Experiences – Jemma Balmer

July 9, 2020July 18, 2020

What I learned from twenty years in the Anglican Church

It’s like we’re swimming laps in a pool. We need something to push off when we get to the end, so we can propel ourselves back through the water. The tiles at the end are hard and uncompromising, but they’re exactly what we need because they help us move forward faster. If a pool edge were made of sand or clay or smoke, we wouldn’t have a pool to swim in, let alone an edge to propel off. For me, the hard, uncompromising nature of Anglicanism functioned as the end of my lane in 2016.

June 21, 2020

White friends – we’ve read enough.

But before you click on that link, answer me this. Do you need to read another article, or do you need to start the work of anti-racism?

May 19, 2020

It’s OK

It’s OK if there was only so much you could handle, and you said so. Because that’s called a boundary, and you drew it in arguably the most boundary-less time in your life, which takes courage.

April 9, 2020

Truth can change

How do you look at what you used to think, who you used to be, with kindness and curiosity rather than disdain and embarrassment?

April 1, 2020

Reflecting

Do I trust everyone and hang all hope on just remembering when we get to July and rip into planning? Is “just remembering” a sound business strategy, ever?

March 23, 2020

“This is precisely the time when artists go to work.”

I wasn’t going to get up today, haven’t felt like writing all week. Where there used to be space to reflect, there seems now to be space only for reaction. For news and anxiety and the barely held capacity to adjust to the new normal, each day.

March 16, 2020

Get up and out, or let it out: solutions to the creative dilemma

Honestly, sometimes writing is like thrashing in a rip. No idea is a good one. I can’t concentrate. Then I get frustrated with myself, which makes it even harder to write... I have found that if I’m struggling to get anything coherent out, usually one of two things has happened, so therefore one of two things needs to happen.

March 9, 2020

Comfort in, dump out

I couldn’t see why he didn’t have empathy for my situation until I told Toni what was happening. Being my counsellor at the time, she smiled knowingly and asked, “Jemma, have you ever heard about The Ring Theory?”