October 2022 was the beginning of a no good, terrible, awful year. I can only say this in hindsight, of course, since I had no idea that the first domino that fell the second weekend of October 2022 would be the first in a series of truly unfortunate events.
These events caught me by surprise only because I had just begun to feel like we were finally out of the COVID-19 woods only to realize that my fledgling optimism was just a trick of the lights.
With everything that’s going on in the world, it feels a bit myopic to talk about my everyday sorrows. It’s important for me to mark this month, however, because this has been one of those turning-point years for me. Two deaths, two career shifts, and an assortment of unexpected bills and ailments paired with the bell jar of depression will do that to you. Apparently.
I say all this to say that’s why I’ve not written for this newsletter as regularly as I did last year. I’ve been writing down ideas and lying awake at night writing essays in my head, but the act of sitting down to make my scattered thoughts make sense was just too hard most weeks.
This week my favorite essayist Lyz Lenz celebrated her three-year newsletter anniversary. I first encountered Lyz’s work through her book “God Land: A Story of Faith, Loss, and Renewal in Middle America” and I have been an avid fangirl ever since. She writes about faith, America, and humanity in ways that make me feel seen. As I read about the ups and downs of her newsletter, I couldn’t help but think of my own.
This newsletter, regardless of who reads it, though I am always delighted to hear that people do read it, has changed me. I’ve found that with each press of the publish button I’m less inclined to take it personally if someone disagrees with what I’ve said. I’ve become more adamant in my positions on the systemic problems within Evangelical Fundamentalism. I’ve begun to truly let go of the arbitrary rules that governed most of my life.
Appropriately, then, this past week in an interview Lyz did with the author Molly McGhee, I came across a quote that speaks directly to this. Molly has written a novel about our culture of overwork, and death, and spirituality that I can’t wait to get my hands on. In response to a statement about how the American Dream Dialogue tells us that “things will be ok,” Molly said; “you’re talking about spiritual health. The thing is we’re surrounded by religions but the religions actually aren’t about your spiritual health at all. … (When you are) in such intense despair, … when the choice gets down to either changing your life or dying, that’s when you’re like, ‘oh my god, these rules don’t matter.’”
The first time I came to this point was sometime in 2012. I remember thinking that if I didn’t change something in my life that I would end up dead. That was the first step in a ten-plus year roller coaster that has led me to today. I no longer worry about ending up dead, but I am finding it easier and easier to distinguish between the rules that matter and the rules that don’t. Most rules don’t.
All of that to say, I often get bogged down by questions of “do my words matter”, “am I just adding to the noise”, “who really cares.” And the answer is that those are the wrong questions. The question should be, “Am I living my life in a way that doesn’t hurt others and that brings some sense of peace and fulfillment.”
Things won’t always be ok. And that’s ok. You can have a sucky year where you don’t write and so you don’t grow your newsletter the way you think you probably should have. Because in the end the rules are all made up and that’s ok, too.