Diamond

Diamond

As the tectonic plates of your world shifted around you

Relentlessly scraping, pressing, molding

Swallowed up by the earth

Deep in the suffocating soil

Your heart felt all of its weight

The more they pressed in

Your supple soul toughened

Internalized

Dense, sharp, clear

Crystallized

A diamond

People look and say,

“Oh! So beautiful!”

Yes…

But little do they know.

Yes…

But little do they know.

A diamond

Oh…

So beautiful…

Tattoo

Tattoo

The warm weight of a surgically gloved hand rests against my fleshy side

Gravity heavy and secure

With the flickering buzz and hum

Burning needles singe the wicks of my nerves endlessly

Knives meticulously sawing, cutting, piercing, scraping, stabbing

Blades with heavy feet

Running with varied cadence across epidermal topography

I cannot outrun the pain

Carving canyons of smoldering tissue

Scouring the image in

The picture must be birthed through the narrow canal of pain

A throbbing river

Waves of lightning ink surge, burst, and sear

Buried under layers

Of trauma

Emotional wounds rise

As the needles dive in

Which I have survived

Creating…

Art

This last week I got my first tattoo. It was 5 hours of the most intense pain I’ve ever experienced. Sometimes, depending on where the tattoo needle was, it felt like a hot knife scraping my flesh. Other times it felt like my tattoo artist was Captain Ahab sadistically and meticulously harpooning a beached Moby Dick with a magical harpoon set aflame by Hades and concentrated ghost pepper extract. That was a long time to try every pain tolerance technique I’ve heard of or could imagine.

I told myself to imagine the pain was pleasurable…nope, didn’t work. I tried feeling the pain and telling myself, “It’s okay. You’re safe. Those are just needles. You’re in no harm. Holyshitballsoffirewhatyouarefeelingistherealestmotherfuckingpainever!!! And you’re still safe. Those are just needles. It’s okay. It’s OKAY. It’s OKAY!!!” I tried staring at a single thing in the room so that everything else would fade away. I ended up staring at almost every single thing in my sight for at least a few minutes each before the pain returned as quickly as it would sort-of-fade-away but not-really-fade-away. I tried focusing on a beautiful tree in my mind while breathing on the hairs of my left forearm while my right hand was tightly gripping the thigh part of my jeans and clenching my teeth. I held my breath for as long as the needle was on my skin and took a breath whenever the needle wasn’t touching me, imagining I was surfacing for air while swimming. I imagined I was David Blaine doing some feat of endurance. I imagined I was Lance Armstrong and the pain was the lactic acid in my legs while I powered up the hills of the Tour de France. I listened intently to whatever was streaming from Pandora, even the commercials. I kept telling myself this is only a moment in time and it will be over soon. I did those things and more, cycling between different survival techniques for 5 long hours.

And after all was said and done, my tattoo artist told me he was impressed with how I sat. Although I was in constant agony, he heard neither a peep nor felt a strong twinge from me.

Speaking of which, I almost forgot to mention a particular pain tolerance technique I used. It was one that kind of shocked me, which I’ve used before for other painful things in life, and that I’m not proud of. I told myself that I deserved the pain. In those moments I imagined the pain to be miniscule to the pain I may have caused others. In my mind I minimized my pain by comparing it to others who I imagine suffer more than me…the mother in the throngs of child birth, people who have been tortured, all those who had ever suffered intolerable injuries and sicknesses. I told myself I’ve been a bad person before and this pain pales in comparison to what I should suffer for all the times I fucked up…so bear it and don’t be a bitch.

It scared me that I could think that way and really tap into such feelings, but in other ways I’m not surprised. I know the persecutory and minimizing voice inside me that came out has been the result of a collection of angry voices in my life. Unhealthy internalizations. Guilt derived from a punitive superego made manifest. It is what evil wants me to believe. But although pain is inevitable, regardless of whether or not it is deserved, it doesn’t mean I need to join its efforts to tear down. Getting the tattoo just reminded me I still have a lot of healing to undergo…healing that forms a beautiful picture.

I’m Eating, So What Now God?

I’ve been attending a bible study that I can stomach...well, at least two times so far. We aren’t fearful of disagreeing with each other. The people that attend represent a variety of theological stances, church backgrounds, cultures, and ethnicities. I’m not afraid to swear or say things that might be considered offensive in some more conservative circles. Christianese (you know, language Christians often use that people who haven’t grown up in the church culture wouldn’t understand) isn’t regularly spoken there. Communion is served at each study. And the fact that the Ruthruffs (the hosts) serve delicious food before each study definitely doesn’t hurt.

More so lately, I’ve had a pretty big aversion towards the practice and explanations of Christian tradition and orthodoxy that seem to exclude anybody who doesn’t immediately understand church or Christianity as a whole. In other words, I’ve been feeling something of a hate (and I think hate is a strong word, but for now it seems most representative of how I feel most times) for things that make a holy huddle. It’s my opinion that Christian practice should always seek to be relevant beyond a myopic and ingrown culture and/or worldview; ultimately representing a Christ that embraces the “other.”

Today we talked about the paschal meal – a recreation of the Passover Meal (which commemorates the Exodus of the Israelites as they were freed from slavery) that became the last supper of Christ. Historically, and in my own personal experience, these types of conversations usually leave me with a bitter taste in my mouth, the flavor of not having met some sort of Christian quota mixed with equal part shame and emotional self-flagellation. So when today’s discussion of the paschal meal led towards the topic of Lent, fasting, the exodus, identity formation, how we bear shame, and where God fits in without reverting to simple bible quoting, and included multiple self-disclosures of personal struggles in believing aspects of God and God’s actions in our lives – I became alive and engaged.

A few things surfaced in my mind as a result of the conversation.

In reading, “When he was at the table with them, he took bread, gave thanks, broke it and began to give it to them. Then their eyes were opened and they recognized him, and he disappeared from their sight” (Luke 24:30-31), we discussed how slowing down from the day’s activities to eat with those close to us can help us “unplug” from the static and hum of life which can sometimes act as a barrier toward mindfulness and attunement towards self. The act of intentionally eating with others can help us feel and recognize the physical and relational nurturing we all long for and need. Isn’t that what the act of abstaining in Lent is intended for? To not feel full anymore. To reconnect with our longings, and as a result see the shitty parts of our lives, who has been M.I.A, how we’ve been falling short, having our mommy and daddy issues surface, various traumas, etc., and then be able to sincerely ask, “So what now God?” Maybe when the disciples received the bread they really felt the “So what now God?” and as a result were finally able to see their answer in the presence of the resurrected Christ. I mean, how often do we in our efforts to tune out the hurtful parts of our life also tune out God’s presence in those hurtful parts? Maybe if we slowed down enough to feel what is floating in the undercurrent we might also have our eyes opened and recognize Christ.

