'Tis a few minutes past midnight in my abode.
I wonder what time it REAL-ly is?
I recently received an email in which the author stated there was a REAL day Jesus Christ was born, and in the future there is a REAL day when he will return (the author's caps, not mine), and that there is a real day coming when people who reject Jesus Christ will be thrown into the wine press of God's wrath and their blood will be as deep as to a horse's bridle for 200 miles.
I had a mental image of a river of red. Then the thought, "Is not that a type of genocide?" On the coattails of that thought, an image from the cover of the book "Martin Luther: Hitler's Spiritual Ancestor" popped into my head.
I simply no longer believe that God is a God of wrath. Neither do I want to worship such an entity.
It is not a balanced weight of justice to spill blood based on the rejection of a "loving" savior. What is loving about that kind of justice? (Perhaps part of the rationalization for a belief in that type of so-called justice comes in one's definition of what it means to reject Jesus Christ.)
I rejected the idea of a burning hell when I was 18 years old. Why would any entity of Love torment someone and do it forever?
The Way International taught/teaches annihilation of the rejectors, a 2nd and final death. At the time I found The Way (at 18 years old), I could swallow a belief in annihilation much more easily than eternal torment.
Immediately after I exited The Way (after 28 years of being a loyal true believer), I was reading the book of Romans. I became engrossed with the Amplified Bible's translation of Roman 5, verses 15 through 19. I thought about those verses for months, rolling them over and over in my mind, trying to grasp and comprehend, at least a little, the expanse of grace. How humankind cannot work one little iota for God's acceptance; that it is totally and completely free? To me, even believing came in the category of works. Believing was the price; didn't I have to "do" something (ie: believe) to gain God's acceptance?
Those verses in Romans in the Amplified Bible state that the effect of what Jesus Christ accomplished can't even be compared to the fall of mankind? How could that be? I believed that "the fall" affected every thing on earth: tainted the blood of man; affected the earth itself - the soil, the air, the content; brought death and shame and evil. So whatever it was that Jesus Christ accomplished, couldn't even be compared with the effects of that contamination? It would have to be so big, so large, so expansive...like beyond and outside our minds to even begin to comprehend. And it wouldn't be based on any works? Not even believing? Could it be that big? What about believing on the Lord Jesus Christ?
About 3 months into my almost daily pondering of this HUGE idea, I met someone online (and then in person) that introduced me to Christian Universalism (CU). I spent the next 10 months or so reading and reading and reading. The approach of the CU interpretation to the scriptures made more sense to me than any eternal damnation, whether that damnation be a forever-burning torment or an annihilation into non-existence and/or never having existed. (Neither of those is just or loving, imo.)
I resonated much with Dr. Tom Talbott's various essays and his book "The Inescapable Love of God."
I slowly gave up the belief of annihilation and accepted the possibility of reconciliation for all.
And alas, I have continued to read various angles regarding various takes on the God debate, and the various takes on various "holy" books.
If there is a REAL time when eternal justice is handed out, I reckon we will all find out about it. There isn't a whole lot of control I (or anyone else) has over such a time. If there is such a time, I imagine we will all be in for some surprises.
I sure hope those surprises don't involve genocide and if so, that I'm counted with the rejectors.
Amen...for a few thoughts on this final day of 2010.
December 31, 2010
December 15, 2010
Stillness
AWW: 12/15/10
non-subject ~ the darkness
*****************************
I read other people's stories. I hear other's stories. Their perceptions. Their experiences. Their judgments. Their emotions. Often their stories involve their families of origin. Their brothers, sisters, moms, dads.
When it comes to stories of people's relationships with their parents, mostly with their moms, I draw a blank. When I think of my relationship with my mom, I feel a void, a nothingness.
That void isn't as prevalent when thinking of my dad.
Dad showed anger, at times quite blatantly. His face turning red. The veins in his neck stretched tight, bulging and almost exposed. The bass-tone verbiage that would bellow forth like it was straight from his heart or belly. I especially recall his passionate "god damn it to hell" phrase. One, which when I think about, is a pretty good phrase if God is going to damn something.
Dad showed compassion and grief. I saw him cry, even before his wreck. When I was in elementary and junior high schools, we would sometimes watch Lassie or Little House on the Prairie. Dad would cry. It wasn't boisterous like when he was angry. A tear or few trickled down his cheek. He tried to hold back, but couldn't. He'd wipe them with the back of his hand. I'd be teary-eyed too.
Dad would dance. And I'd dance with him, in the living room. I was young, elementary school age. A Patsy Cline or Johnny Cash vinyl would be spinning on the record player. Dad would start twisting and swaying his hips. He enjoyed shaking a leg.
When I was 24, about 1-1/2 months before his accident in 1983, he flew out to Kansas to visit me when I was in-residence in the Way Corps at The Way College of Emporia. The Way Corps, and I guess the College Division as well, had a parent's weekend. Dad stayed on campus in the Uncle Harry Dorm. One of my Corps brothers gave up his lower bunk for Dad. Dad and I went to a bar in town and we danced. That weekend was the last time I saw him able to use his body fully.
Little did I know how providential that visit was. The next time I saw Dad some two months later, he lay flat in a hospital bed, his body stretched straight out with a stainless steel halo holding his head perfectly still. Still with steel.
Providential visits. Like the last time I ever saw Dad, in February, 1996, when I was 36 years old. I drove Mom, myself, and my two young children the seven hours from Hickory, NC, to Richmond, VA, to visit Dad. He'd had a rough year with some colon surgeries, a couple short times in a nursing home, and now he was recuperating at McGuire Veteran's Administration Hospital. He was still weak, but was making progress. At the time, McGuire had the largest Spinal Cord Injury Unit in the US. Or so I'd been told.
Mom was an emotional wreck that trip. She knew, I knew, my brother and sister knew, that Dad wouldn't be able to come back home. We didn't have the means to care for him there anymore. That weekend visit to McGuire, she couldn't bring herself to tell Dad he wouldn't be able to come home. I didn't tell him either. He died the following Friday. Some say he did go home.
Dad was cremated.
Mom had tried to commit suicide in 1995. I can't recall exactly where Dad was at that time; I guess either in a nursing home or the hospital. I found Mom on her kitchen floor after the overdose. But of course that incident was never discussed.
Dad was passionate. I have feelings when I think of Dad.
When I think of Mom, I have a void. It's so odd to me. I don't feel anything. I find it difficult to relate to people's experiences when they share their relationships regarding their parents, especially their relationships with their mothers.
I never saw Mom cry, at least that I can remember. Never. The only times I remember her showing anger were when I got my tattoo when I was 18 and then in her later years after Dad's wreck. When I got my tat, her response was more of fear than anger. After Dad's wreck, her anger was directed at her children and Dad. That continued after Dad's death.
Mom laughed though, and seemed to try to see the bright side of things. Well, actually, I think, she ignored the darker side.
She was Compton Encyclopedia's number one salesperson in the United States for about five years in a row in the late 60s and early 70s.
non-subject ~ the darkness
*****************************
I read other people's stories. I hear other's stories. Their perceptions. Their experiences. Their judgments. Their emotions. Often their stories involve their families of origin. Their brothers, sisters, moms, dads.
When it comes to stories of people's relationships with their parents, mostly with their moms, I draw a blank. When I think of my relationship with my mom, I feel a void, a nothingness.
That void isn't as prevalent when thinking of my dad.
Dad showed anger, at times quite blatantly. His face turning red. The veins in his neck stretched tight, bulging and almost exposed. The bass-tone verbiage that would bellow forth like it was straight from his heart or belly. I especially recall his passionate "god damn it to hell" phrase. One, which when I think about, is a pretty good phrase if God is going to damn something.
Dad showed compassion and grief. I saw him cry, even before his wreck. When I was in elementary and junior high schools, we would sometimes watch Lassie or Little House on the Prairie. Dad would cry. It wasn't boisterous like when he was angry. A tear or few trickled down his cheek. He tried to hold back, but couldn't. He'd wipe them with the back of his hand. I'd be teary-eyed too.
Dad would dance. And I'd dance with him, in the living room. I was young, elementary school age. A Patsy Cline or Johnny Cash vinyl would be spinning on the record player. Dad would start twisting and swaying his hips. He enjoyed shaking a leg.
When I was 24, about 1-1/2 months before his accident in 1983, he flew out to Kansas to visit me when I was in-residence in the Way Corps at The Way College of Emporia. The Way Corps, and I guess the College Division as well, had a parent's weekend. Dad stayed on campus in the Uncle Harry Dorm. One of my Corps brothers gave up his lower bunk for Dad. Dad and I went to a bar in town and we danced. That weekend was the last time I saw him able to use his body fully.
Little did I know how providential that visit was. The next time I saw Dad some two months later, he lay flat in a hospital bed, his body stretched straight out with a stainless steel halo holding his head perfectly still. Still with steel.
Providential visits. Like the last time I ever saw Dad, in February, 1996, when I was 36 years old. I drove Mom, myself, and my two young children the seven hours from Hickory, NC, to Richmond, VA, to visit Dad. He'd had a rough year with some colon surgeries, a couple short times in a nursing home, and now he was recuperating at McGuire Veteran's Administration Hospital. He was still weak, but was making progress. At the time, McGuire had the largest Spinal Cord Injury Unit in the US. Or so I'd been told.
Mom was an emotional wreck that trip. She knew, I knew, my brother and sister knew, that Dad wouldn't be able to come back home. We didn't have the means to care for him there anymore. That weekend visit to McGuire, she couldn't bring herself to tell Dad he wouldn't be able to come home. I didn't tell him either. He died the following Friday. Some say he did go home.
Dad was cremated.
Mom had tried to commit suicide in 1995. I can't recall exactly where Dad was at that time; I guess either in a nursing home or the hospital. I found Mom on her kitchen floor after the overdose. But of course that incident was never discussed.
Dad was passionate. I have feelings when I think of Dad.
When I think of Mom, I have a void. It's so odd to me. I don't feel anything. I find it difficult to relate to people's experiences when they share their relationships regarding their parents, especially their relationships with their mothers.
I never saw Mom cry, at least that I can remember. Never. The only times I remember her showing anger were when I got my tattoo when I was 18 and then in her later years after Dad's wreck. When I got my tat, her response was more of fear than anger. After Dad's wreck, her anger was directed at her children and Dad. That continued after Dad's death.
Mom laughed though, and seemed to try to see the bright side of things. Well, actually, I think, she ignored the darker side.
She was Compton Encyclopedia's number one salesperson in the United States for about five years in a row in the late 60s and early 70s.
December 12, 2010
Storms
I've been dealing with a situation for a few months now. By "dealing with" I mainly refer to regulating my internal responses. In regard to the situation, I no longer have anxiety and depression every day. I wrestled with one or both of those up until mid-November. I was doing pretty well after that. Then some circumstances surrounding the 'situation' came up. I found myself infuriated which then led into self-loathing.
That storm passed and the sky cleared. I have done much better the past 4+ days. At least until the next storm. I am not naive to think there won't be a few more upheavals and triggers surrounding the situation, though that would be nice and isn't impossible.
I wrote the following in my journal tonight. I've adapted the journal entry for public eyes, leaving out certain information.
**************************
I'm doing extremely better in regard to [situation]. I'm not sure exactly what has helped with the transformation the past 4+ days. And it has only been 4+ days, not enough time really to know if the "better" is actually more stable or simply a-passing through. Regardless, I'm glad for the 4+ days.
What are some factors that I think helped:
~allowing myself to feel the rage
~being aware and noticing the self-loathing
~allowing myself to feel the grief
~writing about "it"
~being able to share what I wrote
~identifying the trigger factors
~regulating the distorted thoughts
~centering my heart focus
~discussing what happened and my responses with Dr. McColloch & getting his perspective
In light of the above, I need to recall those factors. Most likely, there will be more triggers to come. I may again feel vindictiveness(v). I may feel the rage(r). It's understandable I would feel those emotions in this situation.
I do not have to allow those emotional responses to lead to self-loathing. I can feel the v & r w/out turning on myself and berating myself. For the v & r I can do what I did this time...to write and to heart soak. If I start to plummet into self-loathing...regulate, write, and perhaps "personify" the loathe...or at least check in with the personas I have already named. I could also personify the rage, if I feel the need to.
After getting through the storm, by Thursday, I really had no desire to [...]. I want to be able to forgive, to recall the good. At the same time, I don't want to excuse the harm. [...]
Goals for me in regard to the situation:
******************************
That storm passed and the sky cleared. I have done much better the past 4+ days. At least until the next storm. I am not naive to think there won't be a few more upheavals and triggers surrounding the situation, though that would be nice and isn't impossible.
I wrote the following in my journal tonight. I've adapted the journal entry for public eyes, leaving out certain information.
**************************
I'm doing extremely better in regard to [situation]. I'm not sure exactly what has helped with the transformation the past 4+ days. And it has only been 4+ days, not enough time really to know if the "better" is actually more stable or simply a-passing through. Regardless, I'm glad for the 4+ days.
What are some factors that I think helped:
~allowing myself to feel the rage
~being aware and noticing the self-loathing
~allowing myself to feel the grief
~writing about "it"
~being able to share what I wrote
~identifying the trigger factors
~regulating the distorted thoughts
~centering my heart focus
~discussing what happened and my responses with Dr. McColloch & getting his perspective
In light of the above, I need to recall those factors. Most likely, there will be more triggers to come. I may again feel vindictiveness(v). I may feel the rage(r). It's understandable I would feel those emotions in this situation.
I do not have to allow those emotional responses to lead to self-loathing. I can feel the v & r w/out turning on myself and berating myself. For the v & r I can do what I did this time...to write and to heart soak. If I start to plummet into self-loathing...regulate, write, and perhaps "personify" the loathe...or at least check in with the personas I have already named. I could also personify the rage, if I feel the need to.
After getting through the storm, by Thursday, I really had no desire to [...]. I want to be able to forgive, to recall the good. At the same time, I don't want to excuse the harm. [...]
Goals for me in regard to the situation:
- speak my truth
- uphold my integrity
- not succumb to silencing myself
- be an advocate for me
- be truthful
- be open to possible various outcomes
******************************
December 9, 2010
Lock-in
AWW ~ 12/08/10
non-subject: decision point
***************************
I dated Marshall for a little over one year. I was the ripe age of 13 when we fell in love. Marshall was the same age. Handsome, with an effeminate side. I liked that. A drummer. A lyricist. A musician.
His eyes were a deep Caribbean blue. His hair, wavy brown. His physique, handsome. He didn't have a hairy chest, at least not yet.
Even though he had an effeminate side, Marshall played on the junior high sports teams - football, basketball, baseball. The school mascot was the Cyclones.
I was a cheerleader. I liked showing off my legs in my short cheerleader mini-skirt, even in winter. But in winter it was a wool mini-skirt instead of a polyester blend.
I gave my virginity to Marshall. Though I still can't recall the first time. I guess someday if I need to remember I will. Maybe it will come through in one of my bizarre sleep dreams. I have dreams that are like movies. Colorful and filled with activity. Lately my dreams have involved crowds of people, like packed carnivals.
Marshall and I were together every spare minute. Two lovers so young. We were going to marry one day. I would be his wife.
My parent's couch in the den, Marshall's bed, the neighborhood woods, the little cabin in The Pines. Those were our regular fucking places. But it wasn't just fucking; we made love.
We wrote steamy love letters. I would write descriptly about the size of Marshall's penis and what his erection felt like to my young lips and hands. I'd draw pictures on the sides of the lined notebook paper.
I wonder how many of those letters he showed to his older brothers.
Kelly Klein was a year older than I. She was my best friend, other than Marshall. Kelly and I lived only four houses away from each other. But I didn't share about my sex life with Kelly. My adolescent sex life was private, only shared with Marshall. I didn't talk about it with anyone else. No one.
Kelly & I used to hang out at each other's homes. We listened to 45 vinyls on the record player - Smokey Robinson, The Temptations, Marvin Gaye, Chicago. We rode bikes together. We didn't ride horses together. By the time Kelly and I became friends, I had faded away from horses. I had traded riding horses for riding Marshall. The hours every day I'd spent with horses, I now spent with Marshall.
Maybe Kelly was getting jealous.
I loved watching Marshall on the basketball court. I'd think about sex. I loved watching him play drums, watching his hands and his facial expressions. I'd think about sex. He liked sex. I was good at it. I longed to please.
But it wasn't just sex. Some maybe would call it puppy love, but it wasn't. It was the real thing, adult stuff. At 13 and 14, I was a woman...or so I thought.
Holy Trinity Lutheran Church would sometimes have lock-ins for the youth. Marshall went to one. My friend Kelly went to the same lock-in.
