In the valley

So the man and the woman came to the end of a bridge. It was a long bridge. There was a time of lingering at the end of the bridge before they stepped off. You might think they were surveying the land that they were about to enter into and they were .... or so she thought.

Do explorers ever really see what is waiting for them in the unexplored places? How can you know what's behind the next curve or boulder? Things jump out at you sometimes.

Some people are settlers at heart. Some people are pioneers. But to get where the settler is to settle I suppose there must be a time of pioneering and discovering. It's a good time for the pioneers until the settling and building of structures begins. Then there is the fittng of something expansive into boundaries.

The man and the woman of this journey are very definitely in the valley now and building has begun. The foundation of their life is still solid. So far no earthquake has been powerful enough to break this Rock. Two by fours are going up. The man has remarked more than once in his life that he loves to see a house in the stage of being built that it is all studs and rafters.

In the land of the intangibles what is a stud or a rafter?

Decisions.

Perhaps it's the decisions we make about the life we are going to live.

Hours - maybe days - maybe weeks of conversations. A subject taken out, held in their now open hands to be examined as thoroughly as they can with the help of Holy Spirit. Emotions do not hide themselves at such times as these.

A decision made. A stud goes up.

Joining with other people. People who have been distant now close. People thought lost now in sight.

Holding a relationship that before was touched and then left. A rafter is set in place.

She has watched the man, for many years a carpenter, build houses. She's watched the process of setting these things in place and securing them. Not simple in the natural act. Even less simple in the realms of the emotion and the spirit.

At times the process can push the boundaries toward despair. But then God comes in a quiet moment and says Hope. The lady is listening.

Isaiah 40....They that wait upon/hope in the Lord will renew their strength. They will mount up on wings as eagles. They will run and not grow weary, they will walk and not faint.

He is teaching that lady - finally - to wait and not be afraid of hope.

Jesus, my banqueting table

In John Chapter 6 Jesus presents himself to his listeners as the bread from heaven.

verses 32-35...Jesus said to them, "I tell you the truth, it is not Moses who has given you the bread from heaven, but it is my Father who gives you the true bread from heaven. For the bread of God is he who comes down from heaven and gives life to the world."

"Sir," the said, "from now on give us this bread."

Then Jesus declared, "I am the bread of life. he who comes to me will never go hungry, and he who believes in me will never be thirsty."

I pondered this several years ago when I was involved in activities that challenged me. I felt that I was doing the thing that God would have me do but I can honestly say that I didn't relish all parts of it and if I did it again - which I am open to - I'm sure that I will again not relish all parts of it.

I came to understand that the important part to myself personally was not what I was doing for others but what that experience was doing for me. In the doing of this thing I was experiencing Jesus and I was maturing my taste buds.

Now, we know that bread is used metaphorically. Not just here but in many different contexts the word bread can represent our daily sustenance. We feed our bodies and we feed our minds. And we certainly take into our selves more than just the one item - bread. Our diet, whether for our bodies, minds, souls or whatever is made up of many things. We need a balance, the experts and experience tell us, to be healthy.

I believe same with Jesus. As I was engaged in this activity and I began to understand that I was experiencing Jesus through this activity I began to form a picture in my mind of a table filled with food. That food was my "Bread" and it was diverse. The table was very large and at one end it had the dishes I love. At the other end were the dishes I don't love. Some I truly hate and just will not eat - talking about actual food dishes here. In the middle they sort of mingle. My desire of course, is to hang out at the end of the table with the dishes I love. Who wouldn't? But if I am not willing to go to that other end of the table and eat the food I don't like - or think I don't like - how will I really know about them? In this natural world - I don't care, really, if I never eat those things or ever know what they taste like.

But when I see Jesus as that banqueting table I understand that to experience all of him I have to be willing to pick up tasks that are "unpalatable". Each person would know for themselves what that might be. Does that mean I will experience all of him in this life? I think probably not. I am realizing that my age and previous experiences make me more reluctant than when I was younger and didn't know what I was getting into. I would want to know now that it was definitely God and not just my enthusiasm or zeal that was taking me to that other end of the table. I am definitely more cautious about what I pick up to partake of.