I’ll end this post by submitting to the blogosphere a photo project I came across on the interwebs. “Dinner in NY” is a series of photographs by Miho Aikawa portraying various dinner times. I wonder how these people, in their eating practices, might also be practicing connectedness or dissociation. Do any of the photos remind you of your dinner times?

http://www.mihophoto.com/projects/dinnerinny/

Colorblind (Irate Chinese American Psychotherapist)

I think it’s interesting how conversations can be an organizing receptacle for scattered experiences…and the conversations that especially feel this way are the ones I most love. Tonight’s meeting was no exception. I’ve been meeting with a group of guys for over a year (I think it’s been that long), where we’d share about our lives and pray for each other on a regular basis. Although none of us are homeless or flossin’ twenty inch blades on the Impala, we’re socioeconomically diverse. We’re also ethnically and culturally diverse, with each of us representing various races and heritages. Some of us are married. Some single. Some single and divorced. Most of us attend different churches. I haven’t attended a church for some time. But we all are young men. We come together holding these differences and similarities in an effort to love and support each other; and with that, come many times where we’d get into animated discussions about how our struggles with the same thing can sometimes look so different…such as romantic relationships, encounters with the police, what family means to us, how others perceive us, how we perceive others perceiving us, etc. Our assorted perspectives collide like the reverberations of various instruments in a jazz improv, taking form and simultaneously adjusting, making melodies that provoke and inspire. Or at least that’s a fanciful way of how I’d like to think of our conversations. Sometimes it also sounds like a bunch of guys laughing and cussing up a storm, as it did tonight. So as we ended up talking about race, dating, and self-perception; tonight’s song sounded like, and reminded me of, a poem that I wrote a couple years ago to process something that struck me while I was sitting with one of my therapy clients. I’m still processing it...


Colorblind (Irate Chinese American Psychotherapist)

So he says to me,
“I’m colorblind. I don’t see color. I don’t see difference.”
Now, I’ve learned about countertransference dominance and I’m trying to build a therapeutic alliance.
I get it; in non-psychoanalytic terms it means don’t let your shit get in the way of your client sorting through his own shit.
But now the shit has hit the fan,
It’s flying everywhere and I’m trying to pretend like it doesn’t bother me as the flying feces bespeckles my face.
Okay, take a deep breath and go slowly…watch...your…pace.
Do you even see my face!!!
As someone who isn’t color blind, I see clearly that this bothers me.
As he IS colorblind or as he claims to be, he either doesn’t see that this bothers me
Or he’s in denial or he is stuck in a strange mix of sight and unsight from which understanding, knowledge, and relationship can flee.
Colorblind,
I think I understand the thought behind it. Treat everyone the same. Don’t focus on difference. Be blind to it.
And as a person who:
Has had so much fear, having grown up feeling like the striking features of my hair, eyes, cheekbones, skin tone have been consciously or unconsciously highlighted to align me with the popular media portrayal of exotic dragon ladies, martial arts masters, sidekicks, nerds, and seldom the main character in a non-Asian film;
This by default makes me an intelligent exotic nerdy subservient sidekick kung fu master who never gets the lady at the end of the film.
Damn it’s demeaning!
Who wants to be pigeon holed into that caricature?!?
Colorblind, I see
That you don’t want to see -
These things have been proliferated into the mass consciousness of Western sensibility.
I’d love to love to believe you,
But the fact that Jackie Chan and Jet Li recently starred in a kung fu movie as side characters to a no name Caucasian kid actor who gets the Chinese girl at the end of the story leaves me to believe otherwise.
Damn I’m pissed! Because real life seems to reflect this skewed perspective!
Yellow fever spreads as I watch my Asian sisters go for the White guys
Because for some reason a guy like me is a second place prize.
Do you not see this?
Do you not want to see this?
I guess that’s why you’re colorblind.
I guess that’s why you have color denial.
Sometimes the truth of our difference is too much to handle
And the fact that your simple statement to me is not so simple to me
Highlights a difference from which my mind’s eye will refuse to be blinded to and from which you will not claim to see.
Yes, we are all God’s people, but God has made me different and there is such tragedy and glory in it that it must be seen.
I want to believe that God’s glory can be found in my unique traits that only color can communicate. Do you see what I mean?
So I wipe the shit off my face
I watch my pace
I leave the rant in my head and heart
And return to the session

Embodied

Part 1: Drained
My body often wakes up to the sound of the baseboard heater’s buzz. Buuuzzzzzzz. Buuuuuzzzzz. “Shut the hell up! I was so close. You took me away from that confusing dream. I was on the verge of figuring something out. So close. So so close.” At least that’s what I say in my mind. My body says something else. My eyes are heavy with the sandman’s dust; which feels less like dust and more like bricks in the corners of my eyes. My right nostril went on strike and refuses to breathe. My bladder shoves me and tells me I should get out of bed. The rest of my body resists, like loose wet sand slipping between fingers. Isn’t sleep supposed to reenergize you? My energy has been sapped. After a few minutes of extreme ambivalence, my body finds itself moving into the bathroom…extreme relief. The next mission, twist the little knob on the wall and stop the most annoying hum in the world.

The body says so much when you wake up, as if it were competing with the rooster’s crow. My body says to crawl back into bed.



Part 2: OkCupid
The alarm sounds and my morning iPhone ritual begins (even though it no longer qualifies as morning because it’s 4pm). I am still wet sand. I check my email. I check Facebook. I check Instagram. I check Flipboard. I check OkCupid. Yes, I check OkCupid. Not only that, I begin answering the questions in it (to explain; OkCupid is an online dating website which has these multiple answer questions you fill out so that they can have data which is used to match you with others who answer similarly. I have entered the dark side…but not really, it’s actually kind of fun. Or at least I tell myself it’s fun because it’s satisfying my curiosity of about online dating?), because maybe if I find something interesting, this tired body might wake up. Please carrot, lead this old horse.

The following question is offered: “Do you believe that mind and body are separate entities (Dualism) or do you believe that they are in a state of unity (Monism)?”

You can only select one of the following answers: “Monism”, “Dualism”, “A bit of both”, “Uncertain.”

I skip the question altogether because I am undecided...or just too tired. The sand is still wet.



Part 3: House
After inhaling the El Diablo Azul burger, garlic fries, and a hearty winter warmer (which counts as breakfast, lunch, and dinner because I woke up so late), I feel the light and cold Seattle rain sprinkle baptize my satiated body as I make my way over to “Body Orthodoxy: A Sensual Education.” The house that the art installation is in reminds me of Carl Fredricksen’s house in the movie “Up.” Large and newer buildings in the South Lake Union Area encroach on the minuscule territory that remains for the rickety house left fending for itself. The quaintness of the house punctuates the mindfulness necessary as I prepare to take in the overt and the subtleties…the things I will see, smell, taste, and touch.

A homeless lady passes by the house and asks for two dollars. Her body is in need.



Part 4: Sensual
Each room features an artist or two and their work. There are many rooms.

I see collages of animals and people with the heads of icons transposed onto their heads. God is in all creation, but sometimes we are too blind to see it.

Crochet breasts, vaginas, and penises are mounted to the wall and we are invited to touch. What does my anxiety in touching say about the shame that Adam and Eve felt in covering themselves which is still viscerally alive in me?

Amongst statues of bodies, with televisions and books and grenades in their abdominal cavities, I smell incense and partake of communion; consuming the body and blood of Christ from a soldier’s helmet. The battles and wars we engage with our body involve the body of Christ and fragrant prayers. There is so much meaning, intent, and desire. Desire for what?

