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Books in 2012: unPLANNED

unPLANNED: The dramatic true story of a former Planned Parenthood leader’s eye-opening journey across the life line is — as of this afternoon — the eleventh book I’ve read in 2012.

The book (written with Cindy Lambert) is by and about Abby Johnson, a woman who worked for Planned Parenthood for years, until shortly after she assisted in an ultrasound-guided abortion. During the procedure, she held the ultrasound probe on the patient’s belly and watched the unborn baby react to the cannula (the tube used to remove a fetus from a uterus). Her life (and her values and career) changed instantly.

It says a lot about unPLANNED (and/or about my taste in books) that I read it in under 24 hours. I started it last night, slept with it in my hands and finished it today under the porch fan by the light of the afternoon sun. I found the book fabulous, as a Roman Catholic Christian, and as a woman, and as a writer, and as a mental health professional. Johnson shares her experience of becoming a Planned Parenthood volunteer and employee, of encountering the Coalition for Life (a pro-life organization a couple doors down from the Planned Parenthood where Johnson worked in Bryan, TX) and of discovering over time that the Coalition’s goals resonated more with her than Planned Parenthood’s did.

Some thought provoking excerpts (sometimes followed by commentary):

A talking point Johnson would use while employed by Planned Parenthood, to explain part of the organization’s purpose: 

“The only way to reduce the number of abortions is to reduce the number of unintended pregnancies. The only way to reduce the number of unintended pregnancies is to provide additional funding for contraception.” -page 42

Um, I can think of at least one other way. (Just sayin’.) In the book, Johnson never said whether she is or isn’t still a proponent of the use of contraception to control fertility. The latter line in the above excerpt irks me. This is not solely because I am a proponent of chastity (which involves abstaining from sex before marriage), but because of all else contraception accomplishes. I haven’t discussed contraception much publicly, but for now is this: One of contraception’s purposes is to prevent the unprepared from becoming parents. It says “yay for fewer unfit parents!” loud enough that nobody hears the following over the noise: if you are unprepared to be a parent, maybe you are actually unprepared to be having sex.

What a great definition of integrity:

“…I particularly admired how his faith shaped his values and choices. I sensed a strength and consistency in his life—an integration of his beliefs with his practices…” -page 50

On being a churchgoer simultaneously as she worked for Planned Parenthood: 

“On Sunday mornings, I felt like a spiritual misfit, surrounded by people in touch with God while I just felt left out in the cold. But I wanted to belong—really belong—among other Christians. I was careful to avoid conversations about where I worked.” -page 63

This passage is a great example of what Harriet Lerner wrote in The Dance of Fear, the book I blogged about yesterday: “The extent to which you hide something important about yourself or another family member is a good barometer of shame.”

A really good point (read it to the end):

“When it was clear I wasn’t getting anywhere, I turned to head back into the clinic. But I’d only taken a step or two when I turned back to [a pro-lifer who often prayed outside the clinic] and said, ‘You know—‘ He looked taken aback, as if he thought I was going to get nasty. But I just thought he should see our point of view. ‘There have always been people like us—like Planned Parenthood—defending the rights of women and human rights in general. Isn’t that what the emancipation movement was about in the 1800s, and then in the early 1900s, the suffrage movement? In World War II, people tried to stand up for the Jews. And now there are people like us, standing up for the reproductive rights of women, just as the suffrage movement stood up for their voting rights.’

He listened respectfully, and then he simply said, ‘Abby, you don’t have to justify your job to me.’

What? Justify my job? ‘I’m not justifying,’ I said. ‘I just want to explain—“

‘And you don’t have to explain what you’re doing either. The truth is, you just cited two instances of injustice—[regarding] the slaves and the Jews—that could only exist because a whole segment of our population was dehumanized. Society’s acceptance of that is what allowed injustice to continue. And that’s exactly what Planned Parenthood does to the unborn.’ -page 84

On the pro-choice friends she lost, and other people — the ones who prayed at the gates of the Planned Parenthood in Bryan, TX, who — even before Johnson quit her job — became her friends:

“But the process of seeing previously close friends turn away from me because we now disagreed about the crucial issue of abortion reminds me of the very different brand of friendship I’m also seeing in action these days. I’m thinking of people like Elizabeth, Marilisa, some friends from church and even college days—people who befriended me and stood by me for years even though they did not agree with what I did at Planned Parenthood, even though they do not believe in abortion. Those people modeled for me something far deeper, far stronger than situational friendship: they loved and accepted me even when I was (or am) doing something they found morally objectionable. They didn’t just talk about love—they put flesh on that concept.” -page 220

And I think we can all learn from that.

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Click here to read about all the books I read in 2012.

Click here to learn more about unPLANNED.

Click here to learn more about Abby Johnson.

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Obstacles won’t stop you if you’re committed.

For those of you who are regular readers, you know what I think of Brene Brown and her work (that they are fabulous.). So should Brown stumble upon this post, I’d like her to know that, as well as this: Had it not been for the list on Brown’s web site of books that changed her life, I might not have stumbled upon the book I finished this afternoon.

