Turning the Page

The Secret Questions of a Secret Life

Many of us carry secret questions, and we are hungry for answers, but we need someone safe. Someone secure in themselves yet vulnerable to listen well.
 
When the pastor sermonized my personal story, I felt exposed.
I was once in a small group in a church, where our Pastor taught us how to be leaders in the church.
Once a fortnight, we would meet, talk about what was happening in our lives, then he would give some teaching, perhaps a visiting speaker would chat with us. Overall it was a good thing.
I felt safe. That was until the Pastor used something that I shared in total privacy as an illustration in his sermon.
Now, most of the people in the church service would not have associated the story with me. He didn’t say my name, but there were enough people there to know that this illustration was about me.
I felt exposed, angry, and violated. I had given him my trust, and he used my struggle for his gain.
I never trusted him again.
Another story of exposure. I shared something deep with a pastor, and they, too, decided to share it with others. Then the story gained momentum and a life of its own.
Some people shouldn’t be in positions where they are to hold another’s heart. They are not secure within themselves to keep a fragile gift.
I’ve heard people’s stories, still do, but I don’t share them. I will go to the grave with them. Fortunately, as one person said, I have a very good ‘Forgetter Computer.’
When you’re living in fear of exposure
For many of us, we have questions and struggles rolling around in our heads, but we don’t want anyone to know.
All the internal struggles. If we disclose them, then we’re sure to be rejected, dismissed, abandoned.
So we create an alternative life that is very secret. We don’t feel safe with the ones whom we’re meant to feel safe with.
We think we are the only ones with these struggles.
And if you’re that person reading this, then I want to assure you that you’re not the only one living a secret life.
I think we all do.
We present to the world one face, while all along, we have another world in which we have unmentionable questions, crazy thoughts, and wild passions.
But we have no one safe to express the internal drama, and so we are stuck.
We type our questions into Google, scour the screen for answers, and sicken ourselves with comparisonitis.
We might even send a postcard to at least tell the universe.
He came in the night.
There is a wonderful story of a man who was in this dilemma.
He didn’t want the exposure, but he still had questions. Every kid in Sunday School memorizes the answers he got.
His name was Nicodemus, and he was someone who was supposed to have all the answers, the religious answers.
His role in society in Jesus’ day was that of a Pharisee. He was a keeper of the religion.
But then Jesus came and threw the rule book up in the air and talked about relationships.
We find the story of Nicodemus in three places.
The first is when he came by night to Jesus.
Now there was a Pharisee, a man named Nicodemus who was a member of the Jewish ruling council. He came to Jesus at night and said, “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher who has come from God. For no one could perform the signs you are doing if God were not with him.” John 3:1,2
It’s interesting to see that Nicodemus ‘came to Jesus at night.’ He didn’t want to be seen connecting with the Christ, but he was hungry with questions.
So many of us are like Nicodemus. We are hungry with questions, but if they were to be told, we could lose our social ranking, status, safety, and even our family and friends. We risk exposure if we show ourselves.
The next time we meet Nicodemus is when he is defending Jesus’ right to free speech.
Nicodemus, who had gone to Jesus earlier and who was one of their own number, asked, “Does our law condemn a man without first hearing him to find out what he has been doing?” John 7:50, 51
The final time is when he cares for the crucified body of Jesus.
Later, Joseph of Arimathea asked Pilate for the body of Jesus.Now Joseph was a disciple of Jesus, but secretly because he feared the Jewish leaders. With Pilate’s permission, he came and took the body away.He was accompanied by Nicodemus, the man who earlier had visited Jesus at night. Nicodemus brought a mixture of myrrh and aloes, about seventy-five pounds.Taking Jesus’ body, the two of them wrapped it, with the spices, in strips of linen. This was in accordance with Jewish burial customs. John 19:38-42
Two men, both living in fear, were the ones to touch the crucified body of Christ. Secret servants.
Are you living in fear of someone or something? The body of Christ welcomes your attention.
By the way, note that Nicodemus brought a ‘mixture of myrrh and aloes, about seventy-five pounds.’ That’s 34 kgs—nothing secret about this man’s love for Jesus.
The story of questions
I want to connect with people living in fear of exposure.
Someone once wrote on my whiteboard
‘Will I be loved if they knew the real me’?
We could add other questions of exposure.
Will I be loved if they find out about my porn addiction?
Will I be loved if they find out about my comfort eating?
Will I be loved if they find out about me getting help?
Will I be loved if I don’t go to Sunday church anymore?
What’s your secret that you fear exposure of?
And so we come by night looking for connection.
In the story of Nicodemus, we see a story of spiritual formation. From the questions said in private to being with another secret servant and the adornment of a dead body.
Knocking on the door
In my mind, I imagine Nicodemus sneaking through the streets and dark alleys. Then, finally, he comes to the place where Jesus was resting.
He knocks on the door, waits, hides in the shadows, the door opens, and he quickly dashes in.
Jesus and his followers look to see a man,  a pharisee, and they wonder.
He has his questions. Is it safe to speak? Is there a traitor in the room?
He moves close to Jesus and with a whisper begins his carefully prepared question.
But Jesus throws him questions about his question. It’s a style of opening the heart for a deeper connection. Jesus is a master at this style of meeting the heart.
By the way, Jesus still throws us questions that invite us to walk on water.
When we come with our deepest secrets to God, we come to one who is fully aware of the whole of our story. God knows more about our story than we know ourselves. Therefore, nothing surprises God, and nothing will shock them.
God is not one to expose us to the darkness and the frigidity of nakedness.
They clothe us with compassion and love. They envelop us with community. They don’t throw us to the opinions and judgments of humanity. They don’t have a judge’s gavel ready to fall upon the tenderness of a secret.
Being the one that welcomes
I need someone to welcome my mystery—all those secrets, questions, and fears.
Not someone to spread the word and to pick up a megaphone.
I also don’t want someone to give me a quick answer—the textbook solution. More so, I want someone to explore the secrets and offer me other questions that journey me down new paths.
Isn’t this what Jesus did with so many?
He spoke in parables and stories about wheat and wind, hidden treasures, and lost coins.
Stories were told to confuse those listening with logic, but to those listening with the heart, a hungry heart, there was allurement for more.
How it works here
Do you fear exposure?
How it works here on Turning the Page is that you can knock on my door by sending me an email. It’s as private as that. 
You can also access all the books, courses, and conversations with me on a Pay What You Want basis, which includes Free, just if someone is watching your bank account and you don’t want them to know.
I am trusting in a God of a bigger economic providence than what humanity is constraining itself to.
You can come out of the dark here; you don’t need to be alone anymore.
Quotes to consider
Grace shows up when logic breaks down. Richard Rohr
Love acts like a giant magnet that pulls out of us, like iron filings, every recorded injury, every scar. Terrence Real
 Integrity is often a willingness to hold the dark side of things instead of reacting against them, denying them, or projecting our anxiety elsewhere. Richard Rohr. Eager to Love
 “Sensitive listeners respond to comments with words that convey an interest in hearing more, sentences that open the door to information.  Words that open doors transmit two messages: 1. ‘I am interested in whatever you have to say.’ 2. ‘I will accept you regardless of what you say.'” Larry Crabb
Questions to answer
When have you felt exposed?
What are the secrets that you want to have someone listen to with openness and love?
What would it be like to be in the room where Jesus and Nicodemus are in conversation?
Further reading
 
