Akting Out

It was one of the earliest lessons learned as a child; God doesn’t make deals. Satan does. Back then, it didn’t make much sense. In the literal sense, I suppose that’s true; God doesn’t make deals in the traditional sense. But He will always listen to what you have to say, and He will always meet you halfway.

In my experience, it works pretty much the same way as any other bargain you might strike; you offer something and get something in return. Dealing with God isn’t much different, except the stakes are much higher; God doesn’t demand anything from us, He loves us too much for that. No, that’s the beauty of faith; you don’t really have to do anything but believe.

No, the demands come from His former right hand; the one who’ll give you your supposed heart’s desire for something you may find trivial…and in the end, the price you pay is eternal.

So what is it you could possibly offer God to make Him give you the time of day? What is it you’re asking of Him? Because nothing comes free, and if you want God to give you the time of day, I mean if you really want Him to do something for you, then you have to be willing to give something back.

In my experience, the price paid is mind-numbingly hard work. It often pushes you to your breaking point. You have so many moments where you don’t think you can do it, where you think He’s a tyrant, where you say screw it, I don’t want it this badly, I’m out.

The beauty of it is that if you decide you’ve had enough, then cool, quit. Nothing bad will happen to you for it. Your life will continue on as normal. In fact, therein lies the irony; your life will go back to the same misery you were trying to escape before you made the deal in the first place. God demands nothing; he promises you something if you give something of yourself in return. It’s a simple premise; do nothing, nothing will happen.

For those of us who choose to see it through, the rewards are epic beyond belief; not only do we get what we asked for, in a manner far beyond anything we imagined, but we emerge better people on the other side of the work we put into the effort.

Patience is a big part of it; we may ask for God’s help at any point, but it’s only when we stop worrying about it that He answers. I think that our continuing to worry about it signifies that we haven’t given the problem wholly over to God yet, and why should He give us the time of day when we haven’t shown that we trust Him? Stop worrying about it. Give it over to Him. Let Him work.

Example 1). I wanted off the street. I gave up fighting, running the street, went to the library every day, devoted myself to finding a job—anything that came along. One month later, I had a rinkydink telemarketing job and a shoebox apartment in Bay City, Michigan. I missed the parties, the fast money, and the thrill of looking into someone’s eyes the moment he knew I was about to beat him. It was worth it.

Example 2). In a recession, I was able to sustain myself through writing—sometimes for up to fifteen hours a day—plus help from people I cared about until I found the job I maintain today. Thanks for the five months in between jobs, I was discovered as a writer, and well, you know the rest.

Example 3). To keep up with the demand of my job, I had to learn how to sell TV. I went way outside of my comfort zone and sell between four and five a month (which is epic, for me).

And, of course, the latest example.

I confess; I don’t want to just compete in next year’s Show Me Games. I want to win them.
Beyond that, I’d like to face down the last of my fears. I want to stop trying to succeed and actually do it. I want to stop talking about losing weight and actually do it. I want to actually finish two books on time. I want to stop wishing and talking and actually start doing something.

I want to conquer my fears of success and being happy. So, of course, I asked God for help. Tell me what You want, and I’ll do it.

Today, He answered.
You give Me everything you have, and I’ll make 2011 the year of your life.

My schedule today was extended during the week, at my request, so I could leave early on Fridays. This means I get a 2 ½ day weekend, but eliminates any possibility for me training, or writing at night.
But there’s the mornings…and I realized what He was asking of me.

Up at four in the morning. Hit the Y for an hour. Come back. Take care of the dogs. Write. Go to work. Repeat four days a week.
That’s asking a lot. Of course, I could always do nothing, right?

But I trust Him.

So here goes.

God bless, and thanks for reading.

(c) Avery K. Tingle for Akting Out LLC

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I don’t know a single United States citizen who doesn’t remember where they were that day. I was in California, sleeping in, and recovering. The mother of my children charged into the bedroom and with wide eyes, commanded me to come downstairs as though the house was being evacuated. I joined her family in the living room and observed on the TV as one of two hijacked aircraft crashed into the second World Trade Center in New York and exploded on impact.
September 11, 2001.
More than three thousand people died that day. Some of us lost someone, but all of us lost something; that was the day we lost our sense of security and invulnerability.

