it did at twenty
at fifteen
At fifteen –
I imagined twenty-four
but I think I could not
stretch my imagination more
and think of myself
who I would be beyond
Twenty-four came, twenty-four went
every year since
as though journeying into
a realm unimagined
And it seems to me
my true youth has fled
not that I feel old
but here – at this juncture of time
the limitless, or the illusion,
of limitless possibilities
has narrowed to a single road –
not even one I ever dreamed
I would walk down –
(the aisle as bride)
The future lies ahead now
with the simple choice
of living with the choices
that have closed doors
and opened but one –
ah, but let’s see how far the road
beyond it will go
and what waits along the way

Oh, what waited along the way!

That single straight road became a spiraling one with several forks in it, surprising crossroads where divergent paths met … and many new doors opened onto new paths, views, opportunities, possibilities.

Years before, I thought my life had narrowed to a single road and my path was set only to find myself drawn down an unexpected path.

Since I had felt moved to be in ministry work at 15, I had envisioned my life spent in that calling, a lifetime vow. But Spirit taught me to surrender that vision and vow … and at the time, it was painful to surrender what seemed my truest calling.

I had never dreamed I would walk down the aisle as a bride – no, I hadn’t.  Marriage hadn’t seemed a calling meant for me. But, much to my surprise, Spirit led me there, so I believed that’s where I would stay, always.

I never dreamed I would reverse that walk down the aisle; love bid me stay. But Spirit led me there, too; love bid me go.

And the profession vows I made in the fellowship I grew up in, I only thought then but what those would be for life. I dared not think otherwise … “My vows I have made, I cannot now go back.” I never fathomed leaving; love bid me stay. But Spirit led me there, too; love bid me go.

And never did I think I would be free to accept and embrace my sexuality, my identity, fully and openly … there I had made a vow of silence and self-denial, what seemed a necessary sacrifice (though I was sacrificing my wholeness and well-being, a costly sacrifice indeed, because it affected all those in relationship with me, too). Self-denial that requires denying the essence of who you are isn’t healthy self-denial, but soul-warping self-denial.

But Spirit showed me I was beloved and free, and that loving the essence of who I am and living the truth set me free.

My 29-year-old self believed there would always be a familiar and safe topography along the road ahead: same vows, same faith, same church, same community, same friends, same marriage.

And the same inner landscape with its long angst-y dark night of the soul that I believed would always be a constant in my spiritual and emotional topography, no matter what unfolded on the path.

But then the spiraling road brought me the gift of belovedness.

And living in this belovedness and liberty transformed my inner landscape, then the entire topography of my life, opening up paths, perspectives, possibilities divergent from the familiarity of the known and expected road.

I embarked on a coming-out path and surrendered that vow of deep silence regarding my sexuality. For the good of my soul I vowed to walk and live in wholeness and truthfulness; Spirit opened that vision and vow to me.

For a while, I thought the outward familiarity of the well-travelled road might mostly continue as it was … that I could walk that old path and keep other vows in a new way, as a whole person.

Yes, I expected significant changes. Yet somehow I didn’t see some of them unfolding how or as soon as they’ve unfolded … I didn’t wish for the whole path and all its familiar safe topography to change so much so soon.

But as I continued to make choices aligned with the truth of my sexuality and my spirituality, those divergent paths, those crossroads, kept meeting me at every turn. And at every turn, Spirit, yes, Spirit, kept directing me down the less familiar path, into places and paths of surrender.

My spiritual topography kept evolving; my path kept diverging.

I laid aside belief in any ‘one true way’ teachings and yet found the Way that transcends all religious traditions, creeds, and doctrines, and is the essence of true religion: Love, the universal thread of truth and life.

I parted with dear friends, friends I loved. Left a church community I loved. Spirit bid me leave, but love remains.

Ended a marriage that even in its trying times was precious to me …. worth all of the 13+ years. No regrets, no bitterness. All is gift. Spirit bid me leave, but love remains.

Some might question how it’s of love to surrender a marriage vow; a good question.

But what if the vows come to cause the hurt of your own soul … and surrendering them for the good of your soul?  What if keeping the vows causes the hurt of others, of their souls … and surrendering them for the highest good, for all?

Then surrendering them is love. Surrendering such vows, if it must be done, is best done in Love, because of love.

I surrendered none of these vows without intense contemplation to know its rightness or without profound grief for the accompanying losses.  Because of love.

