Free

Leave it to H. Fay to remind me, via her beautiful obsessions with beautiful people, that I'm right where I belong today.

I've confused ambition with dissatisfaction.

Best, most-thought-provoking, stop-me-in-my-tracks, say-"yes"-out-loud sentence I've read in a long time.

Read the rest here.

Proud of you, K.

Mirrors

Very pretty song. Very overplayed, but well worth it when the 250lb. guy unloading a truck in Harvard Square belts it out at 6am before your run.

Happy Sunday!

Prayers

...of hope that you'll see 95.

...of gratitude that you saw 94.

http://newsone.com/1397375/nelson-mandela-quotes-93rd-birthday/

“Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world.”

Thought Provoking Question: 6 of 25

I thought you'd never ask...

I am certainly holding on to lots, much of it unintentionally, but never the less. While the question asks about something in particular, I think I am going to need to jump around here a bit.

I need to let go of the fear that I am incompetent. This fear is based in insecurity, some financial, some emotional, some social. It really doesn't have a place in a world where my purpose is to love God and love others with my whole heart. Its place is back with a need for achievement and praise and approval that sought my worth from somewhere outside of my Creator. Its place is in a time when I thought personal improvement meant never resting, never being content, and always worrying. My once-fragile sense of worthiness is a wolf in sheep's clothing for me, hiding under the term "competency." It's time to let go of thinking that my right to exist is somehow conditional.

I need to let go of idealizing. Seeing things as they are provides clear insight into the choices I have and my autonomy to exercise them. Idealizing leaves me idle and disengaged. Idealizing is not to be confused with imagination, which I think I ought to really embrace a bit more of these days. Idealizing is taking me out of the moment when life could be rich with the now.

Finally, I think I need to let go of busyness. Big time. It's another one of my wolves, and like idealizing, it is not a friend to the present, but zaps it of its glory. Thoughtfulness, a laugh and a smile all find me when I stop doing and start being.

Disagreement

"Maybe I’m old fashioned, but I’d rather experience people–and their politics–through unlikely, awkward, strained, challenging, beautiful relationships built over time. That way, when we do clash or differ, we love each other..."

http://www.spectraspeaks.com/2013/05/afrofeminism-labels-politically-correct-straight-allies-white-antiracissts-male-feminists/

This is an interesting thought piece, my favorite portion of which is quoted above. With this portion, I wholeheartedly agree. In fact, if there is one way in which I feel I've built the unique, enduring and intimate friendships with the amazing souls I'm blessed to know, it's because I learned to know them innocently, without presuppositions about their ilk or affiliation with this and that. It may have been a comedian who said, "The shortest distance between two people is a smile," but it might as well have been a psychologist, journalist, theologian or an attendant of sorrows, because there is all kinds of truth in the notion that genuine relationship trumps preconceived stereotyping every time.

What makes this article and other items I often post here more interesting, though, is the disagreement I have with the author too. I am not sure I quite get the whole picture, even in embracing her personhood and attempting to live out her quote.

 I marvel in the fact that we share certain perspectives so closely. At the same time, the revolt against labels perplexes. Hypocrisy and ignorance are not new problems in our social movements toward equality. Labels can't take away or create discrimination without some social (mis)education around these words. So if these woes are best alleviated through relationship-building, then why mock the "white girl" (label, label) who stepped out of her comfort zone, albeit imperfectly? How is it moving from the strained and challenging to the beautiful to call her a burden on a public forum? Was there an awkward, but gracious moment in there before the author discounts the volunteer relationally, as well as rejecting her self-professed label? And how now do I work to find my own grace instead of discord in moments when someone I want to cheer for disappoints?

My only guess is humility and common ground. If I knew her, and I do not, it might change my whole mind. In every likelihood, she and I  are ultimately on the the same page. We yearn for some of the same things, though we have different life experiences. While a term I might throw around could inflame her, a word she might deem devoid of controversy could wound me. We're human beings and we're struggling to figure life out, no matter how convinced we are of our convictions or how sensitive we have become to their rationale. And that's still why showing up in relationship is going to be what continues to matter.

Something more useful

Today I post real pictures.

Historic Washington Park. Albany, New York. June 15 2013.