confessionsofcalling

[confessionsofcalling]

“You are so brave and quiet I forget you are suffering.”

— Ernest Hemingway

[confessionsofcalling]

I've never been the sort of person that can deal with a sudden bombshell, especially if it suggests I wasn't privy to important information that might have changed the way I acted in a past situation. Or led me to better understand the people around me.

I often feel like I'm a few steps behind everyone else, struggling to understand how people operate beyond my sometimes limited lens. So when something proves to me that I am not part of something that in reality I should have been, it hurts a little more. Feels a little more like abandonment, or little more like I'm not as important to the people I love as I'd like to think.

I don't know. Part of me thinks it's selfish, that I should just be happy to be anywhere at all.

But then someone I care about, that I thought got my story makes a flippant comment and I'm back to that feeling. Why don't we talk about things? Why don't we think things through together. Why do I always feel like I'm on one side of a conversation that never seems to answer in the ways I expect.

Something about all this struggle makes me realise one of the things I love so much about my faith. It gives me an anchor when I can't understand my world. Because even though faith is full of questions, I don't feel like asking them is going to get me in trouble. Jesus always encourages thoughtfulness, wants us to consider and reconsider, grow and learn in God's word. I never feel like God is mad at me, or that think or asking something is somehow going to destroy our relationship.

When I don't feel safe anywhere, I feel safe in His arms. Maybe that's enough for now.

- M xx

#anxiety #progressive christianity #hope #thoughts #christian blog #reflection #mental illness #mentalhealth #actually autistic #borderline personality disorder #safe with god

[confessionsofcalling]

The lead up to Easter is a whirl of emotions. In a lot of ways, it's joyous, in a lot of ways, it honours some time for the not so joyous parts of life.

Recently I've been thinking about healing. About growing and growing up.

Today I bought chocolate cereal for the first time ever. Last week, I went to the dentist on my own and didn't cry. This afternoon, I booked myself an actual holiday.

All of those things are little signs, little arrows that point towards something like happiness. They whisper, 'youre still here', 'youre doing stuff', 'youre going to be okay'.

And none of those things mean that I'm cured. They don't erase the fact that this week I have cried, that this month I have seen crisis point. They don't erase the fact that I still wonder what the point is pretty often.

But they are footsteps in the sand. Something or other that remind me that God is walking alongside me. That He gets what it's like to hurt, to bleed, to wonder why. And yet He chose that cross anyway. Wow.

So I'm thinking about all this. About the mess we call life. And I'm thinking about the world and all it's pain. Which makes me think just how amazing it is that we have this hope in God's name.

There is so much bad, but this walk towards Easter takes that bad, and shown us that good can come out of it. I don't know and I don't know when. But there are songs you know? That not all is lost.

So once again this year, just because we know that Sunday comes and Jesus rises, doesn't mean all those days before weren't tough and painful, and doesn't mean you are wrong for feeling like there is just no point in carrying on. But there is, if only that tiny little glimmer of light at the end of the tunnel that's pacing you forward.

Whatever it is that reminds you, maybe a good book, a cosy blanket, a long walk or a cup of coffee after a long day. Maybe you did something new this week, challenged a fear or learnt a skill. I don't know what that glimmer is for you, but I know it's there somewhere even if you have to squint to see it.

The cross tells me that all my pain is important and someone sees me, but it also tells me that I am allowed to leave it behind sometimes and look for the light.

There are no easy answers, no fix-all. But I think this walk to Easter and the hope of the resurrection is kinda like this. Sometimes a kid will get several colours of playdoh - some dark and some light, and you think it would be terrible if they got smoothed together. But that kid is beaming as they mix that dough, and suddenly, the colour starts looking kind of good. All that pain and all that joy has purpose. There is time for all things in the sight of God.

Your mess, your mixture, your good and bad and all that stuff in-between. It's all welcome here.

Happy Easter, M xxxx

#lgbtchristian #jesusloveseveryone #progressive christianity #jesuslovesyou #hope #thoughts #blog #reflection #mental illness #christian blog #you are loved #mentalhealth #easter #heisrisen #eastersunday #itsokaynottobeokay

[confessionsofcalling]

I'm feeling confused and anxious right now. There's a lot going on with the people I love, but also the people I have complicated relationships with. My disorder makes me think and feel things I don't always like or understand. I have to keep reminding myself I am a good and loving person being my disordered thoughts.

