strength, redefined.

I was talking with a friend/mentor of mine about strength last week. She is a very intelligent, perceptive, and wise woman, and she was discussing the relationship between strength and rest...more specifically, that strength comes from rest. Like this:

REST ------>>> STRENGTH

There are all of these examples in scripture of this connection between strength and rest, like the way that Jesus went away to rest and seek solitude before he had to be strong before the multitudes. Anyhow, we talked about how much our culture twists this relationship between strength and rest. Our culture tells us that if we need rest, then we are weak. It tells us that activity, accomplishment, busyness, perfectionism, and stoicism equals and breeds strength. But really, all of this stuff depletes us. It makes us frazzled, fragmented, and exhausted.

I was thinking a lot about this today because of something that happened last night. I've mentioned before that I've been involved with a ministry called Celebrate Recovery over the past year. Last fall I started an intensive study that guided me and a group of other ladies through the twelve steps of recovery. It's been a season of breaking down the blinders of denial, doing an inventory of my relationship with God, with myself, and with others, and of learning how to surrender my life to God and to really, really trust Him. Anyhow, last night was our night to celebrate the progress we have made and to give Him praise for the victories we have experienced. We all sat around a big table and ate together and shared our stories.

I wrote over three-pages, single spaced, to share with our group, and about half-way into the first paragraph, I started to cry. I am a crier, a big crier, and once I start, it's hard for me to stop. I thought I was doomed when the tears started coming so early into my story. I'll never get through this, I thought.

But I did...eventually. I had to stop to blow my nose a few times and I felt horribly self-consious. I was a blubbering, shaking mess by the end, but I got every word out. I gave it all that I had; I held nothing back. I hoped that my words might touch the other women in my group and give praise to Jesus, the ultimate Author of it all. It was a powerful night and I felt pretty proud of how much our group has grown and learned over the past year.

This morning, however, something very typical happened. I woke up feeling horrible. The feeling is familiar...a tinge of nausea combined with a lurking sense of shame. I felt embarrassed and stupid about how emotional I had gotten. I wondered, why can't I be one of those women who can speak the words without my voice quivering, without tears blurring my vision, and without my hands shaking as I clench the words on the page? Why must I be so...so...emotional? (I'm slowly and stubbornly learning to accept that maybe God just made me this way and I need to stop comparing myself to people who can speak in public without losing total composure.)

Anyhow, I say all of this because I think I'm realizing that maybe my embarrassment over my vulnerable, emotional display last night is that our culture tells us that this type of behavior is weak. In the same way it tells us that rest is weak, it also tells us that tearful displays of emotion are weak. It tells us to stay locked up inside, to not show our hearts, to protect ourselves, and to keep it all together.

Over the years, I've learned that sharing our stories with one another takes courage. It takes courage to be vulnerable. It takes courage to struggle. It takes courage to fight against resistance, and it takes courage to open yourself up to change, to share your brokenness and neediness.

So, all of this is to say that our culture has got it all backwards. These hard, stoic images that we somehow get in our heads of what it means to be strong are false illusions. Practicing rest gives us strength. This is where we can refuel and listen to God and to ourselves. And then, from that rest, we can go out and struggle hard and boldly share our broken lives with one another--we can share our stories--we can share all that we've heard in our moments of rest.

Throughout my MFA program, this question is commonly asked:

What makes a piece of writing good?

The answer is usually unanimous:

A good piece of writing evokes an emotional response from the reader/hearer.

So, I guess I needed to write this for myself, to remind myself of what strength is, where it comes from, and that it usually doesn't show up in the way I think it should. Perhaps my level of emotion last night doesn't mean that I'm a weak, histrionic basket-case. Perhaps it means that God is writing a pretty incredible story for me as I yield my life to Him...and He is teaching me to share it...tears, quivers, shakes, and all.