But I don't want to become complacent or unwilling. There are many aspects of God that I want to experience. One thing that is different is that I don't have the drive that was born of out of control emotions. It's a bit fascinating to think of the places in God that the fear/anger/despair took me to.

I'm eyeing some dishes at the other end of the table. Things that I have tasted before and things that I have not. Some I desire to eat - even tho I don't relish all parts of them - but I must wait for Father to prepare the dish. Some I desire to eat because I just know there is something good for me there. I think honesty would compel me to say that some I don't want to eat. We'll see what changes more time brings. Well, I guess my own appetite and desires are all over the place right now as I am in an emotional growth spurt while my little inner child grows up. I hope that I will never lose the desire to taste those unfamiliar portions of the Lord. Mary had chosen the better part - she had chosen to partake of Jesus. That's what I want to do - partake of Him. What we eat is what we become. And what we become is what we will express to the world around us. I want to express the nature of Jesus. It is being formed in me and that is yet an unfinished work.

Some days I really feel like I'm walking in sludge. Now, as I say this don't be thinking that I'm in the depths of despair or anything like that. I definitely had a moment last weekend when some money stuff didn't work out because of a mistake I had made - yes, I had a moment over that.

But my eyes see better than they used to and God is good .

He is very good and I see him in things large and small around me.

Larry and I are in a time such as we have been in before. As Larry has been reading some stuff by someone whose name I'm not quite sure of or I would tell you, he's been able to identify a pattern in time that we seem to be living out. He's looked back over the history of us and has been able to see this pattern and so we are expectant to see what will happen as this time period is fulfilled.

In the meantime I see God's grace expressed in my little family/fractal and the things that God is doing there. I love to see the grace of God at work in my children and grand children. They have been so protected and loved by Father. I see that grace here at work where I feel I have his favor giving me favor. I see it in this new business of Larry's and what it is doing for him.

There are some very definite good things that are comfort and joy to my heart. But still I feel the effort of going forward. I am not one who can just sit down and stay sat until things get easier so I keep trying to move. I press this way and I can't go anywhere. I press that way and I can't get very far. I believe I have what Arthur Burk calls a motion anointing. The outdoors is my favorite sanctuary and walking is my favorite prayer position. And there are other ways that motion expresses itself in my life. But it's so much nicer to be on a mountain top that to be in the marshy places that we sometimes walk through on our way to the next mountaintop.

Back to the point. This sludge. My trudge.

I know - I know - I know there is life on the other end of this. I wonder if what I do - this pressing, pressing - has any value or is just me frustrating myself. Is there intercession in this? I hope so. I know that I need and get reminders of what God is doing and his grace and love. Those reminders - in and of themselves - do not lift me out of the sludge. They give me hope and keep my wandering eyes in the right direction.

I guess I will find out later whether this is just for this period of time or have I just become somewhat jaded because of the ups and downs. I will find out if I have the capacity to believe that we can actually live inside God's blessings. Or is it that even? Could it be that this roller coaster life we live is really the one he always had for us and I just have no capacity for living such a life? That's entirely possible.

Sometimes I think of Joseph when he was in Egypt. He became the Second in Command to Pharaoh himself. He had everything that was the finest - but he was still a captive. Maybe he could have resigned and went home, I don't' know. It seems to me that God chose him to be a captive and a captive he remained. Are we not all Christ's bondslaves? Isn't it about what HE wants to do in the earth?

So perhaps the roller coaster is where he always wanted us to live. I just don't know. I would love to have a strait stretch, though, that would last for as long as I've been on the roller coaster.

Larry has been reading a passage from Psalms over us each morning lately that gives me hope that something different is on the way. Something that is affirming and confirming of this life we have lived.

I life the sound of that phrase - something different is on the way.

