The Slow Moving You

This is a blog I’ve been trying to write for a couple weeks now.  Every time I feel like I’m going in a good direction I find myself backspacing, literally backspacing.  Sometimes I wish I could paint a better picture, be a better storyteller, but who I am is someone with vague amounts of insight that come to light at random times.  And that’s good.  That’s enough. 

During my masters program we learned the word “isomorphic”.   While it would thrill me to let you struggle with its concept and have the experience of learning, for the sake of this blog I need to explain it a bit.  Isomorphic basically means that everything we do or say, says something about us and I mean everything.  It’s much easier to spot isomorphism’s in other people, it’s not so easy however to spot them for ourselves.

Recently Oklahoma was hit with two days of sleet.  In some parts of the state it knocked out power, toppled trees, and shut down roads.  Where I live it wasn’t so bad.  Tree limbs littered the ground and gave many in the area a reason to break out their chainsaws but overall we survived with little issue. 

One evening the frozen rain had finally let up and I went out to take my dog Danny Boy on a long walk.  The trees glistened in the streetlights, the grass crunched under my feet, but the streets and sidewalks were clear.  On the backside of our apartment is a small set of four concrete steps.  As Danny Boy ran down them to head towards our home I suddenly realized how slow I was moving, how careful I was being.  I was taking the steps one at a time.  Safely putting one foot down before allowing another foot to join it.  Once I realized what I was doing I just stopped, exhaled a long breath, and thought, “Is this what I am?”

Your body language is hard to argue with and in rare moments of clarity it can shine a light on the most vulnerable parts.  I am a cautious human.  Some of my friends have referred to me as a crock-pot.  I take my time when considering important decisions and trust that when its time for me to know what to do I will.  I’m slow to anger (most times), and I can just be with people as they are without trying to move them or change them to fit my own comforts.  These are the traits I’m proud of, the parts of myself where my cautious disposition serves me well. 

There is a side of being cautious that doesn’t serve me, in fact I would say it keeps me bond to myself.  Being careful when necessary is common sense.  Being careful because your afraid of what might happen is anxiety.  It’s self-preserving in excess.  Sometimes falling is necessary.  Sometimes what we need is to be unsafe.  To walk into unfamiliar territory and face the insecurities that live in our bones.  Sometimes that’s how life starts. 

I’m letting this idea create new pathways in my mind; I want it to become a more permanent part of my thinking.  But I’m a good crock-pot, so it’s going to take me some time and that’s okay, that’s enough.  Just to know that something needs to shift, just to know that it’s time to get uncomfortable, just to know that the spirit within you is restless. 

That’s enough. 

The Fullness of Fire & Trees

The fire came to sit beside the tree. The tree brave and hesitant leaned down to ask the fire what brought her to his side.  For the tree knew that fire was both good and bad, while the tree only knew good. The fire sat quiet for a moment. She peacefully gazed towards the setting sun in the winter sky. "Did you know, spoke the fire, that I am a part of the sun?"  Now for the tree this was difficult because he only knew the sun to be good. So the tree asked the fire, "How can you, knowing both good and bad, be apart of something that is only good?"  The little fire looked up at the tree, smiled and said.   "Sometimes I spark when I shouldn't and sometimes I burn too hot but the sun tells me I am more.  Though some may know me as both bad and good, the sun see's me in my fullness and calls me by a different name."  The tree waves his branches and leaned in closer to the fire.  With a grin across his face he said, "The sun calls you loved as the sun calls me."  The tree recognized the fire for the first time as himself and remembered that though we are all made different we all come from the same sun. And the sun has no favorites. The sun loves and restores all. 

Faith. A Question.

While heading out the door this morning to greet the day via thrift shops, I tuned in to my favorite Richard Rohr sermon.  It’s just over six minutes long and I have listened to it about eighteen times.  My temporal lobe wants to squeeze out every drop of truth like juice from ripened fruit.  It’s all so good; I may commit gluttony.  

The question Rohr asks over and over is,

“What are you for?  What is the thing that gets you up in the morning because that is your faith?”  

Rohr points out if he were to say something negative; talk about what he was against he would be able to gather a larger crowd.  He may even get applause.  Leaving me to wonder.  Why is that?

To be sincere; Its exhausting. 

Facebook.

News Stations.

Comment sections.

Radio Stations.

Twitter.

Etc….

The polarized media is difficult to face on a daily basis.  The worldly approach is cumbersome to navigate when you are trying to get though the eye of a needle.  Not to polarize my own point, there is good in social media, there is positive on the news and radio, but the question is what captures us?  What do we pluck from the tree of good and evil?  And what do we do with what we know? 

Is our faith directing us into difficult conversations or comfortable ones?

Is our faith telling us to love or label?

Is our faith raising us above others or putting us at each other’s feet?

Do we care more about what we are against and less about what we are for, and what does balance look like in this place?

More questions than answers for us meat bags. 

Find Me in Nothing

My hand moves some of my husbands thinning hair in circles between my fingers.  His head is lying face down on our bed and I am gazing into nothing.  He’s struggling and I’m struggling with what to say.

All my years spent growing into a spilt family with too many secrets has prepared me well to read people.  To know without knowing, to adapt, to appease, and to never speak what I know to those who needed to feel accomplished in deception. 

I know how to rescue; I am new at just sitting in the discomfort. 

While staring into the great nothing looming across the room, I feel the voice inside tell me to pray.  What I refer to as my spirit, what I believe to be the Holy Spirit, the part of God who hides away in me, the God who finds me in nothing.  I feel the words vibrate though out my body as if my very bones have become chimes of mercy and grace.  Though I hear their sweet music I am gripped with the unpleasant mocking feeling of anger.  My eyes, now directed towards heaven, shoot beams of stubborn “NOS!” 

