During the summer following my high school graduation, I listened to "Resistor" by Brave Saint Saturn a lot. At the time, I had super low self-esteem and was suffering from depression (unbeknownst to me). So I thought the song was about comforting someone who thought she was worthless. But I listened to the song again last night for the first time in who knows how long--and this time, I thought the song was about a stubborn person with the sub-text that this person was struggling and refusing to ask for help. I think I have become much more rigid and stubborn in what I believe, especially in relation to the church, so this time, the song's character's stubbornness stuck out to me.
The interesting thing is that both motifs are indeed present in the song. I completely missed the stubbornness motif when I was 18, but that was the first thing I picked up on last night. It's odd to see that the context of my life has framed which lines of the song stuck out to me.
Thursday, January 14, 2016
It doesn't go away
"Well, you can never get rid of your anxiety; but the trick is learning skills to cope with it," Dr. Ono told me. My heart sank.
This was August 2012, a month and a half after I had been diagnosed with OCD and depression, and four months after my last serious suicide incident. Since pursuing treatment, I had acquired a new hope that I would be able to be free of my crippling anxiety. But Dr. Ono's statement was hard for me to hear. I heard that I would have to keep fighting off my crushing thoughts for the rest of my life, and I was not prepared for that.
Since then, I've experienced what learning to cope with it looks like. But what I did not expect was how long it takes to process certain experiences.
To this day, almost four years after the fact, I am still processing the events that happened when I was pledging. I am still processing what happened my first active semester. Triggering memories resurface at random times, and every time, I have to convince myself that these memories really happened to me. This is no different from weeks or months after the actual events; the events seemed surreal then too. I still have not claimed these memories as part of my history. On the one hand, that is good, because that means that these incredulously negative events do not define me. But on the other hand, not owning these memories cuts out a chunk of my existence and denies what has shaped me into who I am. When I think of positive experiences that happened around the same time, it becomes a challenge to contextualize them and to remember that they coexisted with the negative experiences.
Maybe Dr. Ono's statement "You can never get rid of your anxiety" also means that you cannot escape the negative feelings that come with memories tied to anxiety. Maybe certain experiences are so traumatic that they can never be fully processed and internalized.
This was August 2012, a month and a half after I had been diagnosed with OCD and depression, and four months after my last serious suicide incident. Since pursuing treatment, I had acquired a new hope that I would be able to be free of my crippling anxiety. But Dr. Ono's statement was hard for me to hear. I heard that I would have to keep fighting off my crushing thoughts for the rest of my life, and I was not prepared for that.
Since then, I've experienced what learning to cope with it looks like. But what I did not expect was how long it takes to process certain experiences.
To this day, almost four years after the fact, I am still processing the events that happened when I was pledging. I am still processing what happened my first active semester. Triggering memories resurface at random times, and every time, I have to convince myself that these memories really happened to me. This is no different from weeks or months after the actual events; the events seemed surreal then too. I still have not claimed these memories as part of my history. On the one hand, that is good, because that means that these incredulously negative events do not define me. But on the other hand, not owning these memories cuts out a chunk of my existence and denies what has shaped me into who I am. When I think of positive experiences that happened around the same time, it becomes a challenge to contextualize them and to remember that they coexisted with the negative experiences.
Maybe Dr. Ono's statement "You can never get rid of your anxiety" also means that you cannot escape the negative feelings that come with memories tied to anxiety. Maybe certain experiences are so traumatic that they can never be fully processed and internalized.
Doing Christian ministry right
My involvement with First Presbyterian Church of Berkeley opened my eyes to the way that ministry should be done. During my freshman year of college, the church had an intern named CJ; and for my first three years of college, Nick was the college pastor for the church. These two nailed it.
What did CJ do right? He made an effort to build and maintain a relationship. He regularly contacted me (every two weeks or so) to schedule a time to meet up and chat. At first, I came from the cynical perspective that "this is just his job; he has to hang out with me," but he could have met with me as infrequently as once a month. Instead, he chose to meet with me every two weeks or so. He legitimately cared.
CJ also was available in times of crisis. He heard me out and acknowledged me when I described my horrid pledging experiences. In one particularly overwhelming week, he picked me up at about 10 PM, we drove to the Jack in the Box drive through, and he just let me talk about what was going on while driving around and snacking. He let me sit in his parked car with him and weep as the rain fell against the car roof. He didn't try to offer me advice or comfort; his mere presence was all that was needed, and he knew that.
