awareness

Lent 2022: Underneath the anger

March 4, 2022 — 1 Comment

The art of removing my armor and laying down my defenses requires that I first acknowledge and maybe even allow myself to experience the anger of being hurt/attacked. Even if that’s not anyone’s intention, and I want to believe it’s often not, my perception can overpower reality. Perception can become reality.

So then first, allow for the anger. I can’t run from it, I cannot pretend it’s not brewing and written all over my brows. I cannot ignore my anger. And it too shall pass when I’m too spent from living in that. And after the exhaustion and after a peek into another way of seeing the world, then, there’s a chance for something softer.

Then in my breath, I see my fallibility and tendency to push others then. Then I can see my survival tactics. Then I can see my fear that, if I don’t stand for myself, no one else will! That’s the lie: that we are alone and no one has our back. That’s the lie that’s been passed down from the beginning of time: that we must fend for ourselves because no one has a plan for us otherwise. That’s the lie I’m trying to let go.

In seeing how I have wronged when I feel wronged and when I have offended in my defending, then I can forgive myself and if necessary, ask for forgiveness. The latter is hard and I suck at it. The former is harder, and I overcompensate by doing more, working harder.

Maybe I’m best when I’m too exhausted to defend myself while at the same time, wise and compassionate enough to see everyone around me is just simply scared as well. We are all scared; now who acts out of love still, is the bravest of us all.

Living by Flesh

January 25, 2021 — Leave a comment

As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins, in which you used to live when you followed this world and of the ruler of the kingdom of air, the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient. All of us also lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our flesh and following its desires and thoughts. Like the rest, we were by nature deserving of wrath.

Ephesians 2:1-2

Building on Ephesians 1, we have to keep in mind God’s purpose: unity of heaven and Earth, unity of Jesus and the church, unity of head and body. This sense of connection and alignment must be the guide for parts of the Bible that mention words like flesh and body. The trap is to create a separation — flesh is bad and mind is good — a binary way of understanding that is engrained in humanity. With this in mind, I can see the above passage with more softness and compassion.

Zooming in on…to follow the ways of this world and of the ruler of the kingdom of the air…gratifying the cravings of our flesh and following its desires and thoughts. To follow the ways of this world is to not live from a place of connection and unity where we tend to forget our purpose and how redemption. To follow the ruler of the kingdom of the air is to live creating fleeting results. And the mention of flesh here is a flesh that is again, disconnected with that divine hope and reality. That flesh and its desires and thoughts do not lead to unity and connection.

This passage is not to neglect our flesh and its desires. This reductive way of understanding God’s word has created so much harm. This is how shame and stigma have over and over again penetrate the church. This is why overarching rules and structures created from fear, white supremacy and patriarchy have been upheld, while faithful moment to moment living where each human has their agency is tossed aside. God does not want us to neglect our flesh and its desires. He gave us flesh, a living and breathing part of us, as an extension of the divine on earth and as a landscape to demonstrate unity and connection. It is how we use the flesh and why and for what reasons. This is where its gratification can do more harm than health. All of us chose this way of living once upon a time, and some of us now, simply have the awareness that there is another way.

Choosing Love

January 4, 2021 — 1 Comment

If I speak in the tongues of men or of angels, but do not have love, I am only a resounding gong or a clanging cymbal. If I have the gift of prophecy and can fathom all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have a faith that can move mountains, but do not love, I am nothing. If I give all I possess to the poor and give over my body to hardship that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing.

1 Corinthians 13:1-3

Love takes off masks that we fear we cannot live without and know we cannot live within.

James Baldwin

We can have the power and purpose to impact people and the world, but without love, the barrier between humans remains and the connection that enables change cannot be formed. Love is what breaks down our defenses and armors so that we can actually be close enough to each other to see and know each other. Love translates our unique actions into the unique language our recipients can understand. Love removes fear so that play, innocence and leaps of faith can exist. Love removes the fear of not being enough, the fear of being seen and potentially rejected, the fear of doing it wrong, (as if there’s actually something such as doing it right), the fear that that where we are right now is off. Where you are right now reveals the insecurities, the heartaches and challenges that are building up your mask. With that awareness, you can have agency to choose love instead.

Choose love? That’s choosing your unchangeable worth and uniqueness ordained by God above all else. Choosing love is to see yourself the way God sees you — divine, done on purpose and delightful. Out of this knowing and love, we then break these manmade prisons that keep us separate and weary of each other. In this freedom, we then communicate, prophesy, perform miracles, give generously and endure all waves. Only when we recognize our own freedom and live into it can we seek to free others. That is our greatest calling: to usher others into their wholeness and freedom. To point people back to their Garden of Eden.

If you continue on in 1 Corinthians, you will find what love is. When you are not living in those — patience, kindness, opposite of envy, humility, and so forth — you are not in love. Will you dare to ask yourself why you are not living in and out of love? What mindset of comparison are you in? What unhealthy narratives are you imprisoned by? Where are you not believing God’s divine touch and making of you? Press in. Press through. You will find love right there.