Not only for my own losses, but also for the losses some near to me felt keenly. For just as my earlier lack of wholeness affected my relationships, following a path of wholeness affected my relationships. To some, I seemed no longer to be someone they recognized or knew; the changes I experienced as good for my soul, they didn’t.

And so I know there was loss and grief for others because of the divergent paths I followed, and I knew (I know) the pang of it in my own heart. Because of love.

So now, my path and my life landscape, inside and out, looks so different than my 29-year-old self could have fathomed, indeed!

For all I’ve lost, I’ve found much, much has found me. I’ve found my wholeness, my mind and soul, spiritual abundance, liberty, Belovedness! New spiritual communities, connections, capabilities. Rich relationships, deeper perspectives, purpose. And realized: I never left ministry, it only returned to me in a new form!

I see more clearly now: there have always been divergent paths. There has always been surrender on the journey. Love in each choice. Surrender and love always interwoven.

Such a divergent path it has been and become and will be, always! And Belovedness now the constant in the entire topography of my life and my journey, always.

So, here’s a new ending, on becoming forty, and beyond:

The future lies ahead now – no,
is Now
with the simple choice
of living with the choices
that have closed doors
but also opened many –
A single path, yes,
but with boundless possibility
limit itself the illusion
and abundance the truth
Ah, now let’s see how far and where the road
beyond it will go
and what is present in the way
Now

Stepping out of the boat (again): owning my truth

/ Lanae / 4 Comments

You might act as if you’re at peace with whatever happens now. However, the truth is that your attractions are pulling you strongly in two opposing directions and you don’t want to let go of either choice. Unfortunately, it’s time to stop living under the illusion that you can follow divergent paths for much longer. You are at a fork in the road and you must make a final decision before moving forward.

I can’t remember where I originally found these words, but when I rediscovered them in my files today, my heart pinged again, and I thought, OH! I have no idea why I first saved those words, but they resonated with me again  ….

Inspired me to reflect further about letting go, about not living under the illusion that it’s possible to follow divergent paths … about moving forward in truthfulness, moving forward in and with Belovedness.

The last few years, my life journey has brought me to several forks in the road, forks where divergent paths met. Both could not be followed, and I had to learn to choose. I confess that at times past I have attempted to hold onto all possible choices, to hold on to an illusion that it was possible to reconcile contradictory paths … but I’ve learned to let go of some illusions!

Many things – interests, possibilities, or relationships – can be integrated into a clear path to follow, but truly conflicting paths cannot be converged into one harmonious way of living, no matter how hard or how sincerely you try.

I love the idea of a middle way – that whatever the divergent-seeming choices might be, there is another way, a way of both truthfulness and peace. I find myself now always looking for a middle way …

Sometimes this middle way is a way of understanding that what seems to be an either/or choice can be a both/and choice, where perspectives or truths that seem to be in opposition can actually be held together and balance one another. This is a beautiful path to see and to follow, a way of choosing peace, finding harmony. This is equanimity, in vision and in action.

Sometimes, the middle way is a way of moderation, sometimes a way of concession and compromise. Sometimes compromise is the path of truthfulness and authenticity; sometimes not. And when it’s not a path of truthfulness, it’s not really a true middle way, a way of peace or of belovedness.

Sometimes, what compromise means is a fear of committing to a clear purpose and path, a fear of committing to authenticity and vulnerability. Fear of claiming an identity, of taking a clear stand, making an open acknowledgement …

What is in stark contrast here is the desire to move forward in a direction of authenticity and vulnerability, but also to remain in a place or path of seeming certainty and safety! To be honest, or to be hidden or to hide behind silence … but is remaining in silence a path of truthfulness and authenticity, or a damaging, deceiving compromise?

And over the last couple of years, I’ve confronted that question in various ways, at deeper levels … and I’ve made some agonizingly difficult decisions to follow a path that diverged from the familiar and comfortable status quo. But this became a path of peace because it was a path of truthfulness and authenticity, of integrity and wholeness.

There’s something I’ve chosen to share in my everyday living, with friends and family, in my faith community, and now here …  I choose this path of truthfulness because for me it’s a path of peace and of belovedness, because it brings a liberty that far outweighs any costs.

I won’t, I can’t, hide behind silence anymore. I choose to be authentic and vulnerable, though this is a risk both exhilarating and terrifying.

As I mentioned in my very first blog post, I am stepping out of the boat:

I am no longer afraid or ashamed to identify myself as gay, nor to stand in love and solidarity with all those in the LGBTQ+ community.

