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Goodbye to Good Work: Grief and Freedom in Walking Away from Ministry as Vocation
77 Plays14 days ago
Tracy Johnson and Beth Bruno have both spent years pouring their passion and hearts into full time ministry, and both ultimately made the choice to leave that work behind. Together, they reflect on their initial call to ministry, why they left, and the life they have found in their vocations since. A conversation full of heart, hope, grief and growth, Tracy and Beth honor the seasons of ministry and the good work that comes after.
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Transcript
Introduction to Red Tent Living Podcast
00:00:01
Speaker
I'm Katie Stafford, and this is the Red Tent Living Podcast, where brave women host honest conversations about our beautiful and hard ordinary.
00:00:12
Speaker
Each week, we share stories with the hope of seeing one another a little better and affirming each other across different seasons and perspectives.
Hosts' Excitement and Focus Challenge
00:00:22
Speaker
We're excited for you to join us.
00:00:24
Speaker
Welcome to our table. Beth, it's good to see you. You too. It's actually fun. Like nobody knows this, but we're together.
00:00:35
Speaker
We're not even in separate locations. i know, which means it's going to be kind of hard to like focus. I know we're, we're kind of, we're hot. We're a little giggly. So this month for this month on the red tent living podcast, we are talking about saying goodbye.
Leaving Ministry: Grief and Freedom
00:00:49
Speaker
So you and I are going to have a conversation today about the saying goodbye to good work and kind of the grief and freedom that comes in walking away from ministry as vocation.
00:01:04
Speaker
What comes up for you as I kind of read that title? We've both done that a few times, haven't we? Yeah, we have done it a few times. I mean, I just, I think that that title makes it sound so definitive and yet The fact that we have done it more than once, both of us in our lives, makes me realize it's not. It's ongoing, depending on our choices. And here and each time, it stands alone.
00:01:33
Speaker
um And, and there's a sense of like relief in that title that I certainly feel in the choices I've made, at least around saying goodbye to ministry as vocation.
Ministry Adjacency and Young Adult Memories
00:01:47
Speaker
That feels true to me also. And we will, we both were talking about just a little bit ago and and our husbands have not. Right. So we're ministry as vocation adjacent, which means we're still not fully out.
00:02:00
Speaker
Not all the way out. Um, Even our conversation leading into this, like as we were sort of sharing some memories back and forth of our homes filled with ah with young adults, young people, and during seasons when we were very much doing ministry as vocation.
00:02:21
Speaker
And I think almost at the same time, we both were like, oh, we do that again. Yeah. Yeah. That piece of it. It's, it felt sweet to remember the why and the who.
00:02:35
Speaker
mean, those are one in the same, I guess, honestly. And that those memories, those who's, those people weren't the reason.
Organizational Issues vs. Personal Relationships
00:02:44
Speaker
Right. Actually that we left.
00:02:46
Speaker
Yeah, neither one of us. I mean, it was for me, it was never it was never about any leaving in this realm. It was never about the people that the ministry was with or to for, but was more about something that had transpired at an organizational level.
00:03:07
Speaker
Yes, and or. How did that impact us at a gut, soul level? Right. Or maybe some ideology or posture that that the organization, whether it's a church or a Christian nonprofit or whatever, that they held that ceased to feel like we belonged in that space. Yeah.
00:03:27
Speaker
And I know for both of us, the back to the the who, those those people often got caught in the crosshairs. Mm-hmm. Which I hold grief around for sure.
00:03:40
Speaker
I do too. I do too.
00:03:45
Speaker
And when I think about the, yeah, the grief and the loss, not that there weren't, but the ones that sting and the ones that i that I carry with me are the relationships that weren't weren't about someone in a position of power or or authority.
Beth's Ministry Departure Story
00:04:02
Speaker
There's sting and grief with those. It's a different kind of a grief, the one that lingers and that will bring tears to my eyes.
