Connected in Story: Chapter Five

In which we become Real…

We’ve journeyed five weeks into Lent together. Five weeks of story. Five weeks we’ve seen the ways that our story fits into The Story. Winnie the Pooh reminded us that community is where we live out our story. Anne of Green Gables helped us find home within community and within ourselves. Harry Potter showed us the power of ordinary people living their heroic stories. Last week, I got a little nerdy (okay… a lot nerdy) as I wrote about Star Wars and finding connection in something bigger than ourselves.

This week I want to get Real. But let’s talk a bit about what Real means. Real is not the pretty filters we post on Instagram. Real is not the “I’m fine. How are you?” that we answer when someone asks us how we are doing. Real is not the smile we put on our face in public when our private life is breaking our hearts.

Real is messy and hard. Real involves tears and words we can’t take back. Real is the story of what happens behind closed doors at home and also within these wandering hearts of ours.

Unfortunately, sometimes it’s a little too easy to convince ourselves that the story we show to the world is real. It is easier to pretend that it is true. Honestly, sometimes believing that it is real helps us to survive. It’s a defense mechanism, a way of protecting ourselves. But defense mechanisms and masks are not truth, nor are they healthy and authentic.

The Veveteen Rabbit, or How Toys Become Real is a sweet children’s tale. Honestly though, it speaks more to me now as an adult than it did when I was a child.

In the book, a stuffed Rabbit made of velveteen is found inside a stocking one Christmas. The Boy loves on the Rabbit for a bit, but soon moves on to the shinier and noisier toys. The Rabbit lives quietly in the toy box in the Boy’s room. However, one night the Boy cannot find his favorite sleep buddy, and Nana gives him the Rabbit to sleep with. From that moment on, the Boy and his Rabbit are inseparable. The little Rabbit is taken on wheelbarrow rides and to picnics and all the things a Boy and his Rabbit can get into.

The Rabbit begins to look worn and his fur is shabby, but that doesn’t matter because the Boy loves him and believes the Rabbit is Real.

I love this quote from the beloved storybook. In it, the Skin Horse, who is very old and wise, tells the little Rabbit how you become Real.

He said, “You become. It takes a long time. That’s why it doesn’t happen often to people who break easily, or have sharp edges, or who have to be carefully kept. Generally, by the time you are Real, most of your hair has been loved off, and your eyes drop out and you get loose in the joints and very shabby. But these things don’t matter at all, because once you are Real you can’t be ugly, except to people who don’t understand.”

I will be honest, y’all. I feel shabby, and I feel like my joints are loose and one eye has fallen out. I feel like my hair has been rubbed off….but not because I was loved well. I feel this way because I have been hurt deeply.

But I am also learning to trust the One Who Made me - and I am learning to see myself as Beloved. And slowly, I’m beginning to see the pain I carry as a part of my story rather than all of it. I’m beginning to believe my story is more about becoming Real - more about who I am Becoming - instead of the IG filtered story of my past.

And the beautiful part of it all? In becoming Real, I am finding my true self. I am finding community. And I am finding myself loved - because I am surrounding myself with those who understand.

“.....once you are Real you can’t become unreal again. It lasts for always.”

Connected In Story: Chapter Four

In which we connect with something bigger than ourselves…

If you’ve known me in any capacity for longer than 5 minutes, you have probably heard a nerd reference. It is a big thing in my family. My kids and I obsess over nearly every big fandom that exists. We are especially fond of Star Wars. We have cosplays and figures and artwork and SO many books and comics (SO. VERY. MANY.)

My youngest son has been obsessed with the fight between good and evil since he was old enough to make sound effects while playing with his toys. My oldest loves the character arcs and minute trivia facts. They both love the musical scores. They both own multiple lightsabers and know their favorite character’s fighting style. I even own my own lightsaber. But what I love most of all about Star Wars is the epic scale and the stories of struggle and redemption.

And of course, I have my favorite characters. I am an original trilogy girl. It’s what I grew up with as a child of the 70’s. I adored Carrie Fisher and her portrayal of Leia Organa, and I loved her even more as a woman who knew that her voice mattered and as an outspoken advocate for mental health.

