Between Then and Now

Lent will be over in ten days.  My Lenten sacrifice has been twofold:

• One, finding the time to write two blogs a week in which I entered into self examination and self reflection regarding eight different topics.  Let's see if I can remember them from heart.  Negative thinking, criticism, procrastination, fear of success, fear of failure.  Well, five out of eight isn't too bad.  Upon a little research, I discover the other three to be negative self-talk, people pleasing, and self-doubt.

• Two, living with the fact that very few people will ever read my blogs.  A trial sore to the ego.

Which reminds me of a story, a true story at that, and also a short one.  One morning, when I was sixteen, I woke up from a dead sleep and burst into tears.  Just burst into tears. I was not rocked by a dream, or some dread worry facing me that day.  I was rocked by a notion.  That notion was the possibility I may not live forever.  

It wasn't long afterwards that I made a life-changing commitment to Jesus Christ, one night under a starry sky while sitting in a parking lot just a few blocks from the Atlantic Ocean.  In an instant it was as if my heart broke open and the entire ocean rushed in, washing away completely any doubt I would not only live forever, but in a sea of joy, love, peace, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, and everlasting divine adventure.  

I was seventeen and seven days.  A week later, I left for college, sailing off into an unknown future that was full of hope.  My faith was so absolute, so strong, so pure, so certain.  I knew that I knew that I knew that I knew Jesus Christ, Son of God, was risen from the dead, and was now risen in me.  No doubt.  Not then, not now.  

Not that I haven't doubted God in between now and then, or been unfaithful to my commitment.  In fact, over the years, I have prayed to many gods.  But only One has answered.  That is why I observe Lent.  My goal is not to indulge my need for perfection, but to enlarge my heart.  Not that I'll ever be able to contain the entire ocean.  But I plan on spending an eternity trying.

Pax et Bonum,
Rose

What does it all mean?

As Lent 2014 comes to an end and the joy of Easter approaches, our journey has led us to reflect on some of our weaknesses and habits that would be better left behind.

Fear, denial and avoidance are never productive, even when it might seem that way. When we fear failure, or success, we sabotage our own dreams and efforts. When we procrastinate, we put off the inevitable, and prevent ourselves from putting our best effort forward in the rush to just get it done at the last minute. When we please people at the expense of pleasing God, we have gotten off track. Criticizing others is a lame attempt to dispel self-doubt, and negative self-talk convinces us to aim low.

As the apostles were drawn unwittingly into the drama of Christ's passion and crucifixion, they had their moments of self-doubt, of criticizing one another and, at times, themselves. They experienced fear, they denied Christ himself, they got off track and tried to please themselves or make themselves look better in the eyes of humans, forgetting the radical lessons Jesus had taught them in their 3-year journey together.

What did Jesus do? He loved them all anyway. He gently (most of the time) steered them back where they needed to be. He offered them glimpses of his own glory, and God on occasion made the relationship between himself and his son manifest for all who had eyes to see.

He sent his disciples off to preach, telling them not to take anything at all with them, to shake off the dust of places where they were not accepted and keep going. He told them it was OK to accept what they were offered by the people they ministered to, that they were deserving, but also that they should accept what came their way.

Jesus often told his followers not to be afraid, that he would be with them until the end.

Lent is, in my opinion, the most beautiful of liturgical seasons, because of its simplicity, its severity even, but also because it takes us back to basics, to be humble of heart and to reflect on our lives, our actions, our words and on how our actions and words affect those around us. In one more week, we will celebrate Palm Sunday and then, ready or not, be flung headlong into Holy Week, when we will, in our own way, enter into the passion of Christ ourselves before celebrating the joy of Easter, of resurrection and new life.

Without our own journey into the desert of Lent, the joy of Easter would be lost in the busy-ness of everyday life.

Lent reminds us to think of others, to know that as special as we may be, we are given what we have to share with others, and the greatest riches are found in learning to be poor in spirit and to serve one another as members of a community of faith, to reach out and touch one another as we are able.

May the peace of Christ be with you.

Who do you try to please?

Are you a people pleaser? What does that mean, anyhow?

Perhaps it's someone who, as they say, "sucks up to the boss." That someone is surely trying to please people, as long as those people have authority of some sort over them.

Do you respect such people? Do you even trust someone who does that?

