On meeting Anna Nalick and my second book-iversary

This last weekend may go down as the most epic in Beth soon-to-be Stoneburner history: I bought my wedding dress, met Anna Nalick, and reflected on the 2^nd anniversary of my first book baby, Confessions of a Prodigal Daughter.

For those who have never heard of Amazing Anna (and sadly, many people haven’t, since she left her old record label several years ago), Anna Nalick is a self-described “indie artist,” which makes her the patron artist of indie authors. She is the incredible voice behind one of my favorite songs of all time, “Breathe,” as well as the lesser-known song “These Old Wings” that helped get me through the worst depression of my entire life.

Can I just say, aside from being wicked talented and a sweet, down-to-earth person who tells stories during her concerts, it’s so amazing to see a successful artist humbly admit to struggling with depression herself. It reminded me that it’s often a source of great art, be it music or literature. I can never have enough of those reminders. I want people to feel the same about my books the way I feel about Anna’s music.

She talked about autobiographical writing as a way of freezing yourself in time. Your beliefs and personality may develop through the years, but when you put yourself out there to be read or listened to, you are in a sense forever bound to who you were at that time. 

That’s how I feel about Confessions. That book was not intended to become a bestseller. Writing it was my way of processing through the conflict of adopting beliefs that are wildly different from the ones my parents taught me, so it reads very much like the journal of a confused woman who is gradually becoming aware of her inner strength. I do not have the same doubts or beliefs that I did when it was published. But I’ve also become stronger in certain beliefs I was shaky about at the time. I can still sense the turmoil when I flip through it every now and then.

My writing has greatly improved in the last two years, along with my knowledge of the publishing industry and marketing (and in a rapidly changing industry like this, there is always more to learn!). I had this idea that having a book available for purchase meant it would sell on its own. I couldn’t be more wrong! Despite working on my fifth book, I’m not beating myself up for not being “bigger” than I’d like to be, since I only actively started marketing when my third book was released last August. Confessions may remain my only memoir for the time being, as I quite enjoy the freedom of inserting my own experiences into my characters, without locking myself into a certain set of beliefs or characteristics. I’m also aware that the average 25-year-old is not world-weary enough for more than one memoir (or even just one).

But today feels like a birthday. So from this day forward, I can only learn more. 

When hate begets grace

A funny thing happened when I got engaged last weekend (cue the squeals!):

I was consumed with so much joy at the thought of spending the rest of my life with a man I’m crazy about (and get this guys, he actually feels the same!) that I forgot to be bitter for the rest of the weekend.

You see, the engagement happened during the 6-year anniversary of being assaulted; the 3-year anniversary of ending the abusive relationship in which that assault occurred; and the 11-year anniversary of when a friend of mine committed suicide. So needless to say, the first few weeks of springtime are not typically joyous for me. In fact, I dread them, for all the memories that come up.

And then – and then! – Fred Phelps, the legendary patriarch of the hate-filled Westboro Baptist “church” passed away. So I’ve been reading up on articles that keep cropping up on Facebook about it, and it seems my internet friends’ reactions fall almost evenly in two separate camps: those who want to piss on Fred’s grave and protest his funeral, and those who insist on extending forgiveness and the hope of salvation to a very, very lost individual.

I, like many Christians, am not without bitterness towards people like Phelps: people who make me ashamed to identify as “Christian” for all the ways that word has been abused. Still, this man was someone’s father, grandfather, brother, husband…and it saddens me that it’s not obvious to more people how protesting his funeral isn’t justice; it’s only sinking to his level of depravity. I find myself increasingly inspired by people who are choosing to extend grace and mercy on his behalf.

But I can’t have those thoughts about Fred without doing some soul-searching about my feelings towards the man who wronged me. I’ve wished for bad things to happen to him. I’ve wished for the chance to humiliate him. But in the same way protesting Fred’s funeral won’t undo the emotional damage caused by holding up signs saying “God Hates Fags,” wishing terrible things on my abuser doesn’t undo what he did. And it certainly doesn’t make me a happier, joy-filled person.

