Wrinkled wisdom... If we pay attention and learn as we live, we can gain in wisdom. Freddie Lou Haworth has been one of my wrinkled wise women. She was the wife of Swan Haworth, a prominent Baptist pastor, and one of the most complete persons I have known.
As a young pastor’s wife, mother to small children, I needed her funny self revealing wisdom. She was as comfortable as an old slipper and as honest as a well lit mirror. When you visited her, she did not put on the Ritz or try to be anyone other than herself. Time spent with Freddy Lou was a treasure, a gift of grand proportions given freely from her loving heart. I learned how to cuss creatively from Freddy Lou, how to sit and be present to the person with you, how to take care of myself without guilt for having needs that seemed frivolous in comparison to all the world’s ills, how to laugh from the bottom up until laughter bubbled over the top of your soul. Two of the lessons I learned from her continue to influence my life daily.
The first lesson is the art of caring for myself, valuing myself as a one of a kind creation without guilt. Freddy Lou used to take one day a month off to go up on the mountain. Sometimes she literally traveled to a mountain but most often she used that image for a day off. After Swan and the children would leave in the morning, Freddy Lou took her time. She might crawl back in bed with her movie magazines (remember those?), her nail polish, turn the radio on and loll away the day. Shortly before the children were due home, she would dress and get their snacks ready, refreshed and ready for the workaday world again. Some days she might dress and walk downtown to window shop, eat lunch out alone, wander as the Spirit led. She had everyone trained so they knew not to be offended if they saw her downtown and she didn’t speak. They knew she was up on the mountain and not to be disturbed. She laughed as she told me about her mountain days and her laughter was the permission I needed to set time apart for myself to just rest, relax, be non-productive, renew my soul with some truly free time.
The second lesson from Freddy Lou was her gentle unflinching straightforward honesty about her life. She could speak of herself, her family, her life’s learning curve, mistakes and successes with equal clarity and forgiveness. She knew the power of acceptance of all that comes as we live, the good, the difficult, the painful, the joyful, and saw them as a piece of a whole. The good and the bad were the same for her, a part of being human, living in an imperfect world. Her ability to include others in all of her life, not just the pretty parts, taught me not to be afraid of the shadows in my own journey but to share them, accept them. Without Freddy Lou as my teacher, I could not write as I do about my own life and spiritual pilgrimage. It is indeed, all good.
And always there was laughter, giggles, sideways grins, smiles and belly laughs. You were ushered into the land of laughter when you spent time with Freddy Lou... laughter that healed, lifted you up, gave you tears of joy to replace tears of sorrow, and laughter that set you free to move out boldly into the life that was waiting for you. It was her spiritual gift. When I imagine God laughing, I hear Freddy Lou’s laughter in my heart and I think they must sound very much alike.
Freddy Lou knew the power of the ragged edges of life... the power to heal yourself and others as you shared your worn and frayed places... the power to move beyond struggle and pain to new life, to resurrection, by simply being all of who you are and then gracing life with laughter. I don’t know for sure but I suspect Jesus must have laughed out loud, a long soul satisfying belly laugh when he woke up from death, alive again, ready to see and be seen. I am pretty sure God laughed out loud during Creation. How else could we have animals like aardvarks and giraffes and pot bellied pigs and human beings unless God was laughing as we were coming into being? Freddy Lou understood life’s punch line and laughed along with God.
I want to let my ragged edges hang out and not be afraid for you to see them. I want to giggle and guffaw and grin. I want to listen for the echoes of a Joyful Creator in all the laughter around me. I want to be more like Freddy Lou (even though she told me to grow up and be more like myself). I want resurrection ragged edges caught up in peals of laughter at the wonder of it all. Please, Lord?
Friday, February 22, 2008
Wednesday, February 20, 2008
thorny grace
Here I am again, back to square one it feels like. Neurofeedback works for me but is not "sticking" this time. When the process works as it should, your brain is trained and will stay in focus for longer periods of time... stick in focused mode. For some reason I am not making that shift like I did before. Without a full scan of my brain there is no way to determine what is keeping me from being able to space my wiring sessions out. Those scans are expensive, not covered by insurance and not guaranteed to be definitive. So I am back to the pill possibilities again. Having tried all of the available drugs except for Adderal, I am reading and researching this possibility.
