Monday, August 13, 2012

On the Value of Being Messy

"And you too have come into the world to do this, to go easy, to be filled with light, and to shine." 


"Long before he laid down earth's foundations, he had us in mind, had settled on us as the focus of his love, to be made whole and holy by his love. Long, long ago he decided to adopt us into his family through Jesus Christ. (What pleasure he took in planning this!) He wanted us to enter into the celebration of his lavish gift-giving by the hand of his beloved Son. . . .  It's in Christ that we find out who we are and what we are living for. Long before we first heard of Christ and got our hopes up, he had his eye on us, had designs on us for glorious living, part of the overall purpose he is working out in everything and everyone."


valued

I have been struggling deeply with questions of identity.  And not because Eve died -- although her death certainly made me unwilling to keep on living as if I had no questions when I did, and do.  No, I have been grappling with identity, with who-am-I-really and who-is-God-and-what-is-this-all-about, for my entire life. 

In my experience, childhood and the teenager years are a time when you learn about the world, are shown how to survive, and when you begin to discover who you are, the person that God created you to be.  You play, you make messes, you scrape your knees a lot, and you growing in the scraping and the mess-making.

That is not my story.  The messages communicated to me, both implicitly and explicitly, were quite different.  You are a problem.  You are inconvenient.  You are not loved if you make mistakes.  Your job is to be perfect.  Your job is to be who you are told to be, to do what you are told to do.  Don't ask questions.

The result of these messages?  Seventeen years of disordered eating to cope with feeling beaten down (seventeen years of mental illness that, thank God, have ended), and thirty years of not-knowing-who-I-am, of not trusting myself.  Not trusting my body when it tells me that it's full or it's tired or it's hurt.  Not trusting myself to make decisions, large or small.  Not trusting the beliefs or opinions or ideas or hopes that spring up in my head and heart.  Thirty years of not asking questions.

The only problem is -- the questions need to be asked.  The messes need to be made.  That's what the people who filled my mind with those false messages didn't understand.  Though I'm sure they loved me in their own way, they didn't understand that it is healthy to play and test and ask and fall.  And honestly, I didn't understand that myself until recently.  Losing Eve has brought that truth home even more strongly.  

So, having missed out on the many figuring-stuff-out opportunities the growing up years have to offer, I am asking the questions now.  I am embracing the mess.  Because if I am messy, there's no use pretending that I'm not just to please someone else (someone else who is probably denying their own messiness, too).  Life is messy.  Grief has taught me that. We might as well be honest about it.

This blog has been a part of that asking, that embracing, and it will continue to be.  But I am ready to start asking questions off the page, too, in the midst of life.  So I am trying to notice more -- notice the beauty and the pain and the exquisite mess of it all.  I try to notice how God enters in, how He is not afraid of the mess.  I am reading more poetry, and reading more in general, and more widely.  I am journaling more outside of this blog.  I am exploring through photography (like the one in this post -- it felt so vulnerable and tenuous that I knew I had to share, even though it makes me tremble).  I am trying to be honest -- with myself and with others.  I am done with hiding, done with being afraid.  I'm asking the hard, scary questions of God and about God, because not doing so turns my heart stony. 

More than that, I am choosing to believe that I am who God says I am, and that His love is as extravagant and graceful and depths-plumbing as the Bible describes it to be.  See that quote from Ephesians 1 at the top of this post?  It says that I am chosen (you are, too).  It tells me that the messages of my youth were wrong, and I am fighting hard to believe that.  It says that I am wanted, valuable in Christ.  It does not say, "God chooses as the focus on His love when we are perfect" or "when we are not messy" or "when we've got it all together."  No, it says that He chose us, period.  That I am valued, period. 

So I'm resting on that, and asking the messy, scabby, difficult questions and figuring out how to be the person He made me to be, how to trust that His workmanship is solid.  I know that He can take it.

This post feels clumsy, limping.  But it's an honest start, and that's something.

17 comments:

  1. It is honest and raw and heartfelt and doesn't feel clumsy at all, but I imagine that you feel that way when everything you've been taught tells you not to be real with people, that your real self wasn't acceptable even. I'm in awe of your determination to break free of that lie and appreciate that you've shared this so openly.

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    1. Exactly, Crystal, about learning to not NOT be real with folks. Hugs.

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  2. *points to Crystal's comment* She beat me to what I was going to say. :)

    This is beautiful, Beth. Truthful and honest and amazing in the light you shine here.

    As always, thank you.

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  3. I love this!! We are all messy. It is part of life and who we are! I don't want to clean myself up anymore!! I want to create and capture and LIVE because that is who I am. I want to feel, deeply. (Was told recently that I'm not understood, analyse too much, feel too deeply -in relation to my miscarriage by a 'friend'. She used 'hers as a positive').
    I don't want to be the person who is void of feeling. I say live and let your light shine. If we have to be messy to do it... then so be it. Embrace it :)

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    1. Ugh I'm sorry that your feeling is being seen as "too much," Melissa. I think feeling is important and so healthy and requires a hefty dose of courage. I'm glad we're both trying to feel, messy as that may be! :)

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  4. I love this post about being messy, chosen, valued! A beautiful reminder. I have been thinking about how the loss of a child leads to courage and boldness in asking God the tough questions. I am learning that He doesn't mind at all and actually even welcomes it. In the questioning and searching Him we can only be closer to Him.

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    1. That's exactly what I think, but you put it in to words so much more succinctly! Thanks. :)

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  5. Life is the intersection of the beautiful and the messy. You are right where you are supposed to be. :)

    That picture? It's your best one yet. I love the vulnerability and the the bravery it captures. You are beautiful, Beth.

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    1. Thanks! Love how you put it (you have such a way with words!): "Life is the intersection of the beautiful and the messy. You are right where you are supposed to be."

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  6. "I'm asking the hard, scary questions of God and about God, because not doing so turns my heart stony." Yes, I have been asking those too. I feel as if I am in a second adolescence (maybe that's all a mid-life crisis is anyway) and am redefining- or further defining- myself bit by messy bit. I love this post Beth, and I love that you let us in on the journey.

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    1. "A second adolescence" -- that's a great way to phrase it, Christine. Although in my case it feels more like delayed adolescence, since I was never allowed to ask the questions when I was a teen. So I'm taking advantage of the opportunity! But it's good to know that I'm not the only one asking (and re-asking) these kinds of questions.

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  7. Clumsy is the last word I would use. It is beautiful and honest and grace-full and I am so very thankful you had the courage to put into words what I have been silently wrestling with for years. I love you so much, my dear friend.

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  8. This is such a beautiful post full of honesty and it kept me captivated and nodding the whole way through. Thank you for sharing vulnerably. your self-portrait is beautiful. This, what you are doing, asking questions, getting messy, is strong and powerful.

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  9. Thanks Beth for this post. It seems our lives have run a similar course. Except I am only figuring it out at 40. At times it seems like I have lived my life without a compass. Although I have wondered through this life aimlessly without a compass, I am so grateful I had a moral compass to keep me on the straight. Thank you for sharing your journey so honestly. So beautifully. And I seriously love your self portrait.
    Much love
    Flowers

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    1. I love how you put it -- "I have lived my life without a compass." I feel the same way. Without a compass, map, or sense of direction. But maybe I'm starting to get my bearings? Like you, I wish I had started to get them earlier, but better late than never, huh? Hugs.

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    2. Better late that never. I agree. Trust we will find our way forward and share our journey together! Big hugs.

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"I am glad you are here with me."
― J.R.R. Tolkien, The Return of the King