But CJ also set up personal boundaries. His life was not just this internship; he did a lot outside of his job. I had another crisis moment once while he was tied up at a social gathering. He was unable to help me in that moment, but he asked me to write down and send him what I was thinking. He cared, but he still took time for himself.
What did Nick do right? He did not shy away from uncomfortable situations. He allowed his students space to think and believe freely, and he coached and guided us along the way. He never pressured us into any particular set of beliefs, and regularly admitted when he was conflicted about something. I remember him explicitly telling me that he didn't know what he believed about same-sex relationships, so there was no pressure for me to conform to any ideology. He was great at asking questions that worked toward getting students to think and to come to their own conclusions.
Nick too, like CJ, was available in times of crisis. After FoCUS one evening, I was conflicted about pursuing a relationship. I asked to talk to him; as the rest of FoCUS was hanging out, he and I sat on a pew as I came out to him. He sat, listened, and offered positive feedback. A month later or so, when I wanted to kill myself at 2 AM, I called him. He was not awake, of course, but he followed up the next day. And the next day. And throughout the week. He encouraged me to tell my parents about the issue; he set me up with the church counselor; and he followed up weeks afterward.
These are prime examples of how Christian ministry should be done. My involvement with these two people was much more fulfilling and beneficial for my faith than any other church authority figures I had encountered in the previous 18 years of my life.
What did CJ do right? He made an effort to build and maintain a relationship. He regularly contacted me (every two weeks or so) to schedule a time to meet up and chat. At first, I came from the cynical perspective that "this is just his job; he has to hang out with me," but he could have met with me as infrequently as once a month. Instead, he chose to meet with me every two weeks or so. He legitimately cared.
CJ also was available in times of crisis. He heard me out and acknowledged me when I described my horrid pledging experiences. In one particularly overwhelming week, he picked me up at about 10 PM, we drove to the Jack in the Box drive through, and he just let me talk about what was going on while driving around and snacking. He let me sit in his parked car with him and weep as the rain fell against the car roof. He didn't try to offer me advice or comfort; his mere presence was all that was needed, and he knew that.
But CJ also set up personal boundaries. His life was not just this internship; he did a lot outside of his job. I had another crisis moment once while he was tied up at a social gathering. He was unable to help me in that moment, but he asked me to write down and send him what I was thinking. He cared, but he still took time for himself.
What did Nick do right? He did not shy away from uncomfortable situations. He allowed his students space to think and believe freely, and he coached and guided us along the way. He never pressured us into any particular set of beliefs, and regularly admitted when he was conflicted about something. I remember him explicitly telling me that he didn't know what he believed about same-sex relationships, so there was no pressure for me to conform to any ideology. He was great at asking questions that worked toward getting students to think and to come to their own conclusions.
Nick too, like CJ, was available in times of crisis. After FoCUS one evening, I was conflicted about pursuing a relationship. I asked to talk to him; as the rest of FoCUS was hanging out, he and I sat on a pew as I came out to him. He sat, listened, and offered positive feedback. A month later or so, when I wanted to kill myself at 2 AM, I called him. He was not awake, of course, but he followed up the next day. And the next day. And throughout the week. He encouraged me to tell my parents about the issue; he set me up with the church counselor; and he followed up weeks afterward.
These are prime examples of how Christian ministry should be done. My involvement with these two people was much more fulfilling and beneficial for my faith than any other church authority figures I had encountered in the previous 18 years of my life.
Tuesday, January 12, 2016
The remnants of a truss bridge
Today I biked 13.1 miles, the distance of a half marathon. I went from my apartment to the end of the Bay Bridge Trail--the trail that borders the new eastern span of the Bay Bridge and is expected to be extended all the way to Yerba Buena Island by this summer.
To the south of the Bay Bridge Trail are the remnants of the old Bay Bridge. The steel double-decker truss bridge that was built in the 1930's. The bridge that had a portion collapse during the 1989 Loma Prieta Quake, prompting discussions of constructing a new eastern span. As soon as the new eastern span opened up, the old span suddenly looked so shoddy and lifeless. The harsh steel-and-bolt exterior illuminated with orange lamps could not aesthetically compare to the white, LED-lit, wide-lane, sleek new span.
