It wasn't supposed to be this way...
My wife just got a new book that I've only seen the cover of. It's called "It wasn't supposed to be this way", and from what I gather it's a collection of reflections on areas where life disappoints you, that is to say your expectations don't match your experience. Or worse yet, things were going well and something out of nowhere just changed everything and you're left wondering, "What the heck just happened? I didn't see that coming. That changes so many things. That wasn't supposed to happen, or if it was, I wasn't ready for it."
You know what I'm saying. No one gets through life without this feeling creeping into into their marriage, home, job, or dreams. You set out with an idea of how things are going to go, even a preferred picture, and then something happens that seems to tilt everything sideways. It reminds me of the time of when I was younger hanging out in my uncles barn and playing with my cousins. Everything was great...we were playing tag together, hide-and-go-seek, finding adventures and then, bam, I stepped directly on a rusty nail that went up through my shoe into the arch of my foot and 30 minutes later I was in the doctor's office getting a tetanus shot. The day was essentially shot for all intents and purposes. I didn't see it coming, but it happened anyway.
Lots of things about this week were like that for me...it started before this week actually as I got back from Israel and the sleep deprivation I came home with only compounded as night after night I couldn't get a good night's rest. Anxiety set in and for the first time in 8 years I had a series of panic attacks leading into the weekend at church were I was slated to speak on encouragement of all things. It was the first time I preached while having a panic attack...it came out of nowhere in one sense, but in other ways I could reverse engineer its origin, it was only a matter of time that life would catch up to me and bring me to an abrupt halt.
That led into a couple days of meetings on top of meetings that I was digging deep into my energy reserves to "stay awake" for. It's not that I didn't care about the meetings, it's that my body wasn't responding to my mind's "crack of the whip"...like it just didn't care if you beat my body, it wasn't moving. I was falling asleep while people were talking in meetings, or just staring off into the distance and not having the foggiest clue what they said after I came to. This isn't typical for me, but between the circadian rhythms that were messing with me, I was tying to find my equilibrium in the midst of it all. I knew my family was coming to our house this year for Thanksgiving vacation and was a bit nervous that this malaise would persist unless I got some sleep and found some energy hiding somewhere I had yet to discover.
The family starting pouring in and I was still feeling every bit as tird, like I-want-to-go-to-bed-and-it's-only-7pm tired. Not good. On top of it all, there were some "crucial conversations" to be had with family members that were long overdue. The first couple days we went out with family members to hash out some mounting tension and misunderstandings, and you know how those things go. Even if you come to some mutual understanding and apologies are made, things are said in the midst of the heat of the conversation that you can't unhear or unknow. Let's just say, you can't go back to the way it used to be. I'm not saying it's healthy to go back, but you realize that things had been building up for a long time and that a lot of the times you've shared over the years were just "lipstick on a pig", painted poop. At least that's what it felt to me. I left some of the encounters feeling this overwhelming feeling that people basically have things to say to you that they never share unless you, set up a formal meeting, and really force them to share it. I made me wonder who else, given an opportunity to just let it rip, would just unload their "real" thoughts about me and what they've felt along the way. I can't say that I'm not like that as well, so this isn't against anyone, it's just the sad reality that most of the time, people are coping and holding back their real feelings...for months, years even.
Though it was good to get to the bottom of things, I felt like I would have just as soon not known, because the exchange was laced with some words mixed with tones that aren't easily forgotten. On both sides, I wonder if our idea of what the tension might be was quite a bit less that what it actually was...I thought it was going to be the other way around. "It wasn't supposed to be this way." When we set out for honest sharing and possible restoration, the reconciliation felt less healing than I longed for...maybe than we all longed for, I don't know. I can only speak for myself.
It got my brain wondering how many people hold back what they really think about everyone around them. Like, how much crap is inside people's minds toward me that I'm unaware of. I've never been a guy that sits around and thinks about that stuff, but something about this week opened up some nerve endings and it's possible I'll never get back some of that lost innocence. It changes the way you look at people when you "get the whole truth". You think you want it by saying things like "Let's just get to the bottom of this." or "Just tell me like it is...I'd rather know what you really think than just pretending." But something about this last weekend makes me feel like I wish we would have just stayed in "make believe", like pretend might have been a better option. Because real feelings and words lodge into the core of your soul and they don't just go away like a splinter's infection. I feel like I know this, not just because of this interaction, but because ministry has dealt some unforeseen and unforgettable blows to me over the years. Things you wish you didn't know are irreversibly planted in your heart and mind...and it feels like you spend a good bit of energy overcoming those things just to get back to normal. But normal never feels the same after that, at least to me. Some people just move on and feel cleansed, I don't know why I have difficulty getting to that same place as quickly as I've noticed other do.
Let's just say that as it relates to the last couple weeks, "I didn't it coming" and "It wasn't supposed to be this way", at least that's my vantage point. Maybe God wanted it to come, ready or not. Maybe God orchestrated things to be less nostalgic so that we could unearth what is more tragic, maybe in time I will see the goodness of what has been exposed. But right now, it just feels like everyone has been exposed and I'm struggling to find stasis and safety in it all. I don't feel like opening my mouth much, I don't feel like putting my heart out there like I'm used to doing, and I feel like I want to keep people at a safe distance so that I don't hurt them and they can't hurt me.
One of the things about getting older is that you realize you're accumulating hurt, and I don't know how you keep doing this until your retire and expire without pulling away from life, but I guess that's what I have to figure out. That's the journey into the future for me. How to develop thick skin without losing a soft heart, which honestly feels nigh to impossible. But I have to hold out hope that it's possible.