My little insecure human self, said no. 

“Quickly now! Quickly!  Ignore the chimes!  Where are my ear plugs?!  I don’t want to do this, Please don’t make me do this!  This is mine!  Do you hear me Spirit in the sky?!  This is mine!”

My little insecure human self. 

Yet the music of mercy persists.  My battle cry of ego and pain hasn’t persuaded God to shut up and move on.  He simply stays.  Consistently playing soft hymns and waiting for me.  Waiting for little insecure human me. 

I close my eyes tightly and with the determined pain of a small child told God,

“If I give this, if I let him into our space, he will be here forever and I don’t want to.  I’m afraid.” 

The slow hum of God responded,

“Pray for him”. 

So in my fear I spoke that I wanted to pray.

With every quick breath I felt my heart pound.

Every nerve in my body ignited with anxiety. 

Then I spoke and the hum of my spirit poured out.

Passion came out of my little insecure human self.

And in my discomfort something larger than myself appeared.

A thought, a presence, a gift, some knowledge.

“Rest now sweet rescuer, you are no longer alone.”

The Story of Presence

You are kind and curious

You become excited about the smallest things

You cry when you feel like crying

And you smile when you feel like smiling

When the wind blows you are fearful

When the night comes you stay close to me

But in the day you are daring

By the light you are always exploring

You attend to all your anxieties

Every immediate nuisance you find

You watch peacefully at comers and goers

And sometimes not so peacefully you speak

Every time we go out walking

You are compelled by nature to lead

And I will stand in the moment and watch you

And you always turn back to watch me

I wish dearly that I was more like you

That I could be so effortless in all my days

Never hiding an inking or unpleasant impulse

To know that being myself is okay.

So for now I will keep watching

Everyday learning and everyday becoming

Someone who can sit at another’s feet

To be different, more like my dog than me.

You're Rad!

It’s difficult to talk about radical love. 

Can I just stop there?  Shortest blog in the history of ever.  That statement feels like enough for me, especially within the safety of my own head and soul.  Yet it feels like hiding.  It feels like I am not taking a stand for what I really believe in. 

And Why?

I read an article recently about a woman who lives in New York and was hiding her faith from her friends.  Her friends were not spiritually inclined people and thus she felt she would be judged.  Sometimes I feel that way but with other believers.  If I don’t conform to the beliefs of my family, friends, or fellow Christians I will be told I am wrong, liberal, unbiblical, or corrupted. 

It’s fear that keeps us quiet. 

But I am tired.  I am (almost) 30 and the burden of unshared joy is difficult for a heart to bear.  Though I realize this experience is part of the process, it is one that I want to rage against.  I sincerely just don’t want to deal with it. 

And all the while I am being taught.  (One of those paradoxical life things)

I believe in the radical power of love.

The greatest teacher of this principle for me is Jesus.  The thing I’ve learned about love is that it’s difficult and people seldom behave in ways worthy of it (including myself).  I’ve told my husband that I don’t treat him well because his actions dictate that he deserves it.  I treat him well because of my submission and belief that God desires for his servants to strive for love.  So what that means is that I am challenged to love even when my husband is way less than loveable.  Even when all I really want to do is assert my ego, yell, and dominate the situation.  Which, I still sometimes do (being human and all), and then I find myself dealing with the unhelpfulness afterwards. 

Truthfully, my husband is much easier to love than the person posting ignorance on Facebook, or the Christian that just disowned their gay child, or the family member that is very judgmental, or the selfish friend, or the random person who almost killed you in traffic, or the lady at the park screaming at her kids, basically anybody else that doesn’t align with the way I believe a good life is lived. We can think of so many reasons why they justifiably don’t deserve our smile little lone our love!

But, they do. 

As Richard Rohr says,

“Very often the reason that people make great mistakes is because they never heard what Jesus heard (after his baptism).  They never heard another human voice, much less a voice from heaven say to them,

“You are a beloved Son

You are a beloved Daughter

And in you I am very well pleased.”

If you’ve never had anyone believe in you, take delight in you, affirm you, call you beloved, you don’t have anywhere to begin.  There’s nothing beautiful and wonderful to start with and so you spend your whole life trying to say those words to yourself, “I’m okay, I’m wonderful, I’m great”, but you don’t believe it.”

Rohr goes on to say that the voice of love always has to come from someone greater than ourselves.  Which, I believe means someone who we perceive as wiser, someone whose opinion carries weight.  The Gospels (aka The Good News) wasn’t written so that we could walk around comparing ourselves to each other and casting out those who we perceive are less than us (way to easy).  How is that good news anyways?! 

It was written as an example of love. 

I believe in telling people they are loved.

I believe that when we are persistent in this that a difference is made.

I believe that everyone is a child of God.

I believe that no matter what you have done in your life you are still a beloved son or a beloved daughter of God.

And I believe it is the most unfortunate thing when we let our “perceived” differences keep us from relationship with one another.

“We couldn't get outside our particular denominational formulas. I called it "homosectarianism", a same "sect" relationship.”

                 -Carlton Phillips-

It’s sad to me that radical love is something Christians don’t like to talk about.  We question often and wonder what we are supporting if we love someone who doesn’t believe, live, or act like us.  To that sort of thinking (and there is a lot out there) I say remember that every one of us is in the process of becoming and so are you.  And if you believe you have some wisdom you want to share with others start with love.  Because we all need a foundation from which to grow from and love is a damn good one. 

Blessings.