Chelsea Brooke Yarborough: The Courage to LOVE

This week’s episode features a talk from Rev. Dr. Chelsea Brooke Yarborough. Chelsea served as the Theologian in Residence for FTE’s online experience supporting young adults through short discernment gatherings. Her reflection serves to inspire young adults to explore their many calls while reminding them they are loved.  

Chelsea is assistant professor of African American Preaching, Sacred Rhetoric, and Black Practical Theology at Phillips Theological Seminary. Her research reimagines the nature and purpose of preaching and worship through the rhetoric and ritual practices of Black women. Chelsea is also an ordained minister, a poet, and an enneagram teacher, aiming to create spaces for healing and wholeness for all with whom she engages. She lives by the motto “live to love and love to live” and is excited to continue curating curiosity in the communities she serves.

Vector Illustration by: ReAl_wpap
Music by: @siryalibeats

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Transcript

Patrick: Hey it's Dr. Reyes, the host of the Sound of the Genuine. And today we have a special episode. This week's episode features a talk from Reverend Dr. Chelsea Brooke Yarbrough, who served as the theologian in resident for an online experience supporting young adults in their discernment. 

Now we rarely have preachers preaching on this show, but I'm excited that we have Chelsea who is the assistant professor of African-American preaching, sacred rhetoric and black practical theology at Phillips Theological Seminary. Now she helps us reimagine, what does it mean to find our purpose, to find our call, to come alive, while telling her story. I'm so excited about this episode and you get to hear from my friend, Reverend Dr. Chelsea Yarborough.

Chelsea: Hello everyone. I am always honored to speak and be present with any group of people. But I must say when FTE calls, I answer. I'm particularly honored to be here with you all. The community that this organization gathers has been critical to my journey, um, over the last six years. And so I'm just so honored to be here. So I’d like to open up in a blessing for our time together. 

God of many names, spirit who shows up in expansive ways, open our senses that we might experience you within the depths of our truths. Animate within us that we might find the courage to love in a world that tries to feed us only fear. Bless our minds that we might give ourselves permission to be present here, even with all that's going on in our lives. May our time together draw us into deeper belovedness with ourselves, one another, all of creation, and you. May this, and all things offered in unconditional love, be so. May it be so.

So friends, while I didn't have to name this conversation, I did. And so if I had to, I would name our time together, the courage to love. The courage to L O V E, love. You are the universe in human form. Have you ever heard that? So these seven words jolted me when I first read them. I had just woken up and happened to come across this quote with no attribution, in a journal that I was perusing. Admittedly, these seven words caught me when I was in a bit of a call crisis, not too long ago.

I had recently finished my PhD and so many people were commenting on how clear my call was and how lucky I was to have found the path that my soul must have. Now it wasn't that I disagreed. It's just that I felt like it wasn't the whole truth. I felt like people saw me and saw just one moment, one story, a path that felt concretized to the eyes of those who weren't looking close enough to see the nuance of who I was.

Is my calling to be a professor? What happens if I change my mind? Is my calling to preach? What would happened if I change what that means to me? What am I called to do? And how in the world do I articulate that to so many people who have already made decisions about what that means for me? But then I came across these words. You, it said. Chelsea, you are the universe in human form. You, yes, all of you that I'm speaking to today, are the universe manifested in human form. You are the magic of the stars and the tenderness of the ground. You are the expansiveness of the root systems and the interconnected ways of all things that breathe. You are light, love, and all that is hope for love wrapped stunningly in your skin and offered in this moment, and in this time, to be here. 

So in this moment when I heard this, I remembered that call is both a noun and a verb. I'd often thought about the noun of calling. You know, this is my calling, this is what I'm to do, but what about the verb, call? Now a simple google search - If you know me, you know I love a good Google search - reminded me that call can also mean to cry out.

Perhaps then, answering the call is simply hearing the ways that the universe - yes, that universe that you are manifested in human form as - is crying out to you to respond. What are your unique gifts, things that excite you, ways of being that produce more love within you, that you want to offer to yourself and then share with others?

