This is my weekly Saturday post for www.whateverhesays.blogspot.com. Again, I searched my heart and mind for a way to articulate some of what is going on in my life, in a way that can touch others. In the process, again, I have learned more for myself.
His Eye is on My Sparrows
A blue jay alighted on the railing as my friend and I conversed on the deck. No sooner there and it was gone. But in that instant I saw its lovely form, bigger than I imagined, of course, because I hadn't seen a blue jay up close before. I muse upon that this morning as I think about my "sparrows" about to fly from the nest very soon. The younger one graduated last night, with honours, from secondary school. A long journey ended, a long period in the nest over. She will literally fly away in two weeks to Bible school in a far country for five months. The older one flew away two years ago,for a year to Bible School and travel in six countries, in Europe and Uganda, her childhood home, and then came back to the nest again for a year. Now she will fly again soon, to study on the other side of our country. Already she has become an award winning writer and a travelling photographer. Her photos of African women hang in a gallery exhibit in our small town.
I rejoice that my sparrows know how to fly, in more ways than one. I have tried to provide for their needs in the nest, and help them find their wings. They said I had given them those in their Mothers' Day card. So I guess that job was well enough done. They, my vulnerable ones, have been my very intensive responsibility for more than eighteen years. Now they, beautiful birds, bright blue jays, but vulnerable sparrows, need to fly from this nest. The time has come.
I also am learning to fly again. Not so much literally, but at least figuratively. I need to push myself out of the nest of familiar ways and launch my business in life coaching. It will be easier to do that with my young sparrows out flying on their own. But it won't be easy for any of us. We will always be thinking of each other, wondering how the flying is going, wanting to preen each others' feathers, for my sparrows are good "mothers" to me too. They have taught me a lot about learning to fly, and helped me find my own wings again.
But my greatest, my only true comfort, is that Jesus is watching us, and, if that is so, I should not worry. How hard it is for me to rest even more in Him as I place my sparrows more consciously in His hands. I remember the old song, and play it for you here, with sweet images that remind us of this abiding truth, even as the way it is sung can slow us down to listen.
June 26, 2009
June 19, 2009
joy in a new perspective
I'm at the library, furiously getting this up for tomorrow for my spot on www.whateverhesays.blogspot.com, because our internet is down at home. Thank God for public computers. I am glad I am lightening up a little, so here is my set of words on a sunny day...
Seeing Things as We are
No it's not a typo. I really did intend to write, "Seeing things as WE are". I got that from this quote from The Talmud: "We don't see things as they are; we see things as we are." Well, so what, you say! Another clever quote. What does it have to do with you and me? Good thought. We need to examine and think about all the stuff that's thrown at us every day, in this culture. Things move so fast and we struggle to keep up. Today has been a slower day for me and I feel guilty. My inner gremlin is working on me telling me I am not doing what I should be doing today...I am wasting time and not accomplishing much. Those rule makers in my head can work overtime on a gorgeous sunny day like today. Why? Because I see things as I am - according to the voices in my head.
We talk a lot about inner gremlins in my Life Coach training program. For they are what keep the kinds of people who like to become life coaches from marketing themselves confidently, and most of all they are what keep the kind of people we expect to coach from making significant changes in their lives. They are what keep us all from moving ahead. And of course one of the reasons they do is because we somehow believe that these voices are interpreting reality as it really is to us, and that they know better than other parts of us, like our hearts, or our guts, know what is going on.
I suppose one of the gremlins I deal with almost on a daily basis is that I feel so stupid about not learning about those voices a long time ago, or not paying attention to what they really were. Why did it take me so long to learn what I have been learning? And then, when I turn away from that gremlin, turn down the volume on that voice, I hear that sweet voice of the Holy Spirit reminding me that at least I am learning this now, and that God can restore the years that the locust has eaten. He can make up for the time I've lost listening to the wrong voices, for the negative influences of my family of origin, or our culture, or imprisoning mindsets that keep me blocked and locked up within the expectations of others.