Barry Pearman
Photo by Ashley Light on Unsplash

I will Champion your Mental Health

Life has many struggles, but with a champion, someone who will walk and talk, we have someone who reminds us of our progress and gives us hope.
I was recently talking with someone about the struggles in their life. We had walked many a mile together over the years.
As we talked, I asked if they remembered how they were five years ago. We actually rated some of their feelings. Five years ago, it was a 9 out of 10 struggle, but now it was 2 out of 10.
They looked up with a sense of realization. Things had actually changed. Some of the issues they faced back then hadn’t changed that much, but many of them had.
From this, they took a great deal of encouragement, and I did too.
For them, the deepest parts of their journey had not been seen by many. They didn’t want others to know. But there were a few special people, such as myself, that they had let into their private dark hole.
In my eyes, they were a superhero. Very few went where they went. Now they were strong in ways unimaginable a few years ago.
Noticing the progress
Have you ever been to a forest, and all you see are the trees, the obstacles, and maybe a faint path to follow?
Your attention gets consumed by what is all around you.
You forget about how far you’ve come. Sure, you might feel it in your body. Aches and pains, but all you know is the depth and darkness of the forest.
That is until you climb a hill, or there is a break in the trees, and you can look back and see how far you’ve come. You’re amazed at the progress from placing one foot in front of another—one millimeter at a time.
There is a saying, ‘You can’t see the forest for the trees. ‘
I would also say you can’t see the progress for the trees.
The depth of the present struggle is so all-consuming that there is no pause to take in the wonder of where you’ve come from.
A champion walking alongside us invites us to take a break, have a sip of water and celebrate the progress.
I think it’s so important to have people in our lives that in various ways, can lift us out of the daily battle with the trees, the brush, and the weeds.
They point out how far we have come and offer us a perspective about where we are going.
Then it’s back to the millimeter by millimeter bush-bashing through the shrubbery of weeds and wilderness.
There can be loneliness to this journey.
One of the features of many people’s journey is loneliness. You feel that no one is there with you.
Possibly you might have friends and family, but there you are with your happy mask because you don’t want anyone else to know the deep struggle you’re going through.
So you’re alone.
You may have reached out, been dismissed, felt overlooked, and disregarded. No one gets you.
You wonder why you’re so self-focused. Isnt that selfishness?
Surely others have it worse off than you.  Maybe they do, but actually, you don’t know. Your journey is your journey.
You trudge on seeing the trees, the weeds, the struggle.
The champion in your family
There is an interesting little verse in the Psalms.
God places the lonely in families Psalm 68:6
This is not so much a family of mum, dad, and the kids. More so, it is a nest of relationships where we can call home.
I have a champion in my family nest. Actually, I might have more than one.
This is not someone who has a big shiny winners cup but more so someone who desires to champion me.
A champion is someone who supportsor defends a person or cause.
Think of these champions
Martin Luther King and the civil rights movement
Nelson Mandela and the Anti-apartheid movement
Kate Shepherd and the women’s suffrage movement
Bill Sinclair and his support of John Bishop
Mary Smith and her commitment to her friend Jenny Bertland
You probably don’t know the last two champion names on the list. I don’t know them either. They are fictitious. I made them up.
But you probably do know people like them.
People who walk alongside someone and encourage them when they can’t see the forest for the trees. They can’t see the progress for the weeds.
We all need a Mental health champion.
I recently had a champion share some very kind words with me. It filled my heart like a breathe of fresh air fills the lungs.
I sucked it in and let it seep in deep.
They weren’t trite words. Instead, they were words crafted out of a known awareness of being in a battle themselves. They knew the walk and so could talk the walk.
I needed that.
Into the pool room – my encouragement journal – went their words.
 
I believe we all need people who will regularly come alongside and pour words of life into the dry and parched areas of the soul. People who have taken the time to watch and listen.
Friends who will champion us as a person of great worth and value.
Let’s walk and talk
We need more Bills and Marys to walk and talk with Johns and Jennys.
Champions.
We have a mental health crisis, and I believe much of it could be addressed by people learning how to walk and talk.
Sharing some wisdom, crying together, laughing.
Reflecting on progress made in life because there were simple conversations and words of encouragement.
I wonder what would happen if all of us would say to one other person, I want to walk and talk with you and be your champion?
Quotes to consider
The word encouragement has its root in the Latin word cor, which literally means “heart”. So does the word courage.  To have courage means to have heart. To encourage – to provide with or give courage – literally means to give others heart. James Kouzes and Barry Posner – Encouraging the Heart
Research teaches us that the capacity to reach out to others for help in dealing with fear and pain is the best single remedy for emotional injury.  Whether the person is struggling with the effects of combat, rape, or childhood injury, the best predictor of trauma resolution is good social support. Terrence Real, I Don’t Want To Talk About It.
Friendship is born at that moment when one person says to another: ‘What! You too? I thought I was the only one. C.S. Lewis
Don’t walk in front of me… I may not followDon’t walk behind me… I may not leadWalk beside me… just be my friend. Albert Camus
Our chief want is someone who will inspire us to be what we know we could be. Ralph Waldo Emerson
Kind words can be short and easy to speak, but their echoes are truly endless. Mother Teresa
 Loneliness is the first thing which God’s eye named not good. John Milton
“There is a soul yonder which is lonely.” And he added, deep in his own mind, “I owe him a visit.” The priest in Les Miserables  Victor Hugo
Real encouragement occurs when words are spoken from a heart of love to another’s recognized fear.  Larry Crabb
Hope is being able to see that there is light despite all of the darkness. Desmond Tutu
Questions to answer
Who has been a champion for you?
What are the qualities of a good champion?
Are you able to look back and see the progress?
Further reading
Do You Feel Alone in Your Struggle?
God Sets the Lonely in Families
Why Men Don’t Talk. 26 Reasons for Silence
Barry Pearman
Photo by Malte Schmidt on Unsplash

