burning like matchsticks in the face of the darkness

Therp last week gave me a list of 4 therps she thought might be a better fit for me (per my request). I called the top of the list one on Saturday, and she called me back today. She reminded me that because she's traveling a lot, she couldn't begin seeing me regularly until mid-February. Current-therp had in fact told me this -- though I had forgotten -- and we scheduled a consult anyway (in like a month, because she is that busy/traveling). Part of me wants to call the other people on the list (for ~consults) and part of me wants to quit therapy. I recognize that this is largely because I was totally not feeling the vibe from potential-new-therp. (I go back and forth about whether therapy is a useful/the most useful place in which to do the work I want to do, and mostly I feel like it is, but blah the process is discouraging sometimes.)

Therp today said her sense of what makes something "traumatizing" rather than "upsetting" is when it shakes your belief system.

Okay, I have possibly been converted to Art Therapy as a Thing that I Do.

So, ANTS has Art Night every Thursday night from 7-10pm.  If I were to stay until 10pm I would get home ~11:30pm ... and I get up at 6am and need ~8 hours of sleep.  And (visual) art is really not a thing that I do.  But the retiring dean gave us this Friday off (4-day weekend!).  And I have had a lot of grief/stress in my life recently (for values of "recently" that encompass "the past six months" through "last week"), so I was thinking that art therapy might be something worth trying.

In the first hour I was there I did I think 3 pieces.  I didn't really know how to make the art supplies do what I wanted, so I was experimenting.  I ate the dinner I'd brought with me and then did 2 more pieces.  I don't have photographs because I still haven't gotten my camera back from Missy and Jess, but I'm probably going back on Memorial Day to pick up my paint- and glitter-covered pieces of paper.

I think I want to keep doing this (and I kinda wanna bring other people with me -- which is probably in part because most of the ANTS conversation isn't stuff I can really engage with, since I'm not a student there).  I could easily just do the first hour of Art Night (though that still means I get like 7 hours of sleep that night edit: math is hard; I could get 8 hours of sleep that night if I only stayed for the first hour) -- and of course during the summer I could come in to work late on Fridays and that would be fine.

Today I emailed a friend of mine (who is queer and mentally ill), Subject "~closeting," telling her about how a casual friend and I were having a conversation on Facebook Wall about making plans to get together, and she suggested next week and I thought, "I don't know when my therapy appointment next week is," and I opted to move the conversation to private message rather than continuing it on our Facebook Walls.  (Yes, some of that was about a desire to streamline the conversation, but that was only part of it.)

The friend I'd emailed said: "I have been really impressed that you posted about therapy both on FB and LJ."

I was so thrown by this.  I mean, I have posted barely anything about the substance of the therapy I've had (all ~10 sessions in ~4 months), so it's not like I'm revealing much at all by publicly disclosing this information.

But if anyone were to ask me about my being in therapy, my honest answer would be something along the lines of, "Well, I'm experiencing a lot of grief and transition."  This isn't anything that's going to make anyone think me less employable.  This isn't anything that's going to make anyone uncomfortable to be around me.

People would in fact be sympathetic.  I woudn't be perceived as "broken" or "less than" or "other."

There would in fact be a sense that I don't "need" to be in therapy -- that it's sort of a luxury item, like going to a spa or something, a nice thing to do to take care of oneself.

I would be perceived as still being a healthy, whole, high-functioning person at base.

But I wouldn't be perceived as someone who "isn't really sick" and is cheating the system.  (This is connected to race, class, etc. privilege that I have.)

My "luxury item" doesn't preclude me doing my job.  Would people's stance change if I had a condition (mental health or otherwise) that required specialist care far away and so I had to miss a lot of work?

Possibly a better title for this post would be, "we live in a culture of perfectionism."

Last Friday, Scott and I were talking about how chronic conditions are stigmatized, whereas temporary injuries aren't.  But even so, I think there's a sense (at least in white, middle-class, culture) in which even when you're only temporarily "broken" you're not supposed to ask for "too much" in the way of "special accommodations."  And that's one of the ways in which dis/abism affects all of us.  If resources aren't provided for "those people" and then you become one of "those people," whether temporarily or permanently (and yes, I'm thinking of physical disability now, but you can make the parallel for mental health, too), you suffer too.

