Tag: friends

Categories
ego Trust God

Prayers or Wishes?

A selection of pictures related me driving – perfect parallel park, Luton van, a couple of walks early in the morning just me and my dog, and then my writing retreat week

I went to a local opticians this past week and she did very through tests on my eyes and found that I might not have great peripheral vision. It is not confirmed as yet. I need some more tests. But for now I cannot drive which has come hard because I so love driving. But in the grand scheme of things it isn’t the end of the world.

What has amazed me is some people’s reactions. Most have been really kind and supportive but from one person I got that I needed to be positive and keep saying that there is nothing wrong with my eyes and get rid of all negative believes that my eyesight is bad. This is hard one because I have always been really shortsighted until 13 years ago when I had lens replacements and went from a minus 21 to minus 0.5 which was totally amazing. But my cornea are stretched and are the cornea of an almost blind person!

I sort of know that if I tell this that my eyes are still bad she will tell me that I didn’t do my statements correctly or didn’t believe enough. That somewhere along the way it will be my fault.

I remember my father-in-law saying that, after his major traffic accident where he suffered brain injuries, people would pray for him and, because he didn’t get better, they would say it was his fault for not believing, or that there was sin in his life. Not helpful at all.

Even though the person who told me to believe in the healing isn’t talking about prayer to me it feels like a similar idea, that there is that potential that if we wish it/believe it hard enough then it will all sort out. And then if it doesn’t sort out then it is our fault. It is all very ego-centric

I was very pleased to come across this phrase this morning in Richard Rohr’s daily meditations which seems very apt

….that the greatest enemy of ordinary daily goodness and joy is not imperfection, but the demand for some supposed perfection or order. 

https://cac.org/daily-meditations/the-mystery-of-the-cross/

Ok there is more going in the meditation but this stood out to me. When one does some of these positive statements or healing prayers or whatever one can get into the trap of calling down what we see as perfection. Note the “we see as perfection.” For me personally, to have perfect peace with whatever the outcome of these eye tests in a fortnight are is the greatest thing I could get. Yes of course I would love to be driving again, would love that freedom of just taking off and being on a beach to watch the sun come up, to pop to the Farmer’s market without having to get a lift, etc, etc. But if that doesn’t happen I want to be able to be so at peace I can feel it in my bones.

So I will ask God for my eyesight to be ok and to be able to drive again because that would be silly not to check in with the Great Creator of the Universe and not ask. And if I wasn’t a Christian I would probably do those positive statements and hope for the best.

But what I want deep down is for this daily goodness, this joy, this peace that passes all understanding, to be settled in my heart no matter what happens.

I’ll post an update in after 28th August to let you know how I get on.

Categories
freedom yoke

Freedom From ….?

https://dailyverses.net/freedom

A moment to write between trips!

We’ve got our Upper Room house group tonight and I’ve been pondering what I’d like to share when this verse came to me. So as I walked the dog this morning I got to pondering about what that “yoke of slavery” really was.

Whilst away I’ve see a lot of people who are trapped, many of whom are Christians, trapped by many things; by holding on to hurts and hates from many years ago and having to regurgitate them; trapped by issues in their upbringing which makes them repeatedly behave in a certain way and where their response is to say “it must be my/our upbringing” even though actually they don’t like those characteristics both in themselves and in others; trapped by diagnoses of mental health or behavioral ways again with this “this is just what I’m like”. When challenged on all these things from the regurgitating hurts to the characteristics, etc the response can be quite aggressive and almost a “so you don’t love and accept me as I am”.

Now I believe totally that God loves us unconditionally just as we are [and from that we are to love others unconditionally] but I also think God wants us to be freed from the “yoke of slavery” that is the often the “this is just what I am, I can’t help it” especially if it holds us back from being content with ourselves and with our lives – good, not so good, bad and downright horrible.

I believe to be in the freedom that is talked about here is NOT determined by circumstance, situation, or survival [which I think is a lot of what brings on these “I can’t help it” responses]. I believe this freedom comes from showing ourselves totally to God and to ourselves as we are, warts, traumas and all, and allowing God to set us free in whatever way they see best; counseling, QEC, therapy, Alcoholics Anonymous type group, or just that touch of God without any human intervention.

