I don't make resolutions anymore. For me, resolutions have always been the first step towards everyone's favorite town of Failureville...though I always think I am turning onto the fabled Road of Change, or the Boulevard of Betterment, or the Avenue of Success. Readers of this blog will know that shunning resolutions absolutely does not mean I am satisfied with my life how it is. I am the Queen of Dissatisfaction, always either striving mightily to improve (if I feel strong and energetic) or feeling guilty for lack of improvement (if I am feeling weak and discouraged). What I have learned is that when the stress and pressure to change is intense, that is the best time to step back and do, well, absolutely nothing about It. Whatever It is. But when I am feeling magnanimous and benevolent toward myself, I can usually make some strides forward. I ALWAYS have a huge list of goals or objectives I can choose from right in my head. I just try to remember I need to avoid the dreaded mindset of perfectionism.
This is at least part of the current List In My Head:
- Get kids back into doing their chores without being asked. I gave them an allowance for doing it WITHOUT being reminded, because I am so not into the Drill Sergeant Thing. It went well for several months, then I found myself needing to remind. So out went the allowance. That was, as you can imagine, not much of an incentive. So, my new incentive idea is to have them pay ME, or rather, pay a jar (whose contents will eventually be used in some charitable way) if they don't do the chores. So, in the morning, if I see the previous evening's chores have not been done, I will hear the sweet tinkle of coinage landing in the jar...insert evil laugh and appropriate hand-wringing. Of course, the chores will have to be done anyway. Insert more evil cackling. The chore lists need some revamping, which is what I actually need to DO in this area.
- Keep my creative life alive by doing small things wherever they will fit into daily life...for example, I have literally hundreds of books that are collage fodder. I usually just pick up a book and start flipping through it when I am making an art journal page or something, but I would really like to have stuff already cut and prepped in some way beforehand. Browsing through books and cutting things out is something I can do when I am doing something like re-watching Buffy with Husband. In the most recent issue of Art Journaling magazine I saw some pages where the artist took inchies or twinchies (just like inchies, only 2" square) and used each one as a "day" in a calendar-type page...she wrote whatever small amount of info, a thought, memory, experience, or whatever would fit, and then attached them in the journal. I might try this with twinchies, and attach them in a way so they can fold out like a page and so have writing on both sides. That is definitely a small thing which would add up to something bigger over time.
- Continue walking slowly but steadily along Sanctification Trail. I am so over trying to incorporate any impressive "spiritual disciplines" into my life. My goal is simply to make a habit of reading the Bible and praying in a more casual, immediate fashion. Today I started this Bible reading plan. The basic format has you reading 10 chapters a day from 10 different portions of the Bible, with the main goal at first being to get you in the habit of reading, and then to help you see Scripture interpreting Scripture. From the PDF of the program:
Since the lists vary in length, the readings begin interweaving in constantly changing ways. You will NEVER read the same set of ten chapters together again! Every year you’ll read through all the Gospels four times, the Pentateuch twice,Paul’s le tters 4-5 times each, the OT wisdom literature six times, all the Psalms at least twice, all the Proverbs as well as Acts a dozen times, and all the way through the OT History and Prophetic books about 1 ½ times. Since the interweaving is constantly changing, you will experience the Bible commenting on itself in constantly changing ways -- the Reformer's principle of 'scriptura interpretans scripturam' --'scripture interpreting scripture' IN ACTION!
In the past, I have always thought that simply reading the Bible wasn't enough - there had to be in-depth study of Hebrew and Greek words, much use of concordances, etc. But God has said that His Word will not return to Him void, so I am going to trust Him on that and just read in this way, like I would read anything.
I recently realized that just as I am very guarded and less than honest about my true self and feelings with most other people, I am the same way with God. Which is totally stupid, of course, since God knows us inside and out. But this tendency of mine is not because I am embarrassed or ashamed, but rather because I have trust issues. After reading a book by Larry Crabb (that much-maligned-in-some-Christian-circles psychologist) I understood that even though God knows everything about me before I tell Him, it does something important for my "relationship" with God if I am honest and talk with Him like I would any trusted friend. For me, it's too easy to have only the "reverence" part down, which can lead to distance, aloofness and cold, stilted prayers. I also think this unwillingness to really admit what I am going through existentially to God has a part in my struggle with Hyper-Calvinistic-Stoic-Que-Sera-Sera type thinking. I know God is there and that He is sovereign. But I don't always maintain a heart level belief that my my relationship with God goes beyond Creator and Creature, I find myself not truly seeking or asking after Him, Himself - rather I maintain a respectful distance and stiff-upper-lip kind of acceptance about my inner and outer life, like a good Creature should do.
I have read several Christian books recently, and a few ideas popped up in all of them. The main thing I took away from them was that what we most need to strive for is valuing God for Himself, and not for His blessings in this life, and the importance and benefit of practicing the presence of God where we are. This is something we can do in every situation. We don't have to have impressive and dynamic spiritual disciplines in place. We don't need to have warm, fuzzy feelings toward God. In fact, Larry Crabb especially made the point that instead of pretending that we have a heart for God, that we value Him above all things, we need to admit to Him that we in fact DO NOT, and then we can go forward, desiring to desire...and even that is proof of our regeneration.
I have noticed that we can take our natural human tendencies and use them to practice His presence. You know how you basically have a running monologue in your head all the time? How about those conversations you have with people that you would probably not have in real life - the things you should have said, or would say if you were brave enough. And all those conflicting desires, frustrations, angers, fears and resentments hanging out in there? Think how awful you feel when you are upset or angry or whatever, and you try to keep it all inside, pretend it's all fine. What I've always done is skip sharing with God what I am really experiencing. I think I shouldn't be feeling any of this stuff anyway, it just proves my lack of sanctification, right...so I just skip right to a pious sounding prayer about whatever it is, wrapping it up in some neat little platitude. But doing that doesn't seem to help with the real issue, which is most often me, living my life for me, thinking about me, me, me all the time. It just allows all that whirlwind of mind to become ingrained into deeper negative neural pathways...and baby, my negative neural pathways are wicked deep. But I can think these same types of thoughts, and instead share them with God. This kind of diffuses it all. It renews my mind, because I begin to see it all for what it is, then I see God for what He is, which is ever merciful to me, a sinner.
This is all easy enough to talk about, but it's hard to practice the presence of God when you are in one of those days, weeks, months or years when you don't feel that presence anywhere. Your life is boring, or kinda depressing, or tedious, or lonely or annoying...and how about when it's actually tragic, totally falling apart and full of searing pain? I think you go about it the same way if you can. But if you just can't, if you are numb, or spiritually cold, or full of doubts...I think hanging onto God by the proverbial skin of your teeth counts, kinda like Frodo hangs there over the fiery chasm with his finger bitten off.
