reminder #332

We all do and say things that are beneath us.

As always there are no loopholes. He says to be a person of class, of graciousness. Doesn't mean we condone or deny the hurt. Just respond the way He would. Like a, gulp, disciple even.

This. Is. Hard.

Treat everyone with politeness, even those who are rude to you
- not because they are nice, but because you are.
~Author Unknown


I have wept in the night

For the shortness of sight

That to somebody's need made me blind;

But I never have yet

Felt a tinge of regret

For being a little too kind.

-- Anonymous

maddie sue

She's here. Arrived 2/21/10 at 12:25 am. Weighed in at 6 lbs 2 oz. Has Kenzie's delicate, sweet face. We are thrilled.
And her mother? Doing fine. After enduring what in hindsight can only be described as a very, very hard (physically and emotionally) pregnancy she gets the medal for one tough and resilient little lady. The delivery turned scary as Doctors rushed in preparing for a c-section. But awesome Kenz, being highly motivated and sensing the urgency of a torn placenta and cord problem, pushed her out in 3 pushes. Well done, Bird. Here's to better days!


Being Grandy is a great gig. Man, I love my daughters and grand-daughters.

As always, more pics coming over at The Grandparentals.

Love is my religion - I could die for that. --John Keats

My valentine and I got a jump start on the day and exchanged chocolate and flowers last night. Good thing, that. Ld also gave me Bright Star, the tragic love story of the poet John Keats and Fanny Brawne. Viewed it late last night. Go watch it, let's discuss.

Today is our Sunday churchin’ routine of meetings, meetings, and more meetings. Not romantic but there is a love tie-in after all.
And finally, a quote that fits the day:

“The Prime Directive has been delivered to us pointedly by the Savior no fewer than three times in John's Gospel alone:

1) ‘A new commandment I give unto you, That ye love one another; as I do you, that ye also love one another. By this shall all men know that ye are my disciples, if ye one to another’ (John 13:34-35).
2) ‘This is my commandment, That ye love one another, as I do you. Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends’ (John 15:12-13).
3) ‘These things I command you, that ye love one another’ (John 15:17).

“…This is not emotional fluff. This is not pie in the sky, wishful thinking, or idealistic gas. Love is not some subsidiary principle that allows the weepy among us to go off on a crying jag. It's not just something thrown in for the benefit of the sisters or for the super-sensitive "artsy" types. It is not an option that may be ignored by those who would prefer not to clutter their lives with other peoples' problems. There is a grand key here, probably the grandest of them all. It is this: the heart and soul of the gospel is love, and all the rest is commentary. Whatever else we may perceive religion to be, we are wrong—for true religion is love in action—God's love for us and our love for God and for our neighbors.” (Stephen R. Robinson, Following Christ, p. 137 – 138)

Cate and Grandy. Such funsters.

Valentine's Day is just around the corner. We have taken to eating lunch festively.


And today Cate gave me this:




Oh that Cate.

I made this for Cate today. Because she is a SuperGirl!*



*Dash over to the Grandparentals for an adorable video of Cate and Megs flying.

walking the same sidewalks

It's been attributed to Albert Einstein and Benjamin Franklin and several pop psychology gurus. Doesn't really matter who, I guess, the quote is profoundly true.

Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.

You'd think I'd figure out I can no longer eat cake for breakfast and a bag of chips for lunch. You'd think I'd learn that if something isn't working then I ought to change tactics. You'd think, huh?

Being wise is not so much hard, as it takes time. Time to learn stuff about ourselves and start to see patterns and trends in our behavior. But even then, we are all pretty dumb, insane, maybe.


A poem, then. Sometimes called Autobiography.

I.

I walk down a street and there’s a big hole. 
I don’t see it and fall into it.
It’s dark and hopeless and it takes me a long time to find my way out.
It’s not my fault!

II.

I walk down the same street.
There’s a big hole and I can see it, but I still fall in.
 It’s dark and hopeless and it takes me a long time to get out.
 It’s still not my fault.

III.

I walk down a street.
There’s a big hole.
 I can see it, but I still fall in. 
It’s become a habit.
 But I keep my eyes open and get out immediately.
 It is my fault.

IV.

I walk down a street.
There’s a big hole.
 And I walk around it.

V.

I walk down a different street.

— Portia Nelson (There's a Hole in My Sidewalk: The Romance of Self-Discovery)

The sheer amount of time I’ve spent falling into holes, floundering, trying to get out. Experiencing the frustration of finding myself in one again. Thinking I knew better. It’ s a little sad.

But I think the sadder part is realizing that the shortest chapter in the whole autobiography is the last one: I walk down a different street.

And what's that *Scott Peck says, about this avoidance, this unconscious choice to remain in our 'stuckness' as being the root of all mental illness?

I am certifiably insane, then.

