Showing posts with label friendships. Show all posts
Showing posts with label friendships. Show all posts

Friday, April 8, 2016

Six Years Out

Six years ago, I came out on this blog. It feels like yesterday and, simultaneously, a lifetime ago.

It feels like yesterday that I started to brave the online world with how I truly felt. Seems only yesterday that I reached out to other gay Mormon bloggers (who I am still friends with today). Seems only yesterday that I was wrestling with two halves of me, not knowing that I could be complete and whole as a distinct individual. Seems only yesterday that the world was simpler, black and white, and easier.

Yet, I look back over the past six years and I am floored by how much has happened and how distant my old life seems. Going to church with my family (when I have the chance) seems foreign to me with only a hint of distant familiarity. My old thoughts and thinking patterns seem labored and heavy compared to the lightness I experience today while contemplating life. It seems a lifetime ago that I discovered the world has so many colors, hues and diversity that makes it truly beautiful.

The world has changed. Gay marriage is now legal. Slowly, there is more acceptance in the world. Information is readily available and communication is easy for anyone needing love, support or help. I've had close gay couples who are dear friends marry (some divorce), adopt children and start their own families. It seems that a lifetime of change has happened in only a few short years.

We still have a long way to go. Policies change, laws are introduced, intolerance still exists. But we are stronger together. We cannot become complacent and forget where we have come from only a few short years ago. Yet we can also celebrate all we have accomplished and push forward, including making personal progress, enhancing friendships and building up the community we have created.

Six years ago I came out on this blog. And in what seems like both a brief moment in time and vast era of change, I've never been happier.

Wednesday, April 8, 2015

Five Years Out


Five years out. I can hardly believe it myself.

A half decade of truly being me! In the past five years, I’ve been on such a journey. From helping out the gay Mormon community to then focusing more on my own health and stability, I’ve found that true happiness comes from both serving others and from within. And I’m happier than ever.

I’m going through so much change right now, but change is good. It
keeps you humble and moving forward. Everything is up in the air right now—my job, where I live, what my future may hold. But the one thing that has been constant is the close circle of friends and family who support me through everything. I even still have friends I met from this very blog.

That’s why I still keep this blog up even though most of the Mohosphere seems to have migrated to Facebook and beyond. Every year I look back, read through my posts and see how far I have come. And if it can be helpful at all in other people’s pursuit of peace, then all the better.

Friday, January 21, 2011

Return

It has been exactly six months to the day that I last posted.

I am sorry I have been gone so long! At first, this break was not planned or intentional. It just happened because of an uptick of my day-to-day responsibilities (and quite possibly me discovering the game Angry Birds during my daily commute). However, the delay in posting turned into a sabbatical from blogging for a few important reasons.

In the past half-year, I have still been heavily involved in the gay Mormon community but my blog has not been the primary vehicle of my interactions. Instead of hiding behind the words on a website, I am experiencing life first hand. This blog initially was a sounding board for thoughts, ideas and feelings as I processed one of the biggest decisions and subsequent paradigm shifts of my life. The words were a manifestation of the transition as I learned to accept who I was – who I am.

On a smaller scale, I started worrying too much about the quality of my own writing. So many of you so eloquently voice your heartfelt experiences and reasoned arguments that I want to put my best effort into participating in our community. I hold myself to high standards especially when it comes to writing. One of the primary things I do every day is write and edit. Before when composing an entry I would work on it for quite some time, and if I couldn't get a sentence just right I would agonize over publishing it until I was happy with the cadence, flow, beat and structure of each post.


If you will forgive me, I am going to try to post more regularly but I am going to spend less time agonizing over every word. I apologize if some of the edges of my future posts are a little rougher than what I have published before, but I celebrate my imperfections because I am an imperfect person.

One of the primary reasons for the break was because I spread myself too thin. Balancing an ever-demanding job with everything that I wanted to do in my personal life became too much of a juggling act. Work days became long and arduous. Free time to think and reflect became a rarity. My priorities were challenged due to my limited time. Pensive moments and blogging fell through the cracks in my schedule.

Additionally, I wanted to do everything I possibly could to help the community. I helped create the MoHo Map and continue to maintain it, offered to help administer the MoHo Directory, attempted to write book entries on gay Mormon issues and helped organize a potential new community for the advancement of gay acceptance within the church. With everything that was happening in addition to my work and church responsibilities, I couldn’t really do my best in any of them so the time I invested into blogging was sacrificed in order for me to concentrate on other priorities.

So much has happened in six months. One of the benefits of this sabbatical is that it has created a buffer of time on this blog because events started moving quickly and I simply could not keep up in real time. At first, I was using this blog primarily as a journaling function. It will continue to serve that role as well as being a place for discussion and reflection of both yours and the humorous and serious thoughts running through my mind.

Still, the mission of this blog remains as it has been from the beginning: celebrate the good, create beneficial connections and relationships, promote the positive, be as uplifting and helpful to others as possible as we take this journey together.

The collective voice of this community has immense value. I think I can give back and contribute more to the running dialogue that I have benefitted so much from before. I love telling stories and I have some to finish up and some new ones to tell.

You are all amazing. Some of my best friends have originated through this blog and I hope to meet many more of you.

Horizon is back!