As with the joy, peace and love, I believe Freedom is a gift from God that is set before us waiting for us to take hold of. This doesn’t mean we will always be safe from falling back into that slavery of comparing, of judging, of fear, of feeling inadequate unless …, but it gives us a rock, a safe place, to crawl back on to, a place to remember that we are not bound by the slavery of being pitched by the waves of thoughts and feelings and situations. But we are totally free.

https://dailyverses.net/freedom

I had a few times over the past week where I could feel myself sliding back into old patterns of behaviour which came from fear, from survival, from old habits, but I either reached to God or asked others to pray from me and that put me back on that rock of freedom away from those “yokes of slavery” that would have dragged me back into old patterns of behaviour which were not wholesome either to myself or to those I was with.

Even today I had to stand on this rock because instead of the regular 10-12 people coming to our Upper Room evening there are only 6, 2 of which are myself and my husband! I heard the “old me”, the “enslaved me” saying things about how it wasn’t worth preparing for, how we ought to have invited more people to allow for there always to be a “crowd” coming, and fear of how it might not work out. Because I had already had to deal with these thoughts in regard to my writing groups – where I used to cancel if only 2 people were coming but now happily run them even if only 1 person is there, so long as that one person is happy about it – I was able to bonk these thoughts on the head very quickly. Or as the Bible says “take these thoughts captive”, which seemed to release this blog and so bless many more than those who will turn up tonight.

Son and dog safe on a rock – March 2018

Categories
oughts writing

Walking Away from “Oughts”

Write from your Passion

First published on Godspacelight 9th July 2024

Writing workshop about dragons and myths run by myself – Barefoot At The Kitchen Table – June 2024

In Christine Sine’s newsletter to those of us who write for Godspacelight she talked about writing into her passion. This is probably one of the bests prompts I’ve had in ages. I have tried writing what I ought to write. I even set up a Substack account to write about writing for well-being but it’s failed. Why? Because, much as I love free writing for my own well-being, I wasn’t writing into my passion. I was trying to be something I wasn’t. I even tried putting in a regular structure to when I blogged but I’m afraid that isn’t me. 

How often do we do that – try to be something we are not? Whether it is in what we write or what we do? I think of many times when I have done something – job or ministry – that is so significant but isn’t me. Too many times to remember. It could even be something I’m good at, have talents in, but it isn’t my passion. I suppose if one jargoned it up I could say it wasn’t “my calling.”

As I’ve got older I’ve learned more and more not just what my skills and talents are but what I am passionate about. I love people, though I need time alone with a book too. If I’m honest my perfect day would be to go for a dog walk, coffee and breakfast with a friend and have a rolling, random conversation that covers deep and meaning as well as trivial and silly; come home and write a blog piece on something that either the conversation has triggered or that was buzzing in my head; and finish the afternoon on the couch to have a read of a good book, then maybe some intense Netflix drama with a glass of red wine to finish the day. Somewhere in that I’d like to ponder writing a short story or flash fiction, though maybe never get to write it; I’d like to email someone I enjoy writing to; run a writing workshop where I encourage others to get the most from putting pen to paper; and probably free write or journal myself. 

But I can get into thinking I “ought to” write X, Y or Z; I “ought to” be connecting with a certain person or group and “ought to” be doing something with them. But that is my “oughts and shoulds” and not my passion coming through. 

I’ve just read Timothy Keller’s The Prodigal God in which he talks of the older brother attitude being the one that says “it’s not fair” when God doesn’t do as we think they should do because we were “good Christians”. My “ought to” comes, I think, from a place that is where I’ve decided what a  “good Christian” or a “good writer” would/should do. It isn’t coming from a place of my passion. 

I think for all of us there are times when we do not run with our passions for many reasons; a need to fit in, a fear of missing out, having been told by a parental figure that life isn’t meant to be about fun, or whatever. I’m sure we all, if we allow ourselves to really hear our hearts, can come up with many reasons why we don’t follow our passions in work, in writing, in church stuff, in life in general. All of them have some truth in them but remember the devil goes around like a angel of light. The one who keeps us away from our true selves does it subtly not overtly. If it was overtly we would notice and rise above it. But it is filled with limited truths and comes from people who do care for us and want the best for us. But it is still lies if it keeps us from our passions and our true selves. 