I am feeling things that are not appropriate when someone else is grieving. I want to say the right things, be the right person. I am trying. I have always put everyone else before me and I struggle now with knowing when to do that still and when not too. I struggle with all the tangles in my brain that I don't ever let people see.

I am finding comfort right now in the story of Jesus in the garden. He was stressed and scared and cried out to his Father. He expressed his conflicting emotions. Saught connection with people whom he loved, even if they sometimes fell short. He was so very human there praying some of the hardest prayers any of us will pray.

I am praying right now that the Lord helps me be a good friend. A good sibling, a good human - no matter what the nasty voice in my head might be saying.

In the end, I remind myself that that voice is not God - so it doesn't deserve to take up so much space in my brain.

I'm writing to cope, to get all the crap out in a healthier way. Trying not make other people's hurt about me - easy to do on the outside, not so easy to do inside my head right now.

I am being honest, by abusive childhood has not built a person best equipped to deal with some hard stuff, and also a person who has had to deal with some stuff that is way too hard. So there's ups and downs. There is no shame in acknowledging that you are not perfect, but that you are loved anyway.

Being around for someone who is grieving is often complicated. But I am taking hope in knowing being present in a complicated situation is enough for now.

This is all kind of messy. But I suppose lent is a time to witness to the darker and more messy things about life. I hope some of this makes you feel less alone. You are not a bad person for having conflicting feelings and symptoms. You are still a loving friend and you are still loved by others.

Breathe, care for yourself, show up in the ways you are able. God gets you. I get you. Maybe that's enough.

Love as always - M xx

#grief #progressive christianity #jesuslovesyou #thoughts #hope #blog #mental illness #borderline personality disorder #support #supporting friends #jesusinthegarden #garden of gethsemane #youcanhurt #you are loved #complicated #keep showing up #keep going #mentalhealth

[confessionsofcalling]

Midnight

Another midnight, another year.

It is impossibly different and impossibly the same. I am lying in bed with my gorgeous dog. I have cried tears, I have felt grateful and I felt unbelievably exhausted. I have hurt so much and healed so much and hurt so much all over again.

I am taking a big breath in and letting it slowly easy out again. What I painful and beautiful thing it is that I am still alive at also the midnight again. That I am here to see another year.

I am meeting myself here at midnight, and meeting again all my past selves that have sobbed through the night and woken up puffy to January first and little no hope. I feel sad. No denying it. But maybe this year I am just a tad more hopeful than devastated. I’m calling that a huge achievement.

If New Year is the time when people decide to take leaps, to do more or less of this and that in the coming year then I can think about the gentlest ways to leave the crappy stuff behind and try to find more light.

Maybe this year I can start to love my body a tiny bit more.

Maybe this year I can trust myself a bit more.

Maybe this year I can be present just a bit more often.

Or maybe this year I’ll just survive.

But for the first time I think staying alive is a more achievable goal. Boy isn’t that crazy.

I imagine God holding my hand as a step over the line of another year. He is so kind to me. I have questions sure, I have doubts, but I have enough faith to feel that if no one else gets just how hard it is to ignore the horrible voice in your head, God gets it. He will work everything for good in its time. Even if that’s impossible to believe right now.

I am breathing in and out again. I am lucky because I can do that freely. I am reflecting on that impossible similarity and that impossible change. I have more feckless than last year, my hair is a different colour, I am in a different house with different coloured walls. And yet, I am me and I am a bundle of energy and joy and tiredness and trauma and the world is still broken.

But in my breath I can believe that there is an eternal force that somehow means as I am breathing here in this little house by the river, somewhere a million miles away someone else is breathing at the same pace, crossing midnight and choosing life still. And so I will hang onto my faith in a God that cares for the most wounded and fragile people and places. And I will relish however heartbreaking the chance to wake up tomorrow and try again.

When I have fallen this year, God has told me, get up beloved child.

When I have won this year God has said, well done beloved child.

When I have been exhausted God has said, rest beloved child.

So the midnight circumstances change, but the truth remains the same, beloved child. That’s me and that’s you.

This is, as always, such a mess of word vomit and love and bad grammar and hope and all the things.

Hey midnight.

Hey fellow traveler.

We made it, once again.