00:04:09
Speaker
would be relationships lost by those that, that I think were caught in the crossfire for sure. The innocence.
00:04:19
Speaker
um So i'm goingnna I'll ask you to read your story. As we also talked about this, didn't I don't think for either one of us, it was like, oh yes, this is a story about some like definitive leaving moment that kind of encapsulates it. I think we both have moments that we can look back and go, that was actually ah decision that meant I was leaving ministry as vocation.
00:04:44
Speaker
The story I've written is one of those kind of looking back and naming, oh, that that was the win. It didn't happen right in that moment. But later, i could reflect on knowing that was where it began. And this particular story and this season of ministry was the second big season of ministry for me. So I already had laid a path of leaving and thankful for that because I think I had more trust in what would be on the other side because I had walked it.
00:05:18
Speaker
This was, I mean, currently as it stands now, this was the last time i I would say I was in vocational ministry. yeah So it's my current definitive leaving story.
00:05:30
Speaker
I have shared pieces of this story before. The version where I am not the central character. The parts where I have yet to name the ways it sent me spiraling.
Impact of External Experiences on Ministry Decisions
00:05:41
Speaker
How it appended my purpose life.
00:05:43
Speaker
It is a story I keep returning to. The one that becomes more clear as time passes. It is a warm June morning when I find myself on a hotel loveseat in between two of my cop friends.
00:05:56
Speaker
By the time I arrive, they have been working the sting for hours. They beckon me to sit so that I can see what is happening on screen, so I can read what the sex buyers are saying and follow their responses, the women they are pretending to be.
00:06:13
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I know these officers to be parents, spouses, believers, and the dissonance between some of our God conversations and this online chat shatters me.
00:06:25
Speaker
In this hotel room, I feel the weight of their role to end human trafficking. and I'm overwhelmed with both gratitude and grief. Another cop pulls ice cream bars out of the mini fridge. It is all so surreal.
00:06:38
Speaker
I sense evil lurking. After lunch, I join uniformed officers in the unmarked van outside. I both uncomfortable and relieved that they aren't apologizing to me for their language.
00:06:51
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Their role is to wait for the signal from inside the hotel. after the chat has yielded enough information to track down the make and model of the buyer's car and to intersect him before he even enters the building.
00:07:04
Speaker
A call comes in on the radio and we speed across the lot, swerve in on an angle, and they jump out of the van. For a moment, it's all so exciting. But shame is near.
00:07:15
Speaker
I smell it. From inside the van, I am surprised to watch the officers extend dignity to the buyers, explain everything with kindness. I wonder if it's their honor that elicits the buyer's shame, because that's all I see in their eyes, every one of them, every time.
00:07:34
Speaker
And it's their shame-filled eyes that haunt me the whole way home, the whole next week, the rest of the summer. Something new has claimed space in my bones that I cannot shake. Though I don't have words for it yet, this is the beginning of the end.
00:07:49
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I've been training and organizing and writing about this hideous thing called sex trafficking for years by this point. reading and watching films and attending conferences but without obvious impact on my soul.
00:08:02
Speaker
Curious and studious and eager to grow as an advocate, a galvanizer, I've played a role, but it's been largely, mostly from the other side of the screen.
00:08:13
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In that, my role has not been face-to-face with victims, survivors, sex buyers, or traffickers. Until shame looks me in the eye and the heavy harm of brokenness comes crashing.
Emotional and Spiritual Transformation
00:08:26
Speaker
unshakable. cannot shake the words my friends wrote in order to catch the men. cannot shake the unsuspecting kindness of the rough, uniformed officers.
00:08:37
Speaker
I cannot shake the look in each of the men's eyes as evil circled. And I descend. My energy evaporates. I resent each new request to train.
00:08:49
Speaker
Frustration mounts at sluggish movement from community partners. and feel stuck and obligated. loyal but drained and visionless. In a sudden grinding halt, I have lost my way.
