Love Letter(s) to the World

Beloved,

There are times I wish that I didn't love so much.  There are times I wish it were easier to separate myself from the joy, hurt, heartbreak, fear, hope.  Yes, there are many times I am grumpy, unapproachable, and rude.  There are times when I do not want to interact with other humans, regardless of how joyous they are.  But mostly, I just love ya.  All o' ya.  

When I look at you, I see daughters, sons, cousins, parents, friends, aunts, godparents, godchildren, dog-moms and cat-dads, widows, and siblings.  

I see creators, thinkers, adventurers, teachers, artists, writers, singers, builders, and discoverers.  

I see no two alike.  

I see beauty in the blue eyes, the brown eyes, the green eyes, the grey eyes, and intelligence there, too.  

I see eyes that have seen nothing, for they are new.  I see faces that have seen much, for they are old--some in years, and some in life experiences.  There is beauty in both the hope in newness, and the careful skepticism in experience.  

There is beauty here, and there is much pain.  

I see the lines in faces of fights between friends or lovers, between parents and children.  I see lines in faces from a long weary road of hardships: suffering, trials, failures, and perseverance.  

I see clouded eyes from long days in the sun, or long hours of working for sustenance.  I see clear eyes, bright with the hopes of academia and a future full of promise.  

I see hands calloused from years of manual labor, speckled by the sun.  I see knobby, arthritic hands, that still strive to complete blankets, scarves, and hats for those in need.  I see baby soft hands, searching, learning, exploring the world which is still new and beautiful.

Every line in every face is beautiful.  Every line, every eye, every hand tells a story.  A story of who you are, where you've been, what you've done, how you've seen, what you know, and for what you still search.

Yes, a line is a symbol of a struggle, a trial, a pain.  But it is also a remembrance that you've come through it.  Some tattoo these remembrances on their bodies: a symbol of a past period of their life through which they've come.  But some trials are undeniably written on your body with an ink no laser will remove.  And it is beautiful, even if it is also painful.

It has taken me time to understand that paradox: beauty from pain.  I do not think one necessitates the other.  There is beauty in something brand new, that has not yet experienced failure.  There is also beauty in the face of someone who has lived through a great trial: a world war, persecution, starvation, illness, or broken relationships.  

I look at you, and I see myself.  I see things we struggle with together.  I see the things I will never understand, or that you will never understand in me.  

But most of all, I see hope.  Or more precisely, I see you through hope.  This is different than "rose-colored glasses."  I am frightfully aware of how much imperfection is in this world.  I choose to hope in spite of it.  It is because of this lens that I know there is beauty here: in pain, in trial, in success, and in ordinary life.  It is because of this lens that I have perseverance for tomorrow, despite how dark it looks out my window.  It is because of hope that I know, in my deepest heart, that it will be okay.  You.  We.  We will be okay.  And we are beautiful.

Love,

   Annaliese

. . . 

Beloved,

I would be remiss if I were to leave the letter above standing alone.

My hope in you, in us, does not stem from some whimsy, some ephemeral desire of things being better in the future.  No.  My hope is rooted, rather unshakably, in a bigger picture.  One in which there is Right, there is Perfection, and there is Hope that we can find it all.  

Why do I understand this to be true?  If I can quickly lay out my understandings, I will try:

  1. I believe in a perfect God, who is the epitome of good, love, justice.  Who is eternal, and all powerful.

  2.  I believe that #1 has allowed His character to be accurately portrayed in the Bible.

  3.  I believe the new testament's statement that the only way to perfection is through belief that Jesus has the power to wipe the record clean of my shortcomings.  

From this standpoint, I see a hope for the future.  I see hope for erasure of the pain in this world.  I see hope for an eventual understanding of why we all have lines on our faces and callouses on our hands.  From this standpoint, I see the pain as a sharpening, a refining process for myself--and I hope it is such for you.  

Am I not a wiser person for having experienced the cocktail of trials and successes in my life?  Are you not a more beautiful person for having triumphed through that decade of fear and self loathing?  Without a gauge, for me I cannot compare who I was prior, to who I am now.  

For me--and I recognize it is not so for all--I require this measuring stick.  For what am I hoping?  Something I have accomplished?  Something I have seen you accomplish?  No.  I hope for it all.  My eyes are open, I see the hurt and the mistakes--yes.  I have made them, Lord, I have made them--I see the world for what it is.  

But because of this lens, because of a hope for things not yet seen, I see beauty in it all.  For in everything, there is hope of achieving that for which you strive. (1) 

Because of this hope, I will never give up on loving you.  On telling you you're beautiful.  Ever.

Love,

   Annaliese

(1) Much of this is spurred by Romans 8, but that is not the only place in the Bible that speaks of this stuff.

The Power in Vulnerability

Clearly, as is evidenced by my recent blog topics, I've been dealing with some heavy-hearted stuff lately.  Family health, personal growth, personal trials, and heartbreak make for deep, occasionally dark, posts.  Hate to do it to you again, but here's another one.

Laying your inner self open for the eyes of another is terrifying.  I've discussed this ad nauseam, I'm afraid.  However, just as your inner self is a complicated thing, so is the topic of vulnerability.

Dictionary.com defines vulnerability as such:

In some discussions (relationships in particular) vulnerability is regarded as a positive thing: it means you trust the other person enough to be open, honest, and true to yourself.  But, it makes me feel a little justified in being fearful, when I look at definition 1.  Capable of or susceptible to being wounded or hurt, as by a weapon.  AND definition 2.  Open to moral attack, criticism, temptation, etc.  AND definition 3, even if it is discussing a building and not a person.  Open to assault, difficult to defend. 