Perhaps a people pleaser is a "yes man." This is someone who goes along to get along, who always agrees just to be agreeable. Do you know someone like this? Do you ever wonder if he or she has any original thoughts or opinions of his or her own?

Do you respect such a person? Do you trust him? Does her word mean anything at all?

Or maybe a people pleaser is someone who is so insecure, she will go along with whatever you suggest, just so you will like her. Maybe there's no ill will there, just a lack of self worth.

Do you feel sorry for him, or do you blow him off?

What's really wrong with being a people pleaser?

Maybe not much, until you inevitably come face to face with a situation where you must make a choice.

Do I lie and say I'm really happy that he got the job I was hoping to land for myself? Or am I honest about it and say I don't want to talk about it?

Do I help cover up my coworker's dishonesty, do I keep quiet about it until asked, or do I tell my supervisor about it as soon as I find out? In one case, I'm loyal to my coworker but dishonest to the boss; in the other, I lie by omission and in the third, I do what seems to be the most honest thing by letting the boss know? Or am I letting the boss know to please him and make myself look better in his eyes.

The first of the 10 Commandments tells us to love God more than any human being and more than any other thing at all, for that matter. The second tells us to love our neighbors as we love ourselves. The rest of them clarify how we are to treat one another: Don't lie, don't steal, don't want what belongs to someone else, honor your parents, don't commit adultery, don't gossip about anyone.

But if you think about it, loving God is the only real commandment there is. That's because it's impossible to love at all without God. You can try to own another person, or you can try to control someone else, or allow yourself to be controlled by someone else, you can be infatuated with someone else in a superficial way.

But it's impossible to love anyone in a truly unconditional way without God, because God IS love. And if you understand that, and you love yourself and others the way God does, the way he has tried to teach us to do, then the rest of it just falls into place. You don't have to worry about pleasing people, because you are pleasing God. And God wants us to treat each other well, with respect and honesty, with caring and in a way that allows us to live with dignity.

When our lives are pleasing to God, the people pleasing comes naturally, and we don't have to think about it or be motivated by that. Instead, we are motivated by a genuine concern for others and their well-being.

And those around us, our family, friends and neighbors, can sense that.

In I Corinthians, Chapter 13, St. Paul tells us:
Love is patient, love is kind. It is not jealous, not pompous, not inflated.
It is not rude, it does not seek its own interests, it is not quick-tempered, it does not brood over injury.
It does not rejoice over wrongdoing, but rejoices with truth.
It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.
Love never fails.

People pleasing is none of those things. It isn't patient, but seeks instant gratification; it may appear kind, but only when rewarded; people pleasers may be quite jealous when spurned; people pleasers can be entirely pompous and self-righteous, with an inflated ego.
People pleasing can be rude and always seeks its own interests. People pleasers can be quick-tempered and hold grudges for a very long time if they do not get what they want.
People pleasers may rejoice in wrongdoing if they see an advantage for themselves in it, and may not rejoice in truth if it doesn't further their personal agendas.
People pleasers may be meek victims seeking self-worth in all the wrong places or arrogant people with inflated egos, but they do not believe all things or bear all things, they may hope for the wrong things and are not likely to endure all things.
And they always fail in the end to get what they are seeking, because they are looking in the wrong places.

You will never please all people, but if you can live your life and conduct your relationships with others in ways that are pleasing to God, you will find peace of mind and experience love in ways you cannot imagine.

And in the process, you may find yourself often pleasing others as you show a genuine interest in them, their lives and their well-being.

Who will you seek to please in your life?

Wildly Successful

A few weeks ago, I wrote that I am starting a new business.   I am a representative for Orenda International, a world class line of supplements and super foods.  I want to be wildly successful at it.    I'm not yet, I suppose, but it feels wild to me that I am succeeding at all.  What's even wilder to me is that I think I can be wildly successful.  I mean, I really think I can make it BIG in this business.

I am using the products, and finding a whole new lease on life--more energy, better sleep, balanced mood, weight loss, greater resilience in the face of stress, clearing up of several toxin-related problems in my body.  As I sell the products, I am also finding more financial success.  Granted, I'm still basically at the "Hey!  I can pay for my personal products!" stage.  But even that seems wild to me.  It seems wild I should be knocking on the Door of Life at this late stage, and it is easing open with hardly any resistance.

