Ambiguity, Idols and Socks

I am reading Forever Lily: An Unexpected Mother's Journey to Adoption in China, and I came across this quote:

Ambiguity is one the most difficult things to tolerate, and the intolerance leads to poor choices. Not knowing, not knowing how something will turn out, leads to impatience for an outcome. The impatience then results in one of two actions: either a resolution is corced, or there is a move to retreat, to give up. Either way, the result cannot be optimal, for in every situation, a process is working, an intricate, complex process, which has as its goal the highest outcome, the good of the whole, which we cannot easily see or grasp. The ability to allow the process to work can be called faith, and this faith is not a belief, this faith is not passive. The self-discipline needed to overome the anxiety of ambiguity takes enormous effort to sustain.

I am so a control freak. Not in the anal-cleaner sense. I'm also not an over protective, obsessive parent, and I don't care which way you hang the toilet paper. But when it comes to controlling what happens to me, or in some cases who happens to me, I am a serious case. I want to know the happy ending. I want to know how someone will react, and I want it to be the way I want them to react. I don't want to have to deal with ambiguity about whether someone will want to be my friend, or will be able to meet my needs or honor my boundaries; what I want instead is to get a promise from God that my life will turn out happy.

I am smart enough to know certainty is a hocus pocus illusion, an idol doll in a frosted window. I may have moments when I am in Love without it, but temptation is sly, and I open my mouth and let hell fly out in search of some measure of control or certainty, and the only thing that is certain is that my idol is porcelain, with a highly flammable dress.

I am hoping to be wise someday. Peaceful, unnattached, fully available, with laughing eyes that learned compassion instead of despair. I'm going to go skinny dipping when my body billows like seaweed, and by the grace of Grace, I'm going to love the socks off of life, even when it stinks, and I'm gonna learn to bide my time in the Presence, allowing this process that has as its goal, the highest good. The good in God.

Looking in the mirror

It is one of the ironies that we attract people who cause us to deal with ourselves. And I do think that when Jesus said, "Love your enemies," it would have been helpful if he had mentioned that a prerequisite to loving Other Enemies is learning to accept and love the enemy within, because we are all so alone and desperate and we act and feel out of this place, and that's how we make enemies of ourselves and one another. Then we see it in someone else -- a co-worker, a nanny, a spouse, a child or sibling, and we when we witness that desperate way of living based on fear or need of one kind or another, we want to kill that part of ourself we see in them, whichc means we get wacko, and wammo, you're left with a cat fight, homeland security, marital breakdown or isolation at best (or worst.)

My au pair is awfully like me. And I mean, certain parts of my self which I find awful, I see in her. We also look like sisters and are quite similar in a number of neutral and beautiful ways. I am having a problem with her, and it's like as bad fighting with my husband -- maybe worse. How do I deal with the part of myself I see in her? How do I deal with her, knowing she is not me, and can't be expected to respond to whatever I do in the way I (or any of my inner parts) would respond?

Quit Quitting, Start Living

I quit seminary. I quit on the grounds that it take too great a stress toll on me and my children and that the loving, self-emptying thing to do is to let it go and be with my kids without the distraction of hanging deadlines or the exhaustion of commuting and thinking layered on motherhood. 'Cause I was pressuring myself to finish my program before we move somewhere else for David's residency. On account of my overriding anxiety and the tape recording that kept saying, "I can't do this." "I'm going to snap."

I quit because I was trying to love my kids selflessly. Because everyone says I can recreate myself later. Because I'm not sure where this road is leading me. Because I was having trouble justifying the time, money, gas and intangibles in a world where kids are starving, the ozone is leaking away and my own babies will soon be big and never again will be little pudgy peach skin rolling in innocence, smiles, fussiness, love, messes and open curiosity.

And when I quit, my heart sank like a sopping wet sand big pitched into an abyss of loneliness and aimlessness. I felt my happy energy sap away and instead of feeling free, lighter, actively engaged with giving my best love to the people in the world I love best, I felt achingly absent and sad.

So I activated the only common sense decision I could: I quit my quitting and put myself back on the road to seminary, now because I am happy to be learning, clear that I am supposed to be on this path, and open to a new way of being that is balanced, learning when it's time to learning and learning when it's time to Be. Laugh. Listen. Engage with life, nourish my family, celebrate the lusciousness of fruit and chocolate, peachy skin and parent in firm, agape ways that acknowledge and nurture the spirits shining through my children in surprising and tricky ways. Love life. Let go of pleasing anyone. Love everyone.

Will I pass my classes with this approach? Will I finish seminary or ever have initials before or after my name? Who cares! I live for the abundant life of the God who lives in me.

Beyond Good Girl or Bad Girl

So I'm sprawled out in Nika's bedroom on her sleeping spot of choice -- the floor -- and I say with awe and meaning,"Nika, you're an amazing person Do you know that?"

She looks at me equally meaningfully, with penetrating eyes like similar to a cat, an owl or a Buddhist monk, and says quite seriously,"Mom, you're very very very Very very VERY very very very Vvvery very very very Girly.

Girly. Of all the things.

Such a surprising crescendo reminded me strangely of my first group therapy meeting, one week ago today, when a woman whom I couldn't stand (and this feeling was quite mutual,) chanted in a voice reminiscent of a crossbreed between bitter divorcee' berating her husband on a talk show and an angry parrot, "You know what you are? You know what you are? I'll tell you what you are...no, I'm not even gonna say what I think of you. You're a, you're a....YOU'RE A Goodie Toe Shoes."

