WordPress Has Some Nerve. So Does God.

December 12, 2008

I’d set aside a couple hours the other day to write a blog post but when I signed onto my WordPress account there was a notification banner for a new version of the software to be installed. Like the dutiful little blogger I am I backed up my database and followed the usual installation process. A few minutes later when the confirmation email arrived telling me my my blog had been updated, I headed back over here to get started on my post and this is where the story turns sour.

The new 2.7 version of WordPress included a complete redesign of the user interface.  Nothing. Looks. The. Same. Everything. Is. Different.

WordPress changed everything and here’s the real rub. They didn’t warn me or even ask if I was okay with them making some changes. Apparently the WordPress developers could care less about my emotional well-being.

For the average bear changing things up with a new design and updated features can be a good thing. They get excited and inspired by the shiny new bells and whistles. I tend to get momentarily overwhelmed. Though I adapt given enough time, it still bristles against my core axiom; change bad, same good.

I can’t help it. I like being comfortable and I’m most comfortable with what’s familiar. That’s why it took my computer building genius of a brother until late 1996 to convince me to upgrade to Windows 95. Actually, he didn’t convince me. In essence he broke into my church office with a floppy disk in his hand, pushed me out of my desk chair and said, “You’re getting upgraded. Deal.” It was not a bonding moment. More jarring than going through the change of the enforced upgrade was the agony of admitting to him several weeks later that I loved Windows 95, that it was the best operating system yet and I couldn’t imagine using the older Windows 3.1 ever again. Memories dim with the years but as I remember his eyes rolled. Significantly.

I’ve heard tell that there are some members of the human species who are just fine with change. Their feathers don’t ruffle. They don’t convulse, gnash their teeth, or have their stomach lurch until their lunch revisits their tonsils. I am not naturally one of them. No matter how small the change my natural inclination is to resist it. I’ve always clung to what’s familiar because when things are the same I know where my place is within it all. The same-o same-o makes me feel grounded and assured. I handle change better now than I once did because, to put it simply, I’ve grown up. The years have taught me to accept that change is inevitable but I will never be able to stress enough that this was not a lesson that came easily.

And yes, it was a lesson that began when I realized I was gay. It was more than a lesson. It was like a pop quiz. “I need everyone to close their books, take out a piece of paper and number to 10. Do so now. This quiz will account for 50% of your overall grade.” I was just there, minding my own business and showing up for my familiar comfortable life every day and wham-bang, everything changes. I had it all figured out and by all, I pretty much mean all in the all-inclusive sense. I knew who I was and what I was to do in the world. I knew who my friends were and where my place was in my family. And to some extent I was fairly convinced I was on the right track when it came to knowing God since I counted myself among those who had nailed the truth of the Christian faith.

Coming out to myself knocked everything out of whack. Nothing remained the same even as I went through the familiar routines, engaged in day to day interactions with family and life-long friends, and sat in church singing the same songs and lifting the same two hands in worship. Before any change in my life became apparent to the rest of the world, everything inside me was swirling in a hurricane of internal change and the impending change to everything and with everyone that was to inevitably follow the moment I opened my mouth and let the words “I’m gay” come stumbling out. I don’t need to provide an inventory of everything that’s changed in my life since coming out. Chances are you know all about it first-hand. You’ve lived the change.

As humans we know change is inevitable and the writer of Ecclesiastes nailed it. Everything changes. The physical world is set up for change. Summer, Autumn, Winter, Spring. Day. Night. Situations change. We move from one place to another. We lose a job, earn a promotion, or switch careers. Old friendships end and new friendships begin. The aging parent who grasps our hand to steady their walk today once held onto our child-sized hand to steady our tenuous first steps. We change. We can’t stop it from happening no matter how hard we try. Wrinkles highlight our eyes. Gray hair frames our face. Things once perky turn their attention to the floor. As the years pass we become more or less cynical, forgiving, loving, tolerant, hopeful and possibly annoying. Our core values might evolve and our priorities shift. We accept that change happens. There are times we even long for change. And still we resist it. Why?

I suspect primal survival instinct plays a significant part. Familiar, safe. Different, threatening. We know what’s in our cave but there’s no telling if a woolly mammoth is lurking in wait in the shadows of the cave next door. Cave relocation is scary business. If you’re somewhere in the coming out process there’s plenty going on that feels scary. You’ve wandered into a whole new cave that has you wondering “Where am I? What the heck is going on? Where is God in all this? How is God with all this? What do I believe now? What am I suppose to do now? Who am I, really?”

We often talk about the struggle to reconcile our faith and sexuality, and as Christians how it is that being gay impacts our relationship with God and our theological understanding is of utmost importance to us but what’s going on here is even more fundamental to our humanity in that our sexuality is an integral component that shapes our core self-identity. The process of coming out involves not only our spirituality but is the struggle to reconcile the entirety of our lives as we understood it with what we know now. Given the huge nature of such an undertaking it’s understandable that some of us experience a range of emotions including fear, dread, relief, worry, anger, confusion, grief, excitement, and depression. When we’re smacked with all those emotions and all the questions there’s a tendency to interpret the turmoil as a sign that we’re doing something wrong. We wonder if we’re miserable because God is making us miserable. We ask ourselves “Is this what they mean when they talk about the conviction of the Holy Spirit?”

I want to offer another suggestion but don’t ready yourself for a profound spiritual insight least you add disappointment to the rest of the package. I simply want to suggest that maybe the turmoil you’re in right now is nothing more or less than a primal human response to change; not the day to day kind of change we’ve come to expect from life, but something that could potentially bring change to every area of your life including the most basic reality of who you understand yourself to be in the world. Beyond what’s happening at the spiritual level between your heart and Gods’, is simply, though not easily, going through the process of grappling with the possibility of impending monumental change in coming out; whether to yourself only or to others in time. Sometimes it helps to parcel the pieces out because it put things such as our emotions in perspective so we can accept them for what they are saying and just as importantly, for what they are not saying.

I was thrilled years ago with the benefits that came from changing my Windows software to a newer version. I’m fairly certain I’ll be equally thrilled with this whole new bells and whistles version of WordPress after I’ve had the chance to take it for a spin a few times, and I wouldn’t want to go back to using all that software anymore than I’d want to go back to my life before I came out as a lesbian. I was grateful for that life while I lived it but I’m ever more grateful for the life I’m living today; a life God brought me into through a season of agonizing change. Remembering back to that time, the fear and pain of venturing into a dark and unexplored cave was nothing compared to the joy of what I found when I got there. And just so you know, there were no woolly mammoths. Not even one.

Now say it with me.

Change good. Change good. Change good.

Now say it like you mean it.

Posted in Coming Out