Faith Like a Child

The other night, we were saying a prayer together and my daughter, who is 4, demanded quite firmly to God to “take the sickness away and take away all problems.” It made me think of the verse in the book of Matthew in the Bible where Jesus is talking and says, “if you don’t turn your lives around and become like this little child, you will definitely not enter the kingdom of heaven” (matthew 18:3).

What are little children like? They are curious, demanding, eager and empathetic. My kids are so curious. My son is constantly upending boxes and containers, turnings things around and exploring the objects in his little world. He puts things in his mouth to learn how they feel and taste. He throws them across the room to see what will happen. My daughter is heavy in a science phase right now, and performs “experiments” in the bathroom that mostly involve filling up every container she can find with water and adding food coloring. Sometimes she convinces me to freeze the bowls of colored water to further the experiment. (She also narrates what she’s doing to her “mirror friend” – it’s seriously cute)

My kids are demanding. They fully expect that their needs will be met the moment they feel them. The instant they are hungry, they demand I feed them and don’t like to wait. Thirsty, needing the toilet or a hug – same story. They are aware of their needs, and expect their caretakers to fulfill them in short order. Beyond their needs, they frequently demand things they want out of life as well – to go to the park, build a fort, read this book, play that game.

My kids are eager. They are filled with energy and seem ready to enjoy all that life has to offer. They will sit still, to play with legos, craft, or read books, but they are always trying to draw joy, fun and satisfaction out of life.

And they are empathetic. My son has a book that goes through various emotions that people feel, with pictures of kids looking happy, sad, embarrassed or angry. He flips through that book and kisses all the kids who are sad, embarrassed, and angry. He is a tender little guy, constantly hugging and kissing all the stuffies in our house. He gives kisses to our carved pumpkins; I’ve even seen him kiss the floor and the wall! My daughter recognizes emotions in others as well, and gets sad thinking about other people who are sad. She has an innate drive to want to help, to alleviate the suffering of others, often offering to share half the brownies we’ve baked with our neighbor friends.

So having a childlike faith to me doesn’t mean blind acceptance and faith without intellect, as I think that sentiment gets interpreted often. Kids ask a million questions, they want to know everything! To me, a childlike faith is one that is self-aware, confident in the love of our Heavenly Father/Mother, and forceful in demanding that our own needs and those of others are met. It is feeling the pain of others, realizing that we are all connected, and somehow knowing that when one of us (humanity) is suffering, it hurts all of us.

(Just to ensure that you don’t walk away thinking I have actual angels for children, know that they are definitely working on sharing and the benefits of bringing joy to others instead of hoarding it all for themselves ;))

And just like with my actual children, those demands and needs aren’t always met right away or at all. Sometimes I tell them to wait to eat when they are hungry, because it is not yet a mealtime. Often they do not get the activity or thing they are demanding (lately my daughter keeps insisting that we build her a tree-fort in the backyard…). Sometimes the reason I say no is explained to them, other times it is not. They don’t always understand, usually because they can’t see the big picture that I am considering.

But holding it all up is the firm belief on their part, and actual Truth on my end, that they are loved. That they are worthy of having needs and having those needs be met. And that being in their position of privilege where their basic needs are always met requires them to look out and see who’s needs are going unmet, and to ask how they can help. I believe that is the childlike faith that Jesus requires of us all.

So let’s all keep demanding that “the sickness” (covid19) be gone, and keep trying to draw joy and fulfillment from this one, brief burst of life that we are gifted to live.

Whew

Man oh man. That was a very stressful week on top of a stressful year. 2020 is no freaking joke. I felt tension in my chest all week watching the election news slowly trickling in. We just found out this morning that Joe Biden and Kamala Harris won the election and will be our next President and Vice President.

I’ve been ecstatic all morning. Crying, smiling, dancing, screaming, shimmying and shaking. It feels like such a RELIEF to be almost done with the Trump Presidency. And I am a white person. The accounts of people of color I follow were all in tears as they finally get to feel safer in their own skin. They will no longer have a President who garners the support of white supremacists and tells Proud Boys to “stand by.” Transgender people can feel safer without getting banned from participation in being a full citizen. Did you know that more trans folks have been violently murdered this year than any other year on record?? Muslims can take a breath of fresh air knowing they won’t be banned from America again. Immigrants will be able to stop looking over their shoulders wondering if another raid is coming. Victims of domestic violence can get their full protection back under the law. LGTBQ people can stop feeling under attack from the highest seats in office.

America can take a deep breath and step forward.

I found myself wanting to say “Thank God” that Trump has lost. But do you know what? I really don’t think God is all that invested in American politics. The God of the Universe, who has been around since before time began, who has seen thousands of empires rise and fall, rise and fall, isn’t American. God isn’t a republican or a democrat. God sees all of humanity, Americans, Middle Easterners, Africans, Europeans, Asians, Antarcticans? (scientists, haha) all as God’s beloved creation, as God’s children.

