bare

I have been toiling over the subject matter hereafter for quite some time. When I sit down to write I usually am ready to collect my thoughts and process through whatever it is that has been swirling around my heart and my head... I am ready to "define" it, ready to name it and start working through it. These blog posts are landmarks for me -- a sort of signpost to reflect back upon as to where I am, where I have come from and where I am going on my journey. 

Something you must know... if you are reading this right now, you are a rare bird. You get to hear about the deepest places of my heart. This fact -- that this blog is where I share with people I cannot see or touch or feel or hear responses from the deepest places of my heart... this fact has been the starting point for all of the things that I am about to share... the fact that I have this freedom to share with all of you things that I will not share with people in my day to day life, people I might call "friends"... people that in the past I might have prided myself on being so open with -- THIS reality has hit me and caused me to really think about the woman that I have become over the last several years. I am not really sure how to articulate what this means, but I am going to document it here, because I need to, and I hope that maybe some of you may relate. 

So, here's the truth. I don't really have any close friends at all. I am not feeling sorry for myself about this. It's just the way it is, and I am trying to figure out why. I don't have anyone right now that I am willing to call and talk to about what's going on in my life. To open up and talk about my life is such a chore and has become such an awkward thing for me, that I really don't do it. I have discovered something about myself... well... let me back up. This is where it will all come out and probably be very disorganized. When I started blogging, I opened myself up to a world that has been overall very beneficial in terms of recognizing that in the general everyday struggles of life as a mother and wife and a person I am not alone. This has been a comfort. It has also connected me with some people that otherwise I might not meet as I go along in life - people that I really relate to in terms of the things I dream about, value and the lifestyle that I lead or hope to lead in the future. There have been people that I've met that God has used my story to help them or encourage them. There have also been people that I have met that I recognized some common experiences with or saw that they were walking through or about to walk through some of the same things I had to go through or put myself through... and in my desire to nurture and love and guide -- in my passionate desire to spare anyone from the pain I have brought upon myself I have volunteered so much advice and help that I am afraid that even though I may feel this was beneficial and done out of love, and even though I felt or thought that the person I was showering all of this help and advice on certainly must have also felt that same way... I have come to realize that to think this is actually valued by the other person is incorrect. I have come to realize that what I am doing is actually overwhelming, suffocating, imposing my beliefs and ideals, monologue-ing, trying too hard to help and redirect and save someone from my pain and bad decisions... what is actually going on is that I have begun to relate to people in a very one-sided manner. In my belief that this is actually what being a friend is all about... being "helpful" to someone, being an "encouragement" to someone, feeling the compulsion to always help or be available to help someone on their journey... this is not really what being a friend is about. I have come to realize that I have absolutely no idea how to relate to people anymore. There have been some people I've met through the internet that in the deepest places of my heart I love and would lay my life down for them, but in doing so -- in offering too much I feel that I have actually turned them off. I had an experience recently with someone that I dearly love that I felt rejected by. Someone I had gotten to know through my blog and other social media that just pretty much stopped corresponding to me or responding to me at all, and then pretty much cut me off. I didn't understand why I was feeling so rejected but it hurt me to my core. I thought such crazy thoughts like maybe they thought my regular responses to their posts was me "stalking" them, or they felt smothered, or that they just didn't like who I was... the thought that they just didn't like me at all for who I was as a person just cut me to my very core. I realized that I must have made some mistakes along the way. Or then I thought, well, we are different, we don't have as much in common, or maybe I am not pretty enough, cool enough, whatever. You know, all the dross that surfaces when you've been rejected makes you feel like such a dork but the reality is, rejection brings out the absolute deepest insecurities of our hearts and causes us to seriously self examine. Here I am people, laid bare. I felt so absolutely sad and felt so stupid for feeling so sad. And then one morning I just broke. I had to let out all the things that were surfacing and put a name to the feelings and emotions and thoughts instead of internalizing them. I called someone and just had to talk. And I basically just sat on the phone with her for thirty minutes and cried my eyes out. This is probably the first time I have been vulnerable and broken with someone about something going on in my life in years. I realized that I have no close friends - not that I am sad about that at all, but just that I have no close friends because I am protecting myself. And if I open up to someone, I am more than willing and able to talk about my past. My past is something that I have learned to relate to people through. Maybe my identity is still wrapped up in it. The stories I have to tell are validated when they resonate with someone else. Maybe I am still so desperate for healing and validation that telling my story makes the reality of it sting less each time. There is so much pain that is soothed when someone affirms the place I have come from as meaningful to them I guess. They are things I've sort of figured out. The thing is I don't really know how to relate to people as far as my day to day life, my struggles, the things that I am going through RIGHT NOW... and yes, I am going through some very difficult things RIGHT NOW. My best guess is that there are people I have "befriended", subsequently smothered, proven that I do not know how to have a two-way relationship with, who have decided it's too much and sort of fallen off the face of the earth. I have learned to internalize so much because I have already had to hide so much of my life... I am a very analytical person anyway so I won't allow myself to proceed without having recognized/acknowledged/worked through stuff, but I don't know how to relate to people as far as that is concerned. The ponderings of my heart are complex and I think I am protecting myself from judgment and being hurt. And the exhaustion of regurgitating all that I think and feel. It doesn't make the fact that I desire community, friendship and mutual love, respect and admiration any less real. I do desire it. I just don't know how to do it. So the rejection feels so intense. 

