In a cultural pickle

This week, a woman in her early 40s in the UK was forced to announce to the world that she had cancer and ask millions of people to leave her and her family in peace

On the other side of the world, another younger woman publicly apologised for liking and dating someone, disappointing fans who demanded that she remain single.

And let’s not even get started on the rising tide of identity crises, mental health issues,   insane pace of life and stress of being overwhelmed with information and impossible expectations.

How did we, society, get ourselves into this cultural pickle?

How did we get to a place where we encroach on others lives, sometimes when we don’t even know them personally?

Where we dictate how others should live? Or we allow others to dictate how we should or shouldn’t live?

How did we get to the point where virtual line becomes more important than real life and where we invest our interest in people we have never met?

Last week I came out of the weekend and into the working week exhausted. I faced my to do list at work and took a deep breath, pushing down the indigestion of panic.

We are at the end of March and with both of our full time jobs with increasing pressure and growing responsibility, interviews, endless drs appointments, people who are on my heart to pray for, some new commitments at church, and more, it was all a bit much.

I have reached a breaking point in the past and now when I feel myself getting close to that edge again I take certain actions. I know that once that thing in me snaps, it’s a place that takes a long time to come back from.

I asked God for advice, a strategy:

I booked myself an emergency Friday off and extended my Easter weekend break by two days.

I stopped contacting all but a few people to see how they are doing because I was concerned for them.

I drastically cut down on social media.

I started planning to do things that I know renew my soul: gardening, organising things at home, cleaning, creative activities like writing a blog post, going to the hairdresser, walking the dog and picking wildflowers on the way.

I closely watched my thoughts,  asking the Holy Spirit to help me stop thinking about work problems or worrying when it was not working hours or in the middle of the night.

A few weeks earlier I had already stopped watching the news and any Netflix series that had negative, spiritual or cruel aspects to them.

And I refused a couple of last minute invitations where there would be people to socialise with.

Everybody has a different make up of their character. What is good for one person is not necessarily what is good for another.

As I get older I get to know myself better and better.

I realise that I am an empath and that I have a pastoral heart, meaning I care for others and naturally want to help them and pray for them. I easily take on other people’s burdens but they weigh me down and I cannot easily stop thinking about them. News items with people constantly suffering can be overwhelming.

In short, social relationships drain me and when I am running on empty I need to refill before I can continue.

I am ambivert, meaning that I enjoy and need social interaction but it needs to be balanced with time alone for me to reengergise.

I am created to be creative, I am a planner an organiser and a thinker. When life becomes too rushed for too long and I can’t find that time to do these things, I need to stop and make time for them before I go on.

My heart is to help others and to see them liberated by God into the things he has for them and I love social media. Sometimes, I need to be reminded that first and foremost I am too experience life with God and enjoy him forever.

And then if I have time after that I can write or post about it. If I never do, that’s fine too. It’s not because I don’t say it outloud that it’s not true or didn’t happen.

Not everything needs to be expressed to others.

And as I thought about this time blocked out away from the world, I realise two things:

1. How even though everyone needs this emotional space, still society doesn’t allow it. How if you say to someone that you blocked the weekend to do nothing but be on your own and not see people, it is still seen as atypical and not acceptable.

2. That Jesus often, very often, went away on his own to pray and be by himself with God. And how people were constantly searching for him, not understanding why he needed to get away

Relationships are wonderful. We are created for relationship with God and with others.

Social media is not a bad thing, it can be an amazing way of connecting with other people.

But it is a tool and and not our master. And it is a broken mirror that easily distorts reality and can distance as much as it brings people closer. And it can cause us to confuse actual relationships with false relationships.

We desperately need the discernment of the Holy Spirit to be able to take the good in the virtual and apply it so that we engage in real life better.

I love Matthew 11:28 which says Then Jesus said, “Come to me, all of you who are weary and carry heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you. Let me teach you, because I am humble and gentle at heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy to bear, and the burden I give you is light.”

https://bible.com/bible/116/mat.11.28.NLT

The tiniest of flowers found on the walk with the dog, there were a cloud of them on brambly weeds.

Finding my voice

You know that feeling when you are in a crowd of people who are all having a profoundly deep conversation and you think of something you’d like to say, you work yourself up to saying it and when you do, it comes out as a squeak? Or you missed the boat? Misunderstood the conversation? Or maybe you say something that you thought was funny but turned out it was just inappropriate?

You can hear the sound of crickets in the silence that follows right?

Turns out blogging can be a lot like that. I was blogging for seven years before I found the ‘right voice’ for me. After a break of 18 months from blogging, when I sat down to write my last post I had to write it three times before I refound my voice. And I still could be wrong.

There are different ‘voices’ for different settings.

The voice (or way you phrase things) when you speak in public is different when you blog to when you write a journalistic article. The voice you use to preach in church is different to the voice you use to write a newsletter. And then your audience comes in.

Are you writing just for you? Are you writing a tutorial? Is it sharing a story or is it instructional? How conversational should you be? When is it oversharing? How much faith should you include? Is anyone even reading it?

How much me should I be? What is the real voice of me anyway? It reminds me of Rhett & Link’s Thoughtful Guy video. Google it. It’s a little bit of joy for a grey rainy day.

I don’t know what the season is but Facebook is stumping me too. It used to be that I would randomly post whatever I was thinking about but perhaps it’s that I’m more aware of who my audience is or perhaps it’s getting older,  but my fingers are poised to type and I click the little x in the corner thinking …nah maybe not.

I wonder if we think before we post or are we so used to just blurting out any old thing that we forget the effect that it might have. Who is reading it? Would they be hurt? Do I care? Am I posting just because other people are posting?  Am I liking things just because I saw someone else liking it and think well maybe I should do too? Am I encouraging people or when they see my feed do they think sheesh – not that complainer again!?

Have you found your voice? Have you found your style? Do you pause before you hit enter or do you click and regret? Is holding back a good thing?

These are things I’m mulling over today.