It’s also true that I would rather not pigeonhole myself into any one label. I am simply who I am. I am a person. A person with an interesting sexuality, yes, but my sexuality is only a part of me that doesn’t define all of who I am.

Yet, it’s an important aspect of who I am, and I had to learn to make peace with it and love it as a part of who I am innately, so that I could be whole, live in authenticity and integrity.

I have previously told my story of finding the gift of belovedness  … the gift of wholeness and reconciliation. Accepting and embracing the truth about my sexuality is also an integral part of my story, of finding that gift of belovedness. I suffered deeply from years of denying or despising my sexuality, not able to accept or love that part of myself or to be a whole person …

But knowing all of myself as beloved, as deeply accepted and embraced by Love, helped me become whole! Helped me learn how to echo belovedness …

And so I send this echo of belovedness, this echo of truthfulness, into the world and hopefully into your hearts!

Resting in the posture

/ Lanae / Leave a comment

The blog has been quiet again! That is what happens to the blogging life when the demands of grad school loom large in the form of two giant research papers. Fifty-odd pages later, I can come up for some air … and take final exams. Then start all over with two more classes promptly starting, two days after these classes end … keep breathing!

Oh, and add yoga teacher training classes into that mix: intense, full weekends once a month, and two of them close together, right in the midst of the rush of the research papers and the exams! Just keep breathing, yes …

Well, this is the life and the workload I chose, and so I am not complaining! I am still learning how to breathe mindfully through it all, however. Still learning how to ‘rest in the posture,’ as it were.

Resting in the posture is something I’ve learned from yoga, a way to sustain, settle, stay in strength,  to find strength to stay in a challenging posture. (To give credit where credit must be given, I learned the phrase ‘rest in the posture’ from a lovely book called Meditations from the Mat, by Rolf Gates. )

In yoga, to rest in the posture is to be able to stay in the pose, deepen into it, even to surrender into it, when the temptation is to bail out of it instead.

But to be able to stay in it, to find strength, means first pausing, stepping back out of the pose a bit, adjusting, and then moving back into it again. It means letting go of tension, letting a softness and lightness flow through bones and muscles and mind instead, surrendering stubbornness and surrendering into the struggle, into the challenge, into the pose in the moment.

Challenging, difficult poses or postures aren’t just found in yoga, though! They’re found everywhere, in parenting, in marriage and friendships, in the workplace, in going back to school, in taking on a new adventure, in suffering the loss of a loved one, or even in the most ordinary-seeming everyday days … and in a sense, the posture never ends. It changes, but flows on, like a river to the sea …

Learning to rest in the posture then, in some way or another, seems essential to having the strength to sustain the posture, to handle whatever the challenge is, to embrace the struggle or the suffering. To sustain and be sustained, to embrace and be embraced through it.

So, sometimes I am struggling in a pose, or struggling in a yoga class, and I remember, ‘rest in the posture,’ and I feel something in me, in my body and in my heart, shift and melt … and I realize, the strength and will and joy to endure are there!

And other times, like when I felt overwhelmed with life happening all at once, research papers, yoga class homework, kids out of school for the summer … I think, wow, how can I manage all of this?! And I remember, ‘rest in the posture.’ And something in me shifts, settles into acceptance, and vital grace is there again.

Let go of tensions, let go of resistance to the challenge, struggle, or suffering, let go of what is not needful or helpful. Pause, rest, surrender, re-adjust, find the grace and joy and strength of this moment! And be amazed at how much grace and joy and strength there is in you, to tap into when you rest in the posture. And be in awe at what postures (of life) you can rest in and how much rest you can find there.

In writing this, I realized that this phrase ‘rest in the posture,’ is so much like a phrase I used in an earlier post, ‘take refuge in surrender.’ They really are so much alike, but yet different, perhaps, too. Instead of me explaining what I think that means, I think I’ll leave space for you to decide whatever the meaning is for you!

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And,  related to the idea of the posture never ending, but shifting into new forms, and finding grace to rest in the new posture …

I find myself moved to do something that is like shifting into a new posture, something that seems scary to me, because it’s perhaps making myself vulnerable in a way I haven’t before, opening up my heart-space, my soul, to you all in a different way …

And that is to share on this blog, in a section of its own that I will set up soon, a statement of faith/spirituality that I wrote after a dear friend said to me, you should write a statement of faith; I would love to read it!

Sharing it feels sort of like a posture that I might rather avoid because of fear I’ll fall out of it or embarrass myself, but something says to me, just take refuge in surrender and rest in this posture, too. And who knows what grace will come from it!

