Home » Encouragement (Page 25)

Category Archives: Encouragement

“The Natural Look”

Posted on by | Leave a comment

There is something very radical about hair and makeup.

If you go natural, people look at you funny.

I celebrate black women who don’t straighten their hair. I celebrate white women who let their hair go grey. I actually cheer them on. I want to counteract society telling them that they aren’t quite good enough unless they conform to the norm.

Why are we told that we aren’t beautiful unless we change ourselves? We are asked to lay ourselves down at the altar of Avon. We are asked to grind ourselves up in the crucible of Clairol.

What is the motto of L’Oreal? “Because we’re worth it”.

Something sounds very backwards about that, now that I think about it.

Like we don’t deserve respect for looking exactly the way that God made us.

You want that natural look? Go natural. Get some natural sunlight and drink some natural water and eat some natural food. You’ll look great.

When you have to buy your “natural look” in a bottle from Walgreen`s, then you know something is wrong.

Our society is telling women that they aren’t beautiful unless they alter themselves.

Shave your legs and armpits. This is reducing our appearance to that of a prepubescent girl. This is really creepy. We are telling women to stop looking like adult women.

High heels are the modern equivalent of foot binding. Uncomfortable shoes cause damage to women’s feet that can only be fixed surgically.

It takes a lot of energy to escape the gravity of this cultural training. It takes a high level of self-esteem to achieve escape velocity.

Look at all the women getting plastic surgery to “fix” something that isn’t broken.

Do you want to have a radiant smile? Take the money you were going to spend on that plastic surgery and give it to a charity.

Mother Theresa was far more beautiful than Paris Hilton will ever be.

Our society tells women constantly that they aren’t good enough. Too fat. Too thin. Hair too stringy. Hair too dark. Skin too pale – get a tan. Skin too dark – bleach it.

No matter what we look like, it isn’t good enough. We have to learn to see through this deception.

We are never “just right”, according to the media and the marketers. We need to remember that the media and the marketers make money on feeding us poison.

Our goal needs to not be beauty but health. I exercise and eat well not to be thinner but to be stronger.

I go to the Y out of a sense of rebellion. I eat vegetables as a political statement. I skip deserts and fried foods to show that I can.

I don’t want to be ruled by autopilot.

Each act is a stone I’m adding to my wall that I’m building to shore myself up against this wave of collective insanity that we call modern society.

My goal is to become fully awake, and to inspire others to do the same.

My goal is to let you know you are beautiful, and you are loved. That you matter. That you are important.

Notes from yoga class.

Posted on by | Leave a comment

A yoga class is kind of like a cab ride. You need to tell the driver where you want to go. If it is a basic, gentle class and you get a substitute teacher, you need to let her know what you expect. If she is working you too hard you may end up hating the class and the teacher. You don’t need that kind of energy at any exercise class, but especially a yoga class.

There is something amazing about yoga. It improves you physically and emotionally and mentally. It is about acceptance of your body as it is and about working on it to get better. It teaches physical and mental balance. There is something about twisting your body that unwinds your mind.

Yoga people end up also often becoming vegetarians. They are interested in organic food and recycling. The exercise is like an adjustment for your soul. It becomes a way of life that you take off the mat and into the world.

I’m so grateful for the generations of yogis who have learned all these moves. They have gone through hundreds of years of experimentation. I get to benefit from all their learning. They know that this posture helps with anxiety, and this posture helps with digestion. I don’t have to learn that from scratch, and I appreciate that.

This is true with everything. I don’t grow my own food. I don’t build roads. I don’t know about medicine. But I benefit from others that have been there before me. They are adventurers. They are trailblazers.

But there is something else that yoga teaches. You need to claim your class, and your life. If it is too much, either ease off or ask the teacher for a modification. The teacher doesn’t know that it is too much for you, or that you’ve broken your arm twice, or that you are pregnant.

It is amazing when I’ve spoken up about a problem in yoga class, or at work, or at school, and other people will chime in that they agree. Only then can the issue be addressed. Otherwise we would all continue to quietly suffer and become resentful.

The other people weren’t brave or confident enough to mention that there was a problem. Think of all the pain they could have saved themselves and others just by speaking up earlier. Perhaps they weren’t quite awake yet – they were suffering but didn’t know what the cause was. Perhaps they were just used to taking it, used to feeling bad. Perhaps they were taught by teachers or parents that their voice didn’t matter.