If we have the mind of Christ, if we have the Holy Spirit to comfort and guide us, then we can move toward a merger of seeing things as they are, and seeing things as we are. Of course we won't get a perfect fit...not until Heaven, but if we know for sure that our perspective in this life is shaped so much by who we are and where we have come from, then we are more able to tune in humbly to hear God's voice and take on His viewpoints and to remember that with Him, "All things are possible."
Seeing Things as We are
No it's not a typo. I really did intend to write, "Seeing things as WE are". I got that from this quote from The Talmud: "We don't see things as they are; we see things as we are." Well, so what, you say! Another clever quote. What does it have to do with you and me? Good thought. We need to examine and think about all the stuff that's thrown at us every day, in this culture. Things move so fast and we struggle to keep up. Today has been a slower day for me and I feel guilty. My inner gremlin is working on me telling me I am not doing what I should be doing today...I am wasting time and not accomplishing much. Those rule makers in my head can work overtime on a gorgeous sunny day like today. Why? Because I see things as I am - according to the voices in my head.
We talk a lot about inner gremlins in my Life Coach training program. For they are what keep the kinds of people who like to become life coaches from marketing themselves confidently, and most of all they are what keep the kind of people we expect to coach from making significant changes in their lives. They are what keep us all from moving ahead. And of course one of the reasons they do is because we somehow believe that these voices are interpreting reality as it really is to us, and that they know better than other parts of us, like our hearts, or our guts, know what is going on.
I suppose one of the gremlins I deal with almost on a daily basis is that I feel so stupid about not learning about those voices a long time ago, or not paying attention to what they really were. Why did it take me so long to learn what I have been learning? And then, when I turn away from that gremlin, turn down the volume on that voice, I hear that sweet voice of the Holy Spirit reminding me that at least I am learning this now, and that God can restore the years that the locust has eaten. He can make up for the time I've lost listening to the wrong voices, for the negative influences of my family of origin, or our culture, or imprisoning mindsets that keep me blocked and locked up within the expectations of others.
If we have the mind of Christ, if we have the Holy Spirit to comfort and guide us, then we can move toward a merger of seeing things as they are, and seeing things as we are. Of course we won't get a perfect fit...not until Heaven, but if we know for sure that our perspective in this life is shaped so much by who we are and where we have come from, then we are more able to tune in humbly to hear God's voice and take on His viewpoints and to remember that with Him, "All things are possible."
June 13, 2009
joy in finding something to be sorry for
Sometimes I know days ahead what I want to write about for the Saturday post on www.whateverhesays.blogspot.com. Sometimes it just happens, ahead, or the day before. This time it happened by a conviction of the Lord into my spirit, and, like I said at the end of the post, I was glad to have something I could say sorry about, something I could write in a humble way about, that is true of me, something that does not make me sound like some sort of saint, but like an ordinary, struggling Christian who is trying to learn to grow in Christ, to grow in my humanity, to be more loving, and more aware of my own failings, and yet accept God's grace to fill me up with His love.
Flint Removal
Grumpy weeks are good ones for making me humble. For me it takes a while. First I go through the complaining stage, reciting to myself all the reasons I have for feeling the way I do. Somewhere in there God begins to challenge my heart, and I take a closer look. It's not that I don't have lots of reasons for needing God's grace to cope and hang in, to give out and to keep going. It's just that the most important thing to God, and really to others, is how I do what I do. What's the point in coping, hanging in, giving out and keeping going, if I don't do them with true grace and gentleness? That was what I always found fault with my mother about, and others who had "power" over my life. If they were harsh, and they often were, I wilted and cringed. Of course I have that capacity well built into me, despite how much I hate it. I may come across as gentle to some, and may indeed be gentle inside, but often it is harshness that lashes out, especially with those closest to me. I am grateful that today I can share challenging and helpful words from Streams in the Desert (of course) that have spoken deeply to my heart, and my need in this area:
That breaking and crushing, that wringing of heart, is really a daily thing, which the great saints knew and embraced so well. I want to be gentle. This I truly know. With all my heart. I want "thorough gentleness". So that means I must embrace all that will create that in me.
