The Magnetic Poles of Love and Fear

   I know so many people whose very foundation of being in the world is love, people who strive every day to defy the pressure in society to be not love.  No matter how often I contemplate it, I never lose my fascination over how such a simple concept can be so complex and difficult to live out. After all I’ve been through the past few years, how do I find myself, once again, moving closer to this truth about love?  While I dreamed of escape from the misery I lived in, three years ago my faith ran on fumes.

   Three years ago I lived a life of fear. Every day I woke up, went to work, consoled others about their fears, and came home to the embrace of complete terror. My heart and soul was locked into a commitment to be a mother. All around me I saw the puzzle pieces of my life falling into place, showing me that I could have a “normal” life, settle down, be a part of community and family, find meaning in helping my local community, and be happy. Except for one problem. One huge enormous barrier. My own fear.

   Deep within, under the signs of a good life, the fear became a mantra, its own living breathing creature. I am not good enough. I don’t deserve to be happy and loved. I will screw up everything. I could not let go of the belief, irrational as it is, that being able to conceive was the only true sign that I was worthy in the eyes of God. Now to me, God doesn’t sit on a cloud and decide things. But the order within the universe, the structure amongst the chaos, it has meaning for me. And if all the infinite variables leading toward conception merged to create life within me, then somehow, I would be anointed and blessed as whole, good, and worthy. And bypassing that crucial step by adopting or fostering a child, well, then, I would be avoiding the judgment of God. I would be living a lie that I was whole and happy while the conviction that I don’t deserve any of it festered in my heart.

   The fear of not being worthy of love, I see now that it is a common human affliction, one that doesn’t really make anyone special or unique, except in our own minds. But the ghost-like tendrils of doubt and anxiety affected my decisions and choices. I lived in fear of that one moment when the world, through one person, a group, an event, would show that the blanket of love and acceptance I lived under was a lie. Bizarre, strange thoughts limited the choices in my head as my spirit and my fear battled inside me. The battle was gruesome and exhausting. The battle immobilized me from participating in my own life. The need for acceptance conflicted with my fear of being found unworthy. Not unworthy for a simple smile or a laugh, but judged and condemned in an ultimate, uncompromising way.

   The opposite of fear is not fearless. The opposite of love is not hate. Somewhere, somehow, in the chaos of infinite possibilities, exists these poles of love and fear. The lure within the magnetic field of existence, drawing us towards love or towards fear, influence every aspect of our lives.

   Letting go of the dream of conceiving life released me from one of the strongest lures towards fear I’ve ever had. I was stuck in a maze of my own making. As long as I clung to the fear I needed to conceive to be worth something, then I had to find “natural” ways to deal with the stress, anxiety, and depression… as if monkeying with the hormones of a woman is “natural.” Not only did I sacrifice my sanity to the god of artificial hormone drugs, I exposed my deepest vulnerabilities and pain at the same time. Once again, my body became a thing to control, reward and punish. No longer the subject of my own life story, my body became the object I had spent years deconstructing. Years of resisting the messages in society to reduce myself to a thing and all it took was the inability of getting pregnant for me to fall off the wagon. OK, that is a lie. Acute onset hypothyroidism, PCOS, insulin resistance, and chronic pain kinda tipped the scale. With all that happening, how in the world is one supposed to NOT be drawn into the web of fear?!

   The thing is, even with all that fear and doubt, I could never truly convince myself that I had no choices. Even as I lied in bed in a fetal position, unable to move, I wanted to move. I KNEW I could move. Living in constant fear is a path I’ve walked before.  So, I did the work, in fits and starts, two steps forward, ten steps back, 15 steps forward, 8 steps back… until the suffocating quick sand of fear had less pull.

    As I spend more time and energy focusing on love, there is a weight lifted, a gravity released, and a freedom to live fully and wholly. I find myself at times feeling giddy with freedom. It’s not as if the insecurities disappear or the fear vanishes. But the choice, the option to move towards love, becomes easier. As love becomes the driving force behind more and more of my actions, I find myself becoming increasingly bold and prophetic in its witness. It’s not courage or pride bolstering me, but a kind of “Why not? I’ve experienced another piece of hell, been through the fire” and all that.  I tried to mold myself into something I am not; I tried to be something limited and restrained, but that time is done. Now is the time to be bold and to be loud. 

   It’s an interesting place for a trained chaplain to find herself in, being bold and loud. It’s not so much that we are a quiet lot, though some are, but more that we train with intentional focus to mute our “self” in order to hear more clearly the person in front of us. Sometimes there is a misperception that means suppressing our own beliefs. However, if done well, it doesn’t have to be. There was no denying of myself or my beliefs, because the very act of being open and accepting is the heart beat of my faith. I strove to embody my theology every day by working on being open, hospitable, loving, accepting, relational, and compassionate. There was nothing insincere about it. Even in the moments I couldn’t really feel it for myself, I never doubted my love for others. How crazy is that? And somewhere within the practice of loving others, I also helped my own heart, mind, and spirit.   Honestly, that practice, the intentional loving of others, saved me. It was the light that led me through the darkest of nights.

   So, now that I am once again basking in sunlight, something within me is more than ready to voice my experience.  This morning I read a quote on http://www.henrinouwen.org/. Nouwen wrote in Here and Now, “My hope is that the description of God’s love in my life will give you the freedom and courage to discover God’s love in yours.” I’m feeling more ready to proclaim what I know, deep in my bones, to be wrong. I’m ready to try to name what I see as truth and shout it from the mountaintop. My sense of truth isn’t in any way ultimate or universal. But I think there are people out there who may find their truth complements mine and mine theirs. And I will forever be grateful for the light of others who led me through to this place. Love is all you need.