A Contemplative Life

May 5, 2016May 4, 2016

Some Thoughts on My 40th Year

The saints in the stained-glass windows look down on us, somber and subdued. Outside, it’s a cloudy day. I get to the front of the line and Reverend Lauren hands me the wafer.

“The body of Christ, the bread of heaven.”

Then I turn to the person holding the cup. It’s my son, Cade, and he looks a little nervous. Our eyes are nearly level to each other now, our shoulders nearly even. He is far from the baby I watched slip into existence. He is getting closer to the man he will someday be.

“The blood of Christ, the cup of salvation,” he says, and I dip my wafer in the cup.

* * * * *

I am halfway through my 40th year. This is difficult to comprehend. I know those of you in your 50s and 60s and 70s will wave your hand at me and call me a “young pup,” but this 40th year is passing heavy and opaque, like molasses. It’s been hard to grasp. I feel so old and so young, all at once.

I had one genuine moment of panic recently, after my friend Nelson passed away, in which I thought, “No! I don’t want to get old! I’m not ready.” But for the most part, I welcome what these coming decades have to offer. They seem kinder in a way, these recent and coming years, less judgmental, less demanding.

When I was in my 10th year, it was 1986, and all I wanted to do was play down at the creek and make it to the Major Leagues. I wore tennis balls out by throwing them up against the side of the barn and chasing them down. There was a tree by the creek that became a graveyard for my fishing line. Life was simple and fun and I spent most of it reading on the large front porch of the farmhouse where we lived. I wonder what I thought about then. I wonder.

When I was in my 20th year, it was 1996 and I was finishing my freshman year in college. I knew less about myself in those years than at any other time in my life. To say I was finding my way would be a huge understatement. I was about to start writing in earnest. I was about to meet Maile. I was about to become my own person, separate from the household of my parents. I stood on the edge of an abyss, and I had no idea the depths of it.

When I was in my 30th year, it was 2006, and we had just come back from England, and we were starting a new life with two children. We would find community and friendships in Virginia that were so beautiful and crucial. And still, God was preparing us for the most difficult time of our lives, in 2009.

And now, my 40th year. Some things seem easier. I know who I am, I know what I’m to do. I have the beautiful and unconditional love of a fabulous woman and five (almost six) children. We have, somehow, landed on our feet, even after many lean years. I wake up everyday and do what I love to do: I write.

But some things seem more difficult, too. My children need me in ways they never needed me before when it was all diapers and baby food and middle-of-the-night wake-up calls. Maile and I are hitting the long stretch of a marriage, 17 years in, when you have a better understanding of love in its toil and its wonder.

Perhaps most difficult of all, I’m coming to terms with my place in the world. I’m not sure how else to say it. I’m not sure why that’s a difficult thing, but it requires a real working through, like a puzzle you’ve never done before, one you haven’t got a picture for, one without even the straight-lined edges to start with.

* * * * *

I will not soon forget being served communion by my son. I will not soon forget the way he tilted that cup forward, that cup of death and life. There was something in that small exchange that fit into this, my 40th year. There was something in that small exchange that holds the key to many things. I’ll have to think on it for quite some time. I’ll have to work through it.

May 3, 2016May 3, 2016

When We Went For Ice Cream in the Rain

We decided it was time to laugh
in the face of our collective sickness
and walk downtown for ice cream. But
at the corner of Prince and James we looked
north and saw the gathering clouds, dark, like
recycled nightmares or the villain in a silent movie.

We’re probably going to get wet, I said. We should
probably turn back. But I saw in the eyes of my
children that no amount of common sense
would prevail. I shook my head. I did not want
to get wet.

Still, we walked south, and the wind began to blow
and we fled from block to block, pushed ahead by
advancing clouds. We quickly ordered our ice cream
while old blossoms from earlier in the spring
scuttled by, afraid and out of place.

Finally we turned north, face to the clouds, holding small
bowls of joy. The kids squealed when the rain began
to fall, and we jogged all the way home from Chestnut,
ice cream melting,
rain splattering heavy dots on the cracked sidewalk
Sam going from tree to tree
hiding in the cold shade of April like a butterfly
or hope.

We came into the house and sighed and stood beside
the warm radiators, eating ice cream, laughing off the
storm. Leo’s face was wet and Abra coughed and we all
grinned. This is the definition
of hope, I think,
this willingness to head out
even when the storm is already on its way
knowing you’ll have to turn into those dark
clouds on your way home.

Don’t let the clouds keep you from heading out.

April 27, 2016

My Friend Died Last Week

My friend died last week. He was a good man, in every sense. I found out about his passing on Facebook, and when I first saw his name, I kept repeating it over and over again to myself because surely my brain must be short-circuiting. He can’t be dead. I must be confusing that name with someone else. There must be someone else with that same name, or a name like it.