Now, growing up in my church context, call always felt like some small tightrope, really thin, that I would have to figure out how to find, stay on it and if not, somehow God was going to be angry with me and like smack me back into my call. It wasn't a bad thing, but it was something I was to answer that was outside of myself, instead of recognizing it within myself. See, far too often, we get caught up in the ‘am I enough’, or ‘am I doing this right’

We can get stuck in the am I’s instead of claiming the I am and allowing ourselves to flourish within that. And I know many of us, myself included, come from communities that deserve so much more than we've ever been given, peoples that have been treated like dirt when they are divinity. So when we talk about what we are called to do and find ourselves in these pressured environments, we often respond to our actions, trying to fix our communities. And there's nothing wrong with that. But I want just to consider that instead of am I living into my call to give ourselves today, space to think, am I acknowledging, honoring, loving my I am? So today I invite us not to take these questions away, but to start from that place of being - from considering what are the components of yourself that you want to take with you as you move anywhere. How can call then be a thread that moves in and through all that you do, not only an occupation or even a vocation of the roles that you have.

How do you think of call as something that manifests then in all the ways that you breathe through this life? So sometimes the question of what's my purpose and call doesn't resonate like it used to. And so I have a different question I'd like to offer you. The question I've settled in - for now - and always is gonna change, how does my unique creation, all of who I am and what I bring to the table as me and all the wisdom given to me, offer something beautiful to myself that I might offer to the world? So again, you are universe in human form. You are multiple stories. Now, all this can be like, that was really cool, but how do I think about where my thread lies?

How do I think about how I want to use it in the world? So today I wanna give you a framework, a kind of list of questions that you might think about and consider as you explore throughout this journey of life. I strongly believe that when you operate from your actual self and give yourself permission to know who that is, then you're in the pocket.

In a world that says move in fear always, in a world that says bet on scarcity, I hope that you give yourself space and place to have the courage to love - L O V E. It's hard and beautiful work. And guess what? You beloved are worth it. So first the L - I love acronyms so that's what we're gonna work with today.

First, the L; take some time to listen. Listen, listen to the way that your breath exists and enters your body. Listen for the places and spaces where you exhale versus where you hold your breath. I started paying attention to the people that I always hold my breath around. I was like, wait a minute. What is that? Where is that coming from? Why is it? Why don’t I feel free to fully be me? And it's helpful to know that! Listen to when your body says, ah, that's a no for me. In the listen, you begin to access your why and what actually motivates you, what actually inspires you to do and to be in the world. I teach a system called the Enneagram, which deals specifically in motivation.

Now I mention it here because one of the most interesting things in my coaching practice is that people will often show up thinking that they are a particular number in the system because they looked at the behaviors, they looked at the symptoms right, of this number. But they haven't looked at the motivation. They haven't looked at the why. They haven't looked at what allows for this number to flourish. What's the root? Cause when you're aware of your why and the actual why, not the inherited one from mama and them, although that can be a part, not the thing people told you should fuel you, although you might be informed by it, but your actual why.

You then give yourself space and place to really understand who you are, and understand why you show up in the world. You give yourself permission to also root in something that is not seasonal, but that is consistent throughout your different seasons. I'm deeply aware for myself that my why is always connected to connection with other living beings always for better and for worse.

So I have to pay attention to, oh, if I'm looking for connection, what is that about? What am I going to, what is fueling that response? So now knowing that, what I do can be rooted in who I actually am! I'm deeply aware that prolonged isolated activities are not where I flourish. It's not gonna keep me going.

So when I was writing my dissertation, when I first started, it was not going anywhere. And what I realized was that I didn't feel connected. Then I realized that my work had me building relationships and connecting with the ancestors that I was studying. And then I added in some writing groups for not just accountability, for again, building connection, promoting connection, inviting all of us into a deeper sense of flourishing. And so once that began to happen, the writing started happening. The thing that I wanted to do started happening because I was able to listen more deeply to who I was. And so when you give yourself time to stop and listen to yourself, to stop and hear how you're doing, to stop and wonder what's my why, you really give yourself time and space to allow for the sound of your genuine to allow for the kind of rootedness of your being to emerge. and for you to be, um, curious and wonder about who that really is underneath all of the things that may not actually be who you are. 