I’m Not Religious but I Have A Religion

‘I’m not religious’ is something many say, but religion is a place of reconnection and realignment. Good mental health grows in a healthy religious experience.
Say the word ‘Religion,’ and you’ll get lots of reactions.
The word ‘Religion’ can a springboard to thoughts of rules, regulations, rituals, commitments, vows, attendance at meetings, obedience, hierarchy, and people often wearing funny-looking clothes.
Religion is often seen as a straightjacket to freedom. You must do certain things to get right with God and be part of the group.
But I think we are all prone to want to find a religion of our own, even making a religion we can call home.
Let’s look into the word religion a bit deeper.
The reconnect of Religion.
If we look into the history of the word, we find that it comes from two words  re-ligare, i.e., re- (again) + ligare or “to reconnect.”
Re-ligio is to re-ligament or reconnect.
I see a surgeon reconnecting ligaments and bones back into the sockets where they have been pulled out.
There is a reconnection to something bigger than oneself.
We’ve drifted, detached, disconnected, and want to come home to the unity of something bigger than ourselves.
There is also the thought of realignment. That religion offers a realignment to a drifting soul. Here is the path. Walk this way—a compass to follow.
We all have a religion.
Using these definitions, I think we all have a religion.
A method by which we reconnect with something bigger than ourselves. Something that realigns us.
We may not be conscious of it, but it will be there calling us back to a conformity.
It might be that sport you love. It could be a personal philosophy or a political party.
The religion of communism or capitalism.
We all have a religion, but it may not meet in a building on Sunday.
So what can a religion offer you?
Playgrounds and fences
It was a busy neighborhood, and cars, buses, and trucks drove many of the streets. But there was no place for the children to play, to have fun, explore, climb, fall and kick a ball.
Nowhere for lovers to walk and children to make friends.
So the parents got together and found an empty area in the middle of their neighborhood and petitioned the town council to create a park full of swings, jumps, and climbing frames.
It was agreed, and the building began.
Trees were planted, a water fountain installed, flower gardens, picnic tables, park benches, climbing walls, poles to swing off.
This was a place where all could come and reconnect to the joy of play and fun.
First kisses would be experienced. Lifelong friendships would form. People could stretch out on the grass and enjoy the summer sun.
But nearby was that busy, dangerous road. It was a huge risk for any child chasing a ball.
So the council built a fence.  It was strong and sturdy and stopped any errant ball or flying frisbee.
Everyone was safe while they stayed within the park’s boundaries, within the fenceline, inside the lines of love and respect.
Religion, in many ways, offers the nuts, bolts, and mesh of the fenceline. We know the rules, the norms, and social conventions.
For newcomers, it has to be taught.
‘In this park, we don’t have wild drunken parties; it’s not safe for the children. And we don’t do drugs.Go to some other park if you want to do that.’
Sadly though, there are many people more interested in focusing on the fenceline and rule board at the entry gate than enjoying the relational benefits of the park.
They may even form committees to ensure everyone knows the rules and that the fenceline is strong and robust.
I once had someone come to me wanting to point out the fenceline, the rules, the regulations. When I suggested we talk about a Jesus story about the fence line, he wasn’t interested. ‘I don’t want to talk about Jesus’ was his response. BIG RED FLAG!
I was inviting him to play on the Jesus climbing frame, and all he wanted to do was inspect the tightness of the mesh fence.
His religious playground was small, black and white, and empty of life.
His back was turned away from having relational fun.
He faced forward like a sergeant major, making sure the religious rules were kept and abided by.
He was trapped in what Richard Rohr would call ‘Early-stage religion.’
Early-stage religion tends to focus on cleaning up, which is to say, determining who meets the requirements for moral behavior and religious belief. Richard Rohr The Universal Christ
And it’s this ‘Early-stage religion’ that gives religion a bad rap. Who wants that!
Sadly, many people stay stuck in ‘Early-stage religion’ and never learn to dance in the summer sun and find their first enduring kiss of grace.
I want to be inside the park to make great friends, have fun, and play.
To be vulnerable, express love to others, and feel the love coming back.
I can’t tell you the number of passionate lovers in my park!
Yes, I know there is a fence, some group norms, but I want to know the friends in my playground.
Jesus was a religious rule breaker.
Jesus was a rule-breaker, well, at least the rules set up by man to codify what was right and wrong.
One Sabbath, Jesus was strolling with his disciples through a field of ripe grain. Hungry, the disciples were pulling off the heads of grain and munching on them.
Some Pharisees reported them to Jesus: “Your disciples are breaking the Sabbath rules!”
Jesus said, “Really? Didn’t you ever read what David and his companions did when they were hungry, how they entered the sanctuary and ate fresh bread off the altar, bread that no one but priests were allowed to eat?
And didn’t you ever read in God’s Law that priests carrying out their Temple duties break Sabbath rules all the time and it’s not held against them?
“There is far more at stake here than religion. If you had any idea what this Scripture meant—‘I prefer a flexible heart to an inflexible ritual’—you wouldn’t be nitpicking like this.
The Son of Man is no yes-man to the Sabbath; he’s in charge.”
When Jesus left the field, he entered their meeting place. There was a man there with a crippled hand.
They said to Jesus, “Is it legal to heal on the Sabbath?” They were baiting him.
He replied, “Is there a person here who, finding one of your lambs fallen into a ravine, wouldn’t, even though it was a Sabbath, pull it out? Surely kindness to people is as legal as kindness to animals!”
Then he said to the man, “Hold out your hand.” He held it out and it was healed. The Pharisees walked out furious, sputtering about how they were going to ruin Jesus. Matthew 12: 1-14 
Religion or Relationship?
In that passage of Jesus, what was more important? The following of the religion or the dance of relationship Jesus was part of.
When I am told I am religious, I feel like I am a movie screen, and people are projecting onto me all their views and opinions about religion.
My religion is not so much about following the rules; it’s more about being in a relationship. And in the relationship, good things happen.
The religious rules become the background to the deeper relationship that is happening.
Where you focus, you will go.
When I focus on the fence, I lose focus on the relationship offered in the playground. I disconnect from the ones I am to be in a relationship with.
I stop smelling roses when I start inspecting the flaky paint on the wire.
I stop enjoying the sun streaming down when I am stooping to dig dirt for a new and even stronger fence.
Looking at the fence is hard work. But playing on the swing is fun.
Where is your religion taking you?
Is the realignment reconnecting you with something bigger than yourself?
Mental Health and Religion
Religion has a lot to offer our mental health—that realignment and reconnection to something healthy and whole.
I also know that religion can bring a great deal of unwellness to people—anxiety, depression, guilt, shame, fear to name but a few.
So what does a healthy religion for our mental health look like?
Dr. David Benner suggests there are six markers of healthy spirituality.
Grounded in Reality, seeing things as they are.
Awareness
Hopeful openness
Loving connectedness
Transcendent meaningfulness
Capacity for love, work, and play
Is your place of reconnection and realignment growing these in you?
I’m Not Religious but I Have A Religion. Let’s dance.
Quotes to consider
The essential function of religion is to radically connect us with everything. (Re-ligio = to re-ligament or reconnect.) It is to help us see the world and ourselves in wholeness, and not just in parts. Richard Rohr The Universal Christ
To the Jewish person, and to all of us who have inherited their wisdom, there was one face that we looked to for mirroring, one face that we keep returning to for validation and definition, the face of God. Healthy religion creates veryhealthy people. Richard Rohr Things Hidden: Scripture as Spirituality
Symbolism, however, always reconnects what has been thrown apart. This probably explains why healthy religion (“re-ligio”=bind back together), throughout history, gives us symbols, images of reconciliation, that heal, that put together what has been taken apart. Richard Rohr Job and the Mystery of Suffering: Spiritual Reflections
Religious beliefs, and the accompanying sense of belonging within a community that shares the monopoly on the truth those beliefs appear to represent, feed a basic need of the ego. The ego needs to feel special. It does this by making distinctions that set it apart from others. Possessing the truth and belonging to the small circle of those that share this distinction is like a hit of crack cocaine to the fragile ego. It feels incredibly good. It wraps the vulnerable ego in a luxurious soft fabric that makes it feel warm, comfortable and substantial. But, like a bandage wrapped too tightly around a wound, it cuts us off from our essential vitality. After all, what need is there for further becoming if you already exclusively possess the full truth! David Benner
Religions lose their way when they focus primarily on the transmission and defence of beliefs and the cultivation of belonging that occurs around these circles of belief. Christians also do this when they settle for beliefs rather than personal knowing. They do this when they worship Jesus rather than following the path he lived and taught. Faith, which should enable them to walk the path, becomes reduced to agreement with propositions. David Benner
In my view, Christianity lost its way when it settled for being a religion rather than the transformational path that I am convinced was what Jesus came to teach, live, and offer the world. And as a result, Christianity is on the verge of irrelevance to spiritual seekers, both within and outside the church. David Benner
Questions to answer
What is your gut reaction when someone says the word ‘religion’?
Is your focus more on the fence line or on the playground? What feels safer?
Where did you have your first kiss of love?
Further reading
Is Taking A Spiritual Bypass Harming Your Mental Health?
Barry Pearman
Photo by Leon Liu on Unsplash

Listen. You’re on Sacred Ground

There was a single tear, and I knew we were on sacred ground, but there was a decision to be made. I chose to linger and listen.
I was talking with a man in his eighties the other day when I noticed a tear forming in his eye. I knew that this was one of those moments.
One of those times where you mustn’t rush past. There was an invitation to a stop and be quiet.
It was a tender moment. A time of standing on what I call ‘sacred ground’ where the other drifts, ponders and reflects on the storied waves of life.
I dare not interrupt where Spirit was dancing him into.
It was only for about 10 seconds, maybe not even that, but then he spoke about loss—the loss of deep friendships and relationships. Opportunity lost to connect with at least one other man. To have a friend.
He talked about his observation that women seem to have more friends and deeper relationships. There was grief and that he had not had this.
And then we moved on. Perhaps we will come back to it one day.
The sacred ground of us
I have been to many places that might have the term ‘Sacred Ground’ attached to them.
It might be a place where some act of religious significance occurred. It could be a place of pilgrimage. Maybe even be a sports arena or stadium where someone achieved some great sporting feat.
We connect ‘Sacred ground’ with the words  of ‘This is where … happened.’
But I also believe that there can be ‘sacred ground’ moments within our conversations. A moment in a conversation where we could say ‘This is where … happened.’
Moments where a space opens up for silence and listening. An invite to intimacy (In-to-me-see) is quietly given.
Have you noticed these?
People are scared of sacred ground.
But people often are scared when they touch the outskirts of a sacred space. ‘Shields up’ and alarm sirens wail.
They back off, divert to other topics.
Avoid, avoid, avoid.
The brain, in all its hardwired self-protective goodness, shouts ‘This sacred ground feels like quicksand that could swallow me up.’
But sacred places are the places where the pivot of change happens.
The warmth of a burning bush
There is a story in the bible about a sacred space conversation.
It happened around a fire.
A desert bush was ablaze, but the strangest thing was that the bush wasn’t turning to ash.
It was fully alive with fire, and this drew some attention from a wandering shepherd called Moses.
Moses was shepherding the flock of Jethro, his father-in-law, the priest of Midian. He led the flock to the west end of the wilderness and came to the mountain of God, Horeb. The angel of God appeared to him in flames of fire blazing out of the middle of a bush. He looked. The bush was blazing away, but it didn’t burn up.
Moses said, “What’s going on here? I can’t believe this! Amazing! Why doesn’t the bush burn up?”
God saw that he had stopped to look. God called to him from out of the bush, “Moses! Moses!” 
He said, “Yes? I’m right here!” 
God said, “Don’t come any closer. Remove your sandals from your feet. You’re standing on holy ground.” Exodus 3:1-6
I think of my conversation, and the desire in me to come closer, dig deeper, ask questions and push the story on. Yet the best choice was not to come closer but actually to remove my sandals and be silent.
You need to take your sandals off.
Many people have conjectured as to why Moses had to remove his sandals. Sure he was instructed to because this was ‘Holy Ground,’ but why?
I want to offer a suggestion.
I wear footwear all the time in the garden. Boots, shoes, sandals are all worn to protect my feet from connection to the earth. Without that layer of material my feet would get dirty, and possibly harmed by thorns and stones.
I wear shoes to protect myself, to keep something between myself and potential harm.
I wonder if God was saying …
I don’t want anything to come between yourself and the dirt and dustiness of this place. I want you to connect fully with the earth of this experience. Have no crafted, man-made structure that acts as a barrier.
The sacred ground has an invite to dig your toes into it.
There is a vulnerability to this moment, and you need to be part of it.
What’s it like to walk barefooted on soil?
In that sacred moment
We so often rush to fill the void when someone exposes pain. It makes us uncomfortable.
Let’s fix their problem.Here is some good advice that they need to takeI can save them from thatThey need to be straightened out
You might also swing to your favorite space-filling therapeutic technique. Perhaps, if you’re a counselor, therapist, spiritual director, pastor, you’ve been taught what to do in these moments. To follow such and such practice.
In these moments of sacred ground, you need to walk carefully, tenderly, quietly.
Take your sandals off, as such, and feel your own vulnerability and what rises in you.
This is a moment to wait and watch.
Watch for where they go. Are they running away from the sacred ground, or are they wanting to dig their toes in with you.
If they run, perhaps a gentle question that asks about their sacred ground is needed.
A reassurance that running and avoidance are normal, but that the sacred ground has an invite to depth.
The sacred ground has answers that our heart needs to hear.
Of course, God is in the business of bringing us to burning bushes. Moments of grabbing our attention and pulling us aside to commune.
One Emmaus many Damascus
I’ve recently been reading Job and the Mystery of Suffering by Richard Rohr.
A quote that grabbed my attention was this.
Conversion, which is forever refining the most intimate nature of our experience, is a long, long process. More a long road to Emmaus than a one-time road to Damascus.
I immediately thought of those two roads.
The Emmaus road, where two followers of Jesus walked and talked out the mystery of what had just happened in Jerusalem. Then someone (Jesus) joined them and answered their questions.
The Damascus road where Saul traveled with a hatred and murderous intent to kill people much like our pilgrims on the Emmaus road. Jesus joined him too, with an explosion of light. So much light that it threw him to the soil beneath his feet.
Perhaps on our Emmaus road journey of conversion- ‘which is forever refining the most intimate nature of our experience’ – we also have Damascus rd experiences.
They may not always be as dramatic as Saul experienced but might be classified as little Damascus rd moments. Micro burning bush, sacred ground, sandal shedding, times.
Those millimeter moments that invite us to pause and pivot. Times, like I experienced in the conversation, where my friend was invited to sacred ground.
Those early followers of Jesus walking home to Emmaus had many small little Damascus rd events where they had their thinking gently challenged and redirected.
They were walking on sacred ground and didn’t even know it until the end of their journey. Then they realized how their ‘hearts had burned within them.’
That’s what happens when you encounter a burning bush that doesn’t turn to ash.
Praying for the sacred ground
I am praying that I might see more of those conversational sacred ground moments.
Those little instants where you know Spirit is dancing and weaving into the conversation.
Perhaps there might be more tears—times where I notice the movement in conversation to a place of it being sacred.
I hope I don’t rush it or invade it.
Instead, the invite is to linger and listen. Love does that.
Quotes to consider
God’s healing has more to do with learning to worship than it does with getting life fixed. Craig Barnes
The pain of something old falling apart—disruption and chaos—invites the soul to listen at a deeper level. It invites and sometimes forces the soul to go to a new place because the old place is not working anymore. Richard Rohr When Things Fall Apart
When we honestly ask ourselves which person in our lives mean the most to us, we often find that it is those who, instead of giving advice, solutions, or cures, have chosen rather to share our pain and touch our wounds with a warm and tender hand. Henri J.M. Nouwen
Real encouragement occurs when words are spoken from a heart of love to another’s recognized fear. Larry Crabb
A good journey begins with knowing where we are and being willing to go somewhere else. Richard Rohr
Learn to respond to others with honest, open questions instead of counsel or corrections. With such questions, we help “hear each other into deeper speech.” Parker J. Palmer.
Good work is relational, and its outcomes depend on what we are able to evoke from each other. Parker J. Palmer
It is usually most helpful to ask questions that are more about the person than about the problem. Parker J. Palmer 
Questions to answer
Have you noticed those ‘sacred ground’ moments in conversations?
Why do we rush to solve a problem?
When have you entered a personal ‘sacred ground,’? That place where memories swirl and time drifts to uncomfortable places. What is your response? Run, take off your sandals, listen?
Further reading
Barry Pearman
Photo by Adrian Swancar on Unsplash