After that, every Muslim in America was at best distrusted, and at worst, a target. It’s a stigma we are only just now beginning to get past. So I was surprised when President Obama suddenly came forward with the idea of building a mosque near Ground Zero.

While I don’t think a mosque near Ground Zero is sacrilegious, I do believe it would do more harm than good. I think it would be a miracle of the mosque was even completed without a violent incident. The worst case scenario is some group firebombing the mosque while it’s crowded and claiming ‘vengeance’ for 9/11.

Instead of a mosque, I propose the following.

We build a Universal Faith Center, where everyone of any religion can come and worship the god of their choice. The rules are simple; you do not harass another visitor for their choice in faith. You share your beliefs freely with those who are willing to listen. You welcome everyone who enters through those doors. And you don’t put it near Ground Zero; you put it right in the middle.

Can you imagine the power of such a place? People of all faiths coming together with the goals of praise, worship, and fellowship. All faiths, not just one. In the end, one may be right, another may be wrong, but who is another man to judge? The way I see it, we will all find out one day.

And in doing so, we accomplish a dual purpose; beyond creating a center of great faith and equality, we show the people who perpetuated 9/11 that after the fire, the ashes, and the tears, we were not broken. Rather, we came together, as one nation, embracing each other for our beliefs instead of persecuting each other. In the end, we were frightened, sure, but we rebuilt, we moved on, and we overcame.

That’s what I think we should build at Ground Zero.

Thank you very much for reading.

(c) Avery K. Tingle for Akting Out LLC

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I nearly died when I was twenty-nine. Not by accident, not some oh-you-got-so-lucky situation that usually ends up on a talk show, someone had me dead to rights. I was only spared because I was needed alive at the time…at least, that’s what I thought.

But God has funny ways of getting your attention.

Let’s back up a bit.
When I was twenty-nine, I was staying in on the North Side of Saginaw, Michigan. It was about as close to hell as you could get without dying; every other home on the block was either burned out or a former crime scene. Nights were riddled with gunfire and the community park was a haven for hustlers and small children alike. Cops never came up there by themselves, and if they were up there, count on itchy trigger fingers. I couldn’t blame them; in the end, everyone just wants to go home, right?

As usually, I had gotten myself involved with something I had no business being a part of. Put simply, it was a contest only a few people knew about and the winner would take home a fair amount of money. I’m training—as usual, mind you, nothing had changed about my routine—when something funny happened. I couldn’t explain it, but as I’m punching and kicking the heavy bag, my legs feel as though I’m dragging them through sand, my shoulders strain and the muscles stretch with each punch. I can feel the shock of each blow against the back reverberate back through me and it hurts. My legs, formerly my best asset, now felt as though they took whole minutes to bring up. I tried resting and going back at it to no avail; it was as though my strength, speed, and endurance had been suddenly, unexpectedly cut in half. I wasn’t injured. It had been months since my last serious fight. There was no reason for this. It shook me to the core. Up until that moment, I figured I would fight for the rest of my life; my definition of immortal.

A few days later, I got a look at my competition as he swiftly beat a friend of mine into submission. Had I felt like I was in my prime, I wouldn’t have been worried. Shaken, unable to ascertain what the hell was wrong with me…there was no way I was going to take this guy on. Screw the money.

I went to the person who organized the event and told him I wanted out. He asked me if I was certain. I said I was. He appeared to let it go at that.
That night, as I returned to where I was staring, someone pulled into the intersection a block away. They stopped, and I looked up in time to see a dark silhouette step out of the car.
I felt something rip past my head before I saw the light, heard the defeaning explosion. I had never heard a gunshot that close. It was my breaking point. I lay there, on the ground, huddled, terrified, almost in tears, in the middle of the road in the worst ghetto I had ever been in.

