from the overflow of the heart, the mouth speaks.: home.

306 South Fork Suites is currently sort of home. I say sort of because, as the name suggests, it’s campus housing. The funny thing about campus housing is... sometimes you get kicked out at really inopportune times. Like holidays. And not in the “you can come back in a day” kind of kicked out that your parents did when you were seventeen and needed an attitude adjustment. I mean I actually couldn’t get into the building for two and a half weeks over Christmas. The good news is, I really didn’t need to be here. I packed two bags, folded up some bedding, stowed my faithful six-stringed companion in its case, pulled on my boots, and drove into the sunset, quite literally, with a head full of knowledge that I forgot by dinner time and a trip itinerary about as long as this sentence. This itinerary included stays of varying durations in Minneapolis, Green Bay, Minneapolis, Grantsburg, Siren, Woodbury, Baraboo, Minneapolis again, and finally back to River Falls.

Before you start feeling sorry for me, please don’t. It was amazing. I did laundry once. I drank more coffee than anyone should in a lifetime. I gave up counting the number of times I filled my gas tank. At one point I had to use a credit card for the first time ever. But more importantly, in those two and a half weeks, I saw more faces I love than I can even count.

In 17 days, 2 states, and 1100 miles, I never left home.

It seemed like a really important process. Seventeen days of living out of a duffel, while not completely unfamiliar to a camp counselor, was different and exciting and unknown. Dragging around a guitar case only added to the charm and appeal of the whole experience. It felt terribly daring, like I was the wayward, restless, prodigal child seeking some greater purpose. In reality, I was just experiencing the consequences of not being able to say no to any opportunity that was offered me. In this case, the consequences weren’t so bad. But fall semester was chock full of these scenarios - places where I spread myself incredibly thin because I wanted to do absolutely everything. I’m still navigating my way out of this habit, and I’m learning some things along the way.

* * *

Home and belonging are kind of weird concepts. They’re not limited to or defined by any words we can string together. They are woven into our stories, our conversations, our heartaches, our laugh-so-hard-you-cry moments. Build a house, any house, and try to find the thing within its physical structure that sets it apart as a home. You can’t. Describe the closest, most intimate community you are a part of and try to explain what it is at its core without describing the specific relationships and experiences that found it. You can’t. Home and belonging are deeply personal and spiritual concepts, and our understanding of them is often defined by our understanding of ourselves. Or maybe it’s the other way around, I’m not quite sure yet.

I do know that it’s hard to feel belonging somewhere you don’t go often. By nature, belonging comes from commitment to a space or relationship, or set of relationships. This is where I missed the mark, by about a mile. As it turns out, I can’t be committed to 72 relationships at the same time. There simply isn’t enough of me to go around. At the end of the day, some relationships end up with the crumbs, and if I’m being honest those relationships have historically been some of the people that matter most to me. And that’s not fair. Of course having a home team matters, but more than just having one, tending to one is what matters. Belonging requires more of me than five minutes here and there invested in the people I call my home team. They deserve so much more of my heart than that. Man, if I could go back and redo all the times in the last four months that I was flying from one friendship to the next, trying to be everything for everyone, instead of just sitting and listening-- being silent and still enough to hear the stories of lives I deeply cherish... If I had taken those opportunities to shut down my anxious thoughts and just be in the same place at the same time without feeling the weight of other expectations, real or perceived, I might have noticed those calloused places in me that were longing for connection and belonging. I might have noticed that I’d stopped being vulnerable all together.

A little over a year ago, I accidentally made a vow to myself. I try really hard not to do that because usually it’s something I regret, and self vows are extremely hard to break. Sometimes you make them without even realizing it, and those are the most dangerous. Anyway, the vow I made to myself was that I was going to stop being vulnerable. It didn’t matter that this vow was intended to be person-specific, and it didn’t matter that I only intended to numb vulnerability. This vow ignored my intentions and it generalized across relationships and across emotions. Because as it turns out, you can’t selectively numb emotion. If you numb the bad, you numb the good. If you choose to numb grief, you also numb joy. If you choose to numb pain, you also numb courage. And if you choose to numb vulnerability, you also numb connection and belonging. (I’m stealing from a TED Talk. Here’s my nod to Brene Brown- WATCH THIS VIDEO) There’s a reason I haven’t blogged for over a year. For a while, I lost my words. It wasn’t until I made a connection in my understanding of vulnerability that I found them again, and that connection was this: Vulnerability is about exposure of our truest selves, yes, but at its core, vulnerability is more about the other. It’s about the actions I choose to take to love other people, and it’s about being authentic and exercising conviction in my belief that the love I have to offer is good, without knowing if the recipient will agree. When I began to frequent vulnerability in this way, I began to regain connection, and when I regained connection, I regained a sense of stability and anchored-ness in my relationships.