But it was him. Later I found out his passing was sudden. He was 67.

I know we tend to say these things about the deceased, but he really was a remarkable man. You see, he grew up in a conservative Mennonite community, but later in life he was the personal assistant to Jerry Falwell in the early days of Liberty University, and he watched as the Religious Right was born. From there he worked for Chuck Colson. As our ever-twisting journeys would have it, he ended his life as an Episcopalian, happy to wrangle theology with anyone who had the time. But not only for the fun of it – though he was always kind and inquisitive – no, he was in it for the Truth. He was a seeker. He referred to himself as an Evangelical on the Canterbury Trail, and I guess that just about says it all.

I had spent some time recently helping him put together a book proposal about his life, a book that now, sadly, most likely will not be written. But even in that process he was measured, deliberate, and above all, kind in how he spoke of everyone, even those who in his life he had eventually come to disagree with. Those very same people sent his family flowers at the news of his passing.

Where have all these men and women gone, the ones who can disagree, even vehemently, yet retain the respect of those sitting on the other side of the table? Can friends still disagree on important topics?

His memorial service was on Monday, and this is where it gets interesting. You see, I have a book currently being shopped around to publishers, a young adult novel I wrote about death and life and living forever. Ironic, I know. I had received an email that a particular publishing house would be considering my book on Monday, the very same day as my friend’s memorial.

During the service, I listened to what all of these wonderful people had to say about my friend, and I kept thinking about what it means to live a good life, and all of these thoughts were swirling around with this sort-of-anxiety I was feeling about whether or not I’ll get a publisher for my book.

What does it mean? How important can a book deal possibly be in the face of our mortality? What is a good life?

* * * * *

Though I have been busy, perhaps overbusy, all my life, it seems to me now that I have accomplished little that matters, that the books have never come up to what was in my head, and that the rewards…have been tinsel, not what a grown man should be content with.

Wallace Stegner, Crossing to Safety

* * * * *

My friend Seth is always reminding me that the book deal is never going to do for me what I want the book deal to do for me. The problems I have now will still be there on the other side of the book deal. The relationship issues. The personal shortcomings. The anxieties. Nothing will magically erase them.

Seth is a good guy, but sometimes, when he says this, I want to stick my finger in his face and say “Shhh!” really loud. Because the truth of the matter is, we all have those things we aspire to. Or most of us do. And we have those things precisely because we are frightened about what we would have to confront if we faced our lives exactly as they are, here and now. We’d rather focus on a goal, and we nudge ourselves into believing that that goal, accomplished, will change everything.

But it will not.

The book will not do for you what you want it to do.

The relationship will not do for you what you want it to do for you.

The successful business will not do for you what you want it to do for you.

The promotion will not do for you what you want it to do for you.

This is not to say we should not pursue these things. It is only to say that we should pursue them with our eyes open.

* * * * *

My friend did not seem to live according to this popular method of grasping. He was motivated, and he had things he wanted to accomplish, but from my perspective, he was one of these rare individuals who listened when I talked, who sat with me in the moment. He was present.

I thought of this as I took communion at his service, as we followed the cross out to the church yard and said the Lord’s Prayer, as we turned and silently walked away from the broken ground now housing only the evacuated chrysalis of a great man.

I think this is something that those who are gone will teach us, if we will listen, if we will step out of our hectic lives long enough to let their message sink in. This is our one and only life, and so few things are truly important. So few.

Can we sift them from the rubble, these crucial things?

April 21, 2016

It’s a Relief, and It’s a Sorrow, the Way These Places Wait For Us

It is a relief to me, and it is a sorrow, the way these places wait for us to come back, the way they welcome us as if nothing important has been lost. And we go about our business, trying not to look directly at the empty space that once held a crucial thing: an old oak tree, or a fishing buddy.

I tell my children to cast in the line one last time. I fix my stare on the small plastic bobber, and I pretend that nothing has changed.

To read this post in its entirety, head over to You Are Here.

April 18, 2016April 17, 2016

Three Reasons You Shouldn’t Give Up

The three reasons are actually three stories.

* * * * *

I’m at a unique place in life, experiencing things I don’t remember experiencing before. On one hand, I’m more confident than ever in my call as a writer, and I’m content with where I am: I have an agent; I have (relatively) steady work; I have a wonderful writing community. On the other hand, I feel unsettled. I have one project currently being shopped around to publishing houses and am working on a book proposal for a second project, one that gets to the heart of what I’ve been experiencing for the last four years.

Waiting is hard. I’ve had two or three rejections so far on the first project, and those are not easy to receive. As the waiting continues, I find it difficult to focus, difficult to do anything but stare at my inbox, eager for the ping of the next incoming message, the potential email that will validate my writing. Validate my story-telling. Validate…me?

Ouch.