I’m grateful to all the healing that I’ve received so I can hear God clearly, hear my heart clearly, and be bold enough to step out into my passions. I’m also bold enough now to walk away from when I’ve try to do something that looks good but isn’t me; when I’ve done an “ought”. But this has come about because I know God loves me unconditionally all the time – not just when I get it right/write 🙂 

Categories
death grief psalm

Psalm 23 – part 4

Photographed by myself Jan 2022. A lonesome tree on the top of the hill

How often do we feel like that when we are going through something awful? Something tough? Like we are exposed and alone?

He guides me along the right paths
    for his name’s sake.
4 Even though I walk
    through the darkest valley

Psalm 23:3b-4a

Do you know we only split the Bible into chapters and verses because some bishop decided it? The divisions started to happen in the 9th Century but really came into their own in the 13th Century. David, when he wrote this Psalm would have just written it as a poem with the lines as they are but to be read as whole.

For some reason this jumped out at me – of us being guided along the right paths for God but that sometimes they would lead us through a dark valley – through the valley of the shadow of death, as it says in the NKJV. For those who have gone through dark times, whether the death of a loved one, the end of a relationship, a redundancy, a lost opportunity, etc, it can feel like walking in the shadow of death. I believe any time of grief is a time of death – death of a dream as much as loss of a person.

Someone I care about deeply is going through a dark time but, standing back a bit, I can see that if they don’t go through this dark valley they will never be freed from certain things. This dark time for them will cleanse them.

I can’t find it but in one of this last week’s Henri Nouwen meditations he talks of how grief can be a place of growth. In Richard Rohr’s blog someone talks of how in our culture we try to ignore grief and dark times and run away from them. That we just want to get over it. But here if we run these verses together and don’t allow for the verse break it says that God, our Shepherd, will guide us this way. So does this mean that it is good for us?

Perhaps this is why we we are lead in those calm quiet places first – so we are refreshed but also have developed our relationship with God. Dark times are hard if we don’t know we are loved unconditionally and don’t know that God “has our back” so to speak. We need to get to that place where we can trust that we are being led – that we will be led through not left there. But that in the going through we will …

I will fear no evil,
    for you are with me;
your rod and your staff,
    they comfort me.

Psalm 23:4b

Maybe then we can support and lead others through their valley of the shadow of death at God’s pace rather than rush them through because we don’t like them being sad and depressed.

God lets people grieve so should we – and that includes ourselves.

Categories
oughts passion

My Passions

One of my passions – encouraging other people to enjoy creative writing – whether adults in libraries or community centres, or children in school. Check out more of what I do with writing groups on my Barefoot At The Kitchen Table website

In Christine Sine’s newsletter to those of us who write for Godspacelight she talked about writing into her passion. This is probably one of the bests prompts I’ve had in ages. I have tried writing what I ought to write. I even set up a Substack account to write about writing for well-being but it’s failed. Why? Because, much as I love free writing for my own well-being, I wasn’t writing into my passion. I was trying to be something I wasn’t. I even tried putting in a regular structure to when I blogged but I’m afraid that isn’t me.

How often to do we do that – try to be something we are not? Whether it is in what we write or what we do? I think of many times when I have done something – job or ministry – that is so significant but isn’t me. Too many times to remember. It could even be something I’m good at, have talents in, but it isn’t my passion. I suppose if one jargoned it up I could say it wasn’t “my calling.”

As I’ve got older I’ve learned more and more not just what my skills and talents are but what I am passionate about. I love people, though I need time alone with a book too. If I’m honest my perfect day would be to go for a dog walk, coffee and breakfast with a friend or family member, have a rolling, random conversation that covers deep and meaning as well as trivial and silly; come home and write a blog piece on something that either the conversation has trigger or that was buzzing in my head; and finish the afternoon on the couch have a read of a good book, then maybe some intense Netflix drama with a glass of red wine to finish the day. Somewhere in that I’d like to ponder writing a short story or flash fiction, though maybe never get to write it; I’d like to email someone I enjoy writing to; run a writing workshop where I encourage others to get the most from putting pen to paper; and probably free write or journal myself.