Confession time though: I have, for as long as I can remember, had a huge celebrity crush on Harrison Ford. Amazing actor. Superbly handsome. And that roguish smile.

As much as I admire Leia as a self-rescuing princess, I really relate to the character arc of Han Solo in the original trilogy (I shall not speak of the sequels & the way they messed up my favorite characters, although the visuals are cool and I like Rey and Ren. I have spoken.)

For all you non-Star Wars fans, Harrison Ford played Han Solo in the movies. And also… what has kept you from watching this cultural phenomenon? Go watch the original trilogy! Better yet, call me and we can watch it together!

So why do I love Han Solo? He appeared in A New Hope as a pilot and a smuggler who only cared about the money he made. He was a scoundrel and a scruffy looking nerf herder, according to Leia, who was a leader in the Rebellion. Han fought beside Luke, and then Leia as they escaped from the clutches of Darth Vader. The Galactic Empire wanted control and power. They also desperately wanted to silence the voice of the Rebellion.

But those in the Rebel Alliance believed in freedom for the galaxy. They believed every voice mattered and every being was worth fighting for. They also believed in the value of every person in the fight for freedom.

Even after connecting in a powerful way during their mission, Han Solo collected the money for the job he completed, and decided to go back to his life as a smuggler. It felt like a betrayal to the comraderie Luke, Leia and Han had developed. It felt like a betrayal to this girl who had been crushing on Han Solo and hoping he would do the brave and right thing.

However, at the crux of the battle, when it looked like the Empire would win, Han swooped in and gave Luke the backup he needed to destroy the Death Star. Han changed his course and decided that he would commit to the cause of the Rebellion. Because Han decided to fight for something bigger than himself, the battle was won. And even though the Empire struck back (see what I did there😉), the trio fought together for something bigger, for something that mattered.

Leia later said about Han:

Over and over, he fought and risked his life and sacrificed and personally saved the entire Alliance more than once. He stayed because even if he couldn’t admit it, he believes in this cause. Han Solo is a smuggler because he likes it, but he’s a rebel because he’s Han Solo. And Han Solo complains and jokes and is generally half-useless… but he doesn’t leave. That’s inspiring. He matters. To the Rebellion…and to me.

This is what I want to do too. I want to be one that stays in the fight and stands up for the voices that are largely unheard. The Black community. People of color. The LGBTQ community. The transgender community. The deaf and hard of hearing. The survivors of abuse. The children who are hungry for physical and emotional nourishment. It matters that we listen to their voices and their stories. It matters that we recognize them as humans who have the image of God wrapped inside them.

I’ve said it before during this series, but I think about Kate Bowler’s statement nearly every day. “Lent is the perfect time to tell the truth about the way things really are.”

Let’s be truthful together, right here. We live in a world that ranks people into a hierarchy. We live in a society that ignores the oppressed and considers them a nuisance. We are a people who claim to follow God, but we don’t hear the cries of the needy and the lonely and the outsiders. We silence their voices when we don’t listen to their stories.

I have been guilty in so many ways of not paying attention to the stories of people who are not like me. But I am learning to listen. Because if I am not willing to hear their stories, I cannot love them the way Jesus does. When Jesus summed up the most important things we are to do as his followers, he said, “love God and love others.” There were no exclusions on the “love others” part. And I believe that begins with hearing their stories.

There is something about the power of rebellion. It matters that someone is willing to stand in the gap and listen to the oppressed and the ones that we so easily dismiss and classify as “other.’. It matters that, even if we think we are “half-useless,” that we choose to stay. We choose to rebel.

In the novelization of Revenge of the Sith: Star Wars: Episode III, the author, Matthew Stover says this:

The dark is generous, and it is patient, and it always wins - but in the heart of its strength lies weakness: one lone candle is enough to hold it back.

Love is more than a candle.

Love can ignite the stars.

Connected in Story: Chapter Three

In which we begin our new adventure

We started our Lenten story journey by looking at the risk and rewards of vulnerability and belonging through the charming stories of Winnie the Pooh. We learned that without courage, we can not form authentic community.

Last week, Anne of Green Gables taught us about the importance of home, which means both finding our tribe in community, but also being at home within ourselves.

