community is hard to find, and the misadventures of trying to find it. March 7, 2011

i seem to only blog when i want to complain.

this may be due to the lack of intimate friendships in which i feel i have someone to call up or share with. i need to externally process and so it comes out here.

tonight we will examine the many ways in which community is  hard to find,  and the misadventures of trying to find it.

hindrances:

1) all my gosh-dang friends got married all in the span of like, a year. i have 3-4 single friends remaining.

1a) many of them seem to not be in need of friends. apparently husbands are good enough.

2) all my gosh-dang friends—single or married,  live about an hour away, save 1 or 2 in the area.

2a) the distance means I have to plan ahead. in the middle of the week the last thing i want to do is try and plan another thing on another day. i’m tired and i just dont want to be blocked in to another thing. but by the time friday and saturday roll around i wish i had, and its too late. I can’t just call someone and say “come on over” when they live an hour away.

3) i feel the lack of deep conversation and life-giving friendship because of being spoiled rotten in college with amazing ones all the time.

3a) due to the nature of my job (working in campus ministry), i am in constant close proximity of deep theological and intimate conversations, therefore reminding me of my love — and lack– of them personally in my life. it dangles in my face more than it would if i were working in another field.

4) i do not have an “office” community of people that i can meet, network through my company, or build a sense of comrodary with. i see my coworkers once a month, or once/twice a week during work. most of my coworkers are spread out across a region. we can’t just “go out for happy hour” or have a weekly volleyball game.

4a) most of the coworkers have expressed that they do not need community from our job environment because they have church and friend and family community that satisfies them. new people need not apply for friends.

5) the people i do work with are still considered my peers. i’m 23, and some of my friends are still in college. i have a real struggle with hanging with my students.  although i could still (and will) consider them friends, they are my students and so even hanging out is really work. when i’m with them i need to be “on”.

5a) i still need to remain an authority figure as well and remain somewhat professional with them.

5b) i can’t rely on them to be my friends because that’s not fair to them, its not how this works. I am THEIR friend, but they are not there to meet my emotional and spiritual needs. they are not in the place nor should they be, to fill that. i can’t go to them with my problems or thoughts or for counsel.

5c) it also then feels like everywhere i go my students are there. if my students are also my friends, i’m never off of work and they are not life-giving friendships. i need breaks from them in order to minister to them and serve them when i should.

6) my schedule is wacky, and so is everyone else’s.

6a) my schedule is flexible, and so i make myself available in all sorts of ways, but friends have more conventional time frames and can’t take me up on offers to do things during the day or later at night.

7) planning something weekly or otherwise, begins to feel like another small group, or another event on my calendar to squeeze in, and to check off having attended. how do you build organic fellowship when we need structure?

8) if 5% of the population is really Christian, even less than that of it are young people. its all just old people or kids at church. Where are the young people going after God?

9) even if i have initiative, me heading something up or starting something takes a bunch of energy. i’m in a place where i need to just attend something. i need to be poured into which is what i’m lacking.

10) making friends is really hard outside of college! it takes alot of emotional energy. and there again, is it dire enough for me to over extend my capacity in order to make/maintain friends? instead it becomes easier to retreat.

experiments:

1)  bible study on wednesday mornings at Central. turned out to be so full of rules and complications (and old ladies) as a part of a national organization called Community Bible Study. it was people from all different churches, not just ours, and they needed to sit me down to “explain how it works” and all were curious how a new person showed up, not to mention that i was young.  i doubt i will return, both because of how weird it was, but also that i’m not always off on wednesday mornings. that story was pretty traumatic, ask me about it some time.

2) college central- i tried being involved in the college sunday school at my church, but found it to be a bit slow, a lack of consistency in members, and just an overall feeling of fatigue at having to be “at work” another day of the week. especially on a day when i’m supposed to get rejuvenated. i really did go for a while but realized i wasn’t going “for me” and so i stopped.

3) girls night- there is a group that goes to starbucks at 8 or 9 pm on a weeknight to get together and talk. one problem is that i was always already at starbucks for work and also that time of night wasn’t the best for returning there at 5am the next morning. it is made up of college girls, and young married women and moms who seem to like to pour into the college age girls. this would be great, except all we wind up talking about is twilight and which boy is cute lately and who might be good to go on a date with and have you watched that show on tv about blah blah blah. shallow conversations, week after week. i forced myself to go to these because i knew i needed community, but i was not finding what i am deeply desiring there.

4) women’s retreat- i am going on my church’s womens retreat this weekend. this will likely be another experiment in community building where i may be disappointed with corny-ness and everyone being old. i really hope i’m able to connect with a few people and that i don’t have all my walls up. when i see that others already seem to have their set of friends, i sort of shut down and wander hopelessly.

5) dinner. i set a plan to have one person/couple over each week during winter break for dinner. i could use my singleness and flexible schedule to host people and use the house and place i am in life to have people over for dinner. i would take advantage of my stage in life of freedom to build community. i would plan ahead, but only really choose from people who are close enough to come over to dinner during the week. Every person I asked for every date i asked said they couldn’t. –feelings of rejection/failure. i just gave up.

6) i tried my best to plan meals and gatherings with the housemates i have, but they all have different schedules and different priorities. so far all school year we have eaten one meal together. its hard to keep pushing ideas for community building when no one else will help you try to arrange it, or who will make it a priority.

7) i have frequently gone out of my way for the sake of my friends and building those relationships. i consider friendship a high priority and so i will rearrange my schedule, stay up later than i should, skip things, and even be downright irresponsible in order to maintain a friendship. its not the same as people-pleasing. but perhaps this is a little extreme. i pay the consequences later for not having any sleep or for spending the money or the time in order to be in relationship. i sometimes regret it or it produces stress in my life, but i always think it is worth it. this mentality is not often reciprocated because its a “look out for number one” world. i’ve been burned by other people not being willing to put the same time and effort in to being friends and I am.

i often reflect on how much i love my life right now. i could have never expected to be in a job so fulfilling and oozing with purpose and life. so flexible and fun. and affirming and uplifting. the freedom i have and the life i have is really awesome!

and just every now and then you get in a funk where you can’t see whats right in front of you because you’re too busy complaining. and thats now. i’m not sure if i’m overly dramatic about my “loneliness” but its just what i feel.

i know many people all feel the same way, but we’re all somehow tired of arranging, putting ourselves out there, having a fear of rejection, both in plans and as a person. and so none of us do anything about all this.