Beware the vicious trap.

"To sum it up, as well-intentioned 'perfectionists' (cultivated by a society and economy built on holding a standard just far enough out of reach so that 'striving' to attain the unattainable becomes the required 'way of being' that fuels the engine) we believe that unless we are perfect in every way, success and love and 'the good life' will constantly evade us. The biggest cost of our 'perfectionism' is our neglect of the humble core within and our failure to claim a life in alignment with God and our true self. Instead of focusing on our higher purpose and our best qualities and all that is right with us, we are busy trying to fix (or hide) everything that is seemingly imperfect, and there is seemingly no end to those things. And in our frustrations in attempting such ridiculousness, we become cold, mean, and harshly judgmental. Driven to live up to (or at least look like) a perfect ideal, we become competitive, pretentious, self-promoting, hyper-critical human beings. Because of our focus on 'looking good' while 'achieving big goals' and 'producing great results,' we never really enjoy the journey very much. As a result, we lose the irreplaceable moments of deeply and richly relating to other human beings and simply participating as an equal in God's breathtakingly beautiful handiwork (and instead pursue sheer idiocy and showy idols in our shallow and fake attempts to worship Him while actually 'working to replace Him')."

-- Allie Ochs

"It is an ironic habit of human beings to get busier, move faster, try harder, and somehow not have enough time for God or ourselves when we have found ourselves lacking and having lost our way. And after getting caught up in this frenzied pursuit of unattainable perfection for long enough, we can't seem to muster quite enough commitment and don't seem to have quite enough energy or stamina to change things for the better, either."

-- Rollo May

"Perfectionism is a misnomer. It is not really a quest for the best, but a pursuit of the worst in ourselves, the part that tells us that nothing we are or do will ever be good enough."

-- Julie Cameron

"Ring the bells that still can ring
Forget your perfect offering.
There is a crack in everything,
That's how the light gets in."

-- Leonard Cohen, in "Anthem"


And when we lay it all down, stepping out from behind our oh so thin veneers of "sanity and sucking up" to each other in order to somehow "move ahead" and "find the right answer" that lets us "get there" and "stay there," and when we see how truly lost and powerless and out-of-control we are, having exiled ourselves from the kingdom where we have been sweetly invited and truly belong, He is patiently waiting there to hold our hands, hoping to be called upon for help and deliverance.


"When you call on me, when you come in all sincerity and pray to me, I'll listen and respond. When you come looking for me, you'll find me. Yes, when you get serious about finding me and want it more than anything else, I'll make sure you won't be disappointed."

-- Jeremiah 29:12,13 (The Message)

Let your distress bring you closer to God, not drive you from Him.

8-9I know I distressed you greatly with my letter. Although I felt awful at the time, I don't feel at all bad now that I see how it all turned out. The letter upset you, but only for a while. Now I'm glad — not that you were upset, but that you were jarred into turning things around. You let the distress bring you to God, not drive you from Him. The result was all gain, no loss.

10Distress that drives us to God does that. It turns us around. It gets us back in the way of salvation. We never regret that kind of pain. But those who let distress drive them away from God are full of regrets, end up on a deathbed of regrets.

11-13And now, isn't it wonderful all the ways in which this distress has goaded you closer to God? You're more alive, more concerned, more sensitive, more reverent, more human, more passionate, more responsible. Looked at from any angle, you've come out of this with purity of heart. And that is what I was hoping for in the first place when I wrote the letter. My primary concern was not for the one who did the wrong or even the one wronged, but for you — that you would realize and act upon the deep, deep ties between us before God. That's what happened—and we felt just great about it.

-- 2 Corinthians 7:8-13 (The Message)


Purity of heart. What a powerful possibility. People keep asking me, "What should I do know?" after discovering and stating that they want to change and "get there," that they are finally ready. And I have never known quite what to say about this, because I have discovered it is a rather mysterious journey, not a detailed project plan, but at least there's a place to start, so let's start there. When it's time for a radical life change, when you finally wake up and see who you've been, what you've been up to, and how you've been living for so long that just isn't right and true and just doesn't work at all, in that it really hurts yourself and other people, and leaves you vulnerable to total disaster, the first step of the life recovery work is to simply turn around. Jesus said "repent," and said it often, but he did not mean to pour contempt upon yourself, or to self-flagellate. The Greek word for what he actually said was metanoia. It is a rich Greek word that is frequently used throughout the New Testament. Jesus uses the verbal equivalent of this noun (Mark 1:14) as the first response to his announcement of the kingdom of God. It is frequently translated as “repent” in our English Bibles, but metanoia, as Jesus uses it has deep meaning beyond what we usually think of when we think of repentance in our modern society. Metanoia is about making a transformative and totally positive change in our hearts and minds, and in our daily lives, and in our society. Metanoia wrongly understood is a guilt-ridden awareness and hopeless contempt for all that is going wrong in our lives and society. Metanoia properly understood is a courageous acceptance of and push forward toward something better for ourselves and for our world. It is a life-giving, positive change that brings us closer to what God intended for His creation, a surrendered and total "allowing in of Him." Break down the word and we see that its first syllable, "meta" in Greek means "with," and "noia" means "understanding." Metanoia is not change for change's sake, in order to be or look good. It is powerfully positive, dramatic change with deep understanding of the radical implications.


