Calling

 

But each day the Lord pours his unfailing love upon me,
and through each night I sing his songs,
praying to God who gives me life. Psalm 42:8

Sometimes I mourn the thoughts and inspirations of yesterday. Regret their transient fragility. Will them back to consciousness.
Time casually evaporates them and new ideas take their place. The regret lingers. Is it the lost opportunity of impressing you?

Other times, I imagine the future. Count down the interim, until I'm there. Where exactly?

I could think myself the most important person in the world. Lots of us do.

Stop. Time to be here and now.

Sit with the jittery man, who averts his gaze. Cravings for a drink shame him. Listen to him.
 
Sit with the fragile woman who can't tell her ex that he's no longer welcome to invade her house. She can't remember ever saying no to anyone, and her shoulders carry that. Listen. Don't forget.

Sit with the proud man who needs to have the last word. Don't resent him for it. Maybe just figure out a gentle way to guide the conversation to a place of common ground. There's something to learn from him, too.

Respect. Respect, genuineness and authenticity. That's a tall order and I want to gradually wear them into my skin. Practice them.

Perhaps this is how a call gets lived out.

Each day the Lord pours his unfailing love upon me,
and through each night I sing his songs,
praying to God who gives me life.
 

Shame and Vulnerability

It's the moment when you think, "I'm not good enough," that it's got you.

I went to the interview with my resume clutched in my hand. I'd forgotten to send it, so brought it myself. I'd not thought much about it's inadequacy. Not until he said in passing - "This is your abbreviated CV?"

The smart-mouth me thought, "No, that's all of it. Entirely." But I didn't think that till much later. Don't the best answers arrive much too late to use? Between the offhand query and the answer were a few hours of shame.

Don't get me wrong, I still drove home, cooked dinner, chatted with my mum, laughed with the kids and kissed everyone good night. My husband, too. But there were moments peppered through the evening of shielding my face with the pressure of my hands, feeling exposed, and calling myself an idiot under my breath. I remembered every clumsy answer, replayed unbidden.

Shame re-imagined is vulnerability.

The interview was important to me. Being seen as competent mattered in that place, with people I do not know. Making myself available for judgement exposes me. And this judgement is always harsher in my imagination than anything that happens in the actual moment. No one could ever measure me as harshly as I do myself when I say "I'm not good enough".

At it's heart, shame is a fear of rejection and disconnection, and when things matter to us, when we expose our heart and our true selves, we are vulnerable to it. But Brene Brown would say, that if we avoid shame, we avoid wholehearted living.

You may have already seen this talk. But if not, listen here. It has some really useful things to say about how perfectionism and controlling our lives can be a way to avoid vulnerability, and hence miss out on real connection with people.



Listen, too, to her comment that we make the uncertain certain to avoid vulnerability. I would like to think about this more in relation to the truths of the gospel, and the way we try to make some areas certain that are actually uncertain - perhaps this is because we feel vulnerable - questions can make us doubt the ability of God to stand up amidst uncertainty.

I also ponder the idea of believing that we are worthy of love and belonging, believing we are enough. On it's own, this lacks a degree of substance - I cannot quite grasp it. But in the light of God's love, it falls into place. His love and grace to us mark us as worthy of love and belonging. I am enough because I rest in God who is enough.

Watch her second talk, too, if you have time...



It's paradoxical, isn't it? - that by protecting ourselves from shame or vulnerability, we actually limit our opportunities to really love, to really serve and to really experience God's work in our lives.

Conversation over a haircut

photo from stock.xchng

I made one of my infrequent visits to the hairdresser. She's pleasant to chat with, and accepting of my lassez faire, low maintenance attitude to hair. My ignorance of product. We compare stories of my children and her grandchildren. I update her about work and it starts her talking about refugees and migration.

Politics and religion. And immigration. #thingswedon'ttalkabout

She tells stories of people she knows from other cultures - all friends, all sympathetic portraits.

