Vulnerability

"How are you doing?"

I always cringe when I hear this question. But typically I know how to answer it. If we're passing each other in the hallway, or in the line at Starbucks, or at the grocery store, I know the answer to this question.

"Good! How are you?" and we move on.

But at the beginning of a potentially two hour long coffee date after weeks of the "Good! How are you?"s, I'm always a bit at a loss.

I'm good. Really. But then as I start talking, I realize that there are things I've been stuffing under the "Good"s and the "Great"s... things that are expected to be stuffed when it's just a quick nod at the other person's existence.

But when there is time created for a true "how are you?" the stuff starts coming. It starts slowly at first. Perhaps a confession of exhaustion, of "this is hard," and then, slowly, yet somehow all at once, everything just pours out. It feels like the faucet pipes have been unclogged, and deep, ugly, hard truth comes pouring out.

It's interesting, but I never seem to choose vulnerability beforehand. I don't go into a meeting with someone saying, "today I'm going to be really vulnerable. I'm going to tell them how I'm really doing." Rather, it's a question that catches me offguard. And suddenly the faucet gurgles, and out comes all the goop that's been lodged in there for a bit too long.

It's a question like, "How have your quiet times with God been recently?" and then realizing there's been a build up of fear, resentment, distrust in our relationship, and that I've been avoiding Him.

Or, "What are you most worried about in moving to Hungary?" and the pit in my stomach growls: loneliness. ignorance. failure. misfit.

Or even the innocent questions of "How are you feeling about leaving? You must be so excited." and the joy and the sadness mix together, while I nod uncertainly, trying to figure out which I feel most powerfully at the moment, feeling guilty for not being excited enough... or that most often the sadness wins because I know what it is I'm leaving behind. But I also feel guilty when the excitement triumphs... because leaving my life, my ministry, my family, my friends, my world is the hardest thing I've ever had to do, and yet, there is nothing more exciting than diving headfirst in obedience to what the Lord has called me to.

But without the questions, I am strangely numb. I am numb to the fact that my life is changing. It's like I'm watching everything happen to me, yet I feel nothing. I am thankful to have people in my life who ask the hard questions, and make time to listen... to help clear out the gunk in the faucet. Because I'm apparently incapable of clearing it out myself.

I'm thankful for the questions that prompt me when I am too exhausted to prompt myself. I'm thankful for people who take time to listen to me, and ask me about how I'm doing. Who ask the annoyingly hard questions, even when I bat them away and roll my eyes.

The people who don't look away, whose eyes find mine even after I've avoided the question, who wait for the answer to a hard question even when it seems like an impossibly long amount of time has passed.

The people who have given me space to be vulnerable. To process. Who have demanded vulnerability of me, not by force, but by giving my tired, numb, fickle heart a voice.

Thank you.