I don't recall now if it was Kelly who told me or someone else. Maybe it was one of Marshall's brothers? Perhaps it was E.B.? He always seemed to have a soft spot for me. Whoever it was, told me that Marshall and Kelly had made out in the dark, downstairs foyer in the church in the wee morning hours of the lock-in. My mind imagined his hand fondling her breasts.
When I got that news, I also got the news that the lock-in wasn't their first time. There had been multiple make-outs.
How could Marshall do that to me? How could he betray me like that? How could he continue to make love with me, telling me how much I meant to him, and at the same time be cheating on me with my best friend?
With gaited fury, I entered the community rec center, a local hang out for teens. I made my way into the large warehouse-sized game room on the ground level. In one section was pool, in another ping pong, in another foosball, in another pinball. On one entire side of the large room, thick windows reached from ceiling to floor; two sets of heavy glass doors were strategically placed within the windowed wall. Through the glass, one could see across the pavement and bit of grass to the building that housed the changing rooms for the swimming pool - the large fenced-in swimming pool located right behind the changing rooms.
I found Marshall at some pool tables. The jukebox sat to the left.
Marshall was standing, the thick glassed wall at his back, with pool stick in hand watching the striped and solid balls roll across the green felted table. He looked over and saw the passion in my visage, tears streaming down my face.
I ripped off the sterling silver necklace with the round, sterling silver St. Christopher piece engraved on the back with Marshall's signature, a token of his love. St. Christopher, to protect me. With all my might I hurled it at Marshall, tears still pouring down my cheeks, my voice shouting words of pain that ripped my young heart.
I don't recall what words I hollered at him in front of everyone milling around the large game room. There must have been thirty people or so.
I marched out the large glass doors and then the 2-1/2 miles home. My heart broken and tears flooding.
I don't know where the St. Christopher landed.
Kelly landed in Marshall's arms for the next couple years.
**************************
non-subject: decision point
***************************
I dated Marshall for a little over one year. I was the ripe age of 13 when we fell in love. Marshall was the same age. Handsome, with an effeminate side. I liked that. A drummer. A lyricist. A musician.
His eyes were a deep Caribbean blue. His hair, wavy brown. His physique, handsome. He didn't have a hairy chest, at least not yet.
Even though he had an effeminate side, Marshall played on the junior high sports teams - football, basketball, baseball. The school mascot was the Cyclones.
I was a cheerleader. I liked showing off my legs in my short cheerleader mini-skirt, even in winter. But in winter it was a wool mini-skirt instead of a polyester blend.
I gave my virginity to Marshall. Though I still can't recall the first time. I guess someday if I need to remember I will. Maybe it will come through in one of my bizarre sleep dreams. I have dreams that are like movies. Colorful and filled with activity. Lately my dreams have involved crowds of people, like packed carnivals.
Marshall and I were together every spare minute. Two lovers so young. We were going to marry one day. I would be his wife.
My parent's couch in the den, Marshall's bed, the neighborhood woods, the little cabin in The Pines. Those were our regular fucking places. But it wasn't just fucking; we made love.
We wrote steamy love letters. I would write descriptly about the size of Marshall's penis and what his erection felt like to my young lips and hands. I'd draw pictures on the sides of the lined notebook paper.
I wonder how many of those letters he showed to his older brothers.
Kelly Klein was a year older than I. She was my best friend, other than Marshall. Kelly and I lived only four houses away from each other. But I didn't share about my sex life with Kelly. My adolescent sex life was private, only shared with Marshall. I didn't talk about it with anyone else. No one.
Kelly & I used to hang out at each other's homes. We listened to 45 vinyls on the record player - Smokey Robinson, The Temptations, Marvin Gaye, Chicago. We rode bikes together. We didn't ride horses together. By the time Kelly and I became friends, I had faded away from horses. I had traded riding horses for riding Marshall. The hours every day I'd spent with horses, I now spent with Marshall.
Maybe Kelly was getting jealous.
I loved watching Marshall on the basketball court. I'd think about sex. I loved watching him play drums, watching his hands and his facial expressions. I'd think about sex. He liked sex. I was good at it. I longed to please.
But it wasn't just sex. Some maybe would call it puppy love, but it wasn't. It was the real thing, adult stuff. At 13 and 14, I was a woman...or so I thought.
Holy Trinity Lutheran Church would sometimes have lock-ins for the youth. Marshall went to one. My friend Kelly went to the same lock-in.
I don't recall now if it was Kelly who told me or someone else. Maybe it was one of Marshall's brothers? Perhaps it was E.B.? He always seemed to have a soft spot for me. Whoever it was, told me that Marshall and Kelly had made out in the dark, downstairs foyer in the church in the wee morning hours of the lock-in. My mind imagined his hand fondling her breasts.
When I got that news, I also got the news that the lock-in wasn't their first time. There had been multiple make-outs.
How could Marshall do that to me? How could he betray me like that? How could he continue to make love with me, telling me how much I meant to him, and at the same time be cheating on me with my best friend?
With gaited fury, I entered the community rec center, a local hang out for teens. I made my way into the large warehouse-sized game room on the ground level. In one section was pool, in another ping pong, in another foosball, in another pinball. On one entire side of the large room, thick windows reached from ceiling to floor; two sets of heavy glass doors were strategically placed within the windowed wall. Through the glass, one could see across the pavement and bit of grass to the building that housed the changing rooms for the swimming pool - the large fenced-in swimming pool located right behind the changing rooms.
I found Marshall at some pool tables. The jukebox sat to the left.
Marshall was standing, the thick glassed wall at his back, with pool stick in hand watching the striped and solid balls roll across the green felted table. He looked over and saw the passion in my visage, tears streaming down my face.
I ripped off the sterling silver necklace with the round, sterling silver St. Christopher piece engraved on the back with Marshall's signature, a token of his love. St. Christopher, to protect me. With all my might I hurled it at Marshall, tears still pouring down my cheeks, my voice shouting words of pain that ripped my young heart.
I don't recall what words I hollered at him in front of everyone milling around the large game room. There must have been thirty people or so.
I marched out the large glass doors and then the 2-1/2 miles home. My heart broken and tears flooding.
I don't know where the St. Christopher landed.
Kelly landed in Marshall's arms for the next couple years.
**************************
December 6, 2010
Sunlife and Orbs
I like our living room. It's bright and open. There is a bay window, with a window seat, that overlooks the front yard. On the seat rests a metal-type bowl. The bowl isn't solid, but rather sculpted with metallic wires and such - leaves and grapes and vines. Inside the bowl are decorative embossed balls, almost the size of croquet balls. Each ball with a different embossed scene. Tigers. Elephants. Giraffes. Africa.
Story orbs.
The spheres bring to mind one of my favorite songs, "Circle of Life," which I first heard in the movie "The Lion King." Circles. Orbs. Globes. Scenes.
On either side of the artistic bowl that is home to the scenic globes, sit two oil lamps. They have been used from time to time. I've not used them in awhile. Perhaps I will tonight, light them instead of turning on the switch of the tall, black, upright floor lamp.
I could swear that the fuel oil I poured into those lamps was originally a pale shade of purple. Did the sun bleach the color from the oil? I wondered as I pondered the lamps this morning. The past months, I've noticed the clear oil and thought of how the sun purifies.
The thought of the sun transforming the oil from purple to clear causes me pause.
Our family used to play croquet regularly. We'd hit or tap the balls with our mallets and watch them travel the lawn. Colored, striped orbs spinning on Earth.
Croquet. That might be a good springtime activity, once the spring has again sprung. The warmth causing the daffodils to sprout. Renewal time after the dormant season of cold and ice and shorter days.
I wonder what I'll accomplish this 2010 and 2011 dormant season?
Wow. The year 2011, ten years beyond the Odyssey.
*****************************
Story orbs.
The spheres bring to mind one of my favorite songs, "Circle of Life," which I first heard in the movie "The Lion King." Circles. Orbs. Globes. Scenes.
On either side of the artistic bowl that is home to the scenic globes, sit two oil lamps. They have been used from time to time. I've not used them in awhile. Perhaps I will tonight, light them instead of turning on the switch of the tall, black, upright floor lamp.
I could swear that the fuel oil I poured into those lamps was originally a pale shade of purple. Did the sun bleach the color from the oil? I wondered as I pondered the lamps this morning. The past months, I've noticed the clear oil and thought of how the sun purifies.
The thought of the sun transforming the oil from purple to clear causes me pause.
Our family used to play croquet regularly. We'd hit or tap the balls with our mallets and watch them travel the lawn. Colored, striped orbs spinning on Earth.
Croquet. That might be a good springtime activity, once the spring has again sprung. The warmth causing the daffodils to sprout. Renewal time after the dormant season of cold and ice and shorter days.
I wonder what I'll accomplish this 2010 and 2011 dormant season?
Wow. The year 2011, ten years beyond the Odyssey.
*****************************
December 4, 2010
The Obvious ~ a quote
Something I've been thinking about. It's not earth shattering or anything and probably obvious to most people.
The quote:
In any so-called service/support organization, if people are expendable, therein the organization is fraudulent.
**************************************
The quote:
In any so-called service/support organization, if people are expendable, therein the organization is fraudulent.
**************************************
December 1, 2010
Purple & Green
What to write?
I draw a blank. ___________ (Now I typed a blank.)
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
It rains tonight
Puddles form alongside the driveway
Where the gravel is
Sometimes the drops come fast
And furious
Making a small crick
That flows to the street
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
As a youngster I often played outside. Our house was located on a hill and the rain would run down the sides of the street. There were and still are no sidewalks on that street. I used to go out after a rain, collect small rocks and sticks, and make miniature dams in the tiny streams that flowed down the paved roadside. I was an engineer. Sometimes I was a captain of a ship, the ship being made of a stick or piece of bark. The imagination with rain.
The smell of rain. The sound of rain. The feel of rain.
Behind our house was a pasture. That's where the ponies lived. Horses too. I'd climb the fence and walk across the grassy slope that leveled out as I got to the creek. This was a real creek. Even had a swimming hole. And crawdads. And good rocks for creek walking. And clay. I'd form bowls from the clay, let them dry in the sun, then paint them with the purple juice from polk berries.
I was told polk berries were poisonous but that one could eat the raw, young leaves in salads. But I never did eat any polk salad.
Jimson weed grew in that pasture. The spiky pods were topped with purple feathery locks. Purple is one of my favorite colors. Purple and green, I really like those colors together. Today at work, as I was unpacking art, I came across a painting of some Jimson plants. I bought the art piece for my miniature art collection.
Jimson, aka Datura, and I had a relationship in the distant past. She almost killed me, but we survived those hellish four days. One of our hallucinations was of water in an aquarium which housed a sanatorium that staffed witch doctors.
I wasn't told that Datura was poisonous, but rather that it was mind expanding. I did eat Datura seeds, but not in a salad.
___________________
I draw a blank. ___________ (Now I typed a blank.)
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
It rains tonight
Puddles form alongside the driveway
Where the gravel is
Sometimes the drops come fast
And furious
Making a small crick
That flows to the street
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
As a youngster I often played outside. Our house was located on a hill and the rain would run down the sides of the street. There were and still are no sidewalks on that street. I used to go out after a rain, collect small rocks and sticks, and make miniature dams in the tiny streams that flowed down the paved roadside. I was an engineer. Sometimes I was a captain of a ship, the ship being made of a stick or piece of bark. The imagination with rain.
The smell of rain. The sound of rain. The feel of rain.
Behind our house was a pasture. That's where the ponies lived. Horses too. I'd climb the fence and walk across the grassy slope that leveled out as I got to the creek. This was a real creek. Even had a swimming hole. And crawdads. And good rocks for creek walking. And clay. I'd form bowls from the clay, let them dry in the sun, then paint them with the purple juice from polk berries.
I was told polk berries were poisonous but that one could eat the raw, young leaves in salads. But I never did eat any polk salad.
Jimson weed grew in that pasture. The spiky pods were topped with purple feathery locks. Purple is one of my favorite colors. Purple and green, I really like those colors together. Today at work, as I was unpacking art, I came across a painting of some Jimson plants. I bought the art piece for my miniature art collection.
Jimson, aka Datura, and I had a relationship in the distant past. She almost killed me, but we survived those hellish four days. One of our hallucinations was of water in an aquarium which housed a sanatorium that staffed witch doctors.
I wasn't told that Datura was poisonous, but rather that it was mind expanding. I did eat Datura seeds, but not in a salad.
___________________
November 20, 2010
Cults and Such
I wrote a rendition of the following in an email to someone tonight.
***************************************************
I'm gonna address your statement regarding "cults." My thoughts may come out ambivalent, because my thoughts and feelings regarding "cults" can be ambivalent. Similar to my thoughts about whether or not a creator exist or a theist god exist. I don't know what I believe currently about the god thing. Perhaps some day I will, and perhaps not.
Anyway "cults." I'm going to simply ramble here. This ain't no dissertation or nuttin'. Just thoughts interlaced with any weirdness that comes through my finger tips. I will endeavor to make it somewhat coherent.
I knew The Way was called a "cult" when I became a Way follower. The "cult" label didn't bother me...much. At the time The Way was kinder than the "church" believers that I was involved with. The Way could answer my questions. My experience at Way fellowships was good and rich, real and tangible. My heart's desire was to know God...to "know"...to "know"....to "know." I had convinced myself that Jesus Christ was THE way to the Father (god). When I found The Way, I began to convince myself that the Biblical scriptures were perfect when "originally" given. I delved deeper into "crucifying the old man." That is declaring my flesh dead and worthless and my life in Christ vibrant and righteous.
Eventually that led me to what I call a soul suicide or soul murder. Any desire that was outside the doctrine of God's Word (the "original" intent of the Bible as The Way claimed to teach) was not of God. I was to renew my mind to the Truth of the Word, to destroy my human logic from the position I had exalted it and put on the mind of the new man; ie: the mind of Christ. In so doing I would know the depth and length and breadth and height of the love of God which passes all understanding. The eyes of my understanding would be enlightened. I would be one of the telios, the initiated.
As time went on, I no longer knew who Carol was. Carol was what the Word said she was. (Interesting I don't state "who" but rather "what.")
For me, that is the essence of cultic influence and harmfulness (for some followers). When one's autonomy is stolen or allowed to be stolen. And when one's interdependence with humanity is replaced with exclusivism; that those not enlightened to the truth (that is taught within the group) are ruled by their natural senses at best, the seed of the 'devil' at worst. (I do think that a follower of any cultic group, **who ends up harmed, most(?) much(?) of the time, holds part of the responsibility in the situation in which they find themselves. **Yet stating that, I get a bit foggy and not quite sure.)
As I figure you might agree, any group can be cultic. And how much so is on a continuum. Us humans don't live in a vacuum. I like what I read from part of a book by psychiatrist, Dr. Arthur Deikman: "Some degree of cult behavior can be seen in all groups, so instead of asking 'Is this group a cult?,' a more useful inquiry is: "How much cult behavior is taking place here?' "
I've read similar in other books written by various psychologists and sociologists and such. I find it a fascinating field - group dynamics. How many of the authors I've read consider themselves part of the anti-cult movement? I don't know, but I don't think many do. Rather they study group dynamics. What is healthy? What is unhealthy? How can we determine such?
How many people join cults? Is it increasing or decreasing? I don't know if we can measure that. How many folks suffer emotional and psychological abuse in groups or in one-on-one relationships? Lots. Is either of those increasing or decreasing? I don't know.
Well, that's a few of my thoughts regarding "cults." (Hmmm...I may put those thoughts on a blog entry. :-D )
_________________________
**I struck part of my words above, because I got to thinking about them and realized I really don't agree with what I had stated. It is like blaming a person who has been abused; the victim is not responsible for the abuse. That said, when a person joins a group, depending on influences utilized in how they joined (and there are variables and degrees), I think in many(?) of the cases the person holds (at the least) some responsibility for their choice to join and continue with the group. That too is variable, because influences from the group and vulnerabilities of the person while in the group will often fluctuate. If a person is born into a group, they really have no choice until later as an adult, and then it is extremely diffi-cult to leave.
I have a lot more thoughts on the subject, and then some foggy-headedness with it.
****************************
***************************************************
I'm gonna address your statement regarding "cults." My thoughts may come out ambivalent, because my thoughts and feelings regarding "cults" can be ambivalent. Similar to my thoughts about whether or not a creator exist or a theist god exist. I don't know what I believe currently about the god thing. Perhaps some day I will, and perhaps not.
Anyway "cults." I'm going to simply ramble here. This ain't no dissertation or nuttin'. Just thoughts interlaced with any weirdness that comes through my finger tips. I will endeavor to make it somewhat coherent.
