Thank you, Blake. I only just now realized what a wonderful recommend you gave my book :) Grateful. I can use all the help I can get! The story is still largely undiscovered. :)
I am late to this discussion,but wanted to relate that your work and honest sharing is appreciated. I am a boomer and struggle just to understand. I did manage to self pub my deconstruction story with paid help as to the technology. Hope u don’t if I mention here…gonna have to assume you’ll forgive it. “something to say” by LeeAnn Summerfield (Amazon). I feel that the whole relevance and only great meaning of my life is contained in this painful story. Only in the last two years have I discovered that I am not alone
Such good thoughts today. Many thanks. Exvangelical is the concept and new identity that allowed many of us to begin to imagine a new future for ourselves.
Pondering today's entry... Did we ever imagine, when in, the confused, convoluted and weirdly diabolical system that is today's evangelical universe? The thrashing push-back and defensive posture verify that it is now a wholly branded political, social and economic system so void of morality or empathy that it spends an inordinate amount of its effort putting down perceived "enemies" and re-defining those who have left as unqualified, bitter critics. It ghosts the rest as insignificant while also somehow being horrible. Meanwhile, it has the proverbial tiger by the tail as it defends, self-promotes and maintains thought dominance among followers increasingly solidified through an amorphous social media identity politically weirder and more ridiculous than the tiny John Birch obsessed Pentecostal church of my evangelically saturated childhood.
How do we now maintain our sanity, our balance? We are learning to take our happiness in small increments--a morning routine, the little life choices no one can judge but comprise who we really are, in loving our animals and kindred humans, soaking in great liberating thoughts and music, trying to manage anxiety--and we realize how lucky we are. We found the way to finally release the clamp on the brain that forced thought conformity and the constant need to be right. Remember when we always knew we were right. How incredible to finally be free of that.
Having left all social media (because old; one can digitally obliterate themself, disappear, and have no one be at all concerned) I still keep an eye on it through a myriad of articles and newsletters, partly because most of my extended family is still in and, like most of us, I still know more about it than they. I push back with reason every chance I get, and there are interactions when I think it is making a difference individually. At least it is personally satisfying.
I sometime wonder where in all this mess I would be if my income still depended on it. I wonder how many feel they can't get out since they don't want to risk losing their life, identity and every relationship and connection they have in their lives. I do know that when I lay down at night that I am deeply serene and sometimes truly happy. Yes, far happier than I ever felt in the troubled decades of my evangelical self. Enough.
Please take care, and live well. You are appreciated.
Thank you, Blake. I only just now realized what a wonderful recommend you gave my book :) Grateful. I can use all the help I can get! The story is still largely undiscovered. :)
I am late to this discussion,but wanted to relate that your work and honest sharing is appreciated. I am a boomer and struggle just to understand. I did manage to self pub my deconstruction story with paid help as to the technology. Hope u don’t if I mention here…gonna have to assume you’ll forgive it. “something to say” by LeeAnn Summerfield (Amazon). I feel that the whole relevance and only great meaning of my life is contained in this painful story. Only in the last two years have I discovered that I am not alone
Such good thoughts today. Many thanks. Exvangelical is the concept and new identity that allowed many of us to begin to imagine a new future for ourselves.
Pondering today's entry... Did we ever imagine, when in, the confused, convoluted and weirdly diabolical system that is today's evangelical universe? The thrashing push-back and defensive posture verify that it is now a wholly branded political, social and economic system so void of morality or empathy that it spends an inordinate amount of its effort putting down perceived "enemies" and re-defining those who have left as unqualified, bitter critics. It ghosts the rest as insignificant while also somehow being horrible. Meanwhile, it has the proverbial tiger by the tail as it defends, self-promotes and maintains thought dominance among followers increasingly solidified through an amorphous social media identity politically weirder and more ridiculous than the tiny John Birch obsessed Pentecostal church of my evangelically saturated childhood.
How do we now maintain our sanity, our balance? We are learning to take our happiness in small increments--a morning routine, the little life choices no one can judge but comprise who we really are, in loving our animals and kindred humans, soaking in great liberating thoughts and music, trying to manage anxiety--and we realize how lucky we are. We found the way to finally release the clamp on the brain that forced thought conformity and the constant need to be right. Remember when we always knew we were right. How incredible to finally be free of that.
Having left all social media (because old; one can digitally obliterate themself, disappear, and have no one be at all concerned) I still keep an eye on it through a myriad of articles and newsletters, partly because most of my extended family is still in and, like most of us, I still know more about it than they. I push back with reason every chance I get, and there are interactions when I think it is making a difference individually. At least it is personally satisfying.
I sometime wonder where in all this mess I would be if my income still depended on it. I wonder how many feel they can't get out since they don't want to risk losing their life, identity and every relationship and connection they have in their lives. I do know that when I lay down at night that I am deeply serene and sometimes truly happy. Yes, far happier than I ever felt in the troubled decades of my evangelical self. Enough.
Please take care, and live well. You are appreciated.