"No matter what the extent of ruin of any life may be, there is always a place to start. There is a place where you must begin. You need to turn away from your current path and turn toward Him, and then deeply and sincerely apologize to God and to some other person in particular. You need to go to Him and then to that other somebody to straighten something major out. You need to cease and desist some practice or position that is dead wrong. You need to open yourself up to wise counsel. You need to seek sound advice. You need to get some Godly guidance. There is always a first step. That is where you must begin. And whatever you pray, first pray that God will give you the grace, the strength, and the determination to take that first step. Then, the process of life recovery can begin.

-- Ray Stedman

"Every person has fallen at some time in his life - most, many times, again and again. Peter's steps in denying Christ have since been traced by every human foot. And anyone can understand how he could have fallen asleep in the garden, when he should have watched and prayed. Most of us feel an almost unconscious sympathy for and a deep resonance with him. But there is something in Peter's life that is much greater than the ugliness of his sin. It is the beauty and sincerity of his repentance. We all too easily relate to Peter in his weakness, but few of us grasp the wonder of his dramatic change. Sinful Peter is one man, and repentant Peter another. That is the real lesson in and power of his life."

-- Henry Drummond

"Contrition, repentance, and clear acknowledgement of full personal responsibility and sorrow over sin should never include massive self-hatred and total self-rejection. God's conviction points to a very specific sin, it is sharp and accurate, going straight to the precise point where repentence is needed. Truly understanding this principle will lead you into freedom from your past suffering so that you can serve God and His people without the fetters of constantly looking behind."

-- Katherine Walden

"Remorse is confused and impotent; it will unconsciously sin again. Only repentance is clear and strong; it can consciously end everything."

-- Henry Miller

"True repentance will entirely change you; the bias of your souls will be changed, then you will delight in God and His people."

-- George Whitefield

"God does not ask us why we sin, for He understands us. He asks us why we don't simply repent in order to be free."

-- Anonymous

"Of all acts of man, repentance is the most divine. The greatest of all faults is to be conscious of none."

-- Thomas Carlyle

"Strange evolution how people have come to believe
That we are it's greatest achievement
When really we're just a collection of cells
Overrating themselves
Oh God I'm avoiding the truth."

-- Dave Matthews, in "Eh Hee"

Help us to stop avoiding You and overrating ourselves, to truly see and fully embrace Your truth, and then help us change our hearts and minds toward You in a consistent, disciplined way, allowing you to continually and radically transform our lives, to give us more than what we know to seek, to deliver us totally from ourselves. Help us to be "more alive, more concerned, more sensitive, more reverent, more human, more passionate, more responsible." Help us to stop our blind fidgeting and fussing and simply get out of Your way. Let us grow into being, like at the end of the song, a "somebody that's gonna change the world," by first allowing and then embracing the total changing of ourselves. Otherwise, while either ambitious or depressed, while we sit around on our butts, blind to our own useless shenanigans or playin' around buildin' castles in the sand, we surely ain't seein' what's comin', and it's sure dangerous enough to totally obliterate us.

Come into His Chambers and be glad!

"All God's revelations are sealed to us until they are opened to us through our total obedience. You will never get them open by sound philosophy or good thinking or your own will power. Immediately, when you obey, a flash of light comes. Let God's truth work in you by soaking in it openly, not by worrying into it privately. Obey God fully in the thing He is at present showing you, and instantly the next amazing thing is opened up. We read tomes on the work of the Holy Spirit when ... five minutes of drastic, radical obedience would make things clear as a sunbeam. We say, 'I suppose I shall understand these things some day (or not).' But you can understand them now, if you choose: it is not effort or study that does it, but obedience. The tiniest fragment of obedience, and heaven opens up and the profoundest truths of God are yours straight away. God will never reveal more Truth about Himself until you obey what you know already. Beware of being wise and prudent and careful in your attempts at obedience. Do not fear how you are seen and judged by man in your attempts. Beware of your own very tentative self-management and others' assessments, good or bad."