The dancer twists and writes. Her body moves beautifully; amazingly. I see a story unfold. Each movement is an exercise in freedom and discovery. Our flesh in movement is the embodiment and expression of our creative souls. How often do we move freely or restrict our range of motion to basic tasks? How do we hide from our spirit in our body? How do we discover our spirit in our body? How do we hide or discover our body with our spirit?

The lady sits on the floor and wraps herself with a mishmash of items tied together. The sheet of birth control pills is weaved into lingerie is weaved into a tampon box is weaved into stockings is weaved into a pregnancy test marker is weaved into…item and item and continuous item – items that barrage the female body. She wraps these items on her limbs and torso and repeats, “This is not what I want…but I want it also.” And we watch as she slowly and consistently engulfs her body in this burden. And we watch as she unravels and unburdens herself. What do we subject the female body to that says Imago Dei?

There was so much more. But all in all, I my eyes, skin, olfactory nerves, taste buds were all doused with a bit of mindfulness; or I should say, awareness of embodiment. Our bodies tell a very loud story that we often don’t take the time to listen to nor consecrate.



Part 5: Attack
It is tomorrow and I am in a “show of support” at the hospital. I enter the room and see an imposing and fuming body. The light fixture is ripped off the wall. A large chair is upside down on the bed. The patient is huffing and puffing and red. We clear the area so other patients aren’t at risk of injury. The trembling voice cusses at the staff that show up to address this angry and frightened body. The patient cools down; but not before long a nurse is punched in the face, followed by a cascade of hospital staff bodies engulfing the patient’s limbs. The writhing body fights. The teeth reach for a shoulder to bite. The staff hang on. We encourage the patient to breath slowly. “Remember to breath…Relax…We’re here to help you.”

Body on body. There is an internal battle that leads to an external battle. The flesh cries out.



Part 6: Both/And
I guess I believe in both/and “monism” and “dualism.” Body and mind are unique, seeming to have an apparent autonomy; but one would not be in its fullness without the other, therefore also taking part in making the other. The body is the extension of the mind and vice versa.



Part 7: Invitation
History resides in our flesh. Relationship forms our flesh. The body tells a story and makes new stories. From the waking aches, to OkCupid curiosities, to knitted privates and interpretive dance, and a raging patient that is swaddled in the protective grasps of many bodies – the flesh asks to received and honored. How do we miss the many ways our bodies cry out for God; or cry out and tell us God is already there?

God Was That Dog I Held

It’s one of those nights…I am restlessly typing away at 2am when I told myself I was going to bed at 10pm. Something was stewing inside of me. That thing wasn’t going to let me go until I began typing this.

A dear friend of mine emailed me regarding his latest blog entry. It was about an interview he had with a filmmaker named Eliot Rauch, one extremely gifted in his ability to capture some of the rawest moments in a short clip. So I ended up watching a tragically beautiful video doc about a guy who was putting his dog down, and something clicked. In the slightly scratchy and sorrowful voice I heard, saying, “God was that dog I held…today…” I realized some of my own seemingly long lost sorrow.

Yesterday, I ran a half marathon. Just earlier I spent what felt like an eternity (probably a couple hours) deliberating, wordsmithing, massaging, my match.com profile only to lose it two times because the stupid site refreshed before I could save. My job revolves around social work and therapy. I attempt to help people the best I can while they may be in their shittiest circumstances. Yesterday I found out while browsing Facebook (of all places) my ex-wife was married...it felt like a sucker punch in the gut (and why the hell do I find out about this through social media instead of directly from a human being?!?). In all those things, my mind and heart were racked with heavy burdens; but an even more salient question lied in wait, the thing that didn’t let me go to sleep at 10pm. It asked, “Why do I put myself in or go through all these things – intentionally or inadvertently?” I mean, why do I long so much? Why do I have the aspirations that make up the core of my being? Why the fuck do I care so damn much when life sometimes feels like a concentrated solution of hurt, disappointment, and shit poured over a worn heart? Of course, there is the answer that says its part of my ego trying to balance my primal instincts and internalized parent objects from childhood while engaging the death instinct and the manifestations of reenactments and other such hardwired survival mechanisms etched into the bowels of my DNA that keep me going (Yes, grad school has ruined me). And while I think those aforementioned reasons are nonetheless true, I also believe I long for God.

God is love. God is most clear in those moments where honesty flourishes in a redemptive embrace. Like that man holding his dog. I’m looking for those moments; that thing that speaks to the truest part of me. It’s the milk that the baby craves. It’s what I long to experience in the peaks, dips, and in-betweens of this messy narrative. I’m looking for this goodness I feel that has been so very palpable yet extremely wild and elusive. So, like the wide-eyed gambler pathetically trying get back the winnings he had lost just a few minutes ago, I’m at the table hoping and scheming. I’m searching...for love...for God...for any semblance of truth and goodness...maybe in the wrong places, but hoping some of those are the right places. And when I find God there, I hold it like that man embracing his best friend of a dog that was in the truest sense God. Crying and reluctant to let go; watching a precious, good, and true thing slowly slip away. That feeling of God slipping away occurs when the glory of running a half marathon ends and a sore IT band sets in; when the attempts of finding someone to share romantic joy with feels futile and downright ridiculous; when helping others underscores more tragedy; and when feelings of once having been deeply loved seem more and more like a delusion. I know somewhere and at some point in those moments, amidst the furious mix of brain chemistry, psychosocial components, and narrative plots, God was present. There, God touched the truest part of me and I was loved. I believe God still does, but it just doesn’t feel the same…in fact, it hurts like hell now. But now that I’ve poured a little of my heart out, think I can go to sleep. God, please meet me in my sleep…and when I wake, work, attempt to love, and continue on…

Last Minutes with ODEN from phos pictures on Vimeo.

Plowshare

A few have asked that I share the poem I read at graduation. I feel so honored being asked to share...




Plowshare

You’d think you’d’ve figured out by now how to unravel the knots of life that sit uneasily in your stomach or throat
That the moments that paralyze you into cloistered patterns of interaction would’ve faded away by now
You know, those ruts you’ve been stuck into, forever
As though a large field of hardened soil lies before you
And you feel only enough strength to plow into the land that is soft and familiar
You’d think that by now, the intimate moments that you long for, don’t scare you when the opportunity presents itself
So that when you pray, with eyes open…
You can look deeply into the eyes of the one you are praying with
Intimate and without shame in that deep gaze
And know that God is there, in that minute and profound moment…
Just as much as when you gaze deeply into the eyes of your lover while making love
Feeling fully known, accepted, and loved…
You are not repelled by fear
But how often does that happen?
O love that wilt not let me go

And of course gazing deeply into the eyes of anyone is unsettling
That lump in your throat returns…
You’d think you’d’ve got used to social interactions
That by now, you’d be fluent in the language of communal contact
And all it takes is the push of the autopilot button and you are cruising at interviews, dates, parties, on the dance floor, riding the bus, family gatherings, and those awkward moments in the elevator
Don’t get me wrong, I think we’ve learned to navigate these moments to some degree
Sometimes it looks like the three wise monkeys
"Non vedo, non sento, non parlo"
I see nothing, I hear nothing, I say nothing
But to fly face first uninhibited by doubts of who we are into the face of the other and operate from a complete sense of security and a sense of complete security
Fully delighting and being delighted in
Well, I think that’s the hard part
The unyielding, dry, and cracked soil
But will it ever be easy?
O love that wilt not let me go

