can we be friends?

There are moments of my childhood that I recall with such clarity as if they were yesterday.

One of those moments was being in elementary school trying to navigate making friends. Especially navigating who your best friends were. So in first grade, I was in hot pursuit of a best friend. Like in most first grade elementary classes there were bathroom breaks. Everyone lines up and goes to the bathroom.

I remember standing in the line of boys in the bathroom next to my friend and as we waited I asked him if he would be my best friend. Why the bathroom I don't know? Maybe it just seemed like the right time to ask? He said that I couldn't be his best friend. Dreams dashed. Someone had already taken that place. But I could be number two. I guess that would be okay.


I realized then and I still do now in my thirties my deep need for friendship. My deep need to belong.

Somewhere in our culture, something has gotten skewed about friendship. We are now under the impression that friendship comes at the click of a button. The term Facebook friend means something quite different than the word friend.

We live under the idea consciously or unconsciously that friendships come at a click of a button. But they really don't. Friendships, I am learning at this stage of my life, come at a cost and a high cost at that.

I am living into and accepting the reality that friendships aren't fast but instead take time to develop. Sure there are friendships that just naturally blossom organically but I think most friendships especially those formed in adulthood don't start out that way. It is hard to know someone over just spending a few moments with them. Instead of getting to know people now... we do background checks. We check people's statuses, political affiliations, posts, blogs... and just then we might enter this space called friendship.

I am learning that friendships take sacrifice. The willingness to stop the background check and enter into the unknown territory of making a friend. It also means I have to prioritize them in my life. They don't just happen. My wife and I often commiserate with one another as we try to schedule lunches, dinners, phone calls with friends or constituents that could be friends. We open up our calendars sacrifice evenings with the family and to no avail, it never works. Either phone calls are dropped, emails unreturned or someone isn't willing to drop something for the sake of being a friend. And parents are the worst. I love being a parent but if I have learned anything from these past few years... I need and want friends!

They take a steadfast commitment. Like I said friendships take time to develop. Knowing this means that everyone has to be committed to this long term commitment to building friendships and community. If we are ever to really "know" one another we have to take the time to spend with one another. Which means we have to abandon our stereotypes and assumptions of each other. Accept that everyone we are friends with is different. Meaning they live life differently. They parent differently. And to accept that is okay. And in fact, it is great that not everyone is like me. I would be a poor friend to myself!

All the while I am entering into this phase of my life of intentionally making friends I am planting a church. Yet I am trying not to even think about the church part. Friendship is what it is all about... and friends can come together to mutually support one another, affirm one another, empower one another. And to me, that is what church is and should be...

Plants have always been a great image for stuff like this. I am the worst at propagating a plant (rooting it from a cut of another plant). Usually what happens is that the plant I am trying to propagate dies. Usually, it is under my watchful daily eye. But a few months ago I took a couple gardenia flowers placed them on the counter in some water. And I forgot about them. Occasionally I changed the water. And three months later there were roots forming on each of the cuts of plants. Before I knew it I had three more gardenia plants to bloom in the garden.

This is what I am doing... I am making friends. And in making friends we are growing a garden without even knowing it. And this garden that just might sustain and nourish our community. Or in other words church.

kickball and never feeling good enough

For the past few months, I have been doing some soul work. Exploring ways that I might be a better spouse, parent, son, and leader... a better human being. Yet to do this has meant to dive into the murky waters of my childhood. I am discovering that to be a better human being means that I have to be willing to face the darkness that exists within me.

Just recently I found a book "Reboot: Leadership and the Art of Growing Up" by Jerry Colonna that recognizes that being a good leader means being aware and connected to who we are as a human being. Being aware of the unconscious darkness that lurks underneath who we are. 

I think about some of the simple moments of my childhood that had a profound impact on me.  One of those moments was playing kickball in elementary school and the utter terror of standing in line while team captains picked players for their team. I was always near last to be picked. And I always would tell myself why I was last, "you aren't any good, you aren't athletic enough, you made a mistake in the last game..." And when we did play and I missed catching the ball... I would yet again tell myself these things... 

And I still struggle with this very same voice in my head that tells me I am not good enough. But I have always compensated. Faked my way. Pretended. And crossed my finger no one found out. 

We often create bad behaviors that silence our demons so we don't have to face them. We make huge sacrifices as not rouse our demons. As long as my demons stay quiet I am okay. So the temptation is not to I take risks. 

Colonna says, "We forge our truest identity by putting our heads into the mouths of the scariest demons, the realities of our lives."

Or as Carl Jung states that if we bring the unconscious to lite we will change our fate. I don't have to live with this lurking feeling "of never measuring up" I can instead choose the path for which our baptism makes real in all of us. 

Relinquish the shame that holds us captive. 

We are children loved, cherished, and called by God. We no longer have to measure up or be good enough or feel the need to change who we are to please others. 

For many, I think this type of soul work makes people uncomfortable. In an age where we share any thought... has really become let's talk about everything but the demons that lurk behind the surface of us. 

This journey has made me more empathetic and compassionate especially towards people that I have been difficult to get along with. I envision them as a child at their metaphorical kickball game or living in the household for which they came. What demons have they spent their whole life trying to hide? Maybe they were abused... mistreated... ignored. Maybe they weren't loved and cared for well. 

Maybe they never felt like they were truly human and deserving of love and compensated for it in all the wrong ways. 

Or I think about my mom. My mom's dad died in a tragic car accident when she was five years old. I think of the thousands (a conservative number) of photos and moments that I have had just in the past three years with my daughter. I can't imagine the type of devastation that does to one's soul to lose your father at such a young age. And then the questions and what-ifs you live with for the rest of your life. All the while trying the best you can to raise your family.

So I am trying to do my soul-work. Everyone has a story or stories they could tell that would make all of us cry for one another because we just didn't know. So I am trying to tell myself on this complicated journey called life that I am of worth and value regardless if I am picked first or last on the kickball. And God celebrates me regardless of whether I kick a home run or not.