I told my husband and he got this goofy, adorable look and said, "oooooh." Now perhaps some people would be horrified to be called a Goodie Toe Shoes, but I thought it was funny. People perceive largely as either a trouble maker or a goodie toe shoes; either one or the other, and the truth is I am both, although somewhere beyond little personality check boxes The Wicked Witch of the West has melted and Dorothy has traded in her red shoes bare feet, occasionally dressed up in Fair Trade heels the color of living sand. Beyond Good Girl or Bad Girl, I'm free.

Someday will I let them see?

Cartwheel

When was the last time I did a cartwheel? If you asked me that question any time before tonight my answer would have been, "Ages ago. I can't remember. Those were days long gone when I did carthweels on freshly cut grass and ballet performances in the grocery aisles."

A person has to have a certain amount of lifegiving abandon and positive carelessness to do a cartwheel. It is not something the overly inhibited or hopelessly depressed are inclined to do, really. And so seeing as yesterday and this morning I found myself in a rather bad way with myself, I marched said self out the door after the kids' bedtime and wondered happily around my neighborhood until I found a suitable spot in full view of several condo complexes and a commonly trafficked street. Pondering my decision, knowing what I was about to do -- in public -- and felt a thrill better than dirty sex or getting a new blog comment or buying fresh books, or great clothes.

I cartwheeled.

Upon landing, m inner thigh muscle pulled slightly, reminding me that I am an adult. I smiled and thanked God for everything, and especially for the beautiful day that saw me do a cartwheel. I marched myself home, satisfied, limping mildly and ready to go back to being a grownup for a little while. A good thing too, because when I could hear my infant daughter screaming for me from the foyer.

Maybe I'll do another cartwheel tomorrow before the kids get up.

Using God for your life or Using your life for God?

Being open-minded sometimes blurs the line between Christian faith and Self-helpy, be-good-feel-good-do-good religion. For someone who doesn't claim much certaintly about the bible, dogma or what it means to be "saved", what is the difference between worshipping the God of Jesus and embracing New Age Spirituality?

It's all about God.

Or it's all about Us.

Put differently, it's a matter arranging magnetic poetry on a cosmic refrigerator, ordering the words that reflect why God is important in our lives. Simply: are we using God for our lives or using our lives for God?

Eat him, not me

My husband barrels toward our daughter Nika, slapping his arms like a fierce crocodile.

"Here comes Crocky!"

"Eat Gabe, don't eat me!" Screeches Nika, giggling with mock terror. Of course if Gabe's in any actual danger, she's the first one there to guard him with her life.

Just days earlier, Gabe reaches for his little sister, Avriana and pats her head saying in his sweet voice, "baybee." He then reaches around her neck giving her the hug of a cobra, before trying to rip a huge hunk of hair from her scalp, possibly with the aim of removing her head from its socket.

"Hug..." Says Gabe, as his little sister screams in pain.

"I love you. Eat him, not me. You're cute. I want to kill you. I'll protect you with my life." These are not just the sentiments of toddlers and young children.

Instinct and Intuition

Some experts (and non-experts) say "follow your intuition." Then other folks assert that the key to abundant life is live counter-intuitively, in an upside-down kingdom sort of way. It hit me the other day that the apparent contradiction is simply a language issue.

At least for me and my personal experience, there's instinct, and then there's intuition. Sometimes the two agree, other times not, but they are separate functions, each with its own purpose. Instinct is concerned with survival at all costs; intuition is concerned with living in harmony with oneself and God, navigating the realm of life and relationships with truth and grace. Intuition ultimately transcending both intellect and instinct.

Instinct might tell you to have sex with anyone flaunting great jeans (and genes,) but intuition will tell you more about a person's character than the information of the eyes or pure reason or plain instinct. Intuition tells the truth, serves love and understands the big picture without always articulating the individual pieces. We know, but we don't know how we know.

Instinct might tell you to run from a difficult person or challenge; intuition may tell you to listen closely for the gift or lesson God's Universe is offering.

Instinct may tell you to defend yourself in an argument; intuition may tell you the safest place for you and the other beloved being is humility and compassion in the face of an attack.

Because instinct guards the physical body and the ego, but intuition guides the soul.

I've been seeing this dynamic in my parenting lately. My daughter does something irksome and unattractive and my instinct is repulsion, anger, disappointment; My intuition is learning to read deeper... to grasp the tenuous, beautiful space where teaching and love are the tools of good discipline, where the child is understood and admired in her search for autonomy, her gutsy testing of a parent's love, her strong, beautiful spirit, and the sweetness that lies tucked between her spunky need to assert herself and her intense fear of losing my love to an apple-faced baby sibling or two.

Life is an adventure, and adventures are not boring or easy or simple. Adventures involve challenges, heroism, ingenuity. Adventures call people out to become Someone beyond Joe or Jill; someone who is the heroin inside each of us, with all our vulnerabilities and quirks. Adventure brings the opportunity for quirky grace.

And so far, parenting is by far, my most exciting, unknown, terrifying, impossible, impossibly amazing and not-simple or easy but deeply wonderful, beauteous adventure of my life. Day by day my choices matter; I can be the villain or the heroin and sometimes both within five minutes. And everyday I learn that self-discipline is really the excersize of intuition challenging instinct, guided by Love.