To Be Here, or Not to Be Here

by Lenora Rand
From the Recovery Worship service on May 1, 2010


When evening came he was there alone, but the boat was already a considerable distance from land, buffeted by the waves because the wind was against it. During the fourth watch of the night, Jesus went out to them, walking on the lake. Matthew 14: 23-25


I don’t really want to be here tonight. Truth is, I never want to be here, totally. A huge, insistent part of me just really wants to be alone.

Does that surprise you?

Addiction is a disease of isolation. We’ve probably all heard that somewhere along the line. That’s what they say. Addiction is a disease of isolation. Often when we hear that, at least I know, when I hear that, I think, oh yeah, when I’m using my substance of choice, whether that’s food or alcohol or smoking or shopping or being right or overworking or fixing up everyone around me, I’m isolating. I’m in this little impenetrable bubble of my addiction and nobody gets in there with me. And it’s very hard for me to get out, to actually stop using long enough to connect in any kind of real way with another human being.

And I know that’s true. But I don’t think that’s the whole truth.

It’s the old chicken and egg thing. Do we isolate because we’re addicted? Or are we addicted because we isolate? Do we actually get into our addictions because we want to be alone, because it feels better, safer to be alone? Because some huge part of us feels deeply “apart” and deeply scared of the alternative.

Am I a compulsive overeater because in my heart of hearts I prefer the comfort of food, the easy, dependable, unsurprising, uncomplicated, undemanding, inhuman, comfort of food, rather than the company of another human being?

In the passage we just read, Jesus has just finished feeding 5000 plus people with a couple pieces of bread and a few little fish. And he’s gone off to be alone afterwards. Now you may think Jesus went off alone to have some direct one on one time with his dear heavenly father and thank him for all the good things in his life. And you are welcome to think that. The Bible doesn’t really give us a lot of details. But if I let myself believe Jesus was in every way human as we are human, I find myself imagining he went off to be alone because he was sick of hanging out with all these needy messed up people. In John’s gospel you get more than a hint of this possibility. The way John tells the story soon after the feeding of the 5000 incident, a bunch of people track Jesus down and when they find him, he actually sounds a little ticked. In John 6: 26 Jesus said to them, "You've come looking for me not because you saw God in my actions but because I fed you, filled your stomachs—and for free.” So maybe Jesus went off to be alone because he needed some distance and he just wanted to zone out for a while. At best. Or maybe, in his heart of hearts, he really wanted to chuck the whole “Son of God, here to save the world from itself” enterprise, he wanted to run the other way, and never come back.

Because let’s face it, people are disappointing. Vastly disappointing.
They don’t meet our needs perfectly. They don’t laugh as much at our jokes as we’d like. They don’t care as deeply about the same things we do. They don’t function in our lives as we’d like them to function. They don’t always say the right thing. Or look at us the right way. They very often don’t even dress the right way.

Like once, when my daughter Zoe was about 3 –she had recently started having strong opinions about her clothing choices. And trying to be a good mother, as I was, I mostly supported her by letting her wear what she wanted as long as it wasn’t going to be harmful to her—like she wouldn’t be warm enough or she wanted to go naked to school or something. But one time, I don’t even remember what the occasion was, I had an outfit I specifically wanted Zoe to wear. And she didn’t want to wear it. I knew I had no leg to stand on. This outfit had nothing to do with warmth or safety needs. It was just that I thought it looked cuter on her. It looked better on her than what she’d picked out and we were going somewhere in public where how she looked mattered to me. It mattered because I was was feeling insecure or whatever and felt how she looked could say something positive about me—as in, “Look, aren’t I great…I am a mother with a cute adorable kid who dresses well.” So I didn’t want to force her—I wasn’t that kind of mother afterall, but I thought maybe I could convince her. I was older, smarter, more manipulative…she had only been on the planet 36 months and wasn’t that savvy…how hard could it be? But I tried...suggesting, strong cajoling, subtle and not so subtle bribery. She didn’t budge. Finally, I pulled out the piece de resistance, the line that would in an indirect but clear way let her know how much she was disappointing me and which would hit the button that would make her want to scurry off to her room to change. I used a line which I’m sure my mother had used on me when I was growing up. “Fine,” I yelled in frustration. “Do what you want. I don’t care.”

