Brave, Anyway

Tag: peace

  • Corona and Communion

    Corona and Communion

    Everything is different, and yet everything is the same. The most important people are still the most important people. The most important things are still the most important things. And yet, everything seems different somehow.

    I guess it’s not actually that things are different so much as that things have been even more revealed. What was there and true all along is simply no longer as hidden. How drug companies profit. How the poor have less access to health care and technology and education. How the selfish hoard, and are incapable of considering and unwilling to consider the community and the greater good. How little some people respect and value and care for our nation’s aging citizens and family members.

    I guess it’s true that adversity brings out the best and worst of humanity, and I am just done with the coverage of and from the worst of humanity. I am done with the fear mongering and the finger-pointing and the projections.

    Translate: I am now rationing my news intake. I want to know what’s closed and what steps the CDC says I need to take, but I am *done* with pictures of empty grocery shelves and listening to pundits say the president mishandled this virus situation (is that actually news?) or that kids should or should not be in school. I need to be informed, but I need to balance information with stories and news about the best of humanity. For my own sanity.

    You know what hasn’t changed, ever? What was true 6 months ago and 6 years ago and 6 decades ago, and is still true today? People are mostly good. Most people are good. We tend to focus on the small percentage that is bad, and it’s gotten so out of hand that it can seem like the bad outweighs the good – and that’s just not truth.

    I believe in science and I believe in God. It doesn’t have to be one or the other; it can be both. I can pray and I can take vitamins and vaccines. And I may even knock on wood. Because I can be a faith person who’s also a little superstitious and who believes that it’s my job to do what I can while letting God worry about the rest. And that’s not awful. I think it’s probably actually pretty normal. And people just won’t admit it because faith people want you to be all faith all the time and science people want you to be all science all the time, and the two are not supposed to mix. But I am faith and science both, and I’d like to say all the time but the truth is sometimes my faith in science and my faith in God can be shaken a little.

    Such as when I watch too much news.

    I am a person who prepares and also a person of faith. I have a stocked pantry and a stocked bible. I have my doctor and my pastor in my contacts. And this morning I balanced yesterday’s worry about a potential lack of things – the result of too much news intake – with communion, taken with a few dozen strangers, before the sun lit the sky.

    And it felt awesome. Awesome to have quiet moments. Awesome to be part of a community of people focusing on the same thing. Awesome to focus on good things at the start of the day. Awesome to throw out old and unhealthy thoughts and fill those parts of my brain with goodness and quiet. Awesome to, for just a few moments, be the child instead of the parent. Awesome to worry about nothing. Awesome to be imperfect and loved anyway. Awesome to be a contradiction and loved anyway.

    1 Corinthians 11:28 says, “Everyone should look into his own heart before he eats the bread and drinks the cup.” International Children’s Bible

  • Praying for Peace

    May our troops in harm’s way be protected. May their loved ones at home be comforted. May the children listening to bombs and explosions and gunfire know in their heart that that’s not the way it’s supposed to be nor the way it has to be – may their fears be calmed this night and in the coming days and nights, and may they grow up to believe in and seek peace. May peace take control of the hearts and minds of all the people who want to wage war. May all who need to be held accountable be held accountable.

  • First Day of School

    First Day of School

    It’s the first day of school and I’m up before the sun, hours before any alarms go off, excited about your year ahead and praying for your year ahead.

    Each year of school brings so many new milestones, from new kinds of math to discoveries about yourself to lessons about people and relationships. As your understanding grows, the world gets bigger and bigger – the number of people and things you impact gets bigger and the number of people and things that impact you gets bigger.

    And so I pray for your growth, in height because I know that’s important to you and in knowledge, faith and spirit because that’s what’s most important to me.

    I pray for your protection, from all forces and people that would harm you physically, mentally or spiritually. And I pray for your discernment to recognize those bad forces that you’ll undoubtedly encounter, and that you will steer clear of them.