The realization again of the daily realities of living with ADD has been a kicker. Losing one more option that has helped in the past, having to work all the aids for ADD coping more intensively (exercise, coaching, list keeping, routine, concrete structure) is a difficult transition. I had so hoped for a kind of healing.
I am beginning to sympathize with the Apostle Paul and the thorn in his side. There is however, a crucial difference between Paul’s thorn and mine. His thorn was given to him to keep him from being too elated from the abundance of revelations given to him. 2 Corinthians 12:7 So far I have not noticed any elated abundant revelations, just occasional glimpses of light in darkness and unexpected joy in chance encounters with God.
The verses that follow Paul’s naming of his thorn will have to become my new pattern for living. "Three times I besought the Lord about this, that it should leave me; but he said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.’"
My thorn is a small sticker compared to others struggles, I know. Every day I teach I see young adults struggling to overcome brain damage from accidents and birth defects. They show up. They try hard. They fail. They get up and try again. Their courage and persistence amazes me. They grapple with acquiring skills I take for granted... reading, writing, feeding myself gracefully, articulate speech, combing my own hair, telling a joke, finding work. In their weakness is a strength that shows me sufficient grace.
So just for today, I will work my list, walk, pray, get ready for my Friday workshop, start working on the income tax, and hold fast hoping and looking for grace, for the signs of God’s power in my struggle. I will give thanks for my thorns knowing they will keep me humble and close to the Rose of Sharon. For today, it is enough.
The realization again of the daily realities of living with ADD has been a kicker. Losing one more option that has helped in the past, having to work all the aids for ADD coping more intensively (exercise, coaching, list keeping, routine, concrete structure) is a difficult transition. I had so hoped for a kind of healing.
I am beginning to sympathize with the Apostle Paul and the thorn in his side. There is however, a crucial difference between Paul’s thorn and mine. His thorn was given to him to keep him from being too elated from the abundance of revelations given to him. 2 Corinthians 12:7 So far I have not noticed any elated abundant revelations, just occasional glimpses of light in darkness and unexpected joy in chance encounters with God.
The verses that follow Paul’s naming of his thorn will have to become my new pattern for living. "Three times I besought the Lord about this, that it should leave me; but he said to me, ‘My grace is sufficient for you, for my power is made perfect in weakness.’"
My thorn is a small sticker compared to others struggles, I know. Every day I teach I see young adults struggling to overcome brain damage from accidents and birth defects. They show up. They try hard. They fail. They get up and try again. Their courage and persistence amazes me. They grapple with acquiring skills I take for granted... reading, writing, feeding myself gracefully, articulate speech, combing my own hair, telling a joke, finding work. In their weakness is a strength that shows me sufficient grace.
So just for today, I will work my list, walk, pray, get ready for my Friday workshop, start working on the income tax, and hold fast hoping and looking for grace, for the signs of God’s power in my struggle. I will give thanks for my thorns knowing they will keep me humble and close to the Rose of Sharon. For today, it is enough.
Tuesday, February 19, 2008
I am a holy invention...
The Wren from Carolina
Just now the wren from Carolina buzzed
through the neighbor’s hedge
a line of grace notes I couldn’t even write down
much less sing.
Now he lifts his chestnut colored throat
and delivers such a cantering praise–
for what?
For the early morning, the taste of the spider,
for his small cup of life
that he drinks from every day, knowing it will refill.
All things are inventions of holiness.
Some more rascally than others.
I’m on that list too,
though I don’t know exactly where.
But, every morning, there’s my own cup of gladness,
and there’s that wren in the hedge, above me, with his
blazing song. Mary Oliver
A sermon I heard awhile ago defined holiness as something you do, actions taken on behalf of those who cannot help themselves. It was the only definition of holiness offered that Sunday. I have been struggling with what has felt to me like a very narrow gate to holiness. This poem made my heart, like the wren, sing. Mary Oliver, the poet, has put in words what my heart knew but could not express.
All things are inventions of holiness and I am on that list just because I am, because I exist, because God made me. Holiness is not something you can acquire only by saintly acts although that is a part of becoming more holy, perhaps. Holiness is given to us as our birthright if we will but claim it. God speaks to Israel through Moses in Deuteronomy and says "For you are a people holy to the Lord your God." And in Romans we read we are "to present our bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God as our spiritual worship." We are holy because we are created in the image of the Holy One who called us into being. Our bodies, flesh and blood bodies, are seen as holy offerings to God. Some of us, as Mary Oliver pointed out, are more rascally than others but we are all still holy.