What are you being silent about?

What is broken, or doesn’t work, or is a problem, that you’ve just decided to accept? Are you waiting for someone else to speak up? What if everybody else is doing the same?

(This was begun on my Kindle while waiting for yoga class to start. It is very busy on Monday mornings and you have to get there early to get a space. I dislike wasting time so I wrote. I completed this after the class.)

Stones

Posted on by | Leave a comment

I have a friend who needs more sleep. It will help with his anxiety and depression. It will help with his heart condition. It will help him to be more focused and less forgetful. He knows this, yet he keeps staying up late and getting up early, so every day is a repeat of the last and it is full of failure and pain. But like with liquor or drugs or any other vice he has to want to change and then there has to be grace in there somewhere too. It is hard to be stuck where you are, going around in circles. It is like Sisyphus, forever pushing that stone up a hill.

What stones do we have? Guilt. Shame. Anger. Fear. Hate. Racism. Abuse (of self or others). Drugs. Some of these stones are given to us by our parents, by classmates, by society. Some we pick up ourselves throughout our journey in life.

After a while it becomes very hard to carry all that weight. Sometimes we continue to carry our stones out of habit. Sometimes it is out of a sense of duty or obligation. Sometimes it is out of fear – what if we don’t know how to act without it? We’ve carried it around so long that we started to define ourselves by it.

I knew a guy who is an alcoholic. That is how he defines himself. He doesn’t say that he is a person with a drinking problem. The problem has become his personality. He has decided that “messed up” is who he is. He carries around this stone like it is a normal thing now.

I know women who stay with the same boyfriend for years even though it is plain that he is no good. He sits on the couch playing video games all day while she goes to work and supports both of them. He makes fun of her in public. But she stays, because she’d rather be in a bad relationship than no relationship at all. He is her stone. He weighs her down. But she doesn’t know how to move on. She doesn’t need him financially, and he isn’t helpful emotionally. But she’s defined herself by “being in a relationship”, even if it is unhealthy.

We are like that with our stones. We’d rather stick “with the devil you know” than to be on our own.

My Mom wanted to quit smoking for years, but she knew that my Dad would never quit. She thought it would be too hard to quit while he kept smoking. So she kept it up, all two packs a day of it. He finally left us to go live back home with his Mom (in his 50s) and then we found out my Mom had lung cancer shortly thereafter. She quit smoking then, but it was too late. She died at 53. Then he died just 6 weeks later. They had both killed themselves out of habit and an inability to change.

I wonder if Dad ever thought the same thing – that he wanted to quit smoking but didn’t think he could if Mom kept smoking? Wouldn’t that have been ?

I wonder if our friends and coworkers are like that? I’ll quit gossiping if you do. I’ll quit telling racist jokes if you do. What if we are playing chicken with each other? What if we are keeping ourselves back because of others? Who is going to be brave enough to take the first step and just drop the stone she is carrying that is slowing progress down?

Not taking care of our bodies is another stone. Overeating is a form of self-abuse. There is a pain that comes from being overfull. There is pain that comes from the guilt and shame of the addiction itself. Somehow the punishment (the obesity, the disability that comes with being so large) is seen as deserved. Sometimes the problem is that the person feels lesser-than, that he doesn’t deserve to feel good, to feel love. Sometimes becoming obese is a way to keep people away.

Sometimes people say they are too old to change. This too is a lie we tell ourselves so that we don’t get better. We think we can’t, so we don’t even try. As long as you are alive, there is hope. And if you start trying to get better, you’ll gain more life. You are only dead when you give up. As long as you keep trying to grow, you’ll get stronger.

One way to drop that stone is to realize that you are carrying it. You’ve carried it for so long that just dropping it outright seems impossible. Try doing it in little steps. Journal about it. Journaling helps you notice progress. It is like writing a letter to yourself.

I’m sending you a letter, now. I used to be where you are. I still have stones I’m carrying. The things I’ve done to grow and stretch have given me the insight and strength to get over and around other stones. I’m sending you this letter to let you know that you can do it. It is hard. It takes a lot of work. You’ll fall and fail quite a bit. You’ll stop doing the work for a while and then remember and start back up again. That is normal. You aren’t failing. You’re being human. I’m cheering you on.