Work quickly began to take down the old span, which was not only an eyesore, but also a possible seismic hazard. A couple months ago, stories circulated in the news that the remaining portions of the old bridge structure would be imploded all at once. And yet, it is still here as an incompletely dismantled piece of infrastructure.
Rumor has it that demolition stopped because an endangered species of bird was found nesting in the bridge. Environmentalist groups shut down the bridge demolition to preserve these birds.
We successfully lobby for endangered species to remain in dangerous public structures. Yet we have no problem proposing or passing legislation that prevents people from sitting or laying down on sidewalks (purposely designed to implicitly target the homeless). We have no problem kicking people out of vacant lots where they have been living to make way for new buildings of $2,000/month apartments. [I had originally written "kicking the homeless out," but then I realized that calling them "the homeless" pejoratively presents them as "others"--similar to when pastors call them "the gays." They are people just like us.] We allow the most vulnerable animal species to continue living in spaces that halt development, yet we force our most vulnerable neighbors out of whatever place they have made their home.
This practice of evicting the homeless could maybe be acceptable if alternate living locations were provided, but this is not the case. We force them out, and they are on their own.
Somehow I feel like the priorities are messed up. If we can protect endangered species, why can we not also protect our own most vulnerable?
To the south of the Bay Bridge Trail are the remnants of the old Bay Bridge. The steel double-decker truss bridge that was built in the 1930's. The bridge that had a portion collapse during the 1989 Loma Prieta Quake, prompting discussions of constructing a new eastern span. As soon as the new eastern span opened up, the old span suddenly looked so shoddy and lifeless. The harsh steel-and-bolt exterior illuminated with orange lamps could not aesthetically compare to the white, LED-lit, wide-lane, sleek new span.
Work quickly began to take down the old span, which was not only an eyesore, but also a possible seismic hazard. A couple months ago, stories circulated in the news that the remaining portions of the old bridge structure would be imploded all at once. And yet, it is still here as an incompletely dismantled piece of infrastructure.
Rumor has it that demolition stopped because an endangered species of bird was found nesting in the bridge. Environmentalist groups shut down the bridge demolition to preserve these birds.
We successfully lobby for endangered species to remain in dangerous public structures. Yet we have no problem proposing or passing legislation that prevents people from sitting or laying down on sidewalks (purposely designed to implicitly target the homeless). We have no problem kicking people out of vacant lots where they have been living to make way for new buildings of $2,000/month apartments. [I had originally written "kicking the homeless out," but then I realized that calling them "the homeless" pejoratively presents them as "others"--similar to when pastors call them "the gays." They are people just like us.] We allow the most vulnerable animal species to continue living in spaces that halt development, yet we force our most vulnerable neighbors out of whatever place they have made their home.
This practice of evicting the homeless could maybe be acceptable if alternate living locations were provided, but this is not the case. We force them out, and they are on their own.
Somehow I feel like the priorities are messed up. If we can protect endangered species, why can we not also protect our own most vulnerable?
Wednesday, January 6, 2016
A very limited revisiting of SBC
I spent all four of my high school summers volunteering at Sequoia Brigade Camp, the camping spin-off of Christian Service Brigade, with which I had been heavily involved since first grade. I volunteered as a junior counselor, giving up 3 1/2 weeks of my summer each year. It was a great experience. I made great friends, great memories, and great laughs; and SBC, probably more than anything else, was where I learned patience, teamwork, and peer leadership through trial by fire.
We had campfire each night, which always followed a very strict formula (Warm-up, then Fun Songs, then Skit, then Transition Songs, then Testimony, then Slow Songs, then Story, then Closing, and ending with "I Have Decided to Follow Jesus"). The next morning at Leader's Huddle (which started at 6:15 in the morning every day--yikes!), we would always go through a campfire evaluation of the night before. And damn, we ripped on each other. I got critiqued one time for slipping my hands into my pockets during Transition Songs. People got critiqued for not starting on a good pitch. People got critiqued for not having prominent enough hand motions. People got critiqued for being too energetic, or not energetic enough. People got critiqued for not announcing songs exactly as "Song Number, Song Name, Song Number again." People got critiqued for calling a section "Fun Songs," "Transition Songs," or "Slow Songs" (as if those titles were supposed to be kept secret from the campers). If you think you gave a flawless campfire song leading performance, you were wrong--someone could always find something wrong with it. And the standard was never consistent--I saw some errors get repeated that would not get critiqued (e.g. the hands in the pockets thing), or Bob, the camp director, would praise someone's performance even though they had made the same errors as someone else that had been pointed out a previous night. The absolute nit-pickiness, combined with the inconsistency of standards, drove me mad.