This reminds of what my daughter said when she was so mad at someone who hurt her regularly. She said she was always glad to have something to apologize for to that person. It helped her to deal with the other issues, helped her to stay humble and in a place of openness to growth. When I struggle most with attitudes in others, that is when I most need to look at myself, and learn the lessons of my own untamed heart.
The servant of the Lord must....be gentle. (2 Tim. 2:24)
Flint Removal
Grumpy weeks are good ones for making me humble. For me it takes a while. First I go through the complaining stage, reciting to myself all the reasons I have for feeling the way I do. Somewhere in there God begins to challenge my heart, and I take a closer look. It's not that I don't have lots of reasons for needing God's grace to cope and hang in, to give out and to keep going. It's just that the most important thing to God, and really to others, is how I do what I do. What's the point in coping, hanging in, giving out and keeping going, if I don't do them with true grace and gentleness? That was what I always found fault with my mother about, and others who had "power" over my life. If they were harsh, and they often were, I wilted and cringed. Of course I have that capacity well built into me, despite how much I hate it. I may come across as gentle to some, and may indeed be gentle inside, but often it is harshness that lashes out, especially with those closest to me. I am grateful that today I can share challenging and helpful words from Streams in the Desert (of course) that have spoken deeply to my heart, and my need in this area:
When God conquers us and takes all the flint out of our nature, and we get deep visions into the Spirit of Jesus, we then see as never before the great rarity of gentleness of spirit in this dark and unheavenly world.
The graces of the Spirit do not settle themselves down upon us by chance, and if we do not discern certain states of grace, and choose them, and in our thoughts nourish them, they never become fastened in our nature or behavior.
Every advance step in grace must be preceded by first apprehending it, and then a prayerful resolve to have it.
So few are willing to undergo the suffering out of which thorough gentleness comes. We must die before we are turned into gentleness, and crucifixion involves suffering; it is a real breaking and crushing of self, which wrings the heart and conquers the mind.
That breaking and crushing, that wringing of heart, is really a daily thing, which the great saints knew and embraced so well. I want to be gentle. This I truly know. With all my heart. I want "thorough gentleness". So that means I must embrace all that will create that in me.
This reminds of what my daughter said when she was so mad at someone who hurt her regularly. She said she was always glad to have something to apologize for to that person. It helped her to deal with the other issues, helped her to stay humble and in a place of openness to growth. When I struggle most with attitudes in others, that is when I most need to look at myself, and learn the lessons of my own untamed heart.
The servant of the Lord must....be gentle. (2 Tim. 2:24)
June 06, 2009
joy in linking old and new again
This is my weekly post for www.whateverhesays.blogspot.com. It was simple to write, and lighter than I have often written. It blessed me especially to be able to use the song I love so much.
Summer - Season of Questions
As I reflect upon the coming summer months, I realize that summer has always been a season of questions for me. Each year as a school girl I had the opportunity to make plans that reflected the questions I asked or was allowed to ask about my life. There was uncharted and unprogrammed time to plan. Even if it was a summer job I had to take I at least could ponder the type of job I wanted or was willing to take. There were many things that I hoped would happen that didn’t in those months, many plans I would have liked to make. The point is that I got to ask some important questions that were key to who I was or wanted to be.
I wouldn’t be sharing this now if I didn’t feel that my experience in some measure has been true for all of us, if not all the time, then at least some of it, if not in summer then at least sometime. But summer can be a metaphor for such a time because we likely don’t have to be so preoccupied with survival, at least weather wise. There is sunshine and a bit of a holiday mood, space really for moving outside of the box of our usual preoccupations and for bringing on board something new and exciting, and time for reflection. Such a season is essential in our lives, and is similar to the day of rest we try to have each week. We step outside our routines and reflect upon the deeper issues of faith, vocation, purpose, and our relationship with our creator and our saviour. We can open our hearts and minds more widely to hear His voice, and realize that the really important questions are the ones He asks us, for, whether or not we listen, they are the only real questions that a Christian has to answer.
