It's All About that Face...

 

 

 

Recently, our townhome complex was re-sided. It was a big controversy because a number of the neighbors did not like the design change from the original look of vertical siding to horizontal siding. One man went as far as saying, “Everyone has horizontal siding and it looks awful. I chose to live here because the vertical look was pleasingly different. Now you are telling me my property has to look crappy?!”

The evils of horizontal siding were hotly debated. I was stuck on the notion that my neighbor might go to the trouble of selling his home of 15 years worked to his taste and perfection, because he did not like the façade.  Would he really make a choice based on outside appearances rather than what was lived on the inside.  The word siding got me thinking……

 We all spend a lot of time on appearances. Many of us change our facades with regularity – different clothes (underwear hopefully at least) daily and certainly with the seasons, we redecorate homes or offices, we get our hair cut or let it grow long, even might change the color. The changing fronts can be helpful, especially if it promotes a feeling of confidence or well-being for an individual. Such veneers we put on can help us in life.

 “She was the quintessential twenty-first-century woman: She could build a high-rise in a Chanel suit and Jimmy Choos, give lessons in multitasking, and freeze the heart of the coldest competitor with a single unblinking gaze over the rim of her ebony-framed reading glasses. But that persona was like a bodysuit that she pulled on at eight in the morning and peeled out of at five in the afternoon.”  ― Donna Ball, A Year on Ladybug Farm

Sometimes such fronts imprison us. My mother used to warn me if I was not careful, my frown would freeze on my face. While permanent facial features do seem to be hallmarks of the Botox used by various celebrities, my grimace, thankfully, never locked up my face.  I have seen a negative attitude take over a person and become their way of life inside and out.  

 Most often, however, we hide our true selves and put on deceptive fronts to keep from facing our own vulnerabilities.  Rather than showing weakness or struggle, we allow pretense and disguise to become a way of life.  Our society has long preached things like “pull your own weight” and “rugged individualism.”  We have glorified wearing the camouflage “fake it, ‘til ya make it.” 

 No man, for any considerable period, can wear one face to himself and another to the multitude, without finally getting bewildered as to which may be the true.  Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Scarlet Letter

Being able to be our true selves can be a nerve wracking business. Masks we wear to hide who we really are, and what we are feeling or thinking, cannot be sustainable or healthy. Such veneers seem less helpful, even detrimental, to our wellbeing and relationships when the pretense disables real connections to self and others.  

“There are moments when one has to choose between living one's own life, fully, entirely, completely - or dragging out some false, shallow, degrading existence that the world in its hypocrisy demands.” Oscar Wilde, Lady Windemere’s Fan

 

Do we have the guts to let go of who we think we should be to become who we really are? Sometimes the space between being vulnerable and portraying tough side is as wide as the Grand Canyon. We need courage to make the leap.  Practicing living without such a façade – a fake or deceptive front - can happen when we practice loving ourselves.  When we own who we are with all our strength and all our flaws and are okay with us, we love ourselves.  With vulnerability, you experience true connection—true love for yourself—and you begin to attract people to you who are inspired by your openness. To be vulnerable is to be deeply seen. It’s to love with your whole heart and to put yourself out there. To feel vulnerable is to be alive—to exist as your most authentic self.  Many are afraid of such vulnerability because there is the possibility of being hurt or let down.

 “It is not the end of the physical body that should worry us. Rather, our concern must be to live while we're alive - to release our inner selves from the spiritual death that comes with living behind a facade designed to conform to external definitions of who and what we are.”  Elissabeth Kubler Ross

While it’s not easy to be vulnerable, you’d be surprised how beautiful and fulfilling such a thing is.  Loving all of you can help you to connect with anyone. In my own life, I despised thinking of myself and my abilities as less than perfect. I hated being wrong. It was a struggle to think people might realize I couldn’t do something. I would blame others rather than accept responsibility for the things in my life that did not work. I feared that if people knew the real me, I would be laughed at, shown disapproval or left behind. I pushed myself hard in all things, and was my own biggest critic.

 A friend’s father helped me realize my folly. He gave me a toothbrush that read “I’m PERFECT” gently mocking my perfectionist armor. Reminding me that as a child of God, I did not have to be perfect, that my weaknesses were made strong, made perfect in Christ Jesus through my baptism. Being human, with all my imperfections, was empowering and enriching. Letting go of my expectations and “rules” of life allowed me to love and be loved and relate to others more deeply. Putting to death the idea that I could be perfect if I tried hard enough, allowed me to worry less about what others thought of how I acted or looked and focused on doing and being well within myself.  Focusing on appreciation of myself and others allowed disappointment to dissipate. Concentrating on what I wanted to create in life allowed a sense of present passion to thrive and my creativity to increase.