This God I believe in cares about all of humanity and wants to see everyone thriving and living lives of safety, joy and peace. I imagine that God is happy when we take steps in that direction. God has, for whatever reason, seemingly limited their power to working through the hands and feet of actual humans living on the planet at any given time. It’s up to us to push the needle forward, to make sure the long arc keeps bending toward justice, to usher in the Kingdom of Heaven here on this earth.

I don’t think I’m being overly dramatic to say the Trump Presidency was a clear step in the opposite direction from that glorious future. His constant bullying, ridiculing of people with different abilities, pettiness, xenophobia, closed arms and tight fists, selfishness, greed, and division revealed a lot of ugliness still present in humanity today, in white Americans in particular. White America is still the overwhelming majority group in this country, and we narrowly voted Trump in in 2016 and narrowly voted him out now. The forces of temptation, that want to hold tight to power, that act as if there isn’t enough prosperity and goodness to go around, as if we are splitting a pie and wanting to hoard the pieces; they are strong. The fear of change, the fear of humbling oneself in order to think of the greater good, the fear of the “other” is very real.

I’ve been fighting hard to maintain decency toward Trump supporters. I do believe that we are all trapped in a bad system, one that is overly binary with only two choices to pick from, and that cunning men have spent lots of years and lots of dollars manipulating voters to think that Christians should all be voting in one particular way. I’m hopeful that the messiness of the last few years will allow us to usher in some creativity and change. America hasn’t given ourselves an update in a while, and we’re overdo. Things were changed in the past (I literally learned that the VP used to be whoever got 2nd most voters from watching Hamilton!), and it seems high tide to adapt again to our current population and situations. Hopefully we can find a better way to vote, a better party system, and a way to better represent all of America’s diversity in Congress, Senate and the Supreme Court.

We’ve got work to do. And I think God is counting on us to do it. It is humanities’ job to be God’s hands and feet and to make this world a better place for ALL who dwell here. Godspeed.

My Best Life

I’m periodically checking in to this online faith conference that is live this weekend. I got to hear Jeff Chu ask a question along the lines of: “Have our imaginations also fallen victim to the evils and suffering present in the world?”

He was asking, what are we living for? What good thing do we desire and want out of life, other than to avoid bad things happening.

The question really hit me, because I often operate like I’m always nervous for the other shoe to drop. When things are going well and I have no big complaints, I’m always nervous to jinx it. Suffering seems completely inevitable, and I believe it is, so I often live just hoping to avoid suffering. My prayers even look like that – “Please protect us from harm, keep my family safe, keep us healthy…”

If I unleash my imagination and dare to dream big for the opposite of suffering, what would that look like?

Research shows us that we are more motivated by a positive goal than by avoiding a negative consequence. Working to avoid suffering is not fulfilling or motivating to our lives. Trying to stay healthy because you are afraid of getting sick is not the best way to stick to healthy habits.

My positive, motivating, rewarding life looks like this: It is full of friendships. Both deep and surface level. I love people. I just read recently that people who participate in small talk, chatting in the checkout line, are happier overall. Human beings are built for community and connection, no matter how surface level and frivolous it may be at times. My best life is full of people. It’s (currently) going for walks, backyard dinners and bonfire dates. It’s Skype and phone calls.

My best life is full of family. My husband and I are loving and affectionate with each other, still making time to talk and cuddle. Our current scenario involves lots of interruptions as we save the kids from themselves and each other mid-sentence often, but we try. In my best life, I am mindful and present with my kids and get so much joy watching them grow and develop.

My best life is one in which I run a thriving business. By thriving, I mean keeping 16 hours a week full of patients at this moment in time. I’m not looking to see as many patients as possible and make as much money as I can. I’m looking to fill two days a week with patients, to help people get out of pain and dizziness and improve their function. My job is very rewarding, and I love having time at home with my kids while they are as young as they are. My best life maintains my version of a work/life balance, which currently is low on the work and high on the family time.

My best life gets me outside as much as possible. Whether simply in the backyard or at the park with my kids, or more adventurously going camping and hiking. Ideally, it’s traveling to new places (once that’s feasible again).

My best life involves lots of books. I love to read and am always interested in new topics. I gravitate toward non-fiction the most these days, but still get sucked in my a great novel here and there. In my best life, my brain is always stretching and growing, making new connections. I give myself permission to ask difficult, challenging, scary questions and see where they lead me.

My best life is one in which I respect myself and my body, treat it well with healthy decisions. No starving, dieting or guilt tripping, but a loving embrace of who I am and what I look like. It’s eating well because that makes me feel well. It’s exercising because that takes care of my mind, my body, and my emotions, and because that gives me more energy and more life to do the things I want.

My best life involves more dancing than I currently practice. Dancing is fun, energizing, athletic, a great way to work off stress, and did I say fun? I’m motivated to dance more.

My best life creates more opportunity for others. In my best life, I want folks around me, especially folks who don’t look like me, to have the same opportunities to live their best lives. I’m motivated to actively work toward civic liberties and equity for all so my privileges are not unique to my skin tone. In my best life, the people around me are thriving as well. My best life is not made easier through the subjugation of others. I don’t get to buy cheap clothes because someone made them in a sweatshop while getting taken advantage of. I make amends for the history of my people stealing land and stealing labor to get where we are today. It’s not a pie. There are enough pieces to go around – enough talent, enough resources, enough money, enough skill, enough goodness. There really are.