Who can guarantee that the look I give to another across from me, like that valentine, clumsily put together with Elmers glue oozing out of its sides like my uneasy affection, and sent out in first grade will, be returned to me with grace?
That my voice as awkward, shrill, unconfident, overconfident, compensating, and true will be received, heard, and reciprocated?
So that when I risk touching and being touched, the surface of my skin will feel the warmth of safety as much as intimacy?
Or that when I timidly step forward onto untried territory that I will not be shamed but seen and rejoiced over?
What promises do I have in this world aside from my heart scarred experiences of having been dropped as a baby…
As a baby and son
As a kindergartener, junior high schooler, high schooler, collegiate
As the pimply teenager who awkwardly navigates attraction for the first time
As a clumsy lover
As a worker that is trying to find that ever elusive niche
As a boy and man
As a Chinese American
As a Chinese
As an American
As a believer and doubter
As a married man and divorcee
As a learner who forgets
Healer and hurter
As a baby…
I have been dropped so so many times
What promises do I have that the unplowed soil will be soft and yielding?
It looks so hard…
O love that wilt not let me go

And like the tortoise returning to its scarred and battle worn shell, I can be found present but not
Or like the furious bear, my violent attacks are truly my fears in bold colors splashed across the canvas of our interactions
The unspoken promises set themselves deeply into my bones and I walk the path supported with limbs saturated…
By fears and failed expectations
They weigh heavily over me like wet clothes over a frail self
Exorcize this paralyzing force that drives me into these ruts that I have plowed forever
Been stuck in
Ruts
That I have plowed
Forever…
Especially, when I know there are new acres to set upon and a harvest yet to be reaped!
O love that wilt not let me go

It’s so easy to till the familiar and soft soil time and again
It’s difficult to break up the soil that has been hardened by the dryness and fear of life
So, as the seasons come and go
And the knots resurface in the stomach and throat
And it is time to either retreat into the shell or wrathfully rage
I remember I have much more growing to do
O love that wilt not let me go…

I set my hands on the plow...

What Just Happened?

What just happened?

This last week a friend of mine passed away; I feel sad but don’t feel weighed down…that’s a confusing feeling. Then I went square dancing and unwittingly became the wingman of a friend’s friend; being asked to dance by girls we’d never seen before, and watching him get the number of a girl while I danced with her uninterested/ing friend on the side…it felt like adolescence again. Then I picked up the last of my belongings from my ex-wife (one of them being the barbeque grill I got for my bachelor party), seeing the house I used to live in but feeling so distant from it. Then I realized there’s a strong possibility that I will have no blood relatives at my graduation commencement; hoping that the dreadful sense of aloneness I have in my family will be proven wrong. Then I saw my therapist and dumped on him, feeling that a bi-weekly fifty minute session is not enough. Then I worked a lot at the hospital, spending hours upon hours with a super depressed and suicidal patient, learning his story; I wanted to cry for him…and I did.

When I got home from working a twelve hour shift today, I sank into the couch while my roommate was thirty minutes into watching the Hong Kong movie, “The Warlords” starring Jet Li, Andy Lau, and Takeshi Kaneshiro. I sat through the rest of the movie; simmering in its drama. It’s a movie about three brothers’ struggle amidst war, romance, and political upheaval in the Qing Dynasty. It didn’t really help me unwind. I probably needed a comedy or some other feel good movie.

Afterwards, I retreated to my room, plopped into my office chair, and began the ritual of turning on the computer to veg out on YouTube and Facebook. Soon I heard a few knocks on my door. My roommate was checking in on me. He noticed I was looking "a little irritated" or "disturbed" earlier. Good eye, Zac. Yes, I was worn out and I hadn’t realized how worn out I was until he checked in on me…saying, “You had an intense week…first ___ happened, then ___...” Wow, sometimes you just need to hear it from another person before you get it. Then, he said we need a vacation…

Practically speaking, I don’t think I can afford a vacation. But I’m glad I can always take a little vacation in writing. I think that sounds a little counterintuitive…I mean, a vacation by writing about your stress? But really, now that I’m typing, I already feel better. Going back to one of my favorite texts – Attachment In Psychotherapy – Wallin (2007) writes, “Studies show further that bringing language to bear on distressing experience—an essential feature of explicit mentalizing—can reduce its neural impact: Subjects shown upsetting images and instructed to describe them showed much less activation of the amygdala than subjects who were exposed to the images without the instruction to verbalize (Hariri, Bookheimer, & Mazziotta, 2000; Hariri, Mattay, Tessitore, Fera, & Weinberger, 2003)…For it appears that emotion regulation can indeed be strengthened when left-brain/cortical resources (language, interpretation) are enlisted in the real-time processing of right-brain/subcortical experience (bodily based feelings)” (p. 82) (side note, I think I have developed an affinity for the APA format). In other words, it helps to write shit down when you’re feeling shitty because our brains are wired that way.

Sometimes the world may feel like a morose haze around you; but when you can put it into words, the clouds lift a little. I guess that’s why I’ve come to love and devour poetry, blogging, creative writing, and other forms of literature much more so lately…I’ve learned to turn it into my little emotion regulation vacation.

That just happened.

Spider In My Brain

Sometimes I feel like I must have a conclusion. Kind of like when writing a research paper, one must have a thesis statement that acts as a hypothesis which formulates a concluding argument by the end of the paper. When life becomes confusing and messy, I feel like it is hypothesis time. I want an explanation for all the crazy shit that is going on…out and around me, as well as inside my heart and mind.

It’s as if there was a spider in my brain that spends frantic energy weaving an intricate web, hoping to capture some truth in it. And sometimes it takes a very long time before my web is complete. But am I really trying to capture truth? Maybe it’s because I believe if the truth lands in my web I can rush to it and sink my fangs deeply into it, and extract its life-giving nutrients to satiate me. Perhaps if I only knew what she really thought about me I would feel satisfied. If I knew why she didn’t say this or do that I would be less anxious. Or if I could understand what next steps to take, I can avoid more heartache. Maybe that’s why I spin so laboriously. But of course, sometimes the web gets broken, there is no guarantee a fly will land, I’ll eventually get hungry again, and I am not always satisfied with the type of flies do I catch.

Well, tonight feels like one of those nights. It seems like this last week has just brought up a lot for me. I am spinning extra hard and I don’t know why. I am wondering about this and that person, coming up with stories and hypotheses that are weighing me down, and I want relief. And there is a part of me that believes relief will look like just knowing what is “really” going on…because then things would make sense. Or would they? By now I feel like I just have a lot of cobwebs in my mind and heart, while I am left wanting.

I’m trying to acknowledge that even if I did understand the reasons of why my divorce happened the way it did – all the reasons for it, including the psychology behind choices made, what went wrong, what could have been done differently, etc. – I will not be satisfied. That if I only understood – why certain relationships unraveled the way they did, then I could do something about it in the future or maybe even attempt to repair the past – is just an attempt to change the unchangeable. I’m beginning to realize I would only have another small fly to sink my fangs into and eventually become hungry again.