But I can get into thinking I “ought to” write X, Y or Z; I “ought to” be connecting with a certain person or group and “ought to” be doing something with them. But that is my “oughts and shoulds” and not my passion coming through.

I’ve just read Timothy Keller’s The Prodigal God in which he talks of the older brother attitude being the one that says “its not fair” when God doesn’t do as we think they should do because we were “good Christians”. My “ought to” comes, I think, from a place that is where I’ve decided what a “good Christian” or a “good writer” would/should do. It isn’t coming from a place of my passion.

I think for all of us there are times when we do not run with our passions for many reasons; a need to fit in, a fear of missing out, having been told by a parental figure that life isn’t meant to be about fun, or whatever. I’m sure we all, if we allow ourselves to really hear our hearts, can come up with many reasons why we don’t follow our passions in work, in writing, in church stuff, in life in general. All of them have some truth in them but remember the devil goes around like a angel of light. The one who keeps us away from our true selves does it subtly not overtly. If it was overtly we would notice and rise above it. But it is filled with limited truths and comes from people who do care for us and want the best for us. But it is still lies if it keeps us from our passions and our true selves.

I’m grateful to all the healing that I’ve received so I can hear God clearly, hear my heart clearly, and be bold enough to step out into my passions. I’m also bold enough now to walk away from when I’ve try to do something that looks good but isn’t me; when I’ve done an “ought”. But this has come about because I know God loves me unconditionally all the time – not just when I get it right/write 🙂

Below are some pictures of some of my other passions. I do need to take more photos of coffee with my friends too

Categories
friendship mithering

Uselessness

Latest flowers from Hilltop Garden Flowers photographed by myself June 2024

Does the title of this blog jar with you? How often do we think we should be useful? should be “doing something worthwhile”? Even with God we think we ought to be useful – even when we stop to pray we think it should be useful and praying about stuff to help God with their sorting out of the world.

Now I am not against social justice or supporting and helping other people. I fully agree with James’ words that “faith without works is dead” [James 2:26] but I do think, as much as that means working with God and supporting people and nature and issues that need support, I think it also means a faith that works in the knowing there is enough and that when I pray “God’s will be done” that I have changed something. That change doesn’t happen because I’m amazing but because I believe God is amazing.

I have really been enjoying this latest run of meditations from Henri Nouwen looking at solitude with God. And it is in here that he explores the ideas of us emptying ourselves of everything as we come before God, knowing God has enough for us, but also is great enough to sort the whole world out by themselves.

In James’s example as well as saying about when you see someone hungry or in need you help them, the example he uses at the end is Rahab. Rahab believes that the God of the Israelites is greater than the gods of her people so, as well as hiding the spies, also ties a red cord to her window so that she gets rescued and becomes part of the Israelite nation. So more than just doing good things!

In Nouwen’s meditations he says how we need to empty ourselves of everything to truly be with God. That also means all our anxieties and worries. I think sometimes when we come to God to pray about something we come with it as an anxiety so that when we do pray about it we are praying from a place of nervousness or fear. We are not praying from a place of openness and trust. So we often pray “God, can you just do x,y&z” rather than “Amazing God I trust you and place this situation into your hands to do as I know you know best” and then leave it with God.

Jesus said to his followers that he now called them friends not servants [John 15:15] which means he now saw them as people to hang out not to tell them what to do, or them to ask things of him. I met with a friend the other day. Whilst we were together we chatted, shared our lives, suggested supportive things to each other, but on the whole just unloaded a bit. At the end she said she enjoyed being with me because she could say things to me that she would like to say to the people concerned but struggled to say. She isn’t going to now say those things to the people we were talking about but she says she now feels like she can deal with the situation. I know that I feel the same too when I’m with friends I can be myself with. Like I’ve left a bit of something that was on my mind with them. Not for them to fix but because they are my friends.

I think that is a bit like God wants. Not for us to come to God to get them to sort out things but for us to unload, to empty ourselves but then we can sit in companionable silence with God because we are empty. And we can then know that actually God, the Creator of the Universe, doesn’t want to be with us because we can help them with their plans for humanity but so that we can know how “useless” we are before them but how loved we are.