And more dancing 🙂

Fighting for Optimism

Something good did happen this year, in this cursed 2020. In fact, several good things happened and to save myself from giving up on humanity, I have decided to list them. These are all my own personal joys; I’m sure there are some societal positives out there, but I don’t have the energy to go digging, and digging would be necessary.

#1 My son has started talking. He has the sweetest little voice, and his growing vocab is so fun to observe. “Mailman!” is his most frequently screamed word (he’s obsessed, and is going to be a mailman for Halloween, with an official USPS costume and everything!). “Kank you,” is my favorite phrase of his, which he says often.

#2 One of my absolute best friends, who had moved away years ago, has moved back in town! We get to hug and dance and have play dates with our kids! It’s amazing!

#3 Friends of ours who have struggled with infertility for years have conceived and heard their baby’s heartbeat! Hallelujah!

#4 Aside from one awful week, we had a blissfully smoke-free summer in the PNW and got to enjoy lots of outdoor time. I took the early days of my unemployment to go on loooong, long walks while the kids napped/TV’d and my husband was working from home. Those long walks in the early spring/summer days, listening to encouraging, informative, and/or thought-provoking podcasts gave me a lot of life.

#5 Stemming from #4 and from being out in the yard so often, we’ve become friends with more of our neighbors! Two families in particular, with young kids close to our kids age, have been so great to get to know. It is super convenient to have fun people to hang out with within walking distance of our house 🙂

#6 My husband’s business is picking up a lot of momentum and looks to have its best year to date. It’s been so encouraging to watch all his hard work starting to pay off.

#7 My son finally got his molars, which honestly makes feeding him so much easier. He was super late getting teeth, so it’s extra appreciated now that he’s got them.

#8 I’ve been making new friends from starting my own business. Networking can be exhausting and overwhelming at times, but I’ve become actual friends with people I’ve met, which is a real treat. Making friends as an adult with someone you truly choose to make the effort with is so fulfilling.

#9 Opening my clinic has changed my mindset, invigorated me in my desire to learn and grow within my profession, and sparked my creativity in ways I didn’t anticipate. As Brené Brown perfectly says, “You’ll also wonder how you can feel so brave and so afraid at the same time. At least that’s how I feel most of the time…Brave, afraid, and very, very alive.”

#10 I finally got my pop-up camper that I’ve been wanting since the minute we got pregnant with our first child (over 4 years ago). It’s been on two maiden voyages now, and it is the best. I get so excited thinking about the trips we’ll take all over the Pacific Northwest and beyond with this baby.

#11 My daughter’s personality is emerging more and more, and is such a delight to watch. She is so creative, loves crafting and has illustrated multiple books now, and is trying to be funny (her one joke is “How do you make a tissue dance? Put a little boogey in it!” and is getting hard to keep laughing at with any semblance of genuine laughter). She overhears us listening to NPR and made her own “black people matter” signs for the yard without any prompting. She loves her brother, is affectionate, reasonable (as in, I can reason with her using logic and she can put off instant gratification), brave, friendly, and has the attention span to listen to 200+ page chapter books read aloud to her.

#12 The avocado tree that my daughter and I grew from an ordinary, grocery store avocado seed is THRIVING! Which is a huge relief, because I put a ton of pressure on that little seed to be the symbolic foreshadowing of how my fledgling new business would do. It’s looking like a good omen so far!

2020 has been rough. Personally, societally, and globally. I am normally an obnoxious optimist, and even I have struggled with staying positive or hopeful. I’ve honestly had some of the darkest thoughts/moments that I can recall in my life. But I keep telling myself that humanity has been through some rough waters before and made it through. Somewhere I heard or read (maybe it was Lisa Sharon Harper?) that we are witnessing the death throes of white supremacy. One can only hope. Fingers crossed that 2021 takes a massive pivot for the better.

Can we talk?

Can we have a real conversation, genuinely listening and seeking to understand each other, one in which we don’t both necessarily see eye to eye yet can manage to stay civil? Because that is possible, you know. Please comment below or reach out to me personally so I can hear your side.

I would like to talk about voting, as a Christian, and abortion.

Yeah.

I was discussing a conversation a friend of mine had recently, in which the person said, “We [Christians] have one platform: defend innocent life – so end abortion…Biblically, abortion is the only thing a Christian should be concerned with.”

May I gently, kindly, disagree? As a fellow, life-long Christian, I believe that there are many platforms which we should care about, politically, and that abortion doesn’t fit the #1 spot. There are a number of reasons, and I would like to clarify that I am all for ending abortions. I don’t want to see them be a part of our reality, and am not at all encouraging casual abortions by any means. I would also never vilify anyone who made or is making that choice, because there many reasons why we all do what we do, and I believe in grace for all.