I've been trying to figure out how I became the person that I am now. I have spent a lot of time thinking about this over the last few months. I am 33 years old. I am a grown woman. I have been a mother for twelve years, been divorced and remarried, made some seriously bad decisions in my life that have affected not only my life but the lives of others. I am still trying to repair my life from the cumulative effect of living so many years with so little concern for the consequences that would result. Some of these choices I share openly and some I have chosen to tell very few people about (and when I say few, I mean a few), and these same choices are known to hundreds and I am judged most harshly to this day because of them. Some of it is rightful/righteous judgment of the offense but not an accurate judgment of the woman I have become. I know and am sure there are people who look at me and see only my past sin, and think they know the me NOW by that sin. They filter me by that sin and write me off in their minds, sitting in a place of judgment over me constantly. "Well, she is just this... look at her." I feel like I experienced that just this week and it still hurts me. I am not that person anymore, but this is the consequence of sin. It follows you. I am sure Peter dealt with that his whole life. I am sure Paul dealt with this too. I am no Peter or Paul, but I am sure just as for me from time to time (or maybe more often) it kept them in a place of humility whether it was by the overwhelming understanding of God's mercy and love or because they had to dealt with the skeptics and doubters and scowls from time to time being in positions of leadership. Don't read me wrong, I am just trying to relate -- I don't consider myself a saint by any means. 