Then asks my opinion about refugees. And Islam and fundamentalism and burqas. She took my hesitation as an invitation for her opinions. No worries, I can do listening.

And she's quite happy to share.

Deep down, it's fear. Fear that refugees are extremists in disguise, that they'll get powerful before we realise it and they'll rip us all off by defrauding Centrelink. That burqas hide disdain and contempt for us. That refugees are different, they're not us and we might not like living next door to them.

I preferred her stories of people she's really met.

But sitting in her space, I found it hard to collect a coherent response. Since than I've formed a few ideas, but it's a long time till my next haircut.

I want to tell her about most of the refugees I've met. That they've been victims of religious persecution rather than perpetrators. That they don't want to leave their home country, they have to. In order to survive. That they spend months, years, days on end, mourning and missing their homes. Grieving the wives or children or siblings who were killed. Trying to forget the wounds they've received or the horror-filled memories seared into their brains.

That most of the Arabic speakers I've met are from Christian minority groups, and that the Iranians are those who have protested the Islamic state. That the idea of refugees promoting fundamentalism, or racial hatred when they bear its scars is oddly ridiculous.

That when she talks of pride in Australia and protecting our Australia, maybe the pride and the protecting rob of us the opportunity to be a nation of strength of character and true compassion.

Just a few ideas. What can you add?

Needing mercy

<sup>Irritation makes her bark and bristle, so I lean closer. I speak softer and I skirt raw spots as we trace her story. She lived a childhood unprotected, and has lived it over and over again. She's not the only one who teeters on the edge of shouting or shaking. They are here, drowning in a welter of loss. Everyone seems to have lost. A husband, a childhood, peace of mind, safety. Gone where?

His polished smile and prepped answers draw me in. It's a performance he's perfected. He's saying its all OK now, but is it? Does gut-tearing shame heal like changing the TV channel, or from reading inspiration in the Women's Weekly? He almost convices me that it does. But when he speaks real, honest words, I can see he's on the edge, too. Of tears. Of giving up. Of seeking real change.

This place of pain and of struggle and the wrestle between life and death. The mingling of despair and hope, where all I can add is my pittance that 'it will be OK'. And this says nothing substantial, or solid, to cling to.

I can listen, too. Especially to the feelings and thoughts that we're not supposed to have. Like being angry at your husband who just died, leaving you to mop up his life. Or that you wish you were dead because the hole you are in feels endless, and dark, and crushing.

So many rules about how we should feel, how we should act, how we should live. I think about religious men questioning why Jesus didn't follow certain customs or rituals, and his answer I'm reading over and over. Puzzling how to absorb it and live it.</sup>

^{I desire mercy not sacrifice.}

^{It's not the healthy that need a doctor, but the sick.}

<sup>What does it mean to live a merciful life, and then also know that I'm one of the sick, too? A merciful life, but not a proud one.

Remembering that I'm welcomed in the same way - embraced with my messy heart and unruly feelings - needing mercy too. Us and them just doesn't work. It needs to be me among all of us. All of us sinners who need mercy. All of us lost, needing to be found. Everyone sick and needing a doctor.

linking with emily...</sup>

Word Update

It's the middle of 2011. My word for the year was 'Commit' and Alece has asked for news on my progress. As I said back in Jamuary, this is a year for getting serious about completing things. I am wanting to stick at it, even when I wish I could do something else.

I realise I cling to being non-committal, and leaving my options open.

In the first two months of the year I sat down and wrote two 10,000 word case reports. The work of looking after the patients had been done in 2007 and between 2005 and 2009. I had been carrying around two folders of notes and photocopies since then. I had barely written one introduction. But deciding to commit helped me sit down and type. My husband helped me by taking the kids to a movie (or two). Thankfully he was willing to be commited, too.

Then I mailed them off to Melbourne and waited. And hoped. At Easter, I found out that they both passed. It was exciting and we went out for dinner to celebrate.

