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Thanks SD. That’s good advice and I can tell it comes from personal experience. I think part of what I’m working through right now is figuring out how much I WANT to be involved at this point. I have major problems with the temple, it’s origins, some of the covenants, the gender roles, etc and feel no desire to attend right now. So I’m ok giving up my recommend. But I’m feeling less of a desire to engage at the weekly ward level too. More and more I’m feeling like an outsider, and less and less like these are “my people.” I go for my wife and I try to make that space a place where I can develop my spirituality, but I just feel like I don’t belong. I know this is on me more than anyone at church, but it is a result of my transition. I just can’t find a place for belief (in anything) right now and it makes it hard to desire to engage.
That’s my struggle right now. Thanks for the support – sorry for side-swiping this thread. I love you all!
Hi DT, My short answer is to
1) Present doubts as something you “struggle” with or that your faith is a work in progress or focus on what you do believe or even hope to be true. In this way you are an honest man going through challenges rather than someone whose heart is already hardened “past feeling”. The first is someone worth saving. The second is someone to save the innocent from.
DoubtingTom wrote:
But I’m feeling less of a desire to engage at the weekly ward level too. More and more I’m feeling like an outsider, and less and less like these are “my people.” I go for my wife and I try to make that space a place where I can develop my spirituality, but I just feel like I don’t belong. I know this is on me more than anyone at church, but it is a result of my transition. I just can’t find a place for belief (in anything) right now and it makes it hard to desire to engage.
2) I recommend seeking to grow and or supplement your needs in other avenues. For me, diversifying my social and spiritual inputs has made it much easier to StayLDS. In some ways I too do not feel like these are my people. I feel like an expatriate. I speak the language and am accepted well enough. This is part of developing “subjunctive or individualized faith.” We rest less and less on the community for our identity and learn to stand on our own two wobbly legs of faith.Quote:Many of us rely at least somewhat on a “reflected” sense-of-self: basically, we get at least some of our self-image and self-worth from the people in our close relationships. Then it becomes very disruptive to our self-concept when those people change. As a result, we become very manipulative in an effort to control them, keep them stable, and thus keep our sense-of-self stable. For example, if my self-concept centers on my position as the “mother of a good Mormon boy,” and then he leaves the church, who am I?
This is so true. I often think of relationships in terms of who has the most “hand” (to paraphrase Seinfeld). There are some relationships in which we care more what the other person thinks of us and others in which they care more what we think of them. The problem with people whose beliefs change is that those who look to them for approval may feel it’s being withdrawn due to changed beliefs, and the people who are used to that person looking up to them may find that they no longer do. It can shift the “hand” in relationships, effectively ending relationships. Losing the approval of someone we look up to is painful. And it’s painful to them if they feel rejected by one they’ve admired.
DT: I agree with Roy and SD that you should back pedal a bit for a few reasons. I think there’s a risk that some fall into of being more definitive in sharing their new “conclusions” (which alienates others) rather than assuming that EVERYONE has different views on things and EVERYONE struggles with different aspects of Mormon belief or community. When you imagine it’s just you or that you are a unique case, then you start acting that way in how you say things which raises flags for some leaders. My own opinion. Once you give yourself leeway to live according to the dictates of your own conscience and use church as a touch stone for that process (rather than a rigid set of beliefs you have to adhere to that really just exists in your own mind–and unfortunately, in the minds of some others), then you can actually focus on Jesus’ teachings and becoming the best person you can be, not on gaining or maintaining approval of leaders.
DT, thanks for sharing. I identify with those feelings.
Others have great advice, and I agree with them.
I just try to keep the door open. Times I feel less “connected” or motivated to want to do any of it are times I allow myself to search for other things to make it meaningful and allow myself to do what I want.
In other words, I don’t force it. I just let it happen, back pedal, coast, skip, substitute and trade up. For me, I just observe what is happening around me and why I feel what I feel. It is what it is.
I can choose to stay home, skip 3rd hour, go for nature hikes or fish, go check out other churches. Without fanfare and without broadcasting to the world.
I have found other times after some breaks, I want to try again to re-engage, and I’m glad I left the door open and didn’t say too much to others, because I want to try again from a stage 5 perspective, and do what works for me…not force it and hate it.
It’s a journey.
AmyJ wrote:The older I get, the more I understand in small measure what it feels like to have that love applied in my life. How many times does He say, “Ok, let’s take a break/rest – I will give you peace.” Or “I don’t expect you to be complete in this area, why don’t we focus on this one task first…”
I love this quote by Amy. It is ok to take a rest and focus on the love in our life.
D&C 50:40
[Behold, ye are little children and ye cannot bear all things now; ye must grow in grace and in the knowledge of the truth.]
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