From Susan S. Weed's Healing Wise:
Just as receptive power seems a contradiction in terms to some, so too does rough love. Compassion, forgiveness, and unconditional love evoke a sense of squishy soft acceptance to many. In the Wise Woman tradition, love is rough, real, truthful, and unattached to outcome. In the Wise Woman tradition, love says "no" as often as it says "yes."
The Wise Woman tradition sees compassion as passionate. Passion shared is compassion. Passion is rough; passion is wild. Screams and shouts and tears and touches are part of living with passion, being com/passionate in the Wise Woman way.
Forgiveness is focused on self, in the Wise Woman way, and believe me, that can rough. Forgive yourself for being hurt, for suffering, and love yourself enough to tell yourself the truth about it. Is it time to say "no"?
In the Wise Woman tradition, forgiving ourselves opens our vision to our limits, to our cramped spaces, to our self-inflicted prisons. Keen-sighted from the truth, we see how to free ourselves by setting boundaries that truly protect our fragile aspects yet are moveable, permeable to nourishment, so we receive the intimacy we desire. Saying "no" leads to unconditional love.
Unconditional love that nourishes the inner being does not tolerate abuse, ugliness, lies. Unconditional self-love brings self-respect and demands it of others. Unconditional self-love knows that it is unloving of anyone, self or other, to allow abuse to continue, no matter their age or circumstances. Loving ourselves unconditionally strengthens our power to say "no" when our heart knows that beauty and the truth are not present.
The wise woman understands that, for most of us, saying "no" is hard to do. We're afraid that if we say "no," we won't get enough love. Or worse yet, we won't be allowed to give our love away, and we need to give our love away so we can expect to get love from others. The wise woman understands that we expect love to come from outside, not inside. She knows that this expectation, this assumption, this hope--that love comes from outside--prevents us from speaking our truth when our heart demands that we say "no."
Loving ourselves, generating love from inside, not trying to get it from outside, that is the Wise Woman way, a way that allows "no" to reveal its loving nature.
Become aware of how often you do the expected thing, the good thing, the right thing, says the Wise Woman helper, and acknowledge the part of yourself that is a liar, that is afraid to say "no."
Truth and unconditional love support each other. To love yourself unconditionally, you must tell yourself the truth. You cannot hear your own truth if you are lying to others. Begin to tell the truth in the smallest thing. This brings you wholeness. Tell the truth often and you will be filled with beauty. You will have health. You with walk the beauty way of health/wholeness/holiness. Your truth will bless all you encounter. You will be blessed. Do not be afraid to reveal your own uniqueness, for that is part of your blessing.
Monday, September 20, 2010
Bobbie - my eulogy
He was the big man next door when I was a little girl, a giant in my eyes who towered over my entire family, and who had to duck whenever he entered our home with his gentle strength. His hands were so huge that when I was tiny, I could have almost worn his wedding ring for a bracelet. That was before I knew him, but not my family.
We weren't always next door to the Smiths. In fact, compared to the time we've known them now, those years when we could walk thirty or so steps to each other's doors were relatively few. But they have always been and will always be our neighbors. The ancient white house, now on the other side of a fence and owned by two people since they moved, will always be theirs.
Bobbie was exactly whom you would want your neighbor to be. An open smile, a firm handshake that could swallow your own, and a perfect willingness to help: these were his trademarks. He loved to laugh, and when he did, even his chuckle would fill the room with the deep sounds of his voice. No opportunity for a pun was passed over, and as I learned what they were, we would trade them back and forth like cards.
He could speak to children, he understood them, and he loved them. I never had the opportunity to be his student in school or to have him as my coach, but no one I have ever met that was in his class or on his team has ever said he was anything but the best they ever had. I would have traded a few I had for him in a heartbeat.
He loved to bake, especially his eponymous Bobbie Bread, delicious and brown and warm and unbeatable fresh from the oven. He loved to work, especially out side and with his hands. Whether it was gardening or mowing the back yard, cutting up the mint over the leach field. You could smell for days when Bobbie had mowed the yard. He gave service more willingly than almost anyone, and he gave love. He stood by what he believed without fail, and always with love.
I speak in the past tense because these are my memories, but Bobbie lives on. He has finally gone home, having enduring his trials, and I know after giving his all. The world has lost one of its greatest men, the kind you're lucky to know one of in a lifetime. I was blessed to know Bobbie Smith as the big man next door.
We weren't always next door to the Smiths. In fact, compared to the time we've known them now, those years when we could walk thirty or so steps to each other's doors were relatively few. But they have always been and will always be our neighbors. The ancient white house, now on the other side of a fence and owned by two people since they moved, will always be theirs.
Bobbie was exactly whom you would want your neighbor to be. An open smile, a firm handshake that could swallow your own, and a perfect willingness to help: these were his trademarks. He loved to laugh, and when he did, even his chuckle would fill the room with the deep sounds of his voice. No opportunity for a pun was passed over, and as I learned what they were, we would trade them back and forth like cards.