To which Zoe responded, “Oh great.” Totally missing all my heavy-laden subtext. And she went on her merry way.

Yeah, so people are disappointing. They don’t meet our needs perfectly and completely. They annoy us. Piss us off. Don’t give us what we want. And many of us grew up in a family in which we were dangerously disappointed in how our needs were met. So being alone just makes a lot of sense. If we don’t need anything from anyone, or expect anything from anyone, they can’t disappoint us.

Of course, I also prefer to be alone because I’m afraid of being a disappointment to others. Because frankly, the more you know me, the less you’ll like me.

No really, you won’t like me.

I’m not that nice. Or smart. Or interesting. Or funny.

I’m secretly very judgmental and angry and insecure and unkind and suspicious and have I mentioned, not that smart, funny or interesting. So I like to hide that as much as possible. It’s easier to hide when I’m alone, but I can also be alone when I’m with people. By being quiet. Controlling my output. Being careful what I say and how I say it. Editing myself. I like to write things out—have you noticed?

One of the first things we have on record of God saying is “It’s not good for people to be alone.” He says it to Adam in Genesis, right before he makes Eve. But oh, he didn’t say it would be easy.

I went to my OA meeting this morning, the way I always go… with judgment and shame and fear. Fear of being stuck with all these people who won’t meet my needs, have nothing to give me and my fear of being found out, seen, known, being just another messed up, broken, imperfect person, who more often than not doesn’t get it right. We were reading the 2nd step together and it said something about how in meetings of OA we have experienced comraderie and comfort. And during the sharing time I told everyone the truth, that I rarely feel as much comraderie and comfort there as I do eating at home in isolation and yet I was there, trying to believe that someday I would. And a few people mumbled what they always do, which is "Thanks for sharing." And "keep coming back." And yes, I will admit, though it wasn’t great to be there, it was good. And sometimes good is good enough.

I think about Jesus, and how hard it must have been for him to keep coming back. Keep coming back to us imperfect messy human beings. I think about him walking out to his disciples on the boat that night and I think what a miracle. The walking on the water part was cool, but in some ways, it was the lesser miracle. The bigger one was the faith that even though it doesn’t always seem like it, it isn’t good for human beings to be alone. We need each other. And when we, if only for a moment, can trust each other, reach out to each other, it’s a good thing. And if we keep showing up, sometimes, it’s an amazing thing.

I’ve never actually, like Peter, tried to walk on water. I do though sing in our church choir. I’m not a very good singer. I am ok, I can sort of carry a tune and I really enjoy singing and what I lack in being able to read music I make up for in…well maybe I don’t completely make up for it…but I sort of make up for in love of the music. And luckily sometimes we do gospel music. Gary, as our director, is always, no matter what kind of music we’re attempting to sing, trying to get us to stop looking so much at the pieces of paper with the notes written on them and listen and look at him. But when we do gospel music, well, I’ve actually seen him rip the sheet music out of people’s hands. On a Sunday morning, while we were singing in front of the congregation. What he tells us is that in order to do gospel music right we need to let go of the sheet music, look at the director, trust the director, watch him, listen to and trust each other. So in choir we have a new saying: “Let go and let Gary.” And I have to tell you, sometimes, when I have been able to do that, when I’ve been able to let go of control and totally let myself become a part of the choir, listening and singing together, not feeling like I have to get every note right, trusting that the person next to me will hold me up at times and at times I’ll have the note and hold them up, keeping my eyes on the director and riding the wave of music…I’ve got to tell you, it’s amazing, it’s exhilarating, it’s like walking on water.

One of the things I’ve been learning in recovery is that you need to do the thing that’s hard for you to do. Where the fear and pain are, that’s where the growth is. And when all else fails follow directions. The direction I seem to be getting today is It’s not good for human beings to be alone. So I am here. In all my messiness and neediness and judgment and resistance. I am here.

When Peter got out of the boat, and started walking on the water toward Jesus, he got scared and started to sink, and he cried out, "Lord, save me!"