I knew The Way was called a "cult" when I became a Way follower. The "cult" label didn't bother me...much. At the time The Way was kinder than the "church" believers that I was involved with. The Way could answer my questions. My experience at Way fellowships was good and rich, real and tangible. My heart's desire was to know God...to "know"...to "know"....to "know." I had convinced myself that Jesus Christ was THE way to the Father (god). When I found The Way, I began to convince myself that the Biblical scriptures were perfect when "originally" given. I delved deeper into "crucifying the old man." That is declaring my flesh dead and worthless and my life in Christ vibrant and righteous.
Eventually that led me to what I call a soul suicide or soul murder. Any desire that was outside the doctrine of God's Word (the "original" intent of the Bible as The Way claimed to teach) was not of God. I was to renew my mind to the Truth of the Word, to destroy my human logic from the position I had exalted it and put on the mind of the new man; ie: the mind of Christ. In so doing I would know the depth and length and breadth and height of the love of God which passes all understanding. The eyes of my understanding would be enlightened. I would be one of the telios, the initiated.
As time went on, I no longer knew who Carol was. Carol was what the Word said she was. (Interesting I don't state "who" but rather "what.")
For me, that is the essence of cultic influence and harmfulness (for some followers). When one's autonomy is stolen or allowed to be stolen. And when one's interdependence with humanity is replaced with exclusivism; that those not enlightened to the truth (that is taught within the group) are ruled by their natural senses at best, the seed of the 'devil' at worst. (I do think that a follower of any cultic group, **
As I figure you might agree, any group can be cultic. And how much so is on a continuum. Us humans don't live in a vacuum. I like what I read from part of a book by psychiatrist, Dr. Arthur Deikman: "Some degree of cult behavior can be seen in all groups, so instead of asking 'Is this group a cult?,' a more useful inquiry is: "How much cult behavior is taking place here?' "
I've read similar in other books written by various psychologists and sociologists and such. I find it a fascinating field - group dynamics. How many of the authors I've read consider themselves part of the anti-cult movement? I don't know, but I don't think many do. Rather they study group dynamics. What is healthy? What is unhealthy? How can we determine such?
How many people join cults? Is it increasing or decreasing? I don't know if we can measure that. How many folks suffer emotional and psychological abuse in groups or in one-on-one relationships? Lots. Is either of those increasing or decreasing? I don't know.
Well, that's a few of my thoughts regarding "cults." (Hmmm...I may put those thoughts on a blog entry. :-D )
_________________________
**I struck part of my words above, because I got to thinking about them and realized I really don't agree with what I had stated. It is like blaming a person who has been abused; the victim is not responsible for the abuse. That said, when a person joins a group, depending on influences utilized in how they joined (and there are variables and degrees), I think in many(?) of the cases the person holds (at the least) some responsibility for their choice to join and continue with the group. That too is variable, because influences from the group and vulnerabilities of the person while in the group will often fluctuate. If a person is born into a group, they really have no choice until later as an adult, and then it is extremely diffi-cult to leave.
I have a lot more thoughts on the subject, and then some foggy-headedness with it.
****************************
Foundations
non-subject: ridicule
aww ~ 11/10/10
***************************
Mid 1990s. It had to have been either Thanksgiving or Christmas because those were typically the only times us siblings and our parents would get together. Or at funerals and weddings.
My mom was one of thirteen children, though two of the children died in childhood. One of her brothers named Craig died; it seems he lived into elementary school age. The other sibling died shortly after being born. I don't know if it was a boy or a girl. My mother referred to it as "the infant."
Mom was 2nd to the youngest in her family.
I am the youngest of three children, so that puts me near the bottom of the cousin rung as far as age. Most of my however-many cousins I have are older than I. I think there are four younger than I.
With all those cousins there have been lots of weddings. And through the years there have been some funerals. Mom was the last of her siblings to die. I wrote a poem in her honor entitled "The Final Drum." That was her maiden name, Drum.
Thanksgiving. Christmas. Weddings. Funerals. Those have been our main family gatherings in my adult years, like so many in our transient culture.
Mid 1990s. Either Thanksgiving or Christmas. My brother and I stood on the porch of our parent's home. The porch of the house where we had grown up. My husband was standing with us. My brother was smoking a cigarette.
The porch. It wasn't a large porch, but neither was it as small as a stoop. The porch floor was a brick red and was some sort of stone tile, but not square tiles. Rather a medley of shapes with off white grout outlining each contour. In one corner of the porch was a beige-painted brick column with a beige-painted pole on it connecting to the roof. A beige-painted gutter ran down the front of the pole and column.
A green wooden bench with a slat back, and big enough for two people, sat in front of the downstairs bedroom window against the beige-painted outside brick wall. An old-timey milk can painted black stood beside the bench. That's where mom hid the key, under the milk can. A ramp covered with green outdoor carpet made its way from the sidewalk, up the one-step porch and to the front door. Mom had the ramp installed after Dad's wreck.
My brother and I stood over by the brick column, the top of which we used for a table for our beverage glasses or cans or whatever we happened to be drinking.
My bother was a liberal. I considered myself a conservative, though I didn't keep up too much with politics. I usually just asked my husband who I should vote for. He too was conservative.
I don't know how the subject of homosexuality came up, probably because of some political conversation.
"Homosexuality is wrong," I confidently stated.
"So you think someone would choose that lifestyle knowing the prejudice they would face?" My brother responded.
"God didn't make a man's penis to go into another man's rectum. It's not natural. God made man for woman and woman for man. Queers choose to be queers. Sure there might be something in their upbringing that caused them to be that way. But it is a disorder. It is wrong. Bottom line is it is devil spirit possession."
My voice was forceful. I knew beyond any shadow of a doubt that I was right. My brother didn't have spiritual eyes to see. I didn't know if he was born again or not. We didn't discuss spiritual matters. Well, once we did, over a decade before, after he'd had enough to drink.
My husband made a gesture to try to calm me down. But I wasn't going to back down. I was going to stand for the truth whether or not my husband spoke up. Do I really believe the Word or don't I? If I do, then I speak. That's what Paul stated in Corinthians: "I believed, therefore have a spoken." I was typically bolder than my husband anyway, when it came to this kind of stuff.
"Can someone who is gay go to Heaven?" My brother asked, not so much for an answer, but to try to trap me in my words.
"Yes," I responded. "Works don't matter as far as getting into Heaven. A person can get born again and never walk the Word and they'll still get into Heaven. But if the queer doesn't confess Jesus as Lord and believe God raised him from the dead, he won't go to heaven."
"Can a murderer go to Heaven?" he asked.
"Yes." I answered. "The same way the queer can go. It's not based on works but on whether they accept Jesus Christ as Lord and believe God raised him from the dead."
"So," he responded. "A murderer can go to Heaven even if he tortures and murders, as long as he accepts Christ. And a person can live a good life and be benevolent, but because he has consensual sex with someone of the same sex, if he doesn't accept Christ, he will burn in Hell?"
"I didn't say they'd burn in Hell. I said they won't go to Heaven. There is no such thing as an eternal burning Hell. I don't know all the ends and outs of how God will judge good works but God is just and all love. He'll figure it out."
I was still heated, more so at my husband for not saying anything. Didn't my husband really believe this stuff!? Why didn't he speak up?!
"I rest my case," my brother responded.
We probably then went inside for fruit cake.
Or pecan pie.
aww ~ 11/10/10
***************************
Mid 1990s. It had to have been either Thanksgiving or Christmas because those were typically the only times us siblings and our parents would get together. Or at funerals and weddings.
My mom was one of thirteen children, though two of the children died in childhood. One of her brothers named Craig died; it seems he lived into elementary school age. The other sibling died shortly after being born. I don't know if it was a boy or a girl. My mother referred to it as "the infant."
Mom was 2nd to the youngest in her family.
I am the youngest of three children, so that puts me near the bottom of the cousin rung as far as age. Most of my however-many cousins I have are older than I. I think there are four younger than I.
With all those cousins there have been lots of weddings. And through the years there have been some funerals. Mom was the last of her siblings to die. I wrote a poem in her honor entitled "The Final Drum." That was her maiden name, Drum.
Thanksgiving. Christmas. Weddings. Funerals. Those have been our main family gatherings in my adult years, like so many in our transient culture.
Mid 1990s. Either Thanksgiving or Christmas. My brother and I stood on the porch of our parent's home. The porch of the house where we had grown up. My husband was standing with us. My brother was smoking a cigarette.
The porch. It wasn't a large porch, but neither was it as small as a stoop. The porch floor was a brick red and was some sort of stone tile, but not square tiles. Rather a medley of shapes with off white grout outlining each contour. In one corner of the porch was a beige-painted brick column with a beige-painted pole on it connecting to the roof. A beige-painted gutter ran down the front of the pole and column.
A green wooden bench with a slat back, and big enough for two people, sat in front of the downstairs bedroom window against the beige-painted outside brick wall. An old-timey milk can painted black stood beside the bench. That's where mom hid the key, under the milk can. A ramp covered with green outdoor carpet made its way from the sidewalk, up the one-step porch and to the front door. Mom had the ramp installed after Dad's wreck.
My brother and I stood over by the brick column, the top of which we used for a table for our beverage glasses or cans or whatever we happened to be drinking.
My bother was a liberal. I considered myself a conservative, though I didn't keep up too much with politics. I usually just asked my husband who I should vote for. He too was conservative.
I don't know how the subject of homosexuality came up, probably because of some political conversation.
"Homosexuality is wrong," I confidently stated.
"So you think someone would choose that lifestyle knowing the prejudice they would face?" My brother responded.
"God didn't make a man's penis to go into another man's rectum. It's not natural. God made man for woman and woman for man. Queers choose to be queers. Sure there might be something in their upbringing that caused them to be that way. But it is a disorder. It is wrong. Bottom line is it is devil spirit possession."
My voice was forceful. I knew beyond any shadow of a doubt that I was right. My brother didn't have spiritual eyes to see. I didn't know if he was born again or not. We didn't discuss spiritual matters. Well, once we did, over a decade before, after he'd had enough to drink.
My husband made a gesture to try to calm me down. But I wasn't going to back down. I was going to stand for the truth whether or not my husband spoke up. Do I really believe the Word or don't I? If I do, then I speak. That's what Paul stated in Corinthians: "I believed, therefore have a spoken." I was typically bolder than my husband anyway, when it came to this kind of stuff.
"Can someone who is gay go to Heaven?" My brother asked, not so much for an answer, but to try to trap me in my words.
"Yes," I responded. "Works don't matter as far as getting into Heaven. A person can get born again and never walk the Word and they'll still get into Heaven. But if the queer doesn't confess Jesus as Lord and believe God raised him from the dead, he won't go to heaven."
"Can a murderer go to Heaven?" he asked.
"Yes." I answered. "The same way the queer can go. It's not based on works but on whether they accept Jesus Christ as Lord and believe God raised him from the dead."
"So," he responded. "A murderer can go to Heaven even if he tortures and murders, as long as he accepts Christ. And a person can live a good life and be benevolent, but because he has consensual sex with someone of the same sex, if he doesn't accept Christ, he will burn in Hell?"
"I didn't say they'd burn in Hell. I said they won't go to Heaven. There is no such thing as an eternal burning Hell. I don't know all the ends and outs of how God will judge good works but God is just and all love. He'll figure it out."
I was still heated, more so at my husband for not saying anything. Didn't my husband really believe this stuff!? Why didn't he speak up?!
"I rest my case," my brother responded.
We probably then went inside for fruit cake.
Or pecan pie.
November 11, 2010
Charlotte & Wilbur's "Ordinary Miracle" ~ Sarah McLachlan
I found the following YouTube this past week and have watched it a few times over.
To life and all its ordinary miracles.
To life and all its ordinary miracles.
November 7, 2010
Forests
****************************
Blogging. What an odd activity. At least it seems that way to me; yet, I indulge.
There was a time I thought I would never have a *weblog* ~ a *we blog* ~ an *I blog.*
I don't know the history of blogging, so I just searched it and found an article in Wikipedia: History of blogging. From there I ended up at Wikipedia's article entitled Online diary.
From there I ended up at a site entitled "the online diary history project," which states:
Fascinating.
I've so often asked myself, "Why? Why do I blog?"
I've yet to come up with a definitive answer.
When I stated to an ex-therapist of mine that I write for myself, he pointed out that isn't completely true. And rightly so, because I blog; that is I choose to make certain pieces public. Some of these pieces are very personal. Other pieces never make it to the public blogosphere.
All that said, I still mainly write for myself...even when I blog. Yes, it is a selfish act; I confess. It is for me first.
I think what most humans tend toward is for "me first." That is, we choose things because of self interest or self desire. Even if that desire is to help others; it is still a desire of the self.
A tree grows. If it is deep in a forest, it may never be seen by public eyes - at least as an individual tree. Yet it continues to grow and is always 'public.'
The tree weathers. It grows. The tree suffers. It grows. The tree provides shade. It grows. The tree provides a home. It grows. The tree's bark may bear scars of onslaughts from its environment. It grows. If the tree is deciduous, it's leaves will change colors each year, and it will bring forth new leaves each year. It grows.
The tree is always on display. Always. Yet only those who seek the forest will ever see that individual tree. Even then, that tree may not be noticed. Yet it is still there, in the open, on display.
Isn't that kind of like a blog these days. How many blogs are out here? Millions? Hmm...time for a net search. Be right back.
O.K. I'm a limited researcher, and in my brief perusal after my search, I found this post on the Blog Herald. The article and comments pose some of the same thoughts I had; especially what makes a blog meaningful? And, I'd add, how much does that really matter?
I think of visual art. What makes it meaningful? Who is to say? The old phrase "beauty is in the eye of the beholder" comes to mind. "Usefulness" and "meaningful" are in the eye of the moment, in the soul of the artist, and in the heart's interpretation of the partaker.
There are millions of blogs. There are billions of trees. There are billions of people.
Why do I blog? I think the answer is probably multifaceted. One facet, currently, and perhaps the main facet, is to give voice and (dare I add) to find my voice...whatever that exactly means at any given moment.
Perhaps that is a good enough reason.
And perhaps the reason isn't all that important, but rather the need or maybe the desire.
Reasons. Needs. Desires. All are part of being human, along with a million(?) other attributes.
Why do I like the color purple? Why do I like chocolate?
***************************
Blogging. What an odd activity. At least it seems that way to me; yet, I indulge.
There was a time I thought I would never have a *weblog* ~ a *we blog* ~ an *I blog.*
I don't know the history of blogging, so I just searched it and found an article in Wikipedia: History of blogging. From there I ended up at Wikipedia's article entitled Online diary.
From there I ended up at a site entitled "the online diary history project," which states:
We asked people who began keeping online journals before January 1998 to reflect on how and why they began journaling, and how they felt journals and the journaling community had changed over the years. Here they tell the story of the first years of online journals in their own words. The entries are arranged according to when the contributor first started keeping an online journal.
Fascinating.
I've so often asked myself, "Why? Why do I blog?"
I've yet to come up with a definitive answer.
When I stated to an ex-therapist of mine that I write for myself, he pointed out that isn't completely true. And rightly so, because I blog; that is I choose to make certain pieces public. Some of these pieces are very personal. Other pieces never make it to the public blogosphere.
All that said, I still mainly write for myself...even when I blog. Yes, it is a selfish act; I confess. It is for me first.
I think what most humans tend toward is for "me first." That is, we choose things because of self interest or self desire. Even if that desire is to help others; it is still a desire of the self.
A tree grows. If it is deep in a forest, it may never be seen by public eyes - at least as an individual tree. Yet it continues to grow and is always 'public.'
The tree weathers. It grows. The tree suffers. It grows. The tree provides shade. It grows. The tree provides a home. It grows. The tree's bark may bear scars of onslaughts from its environment. It grows. If the tree is deciduous, it's leaves will change colors each year, and it will bring forth new leaves each year. It grows.
The tree is always on display. Always. Yet only those who seek the forest will ever see that individual tree. Even then, that tree may not be noticed. Yet it is still there, in the open, on display.
Isn't that kind of like a blog these days. How many blogs are out here? Millions? Hmm...time for a net search. Be right back.
O.K. I'm a limited researcher, and in my brief perusal after my search, I found this post on the Blog Herald. The article and comments pose some of the same thoughts I had; especially what makes a blog meaningful? And, I'd add, how much does that really matter?
I think of visual art. What makes it meaningful? Who is to say? The old phrase "beauty is in the eye of the beholder" comes to mind. "Usefulness" and "meaningful" are in the eye of the moment, in the soul of the artist, and in the heart's interpretation of the partaker.
