Chronic unhappiness

"7 Habits of Chronically Unhappy People" by Tamara Star. When I saw this headline on Huffington Post this morning I just had to click it! (to read the article click here.)  Tamara goes into more detail on the site but here are the 7 habits she describes:

1) Your default belief is that life is hard.
2) You believe most people can't be trusted.
3)  You focus on what's wrong with the world vs. what's right.
4)  You compare yourself to others and harbor jealousy.
5)  You strive to control your life.
6)  You consider your future with worry and fear.
7)  You fill your conversation with gossip and complaints.

Know anyone who fits all 7?  how about 5?  3?  how about yourself?  I see several that I know quite intimately. And even if none of these apply to you, being around someone who lives these mantras can be draining and exhausting.

One of the things I've learned working as a hospice chaplain is that even though someone may have spent a large portion of their life viewing the world through several pairs of these skewed glasses, by the time they receive a hospice referral and we have had an opportunity to talk about their impending death, most of these beliefs have been allowed to fade into the background, seen to be not as important to keep holding onto, or even viewed with some humor. When faced with death, many begin to see more clearly or at least get a new prescription for their glasses.  Let's not wait until then to change our unhappiness habits.

unhappy sunflower taken from wallpaper4me.com

something on the horizon

In light of artist/author Jan Richardson's husband Garrison Doles having died today, I wanted to use one of her wonderful Advent quotes.  May she find the light in the darkness as she grieves the loss of her beloved.

 

“The season of Advent means there is something on the horizon

the likes of which we have never seen before… .

What is possible is to not see it, to miss it,

to turn just as it brushes past you.

And you begin to grasp what it was you missed,

like Moses in the cleft of the rock,

watching God's [back] fade in the distance.

So stay. Sit. Linger. Tarry. Ponder. Wait. Behold. Wonder.

There will be time enough for running.

For rushing. For worrying. For pushing. For now, stay.

Wait. Something is on the horizon.”

Jan L. Richardson, Night Visions:

Searching the Shadows of Advent and Christmas.

 

To join her Advent online retreat go to the painted prayerbook.

prefer truth

It's ironic that my last post from August says "be here now" and yet I've been everywhere but here! 

As life unfolds I'm willing to go where Spirit leads. 

Today she led me to the blog and this photo of Morse Creek in Port Angeles, WA. 

I discovered the quote in Richard Rohr's Immortal Diamond.

May your path lead you to truth. 

 

 

 

 

"Christ likes us to prefer truth to himself,

because before being Christ, he is truth.

If one turns aside from him to go toward the truth,

one will not go far before falling into his arms.

 

- Simone Weil, Waiting for God

tiptoe through the tulips

Today my friend Karen took me to trip through the La Conner tulips to celebrate my 60th birthday.

What a glorious day.  I have no words for the beauty of these flowers. 

Enjoy!

 

 

Deep in their roots all flowers keep the light.

-Theodore Roethke

Life is a celebration of passionate colors. - Leialoha Cator

 

If you've never been thrilled to the very edges of your soul by a flower in spring bloom,

maybe your soul has never been in bloom. ~Terri Guillemets

 

Sometimes I imagine colors as if they were living ideas, being of pure reason with which to communicate.

Nature is not on the surface, it is deep down. - Paul Cezanne

 

Color is joy. One does not think joy. One is carried by it. - Ernst Haas

 

Everything is blooming most recklessly; if it were voices instead of colors,

there would be an unbelievable shrieking into the heart of the night.

-Rainer Maria Rilke

Happy New Year

I receive this email everyday from Inward/Outward: Church of the Savior....

and yesterday's’s is perfect in an “examen” sort of way:

Meaning, what were the consolations of your year? 

What were the desolations of your year?

I encourage each of us to set aside some time in the next couple of days

to ponder some (or all ) of these questions.

Share your thoughts with a friend. I am going to encourage my spiritual directees to do this too!