Formulating these hypotheses is leaving me worn out. Why do I even have to try attempting explanations? Life doesn’t always make sense. I think its okay that life doesn’t always makes sense. I just wish that when things didn’t make sense, I had a strong sense of self and security in the midst of turmoil. That way I wouldn’t be frantically spinning my hypothesis webs.

So right now, I am writing as a way to process the idea that I need more than just a convincing story for my mind to chew on. I think I need a deep and rooted sense of security. And at this point I return to all the things I learned about in my “Human Growth and Development” class at MHGS (side note: the new name, SSTP, still doesn’t roll of the tongue as smoothly). That when a child has a parent that acts as a truly secure attachment figure (a consistent person who helps the child make sense of emotions while allowing for the child to move through important developmental phases) the child experiences security that allows for the formulation and organization of a self-identity. In other words, good parents help the child feel secure when life is confusing, scary, and disorganized. When this sense of security is internalized, the child grows and takes that security with him, even into relational shit-storms; and when the storm is over, the security is still intact.

Then what happens for someone like me who didn’t have parents that were committed to developing a strong sense of security in me? Well, we develop particular ways to cope…not all healthy. And one of my particular coping mechanisms looks like an overactive hypotheses generator. The remedy? According to many psychodynamic object-relationalists, I must continue developing my self-identity by connecting with people who are healthy. By this, I mean healthy in that I can live out mistakes with them, understand what I really think and feel, express my truest thoughts and emotions, and all in a way that does not diminish the awareness of self and other and our connectedness. There are a lot more fancy schmancy psychological terms for what I just said, but I find my colloquial terms help me make sense of developmental psychology. Anyway, that’s what I think my human growth and development class kinda taught me. Then, according to many Christians, I must continue to be rooted in God and community. And by community, I believe a truly God-oriented community will be one that embodies a healthy relationship as exemplified in a healthy self-identity developing attachment relationship. The answer it seems, in both cases, is in relationships.

I am still left wanting…but now I’m trying to convince the spider in my brain to catch healthy relationships instead of little fly nuggets of “truth” that will only add to my impulse to spin more and more.

Dear God, I realize the answers you give are not just in intellectual understandings, hypothesis, and explanations; some of the best answers exist in merely being in the presence of good people. Please, let me know what it means to continually experience relationships of true security and growth. I’m tired of spinning.

Waves Of Memory

On a whim I decided to flip through my calendar and gloss over what my last few years have been like…then the memories, vivid, and saturated with emotions came. It was as if the tide that had receded far back decided it was finally time to come back to wet the shore…

My mother passed away on the New Year’s Day of 2009. That same year, I was separated in October, moving out of my house after being the best man at one of my best friend’s wedding. She kept the house and dog while I packed my bags. I moved into a living room of a one bedroom apartment in lower Queen Anne. To cope, I put my nose to the grindstone like never before. Only letting sorrow take up partial residence, I took four classes that semester while trying to work more shifts at the Spaghetti Factory.

The shower in my new place was whacko. If the shower could have a psychological disorder, it would have a dual diagnosis of dissociative identity disorder and bipolar 1. There were days where I‘d be stuck in the shower because the water decided on a whim that it wanted to stay either ice cold or scalding hot for about 5-20ish minutes. The water pressure was never really consistent either, vacillating between a decent ppi and the equivalent of what would come from a dollar store squirt gun.

Oh, and we had a rat problem. The trap finally got it one day; and many hours later, after finding out it wasn’t dead, I removed the barely alive rat from the bloody mess behind our old rickety fridge. I took it outside and put it out if its misery. Never before, would I have considered stomping on a rat the compassionate thing to do.

The week of Christmas I was fired from my job as a waiter. He fired me because I was 20 minutes late to call to ask if they needed me to come in later that evening. It was the first and only time I had ever been tardy for a phone confirmation. Bittersweet, I say. I needed the job but was glad I didn’t have to work with that manager anymore...it was, as they say, redonkulous.

I worked hard to find a job. But with the spare time there was also space to mourn. The Christmas season was quiet. The anniversary of my mother’s passing was quiet. It was quiet as I laid in the futon alone. I had a lot of time for solitude. So I was quiet, and I worked hard.

Since February of 2010 I’ve been working at the psych hospital. So now, the people I work with at least have some idea they need mental help.

A month before my divorce papers were finalized, I had to find a new place to live since my roommate was moving out by June and I couldn’t afford to stay. June was also the month my divorce papers would be finalized by the State of Washington, by some judge in some court I didn’t care to know more about. I felt like I needed to slow down to get a grip and hurry up to take care of myself at the same time. Contradictions. So I hurried and found a new place to live in, in a short amount of time; and by the beginning of June I was living near my old neighborhood, where my middle and high school days were spent.

On June 16th the divorce papers were finalized. I also had an assignment due for Therapy 1 that day…two papers were finalized that day. When I got home I was sad, angry, and kind of numb since it felt like we had already been divorced for even longer than that. My roommate consoled me as we walked through our neighborhood and I tried to flush the grief out of my body through words. We walked miles and miles for hours and hours.

It’s almost been a year now since the divorce papers were finalized, longer since the separation, and a lot longer from when I first felt the weight and finality of the relational rift set in. I think the pressure and weight of it has considerably been lifted.

In January and February of 2011 I actually went on a few dates. The dates felt clumsy, on my part, since I felt like damaged goods. But as unexpected as they were, those nights turned out to be salve for the dry skin of my soul. Maybe I didn’t have to feel like damaged goods.

This last semester I took five classes, saw clients at my internship, and worked at the psych hospital. I worked my ass off, and it’s been about two weeks since I graduated. It feels surreal. And sometimes I question how intact, sane, and healthy I am because I was able to keep my momentum going these last few years. Sometimes I feel like maybe I should've had a psychic break and ended up in the hospital, fall to pieces and not be able to function, slip into some sort of drunken stupor, etc. Isn’t that what happens when people with warm blood flowing through their veins have their hearts broken? Instead, my executive functioning excelled and I read books, wrote papers, and ran a half-marathon. I coped like my life depended on it…and somehow I feel like my heart was preserved. Maybe it was because amidst all the craziness, I’ve had quiet moments like this to reflect and write, friends to walk with, and work that actually feels meaningful to me.

Looking at my calendar, I feel like God is very strange; strange because the terrain has been so strange. But God has also been faithful...as faithful as is strange.

The tide has washed over me.

Lectio Divina: Ebbing Away

A response to Matthew 14: 22-33

In this time of endings and new beginnings it feels like Jesus is sending me out from a secure place and into a storm. During my three years at MHGS, I went through two major losses; my mother passing away from illness and my divorce. And with those losses many other dreams, wishes, and hopes also passed away. Promises to take my mom back to the Woodland Park Rose Garden, and my hopes to see her smile as she basked in the sights and smells of her favorite flowers dissipated. The feeling that I could come home to a wife and dog and sink into their kisses and love, and dreams of one day hearing the patter of tiny bare feet running on the kitchen floor (at least in the way that I had grown accustomed to imagining) were shattered. I felt like I was torn from life as I knew it; but at the same time I found deep hope and peace in ways I could never have anticipated.

