repentance. or something like it.

June 9, 2011 at 11:07 pm (Uncategorized)

My best friend and I used to say to each other all the time, “sometimes the right thing and the hardest thing are the same.”It’s a line from a Fray song (Track 4 off their first album. I forget what it’s called). It was kind of a half serious joke, but true nonetheless.

This is what my year has been about. Some Christians call it pruning. I call it getting my shit together (or becoming undone. Jury’s still out). Or being willing to have other people call me out and actually taking action (or being passive, whatever the situation calls for).

Repentance is a strange thing. In Greek, it literally means “changing your mind.” I’m changing my mind about quite a few things. Sometimes it takes a well timed text message, running into someone that doesn’t recall the best memories, or simply enjoying breakfast at a dingy diner with your best friend and re-thinking your idea of what the “mountaintop” looks like.

Unlike the crazy “Christians” protesting the Glee concert outside of the HP Pavilion (how you can protest great singing, fancy footwork, and dramatic story lines is beyond me… but I digress), I don’t think repentance looks like bright blue sweatshirts and the Romans Road printed out on a small pamphlet with all the crappy clipart. Repentance has to be more than that. It’s taking a stand (albeit a shaky stand, but a stand nonetheless) for what you actually want to live for and not putting up with the bullshit that’s stopped you so many times before.

What did Thomas Merton say? Ah yes. “”If you want to identify me, ask me not where I live, or what I like to eat, or how I comb my hair, but ask me what I am living for, in detail, ask me what I think is keeping me from living fully for the thing I want to live for.”

Today I learned that not settling hurts like hell. It makes you question everything: especially who you really want to be. And wondering if all this work, this effort, this “what the hell am I doing?” is ever going to pay off (much like being a fan of the Oakland Athletics)- or better yet, is striving for this abstract goal without the certainty of “success” worth it? Am I buying into an illusion? What if it’s all an illusion? What if that B- on that paper I sweated, bled, and cried over is indicative of my sure failure as an academic? (Ugh, I really need to get over that.)

Then again, what if its not? What if there’s a community of people that really do care and that my choices not only reflect me, but them? What if forfeiting my right to “privacy” actually… does something transformative? What if this whole G-d nonsense… isn’t nonsense? What if this thorn on my side is not just a thorn for a thorn’s sake, but pointing out to something better? Redeeming? As the great philosopher George Michael once sang, “There’s someone else I got to be” and it’s not who I’ve settled to be for so long.

And in the middle of my doubt, I get this from my mentor/big sister extraordinaire: “Thank you for doing the right thing. No matter how you feel.”

I may be throwing punches under water but I’m starting to think this is what hope looks like.

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2 Comments

bridget said,

June 9, 2011 at 11:13 pm

love it. love you.

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elba said,

June 9, 2011 at 11:23 pm

and I you. so much.

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Grace, Peace, and Other Thoughts