Book Club: Leaning In Into the Unknown

My husband just dropped me off at the airport. I haven’t seen my daughter all day. My two sons put themselves to bed. At least, I think they did.

I’m leaning in, and I have no idea what I am doing. I wish I had a clearer picture, but I don’t.

Sojourners and its founder Jim Wallis wanted to invest in a group of emerging leaders – not emerging as in the emerging church but emerging as in developing, in process, growing. I am honored to be a part of this group, and from the initial invitation I have been challenged to reconsider my presence, privilege, and power. I have asked myself what a suburban wife of one, mother of three is doing in a room with national leaders in social justice, advocacy, and public policy. I am not a pastor, social justice worker, founder of anything.

But apparently those weren’t the only qualifications. I continue to wrestle with the imposter syndrome, wondering when someone will figure out I actually DON’T belong in he room.

Have you ever felt that way?

But here I am waiting for my flight to D.C. – the last flight out today so I could catch my son’s last middle school band concert and still make it in time for the morning session.

My husband, as usual, told me I had to do this. And since he hears this so rarely…

He was right. I had to do this. Sandburg’s big picture message for women is that we shouldn’t take ourselves out of the game until we have to. That means silencing self-doubt, even when it’s REALLY LOUD. It means listening to God and knowing the talents and gifts He has given us are to be stewarded and developed, not buried, ignored, diminished, or disregarded.

I’m scared. I’m intimidated. I’m confused. I’m excited. I’m open to learning, failing, and leaning in.

Is it OK to admit all of those things?

Will you still like me? Wink, wink.

The Adventures of Shopgirl & Life’s Small Detours

I am not supposed to be working a part-time job in retail selling miracles in a jar or a tube. I am supposed to be a campus minister/blogger developing world changers, renewing the campus, writing and editing blog posts that draw people into a deeper relationship with God, and storming the castle for Jesus.

But I am. Both. And. All.

My “real” job overseeing multiethnic ministry development and training (the corporate world might translate this into “diversity director”) with InterVarsity Christian Fellowship invites me to raise my entire salary, benefits package and overhead. I know. It sounds crazy, right? It is crazy for all right reason. Ministers of the gospel are not meant to go at it alone, which is why Jesus sent his disciples out in pairs. I go out with more than just one partner in ministry. I go out with a host of others praying for me and giving generously because they don’t want to do what I’ve been called, trained and gifted to do – train staff in cross-cultural mission, mentor leaders across the country, teach & preach at conferences, and other incredibly fun, spiritually challenging and exciting stuff.

It’s just that sometimes the math doesn’t work, and salaries are reduced. And time doing some of the things I love doing gets spent doing other things I love less but should love just as much – like raising more support, networking, inviting people to join me on this adventure.

But part of that adventure means taking the occasional detour, in part because the math isn’t working out. To help balance the books at home, I have become “Shopgirl” – selling cosmetics part-time at a nearby department store. And aside from having to stand for 4-8 hours a day with a little more makeup than I usually wear to pick-up my kids from school or when I teach about God creating culture, I’m finding that being Shopgirl and castle-stormer for Jesus has required me to be the same me in new and sometimes uncomfortable ways. And it’s really, really difficult.

I’ve learned more than I want and need to know about office politics and climbing the corporate ladder in the few short weeks I’ve been back in a “secular” workplace. I gotta tell you that being Christ-like is a lot more difficult when the gossip is juicy or when I’m just plain bored out of my mind.

It’s difficult to sell with integrity when I know that the miracle cure-all for your breakouts will cost you half as much if you buy a drugstore product with the same active ingredient, especially if you really want to believe that you get what you pay for. Telling people about Jesus is actually easier because I believe in Jesus and His miracles; I’m not so sure that my wrinkles are disappearing because of a cream I am trying out, but it sure smells nice.

It’s humbling, sometimes humiliating, when you are interviewing for a job that you know you are overqualified for (no, I don’t have any retail experience in cosmetics, but I have been wearing makeup for more than 20 years), or you are in a job that you are overqualified for but need to have and a customer treats you like you are a stupid housewife trying to keep herself busy. (I have yet to meet a housewife who doesn’t already have enough to do, have you?) I don’t really want to know “How can I help you?” I just want to go back to my “real” job where I tell people about Jesus. 

