Yesterday I told my Facebook friends that I was thinking of fighting winter doldrums by concocting a month long birthday celebration for myself! I had fun last night brainstorming about all the things I would really like to do. Imagine my dismay to find myself depressed by those same ideas this morning. Everything last night I pictured enjoying now seemed burdensome since most things I find really pleasurable—reading, writing, conversing, creating—can be reframed as duties. I am a master at taking the things that give me joy and reducing them to obligations, draining them of any gratification. Doing things for sheer delight and living from that motivation seems hedonistic. Surely duty is a much godlier partner to holiness than pleasure.
As you can see, I have a serious problem with being responsible. A sense of duty weighed me down all my life, and nothing I did was ever done well enough, never accomplished to the point of satisfaction, but could always be improved. Each task done inadequately nailed down another proof of my failure and inadequacy as a person—I was not diligent enough, patient enough, thoughtful enough, committed enough. I was not enough.
Responsibility was the driving force of my life—its energy, direction, cohesion, and measurement—and to its cause everything was sacrificed, even my self. What I wanted, what would give me joy, was of no consequence, or worse was a temptation against the unending and uncompromising call of duty. It was God’s will versus my will, and my only choice was to squelch my desires. It seemed to me clearly taught by Jesus in Scripture with the motto “deny yourself, take up your cross, and follow me.” What I wanted didn’t matter. It didn’t matter to God and shouldn’t matter to me. I had a job to do, and that was all that mattered. This I believed wholeheartedly: my task is more important than me (and so I am only valued as a person to the extent I fulfill my calling).
Of course, I was reassured that God really did want me to be happy, but on His terms and not my own. The remedy to my unhappiness was not to be free of duty, but to take pleasure in it. This seemed less like a solution than an additional problem—not only was I bound to live for God’s satisfaction against my own, but I was also obliged to make this my source of pleasure. It felt as though I were locked in a sweatshop and ordered to picture it as a cruise in the Caribbean. I’ve been sitting in this same position for 12 hours: “No, I’m on a cruise!” I just whacked my thumb with a hammer: “No, I’m on a cruise!” I don’t know if I’ll get paid enough to buy supper: “I’m on a cruise!” If this was God’s view, the right view, my only hope was to make it mine as well. From an early age I tried desperately to make this work, fighting hard against opposing feelings which apparently sprang from the blindness of my sin nature. In the end, my emotions mutinied.
Depression, four years of profound and unremitting depression, finally drove me to question the very foundation of my worldview and to discover that God is the God of all grace. God wants the fulfillment of my desires, not their repression. But discovering a broken foundation is one thing; removing and replacing the foundation and rebuilding the structure is quite another (especially when your subconscious keeps sneaking in to replace the old blocks). 40 years I shouted at my desires, “Shut up!” as an act of submission to God’s will. For 10 years I have been learning to receive the grace of God. As you can see, I still have a long way to go.
My mind keeps bouncing with thoughts of what it means to support others. It is difficult to be a strong support without a deep, well established relationship, one in which each person is known genuinely and accepted for who he or she is. My wife and I do this for each other, but neither of us has experienced it fully in any other relationship. We have both had very effective counselors who understood us and accepted us fully, a rich and rare gift even among therapists, but the client-therapist relationship is limited by its professionalism and lack of mutuality.
My relationship with Kimberly is not perfect by any means. We regularly have to deal with issues that cause tension and distance in our relationship, but we do deal with them fully, which is unusual. We talk through our problems, each of us discovering and sharing our true fears and hurts, and return to a place of trust and acceptance with deeper self and mutual understanding. I tend to forget how unusual and valuable a gift Kimberly is to me and I to her.
We each wanted a spouse that was completely supportive, supportive (it turned out) of our coping mechanisms. Instead, we found the person who continually challenges our pretenses by simply being themselves. Since I am insecure, I wanted a wife who is always affirming so as to shore up my sense of worth. In other words, I don’t feel okay about myself, but if my significant other constantly tells me I am okay, it helps me ignore those gnawing doubts. Instead, I got someone who, although affirming, refused to play the role of “Worth Giver.” Rather than being saved from my insecurities by lavish reassurances, I was forced to acknowledge and deal with them. But when I admitted my issues, my wife accepted me for who I really was (instead of affirming the person I really wasn’t).
We expressed this to each other in our wedding vows. Mine read in part, “God has used you to set my soul free and alive in truth as I never imagined. You see me for who I am and who I can be and accept me as I am while believing with me for who I am becoming. I am safe with you, even my deepest, most vulnerable parts, but you also encourage me and challenge me to grow.” Just now my cheeks got damp reading that again and remembering the incomparable blessing of having a wife like her. Such honest and accepting relationships may grow also between friends and relatives, but I think few people in this life ever find it.