In a way, I’m also sending a letter back in time to myself, to let myself know that there is hope. I’m 44 now. I was nowhere near this balanced and aware and healthy at 24. I wonder where I’ll be at 64? At 84? I need to remind myself to be gentle with myself but not allow myself to fall off the path completely. I’m trying to remind you of the same. Forgive yourself your failings, but keep on working on them.

I wonder if we can get a letter to Sisyphus and tell him to just walk away from that stone? Forget pushing it up the hill. It is easier to climb up the hill unburdened.

Filtered water (making ourselves better makes the world better)

Posted on by | Leave a comment

I’m having memories from when my Mom was dying from cancer. I’m not sure how much I can trust these memories. After all, they are nearly 20 years old.

But then I think about water. Spring water starts off as rainwater. It seeps down into the rocks and earth and hangs out for years, hiding out among dark caves and moldy leaves. It changes while it is percolating in the earth. It gets filtered. It gets cleaner. The impurities of pollution are stripped out of it and then it comes forth from the earth as spring water or a mountain stream. I think memories are the same way. They need time to percolate and filter.

When my Mom was sick and dying, I found it strangely easy to be with her in her pain. She would have a problem that required a nurse, and they would often take a while. Perhaps they didn’t feel her problem was an emergency. Perhaps she was last on the list because she was on Tenncare. It didn’t matter. She was having a problem and the nurses weren’t coming and she was getting anxious. Her anxiety was causing a further problem. Her tension from her anxiety was causing more pain for her.

I realized something at that time. I wasn’t the one who was in pain, and she was modeling after me in those moments of uncertainty. When I was anxious along with her, she would become more anxious. She needed someone to show her what to do. So I was calm. I intentionally kept my expression calm. I used a soothing tone. And she calmed down. Freaking out wasn’t going to make the nurse come faster. By my actions she felt better, even though I couldn’t fix the leaking chest tube or figure out how to make the morphine drip work properly.

There was something in that moment where I intentionally chose to remain calm for her that was healing. It was healing for her and for me. It taught me that our reactions to events are often more problematic than the events themselves.

I once had a summer job where I worked at the Kennedy Center in Washington, DC. I drove in every day from Centerville, Virginia. It was maybe 20 miles but because of DC traffic it was an hour and a half coming home.

One day I was sitting in my car on the way home, stuck in the usual traffic jam. I wasn’t tired or hungry, just bored. I made the mistake of looking at my watch. It told me that it was 6:30 pm. Suddenly I felt tired. Suddenly I felt hungry. I hadn’t felt that way just a moment before.

I realized something, and it is the same something that I’ve seen in Buddhism. Our minds trick us. It is better to be here, now, in the moment. The goal of Zen Buddhism is not to find enlightenment while peeling the potatoes. The goal is to peel the potatoes. I stopped wearing a watch from that day on. I have a clock. I pay attention to time so I’m not late. But the clock doesn’t tell me how to feel.

I catch myself all the time forgetting this secret. And then I remember and I pull myself back in. And somehow it seems to help others. I’m not caught up in the tornado of chaos with them. At least one person isn’t freaking out. And that sense of calm spreads, just like how it did with my Mom. You, just by being mindful, can be a healing force. Just by being fully present you can make the world better. It seems backwards – help yourself, and you help others, but it works.

Here are some of the ways I use to be mindful of the now and not get distracted. It helps to not watch TV. I’m only vaguely aware of popular culture. It isn’t real anyway, so I’m not missing anything. I read the news online so I can read what I want in the amount that I want, rather than having it force-fed to me via the evening news.

Regular exercise helps. Exercise isn’t a bad word, and it isn’t an extra. We have to move to prove that we aren’t plants. It burns out a lot of stress, and it makes us stronger and better able to handle life physically, emotionally, and spiritually. It doesn’t have to be bodybuilding at the gym – it can be walking every day and some yoga.

It is also essential to be careful about what we eat – as Michael Pollan said in his book Food Rules – “Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants.” The book explains it better, and if you can get the edition that is illustrated by Maira Kalman, even better. (Her illustrations are beautiful and wise.) Greasy, fatty food weighs us down. And, being mindful of what we eat helps to bring us into the present. We are intentionally making ourselves better and healthier, bite by bite. Another thing I’ve learned recently is also from our Zen friends – chew your food thoroughly. We modern people tend to inhale our food. Chew your food at least 20 times and you’ll find out you are eating more slowly and better digesting your food. You’ll probably also find out that you feel full with less food. You’ll save money and lose weight.