 

Striving for excellence is different than perfectionism. Perfectionists adopt along the path of life the dangerous belief system that they are what they achieve.  Striving for excellence asks “How can I improve?”  while perfectionism asks “What will they think?” Attempting to be perfect creates the notion that if we do things perfectly or make it look perfect, we can avoid pain, judgment or shame. Perfectionism is a billion pound mask that we think protects us, when all it does is keep us from being really seen or known.

Are facades everything to you? Or are you able to allow the flaws and wrinkles be badges of life and living? Consider putting on the new front of the real you… and live!

 

What lives Always and Forever?

Immortality – What lives forever and always?

With Valentine’s Day just past, I have heard the words – ALWAYS and FOREVER – used quite a bit.  Also, the nihilistic notion of always & forever are being bandied about in pop-culture through the immortality of vampires, zombies, and characters that die and return endlessly.  Always & forever is an irregular long time that stretches on and on and on.

I thought of these words, and the notion of immortality, again yesterday in the context of my tradition’s Lent.  While vampires and zombies have endless life, it is a grim and seeming hopeless existence. Futile in life and death.  Valentine’s Day is about the hope of always and forever love. Lent is a journey to the certainty of an always and forever love.

Christianity’s period Lent is an annual 40 days of preparation and cleansing before the celebration of life eternal at Easter. Easter celebrates that death has lost its sting. Easter is about life forever with God. Most Christians recognize Lent as the opportunity to shed all that holds us back from real life, not forever life.

Some people hold that Christianity, perhaps religion of any kind, is a fool’s paradise, or as Karl Marx said, “The opiate of the masses.” Perhaps this idea of life eternal is too unbelievable or undesirable for some, while others want to hold on to life with all they have.

My notion of religion and Lent run as a partnership.  While I do believe that life eternal does exist with God, I do not strive to hold on to this life forever and a day. I know that all things change and transform and evolve. And most often move from good to better to best to penultimate. We need to be able to let go to move forward. And I am not a fool or on any opiate.

Lent is actually the time to return to God, to repent. In the book, Worship as Repentance, Walter Sundberg says that this period is to strip all “illusions away so we know who we are and how short we fall standing before God and holy things.”

Lent begins with Ash Wednesday and reminds us not of our immortality but our mortality.  People are marked with ashes, the sign of our mortality. We hear the words, “You are dust and to dust you shall return.” Reminiscent of words often heard at funerals, “ashes to ashes, dust to dust.” Lent is the journey to the cross, where Jesus the Christ dies so that all might have real life. He defeats death once and for all – for all!  Lent concludes at the feast of Easter, when this life in fullness rises.  

Lent is an opportunity to let go of all that is unreal.  It shows us again and again that we are finite creatures who need each other and God. Lent calls us to the hope and promise of Easter, where God’s love wins always and forever. The finite creatures that we are fall away to who we were meant to be – creatures not made to live forever, but to love always and forever. The real immortals in this world come in the relationships we build and the love we leave.  

What will your forever and always legacy look like? 

Called Up with Direction

 

Tonight is a big night for my husband. Not because he is married to me. Or because it is June 6^th and a remembrance of D-day. It is the Major League Baseball Draft. Ok! He is TiVo-ing it and watching it. He has been calculating various players for his favorite team (The Chicago Cubs, of course). For a huge baseball fan like my hubby, I guess it is interesting. All good until you consider that the MLB draft is the “least watched draft” in sports. It is not as” sexy” as football or basketball, even hockey for that matter. It will not have an immediate impact on anyone’s favorite team in 6 months time. So what is the big deal? 

As someone who was usually picked in the last groupings for most sporting activities, it is not on my interest list. But here are young men still in high or college (of course, no young woman would be offered the ridiculous salaries possibilities for sports that men get. But that is another blog topic) who have great potential in the baseball world in hitting, pitching or fielding and could command high salaries for entertaining us with their athletic prowess . Good for them, they are not left standing loving a sport that they cannot play like most of us geeks and loveable losers.  

 

 “We’d pick out the captains and we’d chose up the teams,

                                          It was always a measure of my self-esteem.
                  Cause the fastest, the strongest played shortstop and first,
                                        The last ones picked were always worst”.  (“Right Field” Peter, Paul and Mary) 

Get yourself a draft of beer or other beverage and consider this:

God does not pick anyone for last. Or conscript anyone to service. Everyone has their own gift and special talent and place in the Kingdom. And the right opportunity to serve. Do you know what your specialty is? Not yet? Ok. You are in the making – a rough copy or preliminary construction growing into what makes you – You. 