He could speak to children, he understood them, and he loved them. I never had the opportunity to be his student in school or to have him as my coach, but no one I have ever met that was in his class or on his team has ever said he was anything but the best they ever had. I would have traded a few I had for him in a heartbeat.
He loved to bake, especially his eponymous Bobbie Bread, delicious and brown and warm and unbeatable fresh from the oven. He loved to work, especially out side and with his hands. Whether it was gardening or mowing the back yard, cutting up the mint over the leach field. You could smell for days when Bobbie had mowed the yard. He gave service more willingly than almost anyone, and he gave love. He stood by what he believed without fail, and always with love.
I speak in the past tense because these are my memories, but Bobbie lives on. He has finally gone home, having enduring his trials, and I know after giving his all. The world has lost one of its greatest men, the kind you're lucky to know one of in a lifetime. I was blessed to know Bobbie Smith as the big man next door.
The Book of Mormon: A piece of my Testimony
I recently went to Utah to attend the funeral of a long-time family friend. (I will post his eulogy shortly.) While waiting for Sacrament meeting to start, I was once again pondering on something a friend had said to me a year or two ago when she was learning about the Church. It's my opinion that she was less concerned with seeking spiritual truth than learning "facts", wherever they came from, ones that she could use to tell me why I was wrong. As I contemplated, this was the result.
If Joseph had been a treasure hunter, digging for gold and claiming to have found it, why then--instead of renouncing his vision, moving far away, and changing his name to live a life of luxury--would he instead go on to publish a single book--having to borrow money in order to do so--face persecution and prosecution, be driven from place to place, threatened, tortured, beaten, imprisoned, betrayed, and be subjected to all manner of hellish tribulation and hatred? Why would anyone endure so much for so worldly little, if there was not a deep spiritual truth at their foundation. How could that book have endured for nearly two hundred years with only increasing worldwide interest and devotion without truth in its very essence?
The Book of Mormon is equal to the Bible in significance and testimony of the Son of God, Jesus Christ, the Savior of the world. The major differences between these two records are the cultures and locations that wrote them, and the methods by which we gained them. One follows the House of Isreal--and in time, primarily the Tribe of Judah--and was compiled from many manuscripts and voted upon as an official consolidation of doctrine. The second followed an offshoot of Israel, preserved in the New World from the destruction of Babylon as followers of Jehovah, handed down through generations of kings and judges, compiled and condensed by ancient prophets and hid up to later be translated by a modern prophet.
Both exhort us to be obedient, to repent, to endure to the end, to make and keep sacred covenents with God, to have faith, hope, and charity, to be about the work of spreading the Gospel, to defend and support the weak, to deal justly with all people and peoples, to be kind, to be virtuous, to be honest, to worship God as the Father of all creation, to have mercy, to do good works, and above all else, to believe in Jesus Christ as Redeemer of the world.
the Book of Mormon has over 500 pages of cultural, literary, and spiritual complexity that is so complete, it is at the very least highly improbable that a farm boy with an eighth grade education could concoct them, much less compile them in sixty days. At best, the Book of Mormon is miraculous in its existence, to say nothing of its power to inspire good and the impact it has had on millions of lives across the world over the past one hundred and eighty years.
Whether on accepts Joseph Smith as a prophet or the Book of Mormon as legitimate Christian scripture, these are the simple facts of that tome.
I do accept the Book of Mormon as scripture, as great and worthy scripture, and I testify that it has profoundly changed and shaped my life. I am a better person since I began a consistent study of it in my early 20s; I am kinder, more patient, closer to God, and spiritually more sure of myself. I have gained great insight, knowledge, and wisdom from the Book of Mormon, and I know that it is true. Because it exists, because I have felt the whisper of the Spirit confirming it, I know that Joseph Smith was and is a Prophet, that he opened this dispensation for the restoration of the fullness of the Gospel, and that his work is still in force today. This I say in the name of Jesus Christ.
If Joseph had been a treasure hunter, digging for gold and claiming to have found it, why then--instead of renouncing his vision, moving far away, and changing his name to live a life of luxury--would he instead go on to publish a single book--having to borrow money in order to do so--face persecution and prosecution, be driven from place to place, threatened, tortured, beaten, imprisoned, betrayed, and be subjected to all manner of hellish tribulation and hatred? Why would anyone endure so much for so worldly little, if there was not a deep spiritual truth at their foundation. How could that book have endured for nearly two hundred years with only increasing worldwide interest and devotion without truth in its very essence?