There are millions of blogs. There are billions of trees. There are billions of people.
Why do I blog? I think the answer is probably multifaceted. One facet, currently, and perhaps the main facet, is to give voice and (dare I add) to find my voice...whatever that exactly means at any given moment.
Perhaps that is a good enough reason.
And perhaps the reason isn't all that important, but rather the need or maybe the desire.
Reasons. Needs. Desires. All are part of being human, along with a million(?) other attributes.
Why do I like the color purple? Why do I like chocolate?
***************************
November 4, 2010
Now I Lay Me Down to Sleep
I should be asleep now, but I'm not. As I laid my head on the pillow and stretched my body upon the mattress, relaxation 'ahhed' through my sinews.
It feels good to lie on my back and stretch.
Yet, I felt an urge to write, even to blog. So here I am.
I attended the phone memoir workshop tonight as I do on other Wednesday nights. The piece I penned tonight will not make it to public eyes, at least not now.
This afternoon prior to the workshop I was thinking about writing, as often I do. These days I write pieces in the workshops that I never post on my blogs. I like that. I am writing for me more than for others.
It is a difficult boundary sometimes when I write something that I plan to blog, to not write for others. I think it is somewhat impossible almost, at least for me. That is, impossible to not 'hold back' in pieces that I know I am going to publish on my blog.
I thought of Emily Dickinson today. She wrote for Emily and apparently for a few friends. I've never studied her life or her writings. I've only heard and read tidbits of information hither and yon. Funny that I was thinking of her this morning and then Dr. McColloch brought her up this afternoon when I met with him. I hadn't revealed to him that I'd just been thinking about that same poet.
I've heard that Robert Frost said something like true publishing is when a writer reads their own work to others. That is what we do in the memoir workshops.
I have compared the memoir workshops to a drum circle; we each drum our rhythm singularly but not alone.
I want to not premeditate too much in regard to what I write in the workshops.
Today, as I thought of that desire, the one about not premeditating before I write, I thought of The Way and what it teaches regarding how interpretation of tongues and the manifestation of prophecy are to be conducted.
One unique thing (at least to my knowledge) about The Way and many of the splinter groups that have originated from Way teachings, is in regard to their teachings about I Corinthians 12 and the so-called gifts of the spirit. The Way teaches they are not gifts, but rather manifestations. Two of those are the manifestations of interpretation of tongues and of prophecy. In The Way we were taught when you speak in tongues aloud in a believer's meeting, you immediately give the interpretation. Don't allow your thoughts to get in the way. Same with the manifestation of prophecy. There is to be no prethought as to what the believer will say in the interpretation or prophecy. A believer just speaks forth the first word that comes to him and lets the other words then flow.
I like when I am able to write with flow. One thing that helps me is to not write for others, to write first for me. Writing for me can include details that I recall from events. Often, the details help me remember more details.
Every one who is a loyal Way follower speaks in tongues, and most interpret and bring forth words of prophecy. The words do flow, but all must be proper and decent and in order and in line with the true doctrine.
Intriguing how a doctrine regarding non-premeditation can end up so pre-determined.
It feels good to lie on my back and stretch.
Yet, I felt an urge to write, even to blog. So here I am.
I attended the phone memoir workshop tonight as I do on other Wednesday nights. The piece I penned tonight will not make it to public eyes, at least not now.
This afternoon prior to the workshop I was thinking about writing, as often I do. These days I write pieces in the workshops that I never post on my blogs. I like that. I am writing for me more than for others.
It is a difficult boundary sometimes when I write something that I plan to blog, to not write for others. I think it is somewhat impossible almost, at least for me. That is, impossible to not 'hold back' in pieces that I know I am going to publish on my blog.
I thought of Emily Dickinson today. She wrote for Emily and apparently for a few friends. I've never studied her life or her writings. I've only heard and read tidbits of information hither and yon. Funny that I was thinking of her this morning and then Dr. McColloch brought her up this afternoon when I met with him. I hadn't revealed to him that I'd just been thinking about that same poet.
I've heard that Robert Frost said something like true publishing is when a writer reads their own work to others. That is what we do in the memoir workshops.
I have compared the memoir workshops to a drum circle; we each drum our rhythm singularly but not alone.
I want to not premeditate too much in regard to what I write in the workshops.
Today, as I thought of that desire, the one about not premeditating before I write, I thought of The Way and what it teaches regarding how interpretation of tongues and the manifestation of prophecy are to be conducted.
One unique thing (at least to my knowledge) about The Way and many of the splinter groups that have originated from Way teachings, is in regard to their teachings about I Corinthians 12 and the so-called gifts of the spirit. The Way teaches they are not gifts, but rather manifestations. Two of those are the manifestations of interpretation of tongues and of prophecy. In The Way we were taught when you speak in tongues aloud in a believer's meeting, you immediately give the interpretation. Don't allow your thoughts to get in the way. Same with the manifestation of prophecy. There is to be no prethought as to what the believer will say in the interpretation or prophecy. A believer just speaks forth the first word that comes to him and lets the other words then flow.
I like when I am able to write with flow. One thing that helps me is to not write for others, to write first for me. Writing for me can include details that I recall from events. Often, the details help me remember more details.
Every one who is a loyal Way follower speaks in tongues, and most interpret and bring forth words of prophecy. The words do flow, but all must be proper and decent and in order and in line with the true doctrine.
Intriguing how a doctrine regarding non-premeditation can end up so pre-determined.
October 31, 2010
~rhythm and flow~
**************************
What do I write tonight? Once I write, will I click 'publish'? Once I publish it, how many typos or errors or better way of saying something will I discover? How many edits will I apply?
Since May, 2009, I spend many-a-Wednesday night on the telephone with a few other writers, folks who draw letters on a page to form words that create pictures. Or perhaps, like me, they utilize a keyboard to create digital(?) letters that form words to convey pictures. Scenes of life.
What may seem a mundane bus ride becomes a deep experience of life and connections. Or a simple boat ride in the Gulf while viewing piers and birds, put into words, spawns gratitude for life and simplicity. It could be that one works as a cashier and store owner interacting every day with such a variety of people that adventures seem to present themselves as regular occurrences.
In order to have something to write about, one must be relating with an environment.
That thought causes me pause.
What if one is in solitary confinement in a prison? What is that environment?
Wow. I guess it would mainly be with one's self. And with the walls, the floor, the bed or mat, a toilet, a sink. All inanimate objects. Perhaps food is given by someone whose face can be seen, or perhaps all that is seen is the giver's hands or fingers sliding a tray through a slot.
I doubt one would have a keyboard or a pen and paper. But perhaps pencil and paper would eventually be granted.
I think of prisoners in austere circumstances who have stated that keeping their minds active is what helped them to keep going. I've heard one story of a man, I think a POW, who would play 18 holes of golf in his head. That imaginary 18 holes kept his mind sane. Story goes that he was able to play very well after being released from his hell hole. (Upon writing those sentences I googled prisoner who played 18 holes of golf in his imagination and found a Snopes link about it entitled Legend in His Own Mind.)
This past Wednesday in the writing workshop via phone, Fred Poole shared something along the lines that Alphie McCourt writes with pen and paper (as opposed to a computer keyboard) because it takes much more effort to stop the flow of writing. That is with a computer, editing while composing is much easier and more tempting; thus one can interrupt themselves to their own disadvantage.
That's not to say we should all or always compose with pen and paper. But the point is to allow flow.
With a ballpoint pen the ink doth flow.
With a keyboard, fingers click out rhythms.
My mother's name was Flo. Her last name was Drum.
**************************
What do I write tonight? Once I write, will I click 'publish'? Once I publish it, how many typos or errors or better way of saying something will I discover? How many edits will I apply?
Since May, 2009, I spend many-a-Wednesday night on the telephone with a few other writers, folks who draw letters on a page to form words that create pictures. Or perhaps, like me, they utilize a keyboard to create digital(?) letters that form words to convey pictures. Scenes of life.
What may seem a mundane bus ride becomes a deep experience of life and connections. Or a simple boat ride in the Gulf while viewing piers and birds, put into words, spawns gratitude for life and simplicity. It could be that one works as a cashier and store owner interacting every day with such a variety of people that adventures seem to present themselves as regular occurrences.
In order to have something to write about, one must be relating with an environment.
That thought causes me pause.
What if one is in solitary confinement in a prison? What is that environment?
Wow. I guess it would mainly be with one's self. And with the walls, the floor, the bed or mat, a toilet, a sink. All inanimate objects. Perhaps food is given by someone whose face can be seen, or perhaps all that is seen is the giver's hands or fingers sliding a tray through a slot.
I doubt one would have a keyboard or a pen and paper. But perhaps pencil and paper would eventually be granted.
I think of prisoners in austere circumstances who have stated that keeping their minds active is what helped them to keep going. I've heard one story of a man, I think a POW, who would play 18 holes of golf in his head. That imaginary 18 holes kept his mind sane. Story goes that he was able to play very well after being released from his hell hole. (Upon writing those sentences I googled prisoner who played 18 holes of golf in his imagination and found a Snopes link about it entitled Legend in His Own Mind.)
This past Wednesday in the writing workshop via phone, Fred Poole shared something along the lines that Alphie McCourt writes with pen and paper (as opposed to a computer keyboard) because it takes much more effort to stop the flow of writing. That is with a computer, editing while composing is much easier and more tempting; thus one can interrupt themselves to their own disadvantage.
That's not to say we should all or always compose with pen and paper. But the point is to allow flow.
With a ballpoint pen the ink doth flow.
With a keyboard, fingers click out rhythms.
My mother's name was Flo. Her last name was Drum.
**************************
October 27, 2010
The Rest of My Life
aww: october 27, 2010
non-subject ~ 'the rest of my life'
Last week I picked up my red journal and my black journal to reread some events from 2004 and 2005. To taste where I was at that time in my life.
I wanted to find the exact date that I officially left The Way. The official date is October 28, 2005.
Official because parts of me had been leaving for some eight years prior to that official date. Official because I called my leadership and informed them of my decision. After 28 years of loyalty, and at 46 years old, I was committing the ultimate Judas act in my thinking. I had tried to leave twice, decades previously. This time would be my third attempt; it would be complete. I was turning away from what I had truly believed for decades to be the functioning Body of Christ, the Household of God.
Tomorrow, October 28, 2010, will be five years since I left.
****
At 18 years old I stood in the college classroom, on the second level. I don't recall which building we were in on the Montreat-Anderson Campus, but it seems we were on the second floor. Many of the buildings on campus were built of stone.
We. That is myself, Matt, Judy, Shirley, Phillip, and Scott. We were all fellow students. We were all Christians, though I was the newest to the fold.
Scott was tall and was the first person to tell me that Christians believed that Jesus is God, which stunned me, that people believed a man could be God. Scott told me a few weeks previously, after I had shown him a Way Magazine that I had been given when I had attended a Twig, which was what Way Home Fellowships were called.
Scott and I were sitting in padded metal chairs in the prayer house discussing the return of Jesus Christ. Scott stated, "When God comes back." I responded, "Well, Jesus Christ is the one coming back. God is already here." Scott replied, "Carol, they're the same person." I looked at him totally baffled stating, "I don't understand." He answered, "You will as you grow in Christ."
The prayer house was a small rustic, wooden cabin on campus nestled within laurels, as is much of the Blue Ridge mountains. A small creek with rocks rippled by the back of the cabin where I often sat in solitude on the small wooden back porch writing prayers to God on index cards, begging Him to show me His will for my life. I'd write scripture on the cards, repeating the words over and over to myself in order to memorize the scriptures in order to push out doubt. I thirsted to believe, to know beyond any doubt.
In 1977, Montreat-Anderson College was a two-year private college located in the Blue Ridge Mountains in the heart of Billy Graham country near Black Mountain, North Carolina. I had decided in late July of '77 that I wanted to go to college. I chose Montreat. I'd heard that spirit-filled small gatherings met in close proximity to the campus. They met in homes around Montreat and in coffee houses over in Asheville. Spirit-filled meaning that at these gatherings people spoke in tongues, sang in tongues, perhaps would dance in the spirit and even get slain in the spirit.
I craved to understand these gifts of the holy spirit. I had recently been led into tongues that summer of '77 and wanted to learn all I could about it. Was it really of God like the Lutheran Charmismatic Church where I first spoke in tongues taught? Or was it devilish like the country Baptist Church I had gone to a year previously had taught? But how could something that made me feel so high be bad? Why did congregations speak in tongues out loud all at the same time when I read in scriptures that they weren't supposed to do that?
I thought that once I graduated from Montreat, I'd go to Wheaton College in Illinois, another Bible-based school. I'd get a degree in Christian counseling.
I sat in the college classroom while Matt stood at the blackboard. Matt was over 6 feet tall and lean. He had emerged as the leader of our little prayer group, a group that had come together spontaneously when we would gather at the prayer cabin by the creek. Matt was confident and sure. Phillip stood with Matt at the blackboard. He was shorter and was overweight; yet he was gentler than Matt. Phillip loved the Word. Shirley was Matt's girlfriend, confident like Matt. They would probably be future leaders in something like Campus Crusades for Christ. Judy was Shirley's friend. Judy reminded me of someone raised in the country in a Pentecostal church in West Virginia. Scott was tall like Matt and was the quietest of all.
Judy and Shirley wore make up and dressed neatly, often sleek and business like. I wore no make up and mainly wore jeans or shorts or long hippie skirts. Church had not been a big part of my life, though my parents would say our family was Methodist. I did sometimes go to church on Christmas and Easter. Growing up, I thought God was bigger than the church and wasn't limited to Christianity.
But when I spoke in tongues that summer of 1977, I knew I'd found the way to be one with God. This was it. The Bible had to be true. Jesus Christ was the one true way to the Father. I felt driven to learn more, to prove the scriptures, to know the will of God.
Matt and Phillip stood at the black board in that college classroom and began to write with the white chalk, scripture verses to prove to me that Jesus was God. By that time I had attended a few Way fellowships. The Way taught Jesus was not God. The Way taught I was righteous before God. The Way taught I was worthy because of Jesus Christ and that I was to claim my "sonship rights."
When I couldn't see with my spiritual eyes what Matt and Phillip were trying to make me see, Judy and Shirley chimed in. The consensus was The Way was a cult. The Way was evil. The Way was of the devil.
But my few experiences with The Way had been loving, not evil. At Way fellowships all they did was teach the Word; the Word was the center of everything. The Way was answering my deepest questions. At Twig, people didn't speak in tongues all at one time; that wasn't allowed just like I'd read in the book of Corinthians. When someone in a Way meeting spoke in tongues, that same person then spoke forth the interpretation. All was done decent and in order just like the Word said. At Twig I felt the love of God; it felt real, tangible, authentic. It was gentle yet strong, an enveloped warmth. There was a mystical cohesion that had to be experienced to be understood; mere words couldn't describe it.
The four voices in the classroom rose in volume and became more forceful to convince me of my error, to convince me that my experiences were due to the devil appearing as an angel of light.
But all their voices did was push me deeper into Way fellowships, to where the believers greeted me with a holy kiss and open arms.
****
October 24, 2010
Giving Voice
I wrote a journal piece last night on my private blog which is viewable to my eyes only. I almost posted the piece publicly. The place I almost posted it was on a mental health help discussion forum, so I probably would have been safe to do so. But I decided not to post it; I don't want to get drawn back into internet forums. Instead I ended up taking Xanax - first one pill, then another, then another, then another over a course of about 1-1/2 hours. I finally got to sleep.
I realize I wanted to post the piece so as to give voice to the pain. To not feel alone.
I have been feeling very down again, isolated, alone. I know the signs of depression. I know isolationism can be a killer if one is suicidal; I am no foreigner to it. Last night I wasn't suicidal, but was having ideation. That is having a desire for my life to end.
Depression isn't new to me. However, up until the beginning of August I was doing better. I felt I was on my road to greater wellness. I had (have) come a long way in a few years.
Then some events happened, circumstances that threw me into a maelstrom of anxiety, self-doubt, self-blame, distrust, doubting my reality, and other stuff. The scenario and my subsequent symptoms are quite similar to what happened when I left The Way, to what happened with circumstances at GreaseSpot Cafe a few years back, to what happened when Claire stayed at our home for seven weeks in 2009. One difference in my current bout of challenges, is that I haven't felt rage. But then, really the only time I have felt rage was over what happened at GreaseSpot.
So I know that the circumstances that happened in August, 2010, are a (if not the) catalyst for my dive into the anxiety, depression, and other symptoms.