So first you listen, that's our L. Second, O - What have you observed? Now, observation is so important and sometimes it can feel methodical. Like Chelsea, are you asking me to write things down? I really am. Take some time to take an inventory. What were you drawn to as a kid? What are you drawn to now? So many of us have had to survive things no one should have had to.

And so we often end up in cycles of survival and continue the behaviors that helped us to get to where we were because there isn't another way in our mental structures. But what I've learned across time is that often what helps us survive, won't always help us heal. Won't always give us the clearest view on what we're trying to see.

So if therapy is accessible to you, please go, whether you really think you need it or not. It helps you observe more clearly. If therapy's not accessible to you, there's a lot of tools that allow for prolonged use for smaller fees, or even for free, there are call lines, things of that sort that just allow for you to have another perspective.

In addition, family and friends who care about your flourishing, who care about your wellbeing, draw them into the conversation. What did I like? When do you see me most alive? What does joy look like on me? Those kind of observations can help us to really begin to see what's the thread that really awakens me in my truest self.

Now as you take some inventory of yourself, also take inventory of the world around you. I'm always struck by the ways that my ancestors responded to the needs around them. People often say out of a need, they acted. And I'm like, yes, but everybody wasn't responding the same way. So I'm like what ignited those that made moves for positive change?

What made it possible for folks to actually feel confident and capable to try something that made such a major change or even a small change? They made decisions to respond to demands as their actual selves. I'm reminded in this moment of Nanny Helen Burrows. She saw a system that wasn't educating black girls. In my study of her, I realized that everything that she did, even the way she talked about her relationships with her mother, her grandmother, her colleagues, she was motivated by development and journey.

So think about this, what's the thread in your life and then what's the evidence of that thread? So you're listening, right? You're listening for this evidence. You're listening for what enlivens you, what draws you to the table and then you're observing what's some evidence of that? What can you tangibly see that shows you that this is a thread of your life that you want to follow? We have threads that we might not want to follow, but what's a thread of your life, a thread of your joy, a thread of your love that you want to follow? 

So you listen, you observe and then write a vision. Notice, I didn't say write the vision because it can change. Imagination is the fertile soil of the prophetic. Once a month, I try to give myself space to sit and just visualize, like really just sit and say, what do I see in my own life in the world? And is there something that I want to create right now or to live into or to shift, right? I try to take some inventory of my why and how I'm actually kind of exploring that in that moment.

And what's the world that I wanna live in? What's the community I wanna be a part of? What are the relationships, how do I wanna participate? God and spirit, they are always inviting you into your best and most beloved self. So I'm finding some stillness, listening and giving yourself space to see into the practical and also what someone might deem as completely unachievable - bet on you! Please!

That business idea you have? Write it out. That book you wanna write? Write it out. That conversation you want to do with your family, you feel it, you can see it happening for some healing work? Write it out. See what's flowing in you that also wants to flow out of you. All of this is often rooted in your why and formed by your observations and growing beyond the confines of what is pushing us, the collective because of you, to what can be.

So finally, as you continue to listen, observe, write your visions again -remember this is cyclical, we keep going back to it - keep on exploring. My late mentor Dale P. Andrews used to always say, I have more questions than answers, ore problems than solutions. From these gifts, I freely share. Your questions are your gifts, the problems you observe and that nudge you are probably inviting your unique response.

I hope you know that even when you're feeling lost, it might often just be a nudge from the beloved beings that surround you to connect back to your center and operate from there. I believe that when you move out of this space, there are worlds that open up to you. There are so many possibilities. Like, if you feel called to preach, you might find that the pulpit isn't the only space you do that in, and that sacred rhetoric - being careful with your words and inviting others through your words, happens across a myriad of platforms.

If you feel called to be a community organizer and create better systems for communities, I hope you also find that you are a system that deserves justice and care, and that your wellness is a part of the community you aim to fight for. If you've been saying you wanna be a chaplain, you might find that the whole world can use someone who will sit with them in their hardest moments and count it not robbery to see presence as a gift.