It took me a long time to realize my special gifts and even feel good about my talents. I love sports and picture myself a great player. But alas, I am a mediocre athlete at best. Give me the brain challenges though and I will be picked near the top. (Except by my friend Rich, whom I talked out of a right answer in a Biblical Trivia Challenge. Still sorry Rich!) I always rule at spectator Jeopardy. 

I don’t talk about this to urge you to find and assert your bragging rights. I simply call attention to each of us being called at the right time in the right place for the right reasons with the right gift. The Spirit is blowing where it will to create partnerships, teams and companies to build the corporate body for good.  You and I are constructed, and reconstructed, to find the flow of the Spirit and pull our load. 

 

We spend a good bit of our lives blown by the wind, and wondering why we’re not getting anywhere. Perhaps we like thinking we are in control and deciding which way, and how, to go. Walking against a strong wind slows you down.  Walking or running with the wind at your back makes you move forward faster. NASCAR fans used to say that the reason Dale Earnhardt Sr. won so many races was because he could see the draft: he could see the airflow coming off our other cars, and he would line up with that draft to aerodynamically propel him forward. What if we understood our lives in a different way: we have a special gift and power and the opportunity to fly by the current of the Holy Spirit and be propelled into a celebratory future!?

 

 Life in Christ is like that. The Holy Spirit is always blowing through our lives and communities. And our main job is to see the draft, to lick our finger and see where the wind’s blowing, what God is already up to, and then to join in that – to make sure that wind of the Spirit is at our back, that we are moving in God’s direction.

 We are never picked last. Or left as only a work in progress. God puts us in always on time, every time. We are caught up by a Spirit of love, for love and life changing purpose.

 

 

My purpose is to create and connect words and everyday living to our Spiritual nature and true home. Please challenge me with a reflection word or countering my perceptions. I would love to hear from, and be challenged by, you.  This is your page, as much as mine.

Fruit in a World of Doubt

"So today I ate a mango like a savage. I bet if anyone saw me they would have thought there was a zombie in disguise living across the street"  - from the web

 “The fruit of the spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, self control.”  (Galatians 5: 22-23).

In a few weeks, I’ll return to serve in parish ministry. There are amazing wondrous things about parish ministry and serving God’s people.  It is sweet and ripe with compassion and love. It often flourishes with people sharing tender care for each other, and seeking service first. Genuine generosity blossoms from many hearts with unmatched fragrant grace.

And occasionally there is that pit. People are people and ministry can be tough and hard-hearted. Ministers pray for their people to be tender-hearted, but sometimes the pastor herself has a heart of stone. Human frailty deceives wearing the skin of beauty. It is peeled back to reveal a less than appealing core. No fruit bearing there.

“Don’t be [hardhearted] as your ancestors were. Clasp God’s outstretched hand. Come to his Temple of holy worship, consecrated for all time. Serve God, your God.” 2 Chronicles 30:8

Let Us Talents and Tongues Employ V3

                           Jesus calls us in, sends us out             

                         bearing fruit in a world of doubt,                      

                           gives us love to tell, bread to share:                

                        God (Immanuel) ev'rywhere!         

                                                                  Jesus lives again, earth can breathe again

                                                                  pass the word around; loaves abound.

                                                                  Jesus lives again, earth can breathe again

                                                                  pass the Word around; loaves abound!

                  

   One of the most perfect fruit is a mango. Over 1000 varieties worldwide, it is a sensuous and tempting fruit, with a dizzying fruity, piney perfume . And a taste that is a temptation hard to resist.  It has even been pondered, that given its semi-tropical location, the Garden of Eden’s tempting fruit was really a mango.

 

Incidentally, in Eastern religions, the mango is a symbol of love. The mango leaves and blossoms are used in the worship of Saraswati, the goddess of knowledge, arts (music of love), creativity, eloquence and power. The symbol of the mango is in many eastern arts – a paisley shape. Mangos are mostly self-perpetuating. Only 15% are male and the rest both.

 

For our wedding shower, my husband and I got a mango slicer. One of the best inventions since blogs. I love the sweet fruity taste and the piney smell of a ripe mango. They are amazing and heavenly. Prior to this great gift, I would drool over mango from afar. They were too tough to figure out how to slice on my own to remove that huge stone pit, and too costly to buy the sliced up ones with any regularity from the store.

 

 Now it is regularly Mango Mondays at our house, and other days to boot. On those days, I actually sing a little song as I am preparing the mango for our enjoyment. First, I use the fantastic slicer to remove the big pit, then I lovingly cultivate the fruit.  (Oh, actually something to thank George Bush for -  The nuclear deal Bush signed with India allowed for the US to import mangoes and develop a love for them that showed imports triple in ten years! Mangos were imported more scarcely prior.)

