Diligent Joy Blog

Painting a Picture

I was the speaker at a service organization luncheon today, and after I gave my presentation on love languages and filling love/value buckets, there were questions.  One man said, "My sister's son told her he was gay.  How do you handle that?" 

I was in front of a group of mostly retired men, some of whom had hinted at connections with conservative points of view.  I was on the spot.  I talked about how personal a situation that was, and how it was important before responding to consider the importance of the relationship and how to preserve it. And then another woman raised her hand and saved the day.  Here is her story, paraphrased.  It was such a beautiful analogy, that I asked her if I could share it.  She agreed.

She said her son told her that he was gay.  She said that first, she had to mourn that he wasn't going to have the life she had thought he was. The picture she had painted about what his life would look like (the one she had concocted in her head and painted out, with details like a daughter-in-law and a big wedding with her as the mother of the groom) was just that--a picture she had painted.  She said in her process, she was able to leave that picture behind, and realize that her 22-year-old son needed to paint his own picture of what he wanted his life to look like.  And if she wanted to be in it, she needed to accept who he was.  She began to focus on all the things she loved about her son, and now, she says, his being gay is not what she would change about him.  She wishes he might get a job, since he was recently laid off.

I LOVE that story!  How many times in our lives do we paint pictures of how things are going to be--with our children, our spouses, our family members, co-workers, or friends--only to find out that we forgot to invite them to the painting party?  And then, we get disappointed or frustrated or angry because they are not cooperating with the image we have painted.  I think we all do that.  The trick is to realize we are there, pick up the paintbrush, and hand it over to the other person to update the painting.  If we stay stuck with our painting, we can miss what's going on in another room in the art gallery.

We may not be completely crazy about the new painting.  Perhaps it's modern art, and we prefer impressionism.  But, in our love for that person, and in the name of preserving important relationships, it's important that we find out as much as possible about modern art, and find what beauty we can in appreciating it, even if it isn't what we'd planned on seeing.  Even if it's not our cup of tea.

This can also be a great exercise to do with oneself.  What picture have you painted inside your mind about who you are?  Is there anything that you might need to update?  Let yourself off the hook for?  Be honest about?  Think of all the energy you could save not beating yourself up if your image of who you are and who you are look the same!

One last thought.  Have you ever been to one of those paint you own pottery places?  You purchase a blank piece of pottery and paint it, then leave it there to be glazed and fired and return to pick it up later.  It NEVER looks the same when you pick it up as it did when you left it.  The firing process changes all the colors.  If you are attached to how it looked when you left, you're sure to be disappointed.  But if you return with a spirit of curiosity and wonder at what the firing process has created, you are more likely to be happy with the result. 

Life happens.  Tragedy touches us.  Challenges engage us.  This is our firing process.  What vibrant colors are in your life because of this that weren't there before?  Look carefully, and celebrate.

Grocery Store Musings

Grocery stores are such interesting places.  As soon as I walked in, I was greeted by the two carts of on-sale Valentine merchandise, which wasn't unexpected.  It still bugs me that the Easter stuff was all out already--huge display--and that holiday is two whole months away.  How many peeps does one person need?

I was tired.  I started work early this morning after a long weekend away.  I worked late, and it was my turn to do the weekly store run.  Smartly, I thought, I decided to go to the store that's closest to my house instead of the one I usually go to.  This meant that, in my tired state, I criss-crossed the store several times to pick up things I missed on my first time down the aisles that are arranged differently than the store I usually go to.  Of course, the store I usually go to recently remodeled, so nothing is where it used to be there, either. 

I went to get in the check out line, remembered yet another thing I'd forgotten, and went back to get it.  When I returned, the line was much longer, so I stared spacily at the magazines commanding me to "Spring into Gorgeous" and "Look 7 Years Younger!"  Why 7?  Why not 10 or 5 or 8 or 6?  Then there were chapsticks decked out in sequined gowns (no kidding) promising me that my lips never needed to be naked again. 

I thought about the thoughtful discussions the group of teens in the sexuality education class my husband and I are facilitating have had about gender roles, and I was momentarily depressed.  Each of these point of purchase displays was geared toward women, giving not so subtle messages that we are not good enough the way we are.  As a child of the 70's and the women's rights movement, I'd love to think we're past all that.  Not so.  Sure, gains have been made, as evidenced by the nonchalant way a teen girl wearing yellow and black pants and sporting pink hair carried the milk out of the store.  I wished she were on the magazines, with a big headline saying "Be Yourself!  If you don't, who will?" instead of screaming at us to be more gorgeous, look more young, and have less naked lips.

I used to know a guy whose dad was part of the "You've Come A Long Way, Baby" campaign.  I agree that we have come a long way (even though that campaign was about getting more women to smoke....)  But, baby, we still have a long way to go.

Circles of Sexuality

Check out my post on Circles of Sexuality over at Parenting by Strengths!

When You Find Yourself In A Hole, Stop Digging!

I attended the Puget Sound Coaches Association Conference (pscaconf09) Thursday, and the first speaker was Sandra Anne Taylor, who mentioned this quote in her presentation about Consciousness and Change.

This idea came up as she was explaining that there are actually several laws of attraction, very connected via quantum physics, which she has studied extensively.  She is the best-selling author of the book, Quantum Success, in which she further explores the relationship between quantum physics and the science of success.  But I digress.

One "aha" moment that has served me since its arrival several years ago is the fact that when I get self-critical, I tend to be unhappy with myself for that, so I go one step further and criticize myself for being critical.  Do you have that voice?  It goes something like this: "There you go again, being so critical.  You know that's not good for you!  Why do you always do this to yourself?" etc, etc, etc.  Recognizing this tendency is much like recognizing I'm in a hole and laying the shovel down, as opposed to continuing the foray into darker places.