When I frequent vulnerability with others, I regain my sense of belonging and home.

A couple of friends and I have begun a new running tradition of playing Settlers of Catan together on a weekly basis. We started calling it “Coffee and Catan”. I know- super nerdy. But honestly, there are few things that have meant more to me than those Monday get-togethers. There is something about the “set apartness” of that time, both logistically and relationally, that gives me a sense of belonging. We have certain weird routines that we can always expect to happen every time we play- Elle makes coffee (or occasionally, we buy Starbucks), Bailey turns on a Pandora station, Fitz meows and pounces on our feet, Bailey builds “wedgewood” out of her Catan pieces, I start to make trades and then change my mind and everyone wants to punch me, Bailey has specific phrases that she shouts when the dice roll 6, 8, 9, or 12... and I have a consistent losing rate of about 90%. Meanwhile, Elle has dubbed herself the “Catan Queen”, and somehow we now have assigned seats AND assigned piece colors. DO NOT make the mistake of trying to change these things, because in all honesty, you might die.

Even though I’m incredibly insecure about the fact that I have 3.5 wins after 20 weeks of playing (yes, they gave me a HALF WIN), I consider this one of the safest spaces I know. Why? Because it is somewhere I go often, and because it is somewhere I know I can be vulnerable. Elle and Bailey and I don’t always talk about hard things, but we know there is space for it. We know that we have safety in one another and we know that we frequent one another’s presence in a way that invites honesty. That kind of friendship is so unique and so valuable. And because I take time to invest in it and choose to dwell there often, my sense of belonging has increased exponentially.

And you know what? It's the same with Jesus. Here's where all of my roommates roll their eyes and groan, because I'm constantly inserting Jesus connections into everything. But hear me out.

It’s hard to feel belonging somewhere you don’t go often. Remember when I said that? That applies here too. Ten-fold. Feeling of belonging and home in Christ comes from frequenting his throne room. I know that sounds super spiritualized and Christian-y, and all I can say is... it is. But it’s also truth. The more time you spend dwelling on Jesus, with Jesus, for Jesus, in Jesus, the more at home you will feel anywhere you are in his presence. The more you are able to be vulnerable with him, the easier it will become to dwell with him often. And the more often you dwell with him, the easier it will become to be vulnerable with him. See how there’s actually no way you can lose? His presence is the ultimate home. I have had to learn this in an extremely tangible way this year. And it’s hard, but it’s good.

There’s a Danish word that a few of my friends have started using to describe the atmosphere they want to create in their home. The word is hygge, and if you ask me to pronounce it, I will change the subject. Hygge is hard to define in English because English sucks. But hygge is about deep relational comfort, and even more than that it’s about paying attention to the things that make us feel alive. It’s about closeness with other people and building connections that celebrate simplicity. It invites sanctuary in community, and it begs both authenticity and vulnerability. Hannah, Amanda, Chrissi, and Evalyn embody hygge. Over the 17 days that I was away from campus, their Minneapolis home (which has come to be known as the Four Seasonz) was a safe space for me to land as “home base”. I got to experience aaalll of the hygge. And it wasn’t in the physical structure of the house or the fact that the house had a name or even the fact that there existed a guest bedroom where I could stay as long as I needed. It was in those relationships- the provision and the care and the love and the vulnerability it took for them to extend that offer to me, risking an overstayed welcome or, alternately, rejection. It wasn’t an offer that benefited them and it wasn’t something they were at all obligated to do, but they were so thrilled to invite me into rest. That is hygge. Hygge is warmth and friendship and making ordinary things special. And they’re doing it right. There aren't many places in this world that I love more than the Four Seasonz.

So, to bring this full circle... what is home? Somewhere you frequent? Somewhere that’s safe? To be honest, I’m still not completely sure. But I do know this: Home is a heart space. Home is belonging, via vulnerability, with frequent intentionality. Home is commitment. Home is hygge and home is resting. Sometimes home is a duffel and a bag full of wrapped Christmas gifts in Green Bay. Sometimes it’s a cabin in the deep woods of northern Wisconsin. Sometimes it’s with family in Henderson, Nevada and sometimes it’s with friends in a River Falls college campus apartment. And it's not the fact that my stuff is there, or the fact that I have a key to the front door, or the fact that it's a few degrees warmer than the outside air- it's the people that I get to share it with. It's the connection that happens when we're in the same place at the same time and we choose to be vulnerable with each other. That is home.