00:09:04
Speaker
It is a gift, though I will not say as much for quite some time. The sadness, anger, resentment are all so loud. Feelings that have been held at bay for years come rushing forward, demanding an audience, and my soul quakes at the onslaught.
00:09:21
Speaker
I teeter between feeling betrayed and rescued. I had held it all together for so long, I barely recognized her. My fortified walls of protection had been cracked open by the proximity of evil, which is why, of course, I eventually see this as a gift.
00:09:41
Speaker
Why eventually i allow the tenderness, welcome it, bless it even. Why eventually I'm able to receive the invitation from God to start something new. But the path there is brutal.
00:09:53
Speaker
Summer fades into into fall and winter mocks the warmth and tenderness that cries to be heard, seen in me. The warmth and tenderness in me. As I hesitantly wake into the fullness of my own brokenness and embrace a duality of strength and softness, fierce lovely.
00:10:10
Speaker
How did it feel to read it? It's been a while since you wrote those words. It feels still true, which is always good. And even more true. The relief, the gift that I was probably just starting to name when I wrote this has sunk in more deeply.
00:10:28
Speaker
I mean, in some ways it feels like another life. That was six years ago.
00:10:33
Speaker
It feels, those are vivid memories though, because it was such a shift. um My body was screaming. for a change, to to change.
00:10:44
Speaker
And I'm glad I listened. And I think like what I said before I started reading, i think it's because I had traveled the pathway before. i knew to listen to myself.
Vocational Struggles and Ego's Role
00:10:56
Speaker
What it was as I listened, knowing that like it's in that parking lot, it's on that day that there's something that you know, and you mentioned several times the the presence of shame.
00:11:11
Speaker
And there's something that's that's undone inside of you. i wonder, as you think about that writing, like where where do you go when you realize I i am i am unwell?
00:11:22
Speaker
like I am undone by what I am encountering in this scene, in this... Because there's several scenes. I just wonder, is there one that you know you talk about what haunts you, but I just wonder, is there a moment in there that you go that this was the moment that... I mean, I think the first moment was my cop friends sitting there nonchalantly eating ice cream and typing what they were typing.
00:11:50
Speaker
Despite my knowing them in so many other ways and contexts, it felt so jarring, almost like this is the next step.
00:12:01
Speaker
If I keep walking down this path, I also, you know, will be invited to dissociate to that degree. ah just, I didn't even know what to do with that.
00:12:14
Speaker
Did it feel like there's almost like a persona they took on that was disturbing to know they had access to that inside of themselves? or I think it was the first, i mean, that, that whole day,
00:12:27
Speaker
felt like the lid popped open and I like I saw what was really going on i mean it just makes me feel so naive to how contained all the work I had been doing was in comparison.
00:12:41
Speaker
Sure. Because you were never anywhere. Like you kind of say that it's like you weren't on the front lines. No, no, you were necessary, important, good. I filled a role and I felt called to it. And I felt the whole Esther, you know, for such a time as this, like my skills were needed in that moment in our community, but I did not feel called to that next iteration.
00:13:10
Speaker
Yeah, I get that. There's there's something ah probably because in in some of the work that i that I do and that I have done where I've sat in groups with both men and women who have paid for sex.
00:13:25
Speaker
And, and to be up close and looking in the eyes and hearing and seeing and experiencing their stories around that their emotion and their brokenness, their shame, like all of those, all of those things.
00:13:40
Speaker
um I and mean, I feel like I can, I can imagine that. ah you know, the tension inside as you're closer. And I, yes, for sure.
00:13:52
Speaker
and the timing, I think it was kind of the the wake up call to what I had already been carrying, starting to carry with all the stories. um I had done a really good job of keeping them outside
Recognizing the Right Time to Leave Ministry
00:14:06
Speaker
of myself. This got inside of me in a way that i just, it wouldn't leave. Mm-hmm.
00:14:15
Speaker
So, and that's why I say it really upended everything because it sunk into my soul and I just, I couldn't bear the weight. I think there's something I actually love as you're articulating all of that, that it it feels like this, that like this day was a moment when there was some sense you had of, Oh, like I could say yes to this call.
