I’ve hardly written any music or lyrics for a full year. My dear friend and endless fount of wisdom, Helena Sorensen Aman, once said, “Sometimes you can’t write; you’re busy becoming the person who will be able to write the next thing.” This simple piece of permission made such an impact on both me and Kelsey that each of us have now quoted it in our Substacks! (Here’s a link to the post where Kelsey quoted Helena, and here’s a link to Helena’s Instagram in case her words haven’t yet graced your social media feed with goodness.)
As with any season of rapid change, it’s taken me a good six or nine months to get my head far enough above water to have any inkling of what’s happening in my own heart, where it’s coming from, and where it’s taking me. We’re all familiar with the suspicious tendency of blog posts, books, and podcasts about suffering and pain to refer to these trials exclusively in the past tense, safely fortifying their authors with an appearance of enlightenment and authority. As long as their struggles have been overcome and “conquered,” we can trust what they say. But someone who still wakes up some days and doesn’t have a clue? Stay far away from them.
Let me be the first to gladly admit my membership in that latter category of people who wake up without a clue. In fact, my own overeagerness to speed along to enlightenment has played no small part in landing me there.
On those exceptional days when I do have a clue, however, I feel like I’m trying to pull up some nasty weed in a garden, only to find that the roots go deeper and deeper than I thought. Before I know it, my hand is fully submerged in the soil and I’m yanking with all the force I have, and it still isn’t enough. Maybe some smaller tendril comes up, but the root stays firmly in place. And I have to get up, rest, and come back out tomorrow to try again.
That weed is a deeply ingrained distrust of myself, my desires, my sense of right and wrong, and my body—which, crucially, has alternately contained, suppressed, whispered, and screamed these sensations at me. That weed was planted in me at an early age not by one malicious person, but by a slow accumulation of messages I received in a variety of Christian contexts.
I’ve tried all my life to trust God. But, honest to God, when I pray to my Creator these days, I step away having received the gentle permission and blessing to trust myself. The most painful part, of course, is seeing clearly—in many cases for the very first time in my life—all the ways I’ve sidelined the wisdom that presented itself in me as that knot in my gut, or that flutter of excitement, or that sinking feeling of loss, when my capacity to listen had thus far been usurped by an admonition not to.
One refrain out of Kelsey’s mouth lately has been, “We’re not in a season of desolation. We’re absolutely in a season of consolation.” That doesn’t have to be true for you. But for me, it’s been deeply freeing to know in my bones, even as I shake and cry with grief over the manifold ways I’ve been alienated from myself over the years, that I’m letting go of this alienation. It’s been messy, but the trajectory has been towards a renewed light-heartedness, an assurance that I am safe, and an ability to receive more fully my own goodness.
I’m not quite ready to write yet. But in this period of wrestling with my own story, I’ve been deeply consoled by so many other people’s songs. I feel more able to truly listen, and thirsty for it, than I have in a long time. I shared one of those beautiful songs with you in December, and I’ll continue to share more of them on a monthly basis until that urge to write songs of my own kicks back in.
For February, here’s a song by The Weepies called “I Was Made for Sunny Days.” For the longest time, when I would listen to it, I would just enjoy the fun without really hearing the depth of the lyrics. But one day recently, I picked up my guitar and played it just a hair slower, really lingering on every word, and felt the complexity of emotion underneath that gives the fun its authenticity.
In so many ways, this song encapsulates (in far fewer words!) what I’ve been sharing with you in this newsletter: that deeply felt sense of awakening to one’s own goodness, the ability to say not only that I prefer sunny days, but that I was in fact made for them—that, contrary to popular belief, following my own delight and desire might just lead me to flourishing.
I went to the market, though it was threatening rain
I was late to the station, so I missed that train
And the streets filled with umbrellas, and we all looked the same
But I’m the one who’s waiting till the sun comes out again
I say
I was made for sunny days
I made do with gray, but I didn’t stay
I was made for sunny days
And I was made for you
Found a book you gave me when we were first in bloom
When I thought that you might save me from the dark side of the moon
Instead we both went walking through the shadows and the gloom
And we never did stop talking and you still light up the room
I say
I was made for sunny days
I made do with gray, but I didn’t stay
I was made for sunny days
And I was made for you
Oh, the nights are longer
Oh, you make me stronger
And the late light lingers on the grass
And the nights are dark, but then they pass
They don’t seem so deep
I’m still losing sleep, but I don’t mind
No, I don’t mind
Got you a winter jacket that our baby wears around
And we chase him through the springtime and the sleeves drag on the ground
And every hour we’re working, and work and play are bound
And every day is Sunday, ‘cause the sun comes dancing down
I say
I was made for sunny days
I made do with gray, but I didn’t stay
I was made for sunny days
And I was made for you
Further Listening
“All Seems Beautiful to Me”—Eric Whitacre & Voces8 (text by Walt Whitman)
Further Reading
All my friends are starting Substacks, and I’m so happy about it. You should subscribe to them, too!
For real. (Leslie Eiler Thompson)
Quarter Notes (Chris Thiessen)
I’ll see you back here in a month!
-Drew
Drew thank you for sharing your reflections with us. I always feel so blessed to read anything you write or anything you sing. ❤️
I love this so much. Keep sharing, Drew! The writing will come when it comes. Your thoughts and music are a boon.