..those who Believe but do not see..

Blessed be those who Believe but do not see...

Those were the words said to a man named Thomas.  A doubtful man, but one who came around when presented evidence to his human eyes. 

How easy it is, and quite frankly how human it is, to believe only that which we can see.  (an by extension, taste, touch, feel, hear).  But there are plenty of things that many just take for granted  or (gasp) on faith.  Things that do not register in the human perception.   Take Love.  Pretty hard to ..prove.. its there, or if it even exists, but few doubt it.

As I listened to a story about Thomas, the story was re-framed.  Not simply about how easy it is to "believe" in things when times are good.  When we are healthy.  Free of $$ worried or debt.  Enjoy success in business and/or in play.  But framed about how much greater the opportunity for growth, personal growth, exists when to try (try being the operative word) to believe during the difficult, challenging, heart wrenching times.  The times where, as humans, we are just incapable or reaching a rationale explanation or even approach to a believable answer to the question "Why?".

To some is a Spiritual things.  To just throw you hands up in frustration/desperation and say to that higher power you believe in, and say "I don't get it.  I just don't get it.  I don't like it.  In fact I frickin' mad as Hades.  But I accept it.  I accept that don't know everything, and this is just beyond me.  So I trust in you"

To those that are not Spiritual in a Religious sense, maybe you just toss your hands up, in much the same way, and say the same things.  But for you, you just come to accept that its just one of those things, and things will turn around.  So its time to move on.

Easier said than done for all, to be sure. But a nice perspective to an old story, to chew on nonetheless.

Peace

A Gift

Merriam-Webster (online) defines a gift as:
1. a notable capacity, talent, or endowment
2. something voluntarily transferred by one person to another without compensation

Woke up this morning, intent on starting the journey to drop 10lbs.  My diet has been decent, but my amount of exercise I get now has diminished. No surprise there is a corresponding uptick in stress and paunch in the midsection.  Went out for a run, normal path.  Wasn't easy, and to be honest, wasn't really fun.  But I've never been know as one that runs for "fun".  Heck the word "Sacrifice" is right there in the blog name. 

Got home. Got ready for work.  Here the yelling and screaming that occurs all to frequent in the house in the morning when someone is doing something they shouldnt have.  Talked #3 down from the ledge so to speak (at least there was a calmness there).  Ate breakfast.  Drove to work.  Listening to some music that just flowed through my.  Thought about some passages that I read last night during Adoration.  I became aware of myself "my felt sense" I suppose.

I was calm.  I had a peace about me.  Despite a not so fun run, what could have been a day wrecking start with the kids, despite some anxiety about a performance review at work today.  I was calm, and at Peace.  Happy even.

A gift.  

A gift whose effect was not lost on me, and fully appreciated.  Merriam-Webster says a gift something voluntarily transferred to another without (the expectation of) compensation.  That maybe be true, though I'm feeling good, and I hope I have the chance today to pass this onto someone else today.

Some gifts are meant to be shared...

Peace

War Witch

I just learned about film that is taking notice within the International Film arena.  War Witch.  Shocking topic.  But also one close to home for some.  Reading about it on wikipedia and watching the trailer really just ought to give anyone with a pulse, pause.

If you would like to learn more about the movie, read up on Wikipedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_Witch

Hangin 10 with the Eagles

Things and events aligned such that I found myself running alone today for the first time in a great while.  Hit the Fox River Trail.  Anyone in the area know what the Fox River Valley can mean this time of year.  Eagles.  Bald Eagles.  Two of the. Circling and diving to the river.  Pretty awesome.  I was about 50 to 75 feet from them.  Almost jogged underneath them whilst they stopped to perch.

Got to thinking.  What an awesome world out there. Nature. Beautiful. Unique. Always has something new to offer.    Sure it was cold out, but Nature is out there.  Life is out there!! Get out!  Catch it!

Peace

Never doubt your talents

Never doubt your talents, for your talents are God given.
And God's talents are never wrong, never deficient.
Trusting in your talents, is indeed trusting in the Lord.


Do not fret in the challenges you face.  In work.  In play.  At home.  In Church.  In all that you do.  Your talents (God's talents), will carry you through.