In September, I wrote some of the circumstances surrounding what happened in July/August and submitted that report to the proper authorities, but I've not heard back yet. Writing and compiling that information was one of the hardest and most agonizing decisions and exercises of my life. Once I got that done, the anxiety and ruminating over and over in my head was quieted. Though it still comes up at times. Yet, the depression continues to be a challenge.
This morning I read from Kristen Skedgell's blog, a piece entitled, More About "Walkaway." It has prompted me to write this blog entry. Perhaps my blog entry is a confession of sorts of my recent challenges and my difficulty at working through them.
I say I want to "get on" with my life. Get my house in order. Be a better wife. Be more social. Explore my interests. Take a couple classes at community college. Perhaps volunteer in some sort of local service.
But, the reality is, I want to be alone. I'm having difficulty feeling joy. I'm having difficulty trusting people and seeing the good in humanity - something I've always endeavored to believe in - the good in humanity.
I seem happiest on the backpacking trail with only my weight to carry, with the necessity of hiking being a must. For one cannot just stop on the trail. There is the next water source to get to, the next food supply. No one is going to come along and pick me up to carry me out.
October is also a month of anniversaries that in the past has brought me down - abortion in 1978 on the WOW field, jimson weed overdose in 1975, AWOLing from The Way Corps two different times on two different interim years in 1980 and 1983, my first asthma attack in 1981, the time of year I got involved in The Way in 1977, my official departure from The Way org in 2010. All happened in or around October. I've done well the past couple Octobers. But this October, 2010, has thrown me - though not as badly as the worst years. I must remember that, remember how far I have come.
One may say, "Most of those things happened 30 or more years ago Carol? What's wrong with you that they still come up?" My answer today is, "I don't know. They just do."
On further thought, perhaps part of the reason they continue to come up is that they were suppressed for so long. Well all except for my Way Corps AWOLs, though I would feign that I was over those 'sins.' The shame of those heinous acts burdened me until 2009; it still comes up from time to time. In fact, it came up with what transpired in August - that I was a failure at commitments. (Which I know logically isn't true, but the feeling is still there.)
I don't like to bother others in regard to my challenges in these areas, though I have a couple close friends and my current psychologist that I can bring them up with.
I've recently wondered if my departure from The Way was the right decision? Yet, I have no temptation to go back; I am no longer a true believer.
Well, if any readers read this, I feel I should issue apologies for its length and even its content. I doubt it is helpful to anyone. But then, I don't really blog to be helpful. I mean, the main reason I write is to give voice to something inside of me. Something I'm not always sure as to what it is.
***********************************
I realize I wanted to post the piece so as to give voice to the pain. To not feel alone.
I have been feeling very down again, isolated, alone. I know the signs of depression. I know isolationism can be a killer if one is suicidal; I am no foreigner to it. Last night I wasn't suicidal, but was having ideation. That is having a desire for my life to end.
Depression isn't new to me. However, up until the beginning of August I was doing better. I felt I was on my road to greater wellness. I had (have) come a long way in a few years.
Then some events happened, circumstances that threw me into a maelstrom of anxiety, self-doubt, self-blame, distrust, doubting my reality, and other stuff. The scenario and my subsequent symptoms are quite similar to what happened when I left The Way, to what happened with circumstances at GreaseSpot Cafe a few years back, to what happened when Claire stayed at our home for seven weeks in 2009. One difference in my current bout of challenges, is that I haven't felt rage. But then, really the only time I have felt rage was over what happened at GreaseSpot.
So I know that the circumstances that happened in August, 2010, are a (if not the) catalyst for my dive into the anxiety, depression, and other symptoms.
In September, I wrote some of the circumstances surrounding what happened in July/August and submitted that report to the proper authorities, but I've not heard back yet. Writing and compiling that information was one of the hardest and most agonizing decisions and exercises of my life. Once I got that done, the anxiety and ruminating over and over in my head was quieted. Though it still comes up at times. Yet, the depression continues to be a challenge.
This morning I read from Kristen Skedgell's blog, a piece entitled, More About "Walkaway." It has prompted me to write this blog entry. Perhaps my blog entry is a confession of sorts of my recent challenges and my difficulty at working through them.
I say I want to "get on" with my life. Get my house in order. Be a better wife. Be more social. Explore my interests. Take a couple classes at community college. Perhaps volunteer in some sort of local service.
But, the reality is, I want to be alone. I'm having difficulty feeling joy. I'm having difficulty trusting people and seeing the good in humanity - something I've always endeavored to believe in - the good in humanity.
I seem happiest on the backpacking trail with only my weight to carry, with the necessity of hiking being a must. For one cannot just stop on the trail. There is the next water source to get to, the next food supply. No one is going to come along and pick me up to carry me out.
October is also a month of anniversaries that in the past has brought me down - abortion in 1978 on the WOW field, jimson weed overdose in 1975, AWOLing from The Way Corps two different times on two different interim years in 1980 and 1983, my first asthma attack in 1981, the time of year I got involved in The Way in 1977, my official departure from The Way org in 2010. All happened in or around October. I've done well the past couple Octobers. But this October, 2010, has thrown me - though not as badly as the worst years. I must remember that, remember how far I have come.
One may say, "Most of those things happened 30 or more years ago Carol? What's wrong with you that they still come up?" My answer today is, "I don't know. They just do."
On further thought, perhaps part of the reason they continue to come up is that they were suppressed for so long. Well all except for my Way Corps AWOLs, though I would feign that I was over those 'sins.' The shame of those heinous acts burdened me until 2009; it still comes up from time to time. In fact, it came up with what transpired in August - that I was a failure at commitments. (Which I know logically isn't true, but the feeling is still there.)
I don't like to bother others in regard to my challenges in these areas, though I have a couple close friends and my current psychologist that I can bring them up with.
I've recently wondered if my departure from The Way was the right decision? Yet, I have no temptation to go back; I am no longer a true believer.
Well, if any readers read this, I feel I should issue apologies for its length and even its content. I doubt it is helpful to anyone. But then, I don't really blog to be helpful. I mean, the main reason I write is to give voice to something inside of me. Something I'm not always sure as to what it is.
***********************************
October 21, 2010
Victor Paul Wierwille: "The Lockbox" (mp3 recording)
I had a previous blog entry on toss & ripple about a common interest group on Facebook. A few weeks ago I decided to put that blog entry into draft, thus taking it off public view on toss & ripple. I made that decision mainly because the blog entry had served its purpose, which was to have a record (at the time) of my dialog with anyone on the Facebook common interest page in case that dialog was deleted by the moderators of that Facebook page.
The common interest Facebook page was(is) entitled "Dr. Victor Paul Wierwille."
One thing I came across via the dialog I had on that page was an mp3 recording of Victor Paul Wierwille teaching about "the lockbox." I am 98% sure the teaching took place at The Way's Advanced Class '79, of which I was an attendee.
When I heard the mp3, I posted it (on my now-deactivated Facebook page) for others to listen to it, including others who had never been with The Way and were not familiar with Way doctrine. I wondered what their responses would be. I got some interesting responses.
Below is a link to the mp3. I'd be interested in any responses that any listeners might have.
The mp3 is just a little over 14 minutes in length.
Click here to listen: "Lockbox" mp3 (no longer accessible)
**************************
The common interest Facebook page was(is) entitled "Dr. Victor Paul Wierwille."
One thing I came across via the dialog I had on that page was an mp3 recording of Victor Paul Wierwille teaching about "the lockbox." I am 98% sure the teaching took place at The Way's Advanced Class '79, of which I was an attendee.
When I heard the mp3, I posted it (on my now-deactivated Facebook page) for others to listen to it, including others who had never been with The Way and were not familiar with Way doctrine. I wondered what their responses would be. I got some interesting responses.
Below is a link to the mp3. I'd be interested in any responses that any listeners might have.
The mp3 is just a little over 14 minutes in length.
**************************
October 17, 2010
Chapter 22: More Journal Entries
The following was originally posted on a different blog as part of a series. The series remains incomplete.
~*~*~*~
At times as I compose these memoir blog entries, I will review sections of my personal journals from that time period to help jog my memory on details of certain events. I find reviewing my journals a revealing exercise - to see my 'logic' and mindset at the time.
Before proceeding with more memoir blog entries, I've thought to post a few more journal entries from the months leading up to September, 2005, even as far back as August, 2004. A few of these are below. My ambivalence regarding The Way is apparent. I think it is also obvious (or will be) that my decision to leave The Way was a long, thought-through, and even planned exit.
I officially left The Way in October, 2005. Upcoming chapters will reveal what prompted that final decision, the proverbial straw on the camel's back. It was one of the hardest decisions of my life.
*****
Friday, July 30, 2004. 2:15 pm at Borders.
As I think about it, cover-up is part of what the Ministry teaches. It is part of that pseudo-wisdom. I'm not stupid. Ministry leadership doesn't publicly admit mistakes, publicly or to its followers. As I grow I may have to confront that. Oh yuck.
Ministry leadership doesn't acknowledge mistakes. I'm not going to keep score, but I am going to be aware of it.
_______________________
Thursday, August 12, 2004. 4:15 pm at Borders.
A paragraph from the book, From Beirut to Jerusalem: "And so [...] the play went on: Palestinians talking to the world about resistance, even resisting individuality, but resigning themselves as a community to the Israeli system; Israeli's talking to the world about their 'enlightened' occupation, and then doing anything they had to do, behind closed doors, to keep the Palestinians quiet."
The above paragraph prompts thoughts of The Way in light of what I read on GreaseSpot.
"Palestinians talking to the world...." is like outties (folks who have left The Way and post on GreaseSpot) talking to the world.
"[...]But resigning themselves as a community to the Israeli system..." is like outties resigning themselves as a community to the world's system of blame.
"Israeli's talking to the world about their 'enlightened' occupation, and then doing anything they had to do, behind closed doors, to keep the Palestinians quiet," is like The Way and us followers talking to the Household and anyone who will listen about our 'enlightenment' in the Promised Land, and then leadership doing anything they have to do to keep the outties' voices quiet from us innies, from the faithful remnant.
I want to believe that The Way has changed, but I am not fully convinced. I don't know if the change is genuine or political. So I am sometimes disturbed that I continue to stand with The Way knowing what I know. Then I observe Sarah's positive response and light-heartedness to being at Headquarters for the Advanced Class, Jeffery's response to living at Headquarters, the Word taught in the Living God's Word as a Family class; and I think, "The Ministry is healthier."
The things I question are:
1) leadership not admitting when they make mistakes
2) the "original" sin teaching of the Adversary posing as a woman having lesbian sexual relations with Eve
3) penalizing Advanced Class graduates that have debt
4) the tithe teaching
5) exclusiveness with Way publications
6) suspicion of people and their motives
7) so-called wisdom and the lockbox.
I think followers should know about The Way's past. I do not agree with how the Ministry handles that aspect.
From the book From Beirut to Jerusalem (in light of how Israel dealt with the Holocaust until it was resurrected in 1961 with the trial of the Nazi war criminal, Adolf Otto Eichmann): "In those days we barely learned about the Holocaust in school. The feeling, the whole atmosphere, was that the future must triumph over the past. All of us, parents and kids, tried to cover up what had happened."
I read those sentences and think of The Way. It is like the past never happened. Something about that doesn't seem healthy to me.
But do I voice my concern? If so, how do I voice it?
Also, I think I no longer believe that The Way is the Household of God. I'm not sure what I believe is the Household.
_________________
Monday, September 27, 2004. 1:00 pm at Borders.
I continue to awake with sadness each morning. I wish it were gone. Janet believes it can be healed, and I do too.
God, You know I want to do what is right. At least I think I do.
I have many doubts about The Way. I think much cover-up has gone on over the years. I sometimes feel that by continuing to attend Household Fellowship, I am participating in the cover-up. Sometimes I wish I had never gone to any anti-Way websites. Yet, that is where I learned about Mrs. Wierwille and about the Peeler case.
I thought the other day that if I were assigned to teach on tithing at Fellowship, that I would have to bypass that assignment because I no longer believe it is accurate. I think Christian Educational Services is putting out more accurate biblical information than is The Way. I really wonder if The Way will still be around in five years. It has been exclusive to its detriment.
I transfer some of my misgivings about The Way onto other organizations, like Reliv. I have to tell myself that I have nothing to hide with Reliv. I can't say that regarding The Way. The Way has a rotten track record.
Hmm, The Way has cleaned up in the past couple years. Except it has never fessed up, never opened its doors. So it's not clean. And if someone checks it out thoroughly, they probably wouldn't touch it.
It saddens my heart. It will take me time to work through this stuff.
I don't want to leave, mainly for my children's sakes. And The Way is clean now, as far as folks not participating in immoral behavior. As far as repentance for the past, I don't know. People's problems are not dealt with at the gut level. I speak in tongues and wonder, "How do I honestly and with integrity deal with these matters?"
It is in my best interests to stay away from anti-Way sites.
~*~*~*~
~*~*~*~
At times as I compose these memoir blog entries, I will review sections of my personal journals from that time period to help jog my memory on details of certain events. I find reviewing my journals a revealing exercise - to see my 'logic' and mindset at the time.
Before proceeding with more memoir blog entries, I've thought to post a few more journal entries from the months leading up to September, 2005, even as far back as August, 2004. A few of these are below. My ambivalence regarding The Way is apparent. I think it is also obvious (or will be) that my decision to leave The Way was a long, thought-through, and even planned exit.
I officially left The Way in October, 2005. Upcoming chapters will reveal what prompted that final decision, the proverbial straw on the camel's back. It was one of the hardest decisions of my life.
*****
Friday, July 30, 2004. 2:15 pm at Borders.
As I think about it, cover-up is part of what the Ministry teaches. It is part of that pseudo-wisdom. I'm not stupid. Ministry leadership doesn't publicly admit mistakes, publicly or to its followers. As I grow I may have to confront that. Oh yuck.
Ministry leadership doesn't acknowledge mistakes. I'm not going to keep score, but I am going to be aware of it.
_______________________
Thursday, August 12, 2004. 4:15 pm at Borders.
A paragraph from the book, From Beirut to Jerusalem: "And so [...] the play went on: Palestinians talking to the world about resistance, even resisting individuality, but resigning themselves as a community to the Israeli system; Israeli's talking to the world about their 'enlightened' occupation, and then doing anything they had to do, behind closed doors, to keep the Palestinians quiet."
The above paragraph prompts thoughts of The Way in light of what I read on GreaseSpot.
"Palestinians talking to the world...." is like outties (folks who have left The Way and post on GreaseSpot) talking to the world.
"[...]But resigning themselves as a community to the Israeli system..." is like outties resigning themselves as a community to the world's system of blame.
"Israeli's talking to the world about their 'enlightened' occupation, and then doing anything they had to do, behind closed doors, to keep the Palestinians quiet," is like The Way and us followers talking to the Household and anyone who will listen about our 'enlightenment' in the Promised Land, and then leadership doing anything they have to do to keep the outties' voices quiet from us innies, from the faithful remnant.
I want to believe that The Way has changed, but I am not fully convinced. I don't know if the change is genuine or political. So I am sometimes disturbed that I continue to stand with The Way knowing what I know. Then I observe Sarah's positive response and light-heartedness to being at Headquarters for the Advanced Class, Jeffery's response to living at Headquarters, the Word taught in the Living God's Word as a Family class; and I think, "The Ministry is healthier."
The things I question are:
1) leadership not admitting when they make mistakes
2) the "original" sin teaching of the Adversary posing as a woman having lesbian sexual relations with Eve
3) penalizing Advanced Class graduates that have debt
4) the tithe teaching
5) exclusiveness with Way publications
6) suspicion of people and their motives
7) so-called wisdom and the lockbox.
I think followers should know about The Way's past. I do not agree with how the Ministry handles that aspect.
From the book From Beirut to Jerusalem (in light of how Israel dealt with the Holocaust until it was resurrected in 1961 with the trial of the Nazi war criminal, Adolf Otto Eichmann): "In those days we barely learned about the Holocaust in school. The feeling, the whole atmosphere, was that the future must triumph over the past. All of us, parents and kids, tried to cover up what had happened."
I read those sentences and think of The Way. It is like the past never happened. Something about that doesn't seem healthy to me.
But do I voice my concern? If so, how do I voice it?
Also, I think I no longer believe that The Way is the Household of God. I'm not sure what I believe is the Household.
_________________
Monday, September 27, 2004. 1:00 pm at Borders.
I continue to awake with sadness each morning. I wish it were gone. Janet believes it can be healed, and I do too.
God, You know I want to do what is right. At least I think I do.