Year-ending, Year-beginning Elizabeth O'Connor Use New Year's Eve or New Year's Day as a time of reflection on the year gone and the year to come: What took place in your home relations? Your work relations? Your church relations? What events in the larger community of city, country and world most captured your attention?   Who were the significant people in your life? What books and art instructed your mind and heart?   Did you create anything this year? Did you make any new discoveries about yourself? How were you gift last year to a person, a community or an institution?   What was your greatest joy in this year gone? What was your greatest sorrow? What caused you the most disappointment? What caused you the most sadness?   In what areas of your life did you grow? Were these areas related to your joy or your pain?   What are your regrets? How would you do things differently, if you could live the year again? What did you learn?   Did you have a recurring dream? What theme or themes ran through your year?   Did you grow in your capacity to be a person in community--to bear your own burdens, to let others bear theirs? Did you have sufficient time apart with yourself?   Did you root your life more firmly in Scripture? Did you grow in your understanding of yourself? What was your most important insight? Did God seem near or far off?   How do you want to create the new year? What kind of commitment do you want to make to yourself? Your community? To the oppressed people of the world? How do the questions about commitment make you feel? Angry? Challenged? Hopeful?   Who are the people with whom you would like to deepen your relationships in the year to come? Do you have relationships that need to be healed? What can you do to heal your own heart? What can others do to assist in your healing?   Is there a special piece of inward work that you would like to accomplish? Is there a special outward work? What are the goals that seem important to you? What are your hopes? What are your fears? What are the immediate first steps that you can take toward the goals that seem important to you?   We might have a time of prayer in which to give thanks for all the events of the year gone, and to ask that the God through whose fingers they were filtered will continue to bless them to our use. They are now the bread of our life--part of all that we have to share with another when we share what is ours to give away. loan payday online 4 web 6payday 41 loan linkloans only 1 arm 5 interestcash loan 5 advance illinois5 loan consolidators best studentloan equity home 5.5loan fax no guaranteed 500with loan 9 payday no 6 Map Source: Letters to Scattered Pilgrims Add your thoughts at inward/outward This message is a daily service of inward/outward. Was this message forwarded to you? Click here to sign up.

First Candle

 

Welcome to the Season of Advent...

We are 3 days in and I'm not quite feeling it yet...how about you? 

Maybe because waiting has become such an integral part of my life?

I'm finding that all I have energy for at this moment is in

lighting the first candle which represents hope

and just sitting in its presence. 

That is prayer in itself. 

Jesus is coming.

 

Listen to the opening of Sunday's Prayers of the People,

written by Christine Hemp:

 

"We have lit the first candle, Lord.

Green has turned into purple,

and we begin our walk toward Christmas.

Startle us into seeing the journey afresh this year.

Open our eyes to the sun and the moon and the stars

and what Jesus really meant when he told us to pay attention.

Help us to see you face-to-face and restore what is lacking in our faith,

in our vision of who you are and how you reveal yourself to us.

Give us eyes to see and ears to hear."

 

from Prayers of the People for the First Sunday of Advent

St. Paul's Episcopal Church, Port Townsend, WA

Author:  Christine Hemp

 

Fall Triduum

Every year, our “Fall Triduum” of All Hallow’s, All Saints, and All Souls

becomes more precious to me as each one focuses my attention on how connected we are

to not only those who are alive, but to all those who have gone before us –

relatives, friends, enemies, muses,(i.e. the communion of saints.)

Yesterday we celebrated All Saints Sunday

with one of the most “thin place” services of the year –

the one in which we commemorate all the saints

by posting their names on the walls of the sanctuary.

+++

Whether they are from long ago....

(Saint Leontia)

Or more recently...

(Jill Cooper, a friend)



Or a close relative like my father,

(Kenneth)

Or even the name of a woman

who has the same name of my

own mother who is still alive!

(Ok, I have to admit,

it was pretty weird to see

my mother on the wall)...



What wasn’t weird or strange was the feeling of their presence in the room with us.

What the Celts call a “thin place”

All of us together. In one place.

One very “thin” place.

These 3 days are as intertwined as a Celtic Knot.

With themes of death and resurrection,

we are reminded that there is no beginning or ending to our souls.

We move and have our being in a continuous flow of God’s love,

knowing that we are always in the presence of God.

 

“Beannacht De le hanama na marbh

(The blessing of God on the souls of the dead.)

Ta siad imithe ar shli na firinne

(They are gone on the way of truth.”)

Irish Blessing



So until it is our time to join all those saints who have gone before us on the way of truth,

may we continue to enjoy their presence, and

walk in love, seeking and serving Christ in all we meet today.



(last photo is of Fall colors outside the Columbarium at St. Paul’s)

Moving On...

I have internet!  Finally!  I love my ipad and iphone but I'm most comfortable with my desktop computer. I enjoy the feel of the keys (instead of a screen) under my fingers. 

 

 









The past month has been all about moving out of our home.  As you can see from the photos all traces of our life have been removed. Such a long process deciding what to keep, what to toss, what to sell and what to give away.   But as I took that final walkthrough, I could almost feel the house aching from the change.  After all, it was built to contain our belongings, to protect our family, and to be a shelter for our stories.  As we move on our house is waiting for its second inhabitants....and it will be comforted by living into its purpose - to be a home.....As for us?  We too look forward to stepping over the next threshold....May we remain open to the possibilities before us....