There's other stuff I want to talk about, too -- particularly about the "joking," dismissive, and pejorative things people say about people with mental illness (and with physical disabilities -- especially invisible ones) -- but that's a whole nother post.

Blogging Against Disablism Day 2010 was this past Saturday (May 1, as it is every year), and I had some posts in mind which I never made, so this is in some ways this my post for that day (even though there is a sense in which every day should be Blogging Against Disablism Day).

I went to seder at my mom's friend Susan's last night (in Brookline).  I took a cab home because I wanted to get some sleep, and other than establishing where I live and how to get there, the cabbie basically didn't talk to me at all.  \o/

And I was actually awake all day today, which surprised me, given the not-enough-sleep I've been getting.

I told Scott that I was gonna skip ahead to working on my Easter sermon, since I'm giving the Reflection at Rest and Bread on Easter Wednesday, but that I think I need to work through the Palm Sunday stuff before I can do Easter.  My Palm Sunday sermon is getting progressively better, but it's still not done.  Not-enough-sleep is also contributing to insufficient brain function.

At 11:11 we paused so Scott could daven the Shema -- "because all is one."  ♥

In my continuing theme of, "I'm just not that into you," I had my last session with the therapist I've been seeing.  The thing I found most interesting was how my posture shifted after we explicitly articulated that this would be my last session with her -- that I was sitting kind of folded up in the chair, with one hand in my hair ... sort of removed and also somewhat in control.  She had some useful suggestions about finding a new therapist, so that's nice.

Therp hadn't realized that I go to church three times every Sunday, so yesterday we ran through my 4 primary church involvements -- how I ended up at each one and why I stay (what I get out of it).

She commented that most people don't go to 4 different churches and I said, "Yeah -- that's why for years people have been asking me if I'm going to div school," and I tangentially mentioned my resistance to ordained ministry, mentioning, "I hate people," in that offhand explanatory way that I do.  Therp was surprised, and I caveated that it was an overstatement, but I still stood by it.

She asked, "Have you been hurt by people?"

I said, "Maybe?" because that's always a good answer.

I said there is an element of pre-emptive rejection -- that if I don't like you, then I don't care if you like me.

She said that when I'd talked about the churches, I kept saying I liked the people.  I said that was true, but that I only liked some of the people -- which makes it awkward say at Coffee Hour when there are only 4 people I wanna talk to, and they're all talking to other people.  She asked 4 out of how many.  I guessed 20.  She thought that wasn't bad.

She said I was "picky" -- in a way that sounded healthy, since I have finite time and energy; in contrast to the way I would frame it, of having unrealistically high expectations of everyone.

I had lunch with Scott today, and I told him about therapy, and he said it back to me as therp saying, "You don't hate people, you're just normal."

Thinking about this later: If I expect that everyone likes a higher percentage of the people they encounter than I do, then I'm expecting a higher percentage of the people who encounter me to like me than actually do/will.  (A few sessions ago, when therp asked about dating, I said I hate the performativity of it, and I said I'm sure that's a mix of shyness and low self-esteem.)  I've always felt like most everyone else has an easier time finding groups of people they really click with than I do, and I pretty well own that quirkiness, that I don't really fit into any particular group, but I think I probably also have some unresolved issues around that.

[Edit: I think part of the problem also is that most people are better at playing the social game than I am -- I'm not an extrovert, so engaging with people is potentially inherently draining, plus I'm not good at that performance of social niceties with people I don't care about -- so I feel like everyone else likes people more than I do.]

I was talking to Trevanna after church Sunday night, and she said that when people don't like her she wants to make them like her, and she's had to learn that really there are plenty of people who do like her and think she's awesome and that's where she should be investing her time and energy -- that it sounds obvious, but it's something she's really had to learn.  I concurred.

The daily lectionary readings last Thursday morning were:
Daniel 2:1-19
and
Ephesians 4:17-5:1

Joan read the Daniel and I read the Ephesians.  As I began the Ephesians reading, I was struck by how it connected to the Daniel reading (well done, lectionary crafters!) -- the nonbelievers do not have understanding, but those who follow God do.