If you have felt called to be a dancer, you might find that it's the honoring of the sacred body we inhabit that is at the root and everywhere you go, you show us how to honor this flesh through movement, relationship, and whatever else it is that you dream up. It's the both/and, and it's the multiplicity, it's the many, many ways we can show up. I believe that the crisis of call is often rooted in the rigid idea that it was centered in a particular location, or we realized we've been living into someone else's idea of who we are when that was never us. When all along that light, that love that possibility, that multifacetedness that unique and amazing collection of gifts and experiences that make you who you are, was within you always.

I don't want you to hear that I'm saying it doesn't matter what you do, because it does. The energy you put into the world always matters. What I am saying is, so often we start at the what and leave the why behind and the intention of your why will carry you further than any individual season. Sometimes also we start at the who, and we forget ourselves in that community. And again, mirror work will take you into the movement and all the other stuff you want to do. So don't be afraid to look in that mirror and start with you. Ask yourself, what does love look like manifested through you? 

Now, let me be super clear, I'm not saying don't have jobs, cuz I don't want it to be confused. I promise you, I'm never the person that's gonna tell you not to go ahead and get paid or secure the bag or whatever you wanna say. However, I'm saying maybe let's not start there. What I'm saying is that should you change your job, should a season change a place that once felt like a yes, this is where I'm supposed to be, now shift to kind of feel like a meh, maybe not. Or you have to relocate or something or a global pandemic happens and shifts so much of our narratives. You can still access your call because it's not in the doing, it's in the way you're doing emerges from your being. And you are the locus of that. 

We are called to a thread of existence and then we manifest that in our lives. It's not limited to the vocational confines of preacher, chaplain, athlete, teacher, lawyer, doctor, engineer, artist, whatever. It expands to how you engage with yourself, your family, your friends, and all of the many roles you carry into this world.

So, when people ask me now what I am called to, I simply say I aim to live fully as my most loved and well self and actively invite all of creation around me to do the same in whatever I do through deeper connection. Doesn't matter if I'm in the classroom, the church, by a hospital bed, doing a reading for someone at my grandmama's house or on FaceTime with a friend, that is my aim.

And I would say that is the way I put rhetoric to my call now. Now before I stop, I will say this work is not easy. I want to tell you it is prophetic to see yourself as life worth living and not just labor. This is a work that takes courage, takes compassion. It takes detangling some things, that is this me, is it not? It takes some trial and error. It takes consistency. However, I can promise, the God spirit, the beyond, universe, whatever language resonates for you has already bet on you. Your benevolent ancestors and others are already cheering you on. This community that you've connected to will champion you.

And I'm happy to be a reminder that you are worth exploring. Friend, you are so much more than any title, degree, or whatever you will have. You are so much more than what anyone can even put into words, an occupation, a business. You are the richness of the earth that supports a global ecosystem animated by the breath of love, which spoke you into being. In short, you're very dope. So sincerely, I really hope that you take some time to give yourself space to do this inventory and to keep returning to it; to listen, to observe, to visualize, write the vision, to explore. And I'm excited! I'm excited to talk to you all in the question and answer. Also, I'm excited for all that you will do.

And if nothing else, I hope that you will give yourself space and permission to love. Living as your actual self, not the one you've been told to be, not the one this world asked you to be, not the one, even that you thought you might be, but the person, the being that feels so in alignment that feels like love to you, that you then offer to whomever is around you.

I hope that you give yourself space and time to explore and allow that person to be a multiple and multifaceted story. Because I think it's gonna be a great one. I look forward to talking to you.

Patrick: Hey, I hope you've been inspired by Reverend Dr. Chelsea Yarbrough and her helping us reframe what meaning and purpose is for our lives and finding that call. Now the Sound of the Genuine is put together by an incredible team. So I want to say thank you to our executive producer Elsie Barnhart, and the rest of the team - Heather Wallace, Diva Morgan Hicks, and @siryalibeats for putting all the music together on this show. It would really help us out if you left us a review or shared this podcast with a friend. We hope these stories and these episodes bring you a little bit closer to finding the sound of the genuine in you.