At the end of my OA meetings we all stand up and say this prayer together. It’s called Roseanne’s Prayer – not sure why it’s called that, I guess someone named Roseanne came up with it at some point.

I put my hand in yours, and together we can do what we could never do alone. No longer is there a sense of hopelessness, no longer must we each depend upon our own unsteady willpower. We are all together now reaching out our hands for power and strength greater than ours, and as we join hands we find love and understanding, beyond our wildest dreams.

And every time we read it I internally roll my eyes. I want to scream. It’s so stupid and corny-sounding and Yuck…but probably I also react that way, because it’s true. Because it’s what I need to hear. It’s what I need to say. And maybe it’s just another way of saying the prayer that Peter taught us that night out on the water. Lord save me.

I don’t really want to be here tonight. I would rather be alone.

Lord save me.

Mucked Up

By Lenora Rand. For September Recovery Worship Service, based on Matthew 19:16-26.


A couple years ago my husband Gary and our two daughters Zoe and Hannah and I were spending a beautiful summer day in Galena, IL, a lovely little tourist town near the border of Illinois, Wisconsin and Iowa, just a couple miles from the Mississippi River. Galena has its own river running through the town, in fact, that empties out into the Mississippi. And that day we decided we were up for a little adventure so we rented canoes and took off on a trip down the lazy Galena River. We even packed a lunch—I say that proudly because Gary and I have in the past gone on canoe trips without bringing any food or water because Gary had told me there’d be someplace to stop along the way and I’d believed him—I guess he was envisioning a canoe-through restaurant or something. And hey I bought into that vision. Clearly we’re not big outdoorsy types. But we did learn…so we packed a lunch for this trip.

After canoeing along, slowly for an hour or two we decided to pull off to the dry land to eat our lunch. It had actually been pretty hard going because there wasn’t much of a current and the river was kind of low, sometimes really low, and we’d been getting stuck in the muck on the bottom of the river a lot. Plus the girls were young and inexperienced canoers and we were old inexperienced canoers, so we really needed a break from all the fun we were having, as you can imagine.

Anyway, Gary and Hannah pulled over in their canoe and then Zoe and I managed to maneuver our canoe to the embankment. I was in the back of the canoe so I got the front end positioned up on the shore and Zoe hopped out the front onto land—muddy land, but land nonetheless. Then I attempted to get out. I however made the mistake of stepping out of the canoe not at the very front, but a little bit on the side. The water wasn’t deep there, so I thought it wouldn’t be a problem, but it was. It was a sucking mass of mud problem. I put one foot out of the canoe and immediately I was knee deep in quick sand like mud. One leg still in the canoe, one leg knee deep in the muck. My family rushed over to the bank yelling words of advice and encouragement, suggesting mostly that I pull that one leg back into the canoe and walk up to the front to get out, that sort of thing. But I couldn’t pull my leg out, I told them. Because I was afraid I’d lose my shoe. I was afraid my leg would come out but my shoe would stay down there deep in the mud and I didn’t have on a pair of $5 flip-flops unfortunately. I had on $100 Dansko sport sandals…OK, once again, not an experienced outdoorsy type. So I was worried that when I took my foot out, the mud would engulf the shoe and I’d never see it again. And I couldn’t let that happen. Those shoes were too important, too expensive, too irreplaceable—I think it was a discontinued model even. So I was stuck there. Knee deep in the muck. While my family waited on shore with an idyllic picnic lunch spread out and ready to eat.

The guy in our story from Matthew was also really stuck, knee deep in his own ideas about the right way to live his life. Knee deep in his own illusions about what was really important and valuable, about what would guarantee him the outcome he was looking for and give him a “good life.” He was born into a world that said wealth and power will save you. He was born into a world that said doing what is expected of you would save you too. And when you think about it that way, it doesn’t sound so different from our world.

But he comes to Jesus and basically says, I’ve been doing all this stuff I’m supposed to do, I’ve got all the stuff I could possibly have. But I still feel like I have nothing. Like I’m missing out on life. Like I’m not really living. Jesus gets right to the heart of things. He tells him to let go of all that stuff, let go of the illusion that he can save himself, let go of whatever he’s holding onto and afraid to step away from. He tells him to trust. To let go and surrender.