You can make the world better through your choices. You can make the world better by making yourself healthier. It is win-win!

Now, I forget all these things all the time, and fall out of my routines. This is totally normal, so I suspect that you do the same. Just get back on when you remember and go on from there. We are all here to remind each other how to do this thing called “being human.” Sometimes I think I write these posts as reminders to myself on how to do it. I encourage you to be your best, and through that, know that you are bringing healing to the world.

Sanctified 2 (uncovering grief)

Posted on by | Leave a comment

I see a lot of people at my job. There are people from all walks of life who come in every day. In general I enjoy interacting with people who are so different and interesting. The people I see are old, young, poor, eccentric. They are pleasant, creepy, and wonderful. But every now and then I have a really bad reaction to certain people and I’ve worked on what my problem is. I like one of the “Rules for being human” that states that every person is mirror of you – whatever you love or hate in someone else is whatever you love or hate in yourself. So I’ve been thinking about that.

I’ve noticed that I have a terrible reaction to those who reek of cigarettes and those who are morbidly obese, as well as people who are alcoholics. I’ve wondered why I seem to have a visceral reaction to them. I get angry when I see them. I’ve prayed about this. I’ve journaled about this. I’ve finally followed my spiritual director’s advice and asked Jesus into this feeling to help me understand it.

I certainly noticed those who smell of alcohol and get only movies. It has become a cliché. They drink so much and so often that even if they aren’t currently drunk they still smell of alcohol. It is escaping from their pores in the way that any poison does.

With all these situations, I have seen a connection. With the people who smoke, who overeat, who are alcoholics, each is a person who has no self control.

Part of my reaction is that I’ve been there. I used to be obese. I used to smoke clove cigarettes. I used to smoke pot. I know what it is like to be an addict. I know what it is like to feel trapped in my own body. I remember deciding I didn’t want to smoke pot every day so I wrapped my stash in several plastic bags and put rubber bands around it. I then put it up on a high shelf. It was going to take a lot of effort to get to it.

And then I’d find myself standing on that chair. I’d find myself unwinding the rubber bands. I’d pull out my bong and my supply of buds and I’d smoke. It is as if I was possessed. It was like I saw myself doing these things. I was a puppet, a slave. I didn’t want to smoke pot, and there I was doing it again. It was a terrible feeling. I felt helpless.

At first I thought to celebrate these instances, of every time I’d see something that angered me. I’d see someone who was obese or smell the smoke or alcohol on someone and it would remind me to pray. So that was good. I was praying more often. I would pray for the person and pray for my bad reaction. I hated the feeling I had, but at least it caused me to seek God. This worked for a little while.

Then Grace happened.

I came to understand this was grief.

My Mom died from smoking cigarettes. My Dad died from smoking and from not exercising. He was obese. I was angry at these people who shared their bad habits because I’m still angry at my parents for dying so young. For abandoning me. For leaving me alone to fend against my predatory brother.

There is a lady who comes every day who is retired. She sits and plays games on Facebook for hours. She is so large that she has a hard time walking.

I’m jealous of the time that she has. I’m angry that my Mom died, and doesn’t have any time left at all. I’m angry that this woman is throwing away her time. It is personal. Not only do I want her to use her time better, I want her to understand that there are people who would love to have that much free time. Why does she get to live and my Mom didn’t? Why do I have to shoehorn in my creative activity and she has all this time and blows it?

It is grief. I’m angry at them because I’m sad for myself. I’m angry at my parents for not having any self control, and then dying young. I’m angry at myself when I waste time and I don’t exercise like I should or eat what I know is good for me. My gut reaction lead me to prayer which lead me to understanding the source of my pain.

Pain became a blessing, because from it, I’m beginning to heal.

I offer you these words to tell you that you can do this too. I offer you these words as a voice in the wilderness, calling out, telling you to walk through the thicket, the stickerbushes, the marsh. Walk on. There is hope if you continue to mindfully walk this path. Don’t sit down, keep walking, keep working. There is healing here, in this work.

Sanctified (pain can be a blessing)

Posted on by | Leave a comment

Pain can be a blessing. It can let us know something is wrong, so we seek treatment. This is true with physical pain as well as spiritual pain.