Fibi responded (on facebook) to my blog post “Let Me Be Weak” with some interesting questions, including the thought, “Of course it is such a natural tendency for one to try to lift you up and encourage during these low times. I think it’s a way that others try to show they care, but I almost hear you saying that it’s not possible … One has to walk through the sad times.” It set me to thinking.
First of all, let me thank you for listening, Fibi. You really listen, and that is a gift. There are few things more encouraging or affirming than to be really heard. I think everyone is unique and so benefited in different ways, and even receive different gifts from different individuals. So one of the best ways to learn how to support is to ask (as you did). I naturally imagine that what helps me will help all others, but that proves to be a false assumption on my part. I first learned from Kimberly that trying to ‘fix’ her is counter-productive (and then to my surprise found the same to be true for myself—I was more benefited by those who listen than those who try to solve).
When I am depressed, I want friends to simply be sympathetic to my situation. If I sense they need my feelings to change or expect that their sympathy should make me happy, I don’t feel supported in my present experience, but feel pressured to cheer up (which would require me to deny or suppress my true feelings). In turn, that pressure feels like a judgment against my depression or against my depression continuing–I am not only sad, but guilty for my sadness. I realize I may misread others’ attitudes and shouldn’t assume that they are critical of my feelings. On the other hand, we all have blindspots, so I may accurately sense in others attitudes of which they are unaware.
I have found great encouragement in the sympathy which says, “I feel sad for you, it must be really painful and difficult. I understand why you would feel depressed. Share with me how you are feeling.” In other words, I want my friends to accept my feelings fully as they are. Instead of trying to get me to join them in their happy feelings, they join me in my sad feelings, not in order to make me happy, but simply to be with me, to identify with my pain, to perhaps share or carry some of my burden emotionally.
This is not an easy thing to do. It scares some people, perhaps because they are frightened of their own sad and depressed feelings, which they are trying hard to avoid, or perhaps because they feel unable to be supportive for a variety of reasons. Their fear or inability is quite understandable and legitimate, and when I am “down,” they may need to put some distance between us for their own sakes. What I want to say to them is, “It is okay if you cannot support me. Just please don’t pressure me or condemn me. Let me at least be true to myself and listen compassionately to my own feelings.”
Your response to my blog has set me thinking more extensively, so I think I will have more to say soon!
Kimberly and I took a trip to the NC Blue Ridge Parkway for Thanksgiving weekend. The first day was rainy, and the next two days were below freezing with very high winds, but it was beautiful!
Our dog Mazie (short for Amazing… yes, Amazing Grace 
) loved the walks, sticking her nose into every clump of grass and chasing deer and chipmunks (to the end of her leash). She didn’t have much use for the vistas. Our digital camera has about a 2 second delay, so getting a good picture of her is nearly impossible.
The road names ’round them parts was quite colorful–Racoon Hollow, Lump Road, Ox Cart Road–and for some reason a lot of streets named after naked people: Don Bare Road, Hiram Bare Road, Doyle Bare Road. There was also a Bare Creek, which may have started the whole thing (I mean, you’ve got to bathe somewhere). Speaking of bare… there was a hot tub in our cabin (only half the parties in the tub allowed for picture taking). Oh dear, TMI!
Kimberly and I had a debate about Christmas trees, which were stacked on the roof of every 3rd car on the road–like there was a pine tree fire sale. “I’ve never seen so many christmas trees getting hauled home… maybe 1 out of 10 cars would be reasonable, but this is crazy,” I said. She responded, “Oh, there aren’t that many. Count the cars: 1,2,3,4,5,6,7 8,9,10 and only one Christmas tree.” Then the next 3 cars had trees on top! We saw one Christmas tree in the bed of a pickup truck that was bigger around than the truck, quite literally. Other holiday cheer was spotted now and again–we saw 3 Santa Clauses hanging from a fence by the country road. As we got closer, we saw they were stuffed like scarecrows… and were headless. Like a Tim Burton movie.
On the way home we stopped in the little town of Floyd, VA for lunch at a local joint called the Oddfellas Cantina and were delighted with french toast made from homemade cinnamon bread and live music from a local crooner–I’d show you the picture, but I don’t know how to get them off my cell phone. It really was a very pleasurable trip.
I feel depressed today, I’m not sure why. No doubt a combination of things–overcast sky, reading back over my journals from years past, not having the distraction or rewards of work (I’m off this week). I have done little personal processing over the last 6 months, especially recently with life going so smoothly that I am not forced to face and work through my baggage. Perhaps it has been a needed break from the usual emotional storms of life, but that calm can trick me into thinking that I am suddenly stronger and not rather that the waves have died down for the moment. Whenever the winds strike up again, I am surprised at my own fragility–my quick fears or reactive anger and defensiveness.
