During the year 2008-2009, I wrote a series of 4 articles for The Kansas City Star. They appeared in their “Faithwalk” column, which is a weekly column on faith written by 13 different writers each year. These are those articles.
There’s this movie I like called State and Main. It’s about a small town that gets overrun with the filming of a movie and all the upheaval that causes. But that’s not why I mention it. In the movie, they talk about second chances. The best line: “The only second chance you get in life is the chance to make the same mistake again
Forgiveness is big in religion. All religions believe that forgiveness is crucial for your relationship with God, other people, and yourself. It’s widely known that it’s important for your physical and emotional health to forgive. There is every reason to forgive. Which for someone like me is a good thing. I screw up a lot.
I like to think that I’m smart and sensitive and capable. But in reality, I snap at my friends when they’re going through hard times and need someone to listen to their problems and make them laugh.
Or I meet an interesting guy for coffee (one of the very few interesting available men I’ve met in years), in the security of my favorite bookstore no less, and I don’t even have the energy to carry on a halfway decent conversation.
Or I lock the keys in the car yet again, making my family wait for an hour while we wait for the tow truck guy to show up and pop the lock. It takes a lot of forgiveness to be in my life.
If the movie guy is right, and the only second chance we get is to make the same mistake again, then that would mean that we all have to forgive each other for the same mistakes again. And again. And again. So here’s my question: do we ever learn?
I do think it’s possible to learn, and to change. It’s just that it’s one of the hardest things we can accomplish. It takes genuine effort, perseverance, courage, and a bit of luck. Maybe that’s why religion tells us to forgive—for all the times we can’t get it together to learn from our mistakes.
What does it mean to love? Is it a feeling, an action, an expression, an ability? Is it supposed to be free and easy, or is it supposed to cost us something?
We all know there are different types of love—love for a parent, a friend, a child, a pet. There is love we feel toward a romantic partner, toward ourselves, toward God.
But there are times that love is not that beautiful, all-consuming fire like the beginning of a relationship or the peaceful, long-term comfort of a sleepy ocean lapping at our ankles. Sometimes love is difficult, dry, challenging, or even painful.
When we get our hearts broken by an unfaithful friend, the illness of a child, or the death of a lover, what’s next? How do we go on? Our first instinct is to shut down, to protect ourselves for getting hurt again. It feels good to hunker down, to stand safe behind walls of titanium and know that nothing can hurt us like that ever again.
But staying behind titanium walls means that we miss out of more than just pain. Life doesn’t come with a filter; either we have to let it all in or shut it all out. Keeping out the pain means also keeping out the joy, the hope, the sweetness of life.
Personally, I think God wants us to live, to enjoy all the pleasures that this world offers. Remember, after the rain comes the rainbow; after the winter, the spring. Love hurts, but it heals too. Just remember the words of the great apostles John and Paul (along with George and Ringo): “Love is all you need.”
So the question becomes: do you want to be safe, or do you want to love? Do you want to protect yourself, or do you want to experience all the joy that life contains? Do you want to open yourself to pain and struggle, or do you want to shut out all hope for connection?
How will you choose to live—with your arms crossed to protect yourself, or with your arms open wide?
Today is my graduation day. I decided a few years ago to go back to school. And today is the day I will walk down the aisle, tassel waving in the breeze, cap covering those last few stress pounds from finals week, “Pomp and Circumstance” trumpeting through the room. Aside from those last two pesky credits I’ll make up for this summer, I will officially be a Master of the Science that is Psychology.
It feels good to complete this goal I set for myself. It feels good to have gained all this knowledge and hopefully a little wisdom as well. What doesn’t feel so good is having to start all over again.
On the one hand, I’m a better person than I was four years ago. I have a great deal more education, good friends, and a stronger sense of myself. On the other hand, I have no job, no financial security, and about $60,000 in student loans to pay back. In this job market, that is terrifying.
However, one unexpected consequence of this expensive educational journey is that I’ve recaptured my faith. It was there when I was a little kid. I prayed. I read the Bible. I went to church. I believed. But years and stress and frustration and losses had slowly eroded away the edges until I thought there was nothing left.
Honestly, I wasn’t even looking for it. I thought I was okay without it. But these last years have given me the chance to open up all those closed spaces inside me. In order for me to learn, really learn, about the world, I had to make room in my hardened heart. I had to clean out those long-ignored places, clearing the cobwebs and giving away all those things I wasn’t using anymore—the fears, the doubts, the anger, the pain.
It was a terribly painful, personal, soul-wrenching experience. I highly recommend it.
They say every ending is a beginning; this one certainly is. I am nervous, but I believe everything will work out just fine. I have faith.
Lately I’ve been looking for a job. I send out resumes, fill out applications, and take personality tests, and for what? What exactly do these people see when they look at a pile of paperwork that is supposed to represent me?
I think about all these papers, the listing of jobs I’ve held and schools I’ve attended, my skills and qualifications, the credit reports and background checks, and the wonderful things that I’m hoping my references say about me. Do they really show who I am?
Of course not.
I have worked with people who had sterling resumes and world-renowned references and who couldn’t be part of a team if they were told they could be in the Olympics. I have worked with people who look as if they just crawled out from under a rock who were the hardest working and most engaging people I’ve known, and I jumped for joy inside myself to find out we were working the same shift.
Now, this is America, and we love our appearances. People will tell you that it’s all in how you look. If you look professional, you can get the job. It’s all about the right hairstyle, the shoes, the jacket.
How many times do I make choices based on the outside, on the resume, instead of on the person? It’s the heart that matters, the character, not the appearance. Anyone can buy the right interview suit. Not everyone, however, will choose to follow through on a promise, or take responsibility for mistakes, or even to show up on time for work.
I am not a resume. I am not a piece of paper. I am a human being, with strengths and flaws and challenges and heartaches. I have a brain and a will and a spirit. I am more than a text message, more than an email, and I want to be seen for the strange, complex, wonderful, aggravating whole human being that I am. I think that is one of the greatest gifts we can give each other, to see the whole and love it all.