Another thing that popped up in all the books was the idea of the two different kinds of time - chronos time and kairos time. Chronos time is clock time, minutes, hours, days...the stuff that can drag, that mocks us for being late, the realm of the schedule, the plan, the rush and the hub-bub of life. Kairos time is the Moments, when time almost stops, when we feel the weight of life. Eternity breaks in somehow. Or we really experience beauty. We see our new baby for the first time after the struggle of labor, or sit by the deathbed of someone we love, seeing them for the last time. We might just be peeling potatoes, but for some reason we are paying attention. We notice the light on the water in the pot, we feel the heft of the potato, see the peels falling under our knife, and we suddenly realize that We Are Living, and it is amazing. This is an experience that we all share as human beings, and is not limited to believers - I think it is a manifestation of having eternity placed in our hearts. I don't know if we will experience more moments like this as we become more adept at practicing God's presence, but in those times when I am trying to just Be Here Now, I do catch more glimpses. Learning to live in the moment has been one of my resolutions for many years, and I am not sure if I am any better at it now, than I was 20 years ago. But it is something I will keep desiring, and I know that I will eventually attain it in Glory, even if I continue to struggle with it here.
4) Fitness/Health/Vanity-wise, I want to continue towards being a physically strong, somewhat slim and lean Happy Eater...meaning, a person who is never on a diet, who does not see food as good or bad, who eats in a way that she enjoys and which makes her feel good. I lost 35 lbs that way, even though I did not realize what I was doing exactly. I want to keep refining my eating by continuing to cut out foods I totally do not care about, so I can have lots of room for foods I do care about.
I care passionately about:
full fat Greek yogurt with maple syrup, 85% chocolate with peanut butter, basic salads, chicken (including fried), tomatillo salsa, hazelnuts, pecans and almonds, cafe lattes, whole grain fresh corn tortillas, pepper jack cheese, frozen wild blueberries, homemade chicken soup, potatoes, butter, olive oil, fresh pecorino romano cheese, italian sausage, stove-popped popcorn with seasoning salt, ginger snaps from the Whole Foods bulk section, natural deli turkey from Central Market and also this totally nummy salami from there.
I care moderately about:
eggs, pasta, fresh hearth-baked breads (current fave rosemary bread with a salted top), brown rice and oats, fajita meat and chuck roasts, occasional high-quality potato chips, occasional homemade pizza, occasional homemade baked goods - favorites being pumpkin bread, cheesecake, pound cake and shortbread cookies with nuts and anything made with almond paste.
I totally do not care about:
ground beef of any kind, pancakes, soda, any kind of juice, mainstream candy bars, any condiments except salsa, any non-bakery breads in a bag, boxed crackers, any cereal except the occasional Kashi Go-Lean in yogurt, tortilla chips, cheese puffs and most other chips, dips, beans, cooked vegetables, almost all casseroles, store-bought desserts of any kind except for those nummy frozen eclairs.
I am 43 now, and by the time I hit 45 I would like to be somewhat lean and muscular but not ripped. At this point I am losing weight fairly slowly but steadily, but I am still nursing - nursing seems to help drop weight at first, but in my experience as an extended nurser, after a while it really causes you to hang on to the last pounds. I want to incorporate more intermittent fasting and shorter eating windows, I like to vary how much I eat day to day instead of trying to keep a steady calorie thing going. It works much better to eat less on the days you are busy or don't really care about food, so you can eat more on the days it means more for some reason...you make your favorite meal that you love to scarf down, you need to eat for comfort, etc. I would also like to become consistent with taking a few supplements.
On the exercise front, my only focus these days is lifting heavy weights 2 or 3x per week. I have been neglecting my flexibility and other restorative physical things, so I would like to add more of that as BabyTime becomes less demanding. My main focus is my shoulders, my back and my rear end. My shoulders look good VERY quickly and easily, my back is where my most hated fat lives, and my natural buns tend towards the flat. Deadlifts with about 60 lbs and dumbbell swings with 30 lbs seem to be shaping "up" the rear, but there is more fat to banish before my back looks like I want it to. I am not super concerned about my abs - I have no desire for a 6 pack or any pack. Just not having a super lot of fat there and having a strong functional core is my goal. I am wide waisted anyway, basically straight up and down if I am fit, with wide shoulders, hardly any hips and slim and muscular legs and arms.
Gotta wind this up...so here are a few other things that float around in my head as possibly worthwhile things to spend time on this year, but no pressure from myself to actually do:
1) Going through the two JINORMOUS bins of kid's drawings and making a huge collage with the best of them on a big canvas...there are some pretty impressive ones
2) Make a prototype for my book
3) Get some digital pictures PRINTED. I have 8 years worth and have never had a single one printed
4) Try to learn to take decent photos with at least a somewhat artistic look
I think that's enough for at least a year.
Sunday, January 1, 2012
Wednesday, December 7, 2011
What Have I Done Today?
Since I have been going all LoserLady recently, I am going to fall back on one of my techniques to get rid of her - to look at what I have actually accomplished rather than at all the things left undone. It usually sends her on a somewhat brief hiatus, because in hindsight things look less failureish.
Got up at 7am. Today I have, by now at 2:30pm:
- Drunk cafe latte
- Eaten one slice of awesome rye toast
- Read my morning forums - Happy Eaters, Video Fitness, Television Without Pity Dexter Forum, FB, Pinterest
- Taken one load of laundry out of the dryer, folded it and put another load in the washer. Did not put folded load away.
- Made a pound cake for Moppet 3's birthday party tomorrow
- Made pasta sauce with Italian sausage, wore Baby in sling to get her to sleep while doing this
- Ate said sauce with garden rotini and 2 raw celery sticks
- Lifted weights in kitchen while waiting for pound cake to be done cooking - 15 lbs: 2 sets of 20 shoulder press, 2 sets of 16 upright row, 3 hand positions of 16 reps lat row - stationary lunges, curtsy lunges, basic squat (30 lb total). 12 lb: 16 reps in and out shoulder flyes, 16 triceps kickbacks, 16 single arm overhead triceps press, biceps curls in 3 hand positions. bodyweight: 2 sets 15 big-girl pushups, 60 second plank lowering alternate knees to floor, triceps dips, barre-style leg raises in 3 positions, 30 reps each. Basic quick stretch.
- Washed accumulated bowls and pans from cake and lunch
- Will take Moppet 1 to an almost 2 hour dance class around 3:30, wait for her at a Burger King Playland with other 4 Moppets, and then will be home around 6:30 (Husband usually takes her, but is on a big job and so is not available)
- Is not planning on doing anything else productive this evening. Will probably play a new game with the family, the hopefully watch Firefly. Will have Moppets do their living room and kitchen chores, will eat regular bedtime snack of full-fat Greek yogurt, Kashi Go-Lean Crunch cereal and frozen wild blueberries, then will undoubtedly be ready for bed, and will hopefully be mentally prepared 10am birthday party in the morning.
Got up at 7am. Today I have, by now at 2:30pm:
- Drunk cafe latte
- Eaten one slice of awesome rye toast
- Read my morning forums - Happy Eaters, Video Fitness, Television Without Pity Dexter Forum, FB, Pinterest
- Taken one load of laundry out of the dryer, folded it and put another load in the washer. Did not put folded load away.
- Made a pound cake for Moppet 3's birthday party tomorrow
- Made pasta sauce with Italian sausage, wore Baby in sling to get her to sleep while doing this
- Ate said sauce with garden rotini and 2 raw celery sticks
- Lifted weights in kitchen while waiting for pound cake to be done cooking - 15 lbs: 2 sets of 20 shoulder press, 2 sets of 16 upright row, 3 hand positions of 16 reps lat row - stationary lunges, curtsy lunges, basic squat (30 lb total). 12 lb: 16 reps in and out shoulder flyes, 16 triceps kickbacks, 16 single arm overhead triceps press, biceps curls in 3 hand positions. bodyweight: 2 sets 15 big-girl pushups, 60 second plank lowering alternate knees to floor, triceps dips, barre-style leg raises in 3 positions, 30 reps each. Basic quick stretch.