It may be that I need the assurance of my holy being because of my own insecurities. Maybe I am still struggling with "such a worm as I" theology. Maybe I really do believe we are saved through grace and not works... saved from becoming little gods in our own minds, out to save the world like the Lone Ranger and Tonto, saved from having to measure up to a standard of being holy that requires works as the only proof of true holiness.
Like the wren, I celebrate my own cup of gladness. I sing with joy for the holy within and without...my grace notes of thanksgiving for the grand and glorious gift of being and being holy. Lent reminds me that all of my life, all of who I am and who I am not, can be a sacrifice offered in holy hilarious humility. I am because God is. Because God is holy, I am holy. And I offer laughter and joy and my own rascally nature up to the One who brought us all into being. Perhaps God will break into cantering praise along with the wrens and me.
Just now the wren from Carolina buzzed
through the neighbor’s hedge
a line of grace notes I couldn’t even write down
much less sing.
Now he lifts his chestnut colored throat
and delivers such a cantering praise–
for what?
For the early morning, the taste of the spider,
for his small cup of life
that he drinks from every day, knowing it will refill.
All things are inventions of holiness.
Some more rascally than others.
I’m on that list too,
though I don’t know exactly where.
But, every morning, there’s my own cup of gladness,
and there’s that wren in the hedge, above me, with his
blazing song. Mary Oliver
A sermon I heard awhile ago defined holiness as something you do, actions taken on behalf of those who cannot help themselves. It was the only definition of holiness offered that Sunday. I have been struggling with what has felt to me like a very narrow gate to holiness. This poem made my heart, like the wren, sing. Mary Oliver, the poet, has put in words what my heart knew but could not express.
All things are inventions of holiness and I am on that list just because I am, because I exist, because God made me. Holiness is not something you can acquire only by saintly acts although that is a part of becoming more holy, perhaps. Holiness is given to us as our birthright if we will but claim it. God speaks to Israel through Moses in Deuteronomy and says "For you are a people holy to the Lord your God." And in Romans we read we are "to present our bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and acceptable to God as our spiritual worship." We are holy because we are created in the image of the Holy One who called us into being. Our bodies, flesh and blood bodies, are seen as holy offerings to God. Some of us, as Mary Oliver pointed out, are more rascally than others but we are all still holy.
It may be that I need the assurance of my holy being because of my own insecurities. Maybe I am still struggling with "such a worm as I" theology. Maybe I really do believe we are saved through grace and not works... saved from becoming little gods in our own minds, out to save the world like the Lone Ranger and Tonto, saved from having to measure up to a standard of being holy that requires works as the only proof of true holiness.
Like the wren, I celebrate my own cup of gladness. I sing with joy for the holy within and without...my grace notes of thanksgiving for the grand and glorious gift of being and being holy. Lent reminds me that all of my life, all of who I am and who I am not, can be a sacrifice offered in holy hilarious humility. I am because God is. Because God is holy, I am holy. And I offer laughter and joy and my own rascally nature up to the One who brought us all into being. Perhaps God will break into cantering praise along with the wrens and me.
Monday, February 18, 2008
Seesaw Living...
"If you are conservative and not somewhat liberal, you be too tight. If you are liberal and not somewhat conservative, you be too loose." Doctor Gilchrist, one of the African American preachers at the New Baptist Covenant, hooked us all with that pithy statement. It was a reminder that balance and perspective help keep us from sliding off the fulcrum of our seesaw lives.
As a person living with ADD, finding and keeping that balance point in my life is crucial, and difficult. My therapist keeps reminding me what comes naturally for the majority of our population will always be a struggle for me. The gift of my ADD’ness is creativity and single mindedness when my attention is engaged. The curse of my ADD’ness is my multitasking wandering around in the wilderness looking for a burning bush life leaves the daily busyness of life half tended. Simple tasks take on monumental importance when I feel overwhelmed with all that must be done. Long ago I learned I was not the chair of a committee type nor am I an organizer. I am full of ideas and vision. I can see what others cannot but I can’t set up a slide show so that you might see it, too.
Living as an out of sync person requires a great deal of grace and forgiveness as well as a clear sighted understanding of your own way of being in this world. It is frustrating to have to always work harder than others to get simple life tasks completed. The temptation is to be angry, see only the cracks in your own head, judge yourself by others standards and throw up your hands in defeat. Being a minority has never been easy.