A Time to Grieve and A Time to Prepare

Grief and loss are always on the horizon, but we can prepare to grieve well. This can help with the grief we are carrying now.
I am pruning roses at the moment.
It’s winter here in New Zealand as I write this post, and one of my tasks every winter for the last seven years has been to prune around 120 roses in a beautiful country garden.
The property is being sold, so this will most likely be the last time I prune, cut, and snip away at these old beauties.
I probably won’t see the blooms next summer.
There is a small heaviness in my heart.
I have enjoyed tending and caring for not just the roses but the fruit trees, the large magnolia trees, the camellias, and much much more.
The garden, when I took over, was in a state of disrepair. But with love and care over many seasons, it has developed a new life.
I fear that new owners may not care for both the soil and soul of the garden. But I am a steward of this season in its life.
It’s a relationship I have with wood, wind, and water—Sun, compost, and worms.
I am grieving, and I am preparing for grief.
I have grief in me. We all do.
Do you sit well with loss?
There is a time to grieve.
What if we were to say that there is a time for you to grieve. To say, ‘this is the moment for you to feel the loss.’
That sounds a bit mechanical and logical and engineered.
It also sounds quite defined. Like you can only grieve between these times, and after that, then you should be over it.
Grief doesn’t work like that, though. It can sweep up on you and catch you unawares. It can’t and won’t be controlled. Try and control it, and it will pop up somewhere else.
All great spirituality is about what we do with our pain.If we do not transform our pain, we will transmit it to those around us. Richard Rohr
We all, I believe, need a place, a time, and a person that says, ‘It’s ok to grieve.’
The wisdom of Ecclesiastes speaks to the naturalness of weeping and mourning.
A time to weep, and a time to laugh;a time to mourn, and a time to dance Ecclesiastes 3:4
Weeping is as natural to life as laughter. Mourning is as natural as dancing.
It’s normal, natural, to be expected. It’s not to be avoided or diminished.
There is a time to feel the loss, and that is ok.
We needn’t fear negative emotions.
The feminine noun
Digging a little deeper into the passage from Ecclesiastes, we see that the Hebrew word used for time is ‘eth,’ and it is a feminine noun.
There is a softness to this expression of time. There is a proper, suitable time for everything.
It’s the welcoming embrace for when the moment is right to be in that place.
It’s not on a schedule or a timetable.  The grief moment is not organized to arrive at this train scheduled time. But more so, it’s a knowing that this season will come and go.
There is an official day when winter begins, but we all know that winter starts when it starts, and spring comes when it comes.
So we don’t rush this process. ‘Eth’ has a time of its own accord.
The pendulum swings
As I write this, I have a grandfather clock ticking away in my background.
It has a large pendulum swinging away inside of it. Back and forth, back and forth, the arc of the ball swings.
It keeps the clock ticking.
Swinging in and out.
I have noticed this about my grief load too, I swing in and out.
I have lost people to me and felt the pendulum’s swing seemingly sit in the dark zone, and then it swings away. A memory swings me back but maybe not so far. Not so deep. Over time the swings don’t go so far in and not so severe.
There is no perpetual motion machine of grief.
But I wonder what keeps some people’s grief pendulum swinging so deep for so long? Perhaps the answer is to be found in our understanding of forgiveness – ourselves and others.
Prepare for grief
How does one prepare for grief?
That’s a strange question because I think we all, to some degree, carry a load of grief with us at all times.
Those little losses, the hurts, the job redundancies, the deaths, the missed opportunities, the failing health, the words we wanted to say someone but now can’t. The broken relationships.
We all carry something that, at times, can feel overwhelming.
Here are some guidelines to prepare for grief.
 1. Be ok with not knowing what the grief will look like.I really don’t know what it will be like not to have this garden in my weekly life. It’s an unknown. I wonder what I will miss the most. What will get triggered in me when I think of the roses.
Thorns or fragrance?
There is an unknowing to much of life, and we have to sit in the mystery of wondering what will come next.
The only thing I can be assured of is that I will not be alone in it.
Jesus, in grief load moment, invited his friends into his garden of Gethsemane. So I’m going to be ok with the pendulum swings.
 2. Keep the good memories aliveOver the years, I have taken photos of the garden. Different seasons bring different perspectives.
As I grieve, I will also celebrate the blessing and the gift of that time and place: thorns and fragrance.
Where you focus, you will go.
3. Forgiving the failingsWe live in a world where mistakes and bad choices happen. It’s part of the tapestry of life.
I try to live with a short accounts book. I don’t want to be a bookkeeper holding tightly to a ledger of rights and wrongs, so I try to forgive myself and others quickly.
One of the little affirmations I have each day is, ‘I am discounting my mistakes before they discount me.’
Grief can so easily become a swirling whirlpool of regrets. A central vortex can appear that sucks you down and away from reality.
Forgiveness can begin by letting the little fish go.
4. Talking it out with someone safeSharing the load, sharing the loss, being vulnerable and open about a particular memory moment.
This is an Emmaus walk where we talk about the mystery of loss out with a friend.
We don’t want anyone to F.A.S.S. (Fix. Advise. Save. Set one straight). Instead, we want someone to sit with us and invite the stories of both thorns and fragrance.
 
