Shoes | Connecting with People When I’m Just Me

Making new friends and meeting new people in general is not an easy thing for me to do. It never has been, but I’m working on being better.

In my church, we are taught to love our neighbors as ourselves. We are encouraged to get to know and love our actual neighbors. We also have a responsibility to minister to people in our neighborhoods. To make sure that their needs are being met, to help them when they need it, and to get to know them and make sure that they feel loved.

I struggle with this. I have no problem being generally friendly at church and checking in on people that I have become friends with, but trying to reach out to new move-ins to the neighborhood or become friends with someone I don’t have a previous connection is terrifying.

This brings me to the shoes. I have different “pairs of shoes” that I wear. When I was in Sacramento, I wore my missionary shoes. When I’m at work, I wear my work shoes. When I was in China, I wore my teacher/camp counsellor shoes. When one of my younger siblings is uncomfortable or in need, I wear my big sister shoes. All of these different identities that I put on help me to interact more easily with the people around me. Let me give you an example of how I’m different in each of these pairs of shoes.

WEARING MY SHOES

Considering how difficult getting to know my current ward at church has been, it’s hard for me to believe that just three years ago I was being thrown into a brand new ward, not knowing a single person. I didn’t even know the girl that I was living with 24/7. And yet, within a month I had gotten to know the name and face of every person that came to church in that area, and I had built relationships with all of them. I had no problem going up to people that I didn’t know, or didn’t know well, and asking them about themselves. I also didn’t have a problem knocking on stranger’s doors or stopping them in the street to try to get to know them and to share the message of Jesus Christ with them. I was wearing my Missionary Shoes.

The same type of thing happens when I have any of my other pairs of shoes on. When I was in China, wearing my Teacher/Camp Counsellor Shoes, I was outgoing, fun, and silly. I played language games all day and never stopped trying to engage and interact with all of the kids. My default personality would have simply talked when necessary, completed the required activities, and enjoyed the quiet whenever I could. But that wasn’t me with my Teacher Shoes on. When I am wearing my Big Sister Shoes, no social discomfort is too great to help my sibling out. Whether it’s asking an awkward question or sneaking a picture to confirm someone’s identity at the grocery store, I’m all in with my Big Sister Shoes.

The situation I notice this effect in the most in my current every day life is my Work Shoes. I work at a doctor’s office, answering the phone, making appointments, and greeting and seating patients when they first arrive at the office, before the doctor sees them. Normally, making small talk with total strangers is something I could never and would never do. But when I’m at work, it doesn’t make me nervous or uncomfortable at all.

THE DIFFERENCE

Here’s what changes. When I have any of these pairs of shoes on, I am protected from rejection and failure. Not that I didn’t get rejected as a missionary or that everything goes according to plan when I am wearing a pair of shoes, but it doesn’t affect me.

With my Missionary Shoes on, Jaycee wasn’t stumbling over questions or getting doors slammed in her face in the rain, Sister Cook was.

With my Big Sister Shoes on, Jaycee doesn’t look stupid for asking a dumb question, Aspen’s Big Sister does.

With my Work Shoes on, Jaycee doesn’t have to pretend to be happy and upbeat even though she’s exhausted from being pregnant and working full-time, because the Medical Assistant loves her job, is happy to do it, and doesn’t mind awkward silences or angry phone calls.

BEING BAREFOOT

So what do I do when I’m asked to do any of these things without my shoes on? Without my protective layer? Without the ability to deflect rejection and failure onto my current role? How do I find the strength and courage to be rejected when I’m nothing but me?

I’m honestly still working on finding an answer to that question, but I think it comes down to love. Learning to have ambient and unconditional love for the other members of humanity that are just as stressed and working just as hard not to fail as I am. I think that we all have a lot more in common with each other than we think, and connecting with each other is easy once someone makes the first move. So that’s what I’m trying to do. Rather than sit around and wait for my neighbors and colleagues and fellow humans to make the first move, I’m trying to push myself to do it sometimes. I don’t have to do it all the time, but I’m trying to follow my friendly urges. I’m trying not to smother the thoughts of outreach that scare the crud out of me.

People need to feel seen and loved and noticed and paid attention to. Our sense of community is one of the reasons that we thrive as a species. Without each other to lean on, we can’t make it in this world. One of my goals this year is to let people around me know that I see them, love them, notice them, and pay attention to them. I want people to know that I care.