Last night I re-potted all of my plants. It was time for a fresh start. I liked the way the soil felt under my pink fingernails, but how lovely it felt when I scrubbed it all away - a fresh start for my hands and my plants. It makes me think of a lot of things, really, but especially the lyrics to an Ingrid Michaelson song, Starting Now.
Speaking of soil (I must confess that I have three separate/unrelated ideas to include in this post, but I will do my very best to connect them anyway), the other day I read this:
"Tragedy is the fertile soil of miracles. ... it seems the way to deal with the evil of the world is not to pretend to go around it, but to plunge right through . ... I believe sometimes bad things happen to good people so we can watch God turn the greatest tragedies into the purest love." -Athol Dickson, from The Gospel According to Moses.
I have watched this happen time and again in my life. I hope you have, too.
And finally, Love. I suppose at nineteen, I'm still too young to understand it. Mostly I know this because I thought I did, and not all that long ago. I was under the impression that it was quite simple. It's not. It's not a bad thing to be too young - I just still have a lot of things to learn about life and Him and the world and other people and myself.
"Teach me and I will be silent; show me where I have been wrong." -Job 6:24
Tuesday, February 19
Monday, February 11
Ready To Stand
I'm walking in an open field looking for some space to fill
I believe there's something left to hold.
So even when the sun goes down and there's no one around
I'm standing in the freedom of my soul.
-Bebo Norman, Stand
Step One: Identify and Overcome Fears
As 2 Timothy 1:7 says, "God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind." (NKJV) I'm giving blood tomorrow. This is a huge step for me - a step of obedience for sure: first His blood - now mine. As far as the more distant future is concerned, I'm considering a move to Seattle next year for graduate school. By myself.
Step Two: Seize Opportunities...
To travel - I figure God made the world and everything in it, so it's probably worth seeing if one has the means.
To love/help others - He also made people and loves each person deeply. I suspect that there is a reason; I'd like to discover it.
Step Three: Learn to Love Unreservedly
Recently I've realized that true freedom requires my extension of the forgiveness I've received to those in my life who are equally undeserving of it. So learn to love mercy (Micah 6:8). "Only the free can love, and only the completely free can love unreservedly." -St. Teresa of Avila
Step Four: Be More Disciplined: Waste Less Time
"In all the work you are doing, work the best you can. Work as if you were doing it for the LORD, not for people." -Colossians 3:23
Step Five: Loosen Up: Waste More Time
A. Try new things: piano, painted fingernails, yoga, Wesley, the old testament, spending some money, poetry, step aerobics, paradoxes, wearing heels occasionally, summer in Russia...
B. Be generous and willing to share. (1 Timothy 16:18)
C. Release whatever it is that I hold onto so tightly; only then will my hands be open to receive God's best for me. Realize that this is a process.
I believe there's something left to hold.
So even when the sun goes down and there's no one around
I'm standing in the freedom of my soul.
-Bebo Norman, Stand
Step One: Identify and Overcome Fears
As 2 Timothy 1:7 says, "God has not given us a spirit of fear, but of power and of love and of a sound mind." (NKJV) I'm giving blood tomorrow. This is a huge step for me - a step of obedience for sure: first His blood - now mine. As far as the more distant future is concerned, I'm considering a move to Seattle next year for graduate school. By myself.
Step Two: Seize Opportunities...
To travel - I figure God made the world and everything in it, so it's probably worth seeing if one has the means.
To love/help others - He also made people and loves each person deeply. I suspect that there is a reason; I'd like to discover it.
Step Three: Learn to Love Unreservedly
Recently I've realized that true freedom requires my extension of the forgiveness I've received to those in my life who are equally undeserving of it. So learn to love mercy (Micah 6:8). "Only the free can love, and only the completely free can love unreservedly." -St. Teresa of Avila
Step Four: Be More Disciplined: Waste Less Time
"In all the work you are doing, work the best you can. Work as if you were doing it for the LORD, not for people." -Colossians 3:23
Step Five: Loosen Up: Waste More Time
A. Try new things: piano, painted fingernails, yoga, Wesley, the old testament, spending some money, poetry, step aerobics, paradoxes, wearing heels occasionally, summer in Russia...
B. Be generous and willing to share. (1 Timothy 16:18)
C. Release whatever it is that I hold onto so tightly; only then will my hands be open to receive God's best for me. Realize that this is a process.
Saturday, February 9
Sore Must Be The Storm
A dear friend of mine just started a blog and in one of her first entries quoted Emily Dickinson. So this is inspired by the pair of them: my dear friend and Dickinson. I'd like to share two lovely poems written by the latter. I wish I had words of my own, but hers are so much more than enough.