"Faith is deliberate confidence in and aligned action with the character of God, whose ways you may not fully understand at the time, even while knowing them. And the way to come to understand them is to obey and act on them, and to be continually ready for course correction."

"Through your total surrender and obedience, you will never cease to be the most amazed person on earth at what God does for you on the inside."

"We are in danger of forgetting that we cannot do what God does, and that God will not do what we can do."

-- all of the above by Oswald Chambers

I want to be clear about something right now for myself, and it is so cleansing to do so. I am completely committed to my surrender of myself, and to my obedience of Him - so much so that I accept whatever is said about me out there by human beings as possibly true, and so what. This goes for both the compliments and the criticisms, of which there will be many on both sides. I accept all of them with humility, humor, and thoughtful introspection, getting that I do plenty of things really well, and I screw up very often in very human and often very humbling ways, and so what. I am totally "out of the closet" as a completely fallable, ordinary human being. It's a "Duh!", an "of course!" And it's not "so what" because I don't care, but "so what" because that it is not the most important measure of me. It does not define me, ever. He alone is the full measure of me, He alone defines me, and He uses me sometimes "because" of myself and sometimes "in spite of" myself, and whenever I remember this, I get to feel the bliss of true alignment with Him, and truly being adored as His, in His definition, as His beloved.

We need not hide any aspect of ourselves anymore, folks, for they are all well known by our Creator, and isn't that all that matters? The more we hide, the more we hurt, both ourselves and others. We are seeing this exposed completely, daily, embarrassingly, frustratingly, whatever, it's out there totally naked. No one, not anyone, not a single soul out there, knows what they're doing, has it handled, is free to assess, blame, harshly judge, or hate another. Thank God He is healing us through our heated and holy interactions with each other. Why not celebrate it out in the open, expanding the joy of it, rather than compare, criticize, evade, hide, hurt, judge, etc., alone and in the dark? There truly are no secrets worth keeping from one another, no confidences worth protecting, when obedience (vs. competing) is the only focus. And "obedience," as I use the word here, is not something we need do out of fear of punishment or retribution, but rather out of a desire for closeness with Him. And as such, welcome into His Chambers, all! Enter at your own risk, but realize the total freedom available only in radical risk. I stand here hopefully and invitingly, at your humble service, and yet I will certainly fail you on more than one occasion, and without ever intending to, and through His perfect intercession, will be healed and served with you, if we so choose, time and time again. How beautiful is that! What freedom, to not have to be good coach, good helper, good teacher, knowing that Jesus even rejected the label, having no need for it, even though he was it and more.

When God chose to "come out" as Jesus, and sent His only Son as an overwhelming gesture of compassion and love, He showered us with His acceptance, forgiveness, and redemption, once and for all time. Whatever it was that went before that defined or marked our relationship, He nevermore merely tolerates us as His wayward children, but instead fully accepts us as His beloved children, so, therefore, obedience now includes fully accepting and forgiving ourselves and each other, vs. hiding from and harshly judging and competing with each other for the special favors of a harsh, critical Father.

Thanks to His grace, it can be a "coming out party" for us, too, folks! Come out and be glad! Jump in with both feet! Shout out your battle cries against your own resistance of the free gift, and yet also claim your ultimate victory! Both are compelling - yet only one is real, true, everlasting! There is nothing to hide from each other anymore! We can come out into the open, because no "closet" can or need hide us from Him or each other. And think about this amazing possibility: the loneliness, meanness, and victimhood of our lives can stop, once we have let go of our own self-contempt and shame, which has no basis in anything anymore, once God's outrageous gesture of Jesus - the real and true and totally penetrating life and spirit of him, in all its fullness, vs. the checkmark we place in the box and the outdated lingo we dish out and the secret handshake we offer to belong to a social club (and yes, sometimes the "closet" we get to come out of is even our past perception and experience of church) - has been fully accepted, received and put into action in our lives.

My new motto, thanks to Jake

"Dad, just face the pain, ... and do the next right thing."