- Washed accumulated bowls and pans from cake and lunch
- Will take Moppet 1 to an almost 2 hour dance class around 3:30, wait for her at a Burger King Playland with other 4 Moppets, and then will be home around 6:30 (Husband usually takes her, but is on a big job and so is not available)
- Is not planning on doing anything else productive this evening. Will probably play a new game with the family, the hopefully watch Firefly. Will have Moppets do their living room and kitchen chores, will eat regular bedtime snack of full-fat Greek yogurt, Kashi Go-Lean Crunch cereal and frozen wild blueberries, then will undoubtedly be ready for bed, and will hopefully be mentally prepared 10am birthday party in the morning.
Friday, December 2, 2011
In Which Several of My Alter-Egos Duke It Out
There once was a gal whose mentality
Tended towards split personality.
Alter-egos she juggled, and constantly struggled
To maintain just a base functionality.
Like some people are blown around with every wind of doctrine, I am sorry to admit that I am blown around on every gust of emotion - mine and others'. I am way too affected not only by my own emotional swings, but I am hyper-sensitive to the moods of everyone else in the house.
When someone in my charge is less than satisfied with life, my alter-ego, LoserLady, dons her cape. LoserLady's Unsuperpower is feeling like a total failure whenever anything remotely within her sphere of influence is imperfect. This may seem like low self-esteem, but it really isn't. When she is not dealing with other people in one of her life roles, she morphs into another personality, maybe one with a real Superpower. And it isn't humility, either, because humble people, it is said, don't think less of themselves, but rather think of themselves less.
When LoserLady is on patrol, everything is about her.
As her therapist, I am aware that in some ways this Unsuperpower developed because she was reared on a far distant planet, fed a diet of Abandonment Soup, Insecurity Crackers and Fear Pudding. She eats better now, but has many lingering problems from this malnourishment...
Okay, I HATE allegory and it is proof that rapidwriting taps into oft unused brain cells if I drifted into it. But the point is that I am tired of LoserLady and want the equivalent of a Buffy Vamp Stake to do her in...I just don't know what weapon would work. LoserLady's arch nemesis (who seems healthier but really isn't) is Self-Improvementista, and she is always trying to slay LoserLady by choking her with wadded up plans and schedules shoved down her throat, or hitting her on the head with big, heavy books on how to better yourself. So far, this has failed and LoserLady lives on.
Recently I have been experiencing a queer lack of drive and/or ambition I thought was a manifestation of LoserLady (or maybe her frienemy DiscouragementDiva) but now I am not sure, after I read this in a blog post (by a man who happens to have Stage IV cancer) today:
"Most of us are mediocre, make unique contributions only in the peculiar ways we screw things up, and could easily be replaced as husband, father or employee, by somebody better suited to the task...As I look round the church, it strikes me that this zen-like condition of a lack of ambition is much to be desired because far too many Christians have senses of destiny which verge on the messianic. The confidence that the Lord has a special plan and purpose just for them shapes the way they act and move. Now, just for the record, I am a good Calvinist, and I certainly believe each individual has a destiny; what concerns me is the way in which our tendency to think of ourselves as special and unique (which we all are in some ways – D.N.A. etc.) bleeds over into a sense of special destiny whereby the future, or at least the future of myself, comes to be the priority and to trump all else."
Despite being quite lazy in lots of ways, I have always been a sporadically productive person of an artistic and somewhat visionary bent, and I do like to help and encourage people in that area, as you probably know. I have all kinds of plans and ideas for things I would like to do or study or accomplish at some point in my life, but lately I have been wondering what the point of any of that is. At times, those thoughts come when LoserLady is visiting, or I assume it's just creative block or whatever, and that it will pass. There is also the fact that basic day-to-day tasks keep me busy and make me tired and so television sounds much more appealing than dragging out and cleaning up paint.
But then there is this underlying sense that nothing I have done or will do is really all that earth-shatteringly important, and I say this in the most self-loving of ways. Even though I have several negative and unmotivational alter-egos who haunt me, I usually think I'm a fairly likable and intelligent person with a somewhat interesting past and present life, and a moderate amount of wisdom that might conceivably be used to help others, make them laugh, or teach them something if I happened to translate it into a book or an art workshop or whatever. But there is nothing I could offer that is so unique that absolutely no one else could offer a reasonable facsimile. Plus, I still struggle to know whether I am using whatever talents I have for God's glory or my own 15 minutes of fame. I don't know how to tell.
Recently I have been considering giving up (for an indeterminate time) my grand plans and the work I do which is geared somewhat toward fulfilling them. I want to do this because:
1) A lot of the stress in my life comes from trying to juggle the daily tasks of wife and motherhood with "the other stuff"...my focus is divided and I can't give either one my full attention. But the artwork doesn't care one way or another if I neglect it, and it will always be there. The people in my life do suffer when I feel resentful because I am being disturbed in the middle of something. Because I become more or less unpleasant, depending on how resentful I feel. This is not to say that I will never write or paint or whatever, but for now I want to let go of the struggle I have trying to carve out the time for it.
This leads into the next reason:
2) My spiritual life has been in the proverbial toilet for a long, long time, and I know my more annoying alter-egos thrive on that fact. I realize we can't really know what God wants us to do with our lives in detail - we know that whatever is lawful is fine to pursue. But this past week SelfImprovementista has been reading First Things First, and a kinda cliche phrase stood out to her - The Good Can be the Enemy Of the Best. All the creative stuff a few of my other alter-egos like to do are good things, but I know I will never get anywhere with them while I put more focus on them than the eternal things. I could create the most beautiful and emotionally resonant art journals in the world, but when my flesh has gone to The Body Farm, they might, at best, be somewhat interesting to my grandchildren. But apart from that, they will pass into obscurity, which is as it should be.
I am not planning on "fasting" from my creative pursuits for spiritual reasons per se, like a personal Autumn Lent. But I feel burdended so much of the time trying to get so many things done, and the burden does not feel light at all. Even though I am not a Career Woman, I am striving to "fit it all in". Even when I succeed in doing that, you know what your clothes look like when you unpack, if you just shoved everything, way too much of it, into the suitcase. I want to free up some space in the suitcase of my life, and see if God will work in an obvious way to fill it. I am sure he won't charge 50 bucks a bag like the airlines do, no matter how much it ends up weighing.
He might give me a nice stretch of time and a burst of clarity and talent to paint a huge canvas next week. I have no idea. But I don't want to be trying to scratch out that time with my ineffective little chicken claws, squinting down at the earth and trying to decide whether the corn or the grubs would be more tasty.
I'm not sure of the "official" meaning of Revelation 2:17, "I will also give that person a white stone with a new name written on it, known only to the one who receives it." But I know that in other contexts God gives people new names when He lets them in on at least a bit of the future He has planned for them. Jacob literally wrestled with God before he got his new name, but I am too tired for wrestling. I have named every one of my alter-egos so far, but I still don't know the Real Name of my primary self. I do know that whatever her name turns out to be, what she ultimately wants is to hear the words, "Well done, good and faithful servant".