We all have a suitcase of grief. Is yours heavy or light? Perhaps as we learn to prepare for the pendulum swings, it will help with what we are carrying now.
Quotes to consider
Conversion, which is forever refining the most intimate nature of our experience, is a long, long process. More a long road to Emmaus than a one-time road to Damascus. Richard Rohr. Job and the Mystery of Suffering
 When we fail we are merely joining the great parade of humanity that has walked ahead of us and will follow after us. Richard Rohr
Those who do not turn to face their pain are prone to impose it. Terrence Real
In cultivating compassion we draw from the wholeness of our experience—our suffering, our empathy, as well as our cruelty and terror. It has to be this way. Compassion is not a relationship between the healer and the wounded. It’s a relationship between equals. Only when we know our own darkness well can we be present with the darkness of others. Compassion becomes real when we recognize our shared humanity.” Brené Brown The Gifts of Imperfection
Redeemed pain is more impressive to me than removed pain Phillip Yancey
Questions to consider
How do you prepare for grief? What are the lessons it has to offer you?
It’s a season, a time, a period, a pendulum swing. Which image connects best with you when you consider loss?
What are the qualities of a person that is safe for you to share your grief?
Further reading
Barry Pearman
Photo by Zoltan Tasi on Unsplash

Am I Worthy of Love?

Life can wear us down, and we question if we are worthy of love. But we need to look to a deeper story going on than feelings of the present.
It was gone. Something had gone from them. And they felt it.
No longer caring about their appearance, their diet, their health. Something deep in their existence had whispered away, or at least that’s how it felt to them.
‘Did they have worth?’ they wondered. And especially were they worthy of love and self-care?
They couldn’t see anything of love or worth in themselves. Others seemed to show scant regard for them too.
They wondered if they died today would anyone come to the funeral. Would anyone say anything?
What worth would be attributed to them?
Worth is 
Worth is such a value-based measurement. So how can you measure one’s worth?
Some measure it by dollars, some by fame. Then there are the medals of achievement, contribution to society, raising a family.
Do younger people have more worth than older people?
Do certain lives #matter or have more worth than others?
How do you measure worth? How do you measure your own worth?
And what about God? How does God measure one’s worth?
But there is Amando
I remember a story from Larry Crabb in his book Becoming a True Spiritual Community.
There once was a small eight-year-old boy called Amando. Small because he had been abandoned by his mother and was dying from the lack of food. Amando wasn’t able to walk, talk or eat by himself. In addition, he had a severe mental disability.
In an orphanage, he found people who loved him and held him, and as they did, he gradually began to eat again and develop.
But when carers picked him up, his whole body would ‘quiver with joy and excitement and say, “I love you.”
Amando was a lover. 
What was his worth?
In our worldy measurement of success, fame, and value, perhaps he had no value.
But to those that held him and knew him, there was a worth that kind of celebrated true love. It was like the Christ shining through his eyes.
Amando’s shake the familiar world of worth that is based on human-based values.
Worthy of love
If I was to ask you and many others if you are worthy of love, then I am sure that I would get many well thought out logic-based answers.
Many of my Christian friends would cite scriptures and give theological answers. Books would be given to read.
Yet, good as all this is, it can leave me cold.
No one has gone to the heart, which can be like a dry, empty well.
The heart can only be entered through deep listening, not logic and law.
Perhaps you’ve been cast out of the group because of a spot on the skin – leper.
Maybe stones are being picked up to throw at you until you die.
And you pick times to come out into town so that you can avoid meeting those nasty tongued neighbors. You go to draw water when no one else is around, but you meet a man.
Now he [Jesus] had to go through Samaria. So he came to a town in Samaria called Sychar, near the plot of ground Jacob had given to his son Joseph. Jacob’s well was there, and Jesus, tired as he was from the journey, sat down by the well. It was about noon.
When a Samaritan woman came to draw water, Jesus said to her, “Will you give me a drink?” (His disciples had gone into the town to buy food.)
The Samaritan woman said to him, “You are a Jew and I am a Samaritan woman. How can you ask me for a drink?” (For Jews do not associate with Samaritans.) John 4:6-9
Jesus cut through the conventions of worthiness. Instead, Jesus would associate, connect with, pour out love to anyone thirsty.
He himself was thirsty.
It’s a pretty simple thing to give someone a drink of water isn’t it. To lower a jug into a well and draw some droplets.
I’m not sure she ever got to do this because, well, a conversation began. Perhaps the words exchanged swept them both into a moment of refreshing delight that expressed the worthiness of love.
She saw in Jesus an ‘Amando’ delight flowing towards her.
Your worth
How do you measure your worth, your worthiness to receive?
Have you done enough yet? Have you ticked all the boxes?
Perhaps you need to crush the conventions of worthiness.
Those rules and social norms that express whether someone is on the inside or the outside. Those messages from religious church experiences that you’re a worm and a wretch. The parental put-downs that still haunt you like ghosts.
I like to look under the skin.
There is something of deep value and beauty under everyone’s facade. It’s there, but you have to give focused listening attention to see its glimmers.
Then it invites you to fall in love with the source.
The person may not see it themselves—that special quality, giftedness, movement, a talent that needs to be endorsed and validated.
But it’s the sparkle in Amando’s eye and the shiver of excitement that shouts, ‘I love you.’
Getting soaked in worth
Imagine yourself taking a long hot shower.
You sit there, stand there, you allow it to pour over until you feel it shaking something deep inside.
You quiet yourself until you feel the water flowing over every portion of your body—a massaging of droplets hitting the skin.
That is what knowing your worth is like. Love working into the crevices of your thinking so that old conventions of worth and value are replaced by truth. You are loved and have worth.
You come back to this shower time and time again because some of those old ways of thinking take time to be washed away.
Are you worthy of love? Yes, you are.
Perhaps we all need Amando’s like you to sparkle and shiver.
Quotes to consider
No one person can fulfill all your needs. But the community can truly hold you. The community can let you experience the fact that, beyond your anguish, there are human hands that hold you and show you God’s faithful love. Henri Nouwen The inner voice of love
When you are overcome by self-doubt and self-criticism, the tiniest bit of understanding feels like a full body massage. Rohr, Richard. Job and the Mystery of Suffering
In the spiritual life it’s much more important to know how to listen than to know how to talk. Rohr, Richard. Job and the Mystery of Suffering
If how we feel each morning depends on whether people are nice to us, if we can’t be happy without outside approval, we’re not really happy or fundamentally free. Happiness is finally an inside job.We are too often “reeds swaying in the breeze” (Matt. 11:7), dependent moment by moment on others’ reaction and approval. This is the modern self: insubstantial, whimsical, totally dependent and calling itself “free.” Rohr, Richard. Job and the Mystery of Suffering
Questions to consider
What were some early childhood messages you received about worth and worthiness?
What is worth?
There is an Amando sparkle inside you. What would it be like for someone else to discover it and endorse its value?
Further reading
Photo by Priscilla Du Preez on Unsplash