I have many doubts about The Way. I think much cover-up has gone on over the years. I sometimes feel that by continuing to attend Household Fellowship, I am participating in the cover-up. Sometimes I wish I had never gone to any anti-Way websites. Yet, that is where I learned about Mrs. Wierwille and about the Peeler case.
I thought the other day that if I were assigned to teach on tithing at Fellowship, that I would have to bypass that assignment because I no longer believe it is accurate. I think Christian Educational Services is putting out more accurate biblical information than is The Way. I really wonder if The Way will still be around in five years. It has been exclusive to its detriment.
I transfer some of my misgivings about The Way onto other organizations, like Reliv. I have to tell myself that I have nothing to hide with Reliv. I can't say that regarding The Way. The Way has a rotten track record.
Hmm, The Way has cleaned up in the past couple years. Except it has never fessed up, never opened its doors. So it's not clean. And if someone checks it out thoroughly, they probably wouldn't touch it.
It saddens my heart. It will take me time to work through this stuff.
I don't want to leave, mainly for my children's sakes. And The Way is clean now, as far as folks not participating in immoral behavior. As far as repentance for the past, I don't know. People's problems are not dealt with at the gut level. I speak in tongues and wonder, "How do I honestly and with integrity deal with these matters?"
It is in my best interests to stay away from anti-Way sites.
~*~*~*~
October 15, 2010
Some Light Reading....
**************************
I enjoy fall. The leaves whirl in circles as they make their way to the earth. Floating as if cradled by unseen arms as they gently drift. The abundance of falling leaves brings to mind an array of butterflies or a light show from fireflies.
Late spring, 1995ish. I was driving the van from Cades Cove, Tennessee, up the mountain toward Newfound Gap on Highway 441. It was dark, as was our typical day at Cades Cove. We would arrive late morning and drive the Cove's 11-mile loop with the van door open taking in nature's display and stopping as we wished - to visit the historical cabins, to hike, to picnic. We stayed as long as we could, 'til dusk or dark.
Perhaps it was this trip that the bear strolled across the road right in front of our van. I snapped an awesome photograph of that bear. Maybe I'll one day learn how to scan photos onto the computer and even post them on my blog.
We - my two children, myself, and I think my mother-in-law - had taken the trip that late spring day from Bryson City, North Carolina, to Cades Cove, Tennesse, and were on our way back to Bryson. Highway 441 is a fun road with a tunnel of green boughs, mountain view vistas, winding roads, bridge arches.
As we left the Cove that evening and began the climb on 441 in the dark, both my children were in the back seat of the van, peering out the back window. Joshua was around four years old and Sarah around seven.
"Wow Mom! You should see the lightning bugs!" They sounded excited.
"Are there a lot?" I inquired.
"A whole bunch!!"
I spied a pull out ahead beside the pavement, on the left side of the road. I pulled over and turned off the van and all its lights. We stepped outside.
The darkness was thick.
There are no street lights along that road, and there was hardly any traffic at the time. I guess folks hadn't started trekking this way yet. Plus we had probably chosen a weekday as opposed to a weekend for our travel, so as to avoid the crowds.
We stood in the darkness enthralled and mesmerized by what was before our eyes. The display must have been the theatrics of thousands of fireflies. We simply stood there, silently. After a moment or so we just said, "Wow...."
I recall thinking, "This is better than a Disney light show." It was total magic. But of course, at the time I didn't allow myself to use the word "magic" as that was unbiblical. A shame really, because it was like magic to me. I was waiting for fairy dust to fall from the sky and transform life into a place where I could float along with those fireflies.
We gazed at the show for some ten or fifteen minutes before we began the rest of the oneish-hour drive back up over Newfound Gap and down the other side to Bryson.
Joshua soon feel into a deep sleep, sprawled out across the back seat of the van. We couldn't rouse him at all when, about one-half hour later, we saw the giant mama hog with her six piglets on the right side of the road.
Bear. Deer. Fireflies. Hogs. Another day in The Smokies. Another day of gratitude.
**************************
I enjoy fall. The leaves whirl in circles as they make their way to the earth. Floating as if cradled by unseen arms as they gently drift. The abundance of falling leaves brings to mind an array of butterflies or a light show from fireflies.
Late spring, 1995ish. I was driving the van from Cades Cove, Tennessee, up the mountain toward Newfound Gap on Highway 441. It was dark, as was our typical day at Cades Cove. We would arrive late morning and drive the Cove's 11-mile loop with the van door open taking in nature's display and stopping as we wished - to visit the historical cabins, to hike, to picnic. We stayed as long as we could, 'til dusk or dark.
Perhaps it was this trip that the bear strolled across the road right in front of our van. I snapped an awesome photograph of that bear. Maybe I'll one day learn how to scan photos onto the computer and even post them on my blog.
We - my two children, myself, and I think my mother-in-law - had taken the trip that late spring day from Bryson City, North Carolina, to Cades Cove, Tennesse, and were on our way back to Bryson. Highway 441 is a fun road with a tunnel of green boughs, mountain view vistas, winding roads, bridge arches.
As we left the Cove that evening and began the climb on 441 in the dark, both my children were in the back seat of the van, peering out the back window. Joshua was around four years old and Sarah around seven.
"Wow Mom! You should see the lightning bugs!" They sounded excited.
"Are there a lot?" I inquired.
"A whole bunch!!"
I spied a pull out ahead beside the pavement, on the left side of the road. I pulled over and turned off the van and all its lights. We stepped outside.
The darkness was thick.
There are no street lights along that road, and there was hardly any traffic at the time. I guess folks hadn't started trekking this way yet. Plus we had probably chosen a weekday as opposed to a weekend for our travel, so as to avoid the crowds.
We stood in the darkness enthralled and mesmerized by what was before our eyes. The display must have been the theatrics of thousands of fireflies. We simply stood there, silently. After a moment or so we just said, "Wow...."
I recall thinking, "This is better than a Disney light show." It was total magic. But of course, at the time I didn't allow myself to use the word "magic" as that was unbiblical. A shame really, because it was like magic to me. I was waiting for fairy dust to fall from the sky and transform life into a place where I could float along with those fireflies.
We gazed at the show for some ten or fifteen minutes before we began the rest of the oneish-hour drive back up over Newfound Gap and down the other side to Bryson.
Joshua soon feel into a deep sleep, sprawled out across the back seat of the van. We couldn't rouse him at all when, about one-half hour later, we saw the giant mama hog with her six piglets on the right side of the road.
Bear. Deer. Fireflies. Hogs. Another day in The Smokies. Another day of gratitude.
**************************
October 9, 2010
Hope
Not sure what will come forth as I sit down to write. I just know I want to write.
Today is the best day I've had in a couple months. I don't feel so dead inside. I don't feel the intense anxiety and self-blame and self-doubt. I don't feel depressed, though when I awoke I felt the low-level depression I've been met with almost every day for two months.
Perhaps the Paxil I started a couple weeks ago has started to kick in. Perhaps my 7-mile walk yesterday helped more than I realize. Perhaps my appointments with Dr. McColloch are having a cumulative effect. Perhaps the affirmations I began last week are helping. Perhaps the meditative exercises I took up last week are helping. Perhaps the 'heart-soaking' I've been doing is helping.
Last week, I lay on my bed after a helluva weekend.
Last Saturday I experienced dizziness for a couple hours and the feeling I was having a bad acid trip for seven hours, plummeting me into a type of derealization or something. The dizziness came on suddently after I typed a sentence that I wanted a new identity; I wanted to erase my past. I'd been there before - the feeling of having a bad acid trip without ever ingesting the acid, but the dizziness was a first. Yet, I'd experienced the other symptoms enough to recognize that they would pass. To recognize I was still present and to keep putting one foot in front of the other.
The day after those events, I continued to have trouble. As I lay in bed I told myself, "I have to get control of this. I can't go back here again." Here being into the mental illness roller coaster of self-destructive mental habits, of hiding, of closing off myself to me, of becoming paralyzed, of mood swings that can feed on themselves, of self-loathing, of possible suicidal ideation or worse.
My next thought was, "Carol, you have gotten well before. You can get well again. What did you do before to get well?"
My answer to myself was, "You journaled. You read. You applied cognitive exercises. You applied relaxation skills, meditation, and affirmations. You applied HeartMath exercises. You can do that again."
So I did.
I turned on my rainforest CD and lay in bed allowing the sounds and music to soothe me, allowing myself to drift into the forest. I slept that night without having to take a Xanax. Good job Carol! ;-)
Anyway, I've endeavored daily to get back to those fundamentals to help redirect my emotional state. They have helped. I especially like the heart soaking tool I first learned about from the Institute of HeartMath. I focus on my heart area and allow the anxiety to be bathed in compassion that I generate in my heart area. It's like soaking a dirty dish, allowing the anxiety to neutralize. It calms me, allowing more flow within myself.
I know the anxiety (and depression) will raise its head again. Hm, I say "it" as if the anxiety and depression are one thing. Maybe they are?
Regardless, I can keep moving forward and find joy in each breath I take. Writing about breath brings to mind how far I have come in the last 10 years. There were almost two decades where to breathe was a daily struggle.
There is much to live for.
Today is the best day I've had in a couple months. I don't feel so dead inside. I don't feel the intense anxiety and self-blame and self-doubt. I don't feel depressed, though when I awoke I felt the low-level depression I've been met with almost every day for two months.
Perhaps the Paxil I started a couple weeks ago has started to kick in. Perhaps my 7-mile walk yesterday helped more than I realize. Perhaps my appointments with Dr. McColloch are having a cumulative effect. Perhaps the affirmations I began last week are helping. Perhaps the meditative exercises I took up last week are helping. Perhaps the 'heart-soaking' I've been doing is helping.
Last week, I lay on my bed after a helluva weekend.
Last Saturday I experienced dizziness for a couple hours and the feeling I was having a bad acid trip for seven hours, plummeting me into a type of derealization or something. The dizziness came on suddently after I typed a sentence that I wanted a new identity; I wanted to erase my past. I'd been there before - the feeling of having a bad acid trip without ever ingesting the acid, but the dizziness was a first. Yet, I'd experienced the other symptoms enough to recognize that they would pass. To recognize I was still present and to keep putting one foot in front of the other.
The day after those events, I continued to have trouble. As I lay in bed I told myself, "I have to get control of this. I can't go back here again." Here being into the mental illness roller coaster of self-destructive mental habits, of hiding, of closing off myself to me, of becoming paralyzed, of mood swings that can feed on themselves, of self-loathing, of possible suicidal ideation or worse.
My next thought was, "Carol, you have gotten well before. You can get well again. What did you do before to get well?"
My answer to myself was, "You journaled. You read. You applied cognitive exercises. You applied relaxation skills, meditation, and affirmations. You applied HeartMath exercises. You can do that again."
So I did.
I turned on my rainforest CD and lay in bed allowing the sounds and music to soothe me, allowing myself to drift into the forest. I slept that night without having to take a Xanax. Good job Carol! ;-)
Anyway, I've endeavored daily to get back to those fundamentals to help redirect my emotional state. They have helped. I especially like the heart soaking tool I first learned about from the Institute of HeartMath. I focus on my heart area and allow the anxiety to be bathed in compassion that I generate in my heart area. It's like soaking a dirty dish, allowing the anxiety to neutralize. It calms me, allowing more flow within myself.
I know the anxiety (and depression) will raise its head again. Hm, I say "it" as if the anxiety and depression are one thing. Maybe they are?
Regardless, I can keep moving forward and find joy in each breath I take. Writing about breath brings to mind how far I have come in the last 10 years. There were almost two decades where to breathe was a daily struggle.
There is much to live for.
October 3, 2010
journal entry: april, 2010..."rows of weapons"
In the last week, I finally finished reading The Cult That Snapped. It isn't a long book, but still it took me a year(?) to finish. I could only read so much at a time. *shrug*
Anyway, I just ran across the following journal entry.
*****************************
journal entry: april 28, 2010
I am, for the first time, reading "The Cult that Snapped: A Journey into The Way International."
I started it months ago and put it down. I didn't want it influencing my own perceptions of my experiences in The Way.
I picked it up again last week. For some reason, I'm able to read it currently without it having that effect on me. That is, I'm able to read it and still maintain my own perspective, perception, knowledge as I experienced it.
This morning I read "Chapter 10: Rows and Rows of Weapons." I was in the 10th Way Corps with Hannah; we used to run together some. But I don't recall feeling the panic she felt or the constantly being warned about a world/communist take-over while in-residence.
I'm not saying Hannah didn't experience that, but simply that I was there and my recall is different. Could I have blocked certain happenings out? Sure.
I recall the MAL (More Abundant Living) packs. We had to keep our backpacks ready. We were each supposed to have our area of study of how to live off the land if we ever had to disperse. My study was supposed to be how to eat from the wild. Ha. My group would have starved if they had to depend on my knowledge. That is, I didn't study it. I don't think others in our group studied up on their assigned/volunteered studies either.
We didn't truly take the warning to heart. I recall that we kept it light.
The "Hunter Safety Course" was just that. I think I fired a rifle a couple times. It seems someone from the Kansas Hunter Safety staff was there on grounds.
I'm not downplaying what I read in the book. Just that different people's perceptions and experiences can be different, even on the same enclosed campus of 100's of followers.
********************
Anyway, I just ran across the following journal entry.
*****************************
journal entry: april 28, 2010
I am, for the first time, reading "The Cult that Snapped: A Journey into The Way International."
I started it months ago and put it down. I didn't want it influencing my own perceptions of my experiences in The Way.
I picked it up again last week. For some reason, I'm able to read it currently without it having that effect on me. That is, I'm able to read it and still maintain my own perspective, perception, knowledge as I experienced it.
This morning I read "Chapter 10: Rows and Rows of Weapons." I was in the 10th Way Corps with Hannah; we used to run together some. But I don't recall feeling the panic she felt or the constantly being warned about a world/communist take-over while in-residence.
I'm not saying Hannah didn't experience that, but simply that I was there and my recall is different. Could I have blocked certain happenings out? Sure.
I recall the MAL (More Abundant Living) packs. We had to keep our backpacks ready. We were each supposed to have our area of study of how to live off the land if we ever had to disperse. My study was supposed to be how to eat from the wild. Ha. My group would have starved if they had to depend on my knowledge. That is, I didn't study it. I don't think others in our group studied up on their assigned/volunteered studies either.
We didn't truly take the warning to heart. I recall that we kept it light.
The "Hunter Safety Course" was just that. I think I fired a rifle a couple times. It seems someone from the Kansas Hunter Safety staff was there on grounds.
I'm not downplaying what I read in the book. Just that different people's perceptions and experiences can be different, even on the same enclosed campus of 100's of followers.
********************
October 1, 2010
Instincts
I was thinking last night that perhaps I am "done." Perhaps I am done writing.
But what then would I do? I thought I had so much to write about. My doubts are currently high. Not that they were low before. I have continually struggled with the gremlins in my head telling me I make things up and questioning my motives as to why I write what I write.
A friend recently asked me my opinion of someone, someone in the counseling field - what I thought of the counselor's work with the limited reading and contact I had had with the counselor.
My response was, "Right now, I don't trust my judgement. I really can't answer the question."
Then I paused. I can share my experience, my impressions, at least what I thought my impressions were and are. So, that I did with the disclaimer of doubting my judgement.
I find myself again, back at the beginning, of learning to re-trust myself. Back at the beginning; but where is the beginning?
I first think of when I left The Way. Self-distrust is HUGE when leaving any sort of totalistic system. One has programmed themselves that the doctrine is above all, every action and thought must align with the doctrine.
But leaving The Way is not the beginning.
The beginning is from the womb, from the moment that first breath is taken. Another life forges the air, changing the world one more time. At that moment trust begins on many levels.
The babe, only by instinct, trusts that she needs to suck. She is born to trust the hand that holds her head, the arms that cradle her, the bassinet in which she lays. Regardless if those hands and arms and bassinet are worthy of trust, the babe has no choice.
The loving parent, by instinct and knowledge, must learn to trust themselves in making judgments for this new life. They may have a belief in trusting God as well, not to mention trusting the process of life. Then there are other caretakers in the babe's life; who can the parents trust with their most precious gift?
The babe will trust the parents regardless of the parent's care for her, for the babe is born to trust.
I wonder if I can trust the parent in me? Not the parent in me that has nurtured my now young adult children. But the parent in me that can nurture me.
I can choose to trust.
***********************************************
Of Leaves, Squirrels, Dogs, and Dances
Gazing out my kitchen window
Change of seasons landed
Nature again makes her mark
She didn't ask my permission
She didn't scatter her leaves orderly
She allowed them to fall where they may
With great purpose she allowed it
The squirrel
All that matters to him is the next nut...
the next squirrel to chase around the tree.
