Questions from a young reader: Do things get better?
written by Julie R. Neidlinger 8 comments link this post::A reader emailed me a short while ago, when I was down and full of self-doubt and wondering, as I often do in such moments, if I was doing anything that was truly worthwhile and amounted to anything in the scheme of life and God and the machinations of this world. I felt like a rusted bearing, perhaps, making some noise but needing to be removed, something extra and nothing vital. My life felt painfully small, quiet, and maybe a little unnecessary, like Emily Dickinson but without the poetry.
And then I received that email from a young reader, a long letter full of thoughtful questions, ending with "Regardless, take care, and don't give up hope. You do have more of an impact on others than you realize." It was the perfect words for the exact moment. They were the questions I often think, that I often wonder of others. I found, in trying to answer them, that I didn't necessarily have the answer, but that I finally began to understand the importance of the questions.
And so I thought about the questions and thought about possible answers and decided to put them on my blog and give all of my readers a chance to answer.::
You spoke of the appearance of hopelessness, the misgivings of life, inconsistencies, problems -- and wondered if it would get better. If you equate "easier" with "better", the answer is no. The paradox of life is one much like Dickens' "best of times worst of times", but above all, it is our time. This is when we are on this earth, this life. I never see beauty like I do in my darkest, lowest moments. I draw better, write better, when I am far below the surface of hope.
Hope, then. There must be hope in life.
I do not know what hope can be, what it is, until I'm at the bottom and I find myself trying to even pretend that I have hope. I can't resurrect hope out of nothing, for my hope is not in me. The more I look in me, like a black hole, I fall further down and in. My hope is in God, I know, learned since I was a child, though I don't often feel it. Hope for me is more often a knowing and not a feeling. It makes it more difficult and harder to hold on to because feelings ring truer in me. Feelings are what my heart sees as true, and my heart seems to be more directly attached to my soul than my head.
All the inconsistencies in life -- those not our fault and those weaknesses we hide inside -- are like the many languages at Babel. They are confusion. It is only the embrace of the paradox of the Bible (the weak made strong, life found in death, the Beatitudes, etc.) that we are able to function wholly. Otherwise, we rage against that machine, angry at all the inconsistencies and unfairness and things that seem to cancel each other out, not realizing that they are only such from our limited view. The confusion is the enemy, not the languages.
Our view, through that glass darkly, is far more severely limited than we realize. The person who is not conflicted, who sees no inconsistency or paradox, who has it all reasonably figured out, is either a liar or is busy building a tower to reach his own god -- himself.
So, in spite of all that, do things get better?
I can only answer for me. Things don't get easier, but they get better. Better, like a kernel of wheat, crushed to become flour for a fragrant bread. I know the more bruised and hurt I become in life the sweeter and softer I become inside, but only as long as I embrace the paradox. If I hold out for fairness, for what's just, for what seems right in my eyes in this life, for when confusion clears, I become hard and bitter and life becomes far worse.
Life is a paradox. The bigger it gets, the bigger the paradox. But the bigger it gets, the richer it is. We could make our lives small in many ways, narrowing our focus and pushing aside hopes and dreams, focusing on ourselves and things that don't matter in the light of eternity, thinking that will make our lives better. It will not. It only makes it easier, and much worse.
Labels: essay, personal, reader input
Copyright (c) Julie R. Neidlinger 8/12/2007 04:53:00 PM
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8 Comments:
This is a charming and wise reply. I hope that the sentiments expressed are true. I want to believe they're true.
Through a Glass Darkly was the title of my college thesis. You might remember another line from I Corinthians about giving up childish things. That is one of the good things about life as one gets older. I see people still worried about what the neighbors think, still keeping score, still piling up stuff in order to prop up their fragile egos. Am I ok? My son's at Harvard, I must be ok.
Childish. All of it. Playground stuff.
I can't think of too many things that get better with age. Wisdom accrues with sadness. But it is possible for kid fears to fall away. Then one wonders what the fuss was about in the first place.
By 
, at
12/8/07 19:44
Things don't always get better, but knowing Him does. This "things" arena is not our final destination, and with that in mind hope materializes. Paul said that we can depend on the resurrection, and rejoice with joy unspeakable and full of glory.
The bottom line is: I HAVE ETERNAL LIFE. Everything else is gravy.
By 
Henry (Rick) Frueh, at
12/8/07 20:45
In agreement with deniro. That is indeed a very thoughtful reply.
Now how would you answer the same question from an older person whose youth has long vanished, and does not enjoy the luxury of having as many years ahead to ponder whether things will get better.
Ah..the mid life crisis.
By David Cho, at
12/8/07 23:09
Am I in mid-life? Can I answer a question from such a position if I am not?
I can only answer from age 33, the life I've lived, the knowledge I've acquired, and what I've seen. That's all I know.
I meant the things I wrote as true. It was not meant to be a response lacking truth or something. However, as you and deniro pointed out in a sense, I can only answer from the place I'm at.
I do know that knees do not get better with age. At all.
By Julie, at
12/8/07 23:32
No, I didn't say you were in mid-life. Since women live longer, their "mid life" is different from men's, so you have many years before you are in it.
By David Cho, at
13/8/07 00:49
Oh, I know I'm not in mid-life.
(Well, actually, since I don't know when my time is up on this earth, I don't know when my mid-life will be, but it's a theoretical place less than it is an actuall mathmatical figuring of the middle of each life, so...anyway.)
I have gone through what you could call the "quarter-life" crisis now common in affluent Western countries where life is easy and full of consumerism and we all wonder what the point is. I can only speak from that vantage point, and can't answer, then, questions about mid-life. I just don't know that yet.
By Julie, at
13/8/07 09:39
When I said true, I meant I hope you're right. Because it is difficult to find good things about getting older. It is difficult to maintain the hope and confidence in life that we (may have) had as children.
By , at
13/8/07 11:44
I suppose if I associate hope and confidence with being a child, the idea that I will put off childish things as I grow older is not promising.
I am, in the midst of my melancholy personality, resolutely naive. This is different than ignorant. I have hope. My methodical, logical, cynical part of my mind can't seem to touch it. Perhaps it was one of God's little gifts to me that in the midst of all of it...there's this little piece of hope.
I think of when I run, how I dread the start because I look down the road to the highway and know it won't be fun. The road goes on and on. I love nearing the end. It's the greatest feeling.
Some people get worried when I talk about death and when I don't subscribe to the idea that I must do all I can to live as long as I can.
I can't wait to get to the end of the road. I run the road as best I can, but the nearing end is my hope, not the long road.
By Julie, at
13/8/07 12:02