Nouwen also believes that as we empty ourselves of our need to be useful so we give more room for others – friends, family and enemies – to join with us and to sit with us and our amazing God. He believes that when we are trying to be “useful” to God we try to control the situation too much.

In the Lord’s Prayer Jesus said “”Focus your light within us and create your reign of unity now. Your will come true in the universe [all that vibrates] just as on earth [all that is material]” [Aramaic version] or “your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.”

Empty ourselves of mithering at God and open ourselves up to being loved for our uselessness by the awesome creator of the Universe who was and is and is to come!

Categories
Distractions enough peace

Distracted By Many Things

Single focus dog. Photographed by myself Cardiff April 2024

This week I have been distracted by many things. I’ve got 3 workshops I am running with funding from Creu Conwy which seemed to have taken ages to finalise but now are imminent. The first two are next week! Also they are in the evening – one from 5-7pm and the other from 6-8pm, times when I am usually in that downward curve energy-wise and just want to mooch about and watch TV. Though I have had a few nights where I have been functioning after my 6pm deadline – once with a new churchy-style group that we’ve started in my house and a couple of trips to the cinema with hubby. But I’m panicking about these workshops because I will have to be the one who is fully alert.

It has amazed me how quickly I get distracted. I’m also doing an online writing course which is great but again is making me worry about that old adage of “not having enough time”. How many times have I written about not having enough. Perhaps I need to be reading my writings not just writing them??

But it also means that, even though I have been reading my Bible meditations and thinking I’ve not been thinking deeply. Not letting things penetrate into my heart.

This week’s Henri Nouwen thoughts are about Celebrating and how one needs to be in that moment to really celebrate, how lots of what and when we celebrate is a going through the motions rather than actually celebrating. So the event is something that sits between the stress of planning and the anticlimax after the event, but that celebration should be a lifestyle thing. I need to remember that I am to enjoy running these workshops and not just caught up in the preparation and then the feedback.

So once again I am like Martha [Luke 10:38-42] where Jesus says “Martha you are worried about many thing but the better thing is to sit at my feet like your sister“.

I was worrying about things. Ok not little things. These things are quite big – running these writing workshops, not being too exhausted because of the time I am doing them, getting the work handed in for the writing workshop I have paid for, and the having enough sleep, time, ability!

Interestingly the other night I was awake worrying about, of all things, having enough energy and enough time, exasperated by being awake from 3.30-5.30am. I had a full day in front of me and a long list of planning not just for the workshop but other things that I had to do. But, as you’ve probably already guessed, I got everything that needed to be done on the list completed and even managed to stay up till 10pm with my husband watching TV as well has having walked my 10,000+ steps. It was as if God was saying “look you can do it. All will be well”.

Also I do know I have the ability to run these workshops. I do an amazing job every Tuesday fortnight with my regular group and can pull things from the depths of my brain when needed. I know I can do it but I get distracted and once I get distracted I move away from God and also move away from celebrating the joys of being alive.

As I’ve said before though, there is an order for how this comes about. To really be able to feel I have enough I need to be at Peace. From that place of Peace comes a deep Joy and only then do I believe I have Enough. And what has gone on this week is that I had to realign my autonomic nervous system back to a place of peace – which does just take a few moments of breathing and looking at the window, of remembering what I have to be grateful for, and forgiving myself and others. For me going through the Lord’s Prayer but an Aramaic translation, helps me.

https://www.pinterest.com/pin/88875792626618323/

Only then do I start to remember that deeper joy that is a bedrock not a happy feeling. And it is then that I feel like I have enough. Today it means I can say “I have enough time to do a blog post – with many pictures – before going away for the weekend even though my first workshop is Tuesday”.

My whole thoughts have been consumed by these workshops to the point where a friend asked me for coffee and I said I was too busy!!! And also nearly didn’t go south with my husband to see his Mum which has now turned out to be a trip to see my Mum too. Goodness me! Fancy me thinking I don’t have enough time to see family or friends! As well as the Lord’s Prayer I did have to have a chat with my covid-bird to be reminded that friends and cups of tea are important.

