What is my lane?

March 28, 2025

What is my lane?

And where is the lane? (Photo by Jon Flobrant on Unsplash)

When I saw the Instagram Story flash through my feed, I knew by sheer intuition that my book would be involved.

First, the backstory. Last fall at an author event at my local Barnes & Noble, an energetic young bookstore owner from Austin, Texas, beelined for my table and bought a copy of AMEN?. Our interaction was warm, earnest, and heartening. How wonderful! I thought. My little book is now wending its way halfway across the country. There new shoppers will find it, new readers will connect with it, and this new-to-me bookseller will feel compelled to stock many copies and make me a minor celebrity.

Back to now, six months later, when this Story from the bookseller's account shared they were selling an entire bookcase (six shelves' worth) of books for $40. At first my thumb tapped past it, but then I thought again and doubled back. Pressing on the screen to hold the image still, I zoomed in on a familiar ivory and blue spine tucked in a row of books on the second shelf from the bottom.

Ah. There she was, my little AMEN?. Indeed on a shelf to be sold, but not in the way I had anticipated. My feelings flowed quickly from there. Dismay at being discarded. Resignation to being relegated. Weary of the perpetual loop of excitement, expectation, and disappointment that having a book out in the world can bring.

I wrote a short message in reply—"I spy AMEN? in there! May it go to a good home. <3"—and received a "heart" emoji from the bookstore account. I wonder if they sensed my forced cheer wrapped around a sincere stab at connection. Don't forget about me, was what I really wanted to say. Help my work mean something.

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I met a dear friend for coffee last weekend, and as happens to every conversation in my neck of the woods right now, the topic quickly turned to the state of the U.S. government and the world. I expressed how the recent takeover of the Kennedy Center, the executive order curtailing the Institute of Museum and Library Services, and the detention of student activists exercising their right to free speech was turning my gut to ice. Not that I've been on board with any other action of this administration so far, but these ones struck most at my personal commitments to creativity, communication, and the arts.

My friend nodded, understanding. "Taking over the arts is about shaping," she said. As in, shaping exposure, shaping narratives, shaping worldviews—shaping how much people feel free to imagine and create. To curtail people's self-expression is to stultify discourse and limit future possibilities, because a society afraid to dream is a society discouraged from acting.

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Someone asked me recently, "What are you giving up for Lent?", and in the moment I sputtered a non-reply about liking to add practices rather than sacrifice items, blah blah blah.

Later, though, I considered the question further. Here I am halfway through the 40 days of Lent, and I have been swirling around several half-baked ideas without any firm commitment. Am I giving up my phone at the dinner table? Am I praying the news? Am I fasting from social media? Am I calling my representatives? Not in any reliable, dedicated way. These are just the things I think I should be doing.

Then I thought about what I am gravitating toward, organically, without any Lenten frame attached. I'm reading and digesting Christian Wiman's Zero at the Bone: 50 Entries Against Despair. I'm enjoying novels that help me relax, escape, and daydream. I'm maintaining—without interruption so far—my 2025 goal to write for two hours every week outside the house. I've submitted a few pieces for the first time in forever. I'm singing at all three of my church's annual Sung Stations of the Cross. I'm throwing open our backyard to a new season of hosting. I'm reaching out to dear ones far and near through texts, calls, emails, LinkedIn messages, postcards, etc. and sending bits of love and support wherever I can.

Maybe my Lenten practice is already in full swing. Maybe I am girding myself, through creation and community, for an unnerving present and an unknown future—for the days between the crucifixion and the resurrection.

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What is my lane? I've asked myself this at least twice a week for the last decade, meaning, I am ten years out from realizing that I need to do my part in being God's hands and feet on earth yet not much closer to articulating how exactly I do that.

One seed planted many moons ago, however, was the Social Change Ecosystem framework developed by Deepa Iyer at Building Movement Project. Grounded in the idea that "we are more effective and more sustainable in our social change work when we build connections with others," the framework maps ten types of roles that people can fill as they work toward social change.

As I have reflected over the years on my most deeply held values, natural abilities, and reliable interests, I find myself most repeatedly called to these roles:

Caregivers: "We nurture and nourish the people around us by creating and sustaining a community of care, joy, and connection."
Storytellers: "We craft and share our community stories, cultures, experiences, histories, and possibilities through art, music, media, and movement."

This surprises no one, right? Yet just as with my Lenten practices, I feel compelled, perversely, to downplay what I can contribute in these capacities. I've somehow got it into my head that if I'm not at every protest with a catchy sign and raised fist, then my witness and my participation don't count.

But when I interrogate that argument, it collapses pretty quickly. Who will nourish the Disrupters? Who will replenish the Frontline Responders? Who will cheer on the Visionaries, support the Weavers, and tell the stories of what we have achieved together and where we can go next? Me. I can. To feed, hold, reflect, narrate: these are my roles in the world I inhabit.

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"Activists and movements burn out. But art keeps protesting for generations, a dissent that keeps speaking long after the first spark has died away. Art is the bonfire that never burns out." —Liz Charlotte Grant

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There's one feeling I forgot to mention about seeing my book, tiny and blurry, for sale in a distant state. I felt hope. The tiniest flicker, mind you, but still: hope. I had a sudden vision of someone in the community buying the bookcase. Sifting through and sorting the haul. Putting AMEN? in a "donate" pile bound for Goodwill or a local library fundraiser sale.

I then pictured someone else, a bargain-hunting customer, finding the book for 50 cents (maybe a whole dollar). Flipping the book over and reading the back copy. Feeling intrigued enough to bring it home. Thumbing through it to have one title or phrase catch their eye. Losing themselves in an essay, then a prayer, then a chapter. Feeling comforted. Rejuvenated. Moved.

I will never know what becomes of that book copy, or most of my book copies for that matter. I don't know what shelves they will rest on or what nightstands they will grace. I don't know what most readers will think of my work or how it will make them feel. And you know what? I have to be ok not knowing. Most of our life consists of not knowing, a reality that encompasses creating art and serving others. These elements are all of a piece: to act without predicting the outcome. To walk without knowing the destination. To accept one's worth without equivocation. To share one's gifts without reserve. To continue sharing them, without resolution. And so on.

Help my work mean something. The work, however it manifests, is the meaning; the meaning, however it emerges, is the work. Keep going.