-- Jake Spivey, to his totally awestruck, dumbstruck Dad

Yesterday morning, as I was pulling my stuff together for the day in my office before taking the kids to school, Jake came upstairs to hang out with me, and he asked me how I was doing. I said, "I feel weak, tired, sore, and just kinda old and weary, buddy." And he looked me right in the eye and said, so matter-of-factly, "Dad, just face the pain, ... and do the next right thing." I said, "Where did you ever hear that, Jake?" He said, "It's just an expression I heard somewhere." I said, "That will be my new motto!" He asked, "What's a motto?" I answered, "It's a sentence you can live by." He said, "Make sure to tell all your friends about your new motto, OK, Dad?" I said, "I will certainly do that, buddy!" So, here you go, friends and followers. So, last night, when I took Jake for dinner at his favorite restaurant, after we had all gone to "Invention Convention" at his school to see him on display with his "dog ball, biscuit, and toy thrower," I was on my cell phone talking to a friend about a disastrous occurence in his life, and Jake cried out, "Be sure to tell your friend your new motto, Dad!" So, S.B., Jake says, "Face the pain, ... and do the next right thing!" And God, the way You keep doing this thing, this talking directly to me, sending me the most profound wisdom through the most amazing, befuddling, totally unexpected messengers - true angels of grace and mercy - I am so thankful, ... and really, really listening.


Jake showing off his invention last night


and eating dinner out at the end of a long day


And here's a goofy shot of me and my dreamy old soul of a son, really loving life at the Monster Jam.

Asking for help, while thanking Him

"Asking for help is a universally dreaded endeavor. ... In finally learning and understanding my lesson in this area, asking for (God's) help not only helps (Him) get my needs met but, even more important, it offers me the chance to be deeply touched by other souls who care about me and want to contribute."

-- M. Nora Klaver

It's that time once again, and I no longer feel shy about it. I've gone 4 months without feeling the need to reach out, after thinking last year that it was going to be an every-2-month exercise, and it has been wonderful to not feel the need for just a little while longer, but now the need is here again. I'm clear that God wants me to continue being who I'm being and doing what I'm doing, and that He wants to help me by sustaining this life for me and my family, and that He needs my cooperation to make that happen, and that involves humbling myself before Him and you, so here I am in total humility. To those who contribute regularly, thank you so much again. And anyone who feels called to help, thank you for surrendering to your own call to do so as I surrender my life to mine. The primary message of this outreach is Thank You! Whatever comes from that'll be worthy of thanks. And please remember, every little thing you can do helps. There are no small favors in this life. This I have learned from 12 years (our 12-year anniversary is on March 3, 2010) of this amazing experience of freedom through fully loving and openly receiving Him, and then truly seeing and humbly helping others.

As if to emphasize my point, Henri comes through again, and this is what we have together, Love Machine:

Solidarity in Weakness (Henri Nouwen Society)
Joy is hidden in compassion. The word compassion literally means "to suffer with." It seems quite unlikely that "suffering with" another person would bring joy. Yet being with a person in pain, offering simple presence to someone in despair or terrible need, sharing resources or yourself with a friend in times of confusion and uncertainty ... such experiences can bring us deep, penetrating joy. It's not just circumstantial happiness, nor fleeting excitement, nor some great surface satisfaction, but the deep, quiet joy of being there for someone else and living in deep solidarity with our brothers and sisters in this human family. Often this is a solidarity in weakness, in brokenness, in woundedness, but it leads us to the center of joy, which comes from sharing our totally unmasked humanity with others.

God, thank You for helping me see the power of true and total giving, and growing in me the courage to give my life away, and for the amazing learning that the "reward" for giving my life away to others is not in the accolades or the money or the stuff I receive in return, but in the quality of life to be found only in giving it all away, and in the powerful Breath He Breathes through you in the process. Talk about Pure Oxygen, Living Water! And the beauty of human beings that becomes visible in doing so is truly astounding, and is pure joy. Yes, living a life unmanaged and unmasked is an unmitigated marvel, and I am blessed way beyond belief, and I remain so humbly and completely at Your service.