I have a memory during either my third or fourth year where I was being evaluated after leading transition songs the night before. Someone commented, "I seem to recall Max not being very good at song-leading his first year, so watching your improvement has been really cool to see." Indignantly, I responded with, "No, I was good my first year," at which almost everyone laughed. That upset me. Because I was good my first year! I was not going to allow my past to be disparaged like that. And apparently, no one else seemed to believe me.
My fourth year, I was a senior counselor. So for one of the weeks, I led my own post. It was a great experience being entrusted with that kind of leadership and the creative freedom to choose how I wanted to run my post. This also meant that I led Bible Exploration with my campers. If I could go back and do it differently, I absolutely would. Bible Ex was for about 90 minutes each morning after breakfast, and I was determined to get through every question, even if my campers were obviously bored and had lost interest. Six months later or so, I watched my older brother lead Bible Ex at Junior Leadership Conference, a CSB event. As a squad, we typically only answered a couple of questions before calling it quits, because my brother thought that we had had a good discussion up until that point. If I could go back and approach Bible Ex in this manner, I absolutely would. I would stop when it was clear that interest had died down, and I would allow tangents if it promoted good discussion. Instead, I forced my campers to answer all the questions in the Bible Ex booklet, which usually ended up filling the 90 minute time slot. This probably left a sour taste in their mouths about studying the Bible, which was totally contrary to what the camp's goal is.
As a counselor, the campfire revolved around the skit. We all pined to be included in more skits, and we spent a ridiculously high portion of the day preparing for the skit (especially the Director's Cut), often leaving our campers to help with preparation.
The positions of "The Craft Guy," "Bob's Assistant," and "Campfire Coordinator" were all highly coveted, because honestly, they involved the least amount of work and did not require direct interaction with the campers. They also had the most time to do skit preparation, so the counselors in those positions were inevitably in the skits more often than other counselors. Also, they were able to hang out with the female counselors (who tended to be super cool) more than any other counselors.
The counselors had an after-hours hang out called S&B (Scarf and Barf), which was supposed to be totally secret from the campers. It lasted from 10-11, and Bob was crazy strict about the 11 PM end time, often unleashing his wrath if we were out past 11. The counselors were not subtle about attending S&B. It was supposed to be kept secret from the campers, but it can't be a secret if two of your post's three counselors suddenly leave as soon as "Taps" was played at 10 PM. During my second year, I believe, Bob used part of S&B time to read to us from a book "50 Reasons Why Jesus Came to Die." That was really weird--S&B was supposed to be a time for everyone just to chill, hang out, and eat food.
It was run very oddly like the military. We awoke and went to sleep every night to a bugle playing "Reveille" and "Taps," respectively. We had to raise the American flag every morning before breakfast and sing one or two verses of "The Star-Spangled Banner" while saluting the flag (and let me tell you, that is not an easy song to sing, much less first thing in the morning, much much less when the camp director always chose a horribly high key). We had to lower the American flag every evening before campfire and sing "God Bless America" while saluting the flag. Our gatherings consisted of formal line-ups, complete with "Alert" and "At Ease" commands. The conflation of Christianity with military practices, in hindsight, is kind of scary.
And, oddly enough, even though I spent so much of my adolescent years revolved around SBC, and it surely shaped me into the person that I am to at least some degree, it's not what comes to mind when I think of influential times in my life. When I was joining AGO and sharing my life story with the actives, SBC never came up.
Meh. This barely counts as analysis. Just a revisiting.