CBG: Reflection

April 19, 2020 — 1 Comment

O Lord, you have searched me and known me!
You know when I sit down and when I rise up; you discern my thoughts from afar.
You search out my path and my lying down and are acquainted with all my ways.
Even before a word is on my tongue, behold, O Lord, you know it altogether.
You hem me in, behind and before, and lay your hand upon me.
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Search me, O God, and know my heart!
Try me and know my thoughts!
And see if there be any grievous ways in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.

Psalm 139: 1-5, 23-24

Self-reflection and quiet meditation to hear God’s voice are courageous acts. It requires surrender. It acknowledges that you don’t have the full picture. It allows another to reflect who you are. When we have the right God — one who is kind, compassionate and ever-for-our-good — we learn to trust being seen. And if we are in consistent practice with God, it will overflow to our trust in being seen by humans. Take some time. Sit with the questions. And whatever form responses come is perfect.

  1. How have you been brave?
  2. Where has fear dictated how you acted?
  3. Who are you when you are quiet?
  4. Who do you want to become?
  5. What questions do you have for God?
  6. How do you want God to respond?

Psalms 6 – 9: oh Lord…how long?

January 11, 2020 — Leave a comment

The ache and the rejoice are neighbors. The desire for God and the anger of the world are complementary. The recounting of God’s presence and the feeling of God’s absence fuel each other. We live in this tension of want and have, of yes Lord and where are you Lord? Maybe there are no peaks and valleys, only journey in the present.

The presence and calling of God calls forth all our emotions. God forces us to self-reflect. The moment we want vengeance, we also see our own faults. We cannot see the speck in another without seeing the plank in ourselves. So what then? Have your say and have your feel. However end with trusting that God is sovereign and we are only responsible for doing our parts that are led by justice, righteousness, gratitude and wholehearted surrender.

God I pray for self-awareness in the stead of self-pity. I pray for vulnerability in the stead of bitterness and fear. God I pray for an overflow of trust in you even when I cannot see and cannot hear because when I recount where I am now, I know you have been with me till now. Amen.

George Saunders – Failures of kindness

July 28, 2019 — Leave a comment

What I regret most in my life are failures of kindness.

It’s hard to put kindness in a box, yet when you’re in the presence of it, you feel it. Some people are naturally kind — what is it? This generosity of spirit? The authenticity of presence? This lack of sauntering their own ego? Their insistence on others’ well-being? All that is part of it. It’s hard to define kindness, yet when you experience it, it transforms you. You too want to be kinder. You feel a little lighter. You feel more capable of being you, nothing more. Being open to kindness is hard because it breaks your insecurities and propensity for evil down. Being open to kindness begins a journey of our own lack towards our true worth. I want to open to kindness. I am open to kindness. It’s my first openness to it that can lead me to my own kindness to others. We love because God first loved us. I am loved. I am love. I can love. I choose to love. I am kind. I choose to be kind. Let us experience heaven here.

Day 34: Touch & taste & all the feels

January 19, 2019 — Leave a comment

Leviticus 14-15; Psalm 34

Did you know that if you lost your sense of smell, food wouldn’t taste as food? Why do you hold your breath when you need to take medicine? You don’t taste it as much! All our senses work together to holistically take in the thing at our attention. Do we experience God like that? With our feelings, our body, our thoughts, our purpose, our everything? Can you feel God’s goodness? Can you see it? Does God overtake your senses? How do we allow for that? How can we be open to this kind of depth of encounter?

1. An openness for it. A belief that it is possible to experience God to depths that make you forget yourself.

2. Awareness and sensitivity. If we look and pay attention, all the signs are around us!

3. Letting go and allowing for what good means to evolve. A faith and a benefit of the doubt perception of a God who loves.

Taste and see and feel and hear and hold and embrace and surrender to and smell and grab the goodness of God. It’s big and you have a seat at the table.

Day 33: What goes in must come out

January 18, 2019 — Leave a comment

Leviticus 11-13; Psalm 33

There is nothing wrong with a kid who plays in mud and gets dirty. It’s normal. It happens to all kids who play in mud. It might even be a little cute. Until that muddy kid wants to jump right into your fluffy white comforter. Even the path he takes to get there — the muddy footsteps, the small handprints on the wall, The flinging of mud here and there — you get it, might get dirty. Being unclean isn’t wrong. It only becomes an issue when it comes in contact with something that reveals the uncleanliness by messing with what it comes in contact with, in a negative way. I don’t want a muddy white comforter.

Same with here. There’s nothing wrong with the unclean, unless it messes with the goodness of that around it. What makes us unclean is no longer eating this or that, but how we present ourselves. Do your speech and actions defile the good around you? Do your words negatively impact those who hear it? Does your silence and inaction harm those around you? Does your passionate unswerving speech condemn those around you? It is not what goes in that makes us unclean; it’s what comes out. But sometimes what goes in affects what comes out. If I eat a lot of garlic, my body smells like garlic. If I listen to the same kind of person talk, I might unintentionally quote them or phrase like them. Awareness!

So listen to your rap music, watch your Game of Thrones, read your romance Harlot novels, use your vibrator, eat your chips — I mean it. But if those things affect how you interact with those around you with less care, compassion and love, maybe reconsider? Is there a correlation? No judgment. Just curiosity and awareness that lead to potential change.