Picture first shared on Relearning June 2023

Categories
Films unconditional love

Back To Black

Post image of film from IMB site https://www.imdb.com/title/tt21261712/

We went to our local independent cinema to watch this amazing film. I say amazing because as well as been well performed it was totally non-judgemental. Those of us who were Amy Winehouse fans had read a lot in the papers about her addictions and her relationship with both her father and with Blake, her husband. But this film took all that media judegmental attitude out. It told a story where we were left to not even make judgements on anyone in the story but to just watch, to feel and to get some sort of understanding. Not an understanding of why but just of what was, I think.

I’m looking at Show Not Tell with my writing group and we were saying that often films are more tell because all the showing comes in what we are seeing. But what we saw here were people living their lives with all their issues, hopes, expectations and humanness.

What struck me about this was how all her family and friends knew she had a problem with alcohol and yet often fudged around the subject. I wondered how often we do that with people we love. We know there is an issue but we don’t want to say much because we don’t want to hurt them, are fearful of sounding like we are judging, and also don’t want to lose our relationship with them.

This made me think of this quote

Sometimes discernment causes you to see things that are not nice and as Christians, we can dismiss it as we think “that’s not how a Christian should think!”

https://www.cwmprayer.com/

I often feel that we are not “taught” or even expected to learn how to say things in love. Yes we hear the “I speak my mind” but often that is followed by “and I don’t care what they think”. As children, whether Christian or not, we are often told that “if you can’t say nothing nice don’t say nothing at all” [quote from Thumper in Disney’s 1942 version of Bambi]

But how do we truly live so we are supporting each other? How do we live as today’s meditation from Henri Nouwen says?

The discipline of community makes us persons; that is, people who are sounding through to each other (the Latin personare means “sounding through”) a truth, a beauty, and a love that is greater, fuller, and richer than we ourselves can grasp. In true community we are windows constantly offering each other new views on the mystery of God’s presence in our lives. Thus the discipline of community is a true discipline of prayer. It makes us alert to the presence of the Spirit who cries out “Abba,” Father, among us and thus prays from the center of our common life. Community thus is obedience practiced together. The question is not simply “Where does God lead me as an individual person who tried to do his will?” More basic and more significant is the question “Where does God lead us as a people?”

Meditation Landing

Note Nouwen says it is a “discipline of community“. It isn’t something that just happens. We need to see it as something we have to make time for, make space for, really fix ourselves into. I think too often we don’t commit to community – whether this is our families or our friendship groups – but sort of expect it to happen. Yet we don’t deal with our issues, our needs, our reasons why we get hurt when someone says a certain phrase which triggers something but we don’t know what.

I think because we are full of our own issues/traumas and are holding on to them we often use those groups we are in to meet our needs. So we don’t call someone out because we want to still be with them, or we call them out in a mean way because we want a fight. We don’t know how to speak out in love because we don’t believe we are loved.

I think, to live in this “discipline of community” and to know how to speak into each other’s lives fully we need to know we are loved unconditionally just as we are, need to know those other people are loved unconditionally just as they are, need to know how to say thing without us having an agenda, and then whether the other person does as we’ve suggested or doesn’t change at all that we carry on loving them and accepting them unconditionally. We need to not be “supporting” them to get our own needs met.

But I believe is can only come fully when we know that someone bigger than ourselves, which for me is the Creator of the Universe, sees me as amazing with all my faults and issues. As Jesus said “love your neighbour as you love yourself” but you do have to love yourself first.

[I’ve covered the Love yourself so you can love others in many posts so please feel free put one of those phrases into the search bar and reread old posts]

Categories
seeing True freedom

Being True to Ourselves

https://www.sidetracked.com/a-delicate-line/

Exhausted but content. As she realises that the complete journey is almost at an end, that she has done it – and on her own terms, at peace with the choices she has made – she feels the bond with this mountain of spirit growing strong.

https://www.sidetracked.com/a-delicate-line/

This article on Sidetracked is amazing. Not just that Anna Tybor climbs the 8th highest mountain in the world without oxygen and then skis back down again collecting all their equipment from the three camps her and her three companions made between base camp and the summit, but it is that she did it on her own terms. She made choices, like not using the oxygen and collecting their detritus which other climbers would not have done, and it is this that give her peace. It would seem that because of this she feels a bond with the mountain. Read the article because this mountain doesn’t work with her on the trip.

