I’m not sure I can pinpoint a single, specific incident in my life that was the first pebble to create the iteration of me right now, and the purpose I’ve uncovered that I believe has motivated me all along, but I can begin with a story that relates a foundational truth about me.
When I was very young, perhaps even before I was born, my mom got sick…and, for the most part, she stayed sick until her heart gave out on her well before we were ready to say goodbye.
What I remember, perhaps one of my most vivid early memories, occurred when I was 4 or 5 years of age. I wasn’t quite of school age yet, and my only sibling was 5 years older than me and was in school. My father was working a job that often meant he was gone very early in the morning and not home until after 5 or 6 in the evening.
So it was me and my mom, and I was too young to really know what was going on, how ill she really was, how it was already sapping her energy. It’s strange now, because when I look back on her all I can think about is ALL THE THINGS she did for me and my sister….her energy seemed boundless! But in those early days, from what I recall and what has been told to me, she spent a lot of time resting on the couch. So there I was as a 4 year old at home with my mom, until my sister got back from school.
This is the memory that I cling to. She would be on the couch with the TV on…Days of our Lives playing at noon every day…and I would drag my toys into the room with her so she could watch me and her show while I played. I was at my happiest when I was able to make her happy, content, and comfortable. This is the thing that I’ve realized about myself as I reflect on how I became the person I am now.
In the past few years I’ve become familiar with the concept of compersion. My favorite definition of compersion is that it is the “wholehearted participation in the happiness of others” (whatiscompersion.com). When I look back on the foundational experiences in my life I have seen how this idea has formed me, in both positive and negative ways.
By no means do I want to paint a picture of my childhood that creates some false truth that revolves around me being the perfect kid, but I will admit that I was MOSTLY good. I rarely got into trouble, often put myself in the middle of social events and legitimately enjoyed “performing”, both literally and figuratively, for the benefit of others. If you were to ask my family and friends about me as a kid they would have absolutely characterized me as a mostly extroverted, happy, albeit sensitive child.
As I grew up my main energetic outlet was performing. As early as 8 and 9 years old I was singing in church and at school. In Middle School and High School that was my identity. I performed in multiple choirs, school and church musicals, and one of my first paying jobs was acting in a musical production for a local dinner theater. I enjoyed being in front of people and making them happy, thereby finding my own happiness.In college I kept going…I could’ve switched gears and done something different, but the call of community and performance was too loud to ignore.
And, by the way, I wouldn’t have changed ANYTHING about it, not even the rigid religious churches and upbringing that I grew up in and would continue to place myself in for years to come.
In reflecting on this I realize that the performance extended beyond the stage and the choir room. I performed, and sometimes outright lied about what was going on inside me, by continuing to put myself in spaces that were starting to feel more constricting than freeing.
This affected everything in my life. How I related to my family, friends and, when I began to date, how I saw relationships. There is a lot to say about the good and the bad of this approach to life ESPECIALLY how it affects romantic relationships.
If one’s sole purpose in life is to make others happy, but they are blind to what makes them happy, it easily slides towards codependency and enmeshment.
I often found myself valuing who I was based on the perceived value I was providing to my friends, family, and romantic partners.
Let’s fast forward to the final year of college and the moment that truly formed how I would see myself for years to come.
I had gone from a relatively sheltered and very conservative childhood to attending Baylor University in Waco, Texas which was, and continues to be (coincidentally enough) often referred to as a “bubble” in that it intentionally preserves religiously conservative and sheltered values. If a college experience SHOULD be about learning who you are and stretching your ideas and values, Baylor was decidedly not that. I got lucky though, in that I attended Baylor at the most opportune time when there was a seismic shift in evangelical culture that leaned, ever so slightly, towards a progressive postmodernism - which I embraced.
Why is this important? Because this shift in church culture allowed me to see nuances in my spirituality that, up to that point, had often been understood with binary, black and white thinking. It got me energized enough to feel a deeper call and purpose to be a pastor.
Now, had you asked me at that time if capital G God had spoken to me, I probably would have said yes, but in hindsight I think what I was tapping into was a deeper more personal inclination to be a helper and a healer that was inside me.
I went to Seminary, where I thrived. Although one of my more vivid memories from this time was coming home from classes and posing that slippery slope of a question to my then wife, “What if Adam and Eve were allegory?” (aside: this part of the story could be its own essay, or a book even!)
It would take me almost 20 years of bi-vocational ministry, me starting a job at a tech giant, the birth of my twins, the divorce to their mom, a move away from Waco, the birth of my third and youngest daughter, and the subsequent divorce to her mom, and another (my third) break-up with a church for me to finally walk away from it all.
I was in a bad state. I didn’t know how to relationship. I often felt unseen and ignored, likely because I was shamed and scared to actually show the real me. How can you be seen if what you’re projecting is, at best, a half-truth if not an outright lie?