Keeping my mouth shut

It's really interesting how many things don't go in a blog. So many things are happening all around me - things that touch me - affect me. Things that bring about those tweakings and adjustments in my own understanding. But I can't really talk about such things and my perceptions of them. I can say this though...I see God in all those situations. He is very present. Some things are being built and some things are being torn down. Some things are feel good things and some are very painful. Some are both. The good and the bad are happening at the same time in this life of ours.

We keep our eyes on him and don't allow ourselves to be defined by either.

Wow

Interesting week. And Larry and I are still asking ourselves what that was about.

September 1 Larry and I go to work as usual. Nothing's pressing. All is quiet. Then Larry gets a call from a man who, in what seems like a moments time - the time it takes to make a decision - but really it was a lifetime leading to this moment - finds himself immersed in God's judgement as God puts his finger on the anger and the fear and is pressing and pressing because He is ready to get to the root that is producing the fruit. Larry left town to spend the rest of the week with this man - just to be there so he would not be alone while God very sovereignly began this mans journey of healing and deliverance.

A chance remark from someone here - a remark that was encouraging actually - sent me into that place of knowing that I had a conflict of interest on my hands that had to be addressed. This was God in my life - God establishing me. Just when you think the details are just the details God steps in and says it's important. So I spent the night awake and the next morning had the necessary conversation with the right person and the resolution was much to my liking.

Larry's situation took longer but by week's end the man was begun on the journey up.

The weekend and we are with our granddaughters and they tell us out of the blue that they want to be baptised. So now that is in the works.

Sovereign God. Sometimes so inscrutable but accessible and understandable. Yes, I did say inscrutable and understandable in the same sentence.

We understand that there is something behind these circumstances that has to do with God's times and seasons and walking in agreement with that.

Here comes into play my definition of faith - Faith is perceiving what God is doing in the spirit realm and joining him there.

I think we did that. Also we understand that obedience releases God's hand. Maybe that's what brought about our granddaughter's desire to be baptised. It was really out of the blue. Thank you Father for all that you have done to reveal yourself to these two beautiful girls.

So - I don't know all that He is doing but I can certainly see the wind blowing.

Changes in the Fractal

So the fractal that is my family is changing - visibly that is.

Some things are being pulled up - some things moved.

Plantings of long ago are beginning to bear some fruit.

Is this fractal what I would have designed for my sake?

Is this fractal the expression that I would choose to bring into the earth.

No.

And it is hard hard for me to believe that it is what God designed.

But then I see with human eyes.

Mother eyes.

But I must - I MUST acknowledge that it might be just MIGHT be exactly what God wants for the sake of HIS expression.

Like he said to this mother many years ago when the children were small and already not doing what I would have them.... "Your children are not here to validate your parenting".

Maybe not.

But I'm still proud of my children. I'm proud of them for being true to who they feel themselves to be. I'm proud of them for choosing to live inside this relationship called family.

I respect their journey and the steps they take that are so different from the steps I take as they work out their own soul's salvation before the Lord.

A new prayer project

Last night I began a new prayer project. Or maybe I began a new prayer journey. I don't know which to call it at this point but I am sure that if I begin to pray as God has shown me how to pray that this project will be a journey.

God has many times given me strategies to deal with the tough things in my life. Such as when I needed to get my mind free from the death wish and he inspired a prayer for me to pray at least once a day like taking a spiritual vitamin. Some days I prayed it more than once and many times through clinched teeth and tears.

This one also involves what I would call a prophetic act. By that word prophetic I mean an act or action which takes that which is spirit and brings it into the natural world. Probably one of the strangest things I have ever done but HEY, why should Jeremiah have all the (?)fun.

Another journey within the larger journey of my life. Another journey to be walked out even as I walk out the other journeys I'm already on. And I suspect that this is going to be a long one. Maybe not, but I'm prepared for it to be.

No details of course. This is too personal. But I wanted to record this moment.

Thank you father for making your wisdom so available to us.

I heard a preacher

I heard a preacher this morning and was reminded why I don't listen to very many of them any more. Hmmmm I don't think I listen to any of them anymore. No I'm sure I don't.

Arrogant! Rebellious! Unwilling to submit to authority!


No, I'm not. But I am unwilling to submit to someone's idea of what God might be doing in my life as though they had all the answers.