My #1, which I derive from Jesus’ own self-proclaimed #1 command, is to love God, and to love my neighbor. Now, that is a broad command. It doesn’t boil down to one action or stance. It means a lot of things. And certainly, protecting the unborn is an act of love. And yet, that is one small piece of the “love your neighbor” puzzle.

Jesus also made it quite clear that our neighbor is every person. We are all neighbors. So the refugee is my neighbor, the immigrant is my neighbor, my political opponents are my neighbor, guns rights activists are my neighbor, pacifists are my neighbor, criminals are my neighbor, gay people are my neighbor, every color of person is my neighbor, and babies are my neighbor. I need to be loving them all, and one way I can do that is to protect their rights and stop discrimination and harassment against them as much as I am (feebly, it feels) able to from the voting booth.

So I would certainly push back against this idea that a Christian’s #1 concern in voting is to be abortion. The Bible’s official stance, if you want to go there, is that life begins at the breath. That’s all they understood of science at the time. The conservative church’s official stance (look it up ) prior to the 1970s, was that life began at breath (birth). Even after Roe v Wade, the official evangelical position was to support the option of abortion for cases of rape, incest, fetal deformity, and threats to the mother’s emotional, mental or physical health.

If you take even a brief glance back in evangelical (my background) church history, you will see that the church didn’t care much about abortion until the formation of the Religious Right. While fighting to stop integration at schools (you read that right, while fighting to keep private, Christian schools racially segregated), they realized they had some political clout when working together as an evangelical voting bloc. Abortion became the new rallying cry to get evangelicals to vote together as a pack, and “pro-life” became the token you needed to get elected by that group.

So, I’m not saying that Christians shouldn’t care about abortion. Of course not. But know your history, and realize that you may be getting played. No one you vote for has any power to change laws about abortion. Congress can’t do that, Senators can’t do that, the President can’t do that. Yes, the President appoints judges, who do control the laws, and the President can pick pro-life judges, but ultimately it is the judge’s call (who you aren’t voting for). And if you truly care about ending abortion, there are better ways to do that besides voting for someone who doesn’t actually hold that within their power.

Again, the thought of abortion saddens me deeply, and I would love to see a world in which they aren’t happening. Teaching actual sex-ed (not abstinence only) helps lower abortions. Having financial support for families, single mothers, and daycare decreases the desperation that drives someone to get an abortion. There are many, complex, nuanced reasons that people get abortions, so the solutions are many, complex, and nuanced. Let’s tackle more of those.

It’s harder work.

It’s not as easy as casting a vote and never thinking about it again until the next election.

How much do you really care?

Voting is complicated. There are lot of factors to weigh. It should be that way. Boiling it down to one issue is doing your civic duty a great disservice. Unless I myself run for office and vote for myself, I will likely never vote for a candidate that I agree 100% with. I go through a list of issues that I hold dear and weigh the candidates’ stances on each of those to make my choice. It’s a balancing act.

Again, please reach out and share your thoughts if they are different than mine. I can handle a tough conversation. I think we need to be having more of those. I’m open to new ideas. But please, please, vote and take it seriously this fall. Do your research, on candidates and on issues themselves. One resource I love is Pantsuit Politics (a podcast). They periodically do “primers” on different issues and go through the history and nuanced details. Or find a resource you like. Make your vote an educated one that you can truly stand behind.

Musical Thoughts

I’ve been reading a very nerdy book on neuroscience lately, called The Brain’s Way of Healing, by Norman Doidge. It’s been fascinating on many levels, both professionally (in my role as a physiotherapist) and personally. Our bodies and our brains are so amazing!

In one part of the book, he was discussing the question “Where, exactly, are our thoughts/ideas/emotions/memories located?” As in, does the brain have a literal file cabinet where specific cells are dedicated to store specific memories? Is the brain a big computer with enough RAM to store all our experiences?

The answer is NO, and there are multiple theories as to how memories and thoughts are actually stored. One theory which I LOVED that has captured my attention for days now, is that thoughts/ideas/emotions/memories are not statically stored in a physical location in the brain, but rather happen when all the neurons responsible for those thoughts/ideas/emotions/memories fire together.

He used the analogy of an orchestra. One memory isn’t the cello player, another thought the violinist, another idea the trumpet player. Rather, every thought/idea/emotion/memory is a song played by the whole orchestra. Individually, neurons are all separate musicians, and when they act together they create the song, which is the thought/idea/emotion/memory.

I thought this was so absolutely beautiful. Our brains are making music, creating a song that tells the story of our life and experience. It was inspirational for me to think about, and to ask myself what type of song was my brain making? There are times when my brain is a punk rocker (usually that’s when I’m thinking about politics), times when I’m making a folk song (anytime I’m outside enjoying nature), times when I run toward flamenco and Spanish guitar (while cooking, relaxing and reading), or the alternative rock set (backyard hangouts with friends).

What we think, what we notice, what we feel, what we attune to changes our experience. In psychology, there is a concept called the facial feedback hypothesis, which says that our body (in terms of the muscles of our face) will directly effect our emotions. So if you frown, you will actually feel crankier. If you smile, despite not feeling happy in the moment, you will begin to feel happier. I am sure that our thoughts have this same effect. Think calm, happy thoughts and feel calmer. Think angry, ranting, frustrating thoughts, and feel angry.