For me, I find those questions embodied in a lovely song we often sing at our church. This song means all the more to me because I spent two very significant summers on or near the island of Iona, in Scotland, the home of the Iona community, who copyrighted the new arrangement to the song. The lilting but haunting Scottish traditional tune evokes deep memories of the questions I was asking those summers, and the choices I sought to make for my life. It was not an easy time, but I am grateful for all that I learned. My prayer for all of us this coming “summer” is that we would each be open to the essential questions God is asking us about our lives, and that we would have the courage to answer them.
Will you come and follow me if I but call your name?
Will you go where you don't know and never be the same?
Will you let my love be shown? Will you let my name be known,
will you let my life be grown in you and you in me?
Will you leave yourself behind if I but call your name?
Will you care for cruel and kind and never be the same?
Will you risk the hostile stare should your life attract or scare?
Will you let me answer prayer in you and you in me?
Will you let the blinded see if I but call your name?
Will you set the prisoners free and never be the same?
Will you kiss the leper clean and do such as this unseen,
and admit to what I mean in you and you in me?
Will you love the "you" you hide if I but call your name?
Will you quell the fear inside and never be the same?
Will you use the faith you've found to reshape the world around,
through my sight and touch and sound in you and you in me?
Lord your summons echoes true when you but call my name.
Let me turn and follow you and never be the same.
In Your company I'll go where Your love and footsteps show.
Thus I'll move and live and grow in you and you in me.
Text: John L. Bell b.1949; Tune: Scottish traditional: Kelvingrove ;
Graham Maule.© 1987, Wild Goose Resource Group, Iona Community, GIA Publications, Inc.
Summer - Season of Questions
As I reflect upon the coming summer months, I realize that summer has always been a season of questions for me. Each year as a school girl I had the opportunity to make plans that reflected the questions I asked or was allowed to ask about my life. There was uncharted and unprogrammed time to plan. Even if it was a summer job I had to take I at least could ponder the type of job I wanted or was willing to take. There were many things that I hoped would happen that didn’t in those months, many plans I would have liked to make. The point is that I got to ask some important questions that were key to who I was or wanted to be.
I wouldn’t be sharing this now if I didn’t feel that my experience in some measure has been true for all of us, if not all the time, then at least some of it, if not in summer then at least sometime. But summer can be a metaphor for such a time because we likely don’t have to be so preoccupied with survival, at least weather wise. There is sunshine and a bit of a holiday mood, space really for moving outside of the box of our usual preoccupations and for bringing on board something new and exciting, and time for reflection. Such a season is essential in our lives, and is similar to the day of rest we try to have each week. We step outside our routines and reflect upon the deeper issues of faith, vocation, purpose, and our relationship with our creator and our saviour. We can open our hearts and minds more widely to hear His voice, and realize that the really important questions are the ones He asks us, for, whether or not we listen, they are the only real questions that a Christian has to answer.
For me, I find those questions embodied in a lovely song we often sing at our church. This song means all the more to me because I spent two very significant summers on or near the island of Iona, in Scotland, the home of the Iona community, who copyrighted the new arrangement to the song. The lilting but haunting Scottish traditional tune evokes deep memories of the questions I was asking those summers, and the choices I sought to make for my life. It was not an easy time, but I am grateful for all that I learned. My prayer for all of us this coming “summer” is that we would each be open to the essential questions God is asking us about our lives, and that we would have the courage to answer them.
Will you come and follow me if I but call your name?
Will you go where you don't know and never be the same?
Will you let my love be shown? Will you let my name be known,
will you let my life be grown in you and you in me?
Will you leave yourself behind if I but call your name?
Will you care for cruel and kind and never be the same?
Will you risk the hostile stare should your life attract or scare?
Will you let me answer prayer in you and you in me?
Will you let the blinded see if I but call your name?
Will you set the prisoners free and never be the same?
Will you kiss the leper clean and do such as this unseen,
and admit to what I mean in you and you in me?