Since I don't know if or where any of my talents or plans fit into the pursuit of that goal, I am just going to loosen my grip on all of them, and see what happens. Believe it or not, relinquishment is the only thing I haven't tried in my personal quest, despite knowing that in God's kingdom, the maxim to follow for discovering ourselves is Finders Weepers, Losers Keepers.
Tended towards split personality.
Alter-egos she juggled, and constantly struggled
To maintain just a base functionality.
Like some people are blown around with every wind of doctrine, I am sorry to admit that I am blown around on every gust of emotion - mine and others'. I am way too affected not only by my own emotional swings, but I am hyper-sensitive to the moods of everyone else in the house.
When someone in my charge is less than satisfied with life, my alter-ego, LoserLady, dons her cape. LoserLady's Unsuperpower is feeling like a total failure whenever anything remotely within her sphere of influence is imperfect. This may seem like low self-esteem, but it really isn't. When she is not dealing with other people in one of her life roles, she morphs into another personality, maybe one with a real Superpower. And it isn't humility, either, because humble people, it is said, don't think less of themselves, but rather think of themselves less.
When LoserLady is on patrol, everything is about her.
As her therapist, I am aware that in some ways this Unsuperpower developed because she was reared on a far distant planet, fed a diet of Abandonment Soup, Insecurity Crackers and Fear Pudding. She eats better now, but has many lingering problems from this malnourishment...
Okay, I HATE allegory and it is proof that rapidwriting taps into oft unused brain cells if I drifted into it. But the point is that I am tired of LoserLady and want the equivalent of a Buffy Vamp Stake to do her in...I just don't know what weapon would work. LoserLady's arch nemesis (who seems healthier but really isn't) is Self-Improvementista, and she is always trying to slay LoserLady by choking her with wadded up plans and schedules shoved down her throat, or hitting her on the head with big, heavy books on how to better yourself. So far, this has failed and LoserLady lives on.
Recently I have been experiencing a queer lack of drive and/or ambition I thought was a manifestation of LoserLady (or maybe her frienemy DiscouragementDiva) but now I am not sure, after I read this in a blog post (by a man who happens to have Stage IV cancer) today:
"Most of us are mediocre, make unique contributions only in the peculiar ways we screw things up, and could easily be replaced as husband, father or employee, by somebody better suited to the task...As I look round the church, it strikes me that this zen-like condition of a lack of ambition is much to be desired because far too many Christians have senses of destiny which verge on the messianic. The confidence that the Lord has a special plan and purpose just for them shapes the way they act and move. Now, just for the record, I am a good Calvinist, and I certainly believe each individual has a destiny; what concerns me is the way in which our tendency to think of ourselves as special and unique (which we all are in some ways – D.N.A. etc.) bleeds over into a sense of special destiny whereby the future, or at least the future of myself, comes to be the priority and to trump all else."
Despite being quite lazy in lots of ways, I have always been a sporadically productive person of an artistic and somewhat visionary bent, and I do like to help and encourage people in that area, as you probably know. I have all kinds of plans and ideas for things I would like to do or study or accomplish at some point in my life, but lately I have been wondering what the point of any of that is. At times, those thoughts come when LoserLady is visiting, or I assume it's just creative block or whatever, and that it will pass. There is also the fact that basic day-to-day tasks keep me busy and make me tired and so television sounds much more appealing than dragging out and cleaning up paint.
But then there is this underlying sense that nothing I have done or will do is really all that earth-shatteringly important, and I say this in the most self-loving of ways. Even though I have several negative and unmotivational alter-egos who haunt me, I usually think I'm a fairly likable and intelligent person with a somewhat interesting past and present life, and a moderate amount of wisdom that might conceivably be used to help others, make them laugh, or teach them something if I happened to translate it into a book or an art workshop or whatever. But there is nothing I could offer that is so unique that absolutely no one else could offer a reasonable facsimile. Plus, I still struggle to know whether I am using whatever talents I have for God's glory or my own 15 minutes of fame. I don't know how to tell.
Recently I have been considering giving up (for an indeterminate time) my grand plans and the work I do which is geared somewhat toward fulfilling them. I want to do this because:
1) A lot of the stress in my life comes from trying to juggle the daily tasks of wife and motherhood with "the other stuff"...my focus is divided and I can't give either one my full attention. But the artwork doesn't care one way or another if I neglect it, and it will always be there. The people in my life do suffer when I feel resentful because I am being disturbed in the middle of something. Because I become more or less unpleasant, depending on how resentful I feel. This is not to say that I will never write or paint or whatever, but for now I want to let go of the struggle I have trying to carve out the time for it.
This leads into the next reason:
2) My spiritual life has been in the proverbial toilet for a long, long time, and I know my more annoying alter-egos thrive on that fact. I realize we can't really know what God wants us to do with our lives in detail - we know that whatever is lawful is fine to pursue. But this past week SelfImprovementista has been reading First Things First, and a kinda cliche phrase stood out to her - The Good Can be the Enemy Of the Best. All the creative stuff a few of my other alter-egos like to do are good things, but I know I will never get anywhere with them while I put more focus on them than the eternal things. I could create the most beautiful and emotionally resonant art journals in the world, but when my flesh has gone to The Body Farm, they might, at best, be somewhat interesting to my grandchildren. But apart from that, they will pass into obscurity, which is as it should be.
I am not planning on "fasting" from my creative pursuits for spiritual reasons per se, like a personal Autumn Lent. But I feel burdended so much of the time trying to get so many things done, and the burden does not feel light at all. Even though I am not a Career Woman, I am striving to "fit it all in". Even when I succeed in doing that, you know what your clothes look like when you unpack, if you just shoved everything, way too much of it, into the suitcase. I want to free up some space in the suitcase of my life, and see if God will work in an obvious way to fill it. I am sure he won't charge 50 bucks a bag like the airlines do, no matter how much it ends up weighing.
He might give me a nice stretch of time and a burst of clarity and talent to paint a huge canvas next week. I have no idea. But I don't want to be trying to scratch out that time with my ineffective little chicken claws, squinting down at the earth and trying to decide whether the corn or the grubs would be more tasty.
I'm not sure of the "official" meaning of Revelation 2:17, "I will also give that person a white stone with a new name written on it, known only to the one who receives it." But I know that in other contexts God gives people new names when He lets them in on at least a bit of the future He has planned for them. Jacob literally wrestled with God before he got his new name, but I am too tired for wrestling. I have named every one of my alter-egos so far, but I still don't know the Real Name of my primary self. I do know that whatever her name turns out to be, what she ultimately wants is to hear the words, "Well done, good and faithful servant".
Since I don't know if or where any of my talents or plans fit into the pursuit of that goal, I am just going to loosen my grip on all of them, and see what happens. Believe it or not, relinquishment is the only thing I haven't tried in my personal quest, despite knowing that in God's kingdom, the maxim to follow for discovering ourselves is Finders Weepers, Losers Keepers.
Tuesday, November 8, 2011
Non-Psychological Rapidwrite, Part 2 - A Project I Would Like to Undertake
I have done a lot of different types of art and craft over the years. Some things I just dabbled in for a while, and either decided I didn't love it...or maybe I did love it, but relegated it to some future decade (God Willing) - because there are, after all, only twenty-four hours in a day. I use the internet as much as the next gal, but I still love most the things that are made with the hands, and ideas contained on real paper...I used to be really into "promoting" those things online (with blogging, an online storefront, etc), but I grew weary. Maintaining stuff like that is a lot of work and takes more time and energy than I have. But I think I am going to make a video, or a few short videos, showing the different non-virtual, tactile things I have done over the past two decades...It has taken two decades to create it all because there is so much else in life that kinda needs to be done.