I began to face questions about myself that were long buried inside of me, as well as questions that were right in front of my face but I had chosen to ignore. Questions about how broken my family and marriage was. I began to excavate the dusty and untouched parts of my life, and found relics that explained deep sorrow, anger, and resentment; those things I felt so guilty for feeling toward my mother and ex-wife. Why did you abandon me? Why am I relieved that you left me? Did I leave you? Did I ever want to leave you? I think I did at times, but why? How was I hurt and how did I hurt you? Why did hurt happen? Did it have to? Why…why…why… And all of these whys, the excavations, the process of understanding, and the search for peace occurred in a time and place of my life that came to feel deeply secure and richly good.

It was secure and good because I was surrounded by peers, friends, and professors at MHGS who were going through their own existential winnowing. They were as invested into that process as I was. Where else were there a bunch of people who would deconstruct and reconstruct with such care and love for God and our identities? We were a community of people engaged in the holy practices of wrestling with God in academics, psychology, theology, creativity, play – and all in an ardent attempt to live more into what being a bearer of God’s image can be. Never before was I able to ask such frightening questions of my life with such freedom; and never before, did I feel like God and the people around me was receiving my questions with such interest, sorrow and delight.

I imagine that in a very dark time of my life, God was holding me safely, cradling and nourishing me at MHGS. I also imagine that taste of security – the experience of care I received as God dressed my wounds – was what the listeners and disciples of Christ experienced as they ate the loaves and bread of Christ and were miraculously healed.

So, when I read about Christ sending his disciples out onto the water after such a wonderful healing experience, only to find themselves stranded on dark stormy waters for hours upon hours without their miraculous master, I can’t help but to imagine they were bewildered and that the sense of security they felt on the shore had slowly ebbed away from them as far as they were away from the shore. In many ways, I’ve already begun to feel my sense of security ebbing away. As I begin this process of leaving my beloved MHGS community, this place of being miraculously healed and fed, I feel like I’m being sent out into the dark stormy waters. Jesus is sending me there and I am afraid.

But I’m keeping my eyes open for the mysterious figure walking toward me on the waves. And when I see him, I will ask “Lord, if it’s you, tell me to come to you on the water.”

Lectio Delusional

It’s about 3:40pm and I just woke up from my “night’s sleep.” I feel really wound up. All sorts of thoughts and feelings flooded me as my eyelids struggled to open, and stayed with me as I attempted to make today’s lectio divina the start of my day. My focus felt like a swarm of wasps buzzing around and around; as if their nest was tucked away in the corner of my brain and heart. And of course if I were to impatiently attempt removing the nest away without being extremely careful, I would be covered by swarm of yellow jacket stings. I wondered about how the nest got there in the first place.

Today’s swarm of thoughts and feelings was probably brought to me by the overnight shift I just worked at the psych hospital. It was my first overnight in a very long time, probably about half a year since my last one. I stayed up all night preparing paperwork and pouring over patient’s charts; walking into every room to check on each patient, making sure they were safe; watching manic patients act out their psychosis throughout the night (I kind of wish I had their energy, but not really); and accompanying the nurses in their attempts to keep busy and avoid the sandman’s tempting calls to close our eyes if even for just a moment. And in between all of those tasks, working the night shift gives you a lot of time to ponder...what I want to do after graduation, why my relationships turn out the way they do, where the best clams might be for the next time I attempt to make clam linguini, what my ambivalence in starting a private-practice might be about, etc. Also, I think it’s really interesting how fielding the questions of delusional patients can sometimes free up my mind to wonder about the most imaginative or reflective things. Statements like, “I’m concerned about my safety.” from a psychotically paranoid patient have on occasion led me to wonder about where in my own life I might be somewhat delusionally preoccupied with protection. Yep, eight and a half hours of time for contemplation in an environment poignantly dedicated to people’s disorganization probably carried over into my “morning.”

It makes sense then, when I read John 1:35-42, about a couple of Jesus’ first disciples, that I wondered what kind of delusions Jesus was welcoming them to bring to him. They were meeting the Christ for the first time and probably had all sorts of assumptions about him; and with that, I’m sure they had their very own ambitions, fears, questions, and the like that come from their own life stories; some true and reality based and others ridiculously ridiculous. They brought into their discipleship with Jesus, their organized and disorganized sense of self. Yet Jesus welcomed these curious followers, inviting them to process their lives with him. So, as I slowly read aloud Jesus’ words, “What do you want?” and “Come…and you will see…”, I felt like God was welcoming me – all of me, which includes my disorganized, my delusional, and my yellow jacket swarm of a heart and mind to “discipleship.”

Naked

Naked

Standing in front of you

I find my skin delighted in

Every inch of me you take in

Taken in

Tasted

Touched

Smelled

Seen

Thought about

And thought about again

And thought about again

And thought about again

With all the blotches and scars and speckles and hairs

How unruly and asymmetrical my body must seem

But you take it all in like the cool forest air

Like the dew on the morning leaf you waited for me all night

As if I was the scent of the forest shade on a warm day

And my touch was like the warm ray of the sun on your goose bumps

You take me into your desire and I am undone

As if that deep deep deep desire that had been stored away

It had finally been unlocked to dance and jump and romp and run

Released to play

You dance and jump and romp and run with me through the trails

When will we stop?

When will your feet grow weary?

When will you tire of me?

But you smile and gaze deeply with assurance

And I am confident with my heart leaping before me

Dancing and jumping and romping and running

Both of us with the wind on our skin and the earth and air grazing our feet

Unencumbered

I want to cry because I am naked but I am not judged

I want to laugh because I am naked and I can fly

I want to dance because I am naked and I am loved

Unashamed and fully accepted

My broken body, flaws, wounds, sorrows, nightmares

My healed body, beauty, character, ambitions, dreams

And even the pieces that were scary and secretly locked away and shrouded

They were taken in and cared for

The parts that I feared even to expose to myself were seen

And you loved

You loved it all

Even my passionate, voracious, longing desire

The urge to explode in overwhelming glory

Even the urge to linger on the blade of danger’s edge

And the desire to curl up as if I were a baby once again

Overwhelming

You loved it all

Even when you feared and turned away

You returned and loved me

So I…

Thrive

Live

Love

Naked

Last night, I stayed up till 2am reading about 140 pages of commentary on the book Song of Songs for my Theology of Eroticism class. I was captivated by the erotic and sensual nature of the book. Of course reading, "To a mare among Pharaoh's chariots I liken you my, darling." (Song of Songs 1:9-10) doesn't exactly sound romantic to our modern sensibilities. However, Longman III (2001) says:

Pope, however, puts forward an attractive hypothesis for the meaning of this verse. He first reminds us that chariot horses were usually stallions, not mares. He then describes an attested defensive strategy against chariot attack. As the stallions rush toward their intended target, a mare in heat is let lose among them, driving them to distraction so that they cannot proceed with attack...To paraphrase the thought of the man, he is saying that she drives all the men crazy with her attractiveness, with the implication that she drives him to distraction as well. (p. 103)

Can you imagine a woman so beautiful and sensual that your strongest urges are brought forward and you cannot even operate heavy machinery safely?!? For the ladies, can you imagine a guy who would do the same for you?!? And we must not forget that the stallions are distracted by raw sexual energy. Kind of approximates the feeling of attraction one has when the raging hormones are at full blast around puberty, right? Heheh.