Hope is the thing with feathers
The perches in the soul,
And sings the tune without the words,
And never stops at all.
And sweetest in the gale is heard;
And sore must be the storm
That could abash the little bird
That kept so many warm.
I've heard it in the chillest land,
And on the strangest sea;
Yet, never, extremity,
It asked a crumb of me.
---
I'm nobody! Who are you?
Are you nobody, too?
Then there's a pair of us - don't tell!
They'd banish us, you know.
How dreary to be somebody!
How public, like a frog
To tell your name the livelong day
To an admiring bog!
Hope is the thing with feathers
The perches in the soul,
And sings the tune without the words,
And never stops at all.
And sweetest in the gale is heard;
And sore must be the storm
That could abash the little bird
That kept so many warm.
I've heard it in the chillest land,
And on the strangest sea;
Yet, never, extremity,
It asked a crumb of me.
---
I'm nobody! Who are you?
Are you nobody, too?
Then there's a pair of us - don't tell!
They'd banish us, you know.
How dreary to be somebody!
How public, like a frog
To tell your name the livelong day
To an admiring bog!
Sunday, February 3
Middle School Monologues
Recently I had the privilege of being a part of something wonderful. My friend was part of a team that created a film for campus movie fest, and she asked me to play a small role. These girls did an amazing job, and out of 140+ entries, they made the top 16 that were shown at the Classic Center on Friday night. I hope this makes you laugh.
Thursday, January 24
Large Enough For Me
I had no time to hate, because
The grave would hinder me,
And life was not so ample I
Could finish enmity.
Nor had I time to love, but since
Some industry must be,
The little toil of love, I thought,
Was large enough for me.
-Emily Dickinson
I can remember doing a unit in my high school American Literature class on Walt Whitman and Emily Dickinson and viewing it as a colossal waste of time. I hated poetry because it wasn't straightforward; it required a creative effort on the part of the reader (i.e. me). Now I pour over these words, perhaps because I've experienced just a little more life and I'm beginning to understand some of Dickinson's sentiments that I couldn't a few years ago. Maybe I've just learned to appreciate poetry in general a little more.
I can also remember sitting in the back of the classroom day after day, ignoring my seventh grade social studies teacher's lectures about African history. Now I'm struggling to manipulate my schedule to fit in an African Studies class next fall.
I wonder what I'm learning about these days that I will look back and wish I had given more attention to (I should probably start by spending less time whining about my schoolwork). Today my "little toil of love" involves a lesson in empathy for my future clients with voice disorders, as I myself have lost my voice. It is definitely large enough for me.
The grave would hinder me,
And life was not so ample I
Could finish enmity.
Nor had I time to love, but since
Some industry must be,
The little toil of love, I thought,
Was large enough for me.
-Emily Dickinson
I can remember doing a unit in my high school American Literature class on Walt Whitman and Emily Dickinson and viewing it as a colossal waste of time. I hated poetry because it wasn't straightforward; it required a creative effort on the part of the reader (i.e. me). Now I pour over these words, perhaps because I've experienced just a little more life and I'm beginning to understand some of Dickinson's sentiments that I couldn't a few years ago. Maybe I've just learned to appreciate poetry in general a little more.
I can also remember sitting in the back of the classroom day after day, ignoring my seventh grade social studies teacher's lectures about African history. Now I'm struggling to manipulate my schedule to fit in an African Studies class next fall.
I wonder what I'm learning about these days that I will look back and wish I had given more attention to (I should probably start by spending less time whining about my schoolwork). Today my "little toil of love" involves a lesson in empathy for my future clients with voice disorders, as I myself have lost my voice. It is definitely large enough for me.
Monday, January 21
What We Had For Dinner
I just finished watching Hotel Rwanda.
I'm utterly confused about the state of the world, especially with regards to international diplomacy. I realize that many of the scenes in the movie were sensationalized, but I cannot ignore the fact that it's based on a true story. Real people. Real families. Real children. 1,000,000 of them.
One of the themes that I picked up on centered around the moment of realization of the bystander apathy infecting one's culture. Paul (Cheadle) was a Hutu. At first he attempted to look away as his own people began to slaughter hundreds of Tutsis, his neighbors included; he claimed that his "family is the only thing that matters." But he could not ignore for long.
I am an American, and although I was only six when this conflict took place, it was my country, the leaders that we elected, that supported UN withdrawal from Rwanda. Our leaders dismissed the issue as insignificant and isolated "acts of genocide." We abandoned them...why?
I'll admit that I know very little about this matter, but allow me to venture a guess: "The economy, stupid." What had Rwanda to offer us? Would things have been different if she had oil reserves to power our SUVs or diamonds to perpetuate our long-standing (est. 1948) traditions?