    I pray you’ll be intentional about your choices. That you won’t expect opportunities and jobs and friendships and relationships to just happen to you. Sometimes the things in your life that seem easy or seem to just fall in your lap are not right for you, and if you’re living intentionally you’ll see that they are distractions from your best choice and your best life.

    I pray that you’ll be intentional about your thought patterns and your peace. That you make choices to discard negative thoughts about yourself and others, that you seek friendships that add to your peace and positivity and joy and happiness, that you set boundaries to enable peace to thrive in your life, and that you actively hold on to your peace.

    I pray that you will not forget who you are and Whose you are. And that when you make choices that aren’t the best, that you never forget that you are always loved and forgiven.

    I pray you will be kind, to others and to yourself. Everyone you encounter each day struggles in some way, and I pray you will have empathy and patience and that you will see what God wants you to see in each person and in yourself.

    I pray that you will see you as God sees you.

    I pray that in the big scheme of things you will put greater focus on how things look on the inside of you than how your hair and makeup and outfit make the outside of you appear.

    I pray you will have fun. That you will enjoy your life, that you won’t take embarrassing things that happen too seriously, that you will find the funny in all things, and that you will make the fun when you or others are struggling to smile.

    I pray that you will love learning, and not just the stuff you’re going to read in books or online resources. I pray for your passion – that as your knowledge of subjects grows you’ll want to know more and more, that as your knowledge of the world grows you’ll want to go out into it more and more, and that as your knowledge of injustice grows you’ll want to act more and more.

    I pray you will surround yourselves with friends of all different kinds and perspectives. Kids who will introduce you to different kinds of thinking and music and art and play and faith. And I pray you will see the value in every single difference and person.

    I pray that you will not give up. You will sometimes want to, after a long hour or day or week, or when you’re halfway through a project and realize you need to start over. At those moments you’ll feel frustrated and you’ll cry, and maybe you’ll scream inside or have an actual shouty tantrum. It’s OK to embrace all those feelings and even to get sucked into them for a little while, but then I pray you’ll shake it off and get back to the task at hand or to simply living.

    I pray that wherever you are, you will always know that you can call me or text me to help you or to help your friends or to help your enemies. I pray that while you may fret that something will make me mad, that that fear will be overridden by the truth that I love you and I want what’s best for you. That the fear that something will make me disappointed will be overridden by the truth that nothing you do could make me not love you and that I have been in your shoes and have made the tough call you’re dreading to my own parents.

    And finally, on your first day of school I pray for me. That I will have the courage to face my fears and let you fly further. That I will give you just the right amount of space and room to grow. That I will not do too many things for you and I will allow and encourage you to do more yourself. That I will remember that most people and kids are good, and that you are not actually in danger the vast majority of the time. And that I will successfully resist the urge to smother you with kisses at the bus stop.

    I also pray that I will remember this day specifically. I’ll remember that Ella Facetimed with her best friend at 5:30 am so they could “get ready together.” I’ll remember that big-girl Audrey set out lipstick and perfume along with her shoes.

    And I pray I’ll remember that as I walked around the house turning off all the lights before going to work, I realized that girl bathrooms don’t change much with the generations – countertops are covered with makeup and hairspray and devices that are absolutely required for us to look just right for the day.

  • Lessons While We Wait

     

    I witnessed a hit and run last week.

    In a span of about 40 minutes, I saw slices of the worst of humanity and the best of humanity. The worst was an angry young man, screaming and cursing at the man whose car he hit. The best was a soft spoken older man, determined to put peace out into the world instead of more anger.

    After realizing he was physically OK and calling the police to come, we stood under a large shade tree and talked about humanity and peace and water and reciprocity.

    If we do not focus on our peace and put peace out into the world, we cannot ever expect to be filled with peace.

    Water purifies and it baptizes and it cleanses and it is a blessing.