So I am half-way committed. In October, I am committed to sitting for my final exams. I don't know if I will pass. But I will have a chance.

Failure teaches

I long to tell stories of my triumphs. To be able to rest satisfied that I have done it, and done it well.

But the replays in my mind are not triumphs. They are wired into memory by the wrench of disappointment in my stomach. I have spoken with clumsy words, or chosen the wrong reaction, or just run out of time to do what is needed.

I listened as he told me of his shame. The shame he felt when he had to cover for me. To explain my mistake and he knew he could not. He didn't call it shame, but he told me how he couldn't stop the laughter escaping from his chest and he couldn't explain. He had to leave. Abruptly.

The laughter mystified him and he searched for neurological explanations. He framed it as an opportunity to learn. And he didn't want to hear my apology. He was so gracious that he wouldn't allow himself to blame me, so he couldn't face 'sorry'. It was then we talked of shame and I realised how deeply it had shaken him.

My sorry  must become an action. Speaking it is irrelevant if I continue to leave him exposed and without an answer. So I work harder at my list and try to do it better. I know this will not cover all my weaknesses, but this small, particular exertion is important. Because I have seen his vulnerability. Just as I have seen his faithful perserverence.

I must listen to this exposition of my failure and learn from it. Know that I am poor in spirit, but that that itself brings its own blessings. And I realise that the memories based in failure and disappointment, in myself, are the ones that really teach me. Painful though they are.

Sharing with Emily,

Today

He roughly says get lost (or some such thing). I stand in the hallway, hesitant. I want to catch him back, soothe and listen. He stalks away.

Another sees my discomfort. She's watched me all day, asked again and again for leave to go. Then she asks if I'm OK. Embarrassed at her insight, I'm awkward. But I'm alright.

Later, I make a joke. Keeping score of foul-spoken rejections. I'm today's winner.

Rationally, I know his mind is too disordered to behave differently. He cannot trust me because he cannot trust his own senses and intuitions. He hates this confinement - the locked doors and illness labels that imprison him. I'm just getting caught up in the edge of that resentment.

He's here because his perceptions are so faulty that he pushed his mother in frustration. And his father holds it against him. His mother brings a tape measure to wind around his waist, so she can bring him new clothes that fit. She will come tomorrow and clipper cut his hair for him. This is mother's love - a woman ungrudgingly, almost cheerfully, will gently shave her tall, irritable, pacing, forty-something son. And she will speak to him with fondness, with grace. In the middle of a psych ward.

I think about mothers' love.
A woman grieving for her son - he has blindly, clumsily destroyed his marriage, his joy. She tries to hold him together.
Another woman agonised in prayer, and wish, and hope watching her daughter cradle a newborn through difficult cardiac surgery. Waiting.
And a woman who would do anything, give anything, drive anywhere to help her sons learn. Anything to help them be happy.
A woman whose desire to love burns a hole in her chest because no baby is born despite her prayers.

Whatever made me think that love is pure?
And I check, it's not pure, it's patient and persevering. Love buries us deep in ugly pain. Love is the reason we survive the pain.

linking with imperfect prose

Getting it done

I started this year as the year to Commit. Here is my first go at it.

Sparing you the gory details, I need to finish some tasks this year to complete my specialty training. So for more than a month I haven't blogged. (Perhaps you didn't notice - that's OK) I noticed. And I have a few faithful friends who emailed me to see if I was OK. Praise God for those who care for me. You lovely people know who you are.

I am OK. I've just been writing reports for work. This morning I got up went to the Post Office and mailed them Express Post to Melbourne. Then I bought myself a fresh croissant (and a loaf of bread for school lunches) and strolled home. I have this sense that I just might be dancing in the kitchen this evening!

Storm Lights

There is a heart and mind broken-ness that separates him from the world. He searches for help where he knows he'll get rejected. In desperation. His, mine, ours.

He cannot still himself to listen because the terror is so loud. And then he hurts himself so that someone will listen to him.