See how this is hard?

It’s all part of my “real” job. It doesn’t matter if the check come from InterVarsity or that department store. It doesn’t matter if I don’t get a check at all, since my family doesn’t pay me except in hugs, kisses, and their eternal gratitude. My job is to be who God has called and created me to be in all circumstances and situations, in all the roles and responsibilities I have the privilege of having.

And this all started gelling for me this morning as I put on some of that wonder cream I get to try for free because I am Shopgirl after a great morning video conference call in preparation for some cross-cultural leadership and ministry training I will get to do later this month because I am a diversity director with InterVarsity Christian Fellowship.

It’s a small detour, but I think I am still on the right track.

 

 

Full-time Ministry and Motherhood

I’ve had another quiet spell on the blogging front. Writing energizes me, but sometimes it just doesn’t happen for public consumption. The end of the year came and went, and Peter and I have spent quite a bit of time fixing the flaws to our calendaring system. If only our refrigerator had an iPad on it where our perfectly synced google and iCal calendars could appear in its rainbow glory.
This is a cheat blog post. The content appears in “Models of Ministry: Husband in the Workplace”, which is part of a resource developed for InterVarsity Christian Fellowship staff. It is linked on the staff website this month, which I didn’t know about until a few e-mails and Facebook posts alerted me to the fact that I had written something. While the following piece was written with InterVarsity staff in mind, I do believe that quite a bit of translates into a non-Christian ministry context. Every mom I know is a working mom, and for all of us parents, calendaring is a verb. I am deeply grateful for the opportunity to have a paying job that is personally satisfying and has made me a better mother. Not everyone gets to say that.
But parenting is not easy. I have plenty of stories of bringing sick children to lie on the floor during meetings I had to run or leaving a grocery cart full of groceries in the store because when I say, “If you don’t stop (insert unacceptable behavior), we are leaving the store” I am not making an idle threat. So being a part of an entire resource for and about working mothers for the organization I work for and with was hardly work.
(For those of you who only “know” me through this blog or the book I helped author, I am a full-time working mother – the regional multiethnic director for InterVarsity Christian Fellowship/USA and am based out of my pretty green home office. For more information please visit www.intervarsity.org and if what you see makes you want to be a part of what I do, feel free to join my financial support team by going to www.intervarsity.org/donate/to/kathy_khang ).

What were the key factors shaping your choice of model for ministry and motherhood?
I had already been in the marketplace for five years, gotten married and had my first child when I made the move to join InterVarsity staff. It never occurred to me that I couldn’t be a working mom just because I was going into campus ministry…until I realized there were so few of us.

What was most difficult or challenging about your choice?
Hands-down childcare was and continues to be the most difficult and challenging part of the decision because it affects my family and my personal development. Campus ministry doesn’t fit neatly into daycare hours, nor does the level of financial compensation fit easily into the cost of quality childcare. Overnight student retreats and staff meetings and travel have required constant negotiation with family, friends, supervisors and colleagues. And because my husband is not on staff, has a set schedule, and has limited flexibility and because taking advantage of any flexibility has a direct impact on our finances, figuring out how to manage two careers takes a great deal of energy, planning, communication and grace.

During my CSM days I was blessed by a wonderful group of students who watched my kids for free as their ministry to the chapter, freeing me up to meet with other students while they fed my kids jellybeans and McDonald’s and pored love and affection on them. But it was never easy or seamless.

My husband and I decided that we would do our best to schedule my job around his for very practical reasons – his job paid more. That meant staying part-time because the full-time job required three weeks at Chapter Focus Week as well as additional area, divisional, regional and national meetings that did not and could not offer childcare.

I made the choice to put personal leadership development and training on a much slower track in order to accommodate my family’s needs and time limitations. It also meant feeling like I had no choice but to say “no” to many wonderful opportunities to teach or be trained, and digging deep into fears that saying “no” too many times would mean the invitations would dry up. To be honest, some opportunities do dry up but others have come back around now that I am full-time and my children are all in school.