    We get back what we put into things, and our investment of time or money or peace yields greater time or money or peace in our lives.

    It’s amazing how many core beliefs a Muslim man and a Christian woman have in common.

    Since that encounter, I’ve been thinking about reciprocity and how what we invest is what we can expect to manifest. At times in my life I have given with the right intentions and a pure heart, and at other times I have given with the secret expectation or hope of getting something specific in return. Perhaps that’s human nature or perhaps I am selfish and superstitious. Or perhaps all of it.

    When Audrey was just a few weeks old, I saw a commercial for St. Jude. I don’t remember the content exactly, but it had beautiful little faces and parents with expressions of both hope and worry. What I do remember vividly is exactly where I was standing in my bedroom when I saw that commercial, then sitting down on my bed filled with a feeling of absolute certainty that I saw it at just that moment for a specific reason. And I had a very strong desire to invest in something that helped others, specifically in an area where my child needed help.

    I have no idea if that commitment had anything to do with Audrey’s outcome. Logical Beth who consumes data thinks that her doctors knew what they were doing, and giving is not related to healing. Superstitious Beth will not ever stop supporting St. Jude becomes it seems like bad juju/karma/luck. And Christian Beth really wonders sometimes if that decision was a game-changer in the spiritual realm.

    I’ve thought about it over and over and over again in the last 8 years – every time I am at CHKD, every time I see a commercial for St. Jude, every time I sow a seed of any kind. Are the things we invest in little seeds we’ve planted for a big harvest later? Is it really that simple? And if it’s that simple, why doesn’t that principle override all others? Is there a seed some folks have sown or not sown that results in sickness within themselves or their families? Why are some people healed while others are not, seemingly regardless of their seeds?

    I don’t have any answers. I have only questions that lead to more questions, I have a gut feeling that the seed I sowed that day made a difference somehow in the lives of others and in Audrey’s life, and I have a lingering sense of disappointment in myself for the superstitious parts of me.

    Audrey’s annual oncology checkup has a number of traditions. She plays at the big wave on the second floor. She finds her favorite tile – the art project of a bravo kiddo from long ago – and she runs her fingers over the words Hope, Faith and Courage. We walk through the butterfly garden and have some quiet time. We get Starbucks when all of our checks and talks and papers are done.

    Loading the pictures to complete the order for my photo album, I really noticed the other tiles in the art display. There’s A Giving Tree and there are flowers. There’s one that says God will make a way where there seems to be no way. There’s another that says Bring People Together. And those brought my mind back to my friend from the hit and run. We parted with smiles and thankfulness, grasping hands and offering blessings.

    If we’re open to it, I believe we can find goodness everywhere. If we’re open to it, I believe some of life’s most important lessons come in the time of waiting. Waiting for the police to arrive. Waiting for help. Waiting for a therapy to work. Waiting for healing. Waiting for good news. Waiting for the answers to our prayers.

    Or perhaps simply waiting for the seeds we’ve planted to break through the earth.

  • Climb, Brave Girl

    Many years ago now, I was on an airplane that had some sort of electrical issue during takeoff. Heat and smoke spread a bit up through the cabin and created a panic (probably mostly in me). At this point, I can’t remember if it was a short in a heating component or an AC unit or something, but what I do distinctly remember is that as I started to process my surroundings this one thought kept running through my head over and over and over again.

    Why are we getting further from the ground?

    Why are we getting FURTHER from the ground?

    WHY are we getting further from the ground?

    WHY ARE WE GETTING FURTHER FROM THE GROUND?!

    I just could not wrap my head around why the pilot would continue to climb when there was danger. Didn’t he know there was smoke? Smoke clearly meant there was an issue. I mean, there had to be some little alarm going off up in the cockpit, right? Some annoying noise or blinky light that indicated something was amiss. Smoke indicates fire. And fire means we’re all dead. This is not a scenario with a water landing where I could maybe figure out how to use my seat as a flotation device and *maybe* be the one person in 100 that survives and gets their own lifetime movie. This is fire, and there’s no safety seat for that. Why were we climbing further from the ground?