It’s giving him permission to live rent-free inside my head. And there’s something about the counter-protests like this one, plus getting engaged, that makes me think “Ain’t nobody got time for that.”

It’s time to start living. Time to accept that the past can’t be undone, and the memories may still sting, but they don’t define me or determine the happiness I can choose to feel. Time to start planning my wedding!

Facebook and the bizarre new culture of grief

The last thing I want to do is take Facebook too seriously; it’s an isolated portal of communication that can only display so much of a person, so it’s inaccurate to judge people solely by the content they choose to post.

However, it does add up. People create patterns and expectations based on their shared information. Even friends I love dearly in “real life” have been hidden on Facebook because I simply don’t care about 99% of what they deem share-worthy. Most of the time, it’s nothing personal.

But I cringe every time I see a personal prayer request – for several reasons. It’s bad enough that “I’ll pray for you” has become a conversation-closer with good intentions that is rarely followed through; these are the posts that typically garner the most ‘likes’ and comments, and I’ll bet that most of them come from people who otherwise don’t give a damn about the rest of your life, except when there’s an opportunity to be a part of something that breeds attention. It’s for the same reason people tend to dress up ordinary encounters they had with someone who recently died, because death and grief create a backwards celebrity status.

I’m a strange person who considers the intimacy of prayer in the same way as marital intimacy: you don’t share the details with a great number of people. Just your significant other, your close friends and relatives, maybe a counselor or mentoring figure. I highly doubt those are the only people who have access to your Facebook account. So when you are asking an artificial community of ‘friends’ to pray on your behalf, what are you really asking for? Why does your grief demand a spotlight?

Personally, I’m terrible with remembering prayer requests. I’d much rather be asked to do something tangibly helpful, like make soup for someone who is sick. It’s possible that my discomfort with publicized prayer requests is linked to my changing conviction about the purpose of prayer, period: I don’t necessarily believe in praying for specific outcomes to problems anymore. Doing so makes me feel like I’m treating God as a personal genie, which I don’t believe he is. If someone is ill, I’ll pray that the doctors do their best performing courses of treatment. I’ll pray that the sick person is giving strength and resiliency, regardless of the outcome of their prognosis.

I think of Facebook-shared prayer requests like the cliffhanger ending of a TV show, because it sets up expectations of fulfillment. You are creating an audience for your troubles, and the voyeuristic tendencies of most people may keep them wanting to know what happens. And if the end result is not what you wanted, what then? Then your grief has been made public, which sets a precedent that leaving a condolence comment suffices for genuine sympathy. It doesn’t.

Real community should be there for you, in person, assisting you with your real needs (Jews have perfected this practice, called “sitting shiva”). Don’t settle for the falsehood of Facebook grief, because while most people may feel passing sympathy for you, they will likely forget once the next engagement post starts making headlines.

God takes crap and makes fertilizer

A timely excerpt about trials and forgiveness from Confessions of a Prodigal Daughter:

     I wish I could say that the rest of my senior year was relaxing and relatively trial-free. The following verse from James became the theme of my last few months of college: “Consider it pure joy, my brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. Let perseverance finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything” (1:2-4). Naturally, this verse did not sit well with me the first time I read it. Consider it joy when facing trials? What kind of crazy logic is that? But setbacks are only setups for God to work. He makes all things work for the good of those who love him. The biggest trials we face are also where our calling for ministry can be found...

     As John was trying to convince me to fall back to our old ways the next time he’d return home, I also found out he was seeing someone else. To add further insult to an already gaping injury, the medium in which I discovered this information was Facebook. He couldn’t even tell me himself.

     That night started well enough. I had gone out to sing karaoke with the girls in my h2o bible study, and did not return until midnight. I now know better than to check my Facebook or email just before going to bed. That night was, without being melodramatic, the worst night of my life. I cried so hard I was dry-heaving and dizzy. When you find out that the man who has been a god-like figure in your life since you were seventeen is now in the arms of someone who isn’t you, it tends to wreck your world. Mine shattered instantaneously, and I’m still amazed at just how easy it was. 