The man was Charles Stanley - a good man, no doubt. A "successful" preacher and church leader, no doubt. And, it would seem, an accomplished photographer. He ended his sermon with an illustration with one of his pictures of a shipwrecked boat. (Looked like a Julie shot : ) but in color). He then began to talk about how that boat - which represents the children of God - once moved along with the current which he likened to God's will. Then the boat somehow got out of the current/God's will and there was shipwreck because of whatever went wrong.

As one who has walked and does still walk in some "shipwreck" experiences, I'm just saying that the times of shipwreck we experience can be the most effective and amazing times of growth and revelation and blessing that we can experience in our walk with God. It's true that sometimes people don't recover and the damage becomes permanent. It doesn't look good on the outside. But we cannot judge from outward appearances. And we cannot say that because a person appears and acts shipwrecked that there is no blessing of God in their life.


And "shipwreck" is not necessarily a permanent condition. That boat may have been and may still be salvageable if someone is willing to pay the price for it as Christ paid the price for us.

Every thing he said sounded like this: If you stay in the will of God your life will be blessed, if you don't you won't. I find that to be way too narrow. Paul, in the will of God, was literally shipwrecked and suffered so many things and did not seem, as near as I can tell, to have those things that constitute a "blessed" life. His life looked nothing like Charles Stanley and many of the "successful preachers we see here in America. But he was greatly blessed and we are the recipients of that blessing that he walked in.

But then you must have someway to control the masses and if you can get them convinced that there is a certain behavior or habit or lifestyle that is more conducive to "being blessed" and that you are the person that can help/instruct/cover them in that lifestyle - well it really works for you then doesn't it. And the people never learn that they can go up on that mountain for themselves and hear God's voice and life the way HE leads you.

Any way - I didn't like what I heard and that's why I don't listen to them nor do I consider such men and women good for the body. Hmmm maybe they are good for that man-made institution we call the church. They keep us believing that the success that they have can be ours too. Or something. But they have very little to offer those who will go up the mountain and will live lives that appear in so many ways to be "not blessed".

So if you are one who feels like you are in a shipwreck experience, please don't listen to the fatalism in that message. Listen to the voice of your Shepherd in your heart and walk that lonely path and embrace the pain of it and experience those places in God that you would never get to otherwise. He will transform you and form his own nature within you and you don't need someone telling you that the place you're in is a "wrong" place.


You are where you are and God is with you.

In the Land of Calm

Life goes on the land of calm.

Daily things being done. Going to work. Cleaning house. Taking pictures. Spending time with friends. Keeping up with Facebook :D.

And through the tapestry of a daily life God weaves himself. Speaking through this one and that one - this situation and that event. Going forward and taking us with him into a new place. Giving revelation and understanding of situations and events and things he wants to do in this earth - within the small sphere that is our life. Things that can be very important to the coming days. He brings his word and starts conversation by bringing to our attention things we had not thought about on our own.

How lovely to meet him here.

The new normal

"Look up" He said, and amazingly enough, I did.












I think one reason that I don't feel the need to write more is that my life is calm. The storms that raged in my inner landscape have abated and there is calm there. So the tendency is to think that nothing is happening and it seems there is nothing to say. There are no emotional upheavals forcing words out the way lava is forced out of a volcano. (that's a very good analogy)

Maybe that's true. Why talk when there is nothing to say.

It's bothered me a little because it seems as if my passion for God left with the problems. Not true. Actually much of what seemed to be passion for God was, I think, that pursuit of the wholeness I feel now.

I finally got it and now I have to learn to be it and allow that new expression of my love for God find its way out.

What a problem to have.

Roots of Performance Orientation

I have known for a loooong time that I am a performance oriented person. Not a perfectionist. I won't go into my ideas about perfectionism but I know I'm not that.

I got some insight from a friend this weekend about how I came to be this way. (And it's kinda funny that in conversation with my cohort here at work this morning she commented that I am so hard on myself. I told her I was working on that.)