Women need respect as much as men

When I feel respect, I feel valued, and I know I am loved.  Respect is about love. It is love in action. Women need respect as much as men.
In 2004 a book by Christian writer Dr. Emerson Eggerich was released.  It was Love & Respect: The Love She Most Desires; The Respect He Desperately Needs. The book became very popular in fundamentalist and evangelical church circles. Eggerich and his wife Sarah became big on the Christian speaking circuit in America, and any copies of the book were sold.
The book is built upon the theory that the “primary emotional needs” for men and women are that men need respect and women need love.
Just like they need air to breathe, apparently. Get this right, and a healthy marriage is sure to ensue, the author promises. 
When this book first came out, it featured at the Christian bookshop we frequently attended, and we bought it.  It seemed true enough.
Several years later, another couple at the church we were attending thought so too.  So much so that they purchased a carton of these books and made them available to whoever wanted a copy.
Whether the would-be reader could afford it or not, they graciously accepted whatever was paid or let the would-be reader have it for free. 
At the time, I remember that it was a topic that my husband certainly identified with.  He knew respect was a major issue for him, and I thought, what woman doesn’t just want to be loved?  
Roll on 10 or 15 years, and I’ve learned more.
Here I am now, in another town, in a new decade and with quite a different way of looking at life. As a result, I no longer agree with the premise of the book. In fact, I think it can be damaging to relationships and might even lead to abuse.
Women need respect as much as men.
One thing I’ve learned is that women need respect as much as men.  Indeed, we all need respect, and we’re all deserving of respect.  And it probably goes without saying that we all need love. It’s not a case of one or the other.
It has become abundantly clear in our present society that disrespect for women is rampant.
It’s probably always been there, covered over by societal norms and not spoken about out loud.   And maybe it’s the same for men, although the way to get it is not by asserting it must be given.  Demanding respect is not likely to get you what you are asking. It could even cause the opposite; disrespect.
What is disrespect?
What is disrespect?
Words and phrases like belittled, not valued, dismissed, not considered, not worthy of time, attention, money spent, snubbed, cast aside, overlooked, and offended all relate to disrespect. 
None of them in themselves truly incorporate that feeling nor do full justice to that awareness of being considered inferior and not worthy of even taking a little effort.  
Respect is often in the small things; it’s in the repeated things.
The stepping back to allow someone to go through the door first. Or holding said door open for me.
The please and thank-yous that we take for granted.  It’s even in those things that aren’t even noticed or regarded, considered so trivial not to be worthy of attention. 
The picking your dirty dishes up and putting them in the sink. Not leaving your belongings scattered around the house. 
Those seemingly little things are often not considered worthy of an attempt at change. 
Furthermore, disrespect is often noted in people from whom we would expect so much more. Partners, loved ones, children, and extended family; we can all be guilty of it.
Those professionals we pay large sums of money to who leave us sitting in their waiting rooms until they are good and ready and to the ones we engage in simple transactions who can’t be bothered to give eye contact.
The people we sit next to on public transport or drive past in our cars.  All are worthy of respect, and all are capable of giving respect.
What does disrespect actually feel like?
So, what does disrespect actually feel like?
I have been asked that question recently.  Now I have to dig deep to find the words.  We’re so used to brushing it aside. 
A shrug and ‘oh, it doesn’t matter.’
But, hold on – it does matter, and sometimes it gets through and gets under our skin.  Or builds up until we explode.  And even then, we quickly clean up and cover up our shame at being disrespected.
It’s not a nice feeling, what more can I say? It sucks, actually. 
Lately, as I’ve been doing my personal work and bravely opening up my heart to scrutiny, I’ve felt it.
In fact, recently, I was shocked by the level of fury and rage in me when confronted with several issues to do with lack of respect.
So I have dared myself to feel difficult feelings by taking out the self-judgment and criticism and extending compassion to myself the way I would to a friend.
I’ve learned to ‘sit with unbearable feelings’ and listen.  And I’ve been able to process it enough to find other words.
And then there is respect. 
And then there is respect—such a beautiful feeling.
One of those commonplace treasures in life that we often fail to see and thereby take for granted.
What does ‘being respected’ feel like? Again, it’s a tricky one to describe, but we know it when we experience it.  It’s somewhere in the being noticed, in the being acknowledged. 
It’s a feeling of I’m okay, maybe even more than that; they see my uniqueness and my individuality.  That person has seen me and has deemed me worthy of a little time, maybe just a second or two.
It goes on from there; it’s the person who seeks out my opinion, takes time to be with me; to really listen, who doesn’t interrupt or talk over me; they do want to know what I think.
The person who speaks highly of me.   It’s the kindness shown. Maybe they know that I’m tired and my back is aching; maybe they just want to be kind to me without reason.
It’s a good feeling, a good nourishing feeling.  ‘I’m okay, they’re okay,’ and the world isn’t just a bad place after all.  
When I feel respect, I feel valued, and I know I am loved.  Respect is about love. It is love in action. And we all need it.
Quotes to consider
I speak to everyone in the same way, whether he is the garbage man or president of the university.  Albert Einstein
Respect yourself, and others will respect you.  Confucious
Be beautiful if you can, wise if you want, but be respected – that is essential.  Anna Gould
Love without respect is dangerous; it can crush the other person, sometimes literally. To respect is to understand that the other person is not you, not an extension of you, not a reflection of you, not your toy, not your pet, not your product. In a relationship of respect, your task is to understand the other person as a unique individual and learn how to mesh your needs with his or hers and help that person achieve what he or she wants to achieve. Your task is not to control the other person or try to change him or her in a direction that you desire but he or she does not. I think this applies as much to parent-child relationships as to husband-wife relationships. Love is not all you need, nor all your wife or husband needs, and certainly not all your children need. We all need respect, especially from those who are closest and most intimately connected with us. Peter Gray PhD
Questions to answer
When did you last feel respected/disrespected? What did it feel like?
Is it true that respect has to be earned?  Why or why not?
Do people need to be deserving of respect to gain our respect?
Further reading
 
By Susanna WarnerSusanna lives on a small farm in Central Victoria, Australia, where she and her husband have 3 alpacas and a small flock of black-faced Suffolk ewes.
These days she has a bit more time to reflect on her decades as a Registered Nurse, and Mental Health Nurse and her many encounters with people struggling with inner health and how applying healthy spiritual concepts can help.
She enjoys writing and putting her musings into words and hopes these will help hurting hearts.
Photo by Axel Vazquez on Unsplash

It’s the Words You Say that will Steer your life

Their life was like a ship heading for the rocks, but with new words and affirmations, the ship slowly began to steer in a new direction. Thoughts change when we take charge.
‘Bitch.’
That was the word on the pendant necklace hanging around her neck. I was visiting her at her temporary home. Temporary because this was the psych ward.
She was in there because she wanted to kill herself.
I wondered if any of the psychiatrists and mental health people would challenge her on the words that hung around her neck. I hoped so.
Then again, we live in such a politically correct, super sensitive, non-directive world that maybe no one would say a thing.
I told her that she wasn’t a bitch, and having that word hung around her neck was having a corrosive effect on her soul.
Every day she had it around her neck. It reinforced a thinking track, a rut, a groove. Every day that path got deeper and deeper.
The power of a word to steer
What’s a word that has been worked and ruminated into your subconscious?
Maybe it’s a word that was spoken at you from a very young age, and you have adopted it as your own: parents, siblings, schoolyard bullies, to name but a few options with cursing tongues.
Then you have nurtured that little word, kept repeating it, and every time you made a mistake or stumbled, it confirmed the ‘truth’ of that word for you.
Then you added a few other words. The super-powerful words of ‘I am.’
You created an affirmation. You were firming up the word to be part of your identity.
I am stupid
I am a bitch
I am an idiot
I am a failure
I am a fool
I am a _____ (name your poisoned words)
It’s those little words that we probably don’t say out loud, but instead, we whisper them in our souls.
We have done this all our lives, and now they are so ingrained that they feel like facts.
Affirmations of truth
He was so secure in his identity that he was rock solid. He was and is the great ‘I am.’
What Jesus said about himself
‘I am the bread of life.’John 6:35
‘I am the way.’ John 14:6
‘I am the truth.’ John 14:6
‘I am the life.’ John 14:6
‘I am the vine.’ John 15:1
‘I am the good shepherd.’ John 10:11
‘I am the door.’  John 10:9
‘I am the resurrection and the life.’  John 11:25
Jesus knew himself. His identity was secure, and it rattled the world.
Jesus knew his identity and shared it to reassure us about the invite he offers to us.
We have a door we can go through, a shepherd to follow, a vine to draw from, a light to shed on our path, a hope, and a future, a daily bread to be nourished from.
Jesus didn’t need to use affirmations to firm us his identity, but we need to. We doubt and get storm-tossed. Our brain is not perfect.
We are in transformation mode.
Do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your minds. Romans 12:2
I need to keep telling myself my truest God-granted identity.
The disputing word ‘Yet.’
Some words in our English language act like a pivot, a hinge, a turning point. They offer a change in direction.
Words such as ‘and’ and ‘but.’
I think one other is the word ‘yet.’ It is a conjunction.
‘Yet’ says ‘I know how this is at the moment, but I will look at things differently, choose a different path.’
It’s a word that can be used to dispute our current thinking track. To challenge our beliefs and feelings, and thoughts with alternatives.
That is the way it was used by a guy called Habakkuk
Though the fig tree does not bud    and there are no grapes on the vines,though the olive crop fails    and the fields produce no food,though there are no sheep in the pen    and no cattle in the stalls,yet I will rejoice in the Lord,    I will be joyful in God my Savior. Habakkuk 3:17-18
I want to dispute the struggle I am in with the larger story of God’s eternal goodness to me.
Life can be tough – fig trees not budding, no grapes, olive crops failing, failures in the field, and the sheep pen and cattle stalls empty – yet I am going to still trust.
There is a larger story going on. One that I’m not fully aware of but I am part of.
When I use the word ‘yet,’ it is a choice to take the road less traveled.
It’s easy to travel down the road of ‘I am stupid’ because I have done it all my life. It’s familiar, comfortable, well worn, but it will always take me to the same old place.
The road less traveled requires a ‘Yet I will’ siding against my old familiar thinking tracks. To steer into a new direction.
It’s going to feel awkward, strange, a ‘waste of time.’ There will be a resistance you run into as you push against the gravity of the stinky thinky.
From ‘Bitch’ to ‘Blessed’
I wonder what would have happened in the woman I mentioned earlier if she had taken the ‘Bitch’ pendant off and replaced it with a ‘Blessed’ pendant.
That every time she had feelings and thoughts of being a bitch, she would have disputed the lies.
‘I know that my thoughts and feelings of being a bitch come from an old life, yet I am telling myself the truth that I am blessed.’
We have to take responsibility for the thinking paths we travel along.
Daily I am affirming Gods firming words about me into my thinking. This flows into my actions.
Steering the ship of your thoughts
Imagine yourself standing behind the helm or steering wheel of a huge old sailing ship.
You control this huge ship, and the captain says to come around to bearing 185 degrees.
You look down to the compass and slowly turn the huge wheel in a new direction. Ropes move under the deck, and the rudder alters and changes.
There is resistance against the change. Push back. You have to keep hold and steer that wheel in that new direction. Even more so when there is a storm around you.
After a little while, the ship moves in this new direction that you have set.
Changing your life takes time.
That old ship of your life takes time to come around to your new direction. You hold the wheel against the resistance of all your previous thinking courses.
It’s you taking responsibility for you.
It’s building a thinking compass that will hold and steer you to a new and better course.
Are you like a ship heading for the rocks?
Maybe you want to change direction, feel the pull to a new course.
With new words and affirmations, your ship will slowly begin to steer in a new direction. Thoughts change when we take charge.
Quotes to consider
The brain is like Velcro for negative experiences, but Teflon for positive ones. [This] shades “implicit memory” – your underlying expectations, beliefs, action strategies, and mood – in an increasingly negative direction. Rick Hanson
Believing all of my emotions is the shortest way into the loop of insanity. First the truth, then faith in the truth, then the feelings will come around.  David Riddell
In order to oppose the influence and direction of one’s old feelings, a rational mind first needs a very good reason. Without truth to reassure, change isn’t possible. David Riddell
It’s not enough to simply read the truth, it must be allowed to ‘sink in.’ If truth doesn’t saturate, change remains cosmetic. David Riddell
The truth will set you free to enter heaven, but first, it will hurt like hell. First the pain, then the gain. First the death, then the resurrection. David Riddell
Don’t try to dispel a wrong belief. Rather displace it with a better insight. It’s only the truth that can set us free. David Riddell
If you only tolerate ideas that agree with your existing beliefs, how will you ever discover new truth or identify your own blind spots? David Riddell
To achieve radical change, I need to call some of my feelings ‘liars’ and choose to side with the truth against my own emotions until my feelings come around. David Riddell
Your mistaken beliefs are your real enemy and will continue to cause you pain until you find and embrace the needed truth. David Riddell
In order to oppose the influence and direction of one’s old feelings, a rational mind first needs a very good reason. Without truth to reassure, change isn’t possible. David Riddell
Your concept of yourself can oppose God’s ability to help you. He cannot violate it to change you without raping your identity. Eventually, we must go to Him to discover who we are. David Riddell
Give yourself the identity you actually aspire to, not the identity you automatically adopted before you were old enough to know better, then ‘fake it ’till you make it. David Riddell
Questions to consider
Have you got a word that you repeatedly say to yourself that needs to go? What would be a better, more truthful word that you could replace it with?
How can you incorporate the word ‘Yet’ into your daily thinking and prayer life?
Steering the ship of your life takes focused and purposeful effort. What is a simple daily affirmation that you can speak to yourself that will shift the rudder and move your life?
Further reading
No More Lies. Stay Grounded in Reality
You’re Not a Problem. It’s Not Who You Are
Barry Pearman
Photo by Maximilian Weisbecker on Unsplash

