Photo by Mayr

By Angela Ryo

Growing up, I was painfully shy. I could never make eye contact with anyone, even when they were speaking to me directly. My default position was to have my head bowed, staring at my shoes as if to burn a hole into them. Immigrating to the States from Korea when I was nine and having to learn a new language didn’t help at all.I went through a silent period of close to two years. When I finally started to speak, I often had my hand over my mouth — a sure sign that I was unsure of what I wanted to say. If you gave me a dime for every time someone told me they couldn’t hear me or understand me, I’d be a millionaire by now!

It wasn’t until my freshman year in high school that I started to have the courage to express myself and freely speak my mind — loud and clear without a hand over my mouth. That happened as a result of giving my life over to Christ. The realization that I was created in God’s image and that I was a precious child of God transformed me almost overnight. It boosted my self-confidence by hundredfolds! I spoke with purpose and certitude. I had answers to everything (i.e. Jesus!) and questioned nothing. I suppose that was my first step in my journey toward self-assertion.

Looking back on my journey, I see different stages of asserting myself. Self-assertion really began with exploring my new identity as a child of God. In my eagerness to express this new identity I had gained in Christ, I thought I had to be sure of everything. After all, who was I if I wasn’t standing firm in Christ? I now see the irony that what should have been a “self-exploration” was really an ill attempt at establishing my identity as firm as I could. I was the girl with all the answers.

However, in my twenties and thirties, I realized that I didn’t really have any answers; all I had were opinions. So I asserted myself with opinions, making it clear to everyone that my assertions were really just opinions.

Now in my mid-forties, I assert myself more with questions than answers or opinions. Funny how that works! I think it’s really interesting that the more I practice self-acceptance and self-love, self-assertion comes in the form of questions more than anything else. The questions are not out of self-doubt, but rather out of courage to express my curiosity. As the famous poet, Maria Rainer Rilke, once said, “Be patient toward all that is unresolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves, like locked rooms and like books that are now written in a very foreign tongue. Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given you because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps then, someday far in the future, you will gradually, without even noticing it, live into the answer.”

Perhaps one day, my self-assertion will take the form of answers again as I “live everything.” But for now, I’m perfectly content with asserting myself with questions.

Angela Ryo currently serves as the Associate Pastor for Christian Formation at Kirk in the Hills in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan. She enjoys taking long walks, reading, listening to NPR, and drinking good coffee with friends and strangers alike.