    The answer was likely the pilot knew it was a containable issue. Fix the unit, send around the drink cart, everyone will be fine. (At least I hope that’s the case – the thought that the pilot knew nothing and just kept obliviously flying is not really an acceptable possibility for the me that regularly flies.)

    But in all sorts of instances, climbing up is a positive game-changer. Pilots climb higher so that they can fly above turbulence. Eagles climb so that they can see and hunt their food, which is sometimes a mile away on the ground or underwater. Leopards will climb trees to rest and eat above ranting hyenas. Zacchaeus climbed a tree so he could take in a view other than a noisy crowd and so he could see Jesus.

    Looking up and going up, instead of looking around and wandering around, is the way out or the way to something better. Golfers hate when their balls land “in the rough” because the taller grass makes play harder – they use a special club to hit the ball up and out of it. At work we say things like “you’re in the weeds,” because we want our peers to stop getting stuck in small details – what we mean is we want them to think bigger than themselves and their current situation as they consider solutions to problems.

    The common theme is easy: change comes when we stop looking around at the view of our noisy, weedy, hungry, rough, turbulent, whiny, combative and confusing surroundings and we instead decide to pursue up. Even if we can’t see what we immediately need, just like a pilot who trusts that sunshine is above the rain clouds, we raise our head above the rough and the weeds and the crowd and the hyenas, and we look in the direction we’re going – UP – and we climb in that direction.

    Up is the way to peace, the way to the food we need to survive, the way to see things differently, and the way to salvation.

    Sometimes you need to go higher to see things as they really are. The world is pretty big and the higher we climb above the mud and the muck and the selfishness of our own lives, the more we realize that we are a very tiny minuscule part of the world. And that each day and each hour and each setback and each horrible person and each car that cuts us off in traffic is really just a very tiny minuscule small part of our lives.

    When we’re in the storm or the weeds or the rough or the crowd, we can’t even see all the things contributing to our situation. We can’t see all of our surroundings. We can’t see how big the storm is. We can’t see how close our salvation may actually be.

    We don’t have real fuller perspective until we go high. And you know what else happens once we go high? It’s not just perspective that we gain. It’s speed. Planes travel faster at higher altitudes. Our fuller perspective allows us to more quickly understand what’s happening and why, and it allows us to progress more quickly toward the healing or salvation or food or peace that we need.

    I used to be scared to fly. When I say scared, I really mean terrified. Like, heart beating 130 times per minute, cold sweat, picturing my airplane crashing into the ground in a big ball of fire afraid to fly. I-needed-Xanax-to-fly scared to fly.

    I have no idea when exactly that fear disappeared or why that fear is gone. Maybe because I had no choice but to fly regularly regardless of my fear. Maybe because I started trusting my Pilot more. But one day several years ago I found myself not dreading flying, and then on another day I found myself actually enjoying it. I can even sleep on an airplane now and it’s absolutely awesome to enjoy a nap while someone else does all the work to get me where I need to be.

    I mostly write or read now when I fly. It’s uninterrupted quiet time, and I don’t get much of that. As I look down at the clouds below me, I am so thankful to be exactly where I am, flying in a beautiful colorful sky. And I am so thankful for the knowledge that the stormy rain, the rough, the crowd, the hyenas, the weeds, and the turbulence are all small from up here, and I can see those things for what they are. They’re all really just noise, designed to steal my peace. It’s my job to hold on to my peace and to stay on course, and from way up here I am reminded that the individual stormy raindrops falling below the clouds I just climbed through are really insignificant in the big scheme of things. Most of those raindrops won’t matter five minutes from now, some won’t matter five months from now, and almost none of them will matter five years from now.

    I just needed to get further from the ground to get that perspective.