Both stories reminded us that our personal story fits within The Sacred Story of all of history and creation.

I think I’m ready now to step into a story of adventure. I can easily hop into my favorite adventure story, the magical world of Harry Potter. Seriously… give me 30 seconds and one sentence and I can tell you exactly what’s going on and where in the series we are. I’ve read these books dozens of times. Also, I can kick the tail of most anyone who challenges me to a Harry Potter trivia contest.

So in the words of Albus Dumbledore:

Let us step into the night and pursue that flighty temptress, adventure.

When we meet Harry at age 11, he has survived a terrible ordeal - in his first year of life, he lost his parents to a murder meant to also kill him. Following this traumatic beginning, Harry spends his childhood years living with relatives who don’t want him, unaware of his true identity, bullied and neglected, squashed into a prison masquerading as a cupboard under the stairs.

But all of that changes on his 11th birthday, when a hairy, giant-of-a-man named Hagrid bursts into his life and announces, “Yer a wizard, Harry.”

This unusual proclamation ushers Harry into the adventure of a lifetime. Harry takes his first train ride on the Hogwarts Express which transports him to his new school and the first place that truly feels like home. Once he moves into the castle that is home to Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, Harry is sorted into Griffindor House, where he makes lifelong best friends in Ron and Hermione.

Harry could never imagine all that would come to pass for him during the next seven years, but his story parallels the Hero’s Journey, described by Joseph Campbell in his book The Hero with a Thousand Faces. In it, Campbell discusses his theory of the archetypal hero, a journey which he called the monomyth, the idea that all mythic narratives are variations of one great story. Specifically, the Hero’s Journey tells the story of a man or woman, who through great suffering, connects with the eternal and as a result of their sacrifice, brings redemption to their society or community.

Sound familiar? It feels like a story we’ve all heard, and Joseph Campbell would say that we have. In our Bible, Jesus himself lived that story - his great suffering and sacrifice led to the redemption of the world.

In mythology and literature, there are a thousand stories of ordinary people who became heroes. But even in 2021, we see echoes of this archetypal story play out. On a smaller stage, we ourselves live out that story again and again. We live and grow through our own trials, and our transformation leads us to sharing redemption and light with those around us. That’s right, our transformation is a witness to the power of God in the world.

Before you say to me, “I’m not a hero,” let me share how Campbell defines the word. “A hero is someone who has given his or her life to something bigger than oneself.” If you follow Christ or seek spirituality in any way, you are someone who has given your life to something bigger than you.

I’ll be honest though. When I’m in the messy middle of a painful situation, I’m not really interested in transformation. Mostly, I just want to stop hurting, to reach the end of the suffering, to go back to “normal.”

In the second book in JK Rowling’s magical series, Headmaster Albus Dumbledore tells Harry, “It is our choices, Harry, that show what we truly are, far more than our abilities.”

We have choices too. We get to choose how we respond to our difficulties. We cannot control what happens to us, but we do choose our response. I notice that when I choose to look closely, I see God’s presence when I am struggling in a way that I just don’t when life feels easier. I also recognize that when I persevere in struggle, my faith grows, and so does my confidence. So, I choose again today to see God’s bigger picture when I feel caught in my small one. And when I am weary and I can’t see past my pain, I have good friends who hold space for me to cry and feel my feelings for awhile, and then they help me get back up and look for God at work, loving and transforming me.

Our stories are mini versions of the Hero’s Journey. As we suffer and grow and transform, we glimpse eternity, and through us, the world is changed. Sirius Black, another character from the series, tells Harry, “We’ve all got both light and dark inside us. What matters is the part we choose to act on. That’s who we really are.”

Spoiler Alert: Harry ultimately defeats the bad guy who murdered his family. But his story twists and turns, he suffers and he grows, he survives because his friends are by his side, and his sacrifice makes the world a better place.

Our lives get to have that impact too. We have the choice to move our suffering into the light of transformation.

I will leave you with one of my favorite Joseph Campbell quotes:

We must be willing to get rid of the life we’ve planned, so as to have the life that is waiting for us.

I solemnly swear that I am up to no good.