Anger, fear, anxiety are all names for spiritual pain. When we notice them, we have an opportunity to seek out a whole different kind of healing than our society usually offers us. Instead of taking a pill for these spiritual pains, we can choose to pray. We can ask God to come into that moment and be with us in our pain and our brokenness.

In this way we sanctify our pain. This is transformative to realize. When we do this, our pain becomes a reminder to seek God. It is like a bell, sounding the time to pray. Our pain becomes a pathway to God.

Of course this is easy to say when we are well. When we are sick, when we have pain or weakness or an unknown diagnosis it is hard to get enlightened. Every thought is about the pain and lack of well being. Everything is focused on the not-well-ness of how we feel. Our entire frame of consciousness is based on how we don’t feel like we think we should.

We have a hard time being objective about our subjective experience.

It is like being in the middle of an argument. It is easy to say that you should back off and not fight, don’t let the person bring you to their level. But when you are in the middle of an argument and the other person is yelling at you, right in your face it is hard to remain calm. All you want to do is yell right back and say what you really feel, free of all the social rules of being nice. This is true whether the fight is with a person or with a disease.

But it is worth trying. Yelling at the other person only makes the fight continue. Freaking out over pain only makes it hurt more.

Certainly, don’t let the other person walk all over you. Certainly, don’t ignore the pain because it might be a sign of something that needs treatment.

But part of being a follower of God is knowing that God is in charge. Even the “bad” stuff is part of the big plan.

We are told that every moment is the guru. Learn from everything, even your pain and suffering and doubt. Learn from the argumentative coworker. Learn from the annoying neighbor. Learn from the busybody aunt. They are all teachers. They are all pathways to God.

Resistance is indeed futile.

The Future is Now. (the bud is the blossom)

Posted on by | Leave a comment

We are currently taught that Jesus will come again. We are taught to wait for the future. We aren’t taught to be thankful for the now.

Jesus tells us that there will be no more signs in this generation except the sign of Jonah. Many people take that to mean the fact that Jonah was in the belly of the whale for three days, and Jesus lay in the tomb for three days.

Or did he? If he died on Friday afternoon and arose from the grave on Sunday morning as we are told, that is hardly three days. It isn’t even 48 hours. But I digress. Perhaps that is part of what is going on. I feel we are being distracted from what is really important.

What if the sign of Jonah is when people learn to be thankful for what is happening right now? Not when we are freed. Not when we are healed. Not when we reach the Promised Land. Jonah gave thanks while in the belly of the whale. While standing in the middle of a bad situation he praised God. Then he was released.

How often did Jesus tell people that their faith has saved them? Simply by seeking him out, they were healed. His healing of them was to let them know that they were forgiven their sins. We are all forgiven. We are all called to forgive. When we forgive others, we are bringing forth the same healing. Our weakness causes us to seek wholeness, and from that we gain the power to help others.

God is the great “I AM”. Not I was, or will be. Think about the idea of God being the Alpha and the Omega at the same time. Our human brains can’t really comprehend that. We can barely handle paying attention to right now, but that isn’t due to our capacity. That is due to our culture.

We are taught that happiness is to be found in the past or in the future. We are taught to focus on the “good old days” for how wonderful they were. We are taught to look forward to the future for when things will get better. The problem is that the good old days weren’t really all that good when we really think about it, because we weren’t even fully participating in them when we were living through them. We were thinking about the past and the future then too. We miss quite a bit of what is actually happening all the time. When we finally get to the future we won’t be happy then either because we are going to be doing the same thing. We’ll think we were better off “back then,” and that we will be better off “soon.”

There are a lot of modern thinkers, artists, creators, and dreamers who believe that there is a change coming. They are talking about a shift in consciousness that is about to occur. They look forward to this new era of peace and enlightenment.

I am telling you that the bud is the blossom. The seed is the fruit. I am telling you that the fact that we can see the goal means we are there.

We have changed. We are conscious of what our responsibility is. We are awake. Not all of us, no. But enough to have generated enough momentum.

We need to see how things are changing around us. How people are waking up.

We need to focus on what is going on right now that is right and good and joyful and keep doing it.

Do not give any energy to what is broken. That is what it wants. The more we focus on “if only” thoughts, the less we are focusing on building up what is going well.