Will you love the "you" you hide if I but call your name?
Will you quell the fear inside and never be the same?
Will you use the faith you've found to reshape the world around,
through my sight and touch and sound in you and you in me?
Lord your summons echoes true when you but call my name.
Let me turn and follow you and never be the same.
In Your company I'll go where Your love and footsteps show.
Thus I'll move and live and grow in you and you in me.
Text: John L. Bell b.1949; Tune: Scottish traditional: Kelvingrove ;
Graham Maule.© 1987, Wild Goose Resource Group, Iona Community, GIA Publications, Inc.
May 30, 2009
joy in growth in listening and learning
Each week I try to find something timely and timeless to say for my Saturday blog post for www.whateverhesays.blogspot.com. And each week the simplest place to write from seems to be from my own brokenness for that is the place of growth and healing for me, and so I trust it must be so for others. This week has felt like I didn't have a lot to say...I am tired and have lots to do and lots more to learn...but the fruits of last week's sharing prompted an email from a blog reader leading to more helpful thoughts to share, and connect with past learning. And so it goes on, as life does, getting simpler in more and more ways. Here it is:
Leading with our ears
Another week of ruminating on how to connect with others in helping ways. Another week of pondering the connection between suffering and sustenance for our souls. Another week of visioning for a future profession and ministry: how to be a life coach and one day a counsellor/therapist coming from an authentic place within myself.
In this process I have been joined by a blog reader who does her own writing, research and ruminating on similar subjects. This week she shared some powerful words from Larry Crabb's book, Soul Talk. :
Crabb's message is the key to this process is to experience and function out of our own brokenness. We don't need to become superhuman and expert, we just need to come alongside and be human and listening to the hearts of others, and sharing as we are led once we have permission to look in on their stories.
I recall a similar message in one of our texts for the foundational course in Christian counselling, William Kirwan's Biblical Concepts for Christian Counseling. He bemoaned the lack of empathy, genuineness and warmth in much Christian counselling, the prevalence of Job's counsellors who label people's issues and say "There you are!" instead of asking, like God in the garden asked Adam and Eve, "Where are you?". He urged us to ask the right questions and listen for the true answers about where people are, allow them to speak for themselves and be part of the process of solving their own problems:
Furthermore, as my blog reader friend Magda said so well, we need our wounds to help us become better healers and helpers: "The wounded heart listens differently than the person who has never experienced pain, either in reality or through denial."
We do not need to be afraid of suffering, of wounds, or of not having the answers for others. We just need to come to others in our own brokenness, with our wounded hearts and Christ's open wounded hands, and open our ears before we open our mouths.
Leading with our ears
Another week of ruminating on how to connect with others in helping ways. Another week of pondering the connection between suffering and sustenance for our souls. Another week of visioning for a future profession and ministry: how to be a life coach and one day a counsellor/therapist coming from an authentic place within myself.
In this process I have been joined by a blog reader who does her own writing, research and ruminating on similar subjects. This week she shared some powerful words from Larry Crabb's book, Soul Talk. :
Every person who relates with people - whether as coach, counselor, spiritual director, therapist, pastor, elder, caregiver, spouse, parent, friend or mentor - needs to speak Soul Talk. And that means we must stop talking so quickly out of what we think we know and learn to lead with our ears...If we learn the discipline of silence as we engage in conversation and think passion as we quietly listen, perhaps we'll spend less energy figuring out what to do as experts and more energy allowing the powerful life of Christ to surface within us and be released in the words we speak. We'll leave behind the sandy foundation of expert knowledge and savvy wisdom and build instead on the solid rock of divine energy, on the foundation of life with the Trinity.
Crabb's message is the key to this process is to experience and function out of our own brokenness. We don't need to become superhuman and expert, we just need to come alongside and be human and listening to the hearts of others, and sharing as we are led once we have permission to look in on their stories.