None of these things particularly inspire me to become vulnerable...at all.  Self preservation is a very strong instinct across the entire animal kingdom:  we encounter this daily.  Physical exercise, sports, martial arts, the military, education, seat-belts in vehicles...all these things encourage us to be knowledgeable and physically able to preserve ourselves.  But then, in relationships, you are taught to do an about face:  let that person in, let them see the real you that you hide behind those walls.  For some, this is easier than others.  Some individuals do not have walls, they are fully themselves all the time, open to whatever life throws their way.  This works out well for some, and for some it yields lots of scars.  Some individuals have a maze inside, only the most determined can find the heart: this protects from lots of scars, but it also causes them to "miss out."  (On what, sometimes I am not sure.)

However, I have experienced another side of this dilemma: when you are presented with vulnerability by another.  When someone lays themselves bare before you, trusting you completely.  Being presented with this is often more frightening to me than becoming vulnerable myself.  This gives you great power.  Great.  Power.  Here, that overused Spiderman quote comes unbidden into my mind: "With great power comes great responsibility."  It rings true (as it always does).  When you are presented with this gift of a person's heart laid bare in their hands, you have been presented with a huge responsibility.  

"My dove in the clefts of the rock, in the hiding places on the mountainside, show me your face, let me hear your voice; for your voice is sweet, and your face is lovely." Song of Songs 2:14

Your heart, tender like a bird, is given to me with open hands, brought out from your hiding places among the rocks.  Hollow bones, fragile feathers, tiny feet: these deserve to be treated with gentle, compassionate hands.  

My hands sometimes are not gentle.  

One wrong move, the dove might lose a feather.  Not a huge deal.  Keep making mistakes though, and I can crush bone.  This, this is great power.  A power I do not relish.  A power I never wish to use for a strategic advantage, a power which I hesitate to accept at all.  Being vulnerable, myself, is one thing.  Accepting the vulnerability of another is entirely another.  A thing that frightens me to the point of freezing.  I have loved and I have severely hurt.  And while I do not run from the first, I am terrified of experiencing the second, ever again.  

Some tell me that I cannot hold the blame for that kind of hurt.  It's not my fault.  I hear those words, and I think they are somehow true, but it does not change the fact that it was my hands that broke that bird.  It does not change the fact that I--we all--have that capability to crush hearts when presented with vulnerability.  Is that the price of mutual openness?  I give you my heart, you give me yours, let's hope I don't squeeze it to death?  Maybe my opinion would be different, if I had my heart broken.  My track record, though, I'm the one who does the breaking.  This.  This gives me pause.  This arrests my step forward.  It is not that I lack the courage to jump: it is that I am afraid to catch another.  Afraid to bungle it, again.  

"Above all else, guard your heart, for it is the wellspring of life." Proverbs 4:23

I suppose, though, you cannot refuse a gift.  Which, really, is how this kind of thing is presented.  You cannot force vulnerability.  You are presented with it, once you are trusted.  I suppose the giver knows you are imperfect, bound to bungle something, someday.  I suppose that is part of the weighing process:  do I roll over?  Do I trust that this person will respect, edify, challenge, protect, and love me?  Do I believe they will do their best to tread carefully, carrying this precious gift?  Yes?  

This is where trust, the trust I've spoken of before, comes in.  I have a perfect example to follow.  1 John, too long to quote here, lays this out quite clearly.  Lord help me emulate that perfect love.

"...And so we know and rely on the love God has for us.  God is love.  Whoever lives in love lives in God, and God in him.  In this way, love is made complete among us so that we will have confidence on the day of judgment, because in this world we are like him.  There is no fear in love.  But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment.  The one who fears is not made perfect in love.  We love because he first loved us." 1 John 4:16-19

Vulnerablility

I am the strong one.

That is a self-imposed title.  But if I look at my life, look at those I know and love, everyone else has something bigger going on than I do.  I'm not going to air laundry here, but that's just how it is.

Well, until this big thing happened in my own life.  But I've spent a while making myself be strong for everyone else, being the one who has it together so that if someone needs to talk to me, they can without fear of my interjections with my own sagas.  I've spent long enough that sometimes I'm not sure I know how to be broken anymore...I'm not sure I know how to let myself...be vulnerable.

Don't misunderstand, I haven't been burned by someone, well, ever.  Maybe once, but that blame isn't totally on the other party.  To be honest, I've probably done my share of the burning; I think my mission to be "strong" became a spirit of "I don't need anyone," somewhere along the line.
Pro-tip: those two are not the same.  They can sometimes feel the same, when you're the one emoting, but...I can bet they don't feel the same to everyone else.

So now here I am.  Broken, tired, and weak.  But the wrinkle is that currently, it's the inner layer that's broken.  Like a burned-out light bulb: you look at it, you shake it and you can hear the burnt filament, but the outer glass is fine.  A cursory glance probably won't tell you it's broken.

In my heart of hearts, I know I need to be totally broken to be rebuilt.  Yes, I get it.  Break me down to the raw building blocks, then put me back together.  But I've spent so long willing my blocks together, they are not falling down easily.  They haven't fallen down yet, not all of them, anyway.  I know how,  I guess.  The very thing (me) holding myself together is the thing that needs to let me go.
Ever tried that?  I've got news for you if you haven't: it ain't easy.  It's not fun.  It takes a whole lot of courage to go toddler-mode and knock those blocks down.  And frankly, I'm not feeling very child-like.

But as for me, I am poor and needy;
    may the Lord think of me.
You are my help and my deliverer;
   you are my God, do not delay.