First, I'd like to start by apologizing for not being more diligent about writing in this over the last week and a half (or so). The only explanation I have is that my mind has been elsewhere. Moving right along.
"With my mother's death, all settled happiness, all that was tranquil and reliable, disappeared from my life. There was to be much fun, many pleasures, many stabs of Joy; but no more of the old security. It was sea and islands now; the great continent had sunk like Atlantis."
-C.S. Lewis; "Surprised by Joy"
For those of you who don't know, my father passed away nearly five years ago from a rare and untreatable form of brain cancer. I was 17, and in an instant, my entire life changed. When I was reading this passage the other day as I sipped my morning tea on the deck, I heaved a great sigh of relief…the kind you can only breathe when you feel the comfort of understanding. Pay no mind to the fact that C.S. Lewis is, you know, dead… because I felt, in that moment, that a good friend had just laid a hand on me and said "I get it"…and I actually believed it. The time during which my father passed, the way in which he passed, and all the events that followed his death have been so uniqe to the situation that I have only on very rare occasions felt this way. Trying to articulate exactly how it has felt has been unbelievably difficult, and the quote above did it perfectly.
My life since November 4th, 2007, has certainly had many pleasures and many stabs of Joy…but the old security is gone. It's never coming back. I have been living an exhausting existence, sailing from island to island trying to find any last remnants of it that may still exist. (I think I am finally starting to accept that they don't.)
I have done this by moving certain places. I have done this through the people I decide/don't decide to spend time with. I have done this through the men I've dated. I have done this by unfairly ascribing responsibility to a bunch of things and people that had no obligation to bear the weight of that responsibility. Nothing/no one should have to be asked to take the place of my father and the security that my family being a whole unit gave me. But this is what I've done, and by doing so I have driven myself to become resentful of the places/things/people that were not able to do that. I have become so tired of the disappointment and terrified of the thought of losing more that I have all but completely closed myself off from some of the exact people I need to be around, some of the exact things I need to do, and some of the specific places I need to go.
Which leads me to now. I have spent the last week being terrified of the World Race. I have spent a considerable amount of time trying to figure out how to get out of it. I have recycled all the same old thoughts and doubts that always seem so rational and which have successfully kept me from living out my potential in the past.
"You don't really need this right now. What you need right now is to be comfortable…to figure everything out. You have so many unresolved things you need to work through. You'll always have time to do this later. What if something happens to mom or Andrew while you're gone and you can't be there? Could you really live with yourself if that happened?"
One of the mobilizers with the World Race emailed everyone in my squad about a week ago and ended the email with this:
"A heads up: You are working towards doing something HUGE and worthwhile for the Kingdom of God. Some people and spiritual forces are not going to be happy about this. As you get closer to camp, be aware that you might start getting "hit" or attacked with thoughts of doubt, discouragement, worry, or fear. You might things like, it's "too dangerous" or, "why don't you just do mission work here in the US?" "Are you sure you're really going to able to raise that money?" You might also run into car problems, flight issues, dropped calls, lost e-mails, misunderstanding, hidden expenses, etc. All things designed to frustrate you, confuse you, and cause you to withdraw."
Well, I guess she was right. (I know I may have lost a few of my non-believing friends here, but bear with me. I think this could be a valuable lesson, regardless of whether or not you think any spiritual force is causing me to have these doubts.) Doubt and fear have been the center of my thoughts in the recent days, and it has been successful in bringing me to a point where I want to throw my hands up and say "Screw it". The hardest part about it is that it all seems grounded in fairly rational thought. I mean, wouldn't it make sense to work through all of my baggage before I embark on such a long and serious journey? Wouldn't I be better equipped and more useful then?
I think I have decided that no, it would not. You see, I am notorious for being able to find seemingly good reasons for doing/not doing things. It is fear masked in rationality, "common sense", and pragmatism. The conclusion I have come to is this: if I don't just start picking myself up off of my ass (sorry) and doing my life the way it was meant to be done, I will spend the rest of it trying to recreate something that no longer exists and can never exist again. Yes, the old security is gone. And that hurts, and it's allowed to hurt. But the death of my old life can no longer dictate the course of my new one. It has been doing so for five years, whether I always admitted it or not, and it's time to let go. It will be the hardest thing I'll probably ever have to do.
So that's that. I'm going to need your help. I am going to ask for your prayer, and if you don't do that, I would simply like to ask for your honesty and your compassion where it's needed. I have never publicly dealt with this and have been uncomfortable speaking without any pretense about my dad's death ever since it happened, so this is all new territory for me. I am going to have a hard time even keeping this blog up because I am not used to baring myself like this. But, if I truly desire to live in community with people, this is the type of honesty that will be required.
And now, I raise my mason jar of tap water to a new pattern of thought, working towards living a life without fear, and to the World Race. Cheers, folks.
-Kelley