The dog
All that matters to her is
the next two-legged creature that comes along
to caress and talk with her...
the next meal...
the next intruder.
The animals do not worry or engage in much ado
Aye...I do think the animals
in many ways are wiser than man.
What is their secret?
Simplicity and instinct
Oh humankind
Why have we allowed so much complexity, strife, unease
Where have our instincts gone
Who stole them
Why did we allow it
Perhaps if we jump off the "Jones" wheel
perhaps if we smile and touch again
perhaps if we quiet ourselves long enough to observe the animals,
even in the cities.
Perhaps we can again arrive at simplicity
arrive at instinct
arise each day with thankfulness in our hearts
a skip in our step.
Perhaps then life in all its richness
and oneness can be enjoyed
and we can bask in all the goodness
with which we are surrounded.
Will you join me?
Here...take my hand
Dance with me
Show me your steps
I'll show you mine
Together we can make our lives, our families, our world
A little better place
december, 2004
carol welch
**************************
But what then would I do? I thought I had so much to write about. My doubts are currently high. Not that they were low before. I have continually struggled with the gremlins in my head telling me I make things up and questioning my motives as to why I write what I write.
A friend recently asked me my opinion of someone, someone in the counseling field - what I thought of the counselor's work with the limited reading and contact I had had with the counselor.
My response was, "Right now, I don't trust my judgement. I really can't answer the question."
Then I paused. I can share my experience, my impressions, at least what I thought my impressions were and are. So, that I did with the disclaimer of doubting my judgement.
I find myself again, back at the beginning, of learning to re-trust myself. Back at the beginning; but where is the beginning?
I first think of when I left The Way. Self-distrust is HUGE when leaving any sort of totalistic system. One has programmed themselves that the doctrine is above all, every action and thought must align with the doctrine.
But leaving The Way is not the beginning.
The beginning is from the womb, from the moment that first breath is taken. Another life forges the air, changing the world one more time. At that moment trust begins on many levels.
The babe, only by instinct, trusts that she needs to suck. She is born to trust the hand that holds her head, the arms that cradle her, the bassinet in which she lays. Regardless if those hands and arms and bassinet are worthy of trust, the babe has no choice.
The loving parent, by instinct and knowledge, must learn to trust themselves in making judgments for this new life. They may have a belief in trusting God as well, not to mention trusting the process of life. Then there are other caretakers in the babe's life; who can the parents trust with their most precious gift?
The babe will trust the parents regardless of the parent's care for her, for the babe is born to trust.
I wonder if I can trust the parent in me? Not the parent in me that has nurtured my now young adult children. But the parent in me that can nurture me.
I can choose to trust.
***********************************************
Of Leaves, Squirrels, Dogs, and Dances
Gazing out my kitchen window
Change of seasons landed
Nature again makes her mark
She didn't ask my permission
She didn't scatter her leaves orderly
She allowed them to fall where they may
With great purpose she allowed it
The squirrel
All that matters to him is the next nut...
the next squirrel to chase around the tree.
The dog
All that matters to her is
the next two-legged creature that comes along
to caress and talk with her...
the next meal...
the next intruder.
The animals do not worry or engage in much ado
Aye...I do think the animals
in many ways are wiser than man.
What is their secret?
Simplicity and instinct
Oh humankind
Why have we allowed so much complexity, strife, unease
Where have our instincts gone
Who stole them
Why did we allow it
Perhaps if we jump off the "Jones" wheel
perhaps if we smile and touch again
perhaps if we quiet ourselves long enough to observe the animals,
even in the cities.
Perhaps we can again arrive at simplicity
arrive at instinct
arise each day with thankfulness in our hearts
a skip in our step.
Perhaps then life in all its richness
and oneness can be enjoyed
and we can bask in all the goodness
with which we are surrounded.
Will you join me?
Here...take my hand
Dance with me
Show me your steps
I'll show you mine
Together we can make our lives, our families, our world
A little better place
december, 2004
carol welch
**************************
September 27, 2010
The Greater Common Factor
***************************
Almost everyday for the past (almost) couple months, I awake and am met with anxiety and dread, "What do I do about this?" "This" being something that, for the moment, will simply remain "this."
I've written a fair amount about part of the "this," a situation that happened almost a couple months ago. But much of that material is not currently public and may never be. Part of the "this" is that I found myself in a(nother) relationship web where false accusations were being thrown around and where, in the end, someone I trusted turned.
One may say, regarding these webs, "Well, Carol you are the common factor." That is true. I have stated the same thing. I am a common factor. I must look at my contribution to the situations.
The other common factor? The similar situations happened with people who were once involved in high-control groups. This has happened to me five(?) times now since leaving The Way. (Slow learner perhaps?) In one sense, The Way was kinder than these five scenarios. That doesn't mean I now endorse The Way.
So do I avoid relationships with ex-cult people? No. My closest friends are folks who were once involved in "cults."
So the common factor may not be the involvement-with-cults factor but may be how people (me included) have processed and continue to process through our experience(s) not only with the involvement-with-cults factor, but with the experiences of life itself.
Plus other people, never in cults, go through this same stuff.
I think the greater common factor is humanity.
***********************************
Almost everyday for the past (almost) couple months, I awake and am met with anxiety and dread, "What do I do about this?" "This" being something that, for the moment, will simply remain "this."
I've written a fair amount about part of the "this," a situation that happened almost a couple months ago. But much of that material is not currently public and may never be. Part of the "this" is that I found myself in a(nother) relationship web where false accusations were being thrown around and where, in the end, someone I trusted turned.
One may say, regarding these webs, "Well, Carol you are the common factor." That is true. I have stated the same thing. I am a common factor. I must look at my contribution to the situations.
The other common factor? The similar situations happened with people who were once involved in high-control groups. This has happened to me five(?) times now since leaving The Way. (Slow learner perhaps?) In one sense, The Way was kinder than these five scenarios. That doesn't mean I now endorse The Way.
So do I avoid relationships with ex-cult people? No. My closest friends are folks who were once involved in "cults."
So the common factor may not be the involvement-with-cults factor but may be how people (me included) have processed and continue to process through our experience(s) not only with the involvement-with-cults factor, but with the experiences of life itself.
Plus other people, never in cults, go through this same stuff.
I think the greater common factor is humanity.
***********************************
September 16, 2010
Authentic Writing
***
In the memoir workshops that I participate in, we write.
And then we read aloud what we just wrote, if we so choose.
Most participates choose to read, but not all. For me, there is something powerful about committing one's words to another's eyes, another's ears.
I've heard Fred say more than once, "Don't commit to reading before writing."
As I dove into writing last night, I had to center myself. Would what I write offend people in the workshop if I chose to read it? How would it affect the workshop, for I might even mention the workshop in my writing?
I wasn't sure what would come off my keyboard, but I had an inkling in my head. And if my writing took a certain course, it was going to be difficult.
I recall words from another time in another memoir workshop when Fred quoted one of the McCourt brothers, I think it was Frank. Something like, 'Write what shames you. Write what scares you.'
On more than one occasion, Fred has said something like, 'Don't commit to reading (ie: publishing) before writing.'
If only I can keep that at the center of my core. For it is only that way that I can be true to my self.
My self.
I recently made a promise to never again abandon my self to another's silhouette.
And if I find that I have failed;
if I look inside and find a hollowness;
or if I look down and realize that I am trying to mold a certain shoe to my foot that I really don't like or walk a stretch of gravel road that I really don't want to be painfully trudging...
I hope beyond hope that first I can recognize my self from the hollowness, from another's silhouette, from shoes not designed for me, and definitely from the crunching of crushed rocks from a quarry.
I hope I will always be able to distinguish my self from what isn't my self.
And if I find my self being another self, that I can get back to my self.
And when that happens, I won't be the same self.
The hollowness; the shoes; the gravel road; the silhouette - all will have become a part of me.
There is no way around it.
***
In the memoir workshops that I participate in, we write.
And then we read aloud what we just wrote, if we so choose.
Most participates choose to read, but not all. For me, there is something powerful about committing one's words to another's eyes, another's ears.
I've heard Fred say more than once, "Don't commit to reading before writing."
As I dove into writing last night, I had to center myself. Would what I write offend people in the workshop if I chose to read it? How would it affect the workshop, for I might even mention the workshop in my writing?
I wasn't sure what would come off my keyboard, but I had an inkling in my head. And if my writing took a certain course, it was going to be difficult.
I recall words from another time in another memoir workshop when Fred quoted one of the McCourt brothers, I think it was Frank. Something like, 'Write what shames you. Write what scares you.'
On more than one occasion, Fred has said something like, 'Don't commit to reading (ie: publishing) before writing.'
If only I can keep that at the center of my core. For it is only that way that I can be true to my self.
My self.
I recently made a promise to never again abandon my self to another's silhouette.
And if I find that I have failed;
if I look inside and find a hollowness;
or if I look down and realize that I am trying to mold a certain shoe to my foot that I really don't like or walk a stretch of gravel road that I really don't want to be painfully trudging...
I hope beyond hope that first I can recognize my self from the hollowness, from another's silhouette, from shoes not designed for me, and definitely from the crunching of crushed rocks from a quarry.
I hope I will always be able to distinguish my self from what isn't my self.
And if I find my self being another self, that I can get back to my self.
And when that happens, I won't be the same self.
The hollowness; the shoes; the gravel road; the silhouette - all will have become a part of me.
There is no way around it.
***
September 10, 2010
Abe
**********************
Betrayal. Abandonment.
I don't think I can ever expect that people are able to live up to the promises of never betraying or never abandoning. I understand that a person may tell another they will never betray or abandon that person. I understand that the promise maker has every intention of living up to that promise and that they are sincere and that it is a noble and loving thing to do.
But the reality is, that given certain circumstances, an individual may not be able to live up to their promise.
Abandonment is betrayal, in a sense.
Death would be the ultimate abandonment. The loved one left to live, is left without. The abandonment may not have been intentional; death is typically out of one's own control. Still the one left living is left with an emptiness.
I don't know if a human being can live up to, "I will never leave you nor forsake you."
For me, coming to the realization that, ultimately, a human being cannot guarantee that promise, brings with the realization a freedom.
But why?
What is that is liberated? Is it that I know I cannot depend on anyone to fulfill that for me and therefore I am free from living up to the same expectation for another? Hm. Is it that I no longer need to look to others expecting them to fill that need, that in a sense it is an unrealistic expectation?
I thought earlier today that the only one I want to expect to live up to the promise to never abandon or betray me is me. And if at times I find that I have abandoned my self, that I am able to recognize that, acknowledge it, forgive that part of me, and embrace my self again.
I hope that I am finally learning to not betray my self, and to not abandon it to someone else's silhouette.
As I met with Dr. McColloch yesterday, I asked if everyone has such a deep need to not be silenced? It is like air to me. I have a deep need to express, and to express out loud, in a sense. Like on this blog, not hidden in my journal.
We both laughed, because for years, I hid in my journal and Dr. McColloch was my soul audience. I'd go into his office, journal in tow, and I'd read bits and pieces of what I had written that week. He was my first publication, so to speak.
God, I loved my journals. They were my salvation for years. All that suppression that was bottled up came pouring onto paper. But only for my eyes...at least for about eightish years.
Abandon. Etymology. "A" means "at, to." "Bandon" means "power, jurisdiction." Etymologically, the word carries a sense of "put someone under someone else's control."
Wow. Interesting.
Betray. Etymology. From the Latin tradere "hand over," from trans- "across" + dare "to give." Hm. Similar to abandon in the sense of it is handing over, like giving someone else control.
I have two poems about "abandonment." They describe a part of me. A part of me that I named Abe.
**********************
Betrayal. Abandonment.
I don't think I can ever expect that people are able to live up to the promises of never betraying or never abandoning. I understand that a person may tell another they will never betray or abandon that person. I understand that the promise maker has every intention of living up to that promise and that they are sincere and that it is a noble and loving thing to do.
But the reality is, that given certain circumstances, an individual may not be able to live up to their promise.
Abandonment is betrayal, in a sense.
Death would be the ultimate abandonment. The loved one left to live, is left without. The abandonment may not have been intentional; death is typically out of one's own control. Still the one left living is left with an emptiness.
I don't know if a human being can live up to, "I will never leave you nor forsake you."
For me, coming to the realization that, ultimately, a human being cannot guarantee that promise, brings with the realization a freedom.
But why?
What is that is liberated? Is it that I know I cannot depend on anyone to fulfill that for me and therefore I am free from living up to the same expectation for another? Hm. Is it that I no longer need to look to others expecting them to fill that need, that in a sense it is an unrealistic expectation?
I thought earlier today that the only one I want to expect to live up to the promise to never abandon or betray me is me. And if at times I find that I have abandoned my self, that I am able to recognize that, acknowledge it, forgive that part of me, and embrace my self again.
I hope that I am finally learning to not betray my self, and to not abandon it to someone else's silhouette.
As I met with Dr. McColloch yesterday, I asked if everyone has such a deep need to not be silenced? It is like air to me. I have a deep need to express, and to express out loud, in a sense. Like on this blog, not hidden in my journal.
We both laughed, because for years, I hid in my journal and Dr. McColloch was my soul audience. I'd go into his office, journal in tow, and I'd read bits and pieces of what I had written that week. He was my first publication, so to speak.
God, I loved my journals. They were my salvation for years. All that suppression that was bottled up came pouring onto paper. But only for my eyes...at least for about eightish years.
Abandon. Etymology. "A" means "at, to." "Bandon" means "power, jurisdiction." Etymologically, the word carries a sense of "put someone under someone else's control."
Wow. Interesting.
Betray. Etymology. From the Latin tradere "hand over," from trans- "across" + dare "to give." Hm. Similar to abandon in the sense of it is handing over, like giving someone else control.
I have two poems about "abandonment." They describe a part of me. A part of me that I named Abe.
**********************
September 7, 2010
Shadow Colors
I just read a couple pages that open "Chapter 3: Commitment and Consistency" in the book Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion by Robert Cialdini.
The chapter (it appears) will explain how humans figure out a way to justify a commitment, even when that commitment is at cross purposes with what a person may really want or is a commitment that may be detrimental to the person.
As I read the first couple pages of the chapter I thought of what is known as "cognitive dissonance," that is when we justify our choices so that our brains don't blow a gasket when we are confronted with opposing information that crosses what we believe is true. As humans, we somehow must reconcile that kind of dilemma. So we reframe the situation in order to justify our decision in order to bring down the static, the dissonance, in our minds. It's a human thing.
But sometimes the static gets too loud and the justification makes it even scratchier. At that point we then make a change. Hopefully, it's a change that is beneficial.
Anyway, I read a sentence in the book, Influence, that caused me pause.
It is the second sentence (in the quote above) that caught my attention.
When I read that second sentence, I felt that something might be "wrong" with me. I then had to think through why I felt that way. Only after writing this out, have I figured out why I felt there might be something "wrong" with me. And that is because I seldom feel I make a "right" or "wrong" choice. I simply make a choice based on the best of my ability at the time of the decision. I won't know if it is "right" or "wrong" until later, if I ever really know at all.
Perhaps that outlook comes with age, or perhaps it is due to experiencing 'shattered faith,' so to speak. That is when one's structure around which they built their lives comes crumbling down and doubt the size of a gigantic edifice is continually looming casting shadows.
There are most always more than two choices, than "right" and "wrong." There are most always a variety or "right" choices and a variety of "wrong" choices. And many in between choices.
In other words, life has many shades of gray in the shadows. Not to mention all the colors and hues in the prism of a crystal.
The chapter (it appears) will explain how humans figure out a way to justify a commitment, even when that commitment is at cross purposes with what a person may really want or is a commitment that may be detrimental to the person.
As I read the first couple pages of the chapter I thought of what is known as "cognitive dissonance," that is when we justify our choices so that our brains don't blow a gasket when we are confronted with opposing information that crosses what we believe is true. As humans, we somehow must reconcile that kind of dilemma. So we reframe the situation in order to justify our decision in order to bring down the static, the dissonance, in our minds. It's a human thing.
But sometimes the static gets too loud and the justification makes it even scratchier. At that point we then make a change. Hopefully, it's a change that is beneficial.
Anyway, I read a sentence in the book, Influence, that caused me pause.
"Once a stand had been taken, the need for consistency pressured these people to bring what they felt and believed into line with what they had already done. They simply convinced themselves that they had made the right choice and, no doubt, felt better about it all."
It is the second sentence (in the quote above) that caught my attention.