"We look with uncertainty

Beyond the old choices for

Clear-cut answers

To a softer, more permeable aliveness

Which is every moment

At the brink of death;

For something new is being born in us

If we but let it.

 

We stand at a new doorway,

Awaiting that which comes...

Daring to be human creatures,

Vulnerable to the beauty of existence.

Learning to love."

 

- Anne Hillman

the mystery of manure

An Excerpt from The Lively Garden Prayer Book by William Cleary

The Lively Garden Prayer Book is a little book that pays tribute to the "Green Spirit God."

Here, for example, is nature's way of practicing transformation.

====================================================

"Among the deeper mysteries of life is the mystery of manure,

how awful it smells,

how disgusting it looks,

how repulsive it feels —

yet how delicious it is to our vegetable cousins in the garden:

the tomatoes, the corn, the carrots.

"We put manure right into their bed.

They not only welcome it, but they take it in,

and through the life powers within them,

absorb its very substance into their individual beings,

transforming its smelly and disgusting substance miraculously into

bright shining red tomatoes,

yellow luscious corn,

sweet wholesome carrots.

"Miraculously, that execrable manure has now turned into something humans can eat:

nourishing, sweet-smelling food, delicious to the mouth and life-giving to every part of our bodies —

a magic we might expect to find only in mythical Eden."

photos of our vegetable patch

psalm one

 

Psalm 1

“Blessed are the man and the woman

who have grown beyond their greed

and have put an end to their hatred

and no longer nourish illusions.

But they delight in the way things are

and keep their hearts open, day and night.

They are like trees planted near flowing rivers,

which bear fruit when they are ready.

Their leaves will not fall or wither.

Everything they do will succeed.”

translated by Stephen Mitchell

from The Enlightened Heart

p. 5

art by Frits Thaulow from here

what to do with sorrow

“The uses we make of sorrow

are the measure of our spiritual growth.”

- Diana Lampen

Image by h.koppdelaney

“The Harvest: Cultivating the Spirit”

found here

+

I’m so taken by this image.  What do you see?

wisp of thread

“Life may seem inexplicable.

But, always, somewhere,

there is a narrow filament of meaning,

like a spider web.

Hold it between the thumb or finger or your heart.

Follow its invisible trail through the labyrinth of your life,

until it leads you where it will.

This is the walk of faith,

this blind stepping in the darkness,

with only the invisible, resilient wisp of thread

that leads to God.”

- Gerda Crake

photo by Jane Manzer

They're back (the wise ones, that is)

'Twas 3 days after Xmas, and all through the house,

there were shouts of glee because Bethany had

finally transferred most of my files from my

"almost dead" computer to my new one:)

So now I'm able to bring you the latest adventures

of the Wise Men.  And if you are not familiar with their previous

 adventures, I invite you to click here to read all about them.

And yes, they are STILL here.  I thought they had left for

the Holy Land last week so I was surprised to see them

on their bathroom shelf this morning.  I have to admit,

they have been in quite the funk for the past few months.

They tell me it's because of the world wide recession but I know

it's because of all the time they have spent with that leprechaun

they've been sharing their bathroom shelf with since March. 

Me:  So why are you guys still here?  Didn't you see the star

shining in the night with the tail as big as a kite?

WM#1:  Yes we saw it but Laddy (the Leprechaun) told us that

we should let some other wise ones visit the Christ child this year. 

After all, why should we always be the one ones who share our gifts? 

Me: You share your gifts because that is what God created you to do.

Wow...you really have been influenced by Laddy.  Haven't I

told you not to trust him?  Just look at that smirk on his face.  All

he cares about is his pile of gold. Not only is he not interested in

sharing it with you, he wants your gifts  too!  Good thing your gifts

 are attached to your arms or they would be in his pile by now!

WM#2: Dearest landlady, is there any conversation during which

you do NOT mention our affliction?  We do have feelings you know.

Me:  I'm terribly sorry.  I forget that you can be quite sensitive about that.  

Please accept my apologies.  In the meantime, I will remove Laddy

from the sill, which I should have done long ago.  Tomorrow we'll have a

 real conversation about your impending journey. 

 In the meantime, I've brought you new reading material.  

100 Graces.  It will help your mind and spirit settle down. 

May you find wisdom inside its pages which will enable you to recall your own story. 

You do have one you know, and it is sacred.

Good Night my wee wise men.

a favorite from 2009

"Advent is all about

the unexpected arrival of God."

Paul-Gordon Chandler

Incarnation happens when you least expect it!

As do polar bears arriving for din-din :)

2nd Sunday in Advent, 2011

Yesterday we celebrated the Second Sunday of Advent. 

Two candles of the four are now lit, bringing a bit more light into the darkness.  