Here, I need to hear my theme song in the background once again, and if you haven't checked it out yet, enjoy seeing my heart and soul in musical form, giving all of itself away: http://www.youtube.com:80/watch?v=mlI8YsRthG4

On the nature and purpose of conflict

Arguments and conflicts are simply mirrors. They're not "revealers of truth" on either side - they are "inviters of change" on both. We're never totally right when we are considering someone else totally wrong, and we're never totally in the wrong, even when society or somebody else insists that somebody be (and that somebody would be me). We're not justified in our self-righteous position, no matter how compelling or enticing it may be. And that doesn't make us evil monsters, either. Conflicts simply reveal where we are and the nature of our ongoing journey. That is revealed by the nature of the relational conflict experienced through a particular relational dynamic and set-up. They show us the challenging and difficult work that lies ahead. They're not to be ashamed of, or to be hidden from, or denied. They're wonderful gifts, especially when they're treated as such. Otherwise, they become spooky phantoms we dread and hide from, even while acting unaffected and totally oblivious. And when we act that way, they can seem to linger on endlessly, and are often repeated again and again in other relationships. They do not reveal our failure or shortcomings, but His opportunity to transform us, and thankfully He never tires of this amazingly beautiful, awesomely life-changing, totally life-giving work. When we finally see and relax into Him, we are blissfully changed, even if temporarily embarrassed through the total release of our previously protected position. When we insist on others doing their work, they rarely change (in our experience), and we remain embarrassingly blind, even while feeling so totally right about it.

Here, try these two treatises on to see what I mean:


"Most if not all arguments can be summed up by the following sentence: 'I am not feeling loved or respected, and I don't feel like I have much say or control in changing that.'

A better way to resolve these relational problems involves focusing on one’s own feelings, with a sense of ownership and self-responsibility, rather than simply blaming another for what happened (even if the other really does deserve some blame).

It is easier for someone to hear what you have to say when you focus on your own experience and feelings and not dwell on his or her alleged mistakes. For example, if your spouse has a habit of coming home late – rather than make a blanket accusation out of bottled-up frustration – 'I hate when you're so late – why do you always lie to me?' – it can help if you can focus on your specific feelings related to the specific incident at hand instead - for example, 'I am feeling sad and a little frustrated right now, and I can sometimes feel lonely and scared when you're not home when you said you would be.'

When trying to discuss a difficulty or problem, it's important not to harshly assign blame. Even saying something as simple as 'It makes me feel uncomfortable...' can come across as an accusation - leading to a defensive response. Phrasing a concern as 'I feel...' rather than 'It (or you) makes me...' is a more effective way of solving problems.

Your motivation for dealing with problems this way should be to help the other person really hear what you have to say, and to overcome this particular kind of relational drama. If you can get the other to understand your feelings and your point of view, you are much more likely to create a meaningful and lasting resolution and a much stronger relationship.

By focusing on your feelings and your ownership of your feelings, instead of another's behavior, others are more likely to:

listen to what you have to say objectively and non-defensively
have compassion for or even empathize with your position
dialog about the problem in a constructive manner

And there are many benefits of approaching relationship problems with this way:

increased closeness, satisfaction, and understanding
greater potential for resolution, goodwill, and change
less future conflict from festering, unresolved messes

Simply put, directly confronting another often leads to greater resistance, more conflict, and deception. Of course, it is easier to get angry and make blanket accusations, but doing so rarely leads to healthy long-term outcomes."

-- from a website on conflict and deception


"The simple fact is that we live in a world of conflict, opposites, and separateness - such 'apparent' black and whiteness - because we live in a world of rigid boundaries, whether we acknowledge our responsibility to shape them and change them or not. If we do not shape them and own responsibility for their existence and maintenance they are still there and often in ways that do not serve us well and do not let us grow. Since every boundary line is also a possible battle line, here is the predicament of humanity: the firmer one's boundaries (conscious or not), the more entrenched are one's battles - battles meaning relational conflicts. The more there are conflicts which delineate our differences the more many often seek refuge in the safety of numbers whether what those numbers are adhering to makes sense or not.

To 'rage against the dying of the light' (from Dylan Thomas' poem, "Fern Hill"), or to choose the 'road less taken' (from Robert Frost's poem, "The Road Not Taken") one must openly welcome CONFLICT into their life. Conflict is merely the instrument from which boundaries are shifted, adjusted, changed, and made more workable in the daily service of what is best for each of us as we change and grow. Rigidly claimed boundaries is old age burning and raving in the face of the agony of the reality from which we all seek to heal. Each of us, right now, has entered this walk toward the conflict, the understanding, the lessons, at the level of our own woundedness. To heal from that woundedness it is necessary to take total responsibility and ownership of where you are right now, not why you are where you are, but just of the reality of where you are and where you need (and consciously choose) to go from where you are and through this raging, through your conscious choice to take the 'road less taken', you can then claim ownership of your past and all that happened to you, which in effect erects a boundary between you and your past victimization that welcomes you, challenges you, to grasp survivorship (and a more rich and true life). Once you claim this survivorship (true life), you cannot continue to be OWNED by your past, your perps, your pain, you cannot continue to be owned by the secrets, the fear, because once you claim all of this and take back who you are and who you are meant to be.......being a victim is through owning you."