His anger (someone calls it spite) stumbles me today. On facebook, my "inner bird doesn't feel like chirping". And I lightly turn from disappointment, return to love and tight-gripped welcome home hugs.

But he sits, enveloped. The anger, disappointment, rejection, fear and alone-ness. He cannot escape. Only numb and blame and rage.

If he could collect himself. If he could turn to God in desperation. Would this be his prayer?

My God, my God, why have you abandoned me?

Why are you so far away when I groan for help?

Every day I call to you, my God, but you do not answer.
Every night you hear my voice, but I find no relief.   (Psalm 22:1-2)

Would he find himself here?

But I am a worm and not a man.
I am scorned and despised by all!
Everyone who sees me mocks me.    (Psalm 22:6-7)

Extreme tortured pleas are answered. If they are made. But what of the one who does not know to make them. Are they instinctive?

Who can bring the lightning flashing in his deep, dark night?

lightning at night

Denial

I've written a post about having a child with a mental illness. You might be interested to check it out, over at Circumstantial.

When I consider how I would respond to the news of a child of mine having a major mental illness, I am ashamed. I realise how perfect I hope my children's lives will be and how unrealistic this is.

 'togetherness' at three

because the glint of mischief in his eye matches the hesitant smile in hers.

New Blog

I have started another blog. Check it out here.

It is a 'work-related' venture, and I'm excited about it.

Today's post is about negotiation skills. I've just re-read it and realised it the tips translate to negotiating with kids - except for 'psychotic' read 'having a tantrum', and for 'medication' read 'vegetables'. ;)

And I am suddenly aware of how slow I can be to answer the 'mu-u-um' call. Prompt responses might win me more negotiating room!

Distractions

I ate my lunch on the train. On my way home for dinner. There's words to write tucked in the pocket of my bag. Work trickling over into life. Breaks postponed till the rush of tasks are left as I bolt out the door to the station. Daylight saving is the saviour bringing me to sit at the table I would have missed, were it winter.

I realise the thought space, the energy directed into work. True, it's into people who (often) desperately need it. True, I love the task and have found a place that fits all my unusualnesses (mostly). I could sink all my self there, and draw great reward, enough to fill my outstretched arms. Enough to fill my ears, to drain my heart, to meet my need to be useful.

I am troubled by knowing where these energies are drawn from. Every story of illness or brokenness that fills my ears, is replacing a whispered child's story of their day. It's a picture book I haven't read, with a writhing body on my lap. It's a plate of vegemite sandwiches I didn't make and serve with crescent apple slices. It's the time spent lying sundrenched on a trampoline side-by-side with a four years old.

Time is only spent once. Choices must be made, and bills must be paid (may this never be my guiding reason or excuse). And teamwork in our marriage means we both spend time at home and both spend time at work.

I'm not saying work outside home and parenting can't go together. There is not textbook template for family, beyond love, grace, wisdom and following God's words and ways.

But I regret that my mind is divided. That, at times, my imagination, my attention and my concern is not with my family. I know that this distraction takes from them. And I realise, that if there was no work, there would be something else to draw me from them. We are so distractible, drawn to passing fashions and things that make us feel good. I am fickle in my attention, lacking perserverence. And busy-ness or pressure in one sphere weighs on me in the other.

The discipline I need is to focus on the person I am with - my child, my patient, my workmate, my husband, my neighbour - and listen to how I can serve them, now. To put aside the distraction of ruminating on elsewhere and attend to what I can do, here.

Heart-soft

I hate disappointing people.

Most of us do. I don't want to be the one who couldn't deliver what was needed. Sometimes efficiency, big picture decisions and 'the way things are done' trump really being there for someone. And I let people down. I have to say no to what a distressed person is asking me because my job only goes so far. I can't stretch it any further.