One of my constant spiritual disciplines is to check my looseness and tightness. If I be loose, my creative juices are flowing and I can get a lot done, especially if it is something fresh and new. The danger in too much looseness is running amok with no structure or simple goals. If I be too tight, I can’t get started. I wander around and worry about what needs to be done and can’t get on with the doing of it in an orderly fashion. Somewhere in all this looseness and tightness is the balancing point, a place where I can be calm and creative and contributing to the work of living in this world. Often I can find that point of grace but have great difficulty living there.
When I try to imagine what this point of grace looks and feels like, I remember the waltz. To waltz is to rise up on the balls of your feet, arch your back slightly, lower your shoulders, relax into grace, feel the beat of the music and dance with your partner. The one-two-three-ness of the rhythm, the circling around the dance floor and your partner, the lilting movement of your feet and body, the wordless communication between the dancers as they slide gracefully around the dance floor... When I am able to let go and be in the moment of the dance without worrying about whether I am doing it right or not, my soul laughs in joy even if my feet are a little clumsy. I want to stay there in that moment, to live as a dancer who is able to change her steps to match whatever music is playing. It is so hard sometimes to see my dance as graceful when I feel so out of step with the orderly structured world.
"Thou hast turned for me my mourning into dancing; thou hast loosed my sackcloth and girded me with gladness that my soul may praise thee and not be silent. O Lord my God, I will give thanks to thee forever." I am created in the image of God and have a unique dance to offer to God in the overflowing gladness of my soul. Thanks be to God for all of us who are a little skewed and out of step. May our life dances bring joy to God and may we find peace in our own life’s choreography. I feel like a little waltz...
As a person living with ADD, finding and keeping that balance point in my life is crucial, and difficult. My therapist keeps reminding me what comes naturally for the majority of our population will always be a struggle for me. The gift of my ADD’ness is creativity and single mindedness when my attention is engaged. The curse of my ADD’ness is my multitasking wandering around in the wilderness looking for a burning bush life leaves the daily busyness of life half tended. Simple tasks take on monumental importance when I feel overwhelmed with all that must be done. Long ago I learned I was not the chair of a committee type nor am I an organizer. I am full of ideas and vision. I can see what others cannot but I can’t set up a slide show so that you might see it, too.
Living as an out of sync person requires a great deal of grace and forgiveness as well as a clear sighted understanding of your own way of being in this world. It is frustrating to have to always work harder than others to get simple life tasks completed. The temptation is to be angry, see only the cracks in your own head, judge yourself by others standards and throw up your hands in defeat. Being a minority has never been easy.
One of my constant spiritual disciplines is to check my looseness and tightness. If I be loose, my creative juices are flowing and I can get a lot done, especially if it is something fresh and new. The danger in too much looseness is running amok with no structure or simple goals. If I be too tight, I can’t get started. I wander around and worry about what needs to be done and can’t get on with the doing of it in an orderly fashion. Somewhere in all this looseness and tightness is the balancing point, a place where I can be calm and creative and contributing to the work of living in this world. Often I can find that point of grace but have great difficulty living there.
When I try to imagine what this point of grace looks and feels like, I remember the waltz. To waltz is to rise up on the balls of your feet, arch your back slightly, lower your shoulders, relax into grace, feel the beat of the music and dance with your partner. The one-two-three-ness of the rhythm, the circling around the dance floor and your partner, the lilting movement of your feet and body, the wordless communication between the dancers as they slide gracefully around the dance floor... When I am able to let go and be in the moment of the dance without worrying about whether I am doing it right or not, my soul laughs in joy even if my feet are a little clumsy. I want to stay there in that moment, to live as a dancer who is able to change her steps to match whatever music is playing. It is so hard sometimes to see my dance as graceful when I feel so out of step with the orderly structured world.
"Thou hast turned for me my mourning into dancing; thou hast loosed my sackcloth and girded me with gladness that my soul may praise thee and not be silent. O Lord my God, I will give thanks to thee forever." I am created in the image of God and have a unique dance to offer to God in the overflowing gladness of my soul. Thanks be to God for all of us who are a little skewed and out of step. May our life dances bring joy to God and may we find peace in our own life’s choreography. I feel like a little waltz...
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