The Journey Home

This word sits heavy with me at this time. Disappointment can sit heavy in our hearts for a multitude of reasons. For me, disappointment sits heavy in my heart because of expectations, hope and as the dictionary defines- emotional dissatisfaction caused by a gap between expectations and reality. Expectations in humans, in myself, and in nature. Let me first begin with my own disappointment in myself.

This Lent I chose to commit to journaling everyday. This may seem a trivial expectation to others, but to myself, it was an expectation I believed I could commit to if only for a season. Doing well in this commitment the first few weeks of Lent, the two weeks mid-season I failed. The weather warmed up and my garden started needing my attention (aka I desired to use my few hours before bed outside working in it than sitting with a journal). Due to this realization of neglect in my writing, I was very hard on myself. I beat myself up internally for my perceived failure and wanted to quit all together going forward. As this has happened to me in the past, multiple times through my life, I chose a different response. Instead of believing I am a failure, I chose to believe I had failed. I had failed at something. Acknowledging and sitting with this, I allowed myself to intentionally process it, evaluate it, and move forward with a different response than the one I tend to do. I told myself I can only start with today. Instead of trying to back track and think of things I should have written, I started in the evening I realized I had forgotten. That experience felt like a release- from the shame, from the failed attempt, and from falling into a pit of despair.

As I reflected that night on the previous two weeks I technically missed, I realized that I had been reflecting and spending time with my inner workings, my thoughts, and with God in prayer. Prayer is not always the bow your heads and close your eyes, though that intention is good. Prayer can come through your intentional work, focus on growing life, talking to your plants and listening to what they are saying to you. Actively listening to the birds, the rustle in the trees, or the way the water hits when it falls on a particular leaf or the ground. Noticing how a particular branch or stem feels in your fingers. This is prayer also, and to me this was intentional time with my creator and creation. As I have continued to write in the journal since, I noticed how I appreciate being able to look back at how focused I was that day, getting my thoughts out on paper and letting them go from my mind and my body. Seeing how some of this season has evolved my thoughts, hopes and prayers for myself and others. Some of this season has brought healing and beauty and, some of this season has brought questions and hurt. Reflecting now as I write this, I have been grateful for the intentional focus the end of each day has allowed me through writing and also through nurturing and helping give life to my garden.

Thinking of my garden and nurturing nature, disappointment sits heavy for me in my inability to control mother nature. She is a beautiful, unpredictable and sometimes destructive force. I experienced this most recently with Hurricane Helene as my beloved childhood tree was uprooted and then cut up for pieces of wood. Granted that was several years ago, it still stings to think I will never walk or sit under that tree that brought me so much comfort again. Last year, my father and I also drove through one of my favorite mountain destinations, Lake Lure, and it still looks unrecognizable. The lake is gone and the buildings we visited and eating spots were swept away, some had layers of mud, or were uninhabitable. It was devastating and something unimaginable for somewhere so beautiful and majestic. In a moment, everything can change. It’s that the nature of life. Nature and the seasons can many times mirror our own lives.

I knew getting into this farming experiment I would lose crops, flowers, even bees. I had such a good experience last year with growth in abundance- corn, cucumbers, zucchini, okra and the blueberries. I sat with sadness over the loss of most of my yellow squash, being the target of the relentless squash bugs and my tomatoes being eaten by hornworms, aphids, and long legged leaf eaters. I considered it a sacrifice for the abundance I had. Working with nature is an unpredictable, risky endeavor. This year, I decided to experiment with potatoes and onions. Most recently, I sat with disappointment of an unexpected freeze mid-March that almost killed all of my early blooming potatoes and some of the early blooming blueberries. Because the weather had warmed up significantly early, some things decided to bloom and this was exciting, until it wasn’t. Last year the early blooming blueberries were some of our best yet. They were big, tasty, and a treat for all of us. This year we most likely won’t taste those. I spent several days nurturing and encouraging more buds to emerge from my potatoes and some have. It will be interesting to see if any are stunted and which plants don’t produce at all. My onions, however, seem to be growing well. This makes me more cautious in planting and growing the rest of my produce. I’ve heard not to plant until after Easter, particularly the things you will lose to frost. I’m adhering to this with the rest of the garden. I plan to sow cucumbers again (hoping for a good return for pickles), zucchini, yellow squash, tomatoes, some corn and okra. I plan to plant nasturtium, dill, marigolds and other companions and see how that controls the pests. It’s hard not assuming already that this will be a hard season… see the connection. Failure. I am consciously choosing to hold a different response, no matter if the outcome is still disappointing. I will keep planting and hoping.