00:14:40
Speaker
From God, for lack of a better way to put that, it feels, you know, very big, but, but that's kind of the language that we tend to use around full-time vocational ministry. I had some sense of a call from God that, that then on this day you realize, oh, wait, this is not what I'm called to. Mm-hmm.
00:15:00
Speaker
not not this. And maybe you didn't you didn't know it that day, but as you sat with the gravity of it and felt it in your bones and realized, this is what I'm going to have to carry. And and kind of the sense like, God didn't make you to carry that.
00:15:13
Speaker
That's not what he called you to. And I think had I not, again, walked away already from something that felt huge and important, you know, ministry to to Muslims, where I had to learn how to let go of my ego and get off the pedestal everyone had me on. Had did that not already happened, I would have stayed because how great of a need is fighting human trafficking and how big of a pedestal did the whole community have me on?
00:15:42
Speaker
I can remember talking with you at the time. like as you were starting to make this decision, our friendship was deepening. And, and I can remember some of like those conversations.
00:15:55
Speaker
um And, and you were meeting a need in the community for sure. And, and I mean, it hasn't, it hasn't gone away that that need is probably never going to go away. And I, I wonder, I mean, I can't presume to know, but I wonder how common that is for people in vocational ministry to stay somewhere far longer than they should because they feel like they're so needed. How could they possibly walk away?
00:16:24
Speaker
And that's, that's really hard. Those have been some of the hardest decisions I've ever made. And on the side of it, they've been the best, the most life-giving. I think I i also,
00:16:37
Speaker
i can't I cannot think a very many times, I mean, in this moment, I can't think of any, where where I've sat with someone who has made the choice to to leave vocational ministry and who has articulated something about their ego and something about a sense of like, and a knowing deep in their bones that like, I'm really not this important.
Katie's Journey: Finality and New Beginnings
00:17:02
Speaker
I mean, everybody thinks that I am and it's easy to sort of stay in that space, but to firmly know. And like you said, you already experienced it once and you were there again. and there was something inside of you that's like, actually, i am not mission critical.
00:17:19
Speaker
Yeah. And ah for me, it's one of the many reasons that I love you and trust you. There's so much goodness and safety in that.
00:17:32
Speaker
I'm not mission critical. And you don't say that in some sort of shrinking violet. I'm not that important. Like there, it's none of that. You know exactly what you bring and you know where you are important and mission critical, but you have a, you just have a very clear sense of that. That is not about your ego.
00:17:53
Speaker
It's about your goodness. Thank you for saying that, but it's, it doesn't come without having wrestled it to the ground. Yeah. Yeah. I hear that. Let's hear yours. Okay.
00:18:04
Speaker
So as I was, as I was thinking, you know, but when, when I saw like this, this is the invitation for what you and I were going to talk about. I thought, huh, interesting. Like I knew where the end was.
00:18:19
Speaker
I, i I hadn't really maybe put it all together until the invitation to think about it. But for me, ultimately the end of vocational ministry, when, when that was for sure, for sure, for sure was actually when I said yes to you and Chris and yes to coming to work at Restory. And, ah and, and not because there was some conversation around it, but because i just, I knew at that point that
00:18:51
Speaker
whatever had been left over inside of me wondering, what do I do next? Because vocational ministry had, had been our life. And yes, we had left, but left onto another organization, another, you know, whatever. Um, and, and it was it was a no, it was the end of that.
00:19:10
Speaker
Not that I wouldn't be involved in ministry anymore, but not as vocation.
00:19:17
Speaker
So i I wrote this post not long after that. And um yeah, so I think then to this is the one to read. It starts with a quote from Brene Brown.
Shame, Belonging, and Personal Growth
00:19:31
Speaker
Shame is the intensely painful feeling or experience of believing that we are flawed and therefore unworthy of love and belonging. Something we've experienced, done, or failed to do makes us unworthy of connections.