Anyway, so, something became very apparent to me recently. Well, I guess it wasn't recently. Maybe about this time last year I began to recognize something within myself... pride. We started going back to the church that Jason and I basically met through. We have a huge amount of history within this church. I can't nor will I go into detail because it is unnecessary at this point, and all water under the bridge as far as the church itself is concerned, but I will tell you that I walked through my divorce there, as well as made some choices within that body that affected other people pretty seriously. I don't need to add this but I will mention my deep regret for this. We eventually left there, as a couple, after coming together after I had been divorced from my son's Dad. The bottom line is so much of the ugly with me happened within the church. So much of my deepest, ugliest, most scandalous brokenness happened  within that community. I am sure many conclusions were drawn by folks who only "heard" what happened. This is not an accusation in any way, it is just a supposition on my part. It was a mess. Seven years later, we were led back to this same church community after a progression of healing and restoration and forgiveness. We chose to come back on our own and were blessed, received and embraced. We've been back now for over a year and I am starting to ask God why we're there. I am starting to get answers and it relates very much to all of what I am talking about right now. One Sunday after being back for a few months, there was a call for folks who needed ministry. This is a staple of their service that at the end of the service you have the opportunity to respond to the message and worship and receive prayer and ministry time. When I was there before I probably was up there every single service, on my face in a puddle of tears and snot. I had no shame, nothing held me back. I didn't care if I was up there every single time. I knew everyone knew my garbage and so what did I have to hide? Now, here we are... we're back there and we have our marriage of nearly seven years, our two children and Jason basically raising my son from my previous marriage. Everything is supposed to be great, stable, good, fine and wonderful. I am not allowed to be broken, struggling, or anything less than whole. Right? Yes. That is what I want them to see. I want them to see NO glimpse of the old Brooke. I want them to look at me and see NOTHING of the person I was. I don't want to look like her, be like her, smell like her, talk like her or behave like her. I cannot be broken. I cannot be unstable because if I am, then nothing has changed. I realized this when on this one Sunday, the call for those who needed ministry came, and my husband willingly went as he always does, and my pride put up a big wall and said "no, don't let them see". My pride (and/or shame) had or has become so big, that I am unwilling to let others in to see who I really am. I am still picking up the pieces of the past, how can I still be struggling so much now in what is supposed to be the great redemption of my life? The great redemption story of a redeemed life... I am supposed to be living out that story and yet here I am, I am still so broken, in so many ways. I am still so burdened. Every facet of our life we feel like we are fighting to just keep our heads above water. Our marriage is going through some struggles - we are very much committed and still love each other so much, we just having some difficult growing pains. We are broke, going back into debt and have very little hope for our future. We are having serious trouble with both of our cars. My oldest son's issues seem to be getting worse and I am not sure how to proceed to help him. My youngest two children - though precious and adorable - are wearing me out at this demanding stage of their lives. I have lost the drive and passion to do the things that I know make me come alive. I've stopped caring about my diet as much or sometimes even getting dressed in the morning. There are so many things I cannot begin to name. So I have gone into hiding. Hiding from the world, trying to save face, trying to keep up appearances. I didn't realize that I had done this. But I did. I am. And to be honest I am not sure yet that I want to come out. Or actually, I am not sure I even know how to come out of hiding. 

This is what I have concluded through all of this self-reflection. The way I've begun to relate to people is to not relate to them at all. Any friendships I try to cultivate lately are not real friendships at all, they must be just one sided efforts with me pouring out pouring out and then poof. It's over. And then that compounds the feelings of rejection and fear of vulnerability and transparency. Which causes me to want to hide even more. And it's not that I really even want friendships. I don't even have time. I don't even have to ability to do more than I have in front of me today, or plan date nights, or futures or things, so how on earth am I going to have time for relationships outside of my home?

When we went to the Phish show in August, I was dumped right back into the culture that had been my demise. I realized how much more uptight and reserved I had become. This is not a bad thing, it just is what it is. I am no longer the barefooted, free-spirited wildflower that I once was. I realized how I have distanced myself so much from that lifestyle that once defined me. This is both good and bad. Inside I long for freedom to live and have the hopes and dreams long desired fulfilled. The cynic in me makes fun of the cliche of the organic/free-spirited/earth loving/farm living folks, but inside I long for that. For us now all seems so distant and we are so mired in the day to day life we find ourselves in, we just don't understand or know when or how things will get better, and so we are restrained to doing things the way that we know we must. The "plan" is going to take so long, how will we ever really get there? And the obstacles so numerous, how will we overcome them? I don't know what the answer is. 

There is nothing more for me to say now. I have said what I needed to say. Here I raise my sort of Ebenezer... I know now that if I am to grow from this place (and there is no other choice but to grow) I need to invite God in and allow him to do whatever more healing he wants to do... to practice humility and vulnerability... that is one of my goals for this year... to practice openness... to get into community and be present and practice being real, open and honest, and to seek support and receive help when it is offered. Such an odd goal to be making, but here it is. I would love to be a part of some sort of meaningful community with meaningful relationships by this time next year... somewhere where I know I can be real about all the things about our life that are weighing us down and celebrate the victories and advances... somewhere where we can participate in something meaningful outside ourselves and for the benefit of other people which is ultimately what we want to do with our lives. 

I don't know what else to say, and frankly I need to get on with doing the laundry.

Thanks for reading.