What You Say

I’m sitting in a coffee shop and overhear a conversation next to me. I heard the words “homeless” and “poor” so I decided to listen in a little bit. What I heard encouraged me and dismayed me.

In a nutshell, the conversation was a man explaining to his friends how he likes to spend his time sitting with the homeless and bringing them food. He then told his friends, “The homeless are my Africa, because they’re just as poor.”

This stirs up a few feelings in me. Part of me applauds the man and I’m thankful for his desire to meet real and tangible needs. I’m easily overwhelmed by that need and find myself paralyzed into inaction. This man is doing a good work that is much needed and I’m grateful he has accepted such a challenge.

But a different part of me is frustrated by his statement. No doubt he truly means it; but to compare America’s poor and homeless to the situations of people living in Africa is just painful. (Side note: the decor in this coffee shop is pictures of Kenyan orphans. I’m just sayin’.) By no means am I an expert in American homelessness or in African life. But I do know this: American poor can find clean water. American poor can get help from the government (though it is woefully inadequate). There is help available for the American homeless, even if it is insufficient.

I don’t intend to ride a high horse in this case; I don’t pretend to be deeply involved in EITHER situation.

What frustrates me is that this man has created an unfair comparison in his head and is sharing it with his friends. I doubt that he has created this statement “The homeless are my Africa, because they’re just as poor” in order to impress people or validate what he does. It is just a simple, catchy phrase I expect he has used before and is now comfortable with. But it makes me sad that we NEED to compare; I’m dismayed at how easily we put things beside each other for the sake of simplicity. Why justify your passion for the homeless by comparing it to another need that is NOT comparable?

I guess what this raises for me are the questions, “What are my ‘sayings’ that I haven’t really thought through? How am I being careless with my words?”

Be careful what you say.

Exhaustion and Joy

A few days ago, I was with a close friend and we were discussing the seasons coming for both of us. His past year has been one of diligence and patience; he has worked hard and in six months this period will be over. Not only will that season come to a close, but the fruit of that work will be present; and I anticipate that his work will produce much of it.

He characterized the past year as a time of “deep exhaustion and deep joy.” I found that pairing to be beautiful, poetic and true. How often are exhaustion and joy partnered together?

It reminded me of a three month stretch in 2006 when I was unemployed. I was living on a friend’s couch in San Clemente, a five-minute walk to the beach. Every day I slept in, watched a little SportsCenter and then went body surfing. I’d work on my tan and then head out for some afternoon Starbucks and reading. When I tell people how I spent that summer, they are envious. It just seems so relaxing to them…no responsibilities, no schedule…it seems so restful.

So why does my stomach drop whenever I talk about those three months?

I think it’s because I had no joy. There really wasn’t much to my life in that season.

Vacation is only restful because it is a pause, a respite from the ordinary. The first two weeks of my couch-surfing were enjoyable until they became my daily reality; after that I just felt aimless and unfulfilled.

I don’t believe that we are to work ourselves to the point of collapse, but I do believe that there is something to be said for the connection between joy and participating in life. Perhaps the lesson is this: our goal should not be to have fuller schedules leading to exhaustion. I’m not sure there’s joy to be found in being busy. Rather, caring deeply, working passionately and being devoted to our commitments will lead to joy. My friend is exhausted because he participates in things that have meaning and purpose, not just fluff that packs his schedule. He is exhausted because he has poured his heart into life, and that has led to joy.

Go and do the same.

Self-Checkout

You know those self-checkout stands at the supermarket, where you scan and bag your own items? I used to think that they were all about convenience, but now I’ve decided that they’re more about how insecure and self-conscious we are.

I realized that this morning when I didn’t put on deodorant.

Stick with me on this.

I didn’t have any this morning but didn’t realize it until after I’d showered. So I got dressed and headed to the closest Safeway. I snagged deodorant and walked towards the self-checkout and then pondered why I went there instead of a regular check stand.

I went there because I was fearful that somehow, the checker would see my lone purchase and intuit that I had foolishly forgotten deodorant that day and now I smelled obscenely like a pig farmer or some other foul-smelling individual.

Of course, I KNEW that the checker probably wouldn’t jump to that conclusion, and even if they did, so what? What do I care what a checker thinks about me (especially when what they think would have been TRUE)? Yet there I went, towards the self-scan machine in order to avoid a Safeway employee judging me.

Maybe those self-scan machines are more about hiding the pseudo-embarrassing things we buy and preventing a stranger from getting a look into the intricacies of our private lives. So what if the checker knows you like nacho cheese a little too much, or that you’re buying donuts paired with diet Coke, or that you have problems with foot odor…does it really matter? I think we need to learn how to be okay with who and what we are. After all, you have two options in regards to those embarrassing items: you can quit buying the cheese in a can if it embarrasses you so much or you can embrace the reality of who you are and confess your love of terrible food and admit to having smelly armpits.