-- A.J. Mahari, in "Survivorship from Victimization"


And when you can get free of the past, your pain, your "perps," or whatever shadowy else is "owning" you, then and only then are you truly free to let God OWN (which He does anyway), guide (which He'd like to if you would choose Him), direct (and he would direct every step, every thought, every word, if you asked), and abide in (setting up the kingdom as) you. He changes lives through radical transformations that we first allow (when faced with impossible conflict), then choose. Oh yes, and the difference between us and the butterfly, you might ask? We humans must "choose" transformation (it doesn't just happen for us based on nature's timing), and we are also free to "choose" not - remaining stuck as a caterpillar through our own distractedness, fearfulness, greed, mirco-management, obsessiveness, panic, resistance, rigidness, stubbornness, unforgivingness, worrisomeness, etc. Yes, God has many names, but the devil has many more.

Nothing is wrong, even when things go dark and quiet.

"The problem is not that there are many problems, and the problem is not even that one 'most difficult problem' itself. The problem is in our attitude toward problems, expecting not to have them at all, and/or thinking that having them is a serious problem that shouldn't be."

-- Theodore Rubin

"Challenges and problems call forth our courage and our wisdom (and our relationship with Him); indeed, they often create our courage and most deeply access our wisdom. It is only because of problems that we grow mentally, physically, and spiritually. When we desire to encourage the growth of the human being as well as the spiritual being, we challenge and encourage and stimulate the human capacity to either solve or possibly just 'be with' difficult problems, therefore the problems are not really the problem at all - how we relate to them and who we become in them is the real issue at hand."

-- M. Scott Peck

"It is despair and grieving that begins to clear out the heart and allow the reality of loss in. This same thing, when fully allowed, allows the heart to heal and lets life return, but this time a new and different life, a real and true one. It cannot be changed - there is - thank God - no doctor Frankenstein. At some point, ready or not, we have a standing invitation to meet with our own mortality. If we are wise we become at that moment more truly and richly and fully alive, and nothing will quite affect us the same way again. Problems cease to be problems. We don’t cling feverishly to life but we cherish the lives of others because they, too, are such brief and remarkable occurrences."

-- Rev. Landau Krivchenia

"Since God knows our whole future, our whole nature, our heart, our mind, our feelings, and our current capacity to listen, He isn't ever going to say one word more to us than we can deal with or understand at any given moment. So, if we are not hearing what we want to hear, or maybe not hearing anything at all, it says more about us than Him, and we needn't be impatient with Him or ourselves. It is an unfolding that will reveal more and more as we explore and listen deeper. The more open to the ongoing exploration we are, the more patient with the deep listening we are, the richer and deeper we hear the instruction, which soon turns into blissful dialogue that leaves us totally thankful for whatever got us there."

-- Charles Stanley


This all reminds me of the "Jake Pogo Stick Story" of my recent fatherhood experience, and it is so true. There is no point, really, in God speaking to me in any way when I am fretting over smaller things than what He is up to in my life. Until I am really ready to hear, see, and possibly wrestle with in order to more clearly understand, what He is up to - which is usually only after I have exhausted myself needing Him (or anyone else, for that matter) to hear what "I'm" up to, or until I am totally overwhelmed by my external circumstances - I am stunned and often feel very disappointed in, if not callously betrayed by, His silence, but I have learned that His gentle, patient, even if totally exasperating, silence is much better and more effective than what I could have quite reasonably deserved (only visible after I wake up) in my ignorance.

Thank You for not being cruel, Father, during the times of my blindness, ignorance, and complaint-laden stubbornness, especially during those times when I become cruel to myself and others, in blind response to my perception of others' cruelty, which is only a mirror to myself. Thank You for loving me in ways only You can, which aren't driven by me in the moment (and thank God for that), but by Your Perfect Plan for me, which waits so calmly for my observation, interest, and acceptance. Thank You for teaching me the power and richness of my so-called problems, to the point where they cease being problems and become instead great gifts. Thank You for teaching me to embrace loss and even death, the ultimate problem, letting go of everything I cling to to feel safe and secure, all illusion, which delivers me to true life and eternal, infinite gain. In humble silence, I sit, wait, and walk with You.


(this reminds me of me and Bosco this morning, a chillin' and a waitin', and now out a listenin' and a talkin' and a walkin')