I recall a similar message in one of our texts for the foundational course in Christian counselling, William Kirwan's Biblical Concepts for Christian Counseling. He bemoaned the lack of empathy, genuineness and warmth in much Christian counselling, the prevalence of Job's counsellors who label people's issues and say "There you are!" instead of asking, like God in the garden asked Adam and Eve, "Where are you?". He urged us to ask the right questions and listen for the true answers about where people are, allow them to speak for themselves and be part of the process of solving their own problems:
Good listening helps to keep the counselor's responses close to the counselee's feelings and experiences, permitting corrections of any misunderstanding the counselor may have. The active listener is open to being corrected. When answering the counselor's question, "Where are you?" the counselee must have the freedom to correct any misapprehensions by saying, "No, not there; I am over here." Often such freedom is not allowed in Christian counseling. The counselee's problems are forced into preconceived molds or categories. The theological points made by the counselor may be accurate, precise, and even profound, but they still may not fit the counselee's problems. If the counselor is to know the right doctrine to apply (as Jesus always did), it is essential to understand exactly where the counselee is. (p. 140)
Furthermore, as my blog reader friend Magda said so well, we need our wounds to help us become better healers and helpers: "The wounded heart listens differently than the person who has never experienced pain, either in reality or through denial."
We do not need to be afraid of suffering, of wounds, or of not having the answers for others. We just need to come to others in our own brokenness, with our wounded hearts and Christ's open wounded hands, and open our ears before we open our mouths.
May 23, 2009
joy in connecting my future work with all that I learn each day
Once again I have the privilege this week of sharing about some new learning of my own. My weekly blog post for the team blog, www.whateverhesays.blogspot.com, is attached here, with the message that is on my heart for this week, born out of reading I have been doing, that has also been directly relevant to my own inner journey, and to the plans and training I am doing for future work. I hope it is helpful to you.
Placing a "higher value" on suffering
I have never forgotten her words, spoken softly but firmly as she taught our teleconference class in Christian life coaching. That was back in April of this year, the first month of my wonderful training. My classmates from Singapore, Alaska, Colorado, Georgia, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts and more places, and I, from Muskoka, Ontario, listened and engaged through the long distance phone lines and dutifully took our notes about the differences between regular and Christian life coaching. The main difference that stood out for me was encased in her words: "We place a higher value on suffering."
Those words were in some ways a truism for me, a "duh". Okay, so we get it. We Christians know all about suffering and its value, I guess, or are supposed to. But in this day and age of the prosperity gospel, the wonderings about whether we are doing something wrong if we have difficulties, we need to be told that. Especially in the world of life coaching. For that is where we are trained to help others to fulfill long dormant dreams, to live their best life, to be the person they have always wanted to be, to move forward in spite of the obstacles and negative mindsets that may have plagued them all their lives.
A.B. Simpson is quoted in Streams in the Desert (where else? This little book is jampacked with big truths about learning through suffering):
Trials and hard places are needed to press us forward, even as the furnace fires in the hold of that mighty ship give force that moves the piston, drives the engine, and propels that great vessel across the sea in the face of the winds and the waves.
It's not just about enduring suffering and growing from it...it's about its necessity in the Christian life. And so its necessity in Christian life coaching.
Another aspect of this theme is given by Thomas Moore about depression in his book, Care of the Soul: A Guide for Cultivating Depth and Sacredness in Everyday Life, and his chapter called "Gifts of Depression":
Maybe we could appreciate the role of depression in the economy of the soul more if we could only take away the negative connotations of the word. What if 'depression' were simply a state of being, neither good nor bad, something the soul does in its own good time and for its own good reasons?
Depression grants the gift of experience not as a literal fact but as an attitude toward yourself. You get a sense of having lived through something, of being older and wiser. You know that life is suffering, and that knowledge makes a difference. You can't enjoy the bouncy, carefree innocence of youth any longer, a realization that entails both sadness because of the loss, and pleasure in a new feeling of self-acceptance and self-knowledge. This awareness of age has a halo of melancholy around it, but it also enjoys a measure of nobility.