Sandra Anne told us about people she knows who think they've ruined their life or day by having negative thoughts.  They ascribe to the popular version of the "law" of attraction as perceived by many watchers of The Secret, and think if they think negatively, they are attracting all kinds of rotten stuff their way.  Worse, they think that when something bad happens, it's their fault because of their thinking.  She assured us it's oh, so, much, more, complicated, than, that.  Which was and wasn't reassuring at the same time.

However, here's the bottom line:  getting stressed out or critical about our own negativity just breeds more negativity and stress and criticism.  It's really important for us all to find a way to put the shovel down.  Think of something you love or do something completely different or move to a project in which you feel competent or literally change the station on the radio.  Listen to comedy.  Sing a song.  Drive down the road saying, "La la la--I'm not lis-ten-ing!" to yourself in a sing-song voice. 

If we truly want to better the world, then we need to be our best and live in love, and being our best is NOT about beating ourselves up.  Or anyone else for that matter.  I've been known to simply shut my mouth and walk out of a room at home when I'm fed up and find myself about to embark on the Litany of All Things Wrong.  I just don't believe in a God who's on the sidelines going, "Yeah, go for it!  Judge yourself!  Judge others!  Go! Go!" If you need an inspirational read on that subject, try The Shack.

Next time you're in a hole, stop digging.  Come on, you can do it.  Just give me the shovel, and nobody will get hurt. 

Inner Peace-s

For the past few years, I have endeavored to develop a daily spiritual practice--reading something of spiritual meaning to me and meditating each morning.  Endeavor is the key word here.  There are some days when a glance at the cover of whatever I'm interested in is all that happens.  Still, I plug away, and over time, there have been some lovely convergences that are starting to serve me well.

Take the idea of inner peace.  For many years, this seemed so unattainable to me, and when I had it, i felt as though a gift had been bestowed upon me by some supreme being.  After awhile, I started to enjoy those moments more when they showed up--increasing my ability to stay present with peace when it deemed me worthy enough to appear in my hectic life, which was usually when I had taken a break from said life, like on vacation, or at family camp, or after a retreat of some kind.

Lately, I have started to realize that my outlook is really my business--the business of my mind, my thoughts, my intentions.  It is really an internal process, over which I have much more control than I am usually comfortable with.  It's so much more convenient to be able to point a finger at the busy-ness of my days, at the uncooperative child or frustrated spouse, at the traffic or lines or finicky technology that interrupt my goals each day. 

I'm still in process, and sometimes, I'm better than others--but I've come to realize that, as much as I can't control the others in my life, or some of the technological glitches that tend to have the power to make me twitch and shout, I DO have control over how I react, over how I choose to be in each moment of time.  (God is smiling about now, I'm pretty sure.)

This has converged in several areas of my life.  I noticed I was in a hurry the other morning, and consciously decided that I didn't need to act stressed and frantic, simply because I was short on time.  Things were going to progress no matter how I chose to be, and I chose calm.

I went to the yoga studio, and saw a quote about peace not being the absence of chaos, but the ability of us to remain calm in the midst of it.

My spiritual reading one day was, "I could see peace instead of this." 

And so it goes.  Of course, this morning, as I was chasing the puppy around, exuding huffy breaths and removing yet another chewed object from his mouth, and as I became increasingly irritated with some ongoing technological issues with my phone, I could hear God sighing and possibly jammin' to "Another One Bites the Dust...".  There's still a lot of work to do.  But the peace-s are there, whenever I chose to put them together.

I'm Gonna Let My Little Light Shine

I haven't felt very inspired since my last burst of inspiration near inauguration day....the flu bug hit our house and took my son down for the count for a good week.  It's been gray and wet, with a brief pretty covering of snow one morning.  I've been slogging away at my too long to do list....

And then this morning, in church, our choir sang "This Little Light of Mine," which in and of itself was...nice.  I hummed along and swayed.  But what caught my heart was looking across to a girl of about 10 in the front pew across from me (our pews are in the round currently).  She had her finger up in the air through the whole song, even as she colored her children's bulletin with her other hand, in a gesture used during some renditions of the song to show one's light is shining.  She was shining her little light during the whole anthem, quietly, joyfully (I saw her and her mom, who is in the choir, exchange smiles), and without it deterring her from her coloring task.

Wouldn't it be great if we could do that all the time?  Shine our little lights, not letting anyone blow them out, not hiding them under a bushel--just nonchalantly walk around letting our little lights shine, every day, in every way, as we go about daily tasks? 

Later this afternoon, we had the privilege of hearing two gentlemen on a panel regarding sexual minorities for our sexuality education class with 8th and 9th graders.  I realized that this "letting your light shine" thing is something I have taken for granted in certain areas of my life.  It hasn't been too traumatic for me to let my heterosexual woman self shine--at least it hasn't been a safety issue for me most of the time.  But for many in our society, it is.  To truly let their lights shine--to truly be who they are--has a huge cost.  It often costs them relationships, jobs, sometimes safety, and even lives.  Yet, one of our panelists said with absolute certainty in his voice, "If there were a pill to take to make me straight, I wouldn't take it.  I am finally comfortable with who I am."  He has learned to shine his light.

That's my challenge this week--to myself, and to you.  Let your light shine.  That pure light within you who is y-o-u.  Here are the words to one of my favorite songs (no, not the little light song...) that helps remind me:

May the longtime sun shine upon you
All love surround you
And the pure light within you
Guide your way on