When The Little One Stumbles

We have all been a little one, a child, and we stumble, but we can grow from the stumbles, and we can learn new truth and find new hope.
I’ve heard many stories of abuse, but some of the worst are when subtle little lies have, with organized precision, been sewn into a child’s life. It’s evil.
Knowing the vulnerability of a child’s mind to learning and absorbing new information and behaviors, someone has, with malicious intent, corrupted a mind made in the image of God. Those lies take root and grow into deformed thinking and behaviors far from God’s intended delight.
I’ve seen adults with low IQ, intellectually challenged and disabled, being taken advantage of because of their child-like naivety. It was repugnant and evil. I called the Police, but nothing could be done.
Then there is another kind of abuse—the one where the child receives messages from another hurting human. Hurt people hurt people. The child hears the messages – verbal and non-verbal and believes them as truth.
Words that couldn’t be taken back and words that dug deep into the soul of that little child.
A thinking track is laid down in the child’s mind. A small little tiny microscopic pathway, and then the next day, another abuse is added to the brain.
This neurological pathway in the brain is gaining strength. That soft, malleable brain takes its cues from the environment around it and shapes its pathways according to what it’s been told.
Stumbling blocks and Millstones
When the followers of Jesus wanted to know who was the greatest, the one who got the pride of place position at the table, Jesus turned their earthly kingdom thoughts of achievement upside down. He still does.
At that time the disciples came to Jesus and asked, “Who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?” He called a child, whom he put among them, and said, “Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.
Whoever becomes humble like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. Whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me.
“If any of you put a stumbling block before one of these little ones who believe in me, it would be better for you if a great millstone were fastened around your neck and you were drowned in the depth of the sea.
Woe to the world because of stumbling blocks!
Occasions for stumbling are bound to come, but woe to the one by whom the stumbling block comes! Matthew 18:1-7
Everyone one of us has taken a stumble. Jesus said they ‘are bound to come.’
My little two-year-old granddaughter took a nasty fall the other day and hurt her head. She was playing on a small plastic slide and fell from the top of the slide onto the floor.
She was crying, and her parents comforted her. After a little while, she got back up and quietly got back into life.
I wonder what she learned? Maybe that this world is not as safe as she once thought it was.
My daughter and her husband didn’t maliciously set up the slide with the intent of her falling. It was an accident, but they felt bad for what had happened. They could have prevented it by not having a slide, not allowing her to try new things.
Wrapping people in cotton wool chokes out the discovery of life.
That delightful two old will have many other stumbles in her life, but woe to anyone who sets out to cause her to stumble.
Where has the little one stumbled
I think we all have stumbled and fallen. Something has tripped us up. Hopefully not with malicious intent, but we have all tripped up in our thinking somewhere along the line.
We heard one thing and interpreted it possibly in a manner that it wasn’t intended to be understood, especially by God.  We have interpreted the experience in the most obvious childlike way.
Children are excellent recorders of their experiences but poor interpreters. David Riddell
Some time ago, I watched a teacher berate a child within their care. It was, to be blunt, a shaming exercise and spoke more about the angry world within the teacher’s thinking than about the slight misdemeanor of the child.
But I wonder if the child took the abuse to heart, whether it added on top of any other experiences of being told they stupid.
We all have bad hair days, but we need to be aware that explosions spill over to others and trigger responses in them.
Willing to become a little one
If there is a consistent barrier that I have come across in helping people, it is the resistance to becoming like a child and examining and reinterpreting early life experiences in the light of God’s truth about us.
I think it has something to do with not wanting to admit to ourselves and others that we got it wrong. Or that someone has wronged us.
We would much rather fix the now, but those earliest conclusions will echo and ghost us until we give them a reason for them not to be around. This requires self-examination, work, the forgiveness of self and others, and being open to new truth.
It might mean we come face to face with how we have acted out of our own hurt, which has meant hurt for others. It might mean being honest with our own failings, not just on a surface level but on a level where we feel deep shame and guilt. As I say, it might just mean learning to forgive and have self-compassion.
Jesus said we have to become humble like a child.
Starting over as a little one
I would love to have a time machine to go back to certain times in my life where I stumbled in my thinking.
Where I misinterpreted what happened as a child and put a negative twist on something, and I started developing a thinking track that got deeper and deeper, stronger and stronger.
I want to become like a child again. To have my brain be like a sponge that is open and ready for the truth. I want to be a child in the presence of Jesus, the lover of children. Perhaps Jesus would talk about the many places where the stumbles happened, and seeds were sown into the thinking.
Becoming like a little child – simple, open, soft, and malleable. It’s being open to thinking differently about life. It’s seeing that some of your core beliefs were founded on stumbling moments. Moments that need a new understanding.
Just as when you were a little child, and you interpreted an event in a certain that led you off in a certain thinking track, it’s now time to interpret similar feeling events with new insights.
Rehearsing the truth
Children rehearse things until they get them right. They take a few steps and fall. Crawl a while; then they try again. That brain is laying out a new fiber network. They get back up on their feet and try to walk again. They practice and practice until they walk freely and easily. None of that crawling business anymore.
A child wants to learn to play the guitar. A few basic chords, a strum, and many repeated experiences can play a simple song. Eventually, with enough work and effort, they can play complex tunes.
What are the words you have been rehearsing through the network of your brain from an early age?
Your thinking compass
One of the ways I think Spirit (Holy) does this is that we are brought to places where the invite is given to explore our inner dialogue and story.
Our life gets interrupted by an event. It could be a sentence we hear, a quote, a verse of scripture, something someone says to us, a trauma.
If you’re listening, – Let anyone with ears listen!  ( listening is a spiritual practice), then you will learn to hear the whispers of Spirit saying, ‘This is for you.’
You take that seed of truth, and you nourish it, meditate on it, and grow it into your thinking. It becomes an antidote to the thinking that you stumbled over as a child.
You build it into your daily meditative life.
I have an audio version of my thinking compass that I listen to every day.
I am slowly and surely rewiring my brain. Removing the stumbling blocks and seeing my path clearer and cleaner than ever before.
Learning how to do this is part of my Dig Yourself Out of the Hole course
Stop the stumble
Do you keep stumbling over the same old tripping hazards?
Perhaps it’s time for you to pray and ask Spirit to illuminate your path, to point out the old ways that need new roadworks. It’s work, but it’s good work.
Quotes to consider
The daily debrief around the dinner table can prevent wrong conclusions taking root in a child’s heart. David Riddell
Children can grow into their labels. Distinguish between their worth, and their behavior when rebuke is called for. David Riddell
Labeling children is the most natural thing in the world. It is also the most destructive as the child grows into the label. How does ‘idiot’ help a child to think more clearly? David Riddell
Questions to answer
Where have you stumbled in your thinking?
What rises up in you when you see someone being lead astray or having stumbling blocks and trip hazards put in their way?
Why is there a resistance to becoming like a little one?
Further reading
Barry Pearman
Photo by Jonathan Weiss on Unsplash