00:19:46
Speaker
Recently, the familiar buzz on my phone yielded a text. Your writing is different, stronger, intentional, larger voice. It's so good. January did not unfold the way I had anticipated. While waiting for my husband to cue up an episode of Justified on the TV, I sat on the couch, curled under a blanket, scrolling Twitter.
00:20:07
Speaker
When I saw the story of Andy Savage, my heart began beating faster and I felt a bit shaken. Reading Jules, his victim's story about the night he raped her, flooded me with feelings of anger, sadness, and grief.
00:20:21
Speaker
Her story contained familiar elements of my own story of rape, and I felt compelled to respond and let her know that she wasn't alone. The next morning, the live stream of Andy speaking to his church and the subsequent applause by his congregation landed hard in my gut, and I found myself typing out what I wanted to say to him and his church leadership.
00:20:42
Speaker
My words came easily, and I posted an open letter.
00:20:47
Speaker
That same week, I received news that my testimony was needed in a case involving sexual abuse of a minor. And I had the opportunity to sit with the executive pastor at my own church to discuss silence is not spiritual and what our church policies and practices were around sexual harassment and gender equality and sexual abuse reporting.
00:21:09
Speaker
If all of this had happened two years ago, it would have felt pretty typical. I was leading a Christian organization at the time where the bulk of my work centered on educating the church and helping victims of sexual abuse.
00:21:21
Speaker
The work was deeply personal, and as my time there came to a close, I was faced with my own failures and the loss of relationships that had once defined my place of belonging, and the shame was deep.
00:21:32
Speaker
Shame shrinks and silences us. And for me, the shame and loss of belonging were absolute death for my heart.
Healing and New Purpose Exploration
00:21:40
Speaker
The road to recovering began over a year ago and included our moving back home to Texas.
00:21:46
Speaker
And there has been a return of so much life and goodness that I really wasn't aware that there was more that still needed life breathed back into it inside of me. I have a playlist of songs that I titled Survivor filled with the songs that helped me over the course of the last year.
00:22:03
Speaker
Tell Your Heart to Beat Again, performed by Danny Gokey, puts words to what happened to me over the past several weeks. Beginning, just let that word wash over you. It's all right now.
00:22:15
Speaker
Loving, healing hands have pulled you through. So get back up. Take step one. Leave the darkness and feel the sun. Because your story's far from over and your journey's just begun.
00:22:29
Speaker
Tell your heart to beat again and close your eyes and breathe it in. Let the shadows fall away. Step into the light of grace. Yesterday's a closing door.
00:22:40
Speaker
You don't live there anymore. Say goodbye to where you've been and tell your heart to beat again. Shame silently seeps into you like cold, wet dew, almost frozen across your heart and soul.
00:22:55
Speaker
Shame told me I no longer belonged or deserved to speak in the world where I once worked. It left me wondering, what now? Where do I belong? What about my story? Will I ever belong again in a world of those fighting for victims of sexual abuse and advocating for change and healing?
Identity and Fundraising Challenges
00:23:14
Speaker
The invitations to step back in and to use my voice to tell my story and to bring all of myself have been clear and profoundly kind of God. And the song lyrics say, step into the light of grace, almost as if Jesus himself stretched out a hand and said to me, it's time.
00:23:32
Speaker
Trust me, let your heart beat it again. and know you're scared and it would be easier to stay in shame and keep yourself small. But we both know that's not what I've called you to. So come on, let's go.
00:23:44
Speaker
i want I want you to keep reading. but You know, as i as I think about, you know, some of what what you what you were saying about, you know, like the the walking away from the pedestal, I was finding myself thinking, I got knocked off.
00:24:02
Speaker
There was no... Yeah, with a big old boot. was it Yes, I did. Got the boot. yeah Yeah, I mean, it was more of an abrupt ending and unexpected and...