FCS-Ian said that the Ephesians reading reminded him that it's a process, rather than just a single moment at baptism or whatever.  I said yeah, as I read it I was reminded of themes in my sermon, because these are the daily lectionaries leading up to that Sunday :)

I said that I forget sometimes what hard things we are called to do.  I said, "I'm not sure I want to commit to that."  (I thought of lashon hara.)

Joan(?) said, "Lots of people don't commit to that."  Which was really not what I was going for.  (I felt like what she was getting at was, "Lots of people call themselves Christians and don't even try to live into being the good people that Jesus commands us to be," whereas I was trying to talk about us and not about Them -- because it's so easy to be judgmental of Other People and so easy to let ourselves off the hook.)

I forget what I said in response, but Joan said, "I think we can't do that.  And that's why we feel guilty all the time."

I thought of the fact that I do the Call to Confession at Rest and Bread every week and how I've been thinking that I would like to make more explicit that in acknowledging and turning back to God, we let go of the sins we are confessing, we let go of the guilt.

What I said was, "I know that we can't perfect it in this life, but it's what we're called to do."

²²You were taught, with regard to your former way of life, to put off your old self, which is being corrupted by its deceitful desires; ²³to be made new in the attitude of your minds; ²⁴and to put on the new self, created to be like God in true righteousness and holiness.

²⁵Therefore each of you must put off falsehood and speak truthfully to his neighbor, for we are all members of one body. ²⁶"In your anger do not sin"^{[Psalm 4:4]}: Do not let the sun go down while you are still angry, ²⁷and do not give the devil a foothold. ²⁸You who have been stealing must steal no longer, but must work, doing something useful with your own hands, that you may have something to share with those in need.

²⁹Do not let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouths, but only what is helpful for building others up according to their needs, that it may benefit those who listen. ³⁰And do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God, with whom you were sealed for the day of redemption. ³¹Get rid of all bitterness, rage and anger, brawling and slander, along with every form of malice. ³²Be kind and compassionate to one another, forgiving each other, just as in Christ God forgave you.

¹Be imitators of God, therefore, as dearly loved children

Those are some strong demands (and I also love the closing line of this lectionary passage -- esp. 'cause, leading up to Baptism of Jesus Sunday).

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We talked afterwards about the fact that I was going to be preaching, and I said I was mostly excited about preaching -- that I don't like standing up in front of people, though I'll sit down and argue with the person who's standing up.

Joan said that when she was at Lesley, there was a big emphasis on cooperative learning sort of stuff and that she insisted that teachers have power (as do students) and they need to step into that and own it, because if you don't acknowledge it then it gets corrupted.  I immediately made the analogy to privilege -- that acknowledging your privilege is the first step.
I also agreed that I think it'll be a good experience for me to stand up in front of people like that.

***

Later, I was catching up on Magpie Girl posts and read "Epiphany: Fairies, Snowballs of Honor, and Finding Your Star."

It is silent and still as “snow, on snow, on snow”  comes down. Cate and I are bundled up to our noses against the cold, but happy in the oasis that is the walled garden near our urban home.

“Can we visit the Fairy Tree?,” asks Cate.

“Of course!” I reply.

“Oh good, I want to give the Fairies the Snowball of Honor.” says Cate.

When we get to the tree, Cate leaves her snowball in a hollow as an offering.

“Hey Cate,” I say, “tomorrow is Epiphany and we get to find the name of the star we will follow for the year. Want to ask the Fairies what the name of your star will be?” She nods. She closes her eyes and holds out her hand it it’s puffy pink glove. I say, “Imagine that the Fairies are carrying a word to you. They are swirling around you like the snow flakes. And now, they are putting the word in your hand.”  I touch her open palm with one finger. “Open you eyes! ”

The second her eyes open, the word is on her tongue.

I was reminded of the Dreamboard idea.

Other posts: "*8Things: To Stop Doing in 2010" (more for the idea of the title than for MG's list itself) and "Fear — How to Break Up with the Bastard" (after the "{dear fear}" post on another blog).