All of these spectacular photos were taken by Caleb Perry from the illustrated versions of the Harry Potter series, written by JK Rowling and illustrated by Jim Kay.

⚡️Mischief Managed⚡️

Connected in Story: Chapter 2

In Which We Meet Anne Spelled With An E and Find a Place to Call Home

Last week, we started our story about connection with Winnie the Pooh and his jolly band of friends. I needed that reminder to move toward connection. I find it so easy to hide myself away from true community. I want to remember to be brave and vulnerable. But there is another idea I want to consider in our story of connection.

Home. It is something Anne Shirley wished for her whole life. She had places where she lived, but they were dark and full of sadness, neglect, and abuse. No one loved or wanted Anne. Until…

One day, because of a mistake in communication, she came to live on Prince Edward Island in Canada. The story was bumpy for a bit, before Marilla and Matthew Cuthbert chose to step forward into an unknown future and take a chance to give a little red haired orphan girl a home. 

Once Anne made her home at Green Gables on PEI, she began to build a life there. But I think it’s important to consider the choice involved. Anne had been hurt so many times. She knew more loneliness and pain than she did joy and belonging. It would have been easy, even natural for her to be skeptical and guard her heart. But she chose courage and connection.

Despite being love starved her whole life, Anne found love and a home in the little town of Avonlea. 

After our great loss, I moved my boys to Montgomery. Many people found this choice odd and unsettling. I had an awful lot of people ask me, “Why Montgomery, when your family is mostly in Birmingham?” Here is the truth: I made the best choice I could in the worst moments of my life. But our time in Montgomery changed me. During our 2 years living there, we learned who we were as a family of 3. We learned how to be in a church without being a clergy family. I found myself accepted - just as Renae, and not for who I was married to. I sang in the praise band, and we made friends. We also began seeing a counselor there who has walked with us in our darkest days and has helped us to process all that we have been through before and since our loss. But I think the most important lesson from that time was that I could survive and build a life on my own.

Around Thanksgiving in 2018, God began to put a longing inside me and my boys - a possibility of change. We began to envision a new home, and in May of 2019, we moved to Moody and bought a home near my parents. It is what everyone expected us to do 2 years prior, but I think I needed time to prove to myself that I could do this new thing alone. And I needed time to heal before I was ready to make a life.

Once we moved here to our new house, it took another 4 months of visiting churches to find a place that felt right. And 6 months later, Covid shut down all the things. 

Just as we were beginning to find our place, quarantine happened. We knew how to confine ourselves to our house; what we didn’t know was how to build community while we were huddled inside. 

It has taken a lot of time for me to find a true home. Really it has taken me a long time to even understand what home is for us in this new season. It was more than learning I could do this alone. It was more than buying a house close to family. It was even more than the nesting necessary to make this home feel like ours. Home is about all of those things. But it is also much more. 

Anne made a home at Green Gables with Matthew and Marilla. She made the east gable room her own with flowers and girlish touches. But home is about more than just the place you live and the cozy spaces you create within. I think Anne knew this. She embraced life in all its beauty and sorrow. She experienced everything with open arms - from the mountaintops to the “depths of despair.” She was loved deeply by Matthew and Marilla. She found a kindred spirit in Diana - her “lifelong bosom friend.” She made a difference in those around her. Anne deeply affected the people in that quiet, green-gabled house, as well as those in that sleepy little town.

I’ve had a lot of time to think about what home is for me during this last year.

I needed a home that was mine - one that we could really settle in. I needed to be closer to my family and reconnect to the people who stood by me when my life fell apart. I needed a friend to do life with, and I have gratefully and gloriously made a friend who loves me deeply and challenges me to be my best self. And I get to do the same for her! I am so grateful to have all these things come together. They have been absolutely life changing over the past year.

What was startling about Anne was her ability to create community around her with an open heart.  And I think that is what I have been looking for too. I need my family and my friends to do life with. I need a tribe. I need to feel ownership in my community. I need to have purposeful work to contribute. I need to see beauty around me. I need to love where I live.