The Dance of Fear: Rising Above Anxiety, Fear, and Shame to Be Your Best and Bravest Self, by clinical psychologist Harriet Lerner, is the tenth book I’ve read in 2012.

Lerner tackles topics the average American is apt to avoid: anxiety, fear, and shame. As a person who studeid mental health (and as a generally anxious person), I happen to enjoy discussing (and reading about) all three.

But you don’t need to work in the field of mental health to get something out of reading The Dance of Fear. It’s part practical advice, part true stories (about Lerner [like the time a pair of her underwear she didn’t know was stuck inside her pants slipped out of her pant leg and onto the street] and about some of her clients [like the woman diagnosed with a terminal illness in her early 30s]). And it brings up lots of points I think we all ought to know, including the ones from my favorite excerpts. See below:

Preach:

“We can’t stop bad things from happening, but we can stop our relentless focus on how things were or how we want them to be, and develop a deeper appreciation for what we have now.” -page 5

On avoidance:

“When you avoid what you fear, your anxieties are apt to worsen over time. … If you fear rejection, you may indeed need to accumulate more experience being snubbed.” -page 20

“Research demonstrates that the harder phobics work to avoid the things they fear, the more their brains grow convinced that the threat is real. If you’re not phobic but merely terrified, avoidance also makes the problem worse. … you need some experience with the very activity you dread, be it dating, driving, or raising your hand in a meeting.” -page 30

Keep the following in mind when you face what makes you anxious:

“I’m never going to transcend fear, but I needn’t let it stop me. I learned that survival is a perfectly reasonable goal to set for myself the first dozen or so times I face a dreaded situation.” -page 36

On authenticity: 

“Every human life is unique, and every human life has value. We’re not meant to be anyone else but ourselves. We all face the challenge of living the life we have, not the life we imagined having, the life we wish for or the life we are quite certain we deserve. So we need to do whatever it takes to let go of anxiety-driven judgments and comparisons. Life is short, and none of us really has that kind of time.” -page 70

On the cosmic countermove:

“Warning: The universe itself may send you a countermove if you make too bold a change! For example, you buy a house and the week you move in, the dishwasher stops working and your car breaks down. You say to yourself, ‘Oh, no! It’s a message that I never should have left my old apartment!’ Well, I’m suggesting another way to look at it. It’s merely the universe saying, yes, you are making a bold and courageous change! Here’s my countermove! Prove your commitment to making this change!” -page 88

Truth:

“…what we believe is most shameful and unique about ourselves is often what is most human and universal.” -page 127

“The extent to which you hide something important about yourself or another family member is a good barometer of shame.” -page 132

“But what is courage? In a world saturated with images of action-figure bravado, we may mistakenly believe that courage is the absence of fear. Instead, it is the capacity to think, speak, and act, despite our fear and shame.” -page 196

– – – – –

Click here for more information about the Dance of Fear.

Disclosure: This post contains affiliate links. So, if you click the links and purchase the products I recommend, I earn a little commission at no extra cost to you. And when you do, I am sincerely grateful.

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Body parts and celebrities.

As is also the case for many of my fellow bloggers, I really like to check my site’s stats. Using Blogger’s basic tracking tools, I get graphs like this:

And this:

I’m famous in India!

But the best bonus, I think, of having access to blog stats is the set of search terms that Google uses to send readers to my blog. In keeping track of what people search for that brings them here, I have compiled a list.

The Top Five Most Unlikely Search Terms That Lead Readers to My Blog:

[insert drum roll here]

– “enrique iglesias nose” 
– “enrique iglesias face” 
– “where to find wealthy men in tampa bay”
– “big boobs women”
–  “enrique’s penis” 

To the folks who found my blog by Googling any of the above terms, sorry to disappoint.

I think the moral of this story for all of us is that if you want a lot of blog traffic, you ought to mention body parts (such as BUTTS!) and celebrities.

In conclusion, JUSTIN BIEBER.

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Books in 2012: Are You Waiting for ‘The One’?

I’d kind of like to invite Margaret and Dwight Peterson to dinner at my house. We’ll have chicken parm, play a little Jenga and when the opp arises, I’ll thank them sincerely for their book.

Are You Waiting for “The One”? Cultivating Realistic, Positive Expectations for Christian Marriage is the ninth book I’ve read in full in 2012. It is a refreshingly realistic exploration of friendship, love, sex, marriage and family that challenges the status quo set by the world (which, as the Petersons point out, is often unwittingly perpetuated by Christians).

In many Christian books as in many Christian churches, important stuff like sex and gender and dating is broached only superficially. What those Christian books and those Christian churches don’t get is that it does serious damage to consider topics taboo that ought to — nay, must — be discussed deeply. The Petersons get it. And that is rare, and therefore, delightful.