It really is possible, at every level, to rejoice in our trials and our sadness. Not only can they produce great inner growth and push us forward to better achieve our goals and dreams, but they can even provide a satisfaction in themselves, a quiet knowledge of God's presence in them, and of our greater awareness of our own companionship, with Him, and with ourselves.
I am so deeply grateful that when I develop my Christian life coaching business I can incorporate all levels of experience, my own in my understanding, and all that my clients will be going through. I will not be coaching them to get out of their depression, or get past the difficulties in their lives, but I will have the privilege of being with them in the midst of them, encouraging them to place a high value on them, and receive all that is possible from and through them. This then can be part of the abundant living that we are promised.
Placing a "higher value" on suffering
I have never forgotten her words, spoken softly but firmly as she taught our teleconference class in Christian life coaching. That was back in April of this year, the first month of my wonderful training. My classmates from Singapore, Alaska, Colorado, Georgia, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts and more places, and I, from Muskoka, Ontario, listened and engaged through the long distance phone lines and dutifully took our notes about the differences between regular and Christian life coaching. The main difference that stood out for me was encased in her words: "We place a higher value on suffering."
Those words were in some ways a truism for me, a "duh". Okay, so we get it. We Christians know all about suffering and its value, I guess, or are supposed to. But in this day and age of the prosperity gospel, the wonderings about whether we are doing something wrong if we have difficulties, we need to be told that. Especially in the world of life coaching. For that is where we are trained to help others to fulfill long dormant dreams, to live their best life, to be the person they have always wanted to be, to move forward in spite of the obstacles and negative mindsets that may have plagued them all their lives.
A.B. Simpson is quoted in Streams in the Desert (where else? This little book is jampacked with big truths about learning through suffering):
Trials and hard places are needed to press us forward, even as the furnace fires in the hold of that mighty ship give force that moves the piston, drives the engine, and propels that great vessel across the sea in the face of the winds and the waves.
It's not just about enduring suffering and growing from it...it's about its necessity in the Christian life. And so its necessity in Christian life coaching.
Another aspect of this theme is given by Thomas Moore about depression in his book, Care of the Soul: A Guide for Cultivating Depth and Sacredness in Everyday Life, and his chapter called "Gifts of Depression":
Maybe we could appreciate the role of depression in the economy of the soul more if we could only take away the negative connotations of the word. What if 'depression' were simply a state of being, neither good nor bad, something the soul does in its own good time and for its own good reasons?
Depression grants the gift of experience not as a literal fact but as an attitude toward yourself. You get a sense of having lived through something, of being older and wiser. You know that life is suffering, and that knowledge makes a difference. You can't enjoy the bouncy, carefree innocence of youth any longer, a realization that entails both sadness because of the loss, and pleasure in a new feeling of self-acceptance and self-knowledge. This awareness of age has a halo of melancholy around it, but it also enjoys a measure of nobility.
It really is possible, at every level, to rejoice in our trials and our sadness. Not only can they produce great inner growth and push us forward to better achieve our goals and dreams, but they can even provide a satisfaction in themselves, a quiet knowledge of God's presence in them, and of our greater awareness of our own companionship, with Him, and with ourselves.
I am so deeply grateful that when I develop my Christian life coaching business I can incorporate all levels of experience, my own in my understanding, and all that my clients will be going through. I will not be coaching them to get out of their depression, or get past the difficulties in their lives, but I will have the privilege of being with them in the midst of them, encouraging them to place a high value on them, and receive all that is possible from and through them. This then can be part of the abundant living that we are promised.
May 16, 2009
joy in being challenged in my humanity
This is my latest post for my regular Saturday contribution to www.whateverhesays.blogspot.com. It was satisfying to discover what I wanted to write about, and to do it. It is fresh for me.
"All That Is Here Are Humans"
This week I was helping my daughter with a class presentation about the effectiveness of UN Peacekeeping in the world. One of our sources was Romeo Dallaire's book, Shake Hands With the Devil: The Failure of Humanity in Rwanda ,his account of the genocide in Rwanda in the 1990's when he was in charge of the ineffective UN force at that time. What he experienced and witnessed drove him into despair and madness for a time, and through his faith and therapy and the faithful love of his wife, he came back to sanity and health and is a powerful voice in the world today against the hypocrisy of many policies of our western governments.
