After I finally stopped crying, I started to think about those three friars and wonder what it was that they knew that I didn’t. Here they were in a foreign country, with no money, no car, no home, and no real plan other than to somehow hitchhike hundreds of miles until they landed in Kansas City, and yet they could not possibly have been more joyful or at peace. I, on the other hand, had a car, a roof over my head, and at least a small income, and yet I was full of fear and anxiety and had little joy and even less peace. What was I missing? Did God favor these three men more than he favored me? Or was it, perhaps, that they knew some secret that I had yet to stumble upon?
I figured, as long as God was touching the earth and doing crazy things, I might as well ask him. Almost immediately — as he likes to take advantage of my attention when he has it — a scene from a few months earlier popped into my mind.
I had been fretting about money, and Dan kept telling me that everything was going to be fine. Over and over again I replied, “But you can’t know that! You have no idea what the future holds!” Finally I added (with no small amount of histrionics), “For all you know we could all end up living under a bridge!” Do you know what he said? He said, “You’re right, Hallie. We could end up living under a bridge. But even if we did, we’d be okay because we’d have each other and God would be with us.”
And that was the end of that conversation. Because there’s no point in arguing with an insane person.
I’m starting to think insane people are God’s favorite kind of people because he played that scene for me in Technicolor and whispered, “Dan’s right, you know. He knows what those friars know. As long as I am with you, you will have everything you need regardless of whether you live in a mansion or under a bridge.”
That ebullience the monks possessed? They possessed it because they weren’t afraid of living under a bridge or on the side of the road. They weren’t afraid of going hungry or only eating one half of a bag of trail mix shared between them for an entire day. They didn’t fear rain, or cold, or the merciless Alabama heat. They carried God with them wherever they went. And so, in a way that is simultaneously utterly mysterious and breathtakingly simple, they were at peace.
Spark
Do something beautiful for God.
Do it with your life.
Do it every day. Do it in your own way.
But do it!
~ St. Teresa of Calcutta
My husband is a natural father. Of the two of us, he is the better parent. He’s the perfect balance of playfulness and firm guiding hand and never even blinks at the idea of watching our seven small scrumptious children all on his own. When he leaves town, I batten down the hatches and warn the children of all the ghastly things I will do to them if they answer the door. He takes them to the beach.
Thanks to his excellent small-army management skills, I used to try to sneak away on occasion to work on writing projects and other creative endeavors. I imagined that I could get more done if I didn’t have a baby in my arms and a multitude of other creatures dancing around my feet. It makes sense, no? And yet, no matter where in the world I settled down with my laptop, my brain would shut down, or go on vacation, or do anything, it seemed, other than what I wanted it to do, which was to help me put words on the page.
After attempting to write in solitude in a number of different locations (including two hotels, three restaurants, and that cute little pie shop down the road) on a shockingly high number of occasions without any improvement in word count, I gave up.
I packed up my bags, came home, grabbed a baby, sat down with my laptop, and began to write. And write. And write some more. It was as if having a little one on my knee was the key that unlocked my ability to produce content. Which I thought was really, really weird.
Usually when something really, really weird happens to me, it’s because God is trying to tell me something. So I asked him. “Hey, God,” I said. “What’s up? Why won’t you let me write in peace while sipping my cafe mocha with half the chocolate and extra whipped cream?”
To which he immediately replied, “So that you will know, my girl, that the privilege of creating art is not reserved for those with hours of free time on their hands. Art is for everyone,” he said. “You don’t need an artists’ retreat or a quiet cafe. You can create things of beauty whenever and wherever you find yourself in life.” (You should know that I did gently mention to him that though I might not technically need to go to a writing cabin in the woods, I was not opposed to it.)
Follow Your Fears
Where I found myself at that moment in time was knee deep in family life. Growing babies and raising babies, feeding babies and kissing babies. I had piles of laundry up to my ears and a dishwasher that never got a break. I had a to-do list a mile long and, as God had picked up on, was not entirely sure that I should be chasing after artistic pursuits at all.
As ironic as it sounds, by shutting down the right side of my brain every time I left the house, God was telling me that family life and creative life were not incompatible and were, in actual fact, symbiotic.
This is not to say that writing in cafes is a bad thing or somehow an offense against the duties of motherhood. But God knew that I needed to behold just how harmonious the relationship between the two can be. Bringing forth new life, nurturing that life, and producing art — it all emanates from the same creative well. God wanted to show me that there weren’t barriers to entry. He wanted me to see that he’d flung open the gates and all were welcome to drink from the well and then go forth and cover the world with bright splashes of paint, mellifluous song, and soul-stirring prose.
But, I asked God, what if my splashes of paint aren’t so bright, my song not mellifluous, and my words not prose-ish in the least? What if my art is terrible? What if people laugh? What if they gather around large tables and talk about how very cringe-worthy my art is?
“Yes, well, people do and may,” he said, “so, what if?”
God then reminded me of an episode of Dr. Phil that I’d seen a few years earlier during what must have been (we can only hope) either a sleep-deprived temporary lapse in judgment or God showing off and demonstrating that he can work through anyone, no matter how many odd interventions they’ve facilitated.
Dr. Phil said to follow your fears to their logical conclusion. What is the very worst that could happen? Maybe they will laugh, and maybe they will insult you, and maybe you will cry a little. You’ll probably feel embarrassed for a while and want to hide away for a time, but guess what happens next? You will curl yourself into your husband’s arms and let your little ones call you “pretty mama.” He will remind you that you are the treasure of his heart, and they will pick flowers for you and tell you startling long stories about the dreams they dreamt the night before. After a time, you’ll brush yourself off and get back to the business of living.
Rudyard Kipling once said, “Of all the liars in the world, sometimes the worst are our own fears.”
My fears have this very bad habit of telling me all sorts of ludicrous stories about all sorts of terrible fates that might befall me, and rarely do I question them.