*(Referring of course, to his The Road Less Traveled. Great, insightful book).

my brudder blogger

Go ahead. Click on over to this:
http://www.allabouthb.blogspot.com/
(You will be adding to his 5,000 hits a week).
This brother joins the other one in the blogosphere. They are both funny guys.

my saturday share

You will like this site, I think.
http://www.mormonwomen.com/
As a result of reading around I found new sites to be very excited about. (Courtesy Michelle Glauser's blog)

Oxford University offers free podcasts
http://podcasts.ox.ac.uk/

and this:
http://www.literature-map.com/

and finally this. The most beautiful libraries in the world. The last one shown I will be visiting sometime later this year. Yippee!

http://oddee.com/item_96527.aspx

Disclaimer

You should know by now that I use my blog for selfish reasons. It helps me sort and work through many things. If you notice my tendency to sermonize and are put off by it, then skip it. The sermons are for me. There are other blogs that are more entertaining, more hip and contain far superior writing. My blog is my blog. It is what it is.

loseth not thy cooleth

Monday found Kenz and I driving to Taylorsville to deliver a wedding cake. We left a frosting strewn kitchen and oh so carefully loaded up 4 layers of wedding cake in the Camry. I was very focused and slightly intense as this wedding cake was different from most. The bride (Kenz’s old friend) had wanted a ‘vintage’ cake ala ‘80’s style. Ivory colored with lots of ornate piping and frosting flowers on the side. I did not want it to get squashed or smashed en route as it would be a real pain to repair.


So I drove carefully and slowly. I rounded each corner gingerly and eased over the bumps with extreme caution. But the driver behind me was having none of it. He gunned his engine and sped by me to pass. Kenz informed me, “that guy is really ticked at you, Mom. Did you see the crusty he shot you?”
Well, I didn’t see the crusty per se but I did see him shake his head in exasperation and then look with angry eyes in his rear view mirror once he had passed to emphasize his annoyance.

I take great umbrage at this guys uppity-ness. I’m thinking, he’s to blame for not understanding that I’m carrying precious cargo. Why if he only knew, I think smugly, he would be humiliated at his rush to judgment.

Holy mote/beam! I wish I had a dime for every driver I have called less than respectful names or questioned their intelligence. I wish I had a penny even, for every petty annoyance I have acted on.

This is, I have come to realize, in large part because I am always in a hurry. I have to hurry to the store, hurry to the bank, hurry to church. All the time I am in a hurry. I have no patience because I am in a hurry.

This hurrying thing, this lack of patience with it’s resultant put-out-ness at life’s slightest irritants, it’s no way to live. Yet I habitually choose it. I am annoyed with the neighbor’s dog who barks, or the person in the express check out line who puts 11 items on the belt instead of 10 (and yes I counted) and ld, well, sometimes his music can really bug me.

And then today in my reading I came across this:
Col 3: 12 Put on therefore, as the elect of God, holy and beloved, bowels of mercies, kindness, humbleness of mind, meekness, longsuffering;

We are to bear with one another. Clothe ourselves with patience. Be long-tempered, as opposed to short-tempered which is what I am when I lose patience quickly and blow up in anger. Patience has to do with having a fairly long fuse, being able to absorb life’s annoyances without exploding in anger.

It’s interesting, when Paul talks about what life is like outside of the Savior, he describes it as an angry life. In verses 7-8 he says that outside of Christ what you find is ‘anger, wrath, malice, slander, and abusive language’
8 But now ye also put off all these; anger, wrath, malice, blasphemy, filthy communication out of your mouth.
Lots of short tempers, lots of anger. The angry life. Get rid of such things, Paul says in verse 8. Take off all those angry old clothes, and put on compassion, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience. Fruits of the spirit.

As if Paul is not enough to condemn and caution, there's this:

Thus, as I have watched myself and others, it is sobering how readily we trade inner peace for something less, for some sort of upset. How readily we take offense and then escalate disturbance around us. How easily we have unsatisfied expectations of how others should treat us or what they should be doing for us; and we grow cold or irritable to retaliate for this real or imagined slight. How eagerly we may insist on being right at the expense of precious relationships. Thus keeping the water rippling around us with negative energy, we are often not at rest, or at peace, in the principles of tolerance and love, of overlooking, of letting go, of forgiving.

I have found that when I am not at peace inside, I make trouble around me. I even look for trouble—picking at this, complaining at that, practicing abuse on my loved ones. I may yield to self-pity, which causes me to withdraw, licking my wounds, waiting for someone to fix what is really my responsibility to fix inside myself. I think self-pity may be a sin, because it functions to violate the spirit of at-one-ment and the power of faith. I have asked myself how long I could last in Zion. How long would it be before I single-handedly dismantled Zion?

--Catherine Thomas, "Zion and the Spirit of At-one-ment"

(The rest of her most excellent talk can be found here: http://maxwellinstitute.byu.edu/publications/transcripts/?id=35