Keep on keeping on.

#jesuslovesyou #hope #thoughts #mental illness #you are loved #mentalhealth #mental health matters #you are enough #keepgoing #progressive christianity #queer christian #keepfighting #keep going #newyear #midnight #new years eve #christian blog #blog #holding on #holding onto hope #hopefull and hurting #big feelings #feelings #keep believing #prayer

[confessionsofcalling]

Right now my brain is soup. I don't have much capacity for good words or inspiring thoughts.

But if you're anything like me, struggling to regulate emotions, living with an ever present since of fear, feeling the world is just a little too broken - and all of that is making it impossible to sleep. I just want you know there is at least one person here who gets it.

You are loved, you will get through this. You are not beyond hope, or help or anything.

You are you and you are fearfully and wonderfully made. If I can't believe it for myself right now, I can definitely believe it for you.

Love always - M xx

#jesuslovesyou #thoughts #hope #keepgoing #stay #you are loved #mental health matters #mentalhealth #mental illness #you are enough

[confessionsofcalling]

“All of us are better when we are loved.”

— Alistair MacLeod, No Great Mischief

[confessionsofcalling]

“Let’s raise children who won’t have to recover from their childhoods.”

��� Pam Leo

[confessionsofcalling]

The in-between

I am in the the in-between. My faith feels like an aged tattoo. Maybe a year, maybe more, it’s part of me so deeply and it is there to stay, but sometimes I forget it’s there because I’m so used to it. Sometimes I forget it’s there because I don’t want to remember the pain that came with it.

Church is a weird thing to think about right now. I know I’m not alone in that feeling. In the sense I love it so deeply but it doesn’t feel like somewhere I want to be right now. Jesus isn’t just in that building, in fact I’ve found much more peace with Him at my kitchen table than I have in a pew these past few months.

I am so much more comfortable and mature in my faith when it is not being used as an excuse to work me beyond my capacity. I miss a lot of things from the infancy of my faith. As my belief began to toddle I was able to break free, and that was so euphoric I could write several books and it wouldn’t be enough. But it’s funny when a faith that breaks chains is used to tie people up, to mould them into something that fits, rather than echoing the Divine and saying, ‘Darling, you fit no matter what’.

Now my faith is walking confidently and taking risks, learning how to climb monkey bars and trying new food. There is something lonely in that growth for sure, but I can see God so much more simply. Turns out, taking a break from being asked so often how I see God, has made me appreciate how I see Him just that bit more.

When the work dries up, when I am painful lonely, Jesus is still there. It’s starting to feel like the building didn’t have much to do with it. Or at least it doesn't anymore. I am a full person. My faith is my own, and I do with it what God has willed me to do. No powerful man will judge my journey enough to make me get off my train, and I will not blindly follow to a place that wouldn’t have me without conditions.

I am in the in between, I know where I am, not quite sure what I have left, and not quite sure where I am going. But my heart is full of love, full of Jesus, and I am bruised, but I am here. And that is the biggest triumph I could wish for.

#progressive christianity #lgbt christian #progressivechristian #jesusloveseveryone #jesuslovesyou #hope #thoughts #reflection #church #wrestling #deconstruction #growth

[confessionsofcalling]

Someone Else’s Poem - David John Keighley

Who will love a displaced person, a transvestite, a downtrodden wife, whose voice is voiceless and goes unheard? “Not me,” said the politician, the bishop, the husband! “The power is mine and mine it shall be, I won’t reach out to equality, and my ivory tower will protect me.”

Who will love an unknown and share with them the glow of fame? “Not me,” said the celebrity, the star of the show, the TV presenter who everyone knows, “It would diminish my own sense of ego and worth, my status depends on being above most. My low self-esteem would be exposed at last.”

Who will take pity on the poor, and feed the crowd around the door? “Not me,” said the banker, behind his high gates, “I do what I can in all honesty, but to give it away is beyond me. There could be a crash, and then what would I do? A million doesn’t go far, you know.”

Who will love and love and love some more, ask naught in return, and keep no score? “I will,” says the Christ, “and if they kill me, the love will remain through eternity for all I’ve created returns unto me.”

“From dust were ye made and dust ye shall be.”

#progressive christianity #lgbt christian #progressivechristian #jesuslovesyou #hope #poem #christian poetry

[confessionsofcalling]

“I knew I could be brave. I already had been for a very long time.”

