Notes from the Wayside: Introspection: Fake It 'til You Break It

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Fake It 'til You Break It

Let your yes mean yes, and your no mean no.

Matthew 5:37 (CEB)

I hold my breath as this life starts to take its toll

I hide behind a smile as this perfect plan unfolds

From "Away from Me" by Evanescence

In May of 2009, I took a week off from work to do some home repair in another town, as a part of a regional work-camp ministry of my denomination.¹ When I returned to the office after Memorial Day, I learned that the company for which I worked, which had recently bought another company, was consolidating offices and moving all operations out of state. Most people would have considered such a revelation to be bad news. I, on the other hand, considered it an answer to prayer. I hated my job because I was ashamed that I worked for a casino vendor. I had been praying for months that God would somehow get me out of it, and I finally had a legitimate reason to leave.

At that time, I wanted nothing more than to get out of my job, but it seems that my job didn't want to get its claws out of me. Not long after I learned about the company's impending move, I received a call from my supervisor. He asked me if I would meet with him and our boss at the company's new headquarters to discuss the possibility of my relocating. I told him I was not at all interested in moving, nor was I interested in hearing any offers. I thought the matter was settled.

I was wrong. Not long after the first call, my supervisor called me again, and, once again he asked me to meet with him and our boss at the new location. I asked if the reason for the meeting was something we could discuss over the phone. He said it wasn't, so I had no choice but to drive two hours to the company's new location in the next state over.

My boss, who was already aware that I was unwilling to relocate, asked me if I would be interested in working from home temporarily. This was not what I wanted to hear. I had been given a way out of my job, but my job was trying to suck me back in. To be perfectly honest, the arrangement was feasible, though it would have been impractical. The light at the end of the tunnel was growing dim, so I responded with the only excuse I could find. I said that, living with my mother, I would not have enough room at my house for the equipment I needed to do my job. My boss was a bit surprised with my response. He offered to rebuild the setup I had been using, and I told him that there still wouldn't be enough room for it.

Sometimes you just have to put your foot down and stop the merry-go-round.

My boss told me that my last day would be July 31. He also said that I might be asked to work from the new location during my last week or two. As you can probably tell, I wasn't very keen on traveling. Typically what got me through the workday was the knowledge that I would get to go home in a matter of hours, so I didn't really want to start living out of a hotel, even for a couple of weeks. In fact, during my interview, I specifically asked if the job would require any travel, and my boss told me that it was not a "road warrior" job. For some reason - perhaps I was just being honest - I told him that I didn't really want to work at the new location.

With that comment, my boss had apparently had enough. Since he had already effectively terminated me, he was left with no other response but to tell me exactly what he thought of me. He told me that he was shocked that a programmer of my caliber would be so uncooperative. He told me that he was very disappointed in me and that I needed to think about that.

Believe me when I say that I've thought long and hard about what a no-good, dirty, arrogant, self-important, self-centered, foul-tempered, mean-spirited, uncouth, unprofessional, disloyal, dishonest, money-grubbing, slave-driving, bottom-dwelling piece of work he is.²

But at least I'm not bitter.

I think a large part of my problem back then was the fact that I wasn't being completely honest, with myself or with others. That day, I was less than forthcoming with my boss, but that ugly confrontation was just the result of a history of dishonesty. Everybody in my life knew that I wasn't happy with my job, but, around my superiors, I played the part of a good employee. When I accepted that job, I hadn't honestly thought through my feelings about working in the gambling industry, because I was too worried about getting a job. When I was in college, I wasn't completely honest with myself about the fact that I didn't really want to be a computer programmer. I just focused on graduating so that I could get a job that would pay the bills, which is what I was supposed to do.

Recently I've come to realize that what happened with my first job has been a repeating pattern in my life. Basically, I have a tendency to float my way into a bad situation and to stay in it far too long, and eventually I will have to fight my way out, at least emotionally. The details vary from time to time, but the pattern follows a general progression.

Because I'm living without intentionality, I float into a situation in which something is expected of me, and I stay because I have people-pleaser tendencies. It's not like I have anything else going on in my life, so I don't exactly have a good reason to say "no."

As more and more is expected of me, I become unhappy. I hide my feelings - from others or even from myself - because I want to do the right thing and, more importantly, because I don't want anyone to hate me.

I become depressed because I feel stuck. My depression manifests itself as irritability or outright anger. By this time, obligation has given birth to resentment, and I wonder why I have to put up with this crap when nobody else does.