But I do want to show people who might want to be more creative - but are too intimidated or feel too busy or whatever - that even with all the other things we have to do, if we do a little bit of It (whatever It is) over a long period of time, we will eventually have a lot to show for it. I seem to go through phases of art-making and writing, and then find myself backing off from it for a while...even with lotsa breaks, I have spent a little or a lot of time time doing these things: embroidery. crazy quilting. dollmaking. card and envelope making. drawing comics, bookbinding. scribing the Bible. writing letters and journals by hand. and using desktop publishing, art journaling, publishing zines under three mastheads...in addition to spending lots of time sitting on my rear watching television, reading gruesome crime novels (with some good non-fiction stuff and literature occasionally thrown in), exercising, being depressed and/or discouraged, praying less than I should, procrastinating about cleaning, cooking and other housekeeping chores, while ironically and simultaneously spending YEARS trying to make a pizza that I was totally happy with.
One thing I have never done is photography (apart from many badly composed digital camera shots, too many to ever sort through before I am in my dotage) or movie making. I got a book at the library called Shoot Video That Doesn't Suck, plus I have a daughter who likes to make and edit movies. But it is still waaaaaaay out of my comfort zone to try to create an interesting piece of film, and also to be in front of a camera, especially TALKING, for any length of time. So, I don't know when this will happen, or even if it will...but I am going to read the book and also gather together my stuff for this possible online Show and Tell.
But I do want to show people who might want to be more creative - but are too intimidated or feel too busy or whatever - that even with all the other things we have to do, if we do a little bit of It (whatever It is) over a long period of time, we will eventually have a lot to show for it. I seem to go through phases of art-making and writing, and then find myself backing off from it for a while...even with lotsa breaks, I have spent a little or a lot of time time doing these things: embroidery. crazy quilting. dollmaking. card and envelope making. drawing comics, bookbinding. scribing the Bible. writing letters and journals by hand. and using desktop publishing, art journaling, publishing zines under three mastheads...in addition to spending lots of time sitting on my rear watching television, reading gruesome crime novels (with some good non-fiction stuff and literature occasionally thrown in), exercising, being depressed and/or discouraged, praying less than I should, procrastinating about cleaning, cooking and other housekeeping chores, while ironically and simultaneously spending YEARS trying to make a pizza that I was totally happy with.
One thing I have never done is photography (apart from many badly composed digital camera shots, too many to ever sort through before I am in my dotage) or movie making. I got a book at the library called Shoot Video That Doesn't Suck, plus I have a daughter who likes to make and edit movies. But it is still waaaaaaay out of my comfort zone to try to create an interesting piece of film, and also to be in front of a camera, especially TALKING, for any length of time. So, I don't know when this will happen, or even if it will...but I am going to read the book and also gather together my stuff for this possible online Show and Tell.
Monday, November 7, 2011
Totally Non-Psychological Rapidwrite Part 1...American Wasteland
I am going to write a series of non-psychological stream-of-consciousness blog entries. No naval gazing, just things that don't have much to do with my Inner Landscape - thoughts about books I am reading, projects I am doing or would like to do...more tangible things and living in the Outer World. Sometimes I've just gotta take a vacation outside my own head, although it will be obvious this comes out of my head sans any editing ;-)
In the past week I have read a few books...let's see if I can remember what they are without getting up...American Wasteland and Precious Blood, and I just started Five Views on Law and Gospel. American Wasteland is my favorite kind of non-fiction book...something about an interpersonal/social issue that may or may not be political, written in an easily readable style with appropriate humor (often sarcastic or ironic). Non-Sentimental-Pathos is also welcome. Wasting food is something I feel guilty about, but I've never really TRIED to reduce it. This book really hit home the fact that throwing away food is like throwing away money. There are so many reasons I waste food - sometimes it is laziness, other times lack of ideas how to use what I have on hand, or I don't have a real plan for managing leftovers, etc. We shop at a scratch and dent, or seconds, grocery store sometimes, but I have realized that a lot of food from there gets wasted because 1) it is more likely to actually be stale since lots of the stuff there is close to the best-by date 2) it is often an off-brand that just isn't very good and 3) we can just buy more than we can reasonably eat because the prices are good...but even if something costs only 1.00 or so per item on average, if even 10% of what I buy gets tossed out, that adds up to a lot of money over the course of a year. The author, Jonathan Bloom, also states that the less varied your diet is, the less you waste...that is kinda good news for me, because I am not a very adventurous eater, and a lot of my struggle with cooking comes from feeling like I "should" cook a huge variety of different meals and lots of components within meals. I saw when we were camping that cooking was easier when there were fewer choices to make...the night before we came home, we didn't have lots of food left, but I made a meal of oatmeal, sauteed green apples with pecans, and fried leftover baked potatoes and onions...yeah, it was high carb, but it was not horrible nutritionally and it all tasted good together, and there was no hand-wringing involved, with me bemoaning my not-well-planned-and-balanced meal. The majority of this book is about food waste throughout the entire food cycle, from farm to store to restaurant or home, and the focus is not clever tips to cut food waste at home. It was a sobering look at how our prosperity has made us immune to the real value of food, and how our Martha Stewart ideas of beauty in the kitchen lead us to reject imperfect produce or crushed boxes, and how our paranoia about safety keeps supermarkets and restaurants from donating tons and tons of perfectly good food to food banks, charities, etc. We just don't know how good we have it...one of the people interviewed for the book thought that in a way, living through a real financial depression would be good for us, because it would shock us out of our mentality that just about everything is easily disposable because there will always be more where that came from.
In the past week I have read a few books...let's see if I can remember what they are without getting up...American Wasteland and Precious Blood, and I just started Five Views on Law and Gospel. American Wasteland is my favorite kind of non-fiction book...something about an interpersonal/social issue that may or may not be political, written in an easily readable style with appropriate humor (often sarcastic or ironic). Non-Sentimental-Pathos is also welcome. Wasting food is something I feel guilty about, but I've never really TRIED to reduce it. This book really hit home the fact that throwing away food is like throwing away money. There are so many reasons I waste food - sometimes it is laziness, other times lack of ideas how to use what I have on hand, or I don't have a real plan for managing leftovers, etc. We shop at a scratch and dent, or seconds, grocery store sometimes, but I have realized that a lot of food from there gets wasted because 1) it is more likely to actually be stale since lots of the stuff there is close to the best-by date 2) it is often an off-brand that just isn't very good and 3) we can just buy more than we can reasonably eat because the prices are good...but even if something costs only 1.00 or so per item on average, if even 10% of what I buy gets tossed out, that adds up to a lot of money over the course of a year. The author, Jonathan Bloom, also states that the less varied your diet is, the less you waste...that is kinda good news for me, because I am not a very adventurous eater, and a lot of my struggle with cooking comes from feeling like I "should" cook a huge variety of different meals and lots of components within meals. I saw when we were camping that cooking was easier when there were fewer choices to make...the night before we came home, we didn't have lots of food left, but I made a meal of oatmeal, sauteed green apples with pecans, and fried leftover baked potatoes and onions...yeah, it was high carb, but it was not horrible nutritionally and it all tasted good together, and there was no hand-wringing involved, with me bemoaning my not-well-planned-and-balanced meal. The majority of this book is about food waste throughout the entire food cycle, from farm to store to restaurant or home, and the focus is not clever tips to cut food waste at home. It was a sobering look at how our prosperity has made us immune to the real value of food, and how our Martha Stewart ideas of beauty in the kitchen lead us to reject imperfect produce or crushed boxes, and how our paranoia about safety keeps supermarkets and restaurants from donating tons and tons of perfectly good food to food banks, charities, etc. We just don't know how good we have it...one of the people interviewed for the book thought that in a way, living through a real financial depression would be good for us, because it would shock us out of our mentality that just about everything is easily disposable because there will always be more where that came from.