00:24:14
Speaker
And not a lot of choice in that. No, no. i'm I mean, i you know, ultimately at the end of the day, I resigned and I, and I didn't have to, i mean, I, I could have. So there's, there are extenuating circumstances there, but.
00:24:30
Speaker
but it feels integrous to say, you know, that that my place had been lost. and And that was the end of vocational ministry.
00:24:42
Speaker
and And I think some of, you know, what I wrote in that post, the wrestling for me after was, ah my am I supposed to do this again and do it in a different way? And and there were invitations and asks and And even some pleading from people, you know, if you, if you build it, we will come kind of thing, but somewhere my gut,
00:25:05
Speaker
and I knew that the answer was no. i just, I knew it wasn't supposed to be that. And, and it also, as much as I love Red Tent Living, and I do love Red Tent Living, it was never meant to sustain vocation.
00:25:19
Speaker
That's not how it was formed. That's not how I ever saw it. And in this season, you know, I, I played with that or wondered about that. And, and that didn't feel right either.
00:25:30
Speaker
So what was, what were some of the things that were going on inside it? in that season, which was only a couple of years, right? But kind of the in-between, but also not that. It was the transition out of but vocational ministry. What were some of the things that you were noticing inside of you, paying attention to, that were confirming, no, not that?
00:25:51
Speaker
Yeah. that You know, as as that was happening, Mark was stepping back into vocational ministry. So he was he had just started on staff and there had been there had there have been questions and inquiries about a staff position for me.
00:26:10
Speaker
People who kind of saw me and saw what I was about and and wondered if I was a fit for a particular role. And when those would come up, I could feel like like ah like a deadness inside of me that and a no not, not an angry, no, or a bitter, no, but just like, ah almost like a quiet.
00:26:33
Speaker
No, not again. So I think that was, that was part of it. I, at some level that was confusing, I think for Mark, um, because we had so many sweet memories, ah really good memories of ministry together.
00:26:49
Speaker
um But I think that's part of what was going on for me. Also, I hate fundraising. I hate it. everything about
Integrity and Non-Commercialization of Stories
00:27:00
Speaker
it. I'm so grateful when people give money and I don't want to ask people for money.
00:27:04
Speaker
I don't like to, and I don't like the work that I'm doing to be dependent on that in the ways that for it to be vocational ministry, like it has to also like produce a living for you. This is what I do. And this is how we live.
00:27:17
Speaker
And I think I, my love of story and, and how that like collided in what I was doing for red tent living. Never. I, I didn't,
00:27:29
Speaker
I didn't want there to be any sense for women that there was somehow profit being made off of their stories. Yeah. That felt really important to me.
00:27:41
Speaker
um i I just never wanted that. And I almost like I didn't want their stories being tracked. And you've helped to that. I have. Year after year.
00:27:51
Speaker
I have. It's just that that has always been a ah hard no for me. And I feel really good about that. But that was some of what was going on inside of me too, because the only way to way to grow Red Tent Living as a you know vocational space for me would have been, but to some extent, I would have had to have been willing to mark it.
00:28:16
Speaker
I mean, there's something inherent in vocational ministry, right? That requires fundraising. It does. and And the way that you raise money is you share the stories.
00:28:27
Speaker
Like that's what people give to, you know, they want to give to lives changed and they want to know what the stories are around those lives that were changed and how that happened. And we have certainly over the years, people have given, I mean, no we did the safe house in Nepal, but not ah I don't have a single story.
00:28:45
Speaker
I can't tell you a single story of a woman who has benefited from that space. And I'm so grateful for the woman in particular, who, as I talked about it one night over dinner, she said, well, I'd just like to write a big check for that. And she did. And like no strings attached.
00:29:00
Speaker
She didn't, she just, she heard it. She believed in it and she had the resources for that. And you know, and that's kind of been the way that it's, that it's happened. And I've been able to share, you know, a quote here or a quote there from a woman who went to a retreat or who sent something in about
Belonging and Community Beyond Ministry
00:29:18
Speaker
a dinner. But I just, I feel cringy inside standing up and, and trying to market this.