Inevitably the time comes when I can no longer pretend to be happy. I finally decide to extricate myself from the situation, and I end up hurting people, disappointing people, or letting people down.

I have a friend who lives by the adage, "Fake it 'til you make it." I think my way of life can be described as, "Fake it 'til you break it."

A couple of years ago, because of pressure and meddling from other people, I ended up in a relationship that wasn't right for me. It had not become romantic, but I knew that the other person had feelings for me that I didn't have for her. When I could no longer fake a smile, I broke things off with her. I ended up hurting the person I least wanted to hurt - probably the most innocent person I have ever met - and I hated myself for months afterward. She forgave me, but, in some sick way, I think I would have felt better if she resented me.

Another part of my life in which I wasn't fully honest about my feelings was my involvement with my church - the church I had attended for my entire life. Despite the fact that I was heavily involved in the church, serving on the Church Council, teaching Sunday school somewhat regularly, and even preaching occasionally, I wasn't very happy about being there. It is not easy to be the only young person at a very small church. For me, it was a lonely existence, and I felt as though the future of the church was on my shoulders. In the last year or so before I finally decided to leave, my attitude had grown worse and worse. I think that others in the church, including the previous pastor, suspected that something about me was amiss.

The size of my church's congregation had been in decline since long before I was born. The church had been focused inward for far too long. Younger people left; older people passed away; and, every now and then, someone would become angry with someone else and leave. Eventually, I was the only young person left. Late last year, when the Church Council began discussing our pastor's upcoming transfer to another church, I remember saying that we needed a pastor who would light a fire under our seats, figuratively speaking. Six months later, we were assigned such a pastor - the ambitious type we desperately needed - but it turns out that I was the one who could not take the heat.

After the new pastor arrived, I started to become increasingly nervous, and I started having stomach problems on Sunday mornings. In my time on the Church Council, I had seen firsthand how resistant to change the congregation was, and, after a failed partnership with a local homeless ministry last year, I began to feel that any progress in the church would depend on me. I felt that more and more would be expected of me when I didn't really want to be there. I was lonely: I wanted to be with people my age. I felt that my church needed more from me than I could give, yet, at the same time, I felt I needed more from my church than my church could give.

For nearly five years, I had been attending a mid-week Bible study at a large church downtown. This Bible study group, like the collegiate ministry I attended before it, gave me the opportunity to connect with other people my age. When a number of core people left the group for various reasons and I began to see that the future of the group was uncertain, I feared that I would soon be further isolated from my friends and my peers. I finally made the difficult decision to leave behind the church I had been attending ever since I was in my mother's womb and to start attending church with my friends.

I started drafting an email to my pastor and my lay leader, and, after I had been attending my new church for a few weeks, I decided it was time to send it. One Monday morning a few weeks ago, I got out of bed, showered and dressed, clicked the "send" button, drove to work, took an Imodium, and waited for everything to hit the fan.

I think I expected the people from my church to react to my decision to leave in the same way that my former boss did six years ago. Though there was no grace to be found in a godless industry, other people in my life have been gracious to me. In moments when I was reminded that I am no better than those I've resentfully judged in the past, people showed me more grace than I showed myself. I've been forgiven by people who, in my opinion, had every right to resent me. It is a humbling, sometimes painful kind of grace. Though I felt I was abandoning my church when my church needed me the most, nobody held my decision against me. My pastor, my lay leader, and my mother all understood how I felt.

I am grateful to the church in which I grew up for giving me the space to grow spiritually, but now I need to move on. I am keeping the congregation in my prayers as they look toward the future.

According to Rob Bell, "You can't say no until you've said yes." In other words, once a person has figured out what is truly important to her and has fully invested herself in it, she is free to say no to all the things that would distract her from it. It is better to passionately do a few things well than to spread oneself thin by doing many things out of guilt or obligation.³ I guess the key to saying no is to find a yes. I'm still figuring out what is truly important to me, but, hopefully, I'm zeroing in on it.

More than once in my life, I have seen how important it is to live with intentionality and to have clearly defined priorities, or else I will float into undesirable situations. More than once, I have also seen how important it is to be honest about my feelings, to myself and to others, so that I don't stay in situations that are no longer right for me. I hope that I have finally taken these lessons to heart. May you, the reader, also see the importance of intentionality and honesty in your life, and may you not make the same mistakes I have made.

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