I was riveted by something he said in the introduction:
Engraved still in my brain is the judgment of a small group of bureaucrats who came to "assess" the situation in the first weeks of the genocide: " We will recommend to our government not to intervene as the risks are high and all that is here are humans".
Besides the rage I feel along with him at "man's inhumanity to man", and the unspeakable evil that was unleashed in those few weeks, I ponder these words in the wider context of all that we and I do in so many contexts each day.
All that is here are humans.
All that is here are humans.
What does it really mean to say that?
How many times do we say that in one way or another to ourselves, or in our actions or our inaction?
How many times do we refuse to take risks, to move out of our comfort zones, in order to help others in their "humanity"?
How many times do I demean my own humanity, and that of another, a friend even, by not being willing to risk my reputation, my pride, my comfort, in order to reach out to them?
I find I have to ask myself this question more, rather than less, as I move on in my Christian life. I am struck more each day by the judgmentalism of Christians, and my own judgments, not only of others, but of myself.
I feel I have many more new levels to explore in my spiritual journey. After more than 40 years on this journey, I often feel I have only begun. I am more and more grateful for the new challenges God is bringing into my life: study and work in the areas of coaching and counselling, which really means learning, growing, and giving (and of course receiving) in the arenas of validating personhood and giving life.
But I know that what matters to Him, and really to me and my growth, is what is going on inside me. As I seek to grow to be more like Him, am I becoming more human? He became fully human. So it is completely spiritually "logical" that growing in Him means growing in my humanity. How often do we or I think that way? Even to ask myself that question in this way seems new for me.
I need to remember this every day: All that is here are humans. Then I need to decide what I am called to do because of that.
"All That Is Here Are Humans"
This week I was helping my daughter with a class presentation about the effectiveness of UN Peacekeeping in the world. One of our sources was Romeo Dallaire's book, Shake Hands With the Devil: The Failure of Humanity in Rwanda ,his account of the genocide in Rwanda in the 1990's when he was in charge of the ineffective UN force at that time. What he experienced and witnessed drove him into despair and madness for a time, and through his faith and therapy and the faithful love of his wife, he came back to sanity and health and is a powerful voice in the world today against the hypocrisy of many policies of our western governments.
I was riveted by something he said in the introduction:
Engraved still in my brain is the judgment of a small group of bureaucrats who came to "assess" the situation in the first weeks of the genocide: " We will recommend to our government not to intervene as the risks are high and all that is here are humans".
Besides the rage I feel along with him at "man's inhumanity to man", and the unspeakable evil that was unleashed in those few weeks, I ponder these words in the wider context of all that we and I do in so many contexts each day.
All that is here are humans.
All that is here are humans.
What does it really mean to say that?
How many times do we say that in one way or another to ourselves, or in our actions or our inaction?
How many times do we refuse to take risks, to move out of our comfort zones, in order to help others in their "humanity"?
How many times do I demean my own humanity, and that of another, a friend even, by not being willing to risk my reputation, my pride, my comfort, in order to reach out to them?
I find I have to ask myself this question more, rather than less, as I move on in my Christian life. I am struck more each day by the judgmentalism of Christians, and my own judgments, not only of others, but of myself.
I feel I have many more new levels to explore in my spiritual journey. After more than 40 years on this journey, I often feel I have only begun. I am more and more grateful for the new challenges God is bringing into my life: study and work in the areas of coaching and counselling, which really means learning, growing, and giving (and of course receiving) in the arenas of validating personhood and giving life.
But I know that what matters to Him, and really to me and my growth, is what is going on inside me. As I seek to grow to be more like Him, am I becoming more human? He became fully human. So it is completely spiritually "logical" that growing in Him means growing in my humanity. How often do we or I think that way? Even to ask myself that question in this way seems new for me.
I need to remember this every day: All that is here are humans. Then I need to decide what I am called to do because of that.
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