The Book of Mormon is equal to the Bible in significance and testimony of the Son of God, Jesus Christ, the Savior of the world. The major differences between these two records are the cultures and locations that wrote them, and the methods by which we gained them. One follows the House of Isreal--and in time, primarily the Tribe of Judah--and was compiled from many manuscripts and voted upon as an official consolidation of doctrine. The second followed an offshoot of Israel, preserved in the New World from the destruction of Babylon as followers of Jehovah, handed down through generations of kings and judges, compiled and condensed by ancient prophets and hid up to later be translated by a modern prophet.
Both exhort us to be obedient, to repent, to endure to the end, to make and keep sacred covenents with God, to have faith, hope, and charity, to be about the work of spreading the Gospel, to defend and support the weak, to deal justly with all people and peoples, to be kind, to be virtuous, to be honest, to worship God as the Father of all creation, to have mercy, to do good works, and above all else, to believe in Jesus Christ as Redeemer of the world.
the Book of Mormon has over 500 pages of cultural, literary, and spiritual complexity that is so complete, it is at the very least highly improbable that a farm boy with an eighth grade education could concoct them, much less compile them in sixty days. At best, the Book of Mormon is miraculous in its existence, to say nothing of its power to inspire good and the impact it has had on millions of lives across the world over the past one hundred and eighty years.
Whether on accepts Joseph Smith as a prophet or the Book of Mormon as legitimate Christian scripture, these are the simple facts of that tome.
I do accept the Book of Mormon as scripture, as great and worthy scripture, and I testify that it has profoundly changed and shaped my life. I am a better person since I began a consistent study of it in my early 20s; I am kinder, more patient, closer to God, and spiritually more sure of myself. I have gained great insight, knowledge, and wisdom from the Book of Mormon, and I know that it is true. Because it exists, because I have felt the whisper of the Spirit confirming it, I know that Joseph Smith was and is a Prophet, that he opened this dispensation for the restoration of the fullness of the Gospel, and that his work is still in force today. This I say in the name of Jesus Christ.
Like unto Mother Eve
Welcome! I hope you enjoy your time here and that you find something worthy of reflection and contemplation in my little blog. It's really more of a personal project, a way of consolidating and categorizing my thoughts, questions, experiences, and questions about life, the Plan of Salvation, and the deep Truths-with-a-capital-T of God.
I love our noble mother, Eve. As with any mother, without her, we wouldn't be here. We wouldn't be who we are. I firmly believe she was courageous, adventurous, insightful, and wise; that she had an inkling of the grand scope of her decision to partake of the fruit of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, and saw that it was indeed Good; that she has suffered an unjust reputation at the hands of her children through the ages, and the world owes her (and every woman abused or belittled in consequence of that reputation) an eternal apology. If you can't respect that stance, you very well may not like my blog, and I will exercise my right not to tolerate disrespect to her.
However, that's not really to point of this blog. I imagine Eve will be a somewhat rare subject here; there are too many other things on my mind. What I do want to impress upon my readers, though, is the spirit of Eve that I strive for in my life, and how it combines two of my interests into one: my religion/spirituality, and the Wise Woman traditions. I am a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. LDS. Mormon. I am a "crunchy granola" Mormon, to boot, and as part of that, lately I've been studying a lot about Wise Woman tradition. A lot of it fits nicely with my beliefs, some I'm still figuring out, and some I can't yet accept, if I ever do... which is a very Wise Woman thing to say, really. Anyway, a lot of this blog will be about how my non-spiritual and spiritual beliefs collide, coincide, correlate, and coalesce. A lot of it will just be thoughts about beliefs, doctrines, traditions, history, and whatever else crosses my mind. This is my spiritual journal. (Please play kindly. Thank you.)
-Sam
I love our noble mother, Eve. As with any mother, without her, we wouldn't be here. We wouldn't be who we are. I firmly believe she was courageous, adventurous, insightful, and wise; that she had an inkling of the grand scope of her decision to partake of the fruit of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, and saw that it was indeed Good; that she has suffered an unjust reputation at the hands of her children through the ages, and the world owes her (and every woman abused or belittled in consequence of that reputation) an eternal apology. If you can't respect that stance, you very well may not like my blog, and I will exercise my right not to tolerate disrespect to her.
However, that's not really to point of this blog. I imagine Eve will be a somewhat rare subject here; there are too many other things on my mind. What I do want to impress upon my readers, though, is the spirit of Eve that I strive for in my life, and how it combines two of my interests into one: my religion/spirituality, and the Wise Woman traditions. I am a member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. LDS. Mormon. I am a "crunchy granola" Mormon, to boot, and as part of that, lately I've been studying a lot about Wise Woman tradition. A lot of it fits nicely with my beliefs, some I'm still figuring out, and some I can't yet accept, if I ever do... which is a very Wise Woman thing to say, really. Anyway, a lot of this blog will be about how my non-spiritual and spiritual beliefs collide, coincide, correlate, and coalesce. A lot of it will just be thoughts about beliefs, doctrines, traditions, history, and whatever else crosses my mind. This is my spiritual journal. (Please play kindly. Thank you.)
-Sam
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