Friday, October 21, 2011
Friday Before-Art Rapidwrite
I am planning on going into my art room to work on some cereal-box journal pages after Grown Moppet finishes watching Supernatural. Since I always struggle whether I "should" be doing written or art journaling (tending to negelct one or the other at any given time) I figured I could write here for 30 minutes then move into the studio to do something a little more hands-on. Moppet 5 is asleep, which is good when I look at it from the vantage point of Right Now...it will not feel so good tomorrow, when she wakes up earlier than I want to get out of bed! Ooops, plans have changed. Husband just informed me that he and all 3 middle Moppets are sleeping out in the tent tonight. That means I will not want to be in my art room, because it is so far away from the bedroom where Moppet 5 is sleeping - she doesn't have a very loud voice and I don't have a baby monitor, so I want to make sure I hear her.
I don't feel like dealing with the mess of paints, anyway. I will either sit here at the computer and write or otherwise occupy myself, or sit in the living room and read or actually handwrite in a journal. I have not been dealing with things honestly in my journaling recently - of course, I haven't been journaling much at all due to being on Baby Time...but when when I do I am not getting at the Meat of Things...definitely due to fear and resistance. There is also the fact that I rarely remember to briefly jot down thoughts that are good writing fodder, so when I sit down to write I can choose something and just go with it. I have a lot of these thoughts at night while I lie in bed, since it usually takes me quite a while to fall asleep.
I have a desire in my journaling to be kinda raw and totally honest and emotional...the only two art journalers I can think of (whose work is well-known) who seem to get into really primal stuff about themselves and their lives are first, Juliana Coles and to a lesser extent, Traci Bunkers. Juliana Coles actually has this process she teaches called Extreme Visual Journaling, which deals exclusively with reaching into the depths of yourself. She uses mixed-media journaling with cool psychological techniques like non-dominant handwriting, letter-writing to the self, or to other people living or dead or perhaps only known to you through books they write, etc. I love reading about her process, and would love to create a similar-but-different kind of process one day. But the truth is that I am totally scared of the depths of myself. Not theologically, although I am scared of the depths of myself in that way, too. I mean I Just Don't Want To Deal With It. But journaling doesn't hold long-term interest for me if I stay on a shallower plane.
I want to write about all the weird experiences I have had and how they have shaped me. I want to write about all the things that have happened to me that are just like what happens to everyone. I want to simultaneously individuate myself and drown in the Teeming Sea of Humanity.
I was just looking at this blog by a woman whose idol is Tasha Tudor, and there were all these poems about nature and quotes from Charlotte Mason, and talk of gardens and canning and the joys of home arts. That is the kind of site I visited a lot from about 2001-2006, and now I can hardly stand to be a click away from one. This is one of the subjects I could really delve into, and I have written a long zine article on the subject - and I was somewhat honest and revealing about the subject in that article. But there was still a bit of the Psychiatrist/Patient dynamic that comes out in a lot of my personal writing...I sound like I am a caring psychiatrist telling an interesting, but somewhat emotionally detached story about a patient. Or a client. Whatever you call people who pay you to listen to them.
But I still skirted over how I truly think and feel about the years I spent in the Biblical Womanhood camp. The thoughts and feelings are multilayered and mostly uncomfortable. They go into deep issues of family and relationships and sex and how I relate to God and right down into the ultimate scary questions...What is my purpose here on Earth, what can I expect from life, how can I survive the raw joy and pain of living and dying? When I peel into the onion of my life, every single thing I could possibly write about will eventually ask those same questions, and they are not rhetorical.
I am drinking decaf now, strong decaf, but decaf nevertheless. Still, it is only 10:15 and I wanted to do something creative until about midnight. I am starting to feel resistance, just talking about possibly writing something real.
I don't feel like dealing with the mess of paints, anyway. I will either sit here at the computer and write or otherwise occupy myself, or sit in the living room and read or actually handwrite in a journal. I have not been dealing with things honestly in my journaling recently - of course, I haven't been journaling much at all due to being on Baby Time...but when when I do I am not getting at the Meat of Things...definitely due to fear and resistance. There is also the fact that I rarely remember to briefly jot down thoughts that are good writing fodder, so when I sit down to write I can choose something and just go with it. I have a lot of these thoughts at night while I lie in bed, since it usually takes me quite a while to fall asleep.
I have a desire in my journaling to be kinda raw and totally honest and emotional...the only two art journalers I can think of (whose work is well-known) who seem to get into really primal stuff about themselves and their lives are first, Juliana Coles and to a lesser extent, Traci Bunkers. Juliana Coles actually has this process she teaches called Extreme Visual Journaling, which deals exclusively with reaching into the depths of yourself. She uses mixed-media journaling with cool psychological techniques like non-dominant handwriting, letter-writing to the self, or to other people living or dead or perhaps only known to you through books they write, etc. I love reading about her process, and would love to create a similar-but-different kind of process one day. But the truth is that I am totally scared of the depths of myself. Not theologically, although I am scared of the depths of myself in that way, too. I mean I Just Don't Want To Deal With It. But journaling doesn't hold long-term interest for me if I stay on a shallower plane.
I want to write about all the weird experiences I have had and how they have shaped me. I want to write about all the things that have happened to me that are just like what happens to everyone. I want to simultaneously individuate myself and drown in the Teeming Sea of Humanity.
I was just looking at this blog by a woman whose idol is Tasha Tudor, and there were all these poems about nature and quotes from Charlotte Mason, and talk of gardens and canning and the joys of home arts. That is the kind of site I visited a lot from about 2001-2006, and now I can hardly stand to be a click away from one. This is one of the subjects I could really delve into, and I have written a long zine article on the subject - and I was somewhat honest and revealing about the subject in that article. But there was still a bit of the Psychiatrist/Patient dynamic that comes out in a lot of my personal writing...I sound like I am a caring psychiatrist telling an interesting, but somewhat emotionally detached story about a patient. Or a client. Whatever you call people who pay you to listen to them.
But I still skirted over how I truly think and feel about the years I spent in the Biblical Womanhood camp. The thoughts and feelings are multilayered and mostly uncomfortable. They go into deep issues of family and relationships and sex and how I relate to God and right down into the ultimate scary questions...What is my purpose here on Earth, what can I expect from life, how can I survive the raw joy and pain of living and dying? When I peel into the onion of my life, every single thing I could possibly write about will eventually ask those same questions, and they are not rhetorical.
I am drinking decaf now, strong decaf, but decaf nevertheless. Still, it is only 10:15 and I wanted to do something creative until about midnight. I am starting to feel resistance, just talking about possibly writing something real.