I haven't always felt I could be a wildly successful person.  I have always felt I've underachieved, that I'm oozing with raw talent in the area of energy medicine and other holistic modalities.  But my business has never seemed to take off in the way I pictured it would, given the amount of talent, training and experience I have.  There's a reason for that. A reason, frankly, that has nothing to do with fear of failure or fear of success.  It's because I've never oozed with good business sense, or a love of marketing, or a knack for networking.  I've oozed with dread, as a matter of fact, at the thought of engaging in any of those practices.  But, I had bills to pay and a business as a psychotherapist and energy medicine practitioner to run, so I've muddled along as best as I can for over 20 years, hoping to prosper on a shoe-string budget and limited knowledge.  So, when I started a new business at 57 years of age, I didn't think I'd be any better at running a new business.

But surprisingly, I am better at this than I thought.  Here I am, tap-tap-tappng, and the Door is swinging open.  How is that possible?  Maybe I've learned more over the years than I realized, and being able to apply it to a fresh business venture is helping me to see it.

Maybe I've learned, for instance, that growing a business means growing yourself as a human being.  It means confronting parts of yourself that are afraid to stretch and try new things. If "push the envelope" means expanding the definition, categorization, dimensions, or perimeters of something, maybe I've learned to expanded the definition of who I am to include more than I thought I could be.

Maybe I've learned starting a new business means being willing to throw your life into a certain amount of chaos.  Life is going to be topsy turvy, especially if you need to start it as I did--while still running another business, a household, a marriage, a life--and attempting to make all this happen in the occasional odd hours. If I'm not willing to tolerate chaos on the way to a new normal, then maybe I won't succeed.

Maybe I've learned succeeding in a new business means I need to stare down the core fear that has probably stopped me from being successful in more ways than one.  The Psalmist wrote, "Hear, O daughter, and consider, and incline your ear:  forget your people and your father's house, and the king will desire your beauty." (Ps. 45: 10-11)  So what if a talented but terribly insecure woman who happens to be my mother was jealous of me?  So what if winning at what I love to do means losing her love for me?

There are worse things.  Maybe that's what I've learned.

Pax et Bonum,
Rose

What Wondrous Love is Obedience?

This verse from John is a beautiful verse, and one to which I totally cannot relate:

"The one who sent me is with me.  He has not left me alone, because I always do what is pleasing to him.  John 8:29"

This prayer from Thomas Merton is a beautiful prayer.  And one to which I CAN totally relate:

"My Lord God, I have no idea where I am going.  I do not see the road ahead of me.  I cannot know for certain where it will end.  Nor do I really know myself, and the fact that I think that I am following your will does not mean that I am actually doing so.  But I believe that the desire to please you does in fact please you.  And I hope I have that desire in all that I am doing.  I hope that I will never do anything apart from that desire.  And I know that if I do this you will lead me by the right road though I may know nothing about it.  Therefore will I trust you always though I may seem to be lost and in the shadow of death.  I will not fear, for you are ever with me, and you will never leave me to face my perils alone."    

Because, and maybe I'm mistaken in thinking this, it seems that Jesus ALWAYS did the Father's will.  Since we know he didn't sin, we must assume he really did know the Father's will, and wasn't just guessing at it in the dark, the way my bro Tom did.  He wasn't just hoping he'd get a pass for trying really hard, even if he managed to break a commandment or two along the way.  

I mean, kudos to you, Jesus, but do you have any idea what it's like to have no idea where you're going and whether you're doing the right thing?  Certain people have made millions on stomach antacids for the kind of anxiety that engenders.  

On the other hand, you do know what it's like to be terrified and lost in the shadow of death, and how mind-bending it is to keep on trusting when it seems the Father has abandoned you.  Pretty soon, Christians around the world will be remembering with great sorrow those hours you endured.  We will watch your Passion through every pair of eyes imaginable--Pilate's, the Sanhedrin, the disciples, Veronica, Simon, the Roman soldiers, the thieves dying by your side, Mary, Mary Magdalene, John--all of them reflecting parts of our own hearts, both tender and hardened.  

This year I will try to witness with the eyes of one who knows his obedience is our blessing, this wondrous love, our salvation. 

Pax et Bonum,

Rose