I cannot clearly express my failure to a colleague. He thinks I'm being too precious, his teasing, mildly facetious 'You're too worthy," just makes my cheeks redden. I am trapped in this 'feeling sorry for...' and unable to do what is being pleaded for.

But I don't want to be the one who hardens my spirit, so that I can escape this not being enough. Inadequacy or helplessness can give birth to heart hardening. It's so easy to reflect..."If I can't fix it then that problem is not a real one, or worthy of my effort." And the next step is to dismiss and ignore, to avoid painful dilemmas.

And for some stories in an acute mental health ward, being in there is not enough. It will not bring solace or rescue. It will not heal a soul scarred by abuse, repeated abandonings or self-loathing scored deep. That sort of healing comes slowly, a winding, wearing journey, needing companions who walk patiently alongside.

I disappointed her. She ran away because I did not give her one request, the one I could not grant. She couldn't hear anything else I said because I abandoned her again. Yes, I know I'm just a page in a story written long, but my wish was to be different. Sadly, I do not have armour or a thoroughbred, and gallant rescues are beyond me.

But as I write, I see that I will be hurt by not rescuing, by disappointing. The hurt comes of not protecting with hardness. Not becoming blase or cynical. I can avoid disappointing by never getting close and never really listening. Safe, to some degree efficient, but lifeless.

There is a call to soft-heartedness that hears pain spoken, and does not shut it out. There's a call to see needs and not be able to meet them. To be broken by that failure, but to see that hope lies in rescue way beyond what I can do.

At Holy Experience, Ann has written about her trip to Guatemala with Compassion. I encourage you to read these posts - Sept 9, Sept 10, Sept 11, Sept 14, Sept 15. She has captured the call to soft-heartedness lyrically.

Linked with Emily and Ann

Procrastination

I have some climbing I need to do - figurative rather than literal.

When it comes right down to it, I'm just putting it off.

If I don't get it done then I won't find out that I've failed. I've embedded myself in other pastimes that are more fun, less demanding and let me be comfortable.

Is it the voice that whispers, "I'm not good enough?", right behind my ear? A chance question or overhead comments on my lack can set that refrain cycling overtime. Tears in my eyes, embarrassing. The lie I'm believing - that I need to be good at everything - that I am God.

No. It's just that I'm putting off wrestling with the monster (externalise it, turn it into a battle). I need to grit my teeth. I need to gird my loins. I need to pull my finger out. Otherwise, in a year or two's time, I'll be sitting here in front of this screen, writing incidentals, reflecting on the life I'm too mealy-mouthed to get on with.

Go on. It just needs to be done.

That woman wrote my textbook!

I went out to a talk last Friday night, by Nancy McWilliams. She had been in NZ for the College of Psychiatrists annual conference and came to Sydney for a few days either side of the main event.

The chance to see her was something I couldn't pass up. And it was worth going. She was interesting, thoughtful and I could understand most of what she was talking about.

In general, she talked about Affect (emotion) Theory and psychotherapy.

A couple of interesting ideas she talked about...

She divided people with depression into 2 subsets, those whose primary need is for healthy attachment and those who focus on negative self-evaluation (I am bad/not-good-enough). The 2 groups respond differently to particular treatments. The first group are responsive to, (and vulnerable to), the therapeutic relationship. The second group are often perfectionistic in their expectations of themselves, and are less responsive to the relationship with the therapist. Instead they may respond to challenge to their ideas of being bad, expressed at the right time.

She told a funny story of a perfectionistic, depressed man she was treating, who started improving after she said to him " I'm not disputing that you're and a**hole, I'm just pointing out you're no worse than the rest of us miserable suckers."

It made me think of how easily we sink into this type of thinking - that we are no good, and that we are worse than other people. We forget one of the freeing things about our human sinfulness... that all humans share in it. Not that being sinful frees us, rather that sinfulness and failure being universal means we are freed from self-absorption. Focus on ourselves as uniquely sinful is just as self-obsessed as thinking we are special because we don't sin.