There is so much in life that we have no control over. No control over the environment, the weather, other people’s decisions (hugely apparent right now as we debate how we’re all handling the covid19 pandemic), changes to our health, etc etc. But we have more power than we realize to control how we respond to our circumstances. Our thoughts can be powerful.

What song are you writing with your brain?

Look Up

My family went camping this past weekend. Far away from the city’s lights, the night sky was inky black. We got lucky with a cloudless night, and the stars were popping out of the sky.

The kids had (finally) fallen asleep in the camper, and my husband and I got to sit out by the dwindling campfire and stargaze. There had been a meteor shower earlier in the week, and maybe it was residual meteors still flying around, but we saw 6 shooting stars! Some were quite bright and covered some distance before sparking out.

It got me thinking: there’s a likely chance that every night while I’m sitting on the couch in front of Netflix (or, more likely Disney+ for Hamilton!), there are shooting stars lighting up the sky above my house. While I’m doing the dishes, cleaning up the kids’ toys, washing up, reading my book, going to bed: celestial beauty flying around overhead.

It’s so easy for life to feel humdrum, to fall into a groove, and think that nothing special is happening. Even when things are good, the routine sets in quickly. Especially now, when everything seems negative (the pandemic, a deeper cultural reckoning of racism, Trump, the upcoming election etc), it can be easy to forget the beauty that is all around us. When really, it’s flying by overhead every night. We just need to take the time to look up.

I remember, back when I was young and cool and got to travel the world during college, I went SCUBA diving in Fiji. A whole new world was opened up to me. I felt like an intruder on another planet or in a magical new dimension. I was spying on a huge school of fish that turned and encircled me in a mesmerizing dance to the music of the stars. My astonished eyes roamed over the most intricate, delicate sculptures of coral that burst out in huge fanned formations from large rocks and underwater canyons. I almost gasped and lost my life line when one of the Fijians pointed out some coral that changed color when “tickled” by agitating the water around it. For deep sea companions, there were fish colored with a rainbow paintbrush, sea cucumbers, and electric blue starfish. I stood on the ocean floor at 15 meters below the surface and gawked like a tourist.

Millions of people will go their entire lives without ever experiencing the ocean depths the way I did. That complete oblivion strikes me as profound. Here was this entire world that I had never known existed. All this wonder and beauty and music had been there every day, and I was totally unaware.

The world is still a mess. Pain and evil still exist, and at the same time, we can try to see past the suffering to an underwater world of wonder and joy. Signs of beauty and love are all around us, hidden in the obvious, buried under the daily grind. I feel it in the sunshine on my face and a soft breeze while walking from my car into work. I hear it in my children’s giggles, the rustling of the wind in the trees, and the wind chimes from my neighbor’s porch. I smell it in the spring lilacs, in smoke from a campfire, in my baby’s soft skin.

Beauty, joy, humor, peace, love. They are always present somewhere. Sometimes, it’s as simple as taking the time to look up.

Strength in Numbers

{Sigh} 2020 is the actual worst. We all know this. I don’t need to list the reasons why, but one of them is that I have been laid off (again!) Never in my wildest thoughts did I think that I, as a physical therapist, would be laid off twice in the span of 8 months. But, covid19.

After reaching out to employers, doing the job searches, joining the job community fairs (virtually, of course), and collecting the unemployment, it became apparent that I was not getting hired any time soon this time around. There simply haven’t been jobs out there for a PT in my region. Unemployment has worked out for our family, and we’ve been able to stay afloat with the added funds from the CARES act, but the clock was running on that.

I am known for loudly and emphatically saying that I would NEVER want to own my own PT clinic. My husband suggested I think about it years ago, and I firmly said no thank you, sir. Who would want the stress of dealing with insurance, billing, and marketing when I could just show up to work every morning, treat my patients, type up my notes, and go home? But with the lack of job options on the horizon, and the need (and desire) to work still very much present, my mind started to go there.

About 5 years ago, I had taken a continuing education class on Chronic Pain. It was heavily based in the latest neuroscience, and argued that we as a society and a medical community still have a poor understanding of pain. Tissue damage does not equal pain, but most people, medical professionals included, tend to still think and act that way. It was a mind-blowing course, I geeked out all weekend, took a ton of notes, and felt that we were really missing the point the way we were currently treating people for chronic pain. But I went back to work and didn’t know what to do with it, since the approach the class argued we should take would look very different from traditional PT. Much less hands-on manual work, and much more talking, teaching, and getting to the roots of the problem.

Fast forward to getting laid off this past March, seeing that there weren’t going to be job options for a long time, and starting to think out of the box. What if I could open my own clinic, focused on a different approach to treating chronic pain? I could dive in deep and really mix it up, tackling this complex, complicated issue from a more holistic approach. Running my own clinic, I could allow things to look different from traditional PT.