And the entire book is poetry between lovers who are so captivated, drawn towards, and attracted to each other that they utterly cannot resist each other and must find ways of reaching each other to make love. They go back and forth praising each other's qualities, pining for each other, and yes...have glorious sex (and not so glorious sex is included - in book 5 they are in the beginning of making love and the man leaves the woman, then she goes out to find him and gets abused, but then they eventually reunite in book 6 and re-consummate. It is also interpreted that the woman is actually having a dream/nightmare about his abandonment. So I should say that even sex that doesn't go as planned is included).

I mean, I had heard before that the Song of Songs was like the Judeo-Christian Kama Sutra, but I wasn't prepared for the beauty and longing that the woman and man had for each other. There was vivid sexual imagery, but there was also vivid desire and poetic longing sung back and forth from lover to lover. We are not just looking at physical attraction, we are talking about a consummation of deep romantic desire that is connected to being fully wanted by another that is fully wanted.

In class today we talked about how Song of Songs is also to be read in context to Genesis 1 and 3. In Genesis, God creates man and woman and they have perfect union. They are naked - physically, emotionally, psychologically, spiritually - and unashamed. When the fall occurs, they become ashamed and that level of intimacy was lost. In Song of Songs we see how that intimacy is still possible. In the reading of it, we capture some of the desire that God intends for lovers to experience - highly erotic, sensual, unencumbered, longing and fulfillment that is physical, emotional, and spiritual. Fully being wanted by the one that is wanted in a way that is deep and fulfilling - deep, glorious, mutual, passionate love.

Near the end of class, we also talked about how wherever there is desire there is danger. We have all experienced how being in relationships has caused wounds and tragedies - whether it is being the child of parents who "love" each other or don't "love" each other, or in being in "love" ourselves and having our hearts broken, or even in having people ruin "love" for us in abuse. To dream and hope for our desires to be fulfilled is fraught with hope and danger. As the biblical story's trajectory moves in the direction of redemption, restoration, and reconciliation, I am moved to imagine what it might feel like to experience intimacy (physical, emotional, psychological, spiritual) in a way that redeems, restores, and reconciles in ways that I can only dream of. Dare I hope dangerously and passionately?

Longman III, T. (2001) Song of Songs, Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans.

I Don't Blame Them

In the summer of 2009, as part of my training as a counselor, I took Dr. Caprice D. Hollins' CSL 509 Multicultural Issues: Social and Cultural Foundations class. One of the assignments we had was to write a poem that talked about where we came from. So I poured out my heart as I wrote about my Chinese American struggle and came up with the following poem. Then I felt compelled to share it in class. Since then, I've been asked to share this poem a few times. And since then, sharing it has been a very frightening but affirming thing to do. Frightening because it is a wound that I am exposing, and frightening because I don't know how the audience will respond. Affirming because I love my story as a Chinese American, and affirming because I get to share my story. So, after being asked once again...here it is

I Don't Blame Them

我的名字是陳天略. My name is Chén Tiān Lüè.

The Chén family name can be traced back to one of the last Six Southern dynasties in China that ruled from 557 to 589.

But I didn’t learn that until recently.

Tiān means the day or sky or heaven and Lüè means plan, scheme, outline, or strategy,

But here it’s just another name people don’t know how to spell or pronounce correctly.

My parents picked the English name Solomon for me.

And it is oh so tough growing up and going to school with two strange names, let alone one.

So I wonder why they make fun of my names.

I wonder why I couldn’t be named something more American.

I don’t blame them; they don’t know any better…

Born in Hong Kong in 1979, before I was two, my family moved to State of California in the U.S. of A.

They sought the American dream and I had no choice but to be subjected to their odyssey.

Dreams of setting up shop and starting a company where my father’s line of Lesa watches (named after my mom) would pave the way for success.

My dad was a doctor who fled China during the revolution and swam to Macau.

A smart, stubborn, creative, and resilient man.

My mom was a talented artist and graduated with a degree in fashion design.

A woman girded with beauty and strength the world would never know.

Their blood and sweat, late nights up, money, late nights up fighting, yelling, screaming, my life, my brother’s life,

And where did we end up in 1991?

Broke and in the brick pillar of “eacon View Apartments” in Seattle, Washington.

It was supposed to be the “Beacon View Apartments,” but the “B” fell off the building and management couldn’t afford to replace it.

The stairwell we walked through every day smelled of urine and never lacked fresh graffiti.

During dark, rainy, windy nights the building would sway

And I felt it could all come crumbling down any moment.

Was this the American dream my parents had pursued?

I don’t blame them; they don’t know any better…

I speak to my brother in English, I talk to my dad in Mandarin, when I see my (ex) in-laws I speak in Cantonese.

This trifecta of language has been honed over the course of my life and has served me…

Served me well?

I remember in elementary school being put into ESL class and the shame I felt being pointed out as an “other.”

When I brought home my report cards, showing to my parent’s that I’ve failed to understand my teachers, this language, and what they have to offer, I’ve felt shame.

Day and night, night and day I wondered how I can be more like my English speaking peers.

Working so hard to fit in the U.S. of A. to pick up the language, the humor, the culture,
I sacrificed the little Chinese language I had to make room for the English I lacked.

So my English grew and my Chinese dwindled.

Relatives, friends, and other fluent Chinese speakers labeled me as the one who knew how to speak Chinese, but didn’t know how to read and write.

So my English isn’t good and I am left out,
So my Chinese isn’t good and I am left out.

I don’t blame them; they don’t know any better…

It’s sad growing up and not knowing the meaning of your name because your parents can’t tell you what it means.

I’ve felt so angry watching my parents succeed and fail, fail and succeed, succeed and fail because they don’t understand this new world they live in.

Even today I’m trying to figure out how I fit in and with whom.

Hi my name is Solomon Chan.

Have they ever thought of me as a chink?

你好! 我的名字是陳天略.

Will they think of me as too American?

Can I be one of them or someone different and still feel like I belong?

Where can I just be?

Who would I be?!?

Why am I so stressed?!?

Who do I…?!?

I don’t blame them; they don’t know any better…

God needs us?

I’ve often heard it said in church, on blogs about Christianity, from Christian friends, pastors, etc. that God does not need you but wants you. You have nothing to offer God, but it is out of His love and mercy that you are alive. You have absolutely nothing to offer God that He can’t do without. In fact, today I was reading chapter six of Francis Chan’s “Crazy Love” and on page 109 he says, “God is the only true Giver, and He needs nothing from us. But still He wants us. He gave us life so that we might seek and know Him.”

Now, I think I’m going to be stepping on a few, if not many, toes today by writing this but I feel compelled to be honest in my reaction to this one-sided perspective of the God-human relationship. There was a time in my life where I absolutely agreed with this and felt good about it. Not today. Also, before I go on I’d like to offer a disclaimer. There is a good amount of what Francis Chan wrote in Chapter six that I do agree with (and that chapter is about all I’ve ever read from him up to this point in my life); but I’m more so responding to and writing about how this particular concept/framework of understanding God has been detrimental to my life. To be clear, this is not a Francis Chan attack. It is an attempt to deconstruct how seeing God as without need and us (humanity or “me” the individual) as nothing/needy does not serve God, and in fact harms God’s image.