My childcare needs have continued to change as the kids have gotten older, entered school, added activities, etc. and as my roles and my husband’s career demands have changed. We are frequently at our desk with our calendars mapping out requests for time-off, adjusting doctor’s appointments, notifying the school and teachers to call Peter in case of an emergency because I am out of town. It has forced us to communicate better.

What have you valued or appreciated about your choice?
Being on staff with InterVarsity has been a gift to me and to my family. It has not been easy, and I often step back to make sure this decision is right for this time in my life and in my family’s life. The choice gave my husband and me a chance to put our values into practice and honor our marriage vows in tangible ways. Honoring one another in a two-career family has required some difficult, heartfelt, honest, conversations about ambition and opportunities and sacrifice.

I can still find myself envying staff couples who would serve their weeks at Chapter Focus week or attend staff conferences and still have vacation time to spend together. For us those situations have required us to either use my husband’s vacation time to stay home with the kids, for the family to come with me at our cost or for me to ask my supervisors to be excused from meetings, conferences and training. It has meant being sure of the calling but uncertain about the intensity or feasibility of pursuing that call at various points in our family’s life.

But all of those choices have in turn opened up an extended family to us. Alumni and fellow staff who met my children when they were young enough to nap in a carseat in the corner or stay busy with a few coloring books when I was able to attend meetings don’t see them as often but from a distance continue to watch Bethany, Corban and Elias grow up, and they have been blessed through a few key relationships developed through my years on staff. My kids look forward to Chapter Focus Week at Cedar Campus and talk about the various conferences and retreats, which to them have been mini-vacations with an ever-changing extended family.

It has also kept me honest and forced me to dig deep into my soul and then run to Jesus about my personal ambitions, frustrations, envy, calling and roles. There are roles and jobs I would be interested in pursuing, but I continue to need a job with some degree of flexibility because the public school system isn’t flexible and my husband’s boss’ vacation requests will always take priority over his.

What advice would you give to women as they’re considering what path is appropriate for them?
You need to do three things: pray, talk with your husband and find support. Whether you choose to stay on staff or leave, and whether or not your husband is on staff, you need to pray and sit at Jesus’ feet because there are many things motherhood will make you worry about. Whatever you decide you may have moments of regret, of feeling like you’ve lost a part of your identity, etc. Be with Jesus first.

And then talk with your husband. There is nothing as demanding as parenthood (well, maybe caring for an aging parent, but that’s another discussion), and I’m not close to being done yet. Your choice may be crystal clear so talk about it with your husband so that when the decision doesn’t seem so clear the patterns of communication are set and they are strong.

Pull out your calendars, know what your babysitter can or cannot do (Evenings? Weekends? Overnight care? Sick child childcare?) You will need to look at the realities of your schedules. How flexible is your husband’s career? How will his schedule look against your schedule work with consideration to childcare? How will scheduling demands affect your effectiveness? Will you or your husband run home from a meeting to pick up your kid from school because she has a fever? Will it always be you because your students will understand or will you take turns? How will you help your husband understand your job and InterVarsity when some of your donors or students don’t even understand all that you do and the importance of it?

How can you explain to your husband (and children) that the emotional intensity at the recent set of meetings means that even if you are “home” by 5 p.m. you aren’t really ready to get dinner ready before he gets home or to appreciate the dinner he made before you got home? The topics and scenarios are endless.

Nothing makes you look crazier than putting on a Wonder Woman costume every day. We are not supermoms and we’re not meant to do this alone. Don’t let the brokenness of our culture and our families isolate you and let you think you have to or should do this alone.

Find a mom’s group or a group of moms who may not have chosen your exact path but support you, pray with you and for you, ask you challenging questions that bother you until you have to go pray and journal. Find women who are single, widowed, empty-nesters from whom you can learn from and with whom you can also find a different audience for the things you’ve learned as well.

Oh, and let me add a fourth – don’t judge. Whatever decision you make, you know it wasn’t a piece of cake. You may not make the same decision as I did, but one decision isn’t better than the other.