We had campfire each night, which always followed a very strict formula (Warm-up, then Fun Songs, then Skit, then Transition Songs, then Testimony, then Slow Songs, then Story, then Closing, and ending with "I Have Decided to Follow Jesus"). The next morning at Leader's Huddle (which started at 6:15 in the morning every day--yikes!), we would always go through a campfire evaluation of the night before. And damn, we ripped on each other. I got critiqued one time for slipping my hands into my pockets during Transition Songs. People got critiqued for not starting on a good pitch. People got critiqued for not having prominent enough hand motions. People got critiqued for being too energetic, or not energetic enough. People got critiqued for not announcing songs exactly as "Song Number, Song Name, Song Number again." People got critiqued for calling a section "Fun Songs," "Transition Songs," or "Slow Songs" (as if those titles were supposed to be kept secret from the campers). If you think you gave a flawless campfire song leading performance, you were wrong--someone could always find something wrong with it. And the standard was never consistent--I saw some errors get repeated that would not get critiqued (e.g. the hands in the pockets thing), or Bob, the camp director, would praise someone's performance even though they had made the same errors as someone else that had been pointed out a previous night. The absolute nit-pickiness, combined with the inconsistency of standards, drove me mad.
I have a memory during either my third or fourth year where I was being evaluated after leading transition songs the night before. Someone commented, "I seem to recall Max not being very good at song-leading his first year, so watching your improvement has been really cool to see." Indignantly, I responded with, "No, I was good my first year," at which almost everyone laughed. That upset me. Because I was good my first year! I was not going to allow my past to be disparaged like that. And apparently, no one else seemed to believe me.
My fourth year, I was a senior counselor. So for one of the weeks, I led my own post. It was a great experience being entrusted with that kind of leadership and the creative freedom to choose how I wanted to run my post. This also meant that I led Bible Exploration with my campers. If I could go back and do it differently, I absolutely would. Bible Ex was for about 90 minutes each morning after breakfast, and I was determined to get through every question, even if my campers were obviously bored and had lost interest. Six months later or so, I watched my older brother lead Bible Ex at Junior Leadership Conference, a CSB event. As a squad, we typically only answered a couple of questions before calling it quits, because my brother thought that we had had a good discussion up until that point. If I could go back and approach Bible Ex in this manner, I absolutely would. I would stop when it was clear that interest had died down, and I would allow tangents if it promoted good discussion. Instead, I forced my campers to answer all the questions in the Bible Ex booklet, which usually ended up filling the 90 minute time slot. This probably left a sour taste in their mouths about studying the Bible, which was totally contrary to what the camp's goal is.
As a counselor, the campfire revolved around the skit. We all pined to be included in more skits, and we spent a ridiculously high portion of the day preparing for the skit (especially the Director's Cut), often leaving our campers to help with preparation.
The positions of "The Craft Guy," "Bob's Assistant," and "Campfire Coordinator" were all highly coveted, because honestly, they involved the least amount of work and did not require direct interaction with the campers. They also had the most time to do skit preparation, so the counselors in those positions were inevitably in the skits more often than other counselors. Also, they were able to hang out with the female counselors (who tended to be super cool) more than any other counselors.
The counselors had an after-hours hang out called S&B (Scarf and Barf), which was supposed to be totally secret from the campers. It lasted from 10-11, and Bob was crazy strict about the 11 PM end time, often unleashing his wrath if we were out past 11. The counselors were not subtle about attending S&B. It was supposed to be kept secret from the campers, but it can't be a secret if two of your post's three counselors suddenly leave as soon as "Taps" was played at 10 PM. During my second year, I believe, Bob used part of S&B time to read to us from a book "50 Reasons Why Jesus Came to Die." That was really weird--S&B was supposed to be a time for everyone just to chill, hang out, and eat food.
It was run very oddly like the military. We awoke and went to sleep every night to a bugle playing "Reveille" and "Taps," respectively. We had to raise the American flag every morning before breakfast and sing one or two verses of "The Star-Spangled Banner" while saluting the flag (and let me tell you, that is not an easy song to sing, much less first thing in the morning, much much less when the camp director always chose a horribly high key). We had to lower the American flag every evening before campfire and sing "God Bless America" while saluting the flag. Our gatherings consisted of formal line-ups, complete with "Alert" and "At Ease" commands. The conflation of Christianity with military practices, in hindsight, is kind of scary.
And, oddly enough, even though I spent so much of my adolescent years revolved around SBC, and it surely shaped me into the person that I am to at least some degree, it's not what comes to mind when I think of influential times in my life. When I was joining AGO and sharing my life story with the actives, SBC never came up.
Meh. This barely counts as analysis. Just a revisiting.
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