00:29:26
Speaker
I just don't like it. So that was certainly part of what was going on inside of me. And I think Again, i love Red Tent Living and I love what I get to do there. and i And I love like it really all it is is the outgrowth of something that happened around my own table. So it was never about a ministry. It was about something that I wanted to try that kind of caught hold. And I love that story.
00:29:52
Speaker
ah When I think about what has God made me for, it it wasn't that. hmm. um And I think that was the angst inside of me was that I didn't know how to do what I felt like God had made me for without the kind of space where I no longer belonged.
00:30:09
Speaker
Because I'm not a licensed therapist. and um And so I can't just hang a shingle and have people come. And that's not the work that I do. I do very different kind of work.
00:30:21
Speaker
And so... For me, it felt like that's gone. I don't know how I could ever do that again and not be in the kind of space that I was in before. and And every space like that, that had been part of my life, I had lost my belonging in. So that's the, like that shame and that sense of like, I don't get to be in this world anymore. That felt really, that felt very real.
00:30:50
Speaker
it feels so final. Like you had a real sense of like, it's over. I did. I'm like, the this is, this is over. And so if not there, nowhere kind of thing. Yeah.
00:31:01
Speaker
I mean, it, it felt very much, it felt very much that way. And, um, you know, I had, I had done a couple of, I had done a couple of sort of intensive things where, you know, somebody had come to sit with me and,
00:31:17
Speaker
but But I also knew something that I had learned along the way was i I didn't want to do that alone. I don't think that that's how it's meant to be done. I don't think it's smart or wise. And again, ah like I'd lost my community. I'd lost the community of people that had provided like companionship and supervision and care and camaraderie and, and wisdom, like all of the things that, that for me are necessary to do story work and do it well.
00:31:51
Speaker
Um, and I had no imagination, none for what would come next for what could come next. It's interesting that you had a very clear sense of what, what should not happen.
00:32:04
Speaker
I did. And isn't that, I feel like that's often the case. Like maybe we have a clearer sense of no than we do of what's next or what then. And there's a, there's a time ah just taking the next step forward, wondering, waiting. Yeah.
00:32:26
Speaker
The irony is you and I met in that moment, like in that stage that we both are describing. We did. As when we met. We did. which is wild. It led to our what's next for both of us.
00:32:38
Speaker
It led to where we both are now. Yeah. Yeah. But that wasn't, we had no sense of that then. No, no. But i but I think it's part of how we connected and, and why, why there was like some sort of sense between the two of us of like, I, you somehow get me and what I'm about. I don't totally know why, but I know that you do. So we'll keep finding out why.
00:33:04
Speaker
Yeah. And i I mean, I remember this isn't about that, but I remember your invitation to me and that was to something incredibly nebulous and vague.
00:33:16
Speaker
But there was a sense of like, that is the next right step because I have a lot of no. right I know it's not for me next. This feels stirring enough to maybe give me a clue of the next thing.
00:33:29
Speaker
And I remember saying yes to the nebulous because it felt more true than all the no energy I was feeling inside.
Connection, Kindness, and Healing
00:33:38
Speaker
And I just wonder if you felt that too, like even meeting with Chris.
00:33:42
Speaker
Oh, I did. that I mean, story where I remember sitting, i remember sitting by your fire pit and, and like how long the conversation went and, and the very odd moments that it was like, oh, that's very weird.
00:34:01
Speaker
You know, like where all the ways that our paths were parallel, but never crossed. Yeah. um And where we'd had shared experiences that had had similar impact and where our responses were similar also. And I did. i think, i you know, i I left that night with just the smallest bit of hope.
