Integrating Reception
The Latest Installment of The Walking Stick Journal
The Walking Stick Journal
Stepping Stones of Transformation
An Unfolding Manuscript
by
C. D. Baker
Chapter Twenty-One: Integrated Reception
The sometimes-agonizing process of spiritual-psychological transformation necessarily involves a long season of deconstruction. It can be an oscillating descent toward the space where we will eventually begin to integrate the emerging truth of whom we have always been.
The process is challenging. We necessarily discard fragments of our false selves even though we are barely ready to integrate fresh truths. We follow an unfamiliar road. Each inch can be disorienting, every step anxious-making.
Yet every movement matters along whatever winding way we are taken, even when we feel as though we are blindly tiptoeing. The beauty is that every step is pure grace and each stride is a divine gift.
If only we can learn to receive.
***
Winter 2023
I pulled into Bill’s parking lot mumbling to myself that I can’t possibly handle all of this. I feel like I’m coming apart, unravelling; that my center has disintegrated. Life feels too threatening and I’m grasping at survival. But who is it that’s in there striving to survive?
I’m completely exhausted again. That Christmas night thing along with [cousin] Elizabeth’s terrible death and the memory-trauma of Will’s experience has piled on to my entangled demons.
*
Bill welcomes me to my usual seat and we both get situated. “So how are you today?”
I hardly know where to begin but I tell him that I sense some kind of fragmentation. It’s like I’ve come apart and can’t find my way back. I add that this is all the more frustrating since the powerful experience of God’s presence in the ICU last April.
“So you feel guilty, too.”
“Of course.” I sip my coffee but my hand is shaking. “I had another one of those dreams about struggling but I can’t remember the details. I woke up and just told God I don’t know who I am anymore. Along with that came the very depressing idea that I have no meaning.”
“You’re discouraged, anxious, and worn out. You’ve lost your sense of self.”
“Yeah. And disinterested in anything that I’m doing. Even my new studies.”
“What are you afraid of right now?”
That’s easy. “I’m afraid of what’s being taken away. What am I losing in all of this...and what happens if I mess this whole process up?”
Bill interlocks his fingers and closes his eyes. “What do you fear losing.”
The answer leaps out. “My illusion of security and the ability to manage my fears.”
“So losing two illusions.” Bill watches me, carefully.
“Two. Right. Why am I afraid to give up illusions?”
Bill nods, sympathetically. “Because you don’t yet trust reality.”
He nailed it.
“Why don’t you ask God about your fear of letting go.”
“I do and he’s not delivering.”
“Are you sure.”
I shift in my seat. “I still resist something about him.”
Nodding again, Bill says, “God has already given you something very valuable. He has shown you his love.”
A lump forms in my throat. That and a sting of guilt.
Bill must see it in my eyes. He waits and then says, “And you’re afraid you’ll mess that up.”
Right again.
Bill stretches his legs forward and crosses his ankles. “You’re still hearing old voices from both your father and your childhood church. It’s not a matter of handling all of this perfectly. It’s a matter of experiencing the security of love... no matter what.”
I look past Bill through the window behind him. Cascades of memories fill me, memories of God’s blessings. An inner voice whispers, “All I want for you is to see my goodness.” A warmth rises.
Bill interrupts. “The truth is that you are not experiencing fragmentation. It may feel like it, but you are not coming apart. What’s falling away are your old thought patterns.” He smiles. “You are actually in a process of integration. You are being delivered into wholeness.”
I sit with that.
“The false-you… that shadow self we’ve discussed... has been slowly dissolving and that’s discomforting. What’s beginning to happen now is the integration of your true identity. That’s an identity that’s unfamiliar...and unfamiliarity makes any of us anxious.”
Lots to process. “I make this harder than it has to be, don’t I?”
We both laugh.
“It wasn’t long ago that Jeff [my medical doctor] reminded me to stay available to grace.” A snow plow splashes slush below. “Despite all my resistance, God has remained gentle and patient. His humility blows my mind. He has not judged me or made demands...”
I tap my coffee cup. “He’s been gracious and this whole process belongs to him, doesn’t it? Not to me. I’m pretty sure I’ve been striving to put the pieces back myself...and my way.”
“Yes, you have.” Bill sits upright. “Some of your depletion is your own fault. You come here but your history isn’t one of asking for help.” He leans in. “You may be ashamed to need it, or you fear it.”
Bill’s tone is firm. “Don’t let your father’s voice interfere with your receiving. It not only cuts you off from healing but it also deprives others the joy of giving. Others, like me.”
He sits back. “Receiving is part of becoming whole; it’s part of who and how you are meant to be as an image bearer of God. The Trinity models giving and receiving.”
‘And receiving.’ I jot that down, and as I do a question creeps in: Have I really received God’s goodness? I stare, blankly. I’m pretty sure I’ve resisted it...even rejected it.
Bill is saying something but my eyes are now fixed on my note pad. I’m guessing that receiving—really receiving—God’s goodness is critical. I’ve not let myself experience it fully. Why? What about that scares me?
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