Oprah says what we focus on expands. There is a lot of power in remembering this. Choose wisely.

Action and Actor

Posted on by | Leave a comment

The Dalai Lama, in his address in Louisville, Kentucky on May 19th, 2013 talked about the difference between “action and actor”. The person is not what they do. While the action may be bad, the person themselves is not. I liken this to when Jesus said “Forgive them, Father, for they know not what they do.” Jesus was dying on the cross. It was a painful, degrading, public way to die. His disciples had left him. The soldiers were gambling for his clothing. In that horrible, embarrassing, difficult moment he showed compassion. He understood the difference between the action and the actor.

Forgive the person. They can’t help it. They would if they could.

Every single person is made in the image of God. Every single person has within them the light of God. It is through the will of God that each one of us continues to exist moment by moment, heartbeat by heartbeat.

Consider Judas. He has long been considered the bad guy in the Gospel story, but his role is essential. There are no saint medals for him, there is no special day set aside to commemorate him. But if it weren’t for Judas, that part of the prophecy would not have been fulfilled. Jesus knew that he was going to be betrayed by Judas, and forgave him. How many of us would be able to forgive someone who was going to betray us?

I have to confess that I have a soft spot in my heart for Judas. He was a pawn. God made him do what he had to do. When he came to his senses he killed himself. What a horrible thing to realize you have just sold out the person you believe to be the Messiah, the Savior, the Son of God.

Something about this story appeals to me personally. I have long wrestled with my calling and felt that it was not real. Who would listen to me, a bipolar lady who says she hears from God? God has enough crazy people who say they are His followers. The Christian faith doesn’t need any more crazy people. But if God can use someone like Judas, the most hated disciple, to bring forth what needs to happen, then who am I to argue?

We are told that if you trust in God, you know that all things work for good.

All things. Even the stuff that looks wrong and crazy and weird. Even the acts of terror. Even war. Everything is in God’s control. If we really believe that “He has the whole world in His hands,” as we teach small children to sing in Sunday school, then we need to start actually acting like we believe it.

Part of that is found in not judging anything. Not just not judging people, but not judging ourselves and events. Not deciding if things are “good” or “bad.” This is very Zen here. But it is all about accepting everything and everyone and every moment exactly as is. Without judgment, without trying to change what is, and without trying to escape.

We are told that every moment is the guru.

Every illness, every failing test score, every unwanted, unkind word, everything is our teacher.

Even Judas.

God bless us, every one.

How to pray – it isn’t the words or the ritual. It is a feeling.

Posted on by | 2 Comments

Prayer is communicating with God. God wants to hear from us, and for us to hear from him. But how do we do this?

Communicating with God is real. Everyone can do it. It isn’t for the chosen few. Not everybody can do it easily, but everybody can learn how. Hearing from God isn’t as easy as picking up the phone. It isn’t the same as turning on the television. But it is a skill that you can learn.

Consider a marathon runner. She doesn’t wake up one day and start running 26 miles. She may not even like to run to start off with. But she hears about a marathon and she thinks about it. She finally decides to start. She trains. She gets better. She may walk more than run at first. First it is a mile run around the block. Then two. Then five. It can take a long time and many setbacks and blisters to get up to 26 miles, but then one day she is there.

This is also true of hearing from God. It requires practice and effort and persistence.

First, it is important for you to know that God loves you. God made you. You are needed and part of God’s plan. This is why you were made. The fact that you are alive is proof that God needs and loves you. Right now. As you are. Warts and all. You may not feel worthy of God, but God thinks otherwise. So God wants to hear from you. God wants to connect with you. This is true communion, or union-with.

The book “The Isaiah Effect” by Gregg Braden says something very interesting about prayer. It says that prayer isn’t something you do, it is something you feel inside your body. This is very important. This totally turns our Western idea of prayer upside down.

It isn’t the vehicle that is the focus. It isn’t the how-to. It is the destination that is important. You have to get to that feeling in your body that indicates you are in the right spot. Prayer is a feeling, not a ritual.

Prayer isn’t the candle or the words or the gestures. It is the connection with God that is produced when you use those things, or anything else that helps you get there. The candle or the words or the gestures are like a car that you get in to go visit a friend. Getting to your friend is the most important part, not how you get there. Perhaps the car breaks down and you have to walk. That is fine. You got there. Don’t focus on the car.