00:34:24
Speaker
Of possibility. Yeah. yeah And it was really, it was tiny, but, but it was there. And I, and I also know that that was a night that like, there was an unexpected,
00:34:36
Speaker
um like restoring of some of my dignity in the shared, like that happened to me too. Like the circumstances might not have been exactly the same, but it was like, Oh, Oh, because I, it just had felt so personal and isolating and you know, like all the oxygen had been sucked out of the room and to realize that maybe it hadn't, maybe there was still some oxygen.
00:35:04
Speaker
um um and and then, I mean, and then the next conversation, you know, was what would you think, would you consider maybe? And it was like, yeah, yeah, I would totally consider that. i could say yes to that risk.
00:35:19
Speaker
Because some part of what felt so really traumatized inside of me had had felt kindness and care and and and camaraderie on your deck that night.
00:35:31
Speaker
who Yeah. Because I don't know that I would have said yes without that. I think it would have felt like, ah, I could risk. Yeah. Kindness becomes like the beacon of light for us.
00:35:43
Speaker
For us who have left something that defined all of who we were and our people, our community, everything. When you leave that, you can feel like you're just wandering in the dark.
00:35:56
Speaker
Well, and I just last week, but you know, sat while Chris was talking to the men and the intensive that we were leading and explaining to them that, you know, tragedy is what happens to you.
00:36:07
Speaker
And trauma is what happens when there's no kindness in the wake of a tragedy. And it's never too late. for that kindness. And what happened to me was tragic and, and no one wanted it to be traumatizing. I don't believe
Belonging, Purpose, and Identity Shifts
00:36:23
Speaker
that. I don't believe that about any of the people that were involved, but you know, it was, and the kindness from that night was, was a piece of what has allowed that to be a tragedy and not a trauma. And there's still parts of it. It's still like, you know, I, I'm aware
00:36:44
Speaker
of of where there was trauma. but But I can far more look back and go, that was just so tragic. in so many ways.
00:36:58
Speaker
And i have tasted kindness. So, you know, we tend to we tend at the end to say, so what are you going to take into the next week? And I wonder, what you, what are you going to take into this next week? I'm just, spoke I'm hearing your word belonging, kind of circling around in my head, a sense of Like that's ultimately what we're looking for. And sometimes we find that in vocational ministry and sometimes we find it elsewhere, but that's ultimately what keeps us somewhere and whether it's belonging to ourself and what feels right and true or belonging to others and greater community.
00:37:37
Speaker
And so I just, I find myself wanting to ponder, like, is that what I have right now too? Is that what I'm experiencing? And what if what would it be like if I named it? like named it that what would that mean yeah there's something more generative too like i love my job or i love what i'm doing or i'm called for this moment in time versus like i belong to this work and these people and you do i love that um
00:38:09
Speaker
I think as we've been talking, I have felt tender to the like myriad, countless stories that I feel like I hold know of just regular flawed people who step into ministry and and for all kinds of reasons are exited of their own choice or of another choice.
00:38:36
Speaker
um And the grief of it you know, so much grief, so much grief. And, and I think just, you know, the grief, the grief doesn't feel clean.
00:38:48
Speaker
When I, when I listen to stories of ah people leaving ministry, the grief doesn't feel clean. It just feels, you know, so messy.
00:38:59
Speaker
So I, I think I'm, I think I'm, I'm, I'm just aware of that. So I think I'll take that into the next week with me. And, um, and I think the other moment in our conversation that I found myself like nodding my head is just the knowing what my yeses are and knowing what my no's are and how important that is and that it's good.
00:39:20
Speaker
Knowing what your no is, is good. So good. And and it's okay. Good to talk to you. You too.
00:39:28
Speaker
The Red Tent Living podcast is produced by myself, Katie Stafford, and edited by Erin Stafford. Our cover art is designed by Libby Johnson and all our guests are part of the Red Tent Living community.
00:39:42
Speaker
You can find us all at redtentliving.com as well as on Facebook, and Instagram. If you love the stories shared here, we would be thrilled if you left us a review.
00:39:54
Speaker
Until next week, love to you, dear ones.