I started looking into it. First I looked to see if anyone else in Spokane was doing this. I stumbled across a few other wellness groups. One clinic is run by an ARNP who has become a friend and mentor, and who strongly encouraged me to go for it and open my own place. So I reached out to former co-workers, gals who handled the insurance side of things. And the strong message I got from them was DON’T DO IT. Don’t work with insurance, it’ll be too much for you to handle by yourself, you’d need to hire someone right away to manage it all. You’ll be on hold for 45-minutes for every patient, calling all of their individual plans to verify benefits only to get obtuse, confusing answers, and end up seeing them without dotting some i or crossing some t that will mean you won’t get paid for the work you already did.

Ok. Yikes.

A friend from PT school sent me info on cash-based PT, with articles, blogs and resources to go out-of-network. This looked more promising. I could see patients and bill them directly, get paid upfront, and the patients could send in my bill to be reimbursed via their out-of-network benefits. There are successful PT clinics doing this around the country, in big cities and rural towns.

My next Google search pulled up the other cash-based PT clinics in the area. There were 2. I knew the woman, a former co-worker, running one of them, who reiterated that I should not work with insurance if I wanted to run my own place. I reached out to the other cash-based PT owner, who immediately offered to mentor me, answered ALL the questions I blitzed her way while she was on vacation, no less, and set up a video chat for when she returned from vacation.

Ok. I’m doing this.

Things start coming together. I reach out to a woman who runs her own acupuncture clinic that I had frequented as a patient, and she is happy to let me share space with her and work on the days she isn’t there. She is super chill and doesn’t mind if I share her furniture and treatment table, or hang posters in “her” room of the last 10 years. Her landlord immediately agrees to let me sublease, and she herself is an ARNP who used to run a wellness clinic out of the building and is really excited about what I’m trying to do.

Website made, business license acquired, business bank account opened, malpractice insurance secured, documentation system figured out, marketing begun.

I set a Grand Opening date for the first week of August. Now it looks like I own, run, manage and treat in my own PT clinic! Wahoo! NONE of this would have been remotely possible without the help of an army of people. The whole “self-made man” is such a myth. I guarantee you that any successful anyone did not get there without the help of others. I am so grateful to have friends, coworkers, mentors and a supportive spouse to have helped make this a reality. And I’m grateful to The Octonauts for entertaining my daughter while my son napped so I could get any work done during the day.

Earlier this year, my daughter and I attempted to grow an avocado tree from the seed of an avocado we had eaten, a regular, non-organic grocery store avocado. I do not possess a green thumb, so my hopes were not high. And shockingly, it worked! The seed cracked open, a sweet little root started working its way out, the crack split the seed from top to bottom, the tentative stem started to reach for the sky, and as of today, it has 3 leaves!! I’ve taken it as an omen. That little seed that I did not think would do anything has turned into a tree. And my little clinic, which I opened out of desperation, a lack of options, and a prayer, will hopefully Flourish into something strong and nourishing and beautiful.

(I would be remiss not to ask you to check me out if you live in the Spokane area and have any PT needs! 😉 FlourishPhysicalTherapyandWellness.com)

It’s Complicated

Life has felt more than a little crazy as of late. We’re still fighting a pandemic, which people have seemed to stop caring about. We are seeing the largest rise of racial justice protests and movement I’ve ever witnessed in my life, both across every state in the US and in countries around the world! That is both exciting and depressing that it took the murder of another undeserving person of color to get people to finally care enough to do something. We’re coming up to a Presidential election which is always its own special kind of crazy. We’re still in an economic crisis. Whew.

As I’ve been getting more and more engaged with politics and civil issues, I’ve found a very tempting tendency, which I have certainly fallen into many times, of over-simplifying things. It’s mentally easy to make things black and white, good and evil, right and wrong with no in-betweens, no gray zones. I’ve never used the n-word, so I’m not racist. I’m a Christian, so I vote Democrat (in my case; I think for a lot of people it’s the reverse). Welfare recipients are taking advantage of the system. Immigrants are bad/dangerous/stealing our jobs. When in reality, it’s never that simple.

Especially as I’ve learned more and more about racism in the US, I’ve been blown away by how ingrained and complex it can be. One of the podcasts or books I’ve read on the topic said that racism is the air we breath in the US. It can be hard to see, hard to define, and hard to identify when we’ve grown up here, especially as white people. But it is a very complicated topic and history. Do the research.

As a Christian, I’ve grown up reading the Bible. I’ve read the whole thing multiple times and many books several times. I haven’t been to seminary and I don’t have a degree in theology or Biblical studies, but I’ve been reading lots of books by people who have. They have taught me that the Bible is complicated. The many different books (66) are written by many different authors in many different writing styles (poetry, history, prophetic, personal letters) and in more than one language. Each book was written to a specific group of people in a specific era with a specific lived experience that would have common knowledge within itself which is no longer common knowledge to us today. The Bible was not written to or for modern day Americans. It’s not trying to answer all the questions we may have with today’s mind. It was very preoccupied with its own questions (most notably how to explain the exile of the Jewish people to Babylon, did God abandon them? Etc etc) So the stories, the meaning, the implications – it’s all complicated. We miss out on a lot when we don’t do the research.