There is a huge difference in distinguishing between “needs” and “wants” for your average person. I think we all agree that I don’t “need” to go buy a pair of brand new 7 For All Mankind jeans when I have a bunch of other perfectly fine jeans in my closet while my wallet is full of moths. I want those jeans, but to go to Nordstrom or the Rack would impair my need to pay rent. I don’t need my broke ass on the streets, and that is a need…or want? This is a little self-disclosure folks, I really have had those specific thoughts while walking around those aforementioned stores. There is a distinguishing between what is necessary for survival, and beyond that everything else is want. Even as I write this I feel like I’m preaching to the choir while beating a dead horse. We all know this.

What is more insidious, however, is that there are many things necessary to our survival that we don’t consider necessary to our survival, and as a result we live without those necessary things. When I mention survival, I particularly mean living as humans who have a healthy, strong, full-sense of self. This looks like a person who is confident and secure in the fact that she is created as Imago Dei. However when we have unfulfilled and insecure areas of our lives we make compromises. We may skip breakfast because we know lunch or dinner will come around soon enough…and if not, I’ll just eat a Hot Pocket. But when we do that, what are we doing? We are saying there are more important things to do other than eating conscientiously. What are those more important things? What are those idols of the heart and systems of the world, the rat race and status quos, that determine our own determinations about how we eat, sleep, work, have sex, comb our hair, study, etc? I seek, go after, need, and want because there is some sort of a desire, survival or not, that I attempt to fulfill. Other desires we have learned to function without while running on empty, and as a result, those parts of our life atrophy. So, it seems we all are always making choices and compromises here and there because of our assessments of what “survival” and “needs” look like.

My identity as a (relatively) young (relatively) eligible bachelor coincide with having a nice pair of jeans that will help me feel like I look good because certain other jeans don’t flatter the silhouette of my slightly bowed legs. I drive more often than I ride public transit because I feel like I’m always short on time and I need my sleep or will be in a bad mood throughout the day. I keep working at a psychiatric hospital because I love the people there and feel like it adds to my development as a person who works in the mental health field. All of these things have everything to do with identity. I think this is the essential point I’m trying to make about needs and wants and God and us. How I perceive myself determines what I perceive as absolutely essential; determines how I function.

If I don’t feel like I have anything to offer God that God needs, because they are only frivolous wants, I may just as well live in a manner where nothing feels absolutely necessary. My identity as a child of God is inextricable to how I function and engage everything around me. As a result, to feel and know that God needs us (as opposed to only wanting us but having no necessity for us) may change how we perceive ourselves, our community, family, etc. and influence how we eat, sleep, work, have sex, comb our hair, study, etc.

So does God need us then?

I believe so. We are necessary to God’s identity. We are inextricable to how God functions and engages. The concept of Imago Dei speaks of God expressing God’s self through humanity, and God’s love for humanity. A singer who doesn’t sing is not a singer. A chef who does not cook is not a chef. A God who does not create, bring glory out of tragedy, and love is not God. And what is love? (Baby don’t hurt me no more…sorry I couldn’t resist…Haddaway for those in still in the dark). Love, I believe, is the connection between autonomous individuals who for some reason must, need, and want to uplift the other. God for some reason must, needs, and wants to uplift you, me, us – as the Christ story speaks of. To not do so would betray God’s identity. It is God’s need. It is the love that interconnects our story with God’s story.

Do we really think that God doesn’t need us then?

Can we just vanish from the story that is being written without consequence?

Is it easy for you to believe you have nothing to offer God because, at the core of your identity, you don’t believe you have much or anything to offer others?

Where does that desire to be inconsequential come from (I mean in your own story…with your mom, dad, siblings, friends, teachers, etc.)?

What does that say about our own personal idols and the many systems we live in today (political, racial, cultural, economic, etc.)?

What does it mean “to seek and know Him” if that isn’t really necessary to God?

These questions, I am still processing and struggling with in my own story, and slowly I am finding out what it means to be wanted and needed by God…day to day…

Conflict

Found the following quote by Thomas Paine on somebody’s Facebook profile, “The harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph. What we obtain too cheaply, we esteem too lightly; 'tis dearness only that gives everything its value.”

My first reaction was, "Yes I agree with this…I need to triumph…this is what I’ve been thinking about and avoiding.” Then I thought, "That doesn't feel right either; I mean to push on and be hungry for glory or triumph all the time, because that could be a result of either greed or pride." The greedy or prideful or narcissistic person cannot be content…that person must conquer, kill, and destroy the “other” in order to be satisfied (more like pseudo-satisfied because that is all the person can bear) with the “self”…there is no true peace even in “triumph” because a little is never enough…you will always need more.

However, there can also be another interpretation, one I think I’m very afraid of, which is more connected to my first reaction. Maybe the victory that is dear and is of value is not necessary only correlated to or just a derivative of pride or greed or narcissism (although there may be parts of those too…no one is perfect, and I am also attempting not to “split” here as object relations would understand it); the victory in conflict is valuable to us because a piece of “me” exists in it. In struggling, in the conflict, our character, our “self” comes to the surface…we put our identity, hopes, dreams, things that are very near to our heart and gut on the line. The things that are of great conflict, if we truly dwell in it, will further shape our sense of self, our identity, character, hopes, dreams, and so on. Those things of great conflict are the things we tend to avoid, but when we are fully in it, it demands so much from us. In a sense, great conflict becomes a force that draws us out to relate with it. Conflict may be the context for the “I-Thou” encounter. It is easier to go through something not so difficult and not be invested…to be dissociative…to not engage the heart, mind, soul. When conflict hits us with full impact, it forces us to engage our heart, mind, and soul. When conflict hits it’s almost like its voice (if conflict could ever speak) is telling us to be engaging, to be relational, and to truly involve our “self” with the “other." I think a major part of why we run away from conflict is because we are fearful of being our true selves and engage with the other…ironically I think that is the same problem that greed, pride, and narcissism has – in that it is a way of avoiding a truly relational engagement where interrelatedness, dependence on each other, and giving to each other exists.

I also really want to emphasize that conflict can also be a very subjective thing. It is easy for the average person to go walk out amongst strangers in the unfamiliar public in order to travel somewhere but extremely difficult for the agoraphobic. Each specific type of conflict deals with our narrative: specific events, times, places, characters, and such in our story. Our story determines what our greatest conflicts in life are. So, in the end I am still wondering what those intense conflicts are that I cop out of, because I am afraid to bless and be blessed in. Some of these conflicts are pretty obvious and others elude me because they really are things I am scared of and block out of awareness.

I think about Jacob wrestling with the Angel of God in Genesis 32 and realize that because Jacob wrestled with the other with his full self (not because he ran away or gave up or that the fight was a breeze) that he was able to be blessed. God blesses our “self” when we offer our “self” to be blessed, and sometimes the parts of our “self” that need the most blessing only come to surface through the context of conflict. Lord help me…Lord bless me…