What we worship

I’ve been reading and pondering a really fantastic new book by Peter Rollins called The Idolatry of God: Breaking Our Addiction to Certainty and Satisfaction. It’s an excellent book, and it’s really challenging me to think (in a good way) about a lot of things.

One of those things is taking a hard look at what an idol really is, how we worship idols, and which idols show up in my own life. I’m discovering that idols don’t always look like I expect them to and that I am not always consciously aware of what I worship.

Practicing self-care

“Secret of Adulthood: If I want to ask a lot of myself, I need to give a lot to myself.” ~Gretchen Rubin

Gretchen Rubin of The Happiness Project frequently shares her Secrets of Adulthood on her blog and on Twitter. These are things she’s learned over the years about how life works. The one posted above is one I encountered today on her Twitter feed.

Like many of her Secrets of Adulthood, it sounds rather obvious, but it’s something that I don’t do very well at living into. I tend to expect a lot of myself but think that it’s selfish to give anything to myself. The problem is that when I don’t fill my own tank, I have nothing to give to others. Therefore, I continually disappoint others and myself with my inability to do what is expected of me.

The energy to seem normal

“Nobody realizes that some people expend tremendous energy merely to be normal.” ~Albert Camus

I’ve run across this quote numerous times; the most recent was from a friend who posted it on Twitter with the hashtag #depression. It fits well with my experience of what depression is like.

The simple tasks and activities that most people take for granted as “normal” become tremendously hard work. Whether it’s meeting people for lunch or keeping the house clean or cooking dinner or running errands, these every day activities suddenly seem to take more energy than I have to give.

Itching to weed

“One of the clearest signals that something healthy is afoot is the impulse to weed out, sort through, and discard old belongings.” ~Julia Cameron

If Julia Cameron is right, there must be something very healthy afoot in my life right now. I have been positively itchy lately to go through and get rid of things. It’s on my mind all the time, and I’m driven to keep it going.

Living inside hope

“Here’s what I’ve decided: the very least you can do in your life is figure out what you hope for. And the most you can do is live inside that hope. Not admire it from a distance but live right in it, under its roof. What I want is so simple I almost can’t say it: elementary kindness. Enough to eat, enough to go around. The possibility that kids might one day grow up to be neither the destroyers nor the destroyed. That’s about it. Right now I’m living in that hope, running down its hallways and touching the walls on both sides. I can’t tell you how good it feels.” ~Barbara Kingsolver

I’ve written several times about my struggles with hope, the way that I resist it, the way that it survives deep inside even when I think I’ve sacrificed it, the way it rises from its own ashes. For me, hope has long been both a painful struggle and a necessity, and the attempt to integrate those two aspects of it has not been a smooth road by any means.

Finding common ground

“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

I spent some time with a newer friend today and had the pleasure of discovering several things that we share in common, from interests, to authors we enjoy, to patterns of reacting, to writing styles. It reminded me of just how powerful it is to discover a point of commonality with another person, a discovery that becomes more powerful the more rare the point of commonality is.

These moments of connection remind us that we are not alone. They bring reassurance that all of our quirks fall within the natural variety that makes up the human race, and that we are not broken or defective for being as we are. They bring the pleasure of finding someone to share our interests, hobbies, and activities with who will value them as we do. These moments whisper the reassurance that we belong to those corners of our souls that fear that we are forever on the outside.

Discerning the meaning of feedback

“Our ultimate freedom is the right and power to decide how anybody or anything outside ourselves will affect us.” ~Stephen Covey

I’ve been the recipient lately of an unusually (for me) large amount of positive feedback, and this has done wonders for my mood and my self-confidence over the last few months. However, this has also provided an opportunity for me to really observe how I react to feedback from other people, and I’ve discovered something very interesting.

My Christmas wish for you

“Such love does the sky now pour that whenever I stand in a field, I have to wring out the light when I get home.” ~St. Francis of Assisi

I have gotten a glimpse over the last few months of the love that St. Francis was referring to. This has grown out of the unbelievable beauty of being showered with so much love, kindness, and generosity by those around me to allow myself to open up to the possibility that of accepting this kind of love not only from those around me, but also from the divine.

I am grateful to have had the opportunity of seeing the divine “with skin on” in the faces of the people in my life that has made this possible.

What the storm is all about

“And once the storm is over, you won’t remember how you made it through, how you managed to survive. You won’t even be sure in fact whether the storm is really over. But one thing is certain. When you come out of the storm, you won’t be the same person who walked in. That’s what this storm is all about.” ~Haruki Murakami

I’ve had the occasion several times just recently to reflect back on the storms that I’ve been through the last couple of years. It amazes me to look back at all that I’ve weathered and how well I’ve come through those storms.

Hiding my light to avoid my shadows

“You have to confront the very parts of yourself that you fear most to find what you have been looking for, because the mechanism that drives you to conceal your darkness is the same mechanism that has you hide your light. What you’ve been hiding from can actually give you what you’ve been trying hard to achieve.” ~Debbie Ford

I’ve spent most of my life projecting my shadow elsewhere so that I could avoid looking at the darkness that I carry within. I was so afraid that if I came face to face with my own darkness, it would destroy me. But as Debbie Ford says above, that also meant hiding my light because the light is what highlights the shadows. Light draws attention to me and makes it more likely that others might see those shadows too.

So I hide.