So yesterday Larry and I spend the day watching the video by Paul Hegstrom (you know, the one about the mind and how we have to build a new axon when we want to change) with some friends. I say the day because we also had lunch and had to pause the dvd at least a thousand times to talk about what we were hearing. It was great.

In the process I shared the nutshell version of my history with depression and J picked up on something I said about my parents requiring so little of us.

They set no boundaries. They set no standards and there was no instruction concerning the reasonable setting of standards. Whatever standards were there were there by default by reason of society and school, etc. But Mom and Dad did not require of us so - let me just stop saying us here and focus on me - I performed at a mediocre level. I suppose I knew in some place in me that I could do better but as long as I was passing in school, not getting into trouble, etc. then I guess I thought that was it. It was good enough.

Maybe good enough would have translated just fine into the future events and circumstances of my life if not for the next big piece of the puzzle. Religion. Church life. A works oriented existence for the next ? years.

I became a Christian at 19 and suddenly I had around me a culture of high standards - at least ideally if not always in actuality. What my friend saw yesterday was that since no boundaries/standards had ever been set for me when it came time for me to set them myself I set them higher than I could possibly achieve. In my mind the Christian was to be living "right" or at least pursuing "right" living. And that "right" living was all about the doing. I thought that what God wanted me to be was a doer. I was quite willing to do what ever it took to be that doer. So I tried and I tried against all odds and always, always feeling my failure. I could not possibly have succeeded according to my standards.

So instead of just enjoying life I was always trying to make it something else, something more and I thought - better. Always striving for myself and my family to reach some "higher level" of something. Not only did I not know how to judge myself correctly - with grace and mercy as Father does - I did not judge my children or my marriage with grace and mercy either.

I understand, now, my Father's grace and mercy as he watches me in my life. I feel that same grace and mercy towards my children now. I still struggle to feel it towards myself. I think I am going to have to have a sit down with Jesus and work this out that way.

Laughing at me

Ha

I have to laugh at me.

I look at my previous posts and my laments about not changing and still don't change. As the man said....Who will free me from this body of death?

Well, I'm not giving up.

Doggonit.

When I grow up

So, little girl, what do you want to be when you grow up??????????

That question continues to ring in my head like a tune recently heard and not easily discarded.

Hmmmm, I say to myself. Could it be that this question is one my Daddy is asking me. My heavenly Daddy? You know, I've been a Christian for 33 years and only now do I feel comfortable calling him Daddy. Hey, it was a pretty big move to go from God to Father. But I don't do these things because it sounds good - I have to know that I know that I feel it deep within me. I consider this a great progression as I understand that he really wants us to come to him as little children. I am only just now at that point.

So again - the question rings - what do I want to be when I grow up.

WELL, I think I have an answer to that now.

I want to be an artist and to bring artistic expression into all that I do. I want to live in the world of art and history and museums and literature and philosophy. I don't mean that it's a big deal to me whether I'm a money maker or not. Money seldom motivates me so if I talk about selling something it's really because I'm competitive enough to want to know if what I do is as good as the next guy. But ideas of success aside art is the area I would like to walk in - just like some do in business and some do in the military.

I don't see this as any kind of contradiction to my life as a Christian either. If God is all in all then these things are all expressions of Him in the earth. Depends on the person - not the vocation so much.

How hard this is at 50+. My mind is largly untrained and undisciplined. The axons I have grown are for other activities and thought processes. It's hard to be beginning again - now - to do those things that are so much easier as a child. When you're a child you can work at a child's level and every thing you do is great. When you are a chronological adult and you do things that are on a child's level it's discouraging. And it's just hard to change habits.

Why didn't my parents see this and train me up in such things? Well, I am not and was not as a child one of those extremely focused and driven ones so I doubt that such a desire seemed anything more than just passing childish fancy. Like playing with cars turned out to be. Our home was not filled with artistic things or music that I remember much (although Mom and Dad had some old albums that we had great fun with as young teenagers). I do remember Dad mentioning Dr Spock and I think they took his teachings way too much to heart. You know, those ideas about letting children just grow up without too much instruction. So I'm sure that if I, as a child, had been one of those that found my own way to do such things I would have grown more in these areas. We did have good books in the house and that was my outlet - the unreal world. It was so much easier there.

