Oh friends, you are in for a treat today!
KJ Ramsey1 is a friend to me and a friend to many of you. When I read her last book, The Lord is My Courage,2 I remember thinking, how in the WORLD did she just combine memoir, theology, and psychology (and then some), and successfully come out unscathed on the other side of it?
And then there’s this one, The Book of Common Courage.
It felt like a cozy blanket on a pillow-filled couch; like snuggling up to a conversation with an old friend, cup of tea in each of your hands.
It felt like home.
The Book of Common Courage is a book of poetry, short prayers, and blessings. And because of KJ is who she is, she intends this as a sweet balm over each and every one of her readers.
And that is nothing short of a gift.
Enjoy!
Cara Meredith: How are you coloring outside of the lines, all over again, when it comes to your writing and this book in particular?
KJ Ramsey: Before this book, I didn’t believe I was allowed to be a poet until I had studied poetry long enough. I’m still shedding a spirituality that says I have to know enough to be enough. Writing The Book of Common Courage was a massive invitation into letting who I am today—with the skills I have now and the craft I am capable of now— be enough to offer others in kindness and care.
With every book I’ve written, I have felt the urge to cover all my bases, to be comprehensive and cite hundreds of compelling sources, to be a compendium worthy of calling a classic. (Yup: there’s an ego in my soul that is just as insecure as the next person’s.). The beauty of writing is a book is that you cannot say everything. And the shining invitation of a book of poetry is that you not only cannot say everything, you should not say everything. The meaning of a poem emerges as much in what is not said as what is.
Writing my first book of poetry and prayers was a practice in shedding the weight of striving and insecurity. I wrote the book in secret—only my agent, spouse, friends, and, obviously, my publisher knew it was happening. This gave me space to practice believing I am a poet instead of relying on readers to reflect that reality back to me. The hidden work in my heart was just as important as all the days I sat scratching out lines in my journal and re-arranging lines in my word processor.
During the year I wrote this book, I became sicker than I’ve ever been before. I was too sick to strive to make my words more poignant or profound. I only had a little bit of time, writing in a body with a little bit of energy. This book draws from Psalm 23 as its inspiration, a song which is deliberately enacted by Jesus when he fed the five thousand from the little offering of loaves and fishes from a little boy. I had the distinct honor of finding myself in that story, only having a little bit to offer up for so many and finding it was more than enough.
Cara Meredith: You wrote a book! Tell us! What upside-down idea were you trying to turn right side up again?
KJ Ramsey: Far too many Christians have been harmed by shepherds who don’t actually shepherd. Actually, a prayer from the book says it best:
Hungry Son,
the Father called you Beloved
and then the Spirit
led you like a lamb
out into the scorching sun
where you
chose trust
in your Father
over proving
your own power.
Lead us to landscapes
we would. Not choose
to feed us with trust
we cannot lose.
Because for far too long
we’ve been fed sugar
by shepherds on stages
in words that say fame
and power
and the removal of pain
are the proof
of bearing your name.
But your sonship reveals
what no stage can show:
it is into vulnerability
that you choose to go.
Amen.
(p. 30)
In The Book of Common Courage and its companion spiritual memoir, The Lord Is My Courage, I am turning over the table where shepherds sit to feast on power and privilege while so many of us starve feeling unseen and unsupported. This book is an invitation to watch Jesus set a table in the wilderness, where every broken hearted human has a seat. My greatest desire in this book is to reintroduce you to the Shepherd who sees you—with kindness in his eyes.
Cara Meredith: Okay. We talk so much about audience when it comes to book-writing, but what did you learn about yourself along the way?
KJ Ramsey: I learned to bless who I already am. I think and see in metaphor. For me, being alive is bearing witness to the concentric circles that connect every concept and creature. Letting myself write and publish poetry years before I would have given myself permission to do so was a practice in blessing the weird way I see the world and show others how amazed I am by it all. (This book exists because readers on Instagram asked me, “When are you going to publish these poems in a book?” To which I thought, “These are poems?” And then after the fifth or so time of being asked the question, I thought, “Well, I might as well try to make this a book. Why not?” It’s the book I didn’t plan on writing and am so grateful I did.)
Cara Meredith: Putting ourselves out there when it comes to storytelling is always a risk. What is the biggest, fleshiest risk you took with this book?
KJ Ramsey: Gosh, publishing this whole book felt risky. Publishing poetry felt so much more vulnerable than my spiritual non-fiction books. But, one prayer in particular that felt risky to pen is towards the end of the book. There’s a line written to Jesus, my “Unconventional Lord”: “in preparing a meal, like a woman you became.”
In the circles of Christianity that raised me, this observation from the story of Jesus feeding the crowds would have gotten me strongly scolded. My poetic rendering is based on insights from theologian Kenneth Bailey, who shows how culturally both the Shepherd-Host of Psalm 23 and Jesus feeding the crowds give us an image of God expressing love through the gender role of a woman. In that culture, only a woman would prepare a table (“you prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies”). Only a woman would prepare a meal.
Reclaiming the feminine in the Divine is risky in a religious context where being right is read through the lens of patriarchy. Which is why it mattered so much to point out the power of what Jesus was showing that crowd and us on that hillside—the heart of God is more hospitable than any one gender can hold.
Cara Meredith: Publishing a book is a shiny milestone! What else are you celebrating in your ordinary, everyday life?
KJ Ramsey: I love this question so much. Celebration has become a central spiritual practice in my life, because I believe that courage that is celebrated multiplies. I am celebrating how far I have come in one year. One year ago, I could barely walk across my apartment without needing to rest. Covid created chaos in my body, and I was in cardiac rehab with people much, much older than me helping my body learn to tolerate walking again. Tonight, I’ll go for my second hike this week, and I don’t have to think twice about whether my body can handle the climb or not. Thanks be to God. Seasons change.
P.P.S. All of these brilliant questions (and the sub theme as well) stem from interviews that the equally brilliant
originally created. I adapted them for this space, but the origins are all hers!
Thank you for hosting this conversation! All of these interviews are so intriguing. 🙏🏼
“The beauty of writing is a book is that you cannot say everything. And the shining invitation of a book of poetry is that you not only cannot say everything, you should not say everything. The meaning of a poem emerges as much in what is not said as what is.”
THIS AAAAAALLLLLLLLLLL DAY LONG. ❤️❤️❤️