The journey of a thousand miles begins with one step.--- Lao Tzu
It was a Sunday morning like any other in the months of intensive delving deep into the world of all things Christianity and recovery, from Sunday services to bible studies to Christian recovery groups to various self-help groups, my life had been, was, at the time all about getting healthy. That was my job, in fact, and it was full time. A few years previous to that fateful Sunday, I had been diagnosed with Bipolar.
That Sunday started like any other Sunday. I got up for church, with a tinge of anxiety that I had been battling based solely on my recent church history connected to not one but a few Calvary Chapels. Looking it back, it seemed to come from the almost enforced decree that the members come to every service possible, serve in every way possible, give until it hurts, and then maybe feel some sort of acceptance from God, the church, and also had something to do with my finally starting to realize that and feeling the opposition from the church leadership. Something along the lines of, 'Hey, that girl seems to be thinking too much.'
So, I drove the 45 minute drive to the Calvary Chapel I was attending at the time. I sat through the worship service, sang the songs, listened to the pastor teach his lesson on whatever book in the bible we were dutifully slogging through, based on his choice, what he thought we should be taught at the time, being hit over the head with the doctrine of not the Bible, not Jesus, but the truth as Calvary Chapel sees it. I see that now, anyway, then it was any other day.
Except that I was miserable. And lonely. And only starting to see it. In a sea of my church family, I felt lonely, disconnected, as if I didn't really belong, in fact, had never belonged.
After the service, I walked around and tried to chat with some of the people I had called friends at this specific Calvary for the last two years, tried to make some connection behind the aimless chatter and forced uncomfortable laughter that always left me more wanting, more empty after the encounter.
Finding none, I headed to the church coffee shop, where due to the church not wanting to shell out the money to buy coffee mugs, they had asked us all to bring along our own to have while at church. I walked straight to the shelf where my mug was, the same I had been given by a friend when I had graduated college, and I picked it up. I said, not to myself but not really to anyone else, "I just want to take this home for awhile", and stared around, no one had noticed. No one ever really did, ever really had.
I slowly walked to the back door.
As I made my way towards the exit, I had no clear idea what I was doing, only that it was time to leave, for the day. Only that I probably wasn't going to enter either the front or the back doors of this church again, but that was buried deep within. What I really knew through and through, if I had been completely honest with myself, was that I was suddenly and completely no longer comfortable there. That I had been fighting for almost five years through at least three different Calvary Chapels in the area to feel at home, find some friends, feel accepted, comfortable with myself, to discover God and who I was, find forgiveness, healing, a family...and that hadn't happened no matter how I had tried to bend myself to their will and their beliefs.
I came to the back door and pushed the door open, getting ready to step outside, walk down the alleyway towards the gate that led to the parking lot. Did I look back at all, hoping that a friend would call out to me, want me to come back? They didn't, I don't think I looked back either.
I stepped outside. Clutching my purse and my mug, with my keys at the ready, I made my way towards the back gate. At the gate, I paused. I actually paused. I felt some sort of guilt for just leaving, so much of my freedom to choose had been swallowed up in the church rhetoric and control. I did have the freedom to choose when I left the church, but I had always come back before. Deep down, I knew I wasn't coming back anymore, even if I had yet to admit it to myself.
I pushed the gate open and let it slam behind me.
And, then I was outside, truly outside, of Calvary Chapel.
I had no idea what was to come after that. I didn't know then how angry I was, how angry I would be for years to come, angry that something that had seemed so beautiful, so full of love, was actually so toxic. That made me sad too. Very sad too. I didn't know that I would also be heartbroken for years over the loss of the friends I had lost by leaving. I didn't know the journey that would come by taking that first step out, not just away from them, but back to myself. That by leaving that behind I would finally and truly find myself.
I didn't know that after I walked that journey away, toiled through the years of a difficult marriage, healing from the abuse of my life, sorting through it all, that I would find freedom, freedom to love again, to love my Calvary friends who no longer call and that I would forgive them for that, for all of it, to love and reconnect with the family and friends I had pushed away during those years, find the freedom to love myself fully and completely, and find the freedom to truly know and love the Divine, and be loved by the Divine truly in return.
I didn't know any of that then. I just knew I had to leave, that it was time. Then, I just took the first step.
The journey of a thousand miles begins with one step. ---Lao Tzu
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