Some of my favorite excerpts:

On hooking up:

“It is difficult to believe, however, that the hookup culture is anything but bad for anyone, male or female. The more casual sexual behavior becomes, the less it serves to deepen existing intimacy and the more it becomes a substitute for and even an impediment to intimacy.” -page 14

On real love: 

“Real love grows through use. You do not have to worry that if you spread it around, you will run out. Nor do you have to worry that if you enter into an intimate friendship with someone whom you do not end up marrying, that person will abscond with part of your heart and there will be less of you than there was before. If you hope to marry someone and do not, of course you will be disappointed. But a great deal of the pain of heartbreak comes not from disappointment in love, but because partners have not, in fact, treated one another lovingly. If you and your friend really do love each other, and really do treat each other well, you will grow in and through the relationship, whether or not it moves toward marriage.” -page 27-28

“Real love develops into deep, meaningful intensity. It does not start with it. The time to look for sparks to fly is after you know one another well enough actually to mean something to one another.” -page 27

On conflict, mutual submission and gender:

“Conflict avoidance is not conflict resolution, however much we might like it to be.” -page 81

“Mutuality takes time. It takes effort. It takes a willingness to talk with one another and listen to one another, for long enough that it can become clear what the issues are, what the feelings and desires of both spouses are, and what some possible plans of action might be. Headship as decision making, by contrast, can seem quick and easy and far less personally demanding. Husband and wife don’t really even have to work together: he just does his job and decides, she does her job and goes along, and they’re done. And that is exactly the problem. They haven’t actually dealt with their differences; they’ve just done an end run around them. They are no more united when they are done than they were when they began. There has got to be a better way.” -pages 94-95

“But before we talk about what a better way might be, we have to tell one more unpleasant truth about the control-and-acquiescence model of male-female relationships. Defining male headship as control and female submission as acquiescence is not just misguided; it is dangerous. By idealizing rigidly defined gender roles, assigning power in relationships disproportionately to men, and encouraging both men and women to see this as spiritually appropriate and desirable, a theological ideology for abuse in intimate relationships is set in place.” -page 95

On communicating via social media:

“Self-revelatory statements are made in isolation, and often to the world in general rather than to anyone in particular. They in turn are read by recipients who are busy with many other things or who may simply happen to be trolling the web for status updates. The result is less an electronic equivalent of conversation, and more a combination of exhibitionism and voyeurism.” -page 114

On sex:

“One of the first things to be said about sex is that it is okay not to know everything. Our culture glorifies sexual prowess—many people simply assume that sexual experience and personal maturity go together, and that anyone who is virginal or otherwise inexperienced is for that reason a mere child. … In reality, experience and maturity are not the same thing. It is possible to have a great deal of sexual experience and to be a thoroughly immature person, and possible likewise to have little or no experience of sexual relationship and yet to be secure and well grounded in one’s own masculinity or femininity.” -page 137

“The foundations for a positive marital sexual relationship begin to be built long before the wedding night. If you and your partner are cultivating an intimate friendship in which you can enjoy one another playfully, talk with one another openly, work on shared projects cooperatively, problem-solve constructively, and relax together trustingly, you are well on your way to building a relationship in which sex can play a positive and intimate part.” -page 144

On contraception:

“On its invention fifty years ago, the birth-control pill was hailed as a great advance over barrier methods, precisely because a woman did not have to negotiate its use with a sexual partner. Now the sense is that a once-a-day pill is too much trouble; people need ‘fool-proof contraceptives that require almost no thought or action.’ The obvious problem with this is that where contraception is foolproof and thoughtless, sex will be too. Is that really what any of us wants? Is that really compatible with Christian notions of what sex and marriage and human life itself are really all about?” -page 164

 

[callout]Click here for more information about (or to order) Are You Waiting For “The One?”. [/callout]

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“God can’t stand me” (and other lies).

One of my favorite defense mechanisms (to study) is projection.

Projection is “attributing one’s own unacknowledged feelings [or thoughts or behaviors] to others.” (1)

It’s sort of like saying “You eat too much…” to a friend (who may or may not actually be eating too much) simultaneously as you eat too much (without noticing that you are eating too much).

It protects us from the discomfort of acknowledging something negative we think, feel or do ourselves (and from the work of correcting it). We use projection unwittingly. With it, we draw attention to something negative we see (or fabricate!) in someone else — something we subconsciously recognize (and dislike) in ourselves. We do it because as long as we are pointing at it in someone else, we a) don’t have to address it in ourselves and b) can trust that no one else will notice it in us (or so we think).

It’s kind of like the time I stopped responding to an ex-boyfriend’s attempts to reach me, and in his 35th email to me in the first days after I cut off contact, he said, “You need to move on!”

Do you ever notice that we do this with God?

Like when we sin and then act like God thinks we’re bad and worthless.

The truth is that when we act like God thinks we’re bad and worthless, we are projecting how we feel about ourselves onto God. It isn’t how God feels about us after we do something we know we shouldn’t — it’s how we feel about us.

But remember:

God doesn’t love us because we are good. We are good because He loves us. And even when we aren’t worthy, we are valuable.

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1. From here.