 

The dark side of this fruit. Incredibly, mangos are related to poison ivy and you can get a rash from their skin and sap resin. The mango pits{Endocarp – a gross word in itself] are large, and sometimes the fruit does not yield that much.

Contemplating mangos, that is how I sometimes feel.  A hopeful depiction of beauty and goodness with this large pit of anger and madness inside. The love and compassion one needs for God’s service gives way to reveal a hardhearted core. Maybe there is only a zombie in disguise.

The hardness I fear  that can be in my heart feels like it leaves little room for the extraordinary love and kindness required in ministry.  God, send me a mango-type slicer to prune away the hardness in my heart so as to get to the tender, juicy loving-kindness of servant mango magic ministry.

One way can be learned by starting to see the magic in everything. Sometimes it seems to be hiding but it is always there. The more we can see the magic in one thing, a tiny flower, a mango, someone we love, then the more we are able to see the magic in everything and in everyone. Where does the mango stop and the sky begin? 

 Joshua Kadison, musician and author of “17 Ways To Eat A Mango: A Discovered Journal of Life on an Island of Miracles”, Hyperion, 1999

Thank you God for answered prayer and helping me to see more magic and the Spirit of a Mango Ministry.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Blooming where you are Planted

bloom•ing (ˈblu mɪŋ)

adj. 1. flowering; blossoming.  2. glowing, as with vigor.  3. prospering.  4. Chiefly Brit. (used as an intensifier.)

Last week it still looked and felt like winter. Suddenly this week, it is obvious spring has arrived. Most everything has blossomed and bloomed. Dull browns have turned to bright greens. Shoots have pushed their way out of the ground. Tree’s leaves have budded out. Bugs have started to appear. Robins and rabbits hop around the yard. Some flowers have opened. And all our neighbors exist again!

  
While things seemed dead and dormant for a while, life finds its way and circles back to growing and blooming.

 

One tree however was still dormant looking despite life finding its way all over the place.

This tree is a later bloomer.  Mom always said I was a LATE BLOOMER. It always irritated me as a child, but especially as a teenager. I was smart, socially aware and I knew I was destined for good things.  I just didn’t always do or appreciate the same things or in the same ways that my peers did – screaming after the latest Hollywood hottie (I liked various real boys), giggling and gossiping, planning my princess wedding (didn’t envision it happening), being a fashion plate (we didn’t have the money for the latest fashion) or running all over town with friends to do all of the above (I wanted to go to college and loved to hole up with a book.)

[S]He who leans on, trusts in, and is confident in riches shall fall, but the righteous shall flourish like a green bough. Proverbs 11: 28 Amplified Bible

Sometimes life isn’t what we are told, or what we expect. Definitely, not what television depicts. Are we learning? Developing? Taking in what we need for the next stage? We are blooming. Is our shaping and growing happening in ways we do not see or others may not see? Do not be afraid. Or do not let other voices shape you into something you are not.

Just because my blossoms weren’t coming in someone else’s time frame does not mean I was not blooming. I had buds and was blooming where I was. Sometimes I was lonely, but it was deeply satisfying to see ideas come to fruition, plans get organized into reality, and projects develop in my time.  And I did recently get married to a most amazing man that I would never have met if I was all those other things.  Better “late” than never. But if never happened, I like who I have grown to be.

Growing in grace they shall still bring forth fruit in old age; they shall be full of spiritual vitality and grow lush in trust, love, and contentment. Psalm 92: 14

 

 

As long as you live, keep learning how to live.  Latin Proverb

Recently, I realized it is worse to be a Non-bloomer. A non-bloomer chooses not to grow or change. A non-bloomer chooses not to live. Most people get stuck from time to time, but when a person gets rooted in place and shows no signs of life, this is sad for all involved. People choose non-blooming through fear or confusion.  What life throws our way can make us want to hunker down, pull in the roots and the tender shoots that get wounded so easily.

But plant those roots. For me it is in my faith through prayer, the company of God’s people and trust in God that I can reach upward in rain or shine to blossom and bloom wherever I am at the time. Every moment is a lesson and fertilizer for growth. Put your face to the sun and grow to your best.

...there shall be no end to our central joy when once we ascend to the stratosphere

 of our richer abilities.  Helen Keller

 

We all must bloom where and when we are planted. Live with vigor and grace even in less than idea situations. Bloom where you are planted.

 

WORD OF NOTE: Next week will involve a submitted word and my reflections on a challenge you give me. Feel free to submit a word for next time or in the future.