I understand the desire to make things simple. Life is crazy, busy, difficult, stressful, and complicated as it is. In addition to the entire first paragraph above, we all have our own personal issues, drama, family problems, health problems, financial stress etc. Life is hard! It can be equally beautiful, but it is hard! So it’s nice to take the easy way, to not do the extra research or searching or thinking, and go with the pre-formed ideas that come out of whatever package we ascribe to. I get it. I’ve done it.

The truth is, in very every single issue in politics, in religion, and in life, things are complicated! I’ve been reading a fantastic book on politics called I Think You’re Wrong (But I’m Listening) by Sarah Stewart Holland & Beth Silvers. They do such an amazing job of discussing politics from each side of the traditional aisle (Sarah from the Left and Beth from the Right) and doing so in a nuanced, grace-filled, amicable way. Their book is the closest thing to therapy I’ve ever read. It’s pointed out areas that I’ve fallen back on talking the party talk. They bring up many examples of different political hot-topics – welfare, trade, healthcare, abortion, etc  – and show how truly complicated these issues often are. I certainly have not done all the research to fully understand many if not all of these topics. I have “formed hardened opinions on subjects without understanding them.”

We all only have so much mental energy, so much time, so much brain power. It is necessary and ok to prioritize and have boundaries. What I’ve been realizing is that I need to keep my mouth shut more often when I don’t really know what I’m talking about. I don’t have the right to get into heated conversations if I haven’t done the research. And I should be doing the research more often. We live in the nirvana age of access to information. I can do a quick google search on my phone, make sure I’m looking at a trusted source (and hopefully a few), and learn some background on a topic. The ladies who wrote the book I’m reading have a podcast called Pantsuit Politics, in which they’ve done several “primers” on complicated political topics to give people the background knowledge in 20-30 min sessions. There are books and podcasts on any topic you care about that make it easier to learn from someone else who has done the deep dive.

I think if I, and more of us, could stay calm when discussing current events and politics, and could stay open and humble, we could enjoy a much more friendly atmosphere. Staying humble allows us to truly care about the person we’re talking to, to remember that they are in fact fully human and deserving of dignity, even when we don’t agree, and to listen with curiosity before jumping to respond. Staying open allows us to dig down to the root issues of why people think the way they do and find that maybe there is some common ground that has translated into different courses of action.

I’ll be honest. I’ve truly struggled with understanding anyone who supports President Trump. I see him act in ways completely counter to what I value as a Christian and as a decent human being. They are too many to list here. He’s one of the few people that I truly find despicable. However, I know people who voted for him. The people I know personally who voted for Trump are good, loving people. They volunteer and spend their time and money helping others. Again, it’s complicated. I’ve seen a lot of people unfriending and unfollowing people they disagree with or who vote differently than they do. I think that is so dangerous. The more we cancel each other out, the more set in our ways we all get.

Let’s try to find a way to have healthy conversations again. Let’s stop villainizing the “other side.” Let’s remember the full humanity of everyone we’re talking too. People are complicated, motivations are complicated, issues are complicated. Let’s stop taking the easy, lazy way and actually do a little research. Actually learn about the issues and the history. It’s always more complicated than it seems. Maybe your stance doesn’t change, but at least you get more sympathetic to other viewpoints. I think if we can practice true listening, humble hearts, and open minds, we can change the ugly state of US politics. And especially with an election coming up, that is my deepest prayer.

To My Fellow White People

I grew up in a suburb of Chicago. It was an insulated upbringing. My world was white. White staff at school, white classmates, white pastors at church, white friends. There was some diversity, but little enough that it was very noticeable. I never had to think about race. I fully assumed that my culture was just “normal life.” Anything else was “ethnic,” “exotic,” “other.”

My mom worked for the local police department for a period of time, so I knew some of the officers on a first name basis, and would roll my eyes if they pulled me over while driving around with my friends, knowing they wanted to scope out us high school girls. Never once worried about the results of such an encounter.

I would go for long, long bike rides down miles of suburban and country roads. I would jog around the local lake by myself. I would have friends over regularly for bonfires. We’d sneak around in the dark to TP each other’s houses. I worked as a lifeguard at the lake, and various other fast-food jobs throughout high school. Never once worried about my skin putting me in danger.

I went away to Marquette University in Milwaukee and finally encountered more diversity. Not really within my classes at MU, which was still predominantly white. But through the neighborhood, through volunteering with groups like Big Brother/Big Sister and different soup kitchens and after-school tutoring programs. I noticed the differences in Milwaukee’s communities of people of color, noticed the fear of wandering too far off campus into the “dangerous” outlying neighborhood.

I was fortunate to have been paired with a random, freshman roommate who became a sister for life. Her family was from India, and through her I ended up joining the Indian Student Association on campus, and participated in their cultural events and dance shows. I learned a Diwali candle dance and Bharatanatyam style dances. Most importantly, I was exposed to a huge friend group of people who mostly did not look like me. And, still ignorant to my white privilege, I remember thinking how FUN it was to be the only white person at some of our parties, and how cool I felt. Not realizing that for a lot of my new friends, the experience of being the only brown person in the room a majority of the time could be alienating and exhausting.

