It's early in the morning now and I can't sleep.
I've been writhing around in bed thinking about the place I am in my life. I'm feeling pretty shitty right now about my current status. I've spent 4 years at this university and don't feel like I've done anything of meaning with my life. I suppose I have been educated, I have done well in academics, and I've done well in athletics but it all doesn't seem that meaningful, it just doesn't seem worth it.
The thought that I've spent my whole college carrier hiding my true self and never truly expressing my feelings makes my stomach turn. Like WTF have I been doing? Often I wish I had never come here in the first place. I wish I would have come out right at the beginning of college and left this institution. I suppose I learned a lot, but the price I've had to be for being in a Christian environment has been worth what I've gained.
I don't even feel it was worth meeting my supposed 'friends'. These people often cause me more torment than relief due to their ignorant and intolerant viewpoints. Every time one of them makes a gay joke and every time I hear some one bashing homosexuality a little part of me dies inside. It hurts me to see how little people actually care to stop offending homosexual people. Even the administration at my school doesn't do shit.
All in all I feel as if I've screwed up the last few years of my life. I've failed to do anything concrete and meaningful with my life and only managed to skim past this time by using hollow friendships and a hiding my true self.
I know this is depressing, but It's how I feel and I want to be truthful to that....
Sooo... the potentially uplifting side of my post...
I was reading through some files on my computer and came across this one it's called You Are Accepted. It's a sermon by Paul Tillich, who was heavily influenced by Kierkegaard and Heidegger.
Now before all you atheists dismiss this as religious babble, I think that Tillich's formulation of sin as 'separation from each other' and grace as an 'accepting of oneself' is valuable to both theists and atheists. I could be wrong so don't hold it against me, but I thought it was relevant given my state and more generally our lot as gay persons.
I think it is easy given our social status as gay persons to feel rejected, scorned, undervalued, isolated, and even begin to hate ourselves. This estrangement is an aspect of the notion of 'sin' which Tillich explicates--sin is a separation from others as well as from ourselves. However there is hope for 'where sin abounds grace does also'. When we are afflicted by the pains and injustices of sin there is also a positive force in our lives (whether that be God, the Ground of our Being, or something arising from our hearts) which can communicate to us pure and unadulterated grace. This grace tells us simply that we are accepted as we are; we are accepted as the gay mother fuckers we are and nothing can change that. Even though society rejects us, even though religion damns us, even though we at times despise ourselves we are nevertheless accepted. For all of you theists out there it can be expressed simply by saying "God loves you". There is no after thought and there is no condition upon which that love is received, it just is the case that you are fine as you are.
I like Tillich's message, though I am not sure I can apply it to my life successfully at all times. Often I do not feel accepted. However, sometimes the light breaks through the clouds and I can feel that acceptance. I can feel again that life as-it-is is a blessing. Even though I may have regrets and even though I despise what my life has become in these moments I can be lifted up and suspended by grace--revived by the notion that my life is fine as it is, that I am loved and valued, and that nothing can take that away from me.
I'm not sure if I'm having one of those moments, but I really need it... And I dunno, maybe all that acceptance talk is just fancy words to make you feel better with no grounding in reality. But part of me hopes there's something more to it. I just don't know how to feel that acceptance all the time, especially when my environmental factors communicate the opposite of acceptance to me.
Perhaps what I really need to come out is the knowledge and feeling that I am accepted regardless of if others accept me.
Let me know what you think.
Core memory unlocked!
5 years ago
14 comments:
I was lucky in that some years ago I met a guy who was working to change attitudes (and the law)towards gay people. I fell for his style, his self confidence and his panache. I gave up eight years of my young life to do work with him (and screw with him meantime!).
We still have battles in the UK. But we increasingly have our rights recognised in law and slowly but surely more and more hets are learning that we're OK people to have around.
I think you should examin doing something similar. U cld do it in words coz you're obv. good at that. But however U do it, I think U should!
Get off your arse and FIGHT for your rights!
(I have an email & msn if you want to rant back at me!!!)
I think with the benefit of time you will realize the past several years have not been a waste. It may just take some time to figure out all that you have learned. From reading this post, IMHO you have accomplished much more than you are giving yourself credit for. In reality your life *is* fine as it is, the question is not so much what have you done, but what are you going to do next?
You're still quite young; don't stress over not having done anything "important" with your life!
Acceptance of us is growing, albeit in fits and starts.
You can start where you are by countering the things people say without actually coming out. You can use the "gay cousin" scenario, for example:
One of my cousins is gay. He's a great guy and every time you make one of those remarks, it feels like you're punching me in the stomach. Gays are human beings, not just punching bags for "Christians."Note the quotes: not anti-Christian but anti-false Christian
First point: your purpose in college was to get an education. If you could also have stood up for respect for gay people that would have been nice, but you had to make a decision about what would work, not in the abstract, but in the concrete circumstances in which you found yourself. From what you have told us, it seems to me that you made a reasonable decision. There is no need to second-guess yourself. You are accepted. Indeed, if sin is estrangement, it would seem that coming out would have led to a situation of sin — not that it would have been a sin for you personally, but possibly others would have reacted sinfully.