Monday, October 3, 2011
Thoughts Spawned Mostly by Mary Pipher's Autobiography and the Season Premiere of Dexter
October 3, 2011 5:37pm
I have been reading Mary Pipher's autobiography, and like hearing about most lives, it makes me feel both hopeful and despairing. I see that other people have similar problems to mine, but somehow they have managed to do something (like write a book) with them. Then I look around and wonder when I will ever have time to write uninterrupted, or if I could even sit long enough to write anything more than the swirling thoughts in my head. She is a Buddhist and the subtitle of the book is Chronicles of the Worst Buddhist in the World. I relate to her in her racing mind, her desire to be all things to all people, her need for solitude. I envy her the interesting years she spent as a radical in the Bay Area. I want to look at my own life in this place - where it is horrible hot half the year, which seems to put me in a horrible mood for that long - as a life that is interesting in itself, not just one that might be interesting if I could spend more time writing or creating.
There is a lot of focus in Buddhism about being present in the moment, and sometimes I think that my introspectiveness and my desire to chronicle what I am thinking or feeling detracts from that...because I always am focusing on my own mind - the interior landscape - which is occasionally scenic but can also be a lot like driving through the flattest, most boring terrain you can imagine. I rarely notice what is going on around me as far as sights, sounds, etc. I am different from most people I read about in writing or journaling who are so inspired and nurtured by nature. I have pretty much zero desire to be in nature. The only nature I crave is fresh air, but I like it to come inside through open windows. I have always said that sitting in front of a large window with a nice view and a computer is my idea of communing with nature. But even in the house, I rarely HEAR things like the fan buzzing, or the computer keys tapping. I don't LOOK at my coffee cup that is green with stylized yellow flowers and orange skeleton leaves, and contains about 1/4 cup of cold coffee. I don't HEAR the rustling of the fairy play tent that I bought for 5.00 at a yard sale. And especially, I have difficulty living peacefully with other people "in the moment".
It is so difficult to have 6 people who need me, almost constantly...of course, it's good to be needed....but there being so many needs that are expected to be met by me is not conducive to "being here now"...because there is so much going on in the now I get overstimulated and can't take it all in. Those so-called golden moments of childhood are rare (except with the tiniest of babies)...then I feel guilty that I am not more adept at creating an atmosphere conducive to Ms Pipher's definition of "moments". She writes in the book about the difference between minutes and moments...minutes are the kind of linear time in which we live most of our lives, and moments are those few drops of timelessness, or sacred time, that come far less frequently. The "peak experiences", which can actually be sorrowful or joyful, but which are somehow transcendent and seem to get at the real meat of what living is, or can be if you are present.
What I AM present to, all too often, is the almost constant discomfort in my body..in my left hip, lower back and leg. I know that a lot of that discomfort is caused by stress, and my unwillingness to do restorative things for my body. I get very nervous inside when I think about taking a month or even a week off weightlifting to focus on "only" stretching" or using a foam roller, or doing yoga. I don't want to be a person who is always fighting aging, while at the same time I do want to be a person who ages in the best way possible, doing whatever I can to facilitate that. I know that fitness is comprised of strength, endurance and flexibility, but I neglect the flexibility and endurance for the strength training, mostly because of the aesthetic benefits of weights. Then I see something on television, or read something in a book that reminds me that someday I might need real strength, for something really happening in my lives. It might be some kind of crisis or dangerous situation where I need to climb fences or pull myself up through a window - something that requires real strength, not just "muscles".
9:17pm
Baby is asleep, Husband is reading Zane Grey while Youngest Son lays in bed with him...both middle kids are listening to headphones - Wizard Rock for Eldest Son and Stuart Little for Middle Daughter. I have the new episode of House to watch but am not really chomping at the bit to get to it.
A few times recently I have heard ideas like, "You can't really begin to change until you accept yourself as you are now", and I tend to agree with that. It's something I first heard in the Happy Eaters world, regarding weight loss, dieting etc. I am an inveterate self-improver, and I guess Ms. Pipher is, too., but it is a totally different mindset to want to change because said change would make your life better in some way, or help others, or whatever - as opposed to the belief that you are such a failure as you are that you need to change to even be acceptable. One viewpoint is hopeful about yourself and the future, while the other has a desperation behind it. Ms Pipher says something to this effect in her book, which has a real focus on self-acceptance and compassion for yourself. What is so interesting is that she says it was when she realized her own innate goodness that she was finally able to accept her shortcomings, whereas I believe I am becoming more accepting of my failures as I internalize the deep theological fact that I am a total screw-up by nature, and that even though I am safe before God through Christ, a life with lots of discouragement, frustration, stress, etc. is to be expected in this fallen world. So, we come to the same conclusion (about needing to have compassion on oneself as well as on others), but have different reasons for believing that. She has struggled a lot with guilt, like I have, and her childhood was (of course) different than mine, but definitely odd and unpleasant in a lot of ways. She learned to repress the loneliness and pain that came from having parents who were not very available and/or were emotionally volatile. She came to feel that if she could be strong and competent and care for others' needs, she would be loved, but in doing that she opened herself up to burnout. That is very similar to how I feel. I have also found that my willingness or perhaps even capability to really experience deep emotions is stunted. I know I don't really "feel" the amount or depth of love or compassion for people that I actually possess, and let's not even talk about other, more naturally painful emotions. They are all there, but behind something like that glass in limos and police cars that block sounds between the front and back seats...I m the driver and so I know the little buggers are there, and sometimes they want my attention, but I can't hear them so they are easy to ignore.
11:05 pm
Half the family is sleeping outside in the tent. I watched House, was not impressed. I have really come to appreciate the weird quirkiness of science fiction, fantasy and other shows that have alternate universes (even if they are only psychological constructs like on Six Feet Under) and your garden-variety drama set in our universe is less interesting than it used to be. The season premiere of Dexter was moderately interesting, but it looks like it will have a religious backstory, and once again I was annoyed than you just can't seem to get a proper presentation of the Christian faith on television - and I am not saying you need a proselytizing message, or even a program that "respects" the faith...but really, you have to be somewhat bright to write a television show, and when there are Christian overtones, why can't the writers at least do their homework and get the story right? It's just as easy to be against the ACTUAL gospel as some stupid wrong depiction of it, if that's what you want to do. One of the most common "mistakes" is calling the book of Revelation, Revelations - which is just a stupid error no one should make even if they don't take the faith seriously. In this episode, Dexter asks his friend Angel to explain his faith, and he was able to begin with something true, like "It's all about His sacrifice for us" (good start) but then there was no more content and it all degenerated into "it's just something you feel, you can't explain it", which, of course, makes the Christian character look like an idiot. There have been a lot of shows I have seen that have episodes wherein the characters deal with spiritual issues, but it is always a bunch of what Francis Schaeffer called "God-Words"...the use of the word God and other words about the eternal things, which actually have no content behind them, but which are still supposed to give solace and comfort and warm fuzzies about "spirituality". They require the "leap of faith", which is a concept totally foreign to the Scriptures, which tell us to always be ready to give a reason for the hope which is in us, and that the reason is rooted in the eyewitness accounts of the historical works of God in Christ. But then, even despite all these dumb misrepresentations of the faith, some non-Christian writers get the Christian message right and present it allegorically, although they would say they don't respect Christianity - like in Buffy, we learn that love has the effect of disarming hatred, and that salvation from evil requires a sacrifice.
