Meet Christy Berghoef | Author, Singer/Songwriter, Contemplative Photographer

We had the good fortune of connecting with Christy Berghoef and we’ve shared our conversation below.

Hi Christy, why did you pursue a creative career?
Throughout my life I repeatedly looked with envy upon my peers who seemed to know exactly what they wanted to “be” when they grew up. History Teacher. Engineer. Dentist. Administrator. And many of them seemed to find straightforward paths to getting there. But for me, every college class I took at my liberal arts institution captivated and intrigued me (with the exception of math). I can’t even remember how many times I changed my major because I was so interested in everything and certain I wanted to further study whatever new class I was enrolled in.

My curiosity in so many subjects scattered me thinly across my growing number of interests. Every subject seemed to light up some new untapped part of my brain. Beginning early on, my teachers and professors across disciplines repeatedly encouraged me to pursue some kind of career in writing. I usually laughed and shot back the excuse that writing would be my “for fun” hobby alongside my other creative hobbies- singing/song-writing and nature photography, that I couldn’t possibly make a living doing these things. But they persisted in encouraging me to consider pursuing these creative endeavors with a kind of seriousness that goes beyond considering them my “side hobbies.”

Creative writing and nature photography, it seemed to me, were not something I could make a living at. I would need to major in something practical so I could get a practical job after college. I ended up majoring in political science and went to work on Capitol Hill after I graduated. Eventually I went on to seminary and began a life of church planting with my husband. Several years later I finally went back to school again, this time for my doctor of Ministry in The Sacred Art of Writing. I was finally doing it. I was finally going to focus on writing. It’s taken me fifty years to believe enough in my ability to be able to jump all in and just go for it.

While I sometimes wish I had trusted all those voices around me early on more than I listened to the self-doubting voices in my head for all those years, the experiences I’ve had along the crooked path toward getting to where I am today have all been fuel for my writing, song-writing and photography.

Alright, so let’s move onto what keeps you busy professionally?
I was raised on a forty acre flower farm. We didn’t have much. While money seemed often scarce, the whole farm was my playground. The slow days of my childhood were spent climbing trees in the woods, spying on painted turtles sunbathing on the edge of the pond, watching water bugs whirl and dive beneath the surface of the water, running barefoot on the warm soil between rows of gladiolas, crawling on my belly looking for ant colonies to study, laying out in the fields watching the clouds roll over. The earth was my world, and I felt rich.

As I grew up, my world expanded, and I got involved in various local, national and global issues. My eyes widened to see pockets of sadness in the world. The heaviness of working around issues of justice and various forms of oppression always seemed to drive me back to the goodness of the earth for respite and refueling. The relatively predictable patterns and seasons of the earth were a comfort to me in a world that sometimes bordered on chaos. The plants and creatures of the earth also have a way of living in harmony and balance, and I find this hopeful. The plants and creatures of the earth seem to have figured out how to live in community – in right balance together. Perhaps the world could learn too. The sheer beauty of plants rising from the ground also restores my soul. The immensity of the universe felt in an open field under the night sky, is humbling. It reminds me of my brief moment in all this.

Over the last decades of my life I’ve had to seek a healthy balance between being immersed in the injustice of the world and resting in the goodness of the world. The world is a terrifying place. The world is a place of incomprehensible beauty. Most of my writing, nature photography and music falls in this theme. I also do a lot of what I call “contemplative photography,” in which I seek to capture images and pair them with poetic writings. Through photography and writing I take people out with me on my nature walks in the hopes that the going out will move them deeper within themselves. My upcoming book focusses on the stories that have risen up from the experience of my moving home to the farm of my childhood and rekindling my relationship to the earth while working within the hardness of the world. My upcoming book tour will feature readings as well as music and images.

Let’s say your best friend was visiting the area and you wanted to show them the best time ever. Where would you take them? Give us a little itinerary – say it was a week long trip, where would you eat, drink, visit, hang out, etc.
Were a friend to come and stay for a visit we would start our day with a walk out back- across the fields, through the woods, finally landing on the dock where we would sit and watch the sun rise up over the pond. This would be followed by brunch at The Biscuit, downtown Holland. This small local restaurant has some of the best breakfast food in West Michigan. After that we would hit the local farmer’s market and fill up a backpack of fresh fruits and breads to snack on later in the day. We would then swing back home and hop on bikes which would take us a few miles down country roads to the lakeshore where we would spend the day hiking the wooded trails of Saugatuck Dunes State Park. When the trail opens up to the often-deserted beach, we might decide to go for a wild swim in the clear turquoise waters of Lake Michigan and dry off in the sun while snacking on our farmer’s market food before continuing on down the trail. We’ll close the day with food and a Michigan beer at HopCat, downtown Holland.

The Shoutout series is all about recognizing that our success and where we are in life is at least somewhat thanks to the efforts, support, mentorship, love and encouragement of others. So is there someone that you want to dedicate your shoutout to?
I could not have arrived where I am without the many teachers and mentors, the dozens of friends in my life and the hundreds of folks who have read something I’ve written or viewed an image I’ve captured or listened to a song I’ve sung and reached out to share the ways it touched them. These folks along with all the people who saw where the spark was in me, who named that spark and who surrounded me with support, kindled the fire and fanned the flames in the always uncertain landscape of living the life of an artist.

Website: https://christyberghoef.substack.com

Instagram: @christyberghoef

Facebook: Christy Lubbers Berghoef

Other: @christyberghoef.bsky.social

Image Credits
Christy Berghoef