Peace

Neuroreorg Update - 9 months in

It has been awhile since we have updated our neuro-reorg and K's progress. I think T would agree, that while we are seeing progress in some areas, the roller coaster ride continues and i just want to jump off at time. K on occasion has been able to calm herself more interdependently, and amazingly, she has stopped stinkin from what we imagine was excess fight or flight chemicals in her body. We did go to Disney in November and expected the worst. We were super impressed that she held it together most of the trip. Unfortunately, when we got home, we found out that she wasn't doing as well as we thought during the trip. She had basically held everything in to be the model "good girl", but she was suffering something awful on the inside the duration. Her favorite parts of Disney, watching cartoons at night and the one day we were able to hang out around the hotel in the pool. Not exactly a proud parenting moment when we realized what she had gone through internally while we were on the trip. Her EMDR therapy to help deal with the trauma that was coming out as a result of the neuro-reorg was a bust however. With no memories to go on, we were able to thread some positive images in her head and talk a little about her eating issues, but the more serious stuff was untouched. Our therapist recommended a new therapist that deals almost exclusively with children and trauma. Last week, we had an intake appointment with her and off loaded a phone book size file on our K. From what we told her, her impression is that K's trauma is playing over and over like a broken record in her brain that she can't process to move past. Because of this, it will continue to come out in her behaviors until she has the tool to start processing it. Neuro-reorg continues to build connections in her brain that were missed as part of her development, however it doesn't stop when this broken record starts playing. We will be waiting for the two therapists to get together, but it sounds like we are going to have to back off the neuro-reorg until we can get "unstuck" with the trauma side of things. Never a dull moment! Looking forward to our appointment this week and praying this direction in the maze will lead us in the direction of the cheese and not towards another dead end.

Forgiveness

One of the aldermen I served with on the City Council passed away last week. He wasn't just the alderman I sat next to, he was the person that had served up one of the greatest hurts I have ever experienced in my life. See I was on the Council to serve and improve communication with the people in my ward, but after my tenure began, it quickly became about something else, my background in engineering. I was naïve and thought everyone serving on the Council was doing so to serve the public. I was by no means a politician and spoke the truth to the best of my knowledge which didn't sit well with some. The alderman that passed away said the prayer before each meeting, was a church goer and a long term well respected member of the Council. He was on the opposite side of the issue from me, but I respected his position on the matter and his passion until he crossed the line. Working with a local advocacy group, he helped stuff flyers in all the local papers accusing me of taking the position I had in the matter because I was trying to solicit work for my boss’s engineering company. I will never forget the day I had to walk into my boss’s office, the boss that had built his company through sweat and tears, whom I had told my position on the Council would not impact his company and tell him about the flyer. I had about ever emotion a person could have felt running through my body at that moment, I was furious that the group would stoop so low and resort to personal attacks when they started losing ground, I was terrified my boss would fire me for the fact his company was dragged through the mud for no good reason, I was so hurt that the person sitting right next to me, the one who prayed to God before each meeting who had pulled out a giant knife and stabbed me in the back just to push his agenda. I went home and called him, I could barely get the words out between my gasps for air as the tears poured down my face. I don’t remember much of the conversation, other than asking again and again how he could have done such a horrible thing. The jist of his response…all is fair in Love and War right? With the Council meeting looming, I needed to response publicly which was going to be a feat as I could barely get two words out before breaking into tears. But I also needed to respond to him. I prayed about it and I realized how heavy and burdensome my hurt was, that it would be an incredible load on me to carry such a depth of anger and resentment. But in order not to carry it with me, I would have to forgive the alderman that had been a part of it, which seemed like a monumental task in itself. I prayed more and before the meeting, that night, I bought a blank card from the store and wrote inside “I forgive you”. It was like a weight was lifted off my chest. Even if he never acknowledged getting the card, I had given my forgiveness to him with my heart and soul. Before the meeting, he sat down and turned to me. Tears were swelling in his eyes and he said “I didn’t think you were ever going to speak to me again, but you did more than that, you forgave me”. Driving to his wake, the hurt stirred in me again as I remembered the crushing pain of it all. Then I remembered what Jesus said, “Not seven times but seventy seven times”. I forgive you and I pray you will rest in peace.

10 Prayers God ALWAYS Answers

I was intrigued at our Adoration Chapel last night by a new book in the pew in front of me. The title was “10 Prayers God Always Answers”. I was skeptical. Of course God’s will is not our will and so many of our prayers ask for something that might not fit into God’s bigger picture for us. It was split by Chapters and the first was a prayer to know God exists. I figured I would skip that one seeing as I didn't need any convincing on that front. The next Chapter was on asking God to make you his instrument and allowing his will to be done through you by coming to the aid of someone. The chapter talked about if someone is to pray this prayer, God will immediately respond and put someone at your doorstep who is in need. It also talked about if you had any doubt that God exists as in Chapter 1, that would be erased from your mind by praying for God to use you as an instrument to help someone. I am pretty sure my thought process on this went something like: “yah right, like all I need to say is “God, use me as an instrument to help someone else” and some homeless person is going to show up on my doorstep”. A few min’s later, the next parishioner entered the chapel and my hour was up. I have a wicked cold and had accumulated a big o’ disgusting pile of Kleenex in the short span of 1 hour next to me. As there is no garbage in the chapel, I gathered them up to throw them away in the bathroom just outside the Chapel door. When I opened the door, I was shocked to see a purse and a pair of shoes next to the door, as I opened the door further, I could see the figure of a small woman asleep under a blanket on the floor. At first I thought my eyes were deceiving me. They weren't. As we found out, the woman was lost, she didn't know her name, had been wandering through the cold in worn black flats, nylons, a skirt and light coat on this frigid night. She only stood about 5’ tall and probably weighted only 90 lbs. She said she was looking for an open door and when she came into the Chapel, she went into the bathroom and collapsed from exhausting. Had the door to the chapel not been open earlier in the night, she likely would have froze to death by morning. God opened the door for her and I pray the people that He put in her path last night will help her find peace and security. My heart is absolutely broken for her, is she someone’s mother, someone’s grandma? I am hopeful that she was lost, but now is found and I was blessed to be witness to it.