The man who organized the event asked me if I was okay as I re-entered the place I was staying. Yes, I was fine. No, I won’t be dropping out of the event. I got the message. Fuckhead.
That night, with my cot traditionally placed under the pay phone by the men’s room (I slept light, and wanted to be woken by any movement), with everyone else sleeping and snoring, I got down on my knees for the first time in nearly three years. I folded my hands, lowered my head, and gave up.
I don’t know what else to do. I don’t know where else to go. I don’t want to die. Please…help me get through this. Help me get out of this situation. I will work. I will go straight. I will do whatever You ask of me. Please, God…just meet me halfway.

My life has not been the same since that night.
Two days later, the event ended positively, almost humorously—and I made a lot of money.
The next week, I was out of the shelter, and in my own apartment. I have not been homeless since.
The following month, I had a full-time job. A friend of mine sold me his old car.

Just like that. One prayer changed everything.

People often tell me that I can get away with things that other can’t, or that I seem to have figured something out that others haven’t. I wouldn’t give myself that much credit. In fact, I wouldn’t give myself any credit. The fact of the matter is, I have a standing arrangement with God; as long as I continue to work and pursue my ambitions, without bringing harm to others unless absolutely necessary, then He will always, without fail, continue to provide aid. This is the very definition of Meet Me Halfway. So many people expect God to do all of the work and then turn away when He doesn’t; He doesn’t work that way. In a dark tunnel, God is your map, He is your flashlight, but you still have to walk to the end of the tunnel.

It’s a beautiful arrangement, too. It allows me not to worry about most things because I know they will be resolved. They may not be resolved in the way I want them to be, but the point is, they are. I pray. He answers. I work. He does the rest. It’s allowed me to get this far.

I still get a little emotional going food shopping (no joke) because I’m grateful that I can. So many people take the simple things for granted. That I can sit here, write this blog, drink the tea I bought and listen to the music from the other computer beside me is nothing short of a miracle. Everything I am, was, and will be I attribute to God; I do none of it on my own.  I only advance because He allows me to.

I wanted to take a moment and use the gift He gave me to publicly acknowledge my gratitude for all He has done for me. Thanks for reading.

(c) Avery K. Tingle for Akting Out LLC

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I mentioned in the new home page that this blog reflects my journey to know myself. It was a preface for this entry.

Do you know how much you can glean from someone simply by shutting up and paying attention? If I’m good at my job (and I seem to be) then it’s not because I talk, because I don’t think I talk that well. It’s because I know how to listen.

So many people eagerly run off at mouth, wasting time and space by saying nothing. They may be spewing words, but it’s nothing intelligent. You’ve met them; the type of people who take small talk to the next level, the ones who have to dominate every conversation they’re in, who have to be the center of attention in anything they do. I’ve found that people who do this habitually either have a need for attention, or are trying to hide something. Not necessarily something malicious, just something they don’t want you to see. Shame, for example.

Of course, there are exceptions to every rule. But this is just my life experience.
A gift I inherited from my father is my ability to read people, mostly by looking into their eyes. Mouths lie; eyes don’t.

Through the years, the ability to read people has probably kept me alive. Stripping away the illusions of what I was dealing with (and what I was becoming) better prepared me to take it on when the time came. And while it undoubtedly saved my life, it destroyed my faith in the human race.

People are scum, for the most part; they may befriend you to your face and tear your down behind you, and that’s the least of it. In my time, I’ve come across a man who beat his own mother to death with a baseball bat simply because she wouldn’t give him drug money (true story), people who whore out their own children to pay debts or feed habits, other people who find pleasure in ruining children…the list goes on.

In the end, most people will do what they want, regardless of the consequences, and I think it’s repulsive. For the longest time, it’s why I wanted to be left alone.

It’s also why I prefer developing online relationships instead of real-life ones. People tend to reveal the best of themselves online, smoothing the transition to real-life if you ever take it that far. Also, I’ve met more like-minded people on the internet, especially since I went straight.