The hardest disappointment I sit with this season comes from the disappointment that involves other humans. And in this moment, the confusing and many times, harmful use of “God’s Will.” I believe that there are those that truly live in the will of God. They fervently seek it out, listen in their hearts and spirits for confirmation, and refuse to let their world be rocked as they abide and follow in it. I also know there are those, in my experience, who offer their intention as the “will of God,” not knowing if this is true or not. In my experience, this is given as a reason or explanation when there is no clear answer or understanding. This, in my experience, is when religion can become harmful. I have heard this from numerous folks that are especially on the margin or have turned away from the institutional church as a whole, or the church to them. Referencing the “will of God” in my experience has harmed many and has become divisive in our already divisively charged world.

It’s a given that we will disappoint each other, through decisions, actions, theology, and politics. For me, I tend to hold disappointment as inevitable, while honestly looking for the best and holding onto hope in others and situations. Maybe it’s the enneagram 6 nature and evolution. Prepare for the unexpected and the worst case. Some things you can’t prepare for and much of that time in comes from the unpredictability of humans and human encounters and relationships. The heaviest disappointment for me, though, has come from within the church. Church is made up of humans. Humans have faults, agendas and sometimes selfish motivations. This is the truth of humanity. Think of all the stories in sacred texts. Having been someone who experienced deep church hurt over the years of my calling to ministry and within my ministry itself, it’s hard to place continued hope in others. Spiritual hurt, I believe, is the deepest hurt. And hurt in the name of God is deeply wounding. In my experience, you enter into a faith community in the truest form of vulnerability. Hopefully you bring your whole self into sacred spaces. After having left the institutional church in my mid-twenties, I was grateful my ministry led me to hospital chaplaincy. I evolved in my thirties, finding the freedom to know myself honestly and wholly. From this place, I entered back into faith community. Mostly because of my family. Today, I live my forties authentically and honestly, without reservation because I am proud of who I am- the good, the bad and the ugly. I am made up of all of that, and if we are honest with ourselves and living out authentically and wholly, we all will say that about our each, individual selves. That being said, how can we not at some point or another disappoint.

I took a chance on going back to the institutional church, knowing what I know and have experienced, with hope. I have not been surprised because humans are humans. I’ve been grateful, and to be honest, it’s been healing. I have become a part of a community of women that I love and cherish, no matter how different or similar we are. I’ve written about that journey and joy in this blog. In this moment however, I name my disappointment with humans within my faith community. I find it hard to hold love when someone I love has been hurt deeply. I don’t think my anger and sadness is with the whole of the situation but with the comment of it “not being God’s Will.” As someone who has found it somewhat challenging to understand the true commitment of prayer and trusting God completely, my husband has not. He is faithful, and he continues to teach me and inspire me through his unbreakable trust, abandonment and sacrifice to the will of God. I have never met someone who so clearly embodies the love of God for his community of faith, his family and the world as a whole. He’s gentle. He’s kind. He chooses daily to be a truth-teller and a peace-maker. Actively. Experiencing his life and ministry has been a gift to me and our daughter. When things don’t make sense, he chooses to trust and holdfast to the living presence of God in this world. He believes in his love for others that can only come from his faith and love in Jesus. Granted, as any human, he has his faults and disappointments also.

I share this though to say, as someone who struggles to trust, keeps suspicion and caution close, and the idea sharing of vulnerability is a huge risk, my husband sharpens my own understanding of loving the world and those who live in it and showing up authentically always. This week my husband experienced a true disappointment. It has hurt him to his core and therefore we all hold the pain that he’s experienced. From this we are holding space as my husband processes, hurts and figures out what it will look like moving forward. I carry away how important words matter and how what you hold to be true in yourself, another may not hold that same value. Instead not knowing how to respond in a moment, please just remain silent and let the pregnant silence be enough. Be mindful and careful of how you use pull God into it. This Lent is pairing up to be much like the past ones- dark, heavy, painful and reflective. I’m coming to see this as an appropriate and authentic whole of this season and experience as we prepare for resurrection and rebirth.

Peace and Hope to you all.