If you want to have real life, Jesus says, you need to let go of what you’re holding onto for dear life.

Letting go of what we think is holding us together isn’t easy. Like trying to gallop on a camel through the eye of a needle.

About 10 or 11 years ago now, I remember having a conversation with my therapist, a recovery specialist, about one of my many addiction issues--smoking—which happened to be the one I was ready to deal with at the time--and I was saying how much I wanted to quit smoking, but I was afraid that if I did I literally wouldn’t be able to function throughout my day. I couldn’t keep going on, I couldn’t hold it together. I knew it was crazy, but still it felt like having a smoke was the glue that was keeping me from falling apart at the seams. And my therapist told me I could always call someone if that started happening, if I started falling apart. I didn’t really like to call people that much, I told him. And with a little smile he added I could even call HIM. See, I never called him. I went to see him at our appointed times once a week, but I didn’t actually need him, you know? You only call people if you really need them. And I didn’t like needing anyone.

So finally, a few months later, armed with his phone number, a nicotine patch and the Zyban he prescribed for me, I quit smoking. And guess what, my worst nightmare? It turned out to be true. I stopped smoking and I started crying. I mean really crying. At the drop of a hat. For seemingly no good reason at all. AN EMBARASSING AMOUNT. I had at least one of what I now fondly refer to as the “blubbering idiot incidents” pretty much every day.

But I lived through it. I started calling my therapist and cried into his answering machine. I cried with my husband. I cried with my friends. I cried in church. I cried in recovery groups. I cried in the ladies room at work with whoever happened to be in there at the moment.

I stopped smoking and I started crying and I also started living. I starting having a real life. What I was holding onto, the cigarettes and the illusion that I didn’t need anyone and that I didn’t have any feelings, the illusion that I could take care of myself, I finally started to let go of that. And the result wasn’t pretty. But it was good.

The addictions I’ve dealt with in my life have all basically been about holding on to what I think will protect me. Or save me. Or make me feel better. Whether that addiction has been to food, or achievement or trying to control others, or to blaming or to hiding my real self or to smoking…it’s all the same thing.

For me, the simplest definition of an addiction I’ve ever heard (and I think this was from Barbara Brown Taylor) is anything we hold onto instead of God. Whatever it is that isn’t God that we think will make us whole, make us happy, make us feel safe, help us feel more alive, that’s an addiction. And we need to let go of it. And the longer I’m in recovery the more I realize I’m addicted to.

And just like the guy who comes to Jesus in our story, I’ve needed to take in what Jesus was saying, if you want to have real life, you need to let go of what you’re holding onto for dear life. I’ve needed to do what Jesus invited that rich young man to do…stop grasping at straws and start opening my hands and heart and life to the good things God might actually want to give me.

You’ve heard that expression haven’t you—grasping at straws? It comes from a proverb written in the 1500s. A DROWNING MAN WILL CATCH AT STRAWS – And it means “A desperate person will try anything to save himself, no matter how unlikely.”
I know what it’s like to feel desperate and like you’re drowning. Maybe you do too. So it’s not surprising that we’d try anything to save ourselves.

The problem is when you’re holding on desperately to one thing, you can’t hold on to something else. Something sturdier, and richer and stronger and more life-giving than a straw.

When you’re stuck knee deep in the mud holding on to your expensive shoe, you can’t have a feast with your family. When your fist is closed tightly around something, there isn’t room for anything else.

And yet we grasp at straws all the time, don’t we? I know I do, at least. Whether that straw is a cigarette or a donut or a drink or a big win at work or an expensive pair of shoes. Whether it’s our own sense of rightness or denial or shame…whatever it is for you and whatever it is for me, I’m coming to believe that it’s still always a flimsy piece of nothing to hold on to. And by holding on to that straw my hand isn’t able to reach out and hold someone else’s hand. My hand isn’t able to wait empty and hopeful and trusting and ready to receive what good gifts God might have in mind for me. Even gifts that might not seem so good when you first get them, like the gift of excessive crying.

But that’s where my recovery seems to be taking me. Step by step. And that’s what I pray to be able to do every day. Let go of what I’m holding onto for dear life.
Release my grip.
And have real life.