When I read that second sentence, I felt that something might be "wrong" with me. I then had to think through why I felt that way. Only after writing this out, have I figured out why I felt there might be something "wrong" with me. And that is because I seldom feel I make a "right" or "wrong" choice. I simply make a choice based on the best of my ability at the time of the decision. I won't know if it is "right" or "wrong" until later, if I ever really know at all.
Perhaps that outlook comes with age, or perhaps it is due to experiencing 'shattered faith,' so to speak. That is when one's structure around which they built their lives comes crumbling down and doubt the size of a gigantic edifice is continually looming casting shadows.
There are most always more than two choices, than "right" and "wrong." There are most always a variety or "right" choices and a variety of "wrong" choices. And many in between choices.
In other words, life has many shades of gray in the shadows. Not to mention all the colors and hues in the prism of a crystal.
September 3, 2010
Unplugging from Facebook
Note: Apparently when one deactivates, their page still pops on and off of Facebook (at least currently). Around September 9, someone at work asked what was up with my FB page. I asked them what do they mean. And they told me that my page has been on and off about 8 times. I'd appear as a friend on their page and then I'd disappear. Well, 'twern't me doin' it. Not sure what's up with that. She said it was happening with some other FB friends as well; they had deactivated and were popping on and off.
***
I realized this past week that I haven't blogged about deactivating my Facebook account.
I pulled the plug toward the middle of August. Some folks have asked me, "Why?"
The simple answer is, "To simplify."
Like other folks I'd thought from time to time about deactivating. But I would always opt to stay plugged in because of the great connections I had found, the cyber companionship FB offers via chat and reading what folks are up to and responding and updating my own status, the platform it provided me to express my voice and share about my blogs and about art, to support people's expression and art and writing, and probably some other reasons - if I were to ponder it more.
As I was backpacking in May on the Appalachian Trail for over a week, I seriously pondered about pulling the FB plug. At the time, I opted to stay for the reasons above and also for future promotion of a project I was working on at the time.
Yet I too often felt a tether to my FB page and a responsibility to respond and keep up with it, as well other pages and groups I had joined on FB. I like to support folks.
I know I could have simply ignored the tether feeling, or continued to put it in perspective. But it was still a tether.
Once the project I was working on was aborted..well..damage was wrought due to the way it was aborted...and I felt silenced..and wasn't sure about parts of my online presence. The day after that project ended cold turkey, I took to the Appalachian Trail for a LONG day hike some 15 miles across the Roan Highlands in Tennessee. I again contemplated pulling the FB plug, and maybe even Twitter and my blogs. Oh my.
Twitter and my blogs deleted? Hmm, that would be too much of a disappearance. Though, one's postings never really disappear (at this juncture of cyber history) once on the net.
Facebook? I felt the most *duty* to it, a duty I really no longer desired to feel. The tether feel.
In less than two weeks from that hike, I sent my FB page into the deactivation vault.
I admit that I felt a wee bit guilty for abandoning my FB page. It felt somewhat like I was committing a type of social-cyber suicide. And in one sense, I was. I also felt like I was destroying part of my identity. Huh?
Those feelings just further confirmed another reason for me to deactivate. Facebook is not my identity. Yikes!
I made awesome connections during my brief FB lifespan, which was around twoish years I think. Some of those connections will remain.
I'm glad, for now, that I deactivated. I have less emails and life is simpler.
Deactivate. The word reminds me of the Borg. Faceborg? Haha.
I still have my Twitter accounts though. I like Twitter. For me it's much simpler than FB.
But who knows, one day I may stop Tweeting. Perhaps I'll take up neighing at that point.
***
***
I realized this past week that I haven't blogged about deactivating my Facebook account.
I pulled the plug toward the middle of August. Some folks have asked me, "Why?"
The simple answer is, "To simplify."
Like other folks I'd thought from time to time about deactivating. But I would always opt to stay plugged in because of the great connections I had found, the cyber companionship FB offers via chat and reading what folks are up to and responding and updating my own status, the platform it provided me to express my voice and share about my blogs and about art, to support people's expression and art and writing, and probably some other reasons - if I were to ponder it more.
As I was backpacking in May on the Appalachian Trail for over a week, I seriously pondered about pulling the FB plug. At the time, I opted to stay for the reasons above and also for future promotion of a project I was working on at the time.
Yet I too often felt a tether to my FB page and a responsibility to respond and keep up with it, as well other pages and groups I had joined on FB. I like to support folks.
I know I could have simply ignored the tether feeling, or continued to put it in perspective. But it was still a tether.
Once the project I was working on was aborted..well..damage was wrought due to the way it was aborted...and I felt silenced..and wasn't sure about parts of my online presence. The day after that project ended cold turkey, I took to the Appalachian Trail for a LONG day hike some 15 miles across the Roan Highlands in Tennessee. I again contemplated pulling the FB plug, and maybe even Twitter and my blogs. Oh my.
Twitter and my blogs deleted? Hmm, that would be too much of a disappearance. Though, one's postings never really disappear (at this juncture of cyber history) once on the net.
Facebook? I felt the most *duty* to it, a duty I really no longer desired to feel. The tether feel.
In less than two weeks from that hike, I sent my FB page into the deactivation vault.
I admit that I felt a wee bit guilty for abandoning my FB page. It felt somewhat like I was committing a type of social-cyber suicide. And in one sense, I was. I also felt like I was destroying part of my identity. Huh?
Those feelings just further confirmed another reason for me to deactivate. Facebook is not my identity. Yikes!
I made awesome connections during my brief FB lifespan, which was around twoish years I think. Some of those connections will remain.
I'm glad, for now, that I deactivated. I have less emails and life is simpler.
Deactivate. The word reminds me of the Borg. Faceborg? Haha.
I still have my Twitter accounts though. I like Twitter. For me it's much simpler than FB.
But who knows, one day I may stop Tweeting. Perhaps I'll take up neighing at that point.
***
September 1, 2010
jury dismissed
I've taken pen to paper lately.
I used to live for ink. To have time for my 'guilty pleasure' of journaling. To dive into the pages, between the covers.
In the past few years, I do more composing at the computer. And since I've had my laptop, a bit over a year now, I type from it a lot. It's like it has become another appendage. Funny that, because just five years ago I didn't really like computers.
As I sat in the Jury Pool Room at the courthouse last week awaiting to be called into the courtroom and questioned as potential jurors are, I wrote with ink in one of my journals, a Moleskine.
****
[journal entry]
Thursday, 8/26/10
I currently find myself not feeling as free to write publicly. Sit with that Carol. Just sit with it in your heart.
Get back to writing Carol. Write for no one else.
But is that possible?
Once, or rather since, I blog and am public with my words, I find it difficult to write for me. Yet that is how I started. Some of my first public things I put on display were writings that were hidden in my journals. Recall how nervous I was? How I trembled at my keyboard?
Once a person opens their life for the public to view, once a writer exposes their soul, those inner works are committed to the public eye. Once that happens, the writer is open to criticism and their words become open game. Open game on a few levels.
- The "quality" of the writing in content, grammar, structure, punctuation, etc.
- Is what is written accurate? Facts, places, peoples, times.
- The author's motive gets attacked. Questions as to why is the author making their life public - it must be pride of wanting attention or narcissistic or something along those lines.
- Whatever is written and read, the reader interprets as the reader will. The reader brings their life experiences with them to the page.
So especially in light of the fourth thing above, why do I, Carol, write publicly? Hmm. Perhaps the fourth thing doesn't prompt the question, but rather the answer. My answer, at least part of the answer, as to why I blog.
This is something I come back to again and again.
If I were to create, design, display a poem or a piece of music or work of art - why do I put in on display? That would be a good question for any artist, would it not?
[end of journal entry]
****
I then pulled out Sudoku while I continued waiting in the Jury Pool Room.
The trial was a criminal trial involving a drug dealer. The accused plead guilty that morning. There was no need at that point for a jury. We were all dismissed.
August 27, 2010
For the Love of God
September, 2005, or there-abouts
It seems I worked the afternoon shift for Children's Fellowship. I can't recall now what children were in my group, my little fellowship which I oversaw for the few hours in the afternoon. There wasn't much to oversee really, since every activity was planned out in advance.
In The Way we were taught to "plan the adversary out of your life." The adversary was the devil, the dark spiritual force that "walketh about like a roaring lion seeking whom he may devour." We were to be ever diligent to not allow a crack in our hedge of believing, to allow no fear. It was through fear that the adversary could gain a foothold. If he got a foothold, he could gain deeper access to our lives, taking us "off the Word."
That's how devil spirits could get into our minds and even into our bodies causing diseases. But our positive believing could hold diseases at bay. If I couldn't believe to be healed in a category, I was at fault. But even then I was to have no condemnation. I would continue to confess the positives of the Word; that is how I could build my believing. That and by doing the five basics of witnessing, speaking in tongues, abundantly sharing, studying the Word, and fellowshipping with likeminded believers. Yet God was always the healer and was to always get the glory.
But by this Limb Day, I was doubting some of that doctrine. Why was it that since I had gone outside the Household of The Way I had gotten so much better in my physical and emotional health? It had to be my believing. It had to be that my reading and writing had somehow built my believing to allow God to work greater in my heart. But weren't all our needs supposed to be met within the Household? Craig had taught that if we are walking with the Father, that our needs would be met on a 24-hour basis. Sure some things took a bit longer, but most our needs should be met in that 24-hour period or sooner.
But Craig was gone now. The believers didn't discuss Craig anymore, except maybe in private conversations behind closed doors.
After the Saturday Limb Day evening event, whatever it was, Hubby and I met up with Linda ending up in her or our hotel room talking into the wee morning hours.
Linda had been in our Home Fellowship when John and I lived in Hickory. We had moved from Hickory in 1997 mainly because most of the Hickory Way believers had quit standing on the Word. Most had chosen to follow Mike and Jane who were made "mark and avoid" in 1995. The remaining people who chose to stand with the Household drove to our home for Fellowship from Valdese or Morganton, some 15 to 30 miles away. All except Linda; she still lived in Hickory.
Linda and I had known each other since high school when we used to party together. But I wasn't the one that got Linda into the Word. My friend Debra had witnessed to Linda sometime in the early 1990s. At the time Debra was a single mom with three boys. Linda was a single mom with the three girls.
Though I wasn't the one that got Linda to Fellowships, I had witnessed to her back in the late 1970s or early 1980s. Linda still remembered when I had her and her then-husband listen to a cassette tape on which Craig taught "Truth versus Tradition." I had loved that teaching. I had loved Craig and how he taught with passion and how he confronted religion.
I didn't like religion.
Here we sat now, in 2005, in a hotel room discussing the Ministry and how it had changed. Linda shared how the Sunday teaching tapes were boring to her, but that it must be her. That she just needed to change her mind, because after all it, the teaching and the Ministry and all that entailed, was still the Word of God.
"The Word, the Word, the Word and nothing but the Word," Doctor used to say. The Word was always right.
I sat in the upholstered chair in the hotel room listening as she spoke. My gut had butterflies. My heart trembled. A hint of anger lie just beneath the surface, a hint that I would quickly dismiss. Anger scared me.
Should I say anything?
"It's not you Linda." The words seem to come out all by themselves. "I feel the same. The teachings are dead. I've pulled out some of the old teachings by Doctor. I've been listening to those instead. Sometimes I miss Craig. I miss his passion."
I dare not go so far as to tell her what I had read on Greasespot Cafe. Besides, I still wasn't sure what to believe about the stuff I'd read. And people there seemed so bitter and one-sided. I didn't want to be one-sided. I didn't want to be bitter.
Then Linda opened up about what had happened to her and her family in the Fellowship where she started going after Hubby and I had moved away from Hickory. It was with the same people by whom Eric and Debra had been publicly shamed. Linda and her daughters had experienced similar. But still, Linda continued to attend Fellowship. It was the accuracy of the Word that kept her coming back. That kept us all coming back. Where else was there to turn?
Listening to Linda further confirmed my doubts. But how could I ever leave? When and if I leave, do I tell Linda? What about my family? How could my children get the accuracy of the Word if I left the Household? How could they know the truth? How could they function in life without the Household? How could we stay a family if we all weren't likeminded on the Word?
The next morning, after the Sunday morning service, I helped with clean-up from the Limb Weekend. I loved the saints, the believers in the Household.
I loved God. I loved the Ministry.
Six weeks later, I left The Way.
It seems I worked the afternoon shift for Children's Fellowship. I can't recall now what children were in my group, my little fellowship which I oversaw for the few hours in the afternoon. There wasn't much to oversee really, since every activity was planned out in advance.
In The Way we were taught to "plan the adversary out of your life." The adversary was the devil, the dark spiritual force that "walketh about like a roaring lion seeking whom he may devour." We were to be ever diligent to not allow a crack in our hedge of believing, to allow no fear. It was through fear that the adversary could gain a foothold. If he got a foothold, he could gain deeper access to our lives, taking us "off the Word."
That's how devil spirits could get into our minds and even into our bodies causing diseases. But our positive believing could hold diseases at bay. If I couldn't believe to be healed in a category, I was at fault. But even then I was to have no condemnation. I would continue to confess the positives of the Word; that is how I could build my believing. That and by doing the five basics of witnessing, speaking in tongues, abundantly sharing, studying the Word, and fellowshipping with likeminded believers. Yet God was always the healer and was to always get the glory.
But by this Limb Day, I was doubting some of that doctrine. Why was it that since I had gone outside the Household of The Way I had gotten so much better in my physical and emotional health? It had to be my believing. It had to be that my reading and writing had somehow built my believing to allow God to work greater in my heart. But weren't all our needs supposed to be met within the Household? Craig had taught that if we are walking with the Father, that our needs would be met on a 24-hour basis. Sure some things took a bit longer, but most our needs should be met in that 24-hour period or sooner.
But Craig was gone now. The believers didn't discuss Craig anymore, except maybe in private conversations behind closed doors.
After the Saturday Limb Day evening event, whatever it was, Hubby and I met up with Linda ending up in her or our hotel room talking into the wee morning hours.
Linda had been in our Home Fellowship when John and I lived in Hickory. We had moved from Hickory in 1997 mainly because most of the Hickory Way believers had quit standing on the Word. Most had chosen to follow Mike and Jane who were made "mark and avoid" in 1995. The remaining people who chose to stand with the Household drove to our home for Fellowship from Valdese or Morganton, some 15 to 30 miles away. All except Linda; she still lived in Hickory.
Linda and I had known each other since high school when we used to party together. But I wasn't the one that got Linda into the Word. My friend Debra had witnessed to Linda sometime in the early 1990s. At the time Debra was a single mom with three boys. Linda was a single mom with the three girls.
Though I wasn't the one that got Linda to Fellowships, I had witnessed to her back in the late 1970s or early 1980s. Linda still remembered when I had her and her then-husband listen to a cassette tape on which Craig taught "Truth versus Tradition." I had loved that teaching. I had loved Craig and how he taught with passion and how he confronted religion.
I didn't like religion.
Here we sat now, in 2005, in a hotel room discussing the Ministry and how it had changed. Linda shared how the Sunday teaching tapes were boring to her, but that it must be her. That she just needed to change her mind, because after all it, the teaching and the Ministry and all that entailed, was still the Word of God.
"The Word, the Word, the Word and nothing but the Word," Doctor used to say. The Word was always right.
I sat in the upholstered chair in the hotel room listening as she spoke. My gut had butterflies. My heart trembled. A hint of anger lie just beneath the surface, a hint that I would quickly dismiss. Anger scared me.
Should I say anything?
"It's not you Linda." The words seem to come out all by themselves. "I feel the same. The teachings are dead. I've pulled out some of the old teachings by Doctor. I've been listening to those instead. Sometimes I miss Craig. I miss his passion."
I dare not go so far as to tell her what I had read on Greasespot Cafe. Besides, I still wasn't sure what to believe about the stuff I'd read. And people there seemed so bitter and one-sided. I didn't want to be one-sided. I didn't want to be bitter.
Then Linda opened up about what had happened to her and her family in the Fellowship where she started going after Hubby and I had moved away from Hickory. It was with the same people by whom Eric and Debra had been publicly shamed. Linda and her daughters had experienced similar. But still, Linda continued to attend Fellowship. It was the accuracy of the Word that kept her coming back. That kept us all coming back. Where else was there to turn?
Listening to Linda further confirmed my doubts. But how could I ever leave? When and if I leave, do I tell Linda? What about my family? How could my children get the accuracy of the Word if I left the Household? How could they know the truth? How could they function in life without the Household? How could we stay a family if we all weren't likeminded on the Word?
The next morning, after the Sunday morning service, I helped with clean-up from the Limb Weekend. I loved the saints, the believers in the Household.
I loved God. I loved the Ministry.
Six weeks later, I left The Way.