So, check back soon! 🙂

 

 

Finding the gift of belovedness: sharing my story

/ Lanae / 4 Comments

As I sifted through possibilities, contemplating what next to write, one seed-thought kept returning … compelling me. The ‘right words’ making themselves known in their ‘right time’.

I feel that sense of ‘rightness’ now, though this may be a more difficult or sober thing to read about, and you may wonder at first, where is the echo of belovedness in this?! But there will be echoes of belovedness, I assure you! For belovedness is my life-theme, a thread I now see woven widely throughout the fabric of creation …

This is a story from when I didn’t believe I was beloved, nor knew that I could live in Belovedness. This is also the story of how and why I came to view myself, my life, everyone, everything, through the lens of belovedness … how belovedness has redeemed the story that came before.

The semi-colon has become a very powerful image of a life continued, continuing. My semi-colon is belovedness, the story following the semi-colon is belovedness … but now I can look back at the story before the semi-colon with the eyes and the heart of belovedness, also.

What preceded my semi-colon?

Years of chronic depression, a baseline feeling of vague disquiet often like a dark cloud on the horizon of an otherwise blue sky. Intermittently there arose intense, acute storms, sometimes situational, sometimes appearing to arrive with seemingly no external provocation …

A spirit-crushing inner certainty of myself as a completely disordered person, mentally and spiritually defective ….

A coexisting certainty my cross was to bear that disorderedness, that defectiveness, with all the grace and strength possible, all the days of my life …

A broken sense of self. A broken sense of belovedness too, leading all too often into an existential despair … many dark nights of the soul.

A deep-rooted, soul-sapping sense of non-belovedness. I believed some did love me, but I did not feel lovable, divinely lovable or beloved. I did not know my belovedness, nor that Belovedness already knew me in an infinitely intimate way …

Five years ago – it seems like another lifetime ago – I descended into a severely debilitating period of deep depression, months-long, eternity-long, with multiple suicide attempts. Many factors were at play, too many to count here. Intensifying my downward spiral was a severe reaction to powerful psychiatric medication prescribed for what was later determined a misdiagnosis. The physical and mental side effects left me more incapacitated than depression on its own ever had. A shambling shell of a person, whose body and brain had gone haywire … my inability to care for my children, my keen awareness of my diminished intellectual ability, my profound sense of non-belovedness, damaged relationships, all excruciating.

I was convinced I was too dangerously impaired to live … yet it wasn’t that I wanted so much to die. I wanted to be free. Free from the chilling dread constantly washing over me, free from the defective mind and character I believed I had … free, safe, whole.

So, in the summer of 2011, I tried to escape this life multiple times, multiple ways. Specifics need no detailing here, but this I want to share …

The time I was sitting in my dark closet, feeling both afraid of the pain of death and the pain of life. The time I felt, strangely, some certainty that if I crossed over, there would be no judgment, only the wrapping of cosmic arms around me, my hell, my suffering vanished. An echo of belovedness; the presence of Belovedness … it was with me already, yet I knew it not, and thought it only waited beyond this life.

I believe now that Belovedness saved me. Even though I left that closet and the ever-present dread rolled in like a tsunami and washed it into oblivion – until an indescribable spiritual experience three years ago this month in which I finally knew the indwelling presence of Belovedness in the deepest fibers of my body, mind, soul. My broken self, my broken sense of belovedness and of my belovedness – knit together, made whole.

Oh, I’m still emotionally intense, passionate, I feel the suffering in the world more deeply, I mourn, I weep for it. Yet, I’m grounded now in a grateful, mindful joy. Miracles happen!

And when I look back on those endless days and months, all the brokenness, the brutal moments, the pain and the shame of the wounds I received and the wounds I gave … I see all redeemed in the light and presence of belovedness. The ‘me’ who experienced them is healed and whole, in the light of belovedness … this is the gift that I gave, give, to my past and present self. Reconciliation.

I am grateful for the brokenness and the suffering, not because they themselves are good, but because I found good through them – blessing from them. I am grateful for my experiences of depression, even of being suicidal, not because they themselves were good, but because I drew good from them. They themselves were not the gifts, but many gifts I discovered within them … ultimately, the gift of belovedness. Liberation.

And now, I am with Belovedness, beloved always, in all ways. And this is my gift to you: You are beloved, always, in all ways. Whoever and wherever you are, you are beloved.

Belovedness is here; live in it! Find the gifts that may be for you in whatever is your brokenness and suffering; find the gift of belovedness there and embrace it.