Not Knowing - Knowing

An insight is never "gotten" that I don't also "get" a regret/remorse of the "lateness" of the "getting." "I wish I had understood . . . sooner." And because I am my best friend, I often give myself good counsel. One of the things that I remind myself is . . . it is because I have experienced "not knowing" that I am now able to embrace "knowing." That understanding also takes the angst away of others not being able to receive what I offer - they are like me - the time will come when they too will be able to receive a "knowing" because they are, at this point, experiencing a "not knowing." I dare not take the "not knowing" away from them. It is their ticket to "knowing."

Tailor-made

I am convinced that we create our own hells - hells that are tailor-made to who we are. I'm also convinced that our mandate is to overcome the tailor-made hells we create. When we learn to overcome these hells, we will then stop creating them.

A Sanctuary

I have a friend that always talks about listening for God. After hearing him talk this way, it occurred to me that I don't listen for God the way he does. So I asked myself should I be listening for God like he does and/or do I seek God differently? What I suspect is that I seek God differently - I seek to sense God - I put out feelers in order to sense God. I'll give you an example. A couple of months ago, I was finishing up at the UPS warehouse where I work. All 150 trucks were gone and it was unusually quiet except for a bird flying somewhere in the hinterlands of UPS' ceiling. With just a smidgeon of imagination, UPS became a sanctuary (large, quiet, empty, timeless) where God celebrated life and just being aware of that caused my spirit to soar with a co-joint celebration - we were in peace and joy - we were in God's sanctuary - I was sensing God.

It struck me that it is possible that just as people tend to favor one of three learning styles (visual, auditory or tactile) that it is possible that people tend to also seek to experience God in one of three ways - visually (looks for God), or auditorily, (listens for God), or tactile-ly (senses or feels God). Just a thought (just a wondering).

Hold It Lightly

I watch myself with gentle humor, trying to make sense of life. Again, I find myself on Amazon, perusing books. As one book about the victims of WWII leads to another book, I am learning that I'm not real sure what it means to be righteous. I read about swindlers and womanizers and cheats who saved untold number of Jews (i.e. Schindler). I read about people who were hated because they were thought to be collaborators. Later, it was learned that they were "non-heroic-ally" and within the system, doing what they could to help their fellow man. And then I've read about people who sacrificed everything, literally, in order to save others (far beyond any Good Samaritan example). In my little system of life, if you were one of those people, that meant that since you were so incredibly noble, you would go on to have a good life. But not so. Many of those people went on to broken marriages, boring jobs, and hurt children. I also read about religious people who had whole families survive intact, mainly because they stayed far away from any heroic "antics." In my system of life, their offspring would not be blessed or honored. Yet, Nouwen grew up in such a family and became one of the more beloved spiritual writers of our time. I don't quite know what to make of all of this other than the fact that it might be the better part of wisdom to hold my judgments, perceptions, and conclusions lightly. I cannot not have judgments, perceptions, and conclusions, but I can choose to hold them lightly. (Is that called humility?)

War - the Tail End of Evil

I'm not quite sure how I ended up perusing books on Amazon dealing with the Holocaust. I guess one thing led to another and here I was, mulling over WWII victims. (Did you know Russia lost 26 million in WWII!?) Whenever evil expresses itself in war, one can be assured that it was incubating in the hearts and minds of men and women long before it expressed itself in war. In other words, whatever happens on earth, first happens in minds which likewise, first happens in hearts. So all the savagery that bubbles up on earth, first bubbles up in the hearts and minds of humanity. In other words, we are appalled by the fruit of evil - but imagine being God and having to witness this savagery in the hearts and mind of humanity long before it ever manifests itself on earth. Bless His heart - do you think it might be hard being God? We can hardly bear witnessing the tail end of evil - imagine witnessing the whole process!

White Bubbles and Intractable Problems

When I envision an Intractable Problem, I envision one of those White Bubbles that cartoon characters have above their heads when they talk. But instead of the White Bubble being filled with the words of a cartoon character, I envision the White Bubble being filled with the Intractable Problem, you know, one of those problems that just will just not go away, that follows you where ever you go and that affects everything you do, sorta. Interestingly enough, what I have noticed is that it is not the Intractable Problem that never goes away, it is the White Bubble. The White Bubble is always there, waiting to be filled and filled it will be. Caring for my mother use to be an Intractable Problem - it never went away and I never succeeded in doing it well. When my much more capable sister moved and took over the job, the Intractable Problem went away. Except, I noticed that the White Bubble was there waiting to be filled and as I said before, filled it would be - with my current Intractable Problem.

What can we make of this? Well, I would propose that we be careful not to let the current Intractable Problem define our life, knowing that we will always have an Intractable Problem. If we define our lives by living to eliminate the current Intractable Problem, we will never live. The job of the Intractable Problem is to consume us. We must not let Intractable Problem have its way. We are the ones who are to define our lives and we must not let Intractable Problem take over that responsibility.