Comfort Zone

            How often do you like to step outside your safe place? The one you’ve built very carefully, so it protects you from doing stuff you really don’t like to do?

            I had to step out of mine recently and thought I’d was going to lose my nerve. Now, in all the world’s problems this is going to sound terribly insignificant. Silly, really.

           

            But that’s what life is. Doing stuff we hate to do for the sake of something or someone else.

            Our pastor was preaching a series about going out and being “the church in the world.” He prompts us every week at the end of the sermon to do just that.  I love that about him…that he encourages us to step out. To DO something.

            So when he asked me to make a video telling a story about a “God Interruption” in my life I instantly said, “No thank you. I don’t do cameras, lights, action or microphones.”

            Figured he could get someone else in the congregation to tell their story.

            Went home and felt that I had been completely honest with him and that was THAT.

            Next day I emailed him back telling him I would do it. I had no idea how I was going to handle it but I knew one thing:

This was not MY story…it’s was God’s story.

            So, for ten days, I would lay in bed going over and over in my head, talking out loud, to see how the story sounded, all the time wishing I hadn’t been so quick to agree on a whim.

            Finally, I located the original typed version I wrote when it happened and re-read it half a dozen times, trying to pick out the highlights.

           

            I worried about what I would wear for the taping, and if my low voice and fear of anything live would end up ineffective. Would I be the first person who could not make a video because I’d had to stop and start so many times?

           

            I don’t like my picture taken, my voice turns weak when I am speaking in front of people, and would rather swallow cod liver oil than stand up in front of people.

            Did I mention that I’m ADD…and that thoughts fly through my mind like a jet through the clouds and I can’t remember things when I’m suppressed with fear.

            So I think you get the picture. I was not looking forward to the video session.

            It just happened that two of our three sons were here visiting, one from NYC, the other from Southern California so our household was wonderfully crazy that week.

            Which did two things for me.

            First, I didn’t have time to wash clothes to dress nice, had to grab the best blouse I could get my hands on, comb my hair quick and run out of the house the day of the taping. There was no time to think too hard about what I was about to do.

            Second, I had no time to re-rehearse what I had already gone over a million times! In other words, I was flying by the seat of my pants that day.

            I had no idea what to expect. Did they sit me in front of the church and video there? Would there be an audience?

           

            I met the young man who was doing the video and waited for instructions.

            Thankfully, since I am a one-on-one type of gal; enjoying a visit with one or two people just floats my boat. You really get to know people that way. And when I’m in a large group I just lose any sense of that closeness.  So I was very happy there weren’t lots of people standing around looking at me.

            It was just me and him, the lights, the camera. I could do this.

            And I did. When it was done I was so thankful I asked the young man if I could hug him! He was fine with that.

            I flew out of there glad to be going home. Glad I had said yes to our beloved pastor and glad that our sons and their girls were waiting at our house. They had been praying for me.

            End of story? Nope. The worst, for me, was yet to come. I thought that was the end of my journey, having done something I hate to do.

            The next hurdle presented itself when I realized the video was going to be shown at church to two services full of people I know!

            I wanted to skip church. Just let my husband tell me about it.

            Chicken!!

            But my husband said, “maybe people will want to talk to you about your story.”

            “That was fine.” I said. “They can call me on the phone.”           

           

            Chicken!

            My husband and I had driven one son and his wife to the airport in Chicago in the middle of the night…so we had very little sleep that Sunday morning.  So I must have been out of my mind to go to church that morning.

            I walked up to the door with my stomach in flip-flops. I thought the worst was over at the taping and here I had to sit through a viewing of myself up there on the screen. In front of the whole church. I mean can it get any worse when you are a gal who does NOT like that kind of attention all at once?

            I love attention. Just one-on-one attention.

            Our wonderfully sweet greeter at the door whispered in my ear how much she loved the story, that it brought her to tears.  My heart began to settle down.

            If SHE said it was okay, then it was OKAY!

            Pastor preached the whole sermon and I was about to jump out of my seat every time he made a move…I had hoped he would not show it until the end. And that was the case, so I was grateful for that.

            But during the entire time, my stomach was still flip-flopping.

            Finally I sat there watching myself on screen criticizing my hair, my facial movements, that shirt I had on…and watched as though I was in a dream.

            There is was.

            I had done it. I had told the story … the one pastor reminded me was “God’s Story” not mine.

            And realized something that day.

            It ain’t about me!!! 

            Idea: Do something outside your safe zone and share your story with me?

            I’d love to hear it.