     I realized that the timing of our inevitable downfall was actually in response to a prayer from the weekend before. I attended a women’s retreat with h2o and listened to a speaker talk about her struggle with a spiritually and emotionally damaging relationship in college. I felt as if she was addressing me personally. I perfectly understood the ugly cycle of giving in to the same old sin, even with the best of intentions to avoid it. I also understood the feeling of hopelessness that can lead to dangerous forms of compromise. 

     It was easy to stay in a relationship that was destroying me from the inside out because I firmly believed that was the best I’d ever have. In looking for a quick fix to my loneliness, I made a personal god out of a fellow human being who was incapable of fulfilling me. Even when I felt disrespected and worthless, I believed I could fix him when I couldn’t even fix myself. I remained convinced, despite warnings from Bethany and Anne, that the man I’d originally fallen in love with still lived somewhere inside him.

     I knew there was no way I could spend the night alone. Kaitlin was the first person I could think of to call, even though it was after midnight. The night I spent sobbing my guts out on her couch was the first time since accepting Christ that I felt so completely worthless. Even before my family found out about my faith, I don’t think I’d ever felt grief this big. This was a man I had known for half a decade, someone I loved with the depth of life itself, even if I was not being respected by him as a daughter of God should be. 

 

     What should have been only a five-minute walk from my dorm to her apartment took nearly half an hour because of all the snow I had to trudge through. By the time I made it to her place, I was a wreck and could barely stand up. We stayed up nearly all night, and I could not believe her when she told me how God would use this pain for glory someday. I could not believe her when she told me I deserved so, so much more than what I had settled for in a man. I felt that my self-worth was permanently shot to pieces, and no godly man would ever desire me as a girlfriend, much less a wife.  

     I needed to do a spring cleaning of my life more than ever, but even that could not be done completely on my own. I hardly ate, slept, or showered within the first week of my newfound “freedom” as an officially single woman. I thought that with enough prayer and support from close friends I could get through this, but I couldn’t. My mind was a broken record of all the things I should have done sooner, things I wish I’d said. 

     Eventually, I decided to get counseling so I could at least finish my senior year on a strong, healthy note. Sometimes I think it will be easier to forgive him than it will be to forgive myself. But I know there is no point in continually beating myself up. I know that the past cannot be changed or undone.

     Jesus’ attitude toward forgiveness never struck me as borderline insane until this moment. I had been hurt before, certainly, but never enough where the thought of forgiveness seemed completely impossible and ludicrous. To forgive someone who hurt me this deeply felt ridiculous and unnatural. It contradicted everything I know that is true about human nature. 

     But then, by sheer grace alone, I remembered how I became a Christian because of the fact that it is unnatural. Christianity calls its followers to rise above their natural condition, to be more than they could ever become on their own. It is completely counter-cultural, and the standards set by Jesus are often perceived as unrealistically high. His words about forgiving those who mistreat you have caused him to be labeled as crazy by many of his critics. But turning the other cheek is anything but a passive response. 

     Forgiving those that the world considers unredeemable is just one of many examples of embracing God’s vision for our lives. It is by no means a light and easy task, but it is necessary for healing. Many people equate forgiveness with excusing poor behavior, but the reality is that holding on to anger is emotionally crippling. It robs you of the chance to heal from tragedy. That’s not to say that it isn’t natural to grieve, but even now, while still grieving, I know that holding onto it for a lifetime and still hoping to heal is like gorging on cupcakes daily and still expecting to lose weight. Refusing to forgive someone who has wronged you only gives them permission to dominate your life. 

     Still, I continue to struggle with it every day. Some days are better than others, and then there are days I feel like I have fallen back to the hopeless pit I was stuck in before. Some days I have to force myself to pray even harder for the ability to choose life again. Hell hath no fury like the prayers of a broken-hearted woman.

     A song that is commonly sung in h2o services contains a verse that says “You make all things work together for our good.” That is another one of my favorite things about Christianity: the fact that no experience, good or bad, is ever wasted. As a friend of mine likes to say, God takes crap and makes fertilizer.