Bedtime.
I have been reading Mary Pipher's autobiography, and like hearing about most lives, it makes me feel both hopeful and despairing. I see that other people have similar problems to mine, but somehow they have managed to do something (like write a book) with them. Then I look around and wonder when I will ever have time to write uninterrupted, or if I could even sit long enough to write anything more than the swirling thoughts in my head. She is a Buddhist and the subtitle of the book is Chronicles of the Worst Buddhist in the World. I relate to her in her racing mind, her desire to be all things to all people, her need for solitude. I envy her the interesting years she spent as a radical in the Bay Area. I want to look at my own life in this place - where it is horrible hot half the year, which seems to put me in a horrible mood for that long - as a life that is interesting in itself, not just one that might be interesting if I could spend more time writing or creating.
There is a lot of focus in Buddhism about being present in the moment, and sometimes I think that my introspectiveness and my desire to chronicle what I am thinking or feeling detracts from that...because I always am focusing on my own mind - the interior landscape - which is occasionally scenic but can also be a lot like driving through the flattest, most boring terrain you can imagine. I rarely notice what is going on around me as far as sights, sounds, etc. I am different from most people I read about in writing or journaling who are so inspired and nurtured by nature. I have pretty much zero desire to be in nature. The only nature I crave is fresh air, but I like it to come inside through open windows. I have always said that sitting in front of a large window with a nice view and a computer is my idea of communing with nature. But even in the house, I rarely HEAR things like the fan buzzing, or the computer keys tapping. I don't LOOK at my coffee cup that is green with stylized yellow flowers and orange skeleton leaves, and contains about 1/4 cup of cold coffee. I don't HEAR the rustling of the fairy play tent that I bought for 5.00 at a yard sale. And especially, I have difficulty living peacefully with other people "in the moment".
It is so difficult to have 6 people who need me, almost constantly...of course, it's good to be needed....but there being so many needs that are expected to be met by me is not conducive to "being here now"...because there is so much going on in the now I get overstimulated and can't take it all in. Those so-called golden moments of childhood are rare (except with the tiniest of babies)...then I feel guilty that I am not more adept at creating an atmosphere conducive to Ms Pipher's definition of "moments". She writes in the book about the difference between minutes and moments...minutes are the kind of linear time in which we live most of our lives, and moments are those few drops of timelessness, or sacred time, that come far less frequently. The "peak experiences", which can actually be sorrowful or joyful, but which are somehow transcendent and seem to get at the real meat of what living is, or can be if you are present.
What I AM present to, all too often, is the almost constant discomfort in my body..in my left hip, lower back and leg. I know that a lot of that discomfort is caused by stress, and my unwillingness to do restorative things for my body. I get very nervous inside when I think about taking a month or even a week off weightlifting to focus on "only" stretching" or using a foam roller, or doing yoga. I don't want to be a person who is always fighting aging, while at the same time I do want to be a person who ages in the best way possible, doing whatever I can to facilitate that. I know that fitness is comprised of strength, endurance and flexibility, but I neglect the flexibility and endurance for the strength training, mostly because of the aesthetic benefits of weights. Then I see something on television, or read something in a book that reminds me that someday I might need real strength, for something really happening in my lives. It might be some kind of crisis or dangerous situation where I need to climb fences or pull myself up through a window - something that requires real strength, not just "muscles".
9:17pm
Baby is asleep, Husband is reading Zane Grey while Youngest Son lays in bed with him...both middle kids are listening to headphones - Wizard Rock for Eldest Son and Stuart Little for Middle Daughter. I have the new episode of House to watch but am not really chomping at the bit to get to it.
A few times recently I have heard ideas like, "You can't really begin to change until you accept yourself as you are now", and I tend to agree with that. It's something I first heard in the Happy Eaters world, regarding weight loss, dieting etc. I am an inveterate self-improver, and I guess Ms. Pipher is, too., but it is a totally different mindset to want to change because said change would make your life better in some way, or help others, or whatever - as opposed to the belief that you are such a failure as you are that you need to change to even be acceptable. One viewpoint is hopeful about yourself and the future, while the other has a desperation behind it. Ms Pipher says something to this effect in her book, which has a real focus on self-acceptance and compassion for yourself. What is so interesting is that she says it was when she realized her own innate goodness that she was finally able to accept her shortcomings, whereas I believe I am becoming more accepting of my failures as I internalize the deep theological fact that I am a total screw-up by nature, and that even though I am safe before God through Christ, a life with lots of discouragement, frustration, stress, etc. is to be expected in this fallen world. So, we come to the same conclusion (about needing to have compassion on oneself as well as on others), but have different reasons for believing that. She has struggled a lot with guilt, like I have, and her childhood was (of course) different than mine, but definitely odd and unpleasant in a lot of ways. She learned to repress the loneliness and pain that came from having parents who were not very available and/or were emotionally volatile. She came to feel that if she could be strong and competent and care for others' needs, she would be loved, but in doing that she opened herself up to burnout. That is very similar to how I feel. I have also found that my willingness or perhaps even capability to really experience deep emotions is stunted. I know I don't really "feel" the amount or depth of love or compassion for people that I actually possess, and let's not even talk about other, more naturally painful emotions. They are all there, but behind something like that glass in limos and police cars that block sounds between the front and back seats...I m the driver and so I know the little buggers are there, and sometimes they want my attention, but I can't hear them so they are easy to ignore.
11:05 pm
Half the family is sleeping outside in the tent. I watched House, was not impressed. I have really come to appreciate the weird quirkiness of science fiction, fantasy and other shows that have alternate universes (even if they are only psychological constructs like on Six Feet Under) and your garden-variety drama set in our universe is less interesting than it used to be. The season premiere of Dexter was moderately interesting, but it looks like it will have a religious backstory, and once again I was annoyed than you just can't seem to get a proper presentation of the Christian faith on television - and I am not saying you need a proselytizing message, or even a program that "respects" the faith...but really, you have to be somewhat bright to write a television show, and when there are Christian overtones, why can't the writers at least do their homework and get the story right? It's just as easy to be against the ACTUAL gospel as some stupid wrong depiction of it, if that's what you want to do. One of the most common "mistakes" is calling the book of Revelation, Revelations - which is just a stupid error no one should make even if they don't take the faith seriously. In this episode, Dexter asks his friend Angel to explain his faith, and he was able to begin with something true, like "It's all about His sacrifice for us" (good start) but then there was no more content and it all degenerated into "it's just something you feel, you can't explain it", which, of course, makes the Christian character look like an idiot. There have been a lot of shows I have seen that have episodes wherein the characters deal with spiritual issues, but it is always a bunch of what Francis Schaeffer called "God-Words"...the use of the word God and other words about the eternal things, which actually have no content behind them, but which are still supposed to give solace and comfort and warm fuzzies about "spirituality". They require the "leap of faith", which is a concept totally foreign to the Scriptures, which tell us to always be ready to give a reason for the hope which is in us, and that the reason is rooted in the eyewitness accounts of the historical works of God in Christ. But then, even despite all these dumb misrepresentations of the faith, some non-Christian writers get the Christian message right and present it allegorically, although they would say they don't respect Christianity - like in Buffy, we learn that love has the effect of disarming hatred, and that salvation from evil requires a sacrifice.
Bedtime.
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