— Jenna Evans Welch, from Love & Olives

[confessionsofcalling]

“Don’t let the concept of change scare you as much as the prospect of remaining unhappy.”

— Timber Hawkeye

[confessionsofcalling]

Hey, I could of written something new (and attempted to be profound) about this Easter, but honestly, I feel the same as I did last year, and it's really joyful to see that a load of internet humans seem to like the stuff I say, so that's enough for me

Maybe I'll have something new to say about this season soon, but right now, I feel content in knowing I'm not alone ❤️

Peace and love - M xx

It's Sunday. He is risen. But He is risen doesn't mean:

You suddenly have it all figured out

Everything should feel happy and light

You should suddenly be absolutely ok

You have to be the most pious

You have to be greatful 24/7

That the world isn't still a fucked up place

That you're expected to be perfect because the mourning is over

But what it does mean, is that the story doesn't end here. You get to be whatever mess you are and Jesus still wants to scoop you up and take whatever time it needs to make it better. The world will be a fucked up place and we will not be perfect and we may still be mourning. But an empty tomb means amongst all that darkness, there is undeniable hope.

[confessionsofcalling]

If you're a survivor like me - hear this. Do not hate yourself for the ways you have coped with unimaginable pain. You are so strong, but you don't have to feel like it. If you're still walking in a fog or if you're walking a clearer path. There is no wrong way to survive, and I can tell you this with complete honesty. You are incredibly brave for simply still breathing. If you needed a reason or a reminder, let this be it. The world needs you.

Love M xxx

#treat yourself with kindness #trauma #trauma recovery #mental health matters #mentalhealth #sign #this is a sign #let this be your reason #reasonstolive #hope #you are loved

[confessionsofcalling]

“We want the war horse.

Jesus rides a donkey.

We want the bird of prey.

The Holy Spirit descends as a dove.

We want the militia.

Jesus calls fishermen, tax collectors, women, and children.

We want the courtroom.

Jesus sets a table.

We want the gavel.

Jesus washes feet.

We want to take up swords.

Jesus takes up a cross.

We want the empire.

Jesus brings the Kingdom of God.

We want the nation.

Jesus calls the church.

We want the roaring lion.

God comes as a slaughtered lamb.

We keep trying to arm God.

God keeps trying to disarm us.”

~ Benjamin Cremer

#progressive christianity #lgbt christian #progressivechristian #jesusloveseveryone #jesuslovesyou #thoughts #reflection #quote #christianity #resistance #protest #bethechange #church #jesus #whojesusis

[confessionsofcalling]

“You alone are enough. You have nothing to prove to anyone.”

— Maya Angelou

[confessionsofcalling]

Trauma does weird things to you. Makes your body act strangely, makes you think think things that from the outside look absurd but make perfect sense to you, it affects every little bit of your life.

It's exhausting.

I've been in the valley for the past couple of weeks, recovery is never smooth and I have been on a pretty bumpy part. I'm struggling to concentrate, just want to sleep or cry. It's been hard.

But it's been hard before, and it'll be better and then harder again. That's how life goes, but especially when you've been through some not so great things.

But I'm sat at uni so I'm at least out the house, and back at work tomorrow so that's something to do. I will be okay.

I've been doing an assignment on lament in the bible recently and I think it fell into my lap just at the right time. If anything I'm saying feels like it's speaking to you, hear this. You are allowed to feel shitty. You are allowed to be sad or angry or anxious or whatever it is you are feeling. You do not have to be positive, you do not have to always believe things will be better, even if logically you know they will.

You are allowed to scream and cry, you can lay all the crap at God's feet. God gets it. Jesus cried, He hurt. You are not alone.

If right now things are heavy, you are allowed to talk about it, allowed to pray about it, you don't always have to look on the bright side, some things are crap and that’s just how it is.

But all that doesn't change how very very loved you are.

Keep hanging on, shout if you need to, treat yourself gently.

With love - M xx

#progressive christianity #lgbt christian #progressivechristian #jesusloveseveryone #jesuslovesyou #hope #thoughts #blog #reflection #mental health matters #mentalhealth #mental illness #christian blog #christian mental health #you are loved #you matter #you are not alone #you are enough #trauma #trauma recovery