How does a person arrive at a point in his life at which he is capable of assigning greater value to some material good than to human life? Or deciding that the protection of hundreds of thousands of children and their families is not worth our precious time and resources? I am not pointing my finger; for we as citizens of a sickeningly wealthy democracy are just as guilty as the crooked politicians that we elect. We all looked away.
Jack (Phoenix), the American camera-man, recognized the bystander apathy of his country:
Paul Rusesabagina: I am glad that you have shot this footage and that the world will see it. It is the only way we have a chance that people might intervene.
Jack: Yeah and if no one intervenes, is it still a good thing to show?
Paul Rusesabagina: How can they not intervene when they witness such atrocities?
Jack: I think if people see this footage they'll say, "oh my God that's horrible," and then go on eating their dinners.
------
I wonder what my family had for dinner that night.
I'm utterly confused about the state of the world, especially with regards to international diplomacy. I realize that many of the scenes in the movie were sensationalized, but I cannot ignore the fact that it's based on a true story. Real people. Real families. Real children. 1,000,000 of them.
One of the themes that I picked up on centered around the moment of realization of the bystander apathy infecting one's culture. Paul (Cheadle) was a Hutu. At first he attempted to look away as his own people began to slaughter hundreds of Tutsis, his neighbors included; he claimed that his "family is the only thing that matters." But he could not ignore for long.
I am an American, and although I was only six when this conflict took place, it was my country, the leaders that we elected, that supported UN withdrawal from Rwanda. Our leaders dismissed the issue as insignificant and isolated "acts of genocide." We abandoned them...why?
I'll admit that I know very little about this matter, but allow me to venture a guess: "The economy, stupid." What had Rwanda to offer us? Would things have been different if she had oil reserves to power our SUVs or diamonds to perpetuate our long-standing (est. 1948) traditions?
How does a person arrive at a point in his life at which he is capable of assigning greater value to some material good than to human life? Or deciding that the protection of hundreds of thousands of children and their families is not worth our precious time and resources? I am not pointing my finger; for we as citizens of a sickeningly wealthy democracy are just as guilty as the crooked politicians that we elect. We all looked away.
Jack (Phoenix), the American camera-man, recognized the bystander apathy of his country:
Paul Rusesabagina: I am glad that you have shot this footage and that the world will see it. It is the only way we have a chance that people might intervene.
Jack: Yeah and if no one intervenes, is it still a good thing to show?
Paul Rusesabagina: How can they not intervene when they witness such atrocities?
Jack: I think if people see this footage they'll say, "oh my God that's horrible," and then go on eating their dinners.
------
I wonder what my family had for dinner that night.
Sunday, January 20
Self-Control is the New Patience
Yesterday morning I was running on the indoor track at Ramsey when God let me know what was about to happen in my life, at least in the arena of character development: self-control.
So joy is the new compassion in that it just kind of sprouted up in me without my notice; and self-control is the new patience, for I have a feeling that I am about to be painfully aware of its lessons.
"It is not good to eat too much honey,
nor is it honorable to seek one's own honor.
Like a city whose walls are broken down
is a man who lacks self-control."
-Proverbs 25:27-28
I kind of feel like I don't fully understand this metaphor because our cities don't have walls, but I imagine that the walls were established to protect the city's inhabitants. The guards at the gates could regulate what went out as well as what came in, and certainly the walls made the city a safer place.
I tend to associate self-control with the regulation of one's actions; a self-controlled person does not hurt others, but keeps the bad things that are inside from escaping. But in this context, it appears that self-control is more about self-protection than the protection of others from self.
Maybe effective self-control starts sooner than we think; for if we filter what comes through the gates, we need not worry about what exits through them.
So joy is the new compassion in that it just kind of sprouted up in me without my notice; and self-control is the new patience, for I have a feeling that I am about to be painfully aware of its lessons.
"It is not good to eat too much honey,
nor is it honorable to seek one's own honor.
Like a city whose walls are broken down
is a man who lacks self-control."
-Proverbs 25:27-28
I kind of feel like I don't fully understand this metaphor because our cities don't have walls, but I imagine that the walls were established to protect the city's inhabitants. The guards at the gates could regulate what went out as well as what came in, and certainly the walls made the city a safer place.
I tend to associate self-control with the regulation of one's actions; a self-controlled person does not hurt others, but keeps the bad things that are inside from escaping. But in this context, it appears that self-control is more about self-protection than the protection of others from self.
Maybe effective self-control starts sooner than we think; for if we filter what comes through the gates, we need not worry about what exits through them.
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