Practicing Relationships.

I sense a tension between the ideal of authenticity and the desire for others' good will. I wonder, do we really want to know others' true state of heart? Or would we, would I, rather just have them lie to me so that I feel appreciated--so that I feel accepted? I might readily accept the latter, I find to my dismay.

Are we supposed to outwardly appear to accept what inwardly we despise, in an effort to love?

From the one side, it's so hard sometimes to put kindly what I mean kindly--to let someone know that what they do offends me. Not that it's not worth it; I'm trying to figure out if it is worth it. If it is--then I must at least try to do it.

My struggle is that if they don't understand, it's so difficult to make amends. And if they do understand--it's still usually difficult to make amends. It seems to break relationships rather than fix them. But perhaps the breaking is part of the fixing--like re-breaking a broken arm that is healing crooked.

From the other side--in thought I would rather have someone tell me the truth, but in reality I am not sure. If the person loves me, cares enough to put it kindly, and help me learn to do better, than I would welcome it. If the person does not care, then in the first place he or she probably wouldn't bring it up, but in the second place would not try to say it kindly and probably hurt me.

How is love supposed to show itself? Is it more loving to gruffly let someone know I don't care--or to appear to listen while inwardly seething? How disgusting that I must ask the question.

...

How confusing our way of talking is! Yet it's so plain, teasing. We pretend to offend, pretend to be offended, and underneath the whole we love each other. And where we have to try to be kind, have to appear to accept--there often is the person we struggle the most accepting, and who senses it the least.

How strange it would be to talk without a mask, that really isn't a mask. Is a transparent mask so bad? Those who know me see through it, and those who don't don't care, usually.

...

I wonder why we don't notice the little things that show others we love them. Things so simple, so easy--but they require stepping out of our comfort zones, letting down our hair a little, letting go the "that's mine!" mentality, opening up. I never realized how private we are, how mine I've made the things I claim.

I wonder what meeting an open soul would be like--someone whose heart was open, and welcoming--and no matter what happened there--loving. Who knew when and how to overlook, and when and how to be overlooked.

Peeking Out From My Past--

Oh, hi! Come on in! Don't bonk your head on the doorway--it's a little low. So good to see you!

Tea or coffee? I'll just be a minute... won't you sit by the fire?

Oh, my visitors on the sofa? These are a few old friends of mine--very old friends. A couple of stories--a couple of poems--a couple of songs. And I think a drawing or two. They dropped by for a visit--haven't seen them in a while--and I find I didn't remember them quite accurately. Somehow I thought they were different--but then maybe I've changed.

This is the first--"And the Stars Remained". Why don't you get acquainted while I go find you a drink?

Help.

Reverence. Fear. These aren't words I normally use towards God. Yet I firmly believe in their importance. Without proper respect and acknowledgment of WHO God is--I gravely misstep in my thoughts toward and conversations with (or are they at?) God.

I want to die having lived a life pleasing to God.

As a culture, and as a generation, we're losing our ideals--the good guys aren't the good guys anymore. The bad guys aren't bad. Evil is not evil--it's a friendly devil, an affectionate death.

God isn't God anymore.

We've copied our stories, images, thoughts, and feelings so many times that they no longer have meaning. We are souls without faces.

What is love, again? Oh, and none of that nonsense, please. The REAL thing. Since all the other REAL things weren't actually real.

We are blind; we have no eyes to see God for who He is and what He requires.

And what is goodness?

Goodness is neither kindness nor righteousness; goodness is speaking in a politically correct manner, having a well-paying job, raising a family, taking a vacation every summer, playing team sports. Goodness is "coopetition"--everyone wins, even though only one gets the gold. It doesn't matter if we don't win; we justify our condition. We don't want to win anymore--doing okay is good enough.

--GOOD ENOUGH. As if there were such a thing--

We are dying. We are weakened. We cannot see it--or maybe we would be healed.

I don't want to sound overemotional. I don't want to glamorize the situation. I am exhausted of living according to what I think is life.

Goodness used to be selflessness: pursuing the good, true, and beautiful, then spending one's life giving it away. Loving the unlovely enough to give them the means to find true beauty.

Goodness used to trust that the missionary pleading for funds was not out to steal your money--but out to heal lives.

Goodness used to remember that God is God.

Remember.
That.
God.
Is.
God.

Not haunting our steps, waiting for us to mess up.
Not lovingly patting us on the head no matter what we do.

He is God: He shows His love to all yet does not let the guilty go unpunished.

...

Who are we now? What have we become? Us who have seen his love and not understood his justice?

...

I long to be a godly woman of purpose and ambition to see God's will done on earth. I have never before felt so lacking in character.

LORD, have mercy on me, a sinner.

And thank you for men like Booker T. Washington.

...

The Wheatstone video came a couple of days ago—and wonder of wonders, I tensed up watching it— "What would they think of me now?"

Old doubts have re-inhabited my mind. Disgust. Pain. Depression.

No! They have no authority here; yank their throbbing roots out of your heart...

Oh, how much I want to remember!

Remember being part of a whole—not isolated.
Remember being happy.
Remember being satisfied, yet not complacent.
Remember being surrendered.
Remember being almost...

Almost who I wanted to be.