But because we are physical beings, we often need props to help us. Just remember that the prayer isn’t the props.

C.S. Lewis says “You don’t have a soul. You are a soul. You have a body.” Our bodies need reminders of our souls. I’ve written before about how I use prayer bracelets, tattoos, painted toenails, and going barefoot as reminders. There are many different ways to remind you to pray and nourish your soul with a connection with God.

Prayer does not have to be passive. It doesn’t have to be sitting in a chair with your hands in front of you saying a prayer that somebody else wrote. It can be active. There are probably as many different ways of praying as there are people. Painting, walking, singing, doodling, meditation, yoga practice can all be used as forms of prayer, for instance. Compassion in action is also good. Volunteering is a form of prayer.

How often should you pray? If you are Muslim, you are to pray five times a day. Some people pray before every meal. If you are Jewish, you are to give thanks to God at least 100 times a day. All of these practices are ways to remind you to pray. Constantly praying is constantly being in communion with God. The more you pray, the better the connection gets between you and God.

In order to hear from God, you have to put yourself in a place where you can hear from God. It is kind of like you want to get a phone call from a friend, but you don’t realize that your phone is turned off because you didn’t pay the bill. You’ll never hear from your friend with that kind of connection.

This is attributed to Saint Francis – “Pray constantly, and if you must, use words.” Prayer doesn’t have to be words, but it can. Part of my goal here is to open your mind up about what prayer is. It doesn’t have to be what you think it is. Trying other ways can be helpful.

Do you use a prayer book, or not? Do you find it helpful or stiff and canned? Jesus tells us that we are not to mutter the same words over and over again, but to pray from our hearts. We learn this in Matthew 6:7 “And when you are praying, do not use meaningless repetition as the Gentiles do, for they suppose that they will be heard for their many words.” (New American Standard Bible) But sometimes that is hard because we don’t know what to say. Then there is this helpful verse from Romans 8:26 “And the Holy Spirit helps us in our weakness. For example, we don’t know what God wants us to pray for. But the Holy Spirit prays for us with groanings that cannot be expressed in words.” (New Living Translation)

So you don’t have to use a prayer book. God knows what you want to say. But if you feel you need a prayer book, be sure to read every word carefully and feel them, so that the prayer becomes your own. It isn’t the words that get you there, but the feeling that happens when you read the words. A friend told me a Jewish story about a little boy who didn’t know what how to pray so he just recited the alphabet and let God pick out all the right letters. That works too – but again, it isn’t the letters. It is the feeling you get when you are there, talking to God.

Many different faiths use prayer beads. You can study how they use them, or you can make up your own ritual. They can be used to center you and focus you. Just handling beads can be very calming and centering.

When you pray, remember the feeling you get if you ask for something. Then see if your prayer is answered. Compare the feeling with the result. Journaling can help you keep track of the results. This is a way to learn how God is talking to you. God always answers prayers, but they aren’t always “yes”. With practice, you can learn to “hear” the “yes” from the “no” from the “not right now”. I often “hear” the reply as a feeling, rather than a word. This is often the first way that we hear from God, as feeling.

When I pray for a specific intention, I get a feeling of ease when the prayer is going to be answered as a “yes”. I get a feeling of resistance when it is a “no”. It took a while to learn the subtle difference of feeling between the two. It isn’t as easy as “this is hot” and “this is cold” – it was far more subtle. But it is there. It just takes practice to sort out where and how the feeling feels to you.

I think it is essential to always be ok with the idea that you aren’t in charge. Sometimes it is best you don’t get what you prayed for. God is not your waiter. You don’t always get to have it your way.

God can use anything as a way to answer. You can “hear” God all around you. Nothing is a coincidence. We are like fish who are unaware of water. We are surrounded by God, as everything is from God.

It is perfectly ok to pray for the ability to pray. It is OK to ask God for help in how to pray. Just like in the story of the prodigal son, when the son started back towards his Dad, his Dad saw him and went running to meet him. God wants us to pray, to connect with him. He’ll make up the difference in distance between us.

You’ll get stronger the more you do it. So pray constantly. Be patient with yourself if you slack off and get out of your routine. That is normal. Just start doing it again. Nobody is consistent at their prayers. But the more you pray, the better you’ll get at it, and the more you will connect with God.