Most of my life I was not fragile at all. I was the strong, courageous one, and others were weak and insecure, leaning on me for support (or vying with me to be the rock). I did not know that my intense fear of inadequacy drove me, that I dashed into danger to flee this greater terror, that my invulnerability was not a mark of courage, but of cowardice. People cannot understand how emotional fragility, acknowledging and embracing my vulnerability and weakness, can be a mark of growing maturity and strength. Many old friends and even family members wish I were my “old self,” that I would be “strong” once again as I was before, that I would handle my feelings as I once did. They think that when I listen and respond affirmingly to my emotions I am being controlled by them. I find myself put in the strange and difficult position of insisting on being weak.
One of the most common expressions of this dynamic is when friends try to talk me out of being depressed, try to encourage me till I feel better, insist that I think positive thoughts until happiness returns. But I find that depression is always telling me something important, that it has some deep truth it is calling me to discover, and if I have the courage and energy not to run from my depression, but to embrace it, listen to it, dig deeper into its secrets, then I find new life flowing into my soul. “When I am weak, then am I strong.”
I’m not sure where I read this, but it is worth posting:
A water bearer in India had two large pots, each hung on each end of a pole
which he carried across his neck. One of the pots had a crack in it, and
while the other pot was perfect and always delivered a full portion of water
at the end of the long walk from the stream to the master’s house, the
cracked pot arrived only half full. For a full two years this went on daily,
with the bearer delivering only one and a half pots full of water in his
master’s house. Of course, the perfect pot was proud of its accomplishments,
perfect to the end for which it was made. But the poor cracked pot was
ashamed of its own imperfection, and miserable that it was able to
accomplish only half of what it had been made to do.
After two years of what it perceived to be a bitter failure, it spoke to the
water bearer one day by the stream. “I am ashamed of myself, and I want to
apologize to you.” “Why?” asked the bearer. “What are you ashamed of?” “I
have been able, for these past two years, to deliver only half my load
because this crack in my side causes water to leak out all the way back to
your master’s house. Because of my flaws, you have to do all of this work,
and you don’t get full value from your efforts,” the pot said.
The water bearer felt sorry for the old cracked pot, and in his compassion
he said, “As we return to the master’s house, I want you to notice the
beautiful flowers along the path.”
Indeed, as they went up the hill, the old cracked pot took notice of the sun
warming the beautiful wild flowers on the side of the path, and this cheered
it some. But at the end of the trail, it still felt bad because it had
leaked out half its load, and so again it apologized to the bearer for its
failure.
The bearer said to the pot, “Did you notice that there were flowers only on
your side of your path, but not on the other pot’s side? That’s because I
have always known about your flaw, and I took advantage of it. I planted
flower seeds on your side of the path, and every day while we walk back from
the stream, you’ve watered them. For two years I have been able to pick
these beautiful flowers to decorate my master’s table. Without you being
just the way you are, he would not have this beauty to grace his house.”
Each of us has our own unique flaws. We are all cracked pots. But if we will
allow it, the Lord will use our flaws to grace His Father’s table. In God’s
great economy, nothing goes to waste.
”Suppose this sunset, this moonrise, this symphony, this buttered toast, this sleeping child…suppose you would never experience these things again! Few things are commonplace or boring in themselves. It’s our reaction to them that grows dull.” Arthur Gordon [via Elizabeth Godbold]
A few nights ago I dreamed I was back in India, a fairly common dream for me. Even though it is a decade past, reminders of that period in my life almost always stir up very painful emotions which I usually choose to avoid. But that morning I began to reflect on the many regrets, small and large, which hound me: hurtful things I have said and thoughtless things I have done, often with very charitable intentions. I realize that I am not unique in this—everyone screws up a lot of things through the course of life. I’m guessing I will reach a stage of maturity in a decade or two when I will no longer cringe at the negative side-effects of my personal impact on the world. I commented to my wife Kimberly, “I should have been quarantined from society till I was 65 or 70 years old.”
I have always assumed that only the demonstrably good things I do are a benefit to the world, that everyone would be better off if I had no flaws. My good blesses the world and my bad curses the world. But in my own marriage I see a contrary principle at work. Not only our strengths but our weaknesses and flaws– and even, by grace, our sins–benefit the other. I have seen this hundreds of times in the 6 years we have known each other. When I am pricked by my wife’s issues and react, I am forced to admit and face my own insecurities, which, if left unchallenged, would subtly and powerfully stunt my growth. I am astonished by the idea that even my flaws are a blessing to the world. When I accept myself and others for who we are now, today, and not who we wish we were, grace has a chance to do its work.
Janathan Grace Reflections 