I traveled farther away for one semester to Melbourne, Australia, and there I made friends from all over the world. I made lots of friends from Australia, but also from Malaysia, Mexico, Japan, Canada, Germany, France, the Philippines, and lots of fellow Americans from around the States. And I began to appreciate the absolute beauty that comes from diversity, from seeing humanity in all it’s beautiful, colorful, varied, fascinating and messy differences. I was in the minority again, this time for being a Christian. Australia is very atheist, and there is a strong presence of Islam from different ethnic groups. I was beginning to see more of what my identity meant beyond “the norm.” The way I lived and acted, ate and worshipped was not the norm for most of the rest of the world.

Fast forward to young adulthood. I’ve gotten more political, started paying better attention really to the world around me. And the terrifying reality of white supremacy was showing itself to me. I started watching the sickening pattern in the news:

Trayvon Martin, Philando Castile, Sandra Bland, Tamir Rice, Freddie Gray, Eric Garner, Michael Brown, Ahmaud Arbery, Breonna Taylor, George Floyd.

I started reading books:

When They Call You a Terrorist by Asha Bandelle and Patrisse Cullors

The Warmth of Other Sun’s by Isabel Wilkerson

Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl by Harriet Jacobs

Between the World and Me by Ta-Nehisi Coates

I’m Still Here: Black Dignity in a World Made for Whiteness by Austin Channing Brown

Raising White Kids by Jennifer Harvey

Defining Moments in Black History by Dick Gregory

Me and the White Supremacy by Layla F. Saad

Seven Sisters and a Brother: Friendship, Resistance, and Untold Truths Behind Black Student Activism in the 1960s

Killers of the Flower Moon: The Osage Murders and the Birth of the FBI by David Granny

Native: Identity, Belonging, and Rediscovering God by Kaitlin Curtice

This Will Be My Undoing: Living at the Intersection of Black, Female and Feminist in (White) America by Morgan Jerkens

Just Mercy: A Story of Justice and Redemption by Bryan Stevenson

So You Want to Talk about Race By Ijeoma Oluo

The Wrong End of the Table: A Mostly Comic Memoir of a Muslim Arab American Woman Just Trying to Fit In by Ayser Salman.

I started to learn more about the full history of our country. Of course I’d always known that white Europeans came over and wiped out the Indians, ended up kidnapping and stealing people away from their homeland in Africa to work as slaves, and established America. But SO MUCH got glossed over, and not fully examined in that history and the long-reaching after effects it has had on the very fabric and nature of this country.

There is a lot of history there and a lot to learn. And white people don’t have to bother since we are often not directly affected by race. Unless you marry someone of another color, or someone in your family does, or you or someone you know adopts a child of another color (and even in all those situations), it is very easy to remain ignorant. But we do so at the peril of Black and Brown lives.

America was founded on the idea of white supremacy, that the “Christian” (I don’t know how to call people who believed in manifest destiny and were totally ok with genocide and owning other humans Christians without the biggest eye roll in the world) founders of this country believed that they were superior to the people already here and the people they’d stolen away from their homelands to work for free and literally build the country. To stomach genocide and owning people, white people had to lie to themselves that those folks were less than fully human. And that lie has stuck around in a thousand different ways.

And not only has the belief that white is better, that white is “normal” and anything else is too [loud, ethnic, foreign, different, aggressive, etc etc] stuck around, but racist practices and laws were molded into the very fabric of America. Red lining, funding differences to predominantly black school districts, sentencing differences for crime, racial profiling; race laws are as prevalent as they are ugly.

Racism is still here, because it is a core part of America. White people NEED to recognize that, to educate themselves on the topic since our white schools did not teach us the full truth, and we need to speak up. We need to be calling our elected officials; we need to be voting in anti-racist politicians. We need to increase our exposure to diversity and read books, watch movies and shows, and follow black and brown artists. We need to examine our whiteness and what the invisible effects that has had on our lives. Me and the White Supremacy is a great book for that, and there are a lot of black activists out there doing the work that we can follow and support. The Great Unlearn / Rachel Cargle, Lisa Sharon Harper, Writing to Change the Narrative/Nyasha Williams, United Street Tours / Chakita Sharnise, Speaking of Racism, TNQ Show (The Next Question) / Austin Channing Brown, Latasha Morrison, Ibram X. Kendi, Black Lives Matter, there are many.

To my fellow white people: PLEASE do the work. Please learn about racism and white supremacy. Please be humble, be aware of our history and how that has affected us as white people over people of color, whether you feel it personally or not. Please try not to get defensive or to bury your head in the sand and pretend like we had a Black President so racism must be over. It is not. I promise you. And the longer we stay ignorant, the more of our black and brown brothers and sisters will keep dying. There is a lot to learn and a LOT of work to do to overcome it and become truly a country with Liberty and Freedom for ALL. And we need everyone on board.

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