Isn't this Advent wreath a thing of beauty? 

I'm drawn to both the earthy textures and desert-like colors.

Which brings me to John the Baptist, the voice crying in the wilderness.

The forerunner to the Messiah, who prepared His way.

He was earthy to the max, wasn't he?

 With his rough clothing, austere diet, and calls for repentance.

I have lifted the following quote from a website

that I look forward to receiving every week:

The Edge of Enclosure.  Do check it out here.

And as you light your second candle, consider the pairing of our loneliness,

our desert experiences of life, with the river of life

that the Christ child will bring and fill us with in this season

so that we might offer such a love to those who, like us,

are also wandering in the wilderness. 

***

"Our brokenness is the wound through which

the full power of God can penetrate our being and transfigure us in God.

Loneliness is not something from which we must flee

but the place from where we can cry out to God,

where God will find us and we can find God.

Yes, through our wounds the power of God can penetrate us

and become like rivers of living water to irrigate the arid earth within us.

Thus we may irrigate the arid earth of others, so that hope and love are reborn."
-Jean Vanier
The Broken Body
1988 Paulist Press
quoted from An Advent Sourcebook (LTP)

the photo of the Advent table decoration is from here.

unknown territory

 

Family Enjoying Thanksgiving Dinner

at St. Anthony's Dining Room in San Francisco

This is the day on which we give thanks, and oh, do we not have so much to be thankful for?  Besides my usual litany of family and friends I want to give a special thanks to my mother and father, who in the face of bigotry and economic failure in N. Ireland, took the risk to take their 2 year old daughter to seek a better future in a new country, the United States of America.  The year was 1955 and I was two. 

Most of the time I consider that story in the knowledge that I know how it turned out - which is also how I often read the sacred story of the birth of Christ...ho hum. But upon further reflection today I realize that my parents had no idea how they would be accepted, whether there would be work, or how they would provide for their child.  There were no guarantees and yet they took this giant leap into "unknown territory."  Sound familiar?  Is that not what God is always calling us towards? 

There are many stories that have been left untold about our families and we experience new connections and compassion as new ones are  revealed.  Case in point: I just learned from my mother that upon their arrival in San Francisco, my father spent many a long and lonely day looking for any type of work with no success.  What I didn't know was that his biggest joy every day was the knowledge that he would receive a hot meal from a group of Franciscans in downtown San Francisco.  I never knew that my father was on the receiving end of such kindness.  That new knowledge has enlarged my heart towards him and towards the hands of Christ who ministered to my dad and  countless others.  The founder, Father Alfred, opened the doors to St. Anthony's Dining Room (he did not want it to be labeled a soup kitchen) on Oct. 4th, 1950 (the feast of St. Francis) and the Dining Room continues to serve on average 2600 meals a day.  I'm constantly amazed at how God's sheep weave God's grace through all of our lives. 

So when it is my turn today at the dinner table to offer what I'm grateful for, I will mention the boldness and tenacity of my parents in seeking out a better life for their family and for those Franciscan friars who took the words of Christ to heart, "Feed my sheep." 

And as we edge closer to the season of Advent, I'd ask that you consider what "unknown territory" God may be leading you toward?

Happy Thanksgiving

1956 - St. Anthony's Dining Room

"I see God as one act -

just loving, like the sun,

always shining."

- Father Alfred, founder of

St. Anthony's Dining Room

a life that is my own

"I can only trust that what lies ahead will be fuller, freer than the present.

I hope for a life that is my own, that has no false chains to bind me,

that allows me to move like a butterfly, on the wind and to stand,

when necessary, like a lioness in the high grass.

I want a life that is directed by the call within myself - not by an institution,

not even by what looks like the care and concern of others."

 -Joan Chittister - from Called to Question, p.54

(thanks E+)

 photo by Gary Voth found here

the mark of beauty

"The marks and wounds that suffering leave on us

are eventually places of beauty."

- John O'Donohue

 

picture of a twisted tree I encountered at Dosewallips Park, WA

 

History Maker

You know that saying, "Well behaved women rarely make history"..?

Well, in today's gospel from Matthew 15 we hear the voice

of the desperate Canaanite woman

who pleaded with Jesus to cure her demon-possessed daughter.

Thanks to her bold response to his initial denial to help,

"Yes, Lord, but even the dogs eat the crumbs

that fall from their masters' table,"

she made history by having her story included for us to hear,

and she enlarged Jesus' view of who was included. 

"Woman, great is your faith! Let it be done for you as you wish."

Dang! 

infrequency

What if the question is not

why I am so infrequently the person I really want to be, but

why do I so infrequently want to be the person I really am?

Oriah Mountain Dreamer