So now I am here today and I have the choice of just setting it all down and just being what I've become which would be much easier - and not at all bad - or I can set my face to just continue in my slow, meandering way to become.

I choose the latter. It's an uphill battle full of disappointments and frustrations. But HEY - If I live to be 100 then what's 5 years given to the recapturing of a childhood that got lost.

This is very painful processing today - for me it seems that facing an old habit and choosing a new one is always painful. Ok - the more I do it the less painful it gets. I'm thankful for this blog/journal/personal diary sort of thing that I do. I feel much better than I did when I started writing. Funny - I could never get this same release with a notebook and pen.

What do you want to be when you grow up?

Haven't we all heard that one.

I think I now have my answer..... Grown up - as in mature - as in something more than just capable of functioning in the adult world but truly mature.

I was raised to be a child by parents who I now believe had to grow up too fast because of their life circumstances. I remember Mom telling me to be a child as long as I could because once you are an adult you are an adult for the rest of your life. So true but not as simple as it sounds.

I've been reviewing some of the things that God has taught me over the years about maturity.

The focus of what he has shown me thus far is that maturing is a process that centers around responsibility. Chronologically you are going to be certain ages in order. And in the normal course of life our responsibility level grows as we age. Certainly our society expects us to be able to behave like adults - or at least to function as adults. Either our parents/guardians, or somebody or..... nobody..... is going to teach us how to do what we must do to function in the society we live in.

Another thing I believe I have seen is that if we skip a few years by having to grow up too quickly or because of trauma or whatever - he will bring us back - one way or another - to experience that age. There were things we were to receive there and he wants us to have them.

Now this is not just coming out of my own head (brilliant tho I may be) - the teachings of some of the teachers I've mentioned in past posts have played a big part in my own understanding. I love having Paul Hegstrom in the mix because of how he has been able to see us as physical beings living and growing in harmony with a soul and a spirit.

But our minds and spirits need the process of maturing also. Too often in this world that process is denied. I know I'm talking about me but I'm also looking at the world around me - the world by which I cannot CANNOT judge myself because then I could say that I'm probably OK. I've spent some time with others - call it "ministering" or "counseling" or just "being an ear or a shoulder" and I know that there are more than me who struggle with life. I'm told that God is forming in me the nature of Christ. As I understand more about his nature then I can rightly judge what is going on with me. Thank God that along with that comes a growing understanding of his grace.

How many are thrust into adult situations with out any ability what ever to process what is happening. When adult life began really crashing into my makebelieveworld I was 17 chronologically and I was as smart as the next person - but I was much, much, much younger on the inside than that. I had walked through life without touching it - with very little being required of me. Though I was 17 years old, and CAPABLE of doing the things that life began to require of me, I really didn't know how to handle it. From the beginning of my adult life I handled it badly.

I've spent a fair share of time being kinda angry at my Mom and Dad. I'm not an advocate of blaming the parents but I know you have to look at where you came from to figure out where you are now and to perhaps change course for the future. A period of anger is part of any course of grief over loss. Then - not long ago - a friend related what Father had spoken to her about her own mother. I won't tell that story because it's not mine to tell - but I did begin to see Mom and Dad's philosophy of child raising in a different light and I took into account the little town they grew up in and the circumstances that affected them. Like I said, I think they had to grow up quickly and had pressures placed on them that they didn't want on their children.

They reacted. The pendulum swung all the way to the other side. Nothing done with any evil intent - just doing what seemed right. Good people who provided me with a home that I always felt safe in.

I love them and I want to honor them by being the best me that I can be. I don't think they would be upset about my processing all this this way - remember they now see what I can't. When I think of them sometimes and especially when I have worried about how they might feel about my working through all this (it's really taken years and who knows if I'm finished) I remember where they are and that their understanding is no longer limited by humanity and I feel like they are cheering me on because I know that I know they always wanted a good life for me. I feel like they're on my side.