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Emily K.'s facebook statuses are usually Bible verses or other Christian "inspirational" messages, which don't always map onto my theology.  But last Wednesday's was: "Moses answered the terrified people, "Do not be afraid. Stand firm and you will see the deliverance the LORD will bring you today...The LORD will fight for you; you need only to be still" (Exodus 14:13)

***

Thursday night was CAUMC small group.  It was me and Sean and Seth.

Sean had two readings -- one from Intimacy: Pursuing Love and one from Hospitality: Risking Welcome.

They were really really good readings, and in the interest of ever getting this post up I'm not going to attempt to retype blocks of text.  But the Intimacy one talked about church as "a place where friends met regularly to tell their stories, share their joys, and bear one another's burdens" (p. 32) and the Hospitality one talked about L'Arche and about how this guy single-handedly prepared a big meal and later realized that by refusing to accept help from anyone, he was signaling that "The quality of the meal---a reflection of my culinary skills---was more important to me than the experience of community" (p. 22).

I borrowed the books from Sean and read them on Saturday.  The one other really powerful story from the Intimacy book was about this congregation which contains a lot of recovering/struggling addicts (who lift up their personal prayer concerns very openly and honestly) and members of a wealthy well-to-do mission partner church were visiting and during prayer time one of the visitors said, "I want to ask this church to pray for me.  I've never said this out loud in any church; but I just can't stop drinking, and it's about to ruin my marriage and my family.  I need your help."  I about cried reading that.  Have I mentioned how bad I am at asking for prayers for myself?  (I told Ian that near the end of Friday's session, the therapist said that one of the things that struck her most was my strong desire that other people think I'm "fine," and in his reply he commented that, "I think we both know you like being seen as uber-competent and in control," which is TRUFAC.)

The L'Arche story in the Hospitality book continued:

Can we set aside our own need to prove ourselves useful and generous in order to listen carefully, to welcome the offering, to appreciate and honor the gifts of other communities, especially the gifts of those we have come to serve?  Can we receive their hospitality?

Can we?  It's an important question, because receiving hospitality is what God does.  In the incarnation, God in Christ entered a particular home, a particular neighborhood, a particular time and place in history.  Jesus went (and still goes) in search of welcome, stepping into people's homes, asking to dine with them, calling ordinary and marginalized people down from treetops so he could join them in their homes for supper.  Being fed at our table, sleeping in our guest room, receiving a cup of tea in our chipped cup, being invited into our lives to listen as well as to speak--all these are sacred acts of Jesus Christ.

For us to become Christ-like is to enter into the holy act of receiving hospitality from the world.  From strangers.  [...]  Even from our enemies.  Receiving hospitality is a sacred risk and a godly adventure.

As you take the risk of hospitality, remember that God is with you.  God. who took this same risk, is with you.  [...]  As you accept hospitality  in unexpected places, God is there.  And God calls us to be there, too.

(pp. 25-26)

Writing this up, I'm reminded of a bit from Loving Jesus by Mark Allan Powell (which full writeup I still need to make):

I ask my seminary students how many of them are prepared to devote their lives to serving the Lord.  Every hand goes up.  Then I read them Mark 10:45  where Jesus says, "The Son of Man came not to be served but to serve."  Jesus says he doesn't want you to serve him, I declare.  He says that he wants to serve you.  I'm messing with their minds, of course.  There are plenty of Bible verses that do exhort us to serve the Lord (for example, Matthew 4:10 and 6:24), but seminarians are often more keen on serving than on being served.  So are pastors.  So are many of us.  Peter would have gladly washed the feet of Jesus, but he didn't want to let Jesus wash his feet (John 13:6-8).

-pp. 177-8

The Hospitality book invokes those who sheltered Jews during the Holocaust, the Underground Railroad, and those aiding "illegal" Mexican immigrants in the USA.

And from my notes on Loving Jesus:

"I offer the following proposition: The mission of the church is to love Jesus Christ; everything else is just strategy" (p. 178).

"Jesus doesn't just want his sheep to be fed; he wants his sheep to be fed by someone who loves him" (p. 178, re: the John 21:15-17 story of "Simon Peter, do you love me? ... Feed my sheep.").

"A more biblical model may describe the external mission of the church as being to love God (through worship) and to love neighbor (through service)" (p. 179).