Not a pleasant piece of writing, but one that I had to log for the ages.
You know what I'm saying. No one gets through life without this feeling creeping into into their marriage, home, job, or dreams. You set out with an idea of how things are going to go, even a preferred picture, and then something happens that seems to tilt everything sideways. It reminds me of the time of when I was younger hanging out in my uncles barn and playing with my cousins. Everything was great...we were playing tag together, hide-and-go-seek, finding adventures and then, bam, I stepped directly on a rusty nail that went up through my shoe into the arch of my foot and 30 minutes later I was in the doctor's office getting a tetanus shot. The day was essentially shot for all intents and purposes. I didn't see it coming, but it happened anyway.
Lots of things about this week were like that for me...it started before this week actually as I got back from Israel and the sleep deprivation I came home with only compounded as night after night I couldn't get a good night's rest. Anxiety set in and for the first time in 8 years I had a series of panic attacks leading into the weekend at church were I was slated to speak on encouragement of all things. It was the first time I preached while having a panic attack...it came out of nowhere in one sense, but in other ways I could reverse engineer its origin, it was only a matter of time that life would catch up to me and bring me to an abrupt halt.
That led into a couple days of meetings on top of meetings that I was digging deep into my energy reserves to "stay awake" for. It's not that I didn't care about the meetings, it's that my body wasn't responding to my mind's "crack of the whip"...like it just didn't care if you beat my body, it wasn't moving. I was falling asleep while people were talking in meetings, or just staring off into the distance and not having the foggiest clue what they said after I came to. This isn't typical for me, but between the circadian rhythms that were messing with me, I was tying to find my equilibrium in the midst of it all. I knew my family was coming to our house this year for Thanksgiving vacation and was a bit nervous that this malaise would persist unless I got some sleep and found some energy hiding somewhere I had yet to discover.
The family starting pouring in and I was still feeling every bit as tird, like I-want-to-go-to-bed-and-it's-only-7pm tired. Not good. On top of it all, there were some "crucial conversations" to be had with family members that were long overdue. The first couple days we went out with family members to hash out some mounting tension and misunderstandings, and you know how those things go. Even if you come to some mutual understanding and apologies are made, things are said in the midst of the heat of the conversation that you can't unhear or unknow. Let's just say, you can't go back to the way it used to be. I'm not saying it's healthy to go back, but you realize that things had been building up for a long time and that a lot of the times you've shared over the years were just "lipstick on a pig", painted poop. At least that's what it felt to me. I left some of the encounters feeling this overwhelming feeling that people basically have things to say to you that they never share unless you, set up a formal meeting, and really force them to share it. I made me wonder who else, given an opportunity to just let it rip, would just unload their "real" thoughts about me and what they've felt along the way. I can't say that I'm not like that as well, so this isn't against anyone, it's just the sad reality that most of the time, people are coping and holding back their real feelings...for months, years even.
Though it was good to get to the bottom of things, I felt like I would have just as soon not known, because the exchange was laced with some words mixed with tones that aren't easily forgotten. On both sides, I wonder if our idea of what the tension might be was quite a bit less that what it actually was...I thought it was going to be the other way around. "It wasn't supposed to be this way." When we set out for honest sharing and possible restoration, the reconciliation felt less healing than I longed for...maybe than we all longed for, I don't know. I can only speak for myself.
It got my brain wondering how many people hold back what they really think about everyone around them. Like, how much crap is inside people's minds toward me that I'm unaware of. I've never been a guy that sits around and thinks about that stuff, but something about this week opened up some nerve endings and it's possible I'll never get back some of that lost innocence. It changes the way you look at people when you "get the whole truth". You think you want it by saying things like "Let's just get to the bottom of this." or "Just tell me like it is...I'd rather know what you really think than just pretending." But something about this last weekend makes me feel like I wish we would have just stayed in "make believe", like pretend might have been a better option. Because real feelings and words lodge into the core of your soul and they don't just go away like a splinter's infection. I feel like I know this, not just because of this interaction, but because ministry has dealt some unforeseen and unforgettable blows to me over the years. Things you wish you didn't know are irreversibly planted in your heart and mind...and it feels like you spend a good bit of energy overcoming those things just to get back to normal. But normal never feels the same after that, at least to me. Some people just move on and feel cleansed, I don't know why I have difficulty getting to that same place as quickly as I've noticed other do.
Let's just say that as it relates to the last couple weeks, "I didn't it coming" and "It wasn't supposed to be this way", at least that's my vantage point. Maybe God wanted it to come, ready or not. Maybe God orchestrated things to be less nostalgic so that we could unearth what is more tragic, maybe in time I will see the goodness of what has been exposed. But right now, it just feels like everyone has been exposed and I'm struggling to find stasis and safety in it all. I don't feel like opening my mouth much, I don't feel like putting my heart out there like I'm used to doing, and I feel like I want to keep people at a safe distance so that I don't hurt them and they can't hurt me.
One of the things about getting older is that you realize you're accumulating hurt, and I don't know how you keep doing this until your retire and expire without pulling away from life, but I guess that's what I have to figure out. That's the journey into the future for me. How to develop thick skin without losing a soft heart, which honestly feels nigh to impossible. But I have to hold out hope that it's possible.
Not a pleasant piece of writing, but one that I had to log for the ages.
Comments
Post a Comment