update from sparkleup

writing/sawtooth/limerent-object/no-way-2-3.md

@@ -1,4 +1,4 @@
-The presentation went over quite well, I think. Jeremy said it sounded good and my boss thanked me in a way that was more than just a *pro forma* thank you. Some part of me wishes that I had offered something less personal, but the rest of me is just glad it's over and that I don't have to care about it too much going further.
+The presentation went over quite well, I think. There were a few questions after. Jeremy said it sounded good and my boss thanked me in a way that was more than just a *pro forma* thank you. Some part of me wishes that I had offered something less personal, but the rest of me is just glad it's over and that I don't have to care about it too much going further.
 
 For posterity (and an admittedly uneasy sense that I ought to attach just about anything to do with this current task of journaling to the journal itself), here's what I wound up writing:
 
@@ -8,8 +8,23 @@ For posterity (and an admittedly uneasy sense that I ought to attach just about
 >
 > A cynical way to put it would be a filter to keep the bad priests out, but in reality, it was a way of drawing out a decision that should --- or must --- take time to commit to. Some decisions are just not meant to be made quickly, whether or not this is because they are bound by time constraints, or simply because they need a lot of thought.
 >
+> I got started thinking about this in a therapeutic context by a client recently. He was struggling with his decision to pursue the degree program he had chosen at university. Something about it just wasn't clicking for him, as much as he liked the idea of it. During a session, I brought up discernment as a topic that can be extended beyond its ecclesiastical roots and into just about any decision that requires time to play out.
 >
+> I described the process of making this decision as an ongoing conversation with yourself as we find out what's important to us, what it takes to get where we want to be, and what is within our reach.
+>
+> I'll note that that last bit is not actually something I said out loud to him. Whether or not he is actually able to pursue his degree to its conclusion is not on me to decide, I don't know one way or the other, but it stood out to me as something that I had experienced.
+>
+> You all know that I'm a very awkward person. It takes me a lot of energy to have a conversation with more than one person and to engage with those that I am talking to in an interesting way that doesn't leave one or the other --- or both --- of us frustrated. Can you picture a priest struggling with something like that? I may have had a mind for theology and all that goes into the bookish side of being a priest, but I don't have it in me at all to do all of the *other* work, most of it based around social interaction, that goes into being a priest.
+>
+> This is what I mean by discernment. In the context of the church, you take a long time to settle into a path that you will stick to for the rest of your life, whether that's a pastoral role, as a member of an order, or simply as a parishioner, but the same can hold for just about any other long-running decision-making process.
+>
+> My advisor at St. John's told me that one could think of it like dating. The process of discernment is one of figuring out the relationship between yourself and a potential outcome of that decision.
+>
+> That can even be very literal. My parents dated for about two years before they decided to get married. In the context of their social lives and their families, this was an absurdly long period of time, but something about each other just made them want to be extra, extra sure that they were ready to be together forever. It's not that they were at each other's throats or constantly frustrated with each other, either. They were some of the most in-love people I've ever known. This year would have been their fortieth anniversary, and until the day they died, they were still holding hands and giving each other these little glances.
+>
+> Where my decision to join the clergy failed, that's an example of a decision that worked out well in the end. Extremely well.
+>
+> Neither my client nor I know where it is that he will wind up. That is still a decision that is underway. But ever since having that session with him and making the connection between what I had gone through in the past with discernment and the idea of slower decision-making processes, I have made a conscious effort to keep this in mind when working with all of my clients who are struggling with big changes in their lives.
 
-(the essay)
 
 (talking with Kay)