When the Lesser Dreams get Shattered

It was a dream, but now it was shattered. Perhaps a new dream was to be discovered, and so we dug deep into what truly mattered.
It was happening again. The dream was being shattered. The marriage was over, the pregnancy test was negative, a redundancy letter handed out, and unemployment was on the horizon. There, in the most honest place of the soul, was a loss of spirit, drive, beauty.
A few years ago, an acquaintance opened up a cheery conversation with me by saying the words ‘Living the dream?’. After some paused consideration, I humorously said, ‘Sometimes, and then at other times, it feels like I am walking a nightmare.’
Live life honestly, and you know that dreams get shattered.
Shattered
Shattered is an interesting word.
I think of a window and how a single little stone can hit the hard beautiful transparent surface and create a crack, then another crack, and then a thousand cracks spread from this impact point.
The glass loses its structural integrity; it bends and flexes and then crashes to the floor. A thousand million fragments of what was once oneness.
It’s gone, never to be seen again—a mess to be cleaned up somehow.
Grief, loss, mourning, anger, all appropriate and needed if we want to glean something good out of the shards and micro-glass dust.
Building your house of lower dreams
Jesus once told an interesting story of two house builders. Both had a dream home they were building. It was going to be their place of security, warmth, and investment. Their house expressed a personal signature about themselves. This was the house of Mary, and this was the house of Tom.
The big difference, though, was what the houses were built on. One house was built on sand, and the other was constructed on rock.
Jesus said it this way.
If you work these words into your life, you are like a smart carpenter who built his house on solid rock. Rain poured down, the river flooded, a tornado hit—but nothing moved that house. It was fixed to the rock.
“But if you just use my words in Bible studies and don’t work them into your life, you are like a stupid carpenter who built his house on the sandy beach. When a storm rolled in, and the waves came up, it collapsed like a house of cards.” Matthew 7:24-27
I have dreams for a better life than I have now.
A life where things go perfectly well. Great marriage, happy children, good income, fulfillment, acknowledgment, etc
I build my life around these dreams. I set goals,  work hard, read, manipulate, control and try to make things work the way I want them to.
I am building my house of cards, and actually, to be honest, it’s ugly.
Yes, it’s functional, acceptable to others, normal, boring, but there’s truly nothing of supernatural glory.
Then a storm begins to build. They always do. Rains beat down, and floodwaters rise, and the strength of that which I have built my little house on begins to be exposed.
The sand grains of collected foolishness begin to lose any sense of energized connection.
Dissolving away, I am exposed as a naked Adam and Eve. I try to cover up my vitals. Hands rush to hide.
Dreams shattered can leave us feeling shamed and exposed.
‘I was such a fool ever to trust again.’‘Why did I ever do that?’
Rock-solid dreams
In Larry Crabb’s book Shattered Dreams: God’s Unexpected Path to Joy, he writes this.
‘Through the pain of shattered lower dreams, we wake up to the realization that we want an encounter with God more than we want the blessings of life. And that begins a revolution in our lives.’ Larry Crabb 
You’re going to have dreams shattered. Your hopes will be hulled out.
Disappointment has unknown scheduled an appointment with you.
The ‘flower-strewn pathway’ has thorny roses, stinging wasps, invasive weeds, and moss slippery paving stones.
What I want more of
I was in a good conversation the other day.  It was rich with words and deep connection. We shared life.
The person I was listening to was sharing something of her life and struggles. She wanted to be heard. Something within her needed to be known and explored.
A few days later, she opened up even more and told me about her life as a child in a poor rural community. She was rich in experiences and how struggle had shaped her identity.
She had her share of shattered lesser dreams but now was growing in deeper dreams.
I have dreams of having deeper, richer conversations with people I care about. That’s a higher dream. One that excites me.
Beware of the dream merchant.
A dream merchant has probably conned you. I have been. They sell you a dream.
Here’s a definition I found.
A person, [such] as a moviemaker or advertiser, who panders to or seeks to develop the public’s craving for luxury, romance, or escapism.
I think that’s a bit too narrow, but it captures something of the essence of these spin merchants.
Essentially a dream merchant sells you a dream. It’s the promise of a better life if you do this or that. It’s the ‘promise in the year of election’ (U2 – Desire)
In the church world, it can be
a preacher passing out prosperity pills
healing hype and whipped up worship
studying the Bible for more knowledge but little knowing
told that attendance is next to godliness
formulas for a better marriage, family life, business
It’s building up a personal theology of believing God’s blessing (however you and the dream merchant define it) is just around the corner if you just do this and that. No faith, no mystery, just mechanics.
I taste heaven when I am in rich conversation with at least one other.
Put first things first and we get second things thrown in: put second things first and we lose both first and second things. C.S. Lewis
Have you placed a second thing in a first place?
In practice
I’m currently creating a short course called ‘Dig yourself out of the hole.
Turning the Page attracts a lot of traffic from people in desperate situations.
They come looking for help related to the dark holes of depression. They’re suicidal. They come, read a few pages, then they’re gone. I hope and pray that something from the website helps them.
But I want to do more. I have so much more to share and help that I believe can help them out of their hole.
There is a dream merchant within me that fills me with dreams of helping thousands of people, making lots of money out of this ‘Pay what you want’ course, and changing the world!
That’s a second thing that my dream merchant wants to make a first thing. It’s a dream that’s lining up to be shattered.
Then there is another dream merchant, a poor but wise one (Ecclesiastes 9:13-16), that says do it for one and leave everything else up to God.
If my listening intent is on the dream merchant selling me fame and glory, I will lose focus on the wisdom offered through the discernment of the poor but wise dream merchant.
Ten lepers got healed by Jesus Luke 17:11-19, and only one connected to a greater story. The others had their lesser dreams fulfilled, one taped into something greater.
Some dreams need to be shattered, and I pray that God will smash any dreams that are not connected to God’s greater good for me.
Post shattered dreams
You’ve had dreams shattered. Things haven’t worked out the way you planned or hoped for.
How did you respond after the dream shattered into a million fragments?
Anger? Disappointment? Loss of trust in yourself, others, God?
Perhaps a ‘shaking of the fist’ at God?
Maybe a ‘dust yourself off’ attitude and then throwing yourself back into the fight.
Can I suggest that you ask yourself some deeply reflective questions?
What is truly a ‘first thing’ for you?
What are the ‘second things’?
What were the deepest desires hidden under the dream that you held so dear?
Who are the dream merchants you have been listening to?
What dreams do you need to quietly relinquish a tight grasp of?
What might come back to you if you simply let the ‘second things’ go and fly free?
What is a dream that can only be received via some sort of supernatural God intervention?
Some dreams need to shatter to allow other dreams to come into view.
Quotes to consider
Supernatural goals need supernatural resources. Dr. Larry Crabb
The greatest blessing is no longer the blessing of a good life. It never was. It is now the blessing of an encounter with God. It always has been. Larry Crabb Shattered Dreams
Our shattered dreams are never random. They are always a piece in a larger puzzle, a chapter in a larger story. Pain is a tragedy. But it’s never only a tragedy. For the Christian, it’s always a necessary mile on the long journey to joy. Larry Crabb Shattered Dreams
Questions to consider
What dreams have been shattered for you?
What did you learn from those experiences?
How would you sit and support someone going through a shattered dream experience?
Further reading
Heart-Shattered Lives don’t for a Moment Escape God’s Notice
The God Who Enters My Shame
Barry Pearman
Photo by Jose Francisco Morales on Unsplash