Second point: I always get a little nervous when theological ideas, such as sin, seem to be reduced to sociological ones, such as estrangement and separation. And yet there is a facet of the nature of sin there. I wish there were some mention of self-imposed estrangement from God as well, but there is the element of estrangement from others. Indeed, I have heard it said that hell is total separation from others (and if people are together there, they all hate each other). Certainly if the basic commandment is love, then refusal to love — estrangement — is of the nature of sin.
Third point: a couple of weeks ago I went to confession, and after I told the priest what I needed to, he said, "God does not want your good works. God wants you." Yes, God wants you, Jordan. He will help you be the person he made you to be. But most importantly he wants you. Always has; always will. Just as you are, he loves you. Of course, if we find ourselves in sin, we need to let him overcome it with the redeeming and healing power of Jesus Christ — and that is what he always wants to do. May you always live in his grace.
I've made it my sole purpose in life to destroy religion, its a tough battle. However, among the shmucks of the religious world I do rarely come across the religious axiologist, who doesnt equate everything to GOD, and explains the pontification in a socialistic view that most can relate to. I've read tillich before, and even tho he is a nutjob his point that since we are inherently social beings, the absence of mutual interaction and acceptance leads to an outlook that is bleak or sinful if you will. It honestly holds true in my experiences.
Your point about how your friends are really not friends due to your lack of honesty and their obvious aversion to the homosexual lifestyle is not necessarily reality. Mind you, the said social acceptance is a double edge sword, it is the norm, especially among college kids to despotize the different and unknown. The fact they profess their non acceptance of a paticular group, is in acctuallity an attempt at self acceptance.
Even tho there is def those who outright hate us homosexuals, there are also those who only say they do... Dont take your friends gaffs to heart, I'm sure some, not all, of your friends will talk and think different if they knew you were gay...
Even I at one point ostracized homosexuals, and look at me now.
I think you've said it beautifully, "Even though I may have regrets and even though I despise what my life has become in these moments I can be lifted up and suspended by grace..."
Jordon, it's only too late to start living when you've died. Otherwise, it's never too late. I hope you can recognize that you are young, that life has understandably delayed you a little, and that you have a lot of life before you to live who you are (indeed, you've already started the process). I hope these are comforting and consoling thoughts for you in this difficult time.
jordan
if grace is a feeling of acceptance then i recently experienced it after feeling i wasted over forty years of life. I actually had lunch with someone i had known and come out to online as i have never come out in real life bbut finally i spent a couple of hours felling accepted and comfortable with someone else fo rmaybe the first time in my life, so yes i think if you could find accpetance you seek but i doubt there will ever be a time it is so widely spread at least in my lifetime
But i hope before yours is through the world sees us in a different light and realizes we offer no harm to anyone. I haved lived and existed but not much else till i found these blogs, what the future may bring is your guess but i hope and pray that it is one in which you can feel comfortable being gay in this world.
take care and be safe
bob
great post. thanks for sharing.
thought this might be interesting for you... it's a documentary film about a group of students who go across the nation to military and religious schools like byu and bob jones and basically get treated like shit.
http://equalityu.com/EU_About_Synopsis.html
Hey, you've come a long way in four years. When you chose your college you made the best decision for you at the time. Since then you've discovered who you are and you know much more clearly what is important to you in life. On top of an education, that is an achievement.
Focus on the future, not the past. This year you are again faced with major decisions about which direction your life will take. Whichever direction that may be, choose a liberal environment that will provide acceptance and an opportunity for your growth as a gay man.
Gees... don't worry so much...
You're still young!
Chill out and relax eh...
There were so many times while I was in college that I wanted to blurt out to someone how I really felt inside but I always stuffed it back down. I didn't feel to good about myself and it hurt.
It's been many years since I was in college now but I found one way that helped me. When anyone I was around started making unkind remarks or jokes about gays I would look at them and tell them that I found it offensive and you know what it worked. I was scared of how they would view me the first time I said it but no one said anything and they stopped doing it around me.....try it.....I know it made me feel much better about myself.
you are me in two years.
i know what you mean. i worked hard to do well in college, get a good career, have some measurable success. but i still feel empty and feel like it's all been a waste of my time and effort. all my friendships and relationships with family are based on a lie. i wish i could be accepted for who i am, and on some level i am. the two friends i have come out to are totally cool with it and accept me as i am. but the love i get from my family, and the value they place on me are based on their perception that i am something i'm not. in general, i don't care what others think about me being gay. but with family, it;s different. will they still love me if i come out to them? probably. will they accept me? who knows. and that's the scary part. i'm glad that you posted this, cos it give me hope that i will be accepted too. but, i don't have any faith in God, or any organized religion for that matter. I hope i too can figure how to feel that acceptance all the time. if you figure it out, let me know.
much love,
dw
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