Are You Willing?

A willingness to risk failure. A willingness to look foolish. A willingness to speak a need to another, or to stand before a group and say “My name is ______, and my life is unmanageable right now.  A willingness to invest in a relationship even though it may or may not work. These are examples of vulnerability, and according to Dr. Brene Brown it is what we need and what we avoid. 

Brown says that America today is the most addicted, most medicated, most obese, most in debt, and most stressed culture in the world. These addictions are numbing strategies to keep us from feeling difficult feelings. The problem (other than being addicted, in debt, over medicated and severely stressed) is that when we numb ourselves to pain, we also numb ourselves to joy, peace and God. After 10 years of painstaking research, Dr. Brown has reached this conclusion:  Vulnerability is what we need. 

As opposed to Dr. Brown’s well-designed academic research, mine would fit the classic definition of anecdotal.  But I’ve got a lot of it, especially stories which (according to Dr. Brown) are simply “data with a soul.”  I think of the countless times I have been in groups where one person has been willing to go first, telling a story not of success, but of struggle.  People not trying to one-up each other—simply saying what is real in their lives. 

Just one example from this past week.  In spite of a full agenda, our committee meeting Tuesday night began with a simple question:  What is going well, or where are you experiencing a challenge? One woman talked about what a struggle it is not to get angry with her kids.  A guy talked about the cost of living at a distance from his extended family. I talked about a painful work experience. It took all of 15 minutes, but the result was the exact by product Dr. Brown names in her research:  Greater connection. Her years of study have yielded a simple formula:  vulnerability leads to connection, and connection is what gives life meaning and purpose.  

Who knew you could research vulnerability? How great that she is. 

Doug Wysockey-Johnson

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How Sargent Shriver and I Are Alike

With Sargent Shriver’s death yesterday, the accolades and eulogies have been pouring in.  When you are Sargent Shriver, there is a lot to say:  founder of the Peace Corps; architect of Lyndon Johnson’s war on poverty; effective ambassador to France; champion of civil rights.   

Along with his many public successes, he was well connected.  That will happen when you marry into the Kennedy clan. 

What struck me amongst the litanies of successes however, was the response he gave when asked why he went to mass each morning:  “I need God every day.”  

My resume isn’t quite as impressive as Sargent Shrivers.  And my spiritual practices do not include catholic mass.  But when I heard those words, something deep inside me responded, “Me too.”  In that way, Sargent Shriver and I are alike.

Doug Wysockey-Johnson

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Be Loved

At the risk of sounding presumptuous, I would like to recommend this goal for you in 2011:  Do what you can to be loved.  It sounds a little selfish, but trust me—the rest of us around you and the world in general will like you more. 

As with most of my thoughts, this one is not original.  It struck me last Sunday in church where I heard a story about the day Jesus was baptized.  He was at a transition point in his life.  So Jesus goes to John and asks if he too can be baptized in the Jordan. John resists but then relents.  At the end of it all, Jesus hears these words: This is my Son, chosen and marked by my love, delight of my life.  I wonder if Jesus knew that one way or another, he would be loved in this act of baptism.

Jesus goes on to do some truly miraculous things in his life.  He was able to be with and for people in a way that still has people talking.  How is it that someone can forgive his or her enemies? What does it take to be so relentlessly truthful?  How do you give yourself for others? I think it has to do his baptism.  And then many other less dramatic ways of letting himself be loved. 

And me?  I’m not Jesus, but the same formula exists.  I know that I have more to give when I am not tired.  I can be there for others if I am not feeling burned out.  And what I have to give has everything to do with being loved.

How to put ourselves in a place where we take in our belovedness is no small question.  It isn’t easy in the midst of stressful lives and complicated relationships.  But I suspect we know at least how to get started.  We know the people who help us feel loved (and ones who don’t); we know the places that help us feel beloved. We could start by spending more time in those places and with those people.  And if all else fails, we could follow Jesus’ lead and look to God.

Reflection Question: Who are the people and where are the places that help you be loved?

Doug Wysockey-Johnson

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Enough Light for the Next Step

January is a time for looking into the future.  At work we are making and tweaking our plans for 2011.  In our personal life, we make resolutions or wonder what the next year is going to be like.  In our home life, we get out the family calendar and talk about who is going to be where and when.  On particularly cold or gloomy days, we may try to envision a vacation plan.

Sometimes this looking into the future helps me.  Having a plan often enables me to feel less anxious.  Then there are days like yesterday, when looking into the future just plain freaked me out.  When I thought about all that needed to happen in the next 6 months, it felt like someone had just deposited a heavy bowling ball in my backpack.

All this thinking into the future is a good thing.  And so is being grateful for simply having enough light for the next step. Henri Nouwen writes:

Often we want to be able to see into the future. We say, "How will next year be for me? Where will I be five or ten years from now?" There are no answers to these questions. Mostly we have just enough light to see the next step: what we have to do in the coming hour or the following day. The art of living is to enjoy what we can see and not complain about what remains in the dark. When we are able to take the next step with the trust that we will have enough light for the step that follows, we can walk through life with joy and be surprised at how far we go.


Reading these words makes the bowling ball a little lighter. 

Doug Wysockey-Johnson

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