The Difficulty With Advent

Sometimes it feels like I have a mild form of split-personality disorder. There’s Past Brendan, who is usually blamed for all my problems; Present Brendan, who makes all the sacrifices; and finally Future Brendan, who is probably going to be perfectly complete and have his life together.

I tend to live for the future, making compromises now that will benefit me in the time to come (For example, years and years of grad school so that Future Brendan can put fun letters after his name or paying lots of money now to own a house that will hopefully be worth more money someday). Consequently, I have a hard time living in the present; rather, I spend a great deal of time focusing on whatever comes next, whether that’s tomorrow, next month or a year from now.

Because of my inability to live in the present, Advent is hard for me. The difficulty with Advent (Hey, that’s the title of this blog! What an odd coincidence…) is that it is a time of year when I am supposed to live primarily in the present. I’m intended to sit in the “now” as I await an impending “then.” I find this challenging in general as I usually live for the future but it gets even more complicated; the “then” is ALSO vitally important. The essence of living in the now of Advent is that it is a four week long season of anticipation. Rob Bell calls Advent “The moment before the Moment” and that’s the difficulty. How on earth do I celebrate and exist fully in the present when my present is celebrating a future event? Advent is supposed to be different than the rest of the year, but it seems to me that ends up being more of the same; I live for Christmas day.

But there is a lesson in Advent and I think it is actually more applicable to the other 11 months. The future event has value and may be my main focus; yet, there is growth in the anticipation of that coming. In regards to school, I’m learning and developing along the way, not just waiting for a piece of paper to put on the wall. That house I’m using as an investment has proven to be a place for me to host, provide a home for people without one and give my community somewhere to draw deeper in relationship with each other.

Perhaps the anticipation of a future event is what gives the immediate its value; knowing that the future has something coming creates opportunities for me in the present.

So Future Brendan, say thanks to Present Brendan; not only is he working hard now to make your life easier, he’s becoming a better person now so that you can creep closer to being perfected.

Managing Disappointment Part Two

If you haven’t read Managing Disappointment Part One, go back and read it, because really, this post is dependent upon that one.

Two weeks after I made that painful phone call, I received one eerily similar.

On short notice, I’d arranged for those students to spend the week serving on a Native American Reservation. We had spent time there before and I knew that this was a good option for us, and I was extremely fortunate to discover they were available to host us.

But, as life would have it, 48 hours before leaving for the trip, I was on the receiving end of disappointment. The Reservation had a staffing issue and was no longer able to host us.

The resemblance between these two phone calls was not lost on me; in one case, I had to disappoint people I cared about and in the other, I needed to be gracious with those disappointing me.

A month later, I suppose what I’ve learned is a sort of grace. I’ve seen a glimmer of the idea that when people fail me, they likely do it with heavy hearts. I’m discovering that it’s no easier to be on either end of that phone call…both sides stink. But that means we must maintain our focus on being in gracious relationship with one another; even when it feels like I’m getting the short end of the stick, I have a part to play in managing both my disappointment and theirs.

Worthy of Delight

Last week, I started training for a half marathon. I found running partners, created a workout schedule, I even created an account on mapmyrun.com.

I hate running. Of all forms of physical exercise, it’s probably the one I hate the most. I would even say I loathe it. I have to get up earlier to run, drink more water (and therefore less coffee), and plan parts of my life around making sure I have hours each week to devote to running. This is stupid.

So why am I running?

Three weeks ago I was sitting in a local park and a boy about five years old ran past me. He was going top speed, arms and legs pumping in that cute uncontrollable manner of a child putting his all into what he was doing. Of course, he wasn’t going very fast (he’s barely over three feet tall) but he poured his whole heart into sprinting past me. And you know what? He had a smile that covered his entire face. I watched him, and he wasn’t racing towards anything in particular. He was just overcome with joy at the running, with passion for testing the limits of his five-year-old body. He was happy because he was discovering what he is capable of, and that was worthy of delight.

I’m running because I want to capture the feeling I saw in that boy. I want to learn how to rejoice in having ability; I want to test my boundaries and find that worthy of delight.

Choose Someone

A week ago I took some of my students to an elderly care facility where most of the residents are wheelchair-bound. It’s a disheartening place to see; it’s a visible, physical manifestation of human frailty and it makes me anxious/resentful that such a life is what waits for me years from now.

But there was an unexpected learning for me last Wednesday.

When we arrived, many of the residents were about to do a group activity. We were told to make ourselves at home and find an open chair. I walked over to a 99-year-old woman named Dorothy. When I sat down, she smiled at me so I took her hand in mine. Then she said to me, “Out of the whole world, you chose me.”

The depth of this statement struck me. At first, I thought she was less than lucid, but after speaking with her for a few minutes I discovered that Dorothy was totally coherent; she meant what she had said to me. She really did believe that I chose to sit next to her, and she was touched by my decision.

So, today, choose someone. Whatever it means for you, be intentional and choose to be present with someone…and make sure they know that you picked them.