I had a crisis of identity. I had been at a job for almost 15 years in Big Tech where I felt like a round peg in a square hole. I no longer felt comfortable in religious settings. I didn’t feel like my purpose as a pastor had any real weight to it any more.
And then I stumbled across a Ted Talk by Brene Brown. You might know the one I’m talking about. It is one of the most watched Ted Talks with close to 56.5 million views. In it she talks about her research into the subject of shame and “The Power of Vulnerability.”
This sparked something in me and fired up a creative and intellectual passion researching and ultimately producing a podcast on the topic of empathy. During this time my spiritual leanings steered me towards Buddhism and subsequently mindfulness. I also came to identify as an empath. These are all things that I will unpack in more detail later, but it began to re-form a more personal and pastoral instinct in me.
And here we are, a full circle. I begin to honor my instincts of being a pastor which, as defined by Merriam Webster, is simply a spiritual overseer.
Can I be a pastor without a church?
I think so.
I believe I can help facilitate the well-being, happiness, and joy of the people around me, using mindfulness, empathy, and encouraging a sense of personal responsibility, to achieve peace and calm and satisfaction with our current circumstances…and I believe I can do so now with boundaries that I failed to inhabit and communicate before.
So there it is. That’s why I do this, and why it’s so important to me.
There are plenty more stories to unpack and I enjoy telling them.
I hope that y’all will join me for the journey.
So if you feel a spiritual inclination but don’t feel at home in church or organized religion anymore I am here for you.
If you are a religious person but struggle with stress and managing your emotions I am here for you.
If you are a young person interested in learning the benefits of mindfulness and meditation and unsure about your purpose and need the non-judgmental guidance and wisdom of an almost 50 year old dude I am here for you!
If you are entering the second half of your life and just now finding that you feel unmoored and unsure of yourself I am here for you.
I am a pastor without a church and I am just fine with that.
(BTW there are good churches out there that minister to the margins and don’t feel like it’s their place to police doubt and dogma…If you need to find community like this I can help and am here for you as well!)
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I am moved and have big appreciation for the way you deliver your story. The way you speak your heart. The way you speak with vulnerability. This speaks to my entire soul. I have found myself in similar situation with identity and unraveling so much of my thinking and belief systems, unraveling trauma so I can heal it. And trying to currently rewrite my own stories at least for my own well being. I also love the way you describe yourself as a pastor. Without a church. Because a church doesn’t need walls. Just needs souls willing to show up, listen, be willing to see things differently, support others, and expressing love and gratitude not out of well of fear and obligation but out of an overflowing well of love. I truly find your words and the way you mind unpacks things fascinatingly refreshing. I think you genuinely have something here - and with or without walls it’s not religion in itself that any of us need. We just need faith and hope that we are worthy of being loved, that we actually aren’t inherently flawed we’re just souls in human suits trying to navigate this world figuring things out along the way. To pretend one religion has all the answers feels foolish to me though for much of my own life it sure seemed simpler. I wanted so hard to believe the black and white and to fit in and thought if I just follow enough of these rules and fill enough of these roles then surely that’s the playbook for success. definitely wasn’t the playbook for happiness It left me feeling uncertain and unraveling belief systems while not everything has to be discarded, there are alot of harmful and shame inducing messages in even in more contemporary churches that claim to be all accepting - yet still so much of it just feels like a forced level of beliefs we accept in exchange for our own unwillingness to ask hard questions. It was hard for me for a long time to not feel betrayed when I started feeling like I was taught to believe things that weren’t entirely true. Religion is a convenient way for some people to put themselves, others, and their problems in a box and while it may be helpful to be able to trust and hope and connect, how much are we limited by still holding ourselves up and saying no matter what no matter how good or how bad you are you just accept this set of beliefs right here. Sign here. And yep your good for eternity. I just think that while it works for many people and I do believe it is convenient for many. I do feel like it does a huge disservice for any religion to think that they are the end all be all truth and have all the answers. That’s the biggest red flag. If you can’t appreciate the commonalities and see the patterns between religions I feel like you are missing out on a huge opportunity to experience the vastness of our universe and the magic it contains. Got wordy - sorry not sorry - got some good thoughts thinking tonight and it’s funny because I was remembering what I miss most about the days when I was in church and it was the music and connection and energy that was in a room of people in gratitude, communion, and receptivity. I always had fantasies of like hey can I just cut out after praise and worship and take me and my music and my God and that relationship my way —- and not have it with a side of one way thinking that felt littered with messages that induced fear of being left behind, fear mongering, and obligation. I could go on and I wasn’t even in a super conservative church. Thank you again. I’m l sure I will be reading the rest of the things you have written !
Also. y’all is the most essential of all the Texas vernacular :). We have y’all. Tacos. Barbecue. All we need now is more of us showing up having more brave conversations, writing and sharing our perspective. All the AI in the world doesn’t compare to our souls ability to keep recalibrating. Keep learning as humans and coming up with fresh perspectives and being brave enough to share them with other humans. Love this good writing gets me all jazzed ! 🤓