Not all of us are called to climb mountains, even little ones, but all of use are much more at peace when we do things on our own terms.

The more I find my true self the more I know what my terms are and the more I can let those things happen not with force but with gentleness because I know it is what I want deep in my heart. Sometimes that might make things harder for me – like with Anna’s thing of clearing up the mountain behind them – but when I go the way I know my heart feels is right then I connect with something higher/greater than me – whether that is God, The Universe, the environment I’m in or the people around me.

I think when we don’t do what we know to be right for us – and again this comes down to seeing ourselves truly and not seeing ourselves as we think others want us to be – we feel a hurt. Often we dismiss this hurt and move on but it stays with us building into something bigger. Then we scream at someone for pulling out in front of us, leaving the top off the toothpaste, etc etc. Often it is that we’ve let those things that aren’t right for us build.

I’ve been running writing workshops for the last 7 1/2 years. Over that time I’ve learned that the ones that work best for the participants are the ones where I am true to myself in them. I run the writing groups that work for me. I do them on my own terms and that gives me peace and causes harmony within the group. When I try to run a group to please someone else then I feel the tension in me and those groups fold.

So practically how can we be true to ourselves and be at peace with our decisions and choices? I will always say that the first way is to get some healing and see what the blocks are that stop us from being true to ourselves, and sometimes that can be not knowing ourselves. Think back to those times when you felt totally at peace and see what you did/didn’t do.

I also think we need to slow down and not just into things. Emails and text messages and phone calls shout at us to do something now but it is ok to wait, to say to the caller “I’ll get back to you” or just leave the text or phone call. I find even if my heart says “yes” I will still wait in case actually I’m going back to people pleasing rather than my own terms.

As a Christian I would say that my final thing with making a decision is that I allow “the peace of God that transcends all understanding to guard my heart and mind” and from there I can go with my peace.

Important note – what I believe to be the right decision is the right decision, the right choice for me, and the more healed I become, the more at peace with myself I become, I can let other people find their own peace and make their own choices on their own terms.

Categories
healing seeing

Seeing

Daffodils and snowdrops out at the same time. Photographed Thursday 15th February 2024 on my river walk at St Asaph

I read this great Substack post by Fiona Koefoed-Jespersen the other day about “The real miracle is seeing” which looks at the story from Acts where John and Peter heal the lame man by the Beautiful Gate [Acts 3:1-10] in which she says that the real miracle is that all three of them, John, Peter and the lame man, all actually see each other for the first time.

She says

What if the biggest miracle of this story is not the healing of a man born lame, but that three people separated by physical ability and difference, by religious interpretation of that difference, and by so many other economic and social realities, actually pause long enough to look each other in the eyes.

And

What if walking the Way of Jesus becomes an inability to ignore, to pass hasty judgement, to believe the propaganda or the toxic theology?

What if three plus years of being discipled by a poor Palestinian Jewish rabbi had led them to this greatest miracle: recognising their common humanity with the person in front of them?

But I also think there was something in the lame man that made him actually see John and Peter properly too. This lame man had been there for years. I often wonder if Jesus had walked past him. In fact I often wonder how there were still people who needed healing in all of Jerusalem and Galilee after three years of Jesus’ ministry on earth.

So after pondering this I think that it takes both sides to be doing the “seeing”. If the lame man had not really looked up at John and Peter he would not have asked them to really heal them. Something went on on both sides of this interaction for the true healing to take place.

I was thinking of this with people I know. Yes I can fully see them and build relationship from my side but if they don’t want to, or can’t, fully see this with me then we cannot build together. It takes two.

Actually this happened to me over this weekend with a friend who I felt hadn’t fully seen what I was feeling but then later in the conversation I said something to which her response was “oh I get what you’re saying now”. Once I felt truly seen I felt barriers go down that I wasn’t even sure I had put up.

So yes we do need to get beyond toxic theologies and prejudices and yes we need to fully see each others humanity. But things will only come together in peace if both sides are willing to do that. And as in all relationships it needs to be a regular daily thing. Not just a one off.