I've been a bit blocked since getting home. For over a month, I have been working through issues surrounding shifts in the interpersonal relationships closest to my heart. The grief that comes with those changes has been complicated. I wish I could say it's getting more straightforward, and that's why I am writing again... But the reality is that I am writing with the aim of working out what it looks like to incorporate this grief into the continuation of life. I'm writing because not writing is letting the grief win.

It's a complex thing to lose someone without losing them, an ambiguous loss that is difficult to assimilate. I can only pray that in time the fog will clear and hope that restoration might be possible. 

In the meantime, there has been much confirmation of God's guidance since returning. I am thankful that he keeps opening doors and fostering conversations. 

Today held the opportunity to attend a workshop presented by the district. While there has been much going on in my life since the conference that I worked with this past spring, this was the first direct contact I have had with the topic of human sexuality. Stepping into this space again with the lens of the shame language that I've been processing since returning from Africa was like walking into a whole different world. 

There is so much shame that circles whenever we talk (or don't talk) about sex in the church. It's an often unconsciously automatic response... and it is heartbreaking to see how we have allowed this shame to put relationships and interactions into boxes, defining them as right or wrong based on a reactive response to the culture instead of allowing the nuanced conversations that it takes to be fully alive and truly loving to our fellow humans.

I'm tired tonight. Somehow the experience today, while educational, seems to have drained my reserves of self-compassion. Between the heightened awareness of my lack of community here and the weight of the subject today, I think I just ran out. And it feels like I'm not the only one aware of it. The battle is real.

Be kind to yourselves.
I love you, friends...
💜💜💜