Read the Bible, and pray beforehand for the Holy Spirit to help you understand. The Bible is the Word of God. If you want to hear from God, it is a good idea to start off with a known good. This way when you get to the point that God is talking to you in words, you’ll be able to measure up and know if it is God talking and not just your imagination.

Read the prayers of other faiths. There might be something that helps. Like buying a one-size fits all suit, sometimes prayer life needs to be altered and adjusted. I’ve found a lot of comfort in reading about other faith systems. There is a lot in Buddhism for instance that helps to inform my Christianity. I’m enjoying a podcast that is all Torah study as well.

Remember to make time for prayer. Turn off the television. Turn off the iPod. We fill our heads with a lot of noise. How can God get a word in edgewise if we are so noisy all the time?

Consider getting a spiritual director. A spiritual director can be a priest or minister, but doesn’t necessarily have to be one. She or he is trained to help you achieve intimacy with God. I consider such a person to be like a guru, but for Western faiths. I’ve learned more from my spiritual director than I’ve ever learned from any minister.

I’ll leave you with a little poem.

Make your life into a prayer,
and everything you do will be a love letter to God.
And God will answer back, I love you, I love you, I love you
from every rock and rainbow,
from every smile from every stranger.

Mother’s Day isn’t always flowers and candy. Sometimes it is painful.

Posted on by | 1 Comment

Today is Mother’s Day in the United States. This is seen as a day of happiness and joy, where we celebrate our Mothers. Moms usually get taken out to supper at a nice restaurant and get gifts of flowers or candy or jewelry.

But Mother’s Day isn’t all beautiful and easy. We pretend like it is. We fake it for the purpose of keeping the peace. We do that a lot. We don’t like to tell others that we aren’t what they think we are. We don’t like to admit our weaknesses.

There are those whose mothers have died. There are those who had a terrible relationship with their Moms and don’t talk to them anymore. There are those who never knew their Moms.

Then there are women who want to be Moms but can’t. There are women whose children have died. There are women whose children are estranged from them. There are women who have children and wish they didn’t.

What if your mother was abusive? What if she was an addict? What if she is the reason for your therapy sessions? What if your mother died when you were very young? What if she is still alive and very feeble and can’t remember who you are while you take care of her?

Mother’s day is hard for many of us. For many people it isn’t flowers and candy and hearts. It is painful. It is very sad. But we often fake it. We pretend that everything is fine. We don’t tell others our painful truth because we don’t want to bother them. We think we are alone in our pain so we don’t want to trouble others.

But what if everybody else is faking it too?

I was at a Chinese buffet recently and the manager and I have become friendly. He asked me what my plans were for Mother’s day. I decided to be honest. I tried to be gentle with it, because this information isn’t easy for others to hear sometimes. I paused, and told him that my Mom died when I was 25. This turned out to be a good thing to say. It somehow gave him permission to be honest about his mother. She had died when he was very young. She had cancer, and one day had gone to take a nap and just didn’t wake up. To this day he still misses her and is confused how someone can die so simply, without drama.

We were able to share a moment of being real together. In that space, in that time, we were real, and we were vulnerable, and we were both sad. But in our shared sadness we were stronger. We no longer had to carry our sadness alone. We knew that we weren’t alone. There was real beauty in that honesty and vulnerability and sadness.

Why do we fake who we are? Do we do it because we don’t want to rock the boat or upset the apple cart? Perhaps if we were more honest we’d actually be doing the world a favor. By being ourselves, we’d be giving other people permission to be themselves.

We will fake that we are straight, or that we live in a happy family, or that we enjoy our jobs, or that we like pop culture, or that we have lots of friends. We fake that we love what we don’t, and pretend that we don’t like what we do.

All this lying causes pain.

Perhaps we aren’t even aware of how often we fake being ourselves. It is often when people are faced with their own mortality that they open up and decide to be who they really are. Sometimes then it is too late to do anything about it.

So let’s try something. You are a mortal being. You are dying, every single moment. This life is an illusion. It is temporary. All the stuff you have is temporary. Nothing is permanent.

Yet, every single moment you have the choice to live. Every single moment you have the ability to move towards life, and be the person you were called to be. Be that person. Choose this time, now, while you can.

I offer you the best Mother’s Day gift ever – the permission to be who you were born to be, who you were created to be by our Creator.