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From: blancaro
Date: Fri Sep  1 00:00:45 MST 2006
Subject: Response

Responses
emily: Eden (9/1/06)

Karen: Choice vs. feeling (9/1/06)
Karen: More thoughts... (9/1/06)

Responses (sorted by date)
Karen: More thoughts... (9/1/06)
Karen: Choice vs. feeling (9/1/06)
emily: Eden (9/1/06)

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From: emily
Date: Fri Sep  1 09:41:24 MST 2006
Subject: Eden

Blanca, I really liked your many blank responses. They remind me of how my heart feels when someone trys to tell me that "such and such" is the point. My mind recognizes the truth in various versions of saying "God is the point" but my heart just sighs.
Being a person who struggles with meaninglessness, I don't have a good stock of ideas to offer because I have rejected too many of them as, well, meaningless.
I can only offer a part of my story with God that seemed to ease some of my pointlessness feelings.
So I start with a long history of not being interested in symbolic events: birthdays, weddings, anniversaries, Thanksgiving, Christmas, baptism, communion, etc. One evening at church I was once more pondering the bread and the juice with a sigh. I wanted to cry because yet again, people around me seemed to be having intimate experiences with God as they took on postures of repentence and reverence in preparation for communion.
I felt bitter. References were made in the sermon about how we are the precious bride of Christ and we should feel so grateful about that, blah, blah, blah. Woop-de-doo. I'm the bride of Christ but I don't get any chance to WANT to be that bride (besides the obvious problem of deserving to go to the dungeon with the dragon if I don't become the bride).
I guess I'm supposed to sit here and try to think about what a bad person I am so I can be grateful that I get to be a bride. Or maybe I'm supposed to think about how magnificent the groom is so I can be grateful to be his bride? It seems like a one-sided romance where I do all the work. He shrouds himself in mystery and I get to try to convince myself that he loves me and find all the reasons to love him to boot. How come he doesn't bring some of his own reasons himself? If he's such an eligible bachelor how come he's not very good at catching my interest?
At that point I distinctly heard in my mind "I will woo you" (emphasis in the I and you). My thoughts scrambled around basically saying "what? can you be more specific?" But I just got a repeat of the first statement. So after I realised that was all that was going to be said I started thinking about what that meant to me. I realised that Jesus was freeing me from trying to reach to the heights of love for him before he has even wooed me there.
So I gave up trying to love Jesus. I remain faithful by not turning to other gods - but I reserve my praise and adoration for when I'm really convinced. That seems to be far less often than for other people. But its far more meaningful to me than anything else I've ever done.
So the reason this has eased my pointlessness feelings is that I don't try so hard to find meaning anymore. And I try really hard not to be pursuaded to try "purposes" that are meaningful for other people. Its rather like yo-yo dieting in my case. I really throw myself into their vision for a while and I do find meaning and purpose and I feel so fulfilled! But then I can't keep it up and the meaninglessness comes back even stronger than before.
In recent years I have gone through a number of variations of shedding "purposes" that aren't convincing to me. My creator has become more interesting to me. I'm still not interested in communion. Oh well. At least I'm interested in what might happen next.
EmilyMc.

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From: Karen
Date: Fri Sep  1 11:13:17 MST 2006
Subject: Choice vs. feeling

Emily, I totally relate to the "whoop de doo" comment. On the hard days, although I know I'm committed and am not going to change my mind about that, it still feels like a "marriage of convenience," if you know what I'm saying. If I'm the bride, I think of the Streisand/Neil Diamond song: "You don't bring me flowers anymore." The honeymoon is over... (or maybe we never really had one?)
If I know what the point of being alive is, how come I can't make myself feel it all the time? I guess all you really can control in yourself is not bowing to the other gods. All those gods itemized in Ecclesiastes, for example.
The feelings do come and go (as the moon goes through its phases, as the barometer rises and falls...) and what you're saying makes me think, we're not responsible for ridding ourselves, or generating in ourselves, the woo-hoo feeling. We're just responsible for obedience to God. "Just" for that! Ha-ha. "It's by grace you've been saved."

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From: Karen
Date: Fri Sep  1 15:56:18 MST 2006
Subject: More thoughts...

I can't help but seek the underlying meaning, the reason for x, y, z. Why was my teacher, Audrene, allowed to die suddenly of heart failure before her son was even weaned? Why was my friend Larry allowed to die at 16: half-awake, he got caught in his blankets and hit the back of his head on the bunkbed ladder, smacking his brainstem, stopping breathing, instantly.
What is the point of investing deeply in other people's lives, when it's all so fragile? What's the point of investing in anything, anything that could be lost, stolen or taken at any moment?
What's the point of getting my students to engage with a poem when so much in our culture implies that art (because it's not practical, it's not wealth-producing) is not worth the effort or time? What's the point of anything, anything at all?
I guess "there is no point," in a way. But I must do it anyway. Because that's how God will "get" to me, through the engagement with the "stuff" of life. No dropping out allowed. I can take naps when needed, but I can't pull the covers over my head forever. I guess there's really no halfway participation.
The school administration brought in a special multimedia presentation this week. There were true stories interlaced with rock music and film clips. There was an indirect, but clear reference to God, early on: our world tells you x, y, and z, all these messages that aren't true, but you have to listen to a higher authority.
The underlying message was clear to me. It made me think of the scripture that we sing at Vespers: "Consider it pure joy...whenever you face trials of many kinds, for the testing of your faith leads to perserverance." The filmmakers gave a couple of examples of what NOT to do when your feeling of pointlessness strikes. There was one satirical video clip..."I'm from the United States of Whatever." (OK place to visit, but you wouldn't want to live there??)
I think offering a blank in response to anything, not having an answer at all, is much better than "whatever."
Still fighting the pull to say, "Whatever."
And speaking of pull... yeah, I think Julie's right about the weeds. Have you seen Dr. P yet, Blanca??

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