Secondly, she talked about some research she had done into altruistic people. She studied people who were involved in altruistic, serving endeavours and discovered among them a high degree of perfectionism, too. Most of them did not, however, get depressed and she theorised that by living out their principles of serving others, these people were satisfying their own high self-expectations to the point where they did not become discouraged or feel like a failure.

Two of them did get depressed, however, both when they had young children and were not able to continue their 'serving' to the degree to which they had become accustomed. Suddenly I thought of all the mums I know, or whose blogs I read who struggle with just these feelings. What a twisted place the world is to have tricked us into thinking that raising children is not serving enough, not doing enough, not significant enough. Perfectionism is such an enemy of grace and it is definitely not the same as being made perfect.

May God help us to know who we are and where we stand, because we know him. May he rescue us from self-evaluation based in perfectionism which perpetuates the lie that we can be perfect in our own strength.

Neuroplasticity

'Neuroplasticity' is a bit of a buzzword at the moment. Norman Doidge, a North American (Canadian, I think) psychiatrist, has written this book about the development of neuroplasticity as an idea and a basis for treatment in a variety of neurological and psychiatric disorders.

He shares a number of amazing and inspiring stories about recovery from brain injury, congenital brain abnormalities, from obsessions and childhood trauma. The book is interesting and engaging and definitely worth reading.

Until recently, it was generally believed that the brain carried out its various functions in specifically localised areas, and that damage to an area resulted in loss of function, never to be regained. Evidence is mounting that this view is simplistic and that our brains are much more sophisticated in their response to damage or injury.

Contrary to the idea that adult brains are static, people have been retrained in lost function despite permanent brain tissue damage. Other neuronal networks develop the ability to take over the functions of damaged neurons. Damage to neurons stimulates the production of hormones which catalyse the formation of new networks and pathways.

One of the interesting ideas which Doidge proposes is that our brains delight in learning new things. He goes so far as to say that if our brains lack novelty then we begin to become restless. Delight, enjoyment, love, pleasure all stimulate dopamine in the brain. (The dopamine reward pathway in the pre-frontal cortex is thought to mediate addiction.) We can become tolerant to dopamine stimulation and novelty will renew the 'buzz' and enjoyment.

'We must be learning if we are to feel fully alive, and when life, or love, becomes too predictable and it seems like there is little left to learn, we become restless - a protest, perhaps, of the plastic brain when it can no longer perform its essential task.' (p116).

So, learning new skills and concepts is a way to maintain brain stimulation and protect against the pitfalls of plasticity. Doidge 's illustration is of a skier going down a new slope. The first run will create a new path, but as that path is used a number of times, it begins to direct the skier in that path and it is more difficult to divert to an alternate path. Plasticity gives us the ability to create new paths, but can also bind us tightly into faulty pathways, which become tricky to evade.

These are just a couple of ideas from the book. It is worth reading more, especially because of Doidge's readable, informative style.

Unexpected Death

A sad day at work, today, as I discovered that one of the doctors I work with died suddenly and unexpectedly yesterday. His wife is expecting their third child later this year and my heart aches for what this little family faces over the next while.

Both he and his wife have worked for a number of years in their busy hospital department and are well liked. A memorial service is being planned and I am sure it will be packed.

Instinctively, I imagine what it would be like if my husband died like this. Somehow, I need to personalise the pain to make it more real. In shock, I find myself drawing on connections to establish a sense of reality. Is it not enough that the pain exists? Somehow it needs to touch me, to be close. I do not like the tinge of voyeurism that comes with another's grief, but it speaks of our need to know and be known.

Losing a dear someone brings so much attention, especially when it is in tragic or sudden circumstances. Attention that can be initially overwhelming but fades all too soon as the world moves on. Moving on, as the people whose lives have been blown apart are left reeling and lost.