Silence Speaks ...

I just got off my bike trainer in the basement after a 20mile ride.  It felt good.  So did yesterday's ride.  I don't hold the illusion that I'll bike 20 miles a day, everyday, but its a start. Just like the New Year is a new start.
We can keep on, keeping on.  Or we can start a new.  Behaviors are a rut, easy to slip back into, an they can be monstrously difficult to get out of.  That holds true for kids and their physical and emotional behaviors (so we've learned).  That holds true for older kids like me.  I've gotten away from exercising as often as I would like to.  As often as I need to.  I've gotten away from being the Clown.  You know every parent is either the Clown or the Policeman, or something like that.  I never really like the Muppet's, but sometime I feel like one of those crotchety old men that were movie critiques or something.  The fun is in there.  I need to figure out the right rut to slip back into groove.  I'll happen.  Maybe I just need to get more sleep.  Its a toss up.  Me time.  or Sleep.  Surprisingly difficult to balance in a house with 6.

Had a routine checkup today.  For nothing special, and nothing special came out of it.  That is except apparently the scale as the Doctors office is clearly faulty.   Probably about 10lbs faulty. So the time on the bike trainer will help that.  The weekend runs with the "men's group" will help that also.

I read something on just recently about the phrase "Silence Speaks Volumes".  What I read was that, usually silence is the result of having so much to say, that you can't put it all together to simply express what you are feeling.  Silence expresses emotion properly, whereas words and more words really just get in the way and cloud up the real emotions. So to that end...

Peace

We are Here. We are Here. We are Here.

(Sharing a short message I shared with a number of friends that I have the good fortune to run with on Saturdays)

First off Merry Christmas and Happy New Years to all you fine Gentleman. I'm very happy and proud to be a part of this dedicated group. And I mean dedicated as we had one of our largest turnouts this morning even though it was about 13 degrees. Thank you.

While running I was sharing a story with Dan and Dave (names changed) that I had been reflecting on the Newtown shootings.  About the violence we hear about daily downtown [in the City].  On my way to run with you guys I have to pass Planned Parenthood (twice every Saturday).   I think about the people going in, and about the people that are always outside praying.  As I was telling Dan/Dave it just seems that the pendulum has swung so far to the left in our society and I keep waiting for it to swing back a little.  I can't say I was depressed, but I was having a prolonged moment thinking about us (humanity) our role and purpose on this Earth.  I thought about how the Earth really is Satan's domain, and we are here to learn, to love, and if we accept it (him), eventually be called home when our "job" has been completed.  I thought of Lot (or was it Abraham dont recall) and how the Lord was going to destroy that city, but Lot says would you destroy it if there were 50 believers. If there were 15, if there were only 5.  And the Lord ended up saving the city.

I know the Lord hears us.  But are we saying the right things.  Are we praying for the right things. Anyway, I had this weird correlation come to mind.   It was about a scene in the cartoon movie Horton Hears a Who.  There is a scene in the end in which the Who's were going to be destroyed and Horton couldn't protect them. The Who's needed to make a loud noise (think a loud Joyful noise).  It wasn't working, they needed EVERYONE every voice to help.  To raise the message..  "We are here.. We are here... We are here"..

its my new Mantra for awhile.  In my prayers, while reflecting on today's society, about the violence that I can't make sense of, about the hurting Children that are arming themselves and hurting/killing others. I'm thinking "we are here we are here, we are here".

I know the Lord hasn't turned his back to us.  But Maybe we've stopped using our voices.  Maybe we are not loud enough.  Maybe if more Christian raised their voices, and made a Loud Joyful noise, maybe we (humanity) would be given a new direction...

Anyway.. I'm not a poet or writer so maybe I cant explain the tie between the thoughts so well.   But here is a YouTube clip of the entire scene in the moving.  If you watch it, and think about it in a Relgious Context.. Raising our voices to the Lord "We are Here"... maybe the point will be shared

Have a blessed Christmas and New Years..

Peace