Rant of the Exiles

I’m not sure if I’m on the #YangGang bandwagon yet but I’m certainly intrigued. Yang is funny and self-deprecating. His humor is evident throughout his book “The War on Normal People” with lines like “This was back when people dated in college” and his mom’s endorsement of universal basic income (UBI). My favorite chapter is the first, titled “My Journey”. I love how he tells his growing up story in a couple pages and I resonated with his stories of being bullied with ethnic slurs. I couldn’t relate to his entrepreneurial success but admired how he “had gone from being an underdog to one of the guys with the answers, from finding the most marginalized or excluded person in the room to finding the richest person and making him or her feel special” (pg. 9). I love how he visited various cities - Detroit, Cleveland, and Pittsburgh among many - and personally witnessed the hollowing out of the middle class. These rapidly increasing negative effects on America’s cities, Yang calls the G...

My son, Caleb, graduated from high school this past May. I wanted to celebrate the milestone with an event that would foster a sense of dignity about becoming a man while also conveying responsibility and vulnerability in regards to power.  Months earlier, I told my friend Jon about my son’s imminent adulthood. Jon described how he hosted a manhood blessing event when his son turned 18 years old. He gathered a group of men that had spent time with his son. He called it Knights, Warriors, and Barbarians: The Commissioning of Sam. There were copious amounts of grilled meat. And each man spoke a blessing over his son. I loved everything about it except the name. Chivalry, protection, and courage are vital aspects of manhood but violence has a tainted narrative. The process of planning and executing this event was greatly meaningful to me. So much so, that I debated whether and how to write about it. My indecision finally broke after I recounted the manhood blessing night to...

I remember seeing my primary care physician a number of years ago for my annual physical. It had been years since my last exam. My doctor told me men see him for one of three reasons: One, a woman - a man's significant other, mom, or sister - made them. Two, they’re experiencing chronic and debilitating pain. Basically, they’re in a world of unrelenting hurt. Finally, they’re dealing with a condition that threatens their manhood (i.e. erectile dysfunction). I was in the first camp as my wife made me. In general, men resist seeing a doctor almost as much as they resist seeing a therapist. Therapy has less of a stigma for young men than earlier generations. According to this articl e, there appears to be about 2:1 female to male ratio of those who go to therapy. Why is it so difficult for men to seek therapy? Here are five possible reasons: Men fear exhibiting weakness: Though less true today, going to therapy is viewed as weakness as men tend to experience shame when asking for ...

Step off the cliff and fall into slumber Or step to the edge and look down There is darkness and the past below On the precipice of now and eternity Sit on the fence dividing Consciousness and nothingness This desert of liminal space Place of wanderings uncharted  To walk off the edge is to surrender One's thoughts to the whim of the wind Swirling and lost in the oblivion  A blissful trance of suspension drift To balk at the edge is to fight the fall Monkey mind screams against the plunge The body longs for the drop But thoughts panic from the heights Wicked dreams wait at bottom Lurid fantasies beckon Nightmares lurk on ledges unseen You don’t find out until you fall Some escape in the descent Some avoid it like the plague Fatigue chases the restless Until they’re caught and thrown down Long is the trusting fall of childhood Oft interrupted is the curse of age Apnea and anxiety make shallow depths While inno...

This article was originally published at SOLA Network on June 4th, 2019. In a previous post , I took issue with Brene Brown’s definition of shame and examined how we often overlook how shame occurs in the context of relationship and is the pain of disconnection. I defined shame as the exposure of a relational rift caused by one’s party misalignment with another party’s stated values. It can (and often does) result in thoughts of being worthless. And yet the act of incurring shame can also be a redemptive gift because of what Jesus has done. The shame of Jesus has two purposes: First, the misalignment of values rebukes the injustice embedded in the religious system at the time. The Messiah’s disgrace exposes the self-seeking nature of the Jewish ruling authority. Second, the shame of Jesus is evangelistic. It indicates to the world there is no person who falls so far in disgrace that Jesus is unwilling to fall deeper to catch. In other words, Jesus suffered shame to heal the rif...

In a post that I have now removed, I made an analogy between therapy and prostitution. I  apologize for the hurt it caused. The analogy was intentionally absurd and offensive. A friend asked me what lessons I learned from the response to the post. Here are several notable ones plus an explanation of what I was trying to do: First, I believe therapy is extremely helpful. My life has been changed for the better through interactions with my therapist. My marriage is stronger and my relationship with my kids healthier because of work I did in therapy. Over the past fifteen years, I’ve recommended and seen dozens of people benefit from therapy. As I’ve noted elsewhere, I had no intention of disparaging therapy though I recognize that contradicts the repugnancy of the comparison. Second, it hurts to be misunderstood. I could sense the outrage behind some of the responses because commenters perceived I misunderstood therapy and in doing so, misunderstood their experience and misun...

My dad and I in Southorn Playground When I was a kid, one of my enduring memories of my dad was lectures he gave my brother and me about his impoverished upbringing. He would regale us with tales of how hard he worked to gain entrance into National Taiwan University, make it to America, obtain a master’s degree, get a job at IBM, become a successful project manager, and then own an expensive home in Almaden Valley. I have not so fond memories of sitting there in guilt and shame as he described to my brother and me the circumstances he overcame because of his diligent work ethic. That was an enduring paternal narrative of my childhood. Unlike his immigrant peers, he didn’t put as much pressure on me or my brother to succeed but he was extremely critical of us and quick to point all the advantages we grow up with that he did not.  And then when I was around 13 years old, my dad became a follower of Jesus and his narrative gradually began to shift. It didn’t become apparent t...

The fog drifts in Surrounding all in quiet embrace Trees wrapped in mist Real masked by cloud The road is obscured My path is blank Objects are hidden Wisps whip past There is no sky There is no firmament There is only gray mass A cage of cloud trapping me Driving in fog Searching for a collision Blind and confused Barely seeing in front of me Uncertain of direction Unclear on the route Unsettled in mind Unseen obstacles in my path What does my future hold? Where are you, God? Why have you forsaken me? How can I see clearly? Frantic in thought Frenetic in action Heartbeat races But I drive on Frozen in fear Yet faster I go Faster to nowhere Further to go or too far past? But the LORD is the fog Stop moving Stop thinking Stop planning Stop searching Stop You cannot see me Because you’re moving You cannot feel me Because you’re too busy talking You need only to be still To see...

I hear the refrain so often. “I’m just looking for community” I hear it from single people. I hear it from married people. I hear it from parents with kids. But mostly I hear it from young people. So many young people. I hear resounding loneliness. I hear the pain of disconnection. I read about skyrocketing rates of mental health issues for young adults such as anxiety, depression, suicide rates, etc.. There is an increasing body of research on the real physiological damage that comes from social trauma and displacement. And yet in spite of the longing for community, emerging adults are less likely to attend church than prior generations of young adults. I hear people complain they don’t feel like they belong, that they’re not being fed, that they feel excluded, that people are judging them, and so forth. And I look at them and I just don’t understand how they can feel those things so powerfully when they barely show up to church. Of course, you feel excluded when you’re not r...