This broken, broken world where families are bereft, children fatherless, death uncontrollable. We desperately need someone to bring hope and healing. I cannot fix things. We cannot fix things. Despite our competencies, our professionalism, and our independence, our self- reliance is, in fact, baseless in the deep and lasting matters of existence and purpose. Part of my grief is desperation that we are so powerless, in the end, when it really matters.

The message of Easter is that I am powerless, but God is not. Jesus chose to come in innocence and die. God raised him from death to sit beside him in heaven. Relying on God's power and work to rescue us is based on truth. His power to defeat death has passed the burden of proof. He has already done it.

My grief gestates an urge to trust God more.

Then, when our dying bodies have been transformed into bodies that will never die, this Scripture will be fulfilled:

“Death is swallowed up in victory.

O death, where is your victory?

O death, where is your sting?”

For sin is the sting that results in death, and the law gives sin its power.

But thank God! He gives us victory over sin and death through our Lord Jesus Christ.

1 Corinthians 15:54-57.

Please pray that this family will know God's love, comfort and power, now and in the years to come.

Mental Health Reform Needed

In vain I have looked for the icon to post a video here. My minimal technical knowledge is bamboozled for today...

Anyway, watch this video from GetUp starring Patrick McGorry. Health reform needs to include mental health reform in Australia.

The Easy Answer

Another dialectic...

Helping people to recover is one of the key goals working with people who have mental illness. I see patients who have experienced considerable difficulties with depression and anxiety. Some struggle with drug and alcohol use because of their depression and anxiety.

Sometimes people want to find a solution or treatment that will fix everything. Sometimes they want it to be easy. People look to medication, to particular doctors or programs, to alternative therapies to have THE answer. Sometimes I can see that someone will struggle to find the motivation and strength to do what is necessary to recover. Getting better takes hard work, requiring determination and perseverence (thesis).

Those who struggle to recover (and that's most of us isn't it?), can so easily feel that it is their fault that they don't recover, or aren't doing it quickly enough. Is it because I'm not trying hard enough? Is it because I don't have enough faith? What else can I do? Not getting better can be a source of guilt, self-blame, depressed and anxious thoughts. People who are already struggling get sunk by these kinds of self-evaluations (anti-thesis).

We need a synthesis which encompasses a call to perservere and struggle on and a reassurance that suffering is not all our fault. We need to encourage hard work and gracious acceptance.

Sometimes it looks like people will not be up to the task, but they need us patiently preparing for the time when they will be able to summon the strength.

2 Reflections, Vaguely Connected

Numero Uno

Going back to work, I have been thinking about how I can invite Jesus to influence the decisions I make, the conversations I have and the people I see and work with when I am there.

Allowing God to be in every corner of my life and my faith to be evident to all is something I struggle to picture clearly and to put into action. I wonder whether I say enough to make clear the connection between God in my life and how I live, as others see me.

I want to live in a way that brings glory to Jesus and shows that God can touch our lives. However, I sometimes think that my life is more likely to raise the comment, 'She's a nice person.' It doesn't actually lead anyone to meet God in a world where there are any number of 'nice people'. And to some degree I am lying because I am not really that 'nice' when all of my life is under the spotlight.

I really want to know how I can be salt, or light, rather than just more sugar.

The second reflection

Apparently my generation (X) have a history of responding to sense of purpose in life, while the next generation (Y) connect more with the idea of authenticity, rather than purpose. I know that I have often reflected on the way knowing Christ has helped me to understand my life's purpose and that has given me a real peace and contentment in existence.

I would like to become more authentic - and by that I mean I would like there to be less difference between what I say/do and what I am - to express love because it is what I actually feel, not what I think I should feel. I want to spend less time thinking, 'What will *** think if I say _____ ?' and more time training my heart and mind to respond with love and light to any situation.

I have read 2 things recently and am trying to remember them, daily, while I puzzle out how to live them better.

Yes, everything else is worthless when compared with the infinite value of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. Philippians 3:8a.

Let the message about Christ, in all its richness, fill your lives. Colossians 3:16a

What do you think?