Rejection is difficult. Waiting is difficult. Hoping is perhaps the toughest thing of all. Yet everywhere I turn, I am being reminded that I should not give up.

My friend Sarah Bessey shared the following on her Facebook page after speaking at the Festival of Faith and Writing last week:

…this is a moment of full circle redemption. Eight years ago, I experienced the death of all my dreams to write at this very Festival of Faith and Writing. It was hard and beautiful and reorienting. Writing simply became a place to meet with God, no expectations attached. So it’s hilarious to me that I’m now on stage, all these years later, to proclaim the truths I’ve learned: we’re all unqualified and qualified to preach the Gospel and to write about God.

The death of her dreams was “hard and beautiful and reorienting.” Reorienting. Maybe we all need that, to be shaken from our present course and redirected on paths that lead somewhere better.

* * * * *

Two weekends ago, I listened to the keynote speaker Robert Liparulo speak about a similar topic. Twelve years before, he stood at the precipice, wondering if he should quite writing the novel of his dreams, the one he was working on but barely halfway through. Quitting seemed very easy to him at the time.

But he didn’t give up. He decided he would at least finish what he had started. Three million copies later, he’s rather glad he kept on.

* * * * *

Seven years ago, Bryan Allain and I began having breakfast together once a month, and it became an immense source of encouragement for both of us. He wanted to get out of his day job, and I wanted to make a living as a writer (well, most of the time that’s what I wanted, but there were many times when what I really wanted was a regular paycheck and health insurance).

But we kept moving forward. We kept taking that next small step. Now Bryan makes a living as a writer, supporting authors as they launch books and create new projects. And I’m moving forward as well, testing the waters, trying new things, helping people tell their stories.

* * * * *

Something Robert Liparulo said has stuck with me: “It’s a tragedy when people give up on their dreams.” I think it’s true, but giving up is also so easy, so simple. Usually, when I want to give up it’s because the mountain of my dream rises up through the clouds, and I can’t imagine ever arriving at those heady heights. I can’t imagine the days, the weeks, the years it will take to chart my course and scale those sheer rock faces.

That’s when we give up. When we stare up at a peak we can barely see.

Stop it. Stop focusing on the dream, and start focusing on the next small step. The next chapter. The next page. The next word. Finish the business plan, the outline, the funding letter. Take the next photo. Paint the next brush stroke. Look at the path, the one that’s grown over, the one that few others have traveled before you.

Then take the next step.

* * * * *

Bryan Allain and I recently took our seven years of breakfasts talking about the writing life and made three free videos about practices that will help improve your life and your writing: Silence, Discipline, and Community. You can get access to those three free videos HERE.

March 24, 2016March 24, 2016

Five Things I Do Instead of Blowing Up My Life and Starting Over

Last week I was working. I had my laptop with me in bed, I was wearing my sweatpants, a hoodie, and I was obsessing over whether or not a publisher is going to pick up The Day the Angels Fell (commercial break – you can purchase it for your Kindle right now for only $2.99). ~~I am terrible at~~…~~I have always struggled with~~…I am working on my ability to wait. Learning how to wait isn’t fun. It takes time.

There are plenty of areas of my life that aren’t exactly where I want them to be right now. There are many things I would wish into my present, if I could: a little more money, a few more projects, kids that all sleep through the night and don’t end up on your floor at various nope-o’clock hours. A box of Lucky Charms and a gallon of whole milk all to myself.

The temptation for me while waiting, with my personality and background and temperament, is to make drastic changes, either in an attempt to rush things or to so drastically change the game itself that what I was waiting for no longer applies. We’ll move! I’ll get a job! I’ll sleep all day! I’d rather blow up this beautiful life I’m living than sit around and wait.

This is a strange and scary concept I only just realized about myself as I typed that last sentence. I would rather change everything than keep waiting. See? Writing IS free therapy!

But instead of blowing things up and starting over again, I have to remind myself of what got me into this life, one that I honestly, truthfully, cross-my-heart really do love.

Trusting that God has this whole mess completely under control.

Consistently showing up and doing the work I can do (which for me looks like 1,000 words a day).

Choose hope (go on a jog or take the kids to the park).

Continue to believe in the necessity and power of shitty first drafts (thanks, Anne Lamott).

Embracing silence and releasing worry (don’t forget to breathe).

These are not concepts that apply only to writing. Maybe you’re a mom and the monotony or the schedule or the lack of adult conversation is killing you – keep showing up. Maybe you’re a business person writing your 100th business plan – choose hope. Maybe you’re trying yet another new idea – get that terrible first draft finished and behind you. Maybe you’re a pastor starting a new church and you don’t where the money will come from – release your worry.

But always remember – and this is coming from someone who’s been through quite a few of these waiting periods in my life – if all else fails, Lucky Charms will probably help, at least a little bit.