Slowing Down to Count & Show Shoulders

I couldn’t wait until a year passed to write another blog, though I wanted to. And so, I hope that in sharing this blog, it will bring encouragement to you as I welcome you into my therapy (and I am in therapy).

Whoever you are, whatever season you find yourself in, whoever you are quarantining with, and wherever that may be, you are not alone and you still matter.

Since returning home I zoomed back into the daily routines I used to have just a few years before I became a missionary. This has allowed me to suppress many emotions and charge back into the "grind" of American life. That all came to a head these past two months.

When I slow down, I can't help but have all the feels, and that's why I don't like to slow down.

As a missionary, I was in a sense, always “on-call". I was always being held accountable for my actions. I mattered but my emotions couldn’t be let too far out of their bag. Everyone needed to “save face” to survive and so I did. It was easy to live in Asia and to "save face" because I am more Asian in my thinking and way of life than I am Western. Planting my feet on their ground, I ran at the speed of light to help any and everyone. I felt so alive. I likewise tried to fundraise and keep afloat spiritually and physically speaking, keeping my adrenaline racing and my faith fearless. I faced many difficulties and had to continue to keep my hope, faith, trust, and love “on”. Never turning “off” necessarily, led me to the place I find myself now, feeling a bit empty and exhausted seven months later because I left.

Last year, I knew that I needed to break my commitment with YWAM (and not return in 2020) though I hate quitting things/ not finishing projects, and I hate not helping…but my helping was hurting me. I find the more that I have been forced to face the music of my limitations, I am meeting other (should I call them pilgrims?) or veterans of life in general who are weak, tired, burned, mistrusting, hurt, bitter, upset, sad, and lonely people, just as I am. Maybe I never slowed down long enough before to just sit in it with myself and then with others. I used to try to sympathize with these "types" to help them quickly recover but now I only empathize to the point where I realize that I cannot help them or anyone for that matter. I empathize by just being there too, that's all and not just try to make them better.

Better may not be the best.

Better may be "normal capacity".

To return to my "normal capacity", I’ve wanted to either overly/ overtly help others or avoid people completely in this time because the needs are too great, the pain too deep, the sadness to overwhelming. But I am finding that life is not normal and I can no longer necessarily operate at "normal capacity" because I need to grow, mature, develop, and change. My normal capacity needed to shift to expand and so it has.

In this shifting, I am learning that all people can do for one another is to provide that shoulder to lean on and let the other know, “you are not alone”. If there is any message, I now wish to lead with my life it’s that people, wherever they are, in whatever condition, are “welcomed” to just be, with actually no conditions or time frames to be healed.

None of us can save face for very long, especially when we keep falling in our own devices and find ourselves hurting the ones we love repeatedly. So in my "sitting in it", I am letting my tears run wild and my smile be true, even if that is less than "normal".

There is a problem when I live like a leaky faucet, always depleting my energy, resources, time, etc. and I am coming to understand that God is not asking us, you, or me, to save the world or to save face.

God is not asking you or me to rescue our parents from death.

God is not asking you or me to protect children from living.

God is not asking you or me to just put on a happy yet fake smile or to even cry.

God is asking us to be real, whatever that may mean to you, because that's all He has been with us since the beginning.

So let's get real.

This world is a wild place to live in and nothing is guaranteed, but if there is anything to truly put our money on it is the fact that we have never been truly left alone to our own devices. God always sends a shoulder. There may have been times when you were that shoulder for someone else, and perhaps with all the social distancing, you haven’t been truly allowed to find a safe shoulder to lean on. If that is the case, God has never left. He is still the safest refuge. Slow down long enough to show your shoulder or count shoulders in your "corner".

Personally, God has been with me through it all. I don’t always allow Him to be that for me nor do I always allow Him to bring others in my life to be that for me, but quarantining with my family has taught that I need other shoulders, no matter how old or young they are or I am. I am weak but this is where my true strength can be found.

Rather than hiding from our weaknesses, what better than to expose it courageously and reach out to someone and say, “I just need your shoulder.” This doesn’t mean we want someone to fix it, we just want to go through that deep dark and scary valley with another.

Life in isolation is not a life worth living.

Our triune (three in one) God didn’t design us to be alone. He made us in His image and He even submits to community (Himself, Holy Spirit, Jesus).

Community is constantly changing but it is around us in some capacity.

With so much to divide us and keep us apart from one another, I hope in this season you can embrace your pain, your past, your present, and your future with hope. That is the battle I am facing the most at the moment, to keep hope.

Hope is a great weapon and it stems from our understanding of love and what love is.

Love is patient, kind, and is only a shoulder away.

These photos are from a family vacation I recently took. We, as a unit, tackled some huge points of pain and suffering in our own family, some things even that have been too taboo to talk about for years. But, what I learned from “going there” with them, is that these shoulders are worth it (there's and mine). Thus, I am learning to embrace those emotions and the pain with the gain.

My "pain" is still seeping through and thawing out daily. So if I haven't been the best shoulder to you or haven't asked for yours, it isn't that I don't love you or need your love. It is rather that I am in a healing season after having poured out and received so much.

Let me be clear, I do not regret having been a missionary. It has truly changed the way I live, think, eat, breathe, sleep, and love. I only regret having pushed away any shoulders on my way there, back, and beyond (mine and others).

Until the next blog where I potentially unpack more of those emotions, I am still marinating/processing points of pain and having more "shoulder" adventures...I hope you keep going strong and don't lose hope yourself.

Jeremiah 29:11 "For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the LORD, “plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future".