And, to be honest, I’m no different. I used to tell myself that I wasn’t a bad person because of who I was punishing. The fact is, I was a bigger monster than anyone I took on, and I didn’t want to face up to it. That life is long behind me now, and there’s no shame in admitting I was wrong.

My attitude used to be; the world can self-destruct for all I care, just leave me out of it. As long as my soul is assured, I don’t have anything to worry about, right?

Yeah, right.

My problem lately is that I have not seen malice when looking into people’s eyes. I have no idea how to deal with that. Mostly I seal up and push people away.
I look into the eyes of people now and I see beauty, I see passion, I see forgivable faults, I see innocence, I see love, I see genuineness, I see compassion…none of these things I’m used to. I find myself unable to maintain eye contact because I’m afraid these eyes will see right through me, and the monster I used to be.

Again, this may be why I’m good at my job; I’m great at short-term engagements with people I’ll never meet. We get on the phone, we shoot the breeze, we hang up, end of story. I’m not so good at the long-term thing. Ask anyone who’s been with me.

God did not intend for us to live in solitude, and on the other side, I have no idea how to reach out. I wonder now if everything I went through was meant to destroy my faith in humanity, only to see if I was strong enough to find it again.

I can’t run from who I used to be; if anyone chooses to get close to me, then I have to be honest and hope they can deal with it. But I am who I am.

So I present myself to the world, nervous as all hell but confident; this is who I am, now show me who you are.

(c) Avery K. Tingle for Akting Out LLC

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I spent a few minutes trying to sort through the madness of my life. I spent about ten minutes warming up, and this is what I came to.

My life is, and always has been, about faith. But I have yet to find the words to accurately convey what it means to me, yet I can provide examples.

If I may elaborate, please?

Faith is falling out of the running for a job—and then interviewing for it that following week.

Faith is living homelessly for more than five years and living to tell about it.

Faith is maintaining your residence and way of life despite a lack of income.

Faith is victory after exhaustion.

This is the most trying time of my life, and I’m not talking about the lesson plan I keep twittering on about. I’m still amazed that my children’s family (on their mother’s side) were the ones who alerted me about my children. Once my staunchest adversaries and now they’re the ones who’re instrumental in me being able to maintain contact with my kids? That is faith.

Still, the questions mount, and these are questions beyond whether or not I can do it; if it was that simple, there’d be no question.

There’s the thorny legal process. My ex-wife abandoned our children, leaving them with her family so she could be with her drug-addicted boyfriend. I don’t have much better on my side; I still left them. But…I’ve gotten myself together, somewhat. I mean, I live alone, I’m self-sufficient, I have a trickling revenue stream even though I’m out of work, and my oldest son seems excited about seeing me again. Will my ability to support them count for anything in a system notorious for awarding custody to the mother regardless of the father’s status?

I’m not just saying that. I’ve seen it firsthand.

What if I have to remain in California in order to keep my kids? This is the only way I’d have to concede the issue. I can’t afford to live in California, much less support two children.

I don’t want to live in California, either. It took me more than a decade to say that (and I would do it for my kids if left with no choice, and I had the means), but there’s nothing for me there. I grew up in San Francisco, and that feels great to say, but Missouri is home, and God willing, I’ll spend the bulk of my years in St. Louis.

Moments like this, when doubt creeps into my mind, I get that feeling at the pit of my stomach, and the comforting thought that I’ve had since I was a child; it’ll all be okay.

Funny thing; it always is.

And so I fight on, working towards the inevitable exhaustion, for the first time unsure as to whether or not I can achieve my goal. I know that I have a gift for pulling things together, and I do not quit.
Faith, like always, is what will turn raw willpower into reality.

So at last I find the words. What is faith?

Faith is the knowledge of knowing that things will work out without knowing exactly how.

Faith is the will to fight on.

The source of my faith is, and always will be, God and His Son, but what you use is entirely up to you.

(c) Avery K. Tingle for Akting Out LLC

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