But I also need to love myself and know who I am. (This is definitely something I am still working on - and it is hard.) It is something Anne understood - she knew who she was way down deep. I want to know myself that way too. I want to be at home in my own soul and body. Brene Brown is my favorite author, and I absolutely love this quote from Braving the Wilderness

True belonging is the spiritual practice of believing in and belonging to yourself so deeply that you can share your most authentic self with the world and find sacredness in both being a part of something and standing alone in the wilderness. True belonging doesn’t require you to change who you are; it requires you to be who you are.

 We all need a place and people to belong to- a place that feels like home. We all need to belong to ourselves too. I hope you have experienced this for yourself. I will leave you with a question, and I’d love for you to share with me here in the comments: What is it that creates home for you?

And yes, this is me. I once played Marilla in community theater. 🙂

“Dear old world,’ (Anne) murmured, ‘you are very lovely, and I am glad to be alive in you.”

Connected in Story: Chapter One

Chapter One: In Which we are Introduced and the Stories Begin

I’ve been steeped in story in so many ways lately. Over and over, I see and hear stories being told. History engages our minds, but stories engage our hearts. We grow in empathy and love when we hear a story. This just doesn’t happen the same way when we hear facts. And so I have felt compelled to look back at stories that have mattered to me - stories that have charmed me, made me feel brave, reminded me of the importance of community, and touched my heart in life changing ways. During Lent, a time when we walk through Jesus’s story, I feel drawn to share my favorite stories and how they have taught me and led me into community. So let’s open our hearts and jump first into The Hundred Acre Wood!

The bits of the Winnie the Pooh stories that charm me the most are the characters and their interactions. Through the eyes of Pooh, Tigger, Piglet, Eeyore, Owl, Kanga, and Little Roo, we learn important lessons about life and relationships. Through their simple and childlike wisdom, we learn the importance of friendship, what it means to be brave, how to listen well, and the risk and rewards of opening your heart to others. Listen to the wisdom in some of my favorite quotes from a certain Silly Old Bear:

“A day without a friend is like a pot without a single drop of honey.”

“If the person you are talking to doesn’t appear to be listening, be patient. It may simply be that he has a small piece of fluff in his ears.”

“Some people care too much. I think it’s called love.”

“When you are a Bear of Very Little Brain, and you Think of Things, you find sometimes that a Thing which seemed very Thingish inside you is quite different when it gets out into the open and has other people looking at it.”

I spent my first few days after Ash Wednesday in an intensive training with Metagem. If you are new to my story, I am a spiritual director - a companion and holy listener of stories. And sacred story was the theme for our time together. We talked about saints and mystics, about mythology, about asking better questions. But most of all we recognized the way our sacred story fits into The Sacred Story.

I am awed by this: that my story - and yours - fits within the tapestry of God’s connection and movement throughout all of the past, present, and future of humanity. Our joys and our sorrows, our daily moments and our extraordinary experiences, are woven together with the stories and days of all of creation.

One of my favorite parts of my training with Metagem is my wisdom group. I meet monthly (and text frequently) with three other ladies who are also training with Metagem. At first, we followed cautiously the step by step process of how to behave in our monthly meetings. But now I know these women deeply, and I love them. I know their stories and their hearts. We are doing life, and this spiritual direction path, together. We have gone from 4 women following a process to one sisterhood journeying together within a holy calling. I know that this connection we have has been built because of story. As we listened and shared our stories and hearts, God formed us into a family through the power of story and the pull of connection.

And isn’t that what we want most? Connection and belonging.

Brene Brown, one of my favorite authors, said in her book Daring Greatly, “Courage starts with showing up and letting ourselves be seen.” Y’all, I am so quick to wallow in feeling insignificant and ordinary. I am just a mom, a widow, a daughter, a friend. And I have so often held my heart close to keep it safe and protected from being hurt again. But there is no community without vulnerability. I have to be brave and risk being seen.

My story is significant and so is yours. And we are made for community and connection. God put within us a a longing for it. We are connected with one another and with all of creation in a song of praise and wonder to the God who intimately loves us.

I know this is hard. It is scary and we risk rejection. But listen to my very favorite Winnie the Pooh quote of all time:

“I always get to where I’m going by walking away from where I’ve been.”

So here I am, walking away from my lifelong story of being afraid of rejection. Here I am, walking toward community and belonging. Will you be brave and join me on the journey?