I'm 50+ish now and am going back to some places inside myself so the little girl can grow up. I'm still functioning in the real world - you know, work and whatever else but mostly work now. But I'm getting understanding about the reasons why some of the things I do - reactions - are what they are.

Very thankful and feeling peace.

Last night and the night before Larry and I watched a video by Dr. Paul Hegstrom about the brain and how it works and how it renews and what happens when we make a decision to start a new thing or to change a habit, etc.

Amazing how God made us and how involved our physical bodies are in the transformation process. And it helps to explain why it's not easy. It takes three years for a new axon to be fully formed in the brain. And the old axon containing data about the old way will even try to absorb the new one. So we're trying to change and our very brain matter is fighting against it.

In a previous post I said that I felt as though I'd been asleep for 50 years and am just now waking up. Maybe another way to put that feeling is that I feel like I've gone back to being a child. And I believe this has been God's setup. When I turned 50 I knew that I knew that there was more going on than more wrinkles and gray hair. In God's economy 50 is the year of Jubilee - the year of starting over. I've started over and I feel it as I walk through my land and I'm going through a stage - yes a stage - of childhood. How strange. Last night's conversation - prompted by the video - was about taking another look at the homes we grew up in - our parents - events - those vague things you remember and have heard about that time down through the years.

Pieces of a puzzle being brought to their places. The fragmented soul being called back to itself.

As I said, I willingly embrace this journey. I can trust my Father now.

It begins again

The healing journey that is.

Wow.

Wow. Wow.

I knew when God touched that deep place in me that prevented me from trusting him that it was not the last thing to be dealt with. It's just that I had to go there in order to go where I'm going now.

So many thoughts and feelings are running through me. These days since moving into the apartment have become very strange as new and different sensations have moved through me. I didn't know what to think of some of them. I have said and done things out of some hidden places within myself that leave me once again not feeling too great about myself. Tears come anytime of the day. The old triggers are still active.

At this point I just can't do details or explanations.

I feel so tired right now.

I want to blog about this. I haven't been able to pull thoughts together to write. I don't want to retreat inside myself. I acknowledge that blogging is a way to keep my door open and still keep myself in a safe place. I still need that.

God, once again, in his amazing wisdom and timing has brought information that speaks to this place and time of my transformation journey. He's really good that way. And there is so much that can help us to understand.

I'm so thankful for such people as John and Paula Sanford, Arthur Burk and now Paul Hegstrom who have shared the understanding of our spirit, soul and body that God has given them with all who wish to listen.

It seems we begin with the question - What's going on with me. And there is confusion and a host of emotions that seem to have no explanation. In my past this would be a point of no return - a spiral into the black hole of despair.

But not today. Today I'm thankful for the teaching Larry and I just listened to about our brain, and memories and reactions and responses and triggers and the actual physical renewing of the mind; the death of the old man as the new one emerges.

I willing take this walk with my Father. I know things will be better at the end of this path. And now I'm not afraid.

Epiphany moments

A nod to my brother just older than me for his contribution to my journey.

Thanks Neil.

As I was conversing with him about my blog and some of these experiences that I'm having in what seems like rapid succession sometimes he said "epiphany". I know that word and my initial reaction was that it was not the word but it continued to work in my mind so I thought I better look it up. You know - just in case I didn't know something that I thought I did. It happens.

Here is definition #3 from the Merriam Webster Online dictionary:
3 a (1): a usually sudden manifestation or perception of the essential nature or meaning of something (2): an intuitive grasp of reality through something (as an event) usually simple and striking (3): an illuminating discovery, realization, or disclosure b: a revealing scene or moment

That's what's happening as I walk along this transformatin journey. Epiphany moments. Sometimes I feel as though I've been asleep for 50 years and am just now waking up and seeing and really seeing and experiencing the world I live in. It's wonderful.

It's also a little scary sometimes. I wonder if this is what it feels like to be a child trying to negotiate the world. I'm making mistakes that a 50+ year old woman ought not be making. It's not really comfortable and this morning I was thinking about maybe even just shutting down this blogging until I grow up some but then what is the point of blogging about your journey if you are going to leave out chunks of it.