Keeping our Knees Bent

 

 

Today’s word…… FLExiBiliTy.  It is about adapting or changing as circumstances require. I have discovered that some people are better at this than other people.  Sometimes I am better at this than others.  Recently, my re-engagement in the practice of yoga reminded me how it hurts to be inflexible.  When I am rigid and unbendable, I seem to get hurt and broken the most - in body, mind or spirit. It is better to go with the flow and be flexible.

“If you don’t know what you want, you’ll seldom get it. But, no matter how well you plan, you will fare better if you expect the unexpected. The unexpected, by nature, comes unseen, unthought, unenvisioned. All you can do is plan to go unplanned, prepare to be unprepared, make going with the flow part of your agenda, for the most successful among us envision, plan, and prepare, but cast all aside as needed, while those who are unable to go with the flow often suffer, if they survive.”

― David W. Jones, Moses and Mickey Mouse: How to Find Holy Ground in the Magic Kingdom and Other Unusual Places

Many cannot “go with the flow.” It seems too unpredictable. Some prefer a bad known, then the possibility of a better unknown. Many of us hate change. Like the old Hershey Bar commercial….”Change is bad…..Hershey bar the same for a zillion years….”  Change is not bad, it is essential to humankind and the whole earth. The nature of life is to evolve. Seasons come and go. Children grow up and out. Jobs come and then we retire. Technology zips in and out at warp speed. Favorite shows, baseball games, springtime romances and people end. If we are not flexible we get run over and mowed down, or at the least, left behind. Flexibility helps us, as the old song goes, “to roll with the changes.”

When I was a little league baseball outfielder, one of the most helpful things I learned for the sport and life was to keep my knees bent. This allowed me to move in whatever direction the action taking place in.

"Blessed are the flexible for they shall not be broken." Geri Laeder and many others (Thanks Jeff)

In general, when I look in the rear view mirror of life, I realize that most of the good things in my life are the results of change and a willing and flexible spirit.  Life is not stagnant. It keeps moving on with or without us. I do know – through faith – that I am not alone in the changes. I trust there is a way the changes will fit together for good (whether I see it now or not.)

“For I know the plans I have for you," declares the LORD, "plans to prosper you and not to harm you,   plans to give you hope and a future.” Jeremiah 29:11

I have moved many times, have had a couple career changes, and had a number of hairstyles. Not all of it has been easy, but I have grown and learned a lot. The biggest change in my life occurred a few years ago when I got married. This change brought love, peace, joy, and comfort into my life. As a result, a new me was born—a wife and happy woman.

Today I sit on the verge of big and small change, and am contemplating my abilities to bend and move with it all.  I am both excited and terrified, and trying to lean into it.  From past experience of change, I know that flexibility and movement are good and important. Breathing in the spirit of life, holds back fear.

I am trying to keep my knees bent in all manners of speaking…..

-          to be able to move quickly in whatever direction God wants me to move

-          to get down on them to pray in whatever circumstances I find myself

-          to not cut off my air flow and faint (ask any groom who locked his knees!)

-          to keep the options open

Things that help my flexibility –

Praying                                                  Breathing deeply                                                Observing creation

Laughing,                                              Hugging or loving someone                             Dancing

Petting a soft cuddly animal            Drawing or rather, coloring                             Gardening

“Men are born soft and supple; dead they are stiff and hard... Thus whoever is stiff and inflexible

 is a disciple of death. Whoever is soft and yielding is a disciple of life.”  Tao Te Ching

 

Be a disciple of life. Keep those knees bent!

In The Beginning

IN THE BEGINNING...was the WORD.  The creation of this space is to share words around the WORD. Faithfully, I will reflect on a word or few, and share where I see God's Spirit at work in the world. The word may be what's in the prevailing wind, on my mind or in your questions. I hope you will consider sharing words.

A Wordly Welcome!  Today's word....DAWN.  It is my name, but it reflects the beginning or start of something. Hence this blog. It finally dawned on me how to share and not too soon go stale.  I love words and the crafting of them. I do not think I stink at it.

Dawn loves to have fun. And bring new things to light all the time - to myself and others. It leaves room for quotes and others thoughts. I love the way that words can comfort and challenge. A new kind of Words with Friends and their friends. And a place to share the great words of others.

"What has dawned through the WORD is life and the life is the light of all people." paraphrase of John 1:4

Words are powerful....for good or evil. My intent is good and reflection of light and truth on what I see in the world. I am a person of faith and hope and trust the Word is at work among us.

Thanks for starting out with me. I hope you will stay and enjoy the dawn of a new blog creation.