Everybody Screams at New Lows and 99 Problems

Seen. Safe. Supported. Why does that matter in the spaces and places we show up? For me, it's because I don't know too many spaces that have done all three at the same time consistently. I was seen and supported on a conditional basis growing up. I was rarely safe. I was seen, safe, and supported in the Church until I wasn't. At work, if I want to feel safe and supported, I have to go unseen. It's hard for me to feel safe and seen at the same time when there are conditions and stakes, such as performance and livelihood. 

But, why dwell on the ghosts of the past? I have a good job. I'm in a position of leadership and influence. I feel supported most of the time. It's work, so of course, there are expectations. I'm proud of my success. It's the most polite “middle finger energy” (thanks, Paula) I could possibly give to any of my naysayers. But, I fight with ghosts every day. 

“I'm no one's shadow. I've felt the lights and I'm not going back there. I talk to your ghost every night in my sleep” (New Lows, The Wonder Years and WWE).

My ghosts come from growing up too soon. My ghosts stem from coming to terms with my own human fragility as a child. My ghosts come from family dysfunction. My ghosts come from bad theology. My ghosts come from pain, loss, and failure. No matter how much success I taste, I don't outrun those ghosts. Frankly, they drove my success on multiple occasions. 

Prime example, when my ministry career didn't work out, I started at the ground floor of library work and within five years I became a library director. That was a hundred percent fueled by feeling unseen, unsafe, and unsupported. It was an, “oh, really, watch this.” It was “middle finger energy.” 

When I severed most of the tendons in my dominant hand at the age of twenty and the hand surgeon said my life would never be the same. It became my mission to give them the middle finger, literally. I accomplished the ability to achieve my goal, but chose not to because my recovery impressed literally everyone involved in the process. I defied the odds. 

At the risk of sounding smug, that's what I do. I've made a habit of defying odds. When I have a goal that emotionally motivates me, I will accomplish it. Without question. In a weird way, I'm grateful for the ghosts because anger and resentment motivated my career at warp speed. I'm grateful for the ghosts because they illustrate to me every day why I do things and I put in a lot of work to learn from that. 

“Now, once upon a time, not too long ago…I tried to ignore ‘em, talk to the Lord. Pray for ‘em, cause some fools just love to perform. You know the type, loud as a motorbike” (“99 Problems,” Jay-Z). 

As much work as I've put in to heal, learn, and grow, I still have emotional flashbacks every day to being unseen, unsupported, and unsafe. And here's the thing, I survived that by whatever means I could. Usually humor, wit, deflection, and self-sacrifice. Sometimes to extreme measures. I choose not to live like that as much as possible anymore. But, I know how to take on roles that I never should have had to take on in the first place. The difference between past me and present me is that I recognize that dysfunction and work really hard to change it, and I get really mad when the damn ghosts win. 

Success has caused me pain. Usually the pain of being unseen. Failure has caused me pain. Usually the pain of being unsupported. Fear has caused me pain. Usually the pain of feeling unsafe. I don't have to be laughing in the face of a knife blade, or lying in the forecast of a swinging malt liquor bottle, or reeling from the punch of a bully, or embarrassed from the pity of a girl to feel unseen, unsafe, and unsupported. Those triggers can happen in meetings when someone makes me feel small, at home when my kids ignore my instructions, in relationships of all kinds because I can't trust you. I am an incredibly fortunate human being but I've lost a lot of skin in the game to arrive here. 

“I'll come to you in the evening, ragged and reeling…extraordinary and normal, all at the same time” (“Everybody Scream,” Florence + The Machine). 

My greatest success isn't having a great job with a nice title. My greatest success isn't defying odds with my Cerebral Palsy. My greatest success isn't living the American dream. My greatest success isn't surviving death and dysfunction. My greatest success is carving out spaces where I feel safe, seen, and supported at the same time because there I can acknowledge that I'm tired, that life's been really hard, that I'm still learning how to rise from the ashes of what was and let my flame burn bright with what is. When you find a home in chaos and normal scares the shit out of you, the path forward is carved by hand one day at a time.