This is not comfortable right now.

Larry got this description of progression from somewhere -

We are unconsciously incompetent
We are consciously incompetent
We are consciously competent
We are unconsciously competent

I feel like I am in stage #2. I am conscious of my incompetence as a person.

I am conscious of my need for a Father who will help me grow up. For about 30 years I have been unconscious of this need and so I did not let him help me grow. I did not work with him but rather like a petulant child I worked against him.

It's a good thing I'm living to be 100 (my plan- I don't have a word from the Lord on that).
Hopefully I will have a few years as an adult before I'm done.

Off The Bridge

Me anyway. I don't know if Larry is off his personal bridge yet but I know that I am off mine. Sometimes I am chomping at the bit with all the things I want to be involved in and doing. I want it to be as though I had been here 20 years already and I'm established and doing what I do.

That's not the reality though and it will take time for me to become a part of this little piece of the world that Father has placed us in.

The city calls me and I can't quite seem to get to it.

The arboretum calls me and my schedule is most uncooperative.

There is a ministry to homeless or poor people somewhere that is calling me.

Time with my family and friends.

Parks all around Dallas.

My computer and photo work.

The Lake and once a month cleanup days even seem out of reach.

Alas. Alas. I am here - at work - at this job that I am truly grateful for.

The realities of life and the dreams must find the way to walk together.

Community, a larger fractal

This weekend Larry and I travelled south. A two/two and a half hour drive, for an overnight stay, into the places that GPS devices have a hard time following and the bugs seem to be so desirous of leaving that they will attach themselves to your vehicle to be sure they go home with you. A pity, I suppose, that they never survive the attaching process.

A lovely place. A family campsite on a lake where God has placed another prophet/teacher combo for a time and a season and put it on their heart to open the place up for retreats, etc.

So we retreated with a few people we knew and several we didn't.

San Diego, Boston and Milwaukee (?) were there. Oh yes, and Dallas.

This circumstance played in to my thoughts about community.

Firstly - as one told her story I caught the fact that God had joined them together with a certain group of people about 9 years ago. That was the same time period in which he joined together the group of people that we have laid some claim to as our spiritual family.

Hmmm I thought. Was that perhaps a season of joinings going on everywhere? I know the same soaking meetings that we were having at the time were going on everywhere. I have no answer to that unless more info comes in. I also consider that our joining with our KC group happened a few years later. We'll see what the evidence shows (shades of CSI - did you get it?) and deal with that later. Maybe it's a season we're still in.

Almost as part of that same conversation a guy from San Diego asked me what I saw for me and Larry and for the body. As I was answering him my picture of the community dynamic happening in the body of Christ began to enlarge and I was able to see (much like a vision from several years ago) not just people being joined to one another but communities adding to communities.

I see the fractal/family/garden in a bigger picture.

Let us forsake not the assembling of the body as the manner of some is.

• Let us not let the various languages and dialects that we speak cause us to stop speaking.....
• Let us not allow our differing paradigms put up unnecessary walls....
• Let us not give in to impulses to run from the itchiness of new organic matter being introduced....
• Let us not so crave comfort and ease that we allow the discomfort of growing and becoming to put us off from the appointed joinings of God.

Grace Grace is my cry for the Lord's Body.

We are his body of many parts in the process of becoming fitly joined together.

Our flesh may not want this but our spirit cries out for it.

Grace Grace Father - for we know not what we do but we must learn to love because it is by our love for each other that "they" will know us as your disciples.

New Life in the Garden

Last week a conversation. Us and our daughter. Language Barriers interfered with the making of plans. We said.... She heard.... and there was missed opportunity and there was hurt.

Last night a conversation. Me and my daughter. Language Barriers began to be overcome. Understanding came. Can't undo what is - that gets consigned to opportunities missed.

Last night beauty came from the dying of old thought patterns - old behavior patterns. New life for the future.

Newness springs from the detritus of the old and grows in the fractal/garden of our life.