Took a little trip around town to hug my family yesterday. Not that I'm gonna be gone for long, just that I realized I haven't seen them in a while and now it will be even longer. Found my two youngest nieces overly energized with millions of stories to tell me and in their attempts to get my attention they started jumping higher and higher, waving their arms and increasing the decibel level. I found myself stuck on the floor trying to grasp just a little of whatever was told but mainly just feeling a precious sense of being loved and longed for.
Left the house with an image stuck in my head of those girls parents joining in the jumping just for the fun of it and still haven't been able to shake that picture out of my head.
Love. I wonder if it is not most of the time easiest to explain just by a lot of jumping up and down.
I do know for sure though, that no matter what, love is easiest understood through the unconditional expressions of a child taking your place in their world totally for granted. Like you would exist for no other reason then to fulfill that child. And realizing that you don't mind if that is all you ever do. Ever.
I don't know why I know these things. But I do. :)
Wednesday, April 16, 2008
Tuesday, April 15, 2008
Gray Matters
How the heck...
... do people, myself included, keep all our relationships up and running? It just struck me today. It's so damn hard. Like most of the time. Ok, I'm totally over dramatic, but, I spent the weekend teaching leadership and management. And you teach all these little tips and ideas on how to maintain wise relationships to the people you lead and how to encourage and lift up people. And it just hit me... Should it be this hard? Why can't all people just simply understand and love each other?
I know people like that. People who are just loved by everyone, and everyone seems to be feeling loved in return. I, of course, also love those people, it kind of comes with the whole thing, that's what's disturbing. There's just so much to like that it becomes... uninteresting. I know this is a harsh thing to say... but loving almost becomes too easy and I lose interest. I need a challenge. Something to anchor my love in.
I'm in the middle of preparing for my trip to the States (also the reason why I'm blogging, too busy not to do something else). In researching articles and stuff I stumbled over the name of Jars of Clay's new label; Gray matters. I love that name. If you've known me for a while you know how I constantly come back to accusing the church of dividing life into black and whites. I think one of the biggest mistakes we do when it comes to young people is that we make them believe that this world can be divided into good and evil. And then, suddenly, we all realize that the world is actually a gray mess and the church has nothing to say about it.
I love hanging out with people who are accepting their gray little marshy ground called life. And not accepting it like giving up but accepting it as in wanting to build something real out of it. Something worth fighting for. People who make the gray matter. If I look around on the people I truly love or look up to, most of them have been through some real ordeals but they are building. And they are not building chessboards, they are building nice gray mushy things that will last. That I can drop anchor in. Me like.
Maybe then, if we accept that, relationships doesn't have to be so hard? Maybe the times when we do give up on each other, cause I truly think we're entitled to sometimes, is when we can't get out of our chess board way of looking at the other person. When someone is looking at me and trying to understand the good and the evil rather then the whole mess that in the end defines me.
Have no idea what the Jars boys were thinking in naming their label but they got me thinking long enough to avoid packing for another couple of minutes.
... do people, myself included, keep all our relationships up and running? It just struck me today. It's so damn hard. Like most of the time. Ok, I'm totally over dramatic, but, I spent the weekend teaching leadership and management. And you teach all these little tips and ideas on how to maintain wise relationships to the people you lead and how to encourage and lift up people. And it just hit me... Should it be this hard? Why can't all people just simply understand and love each other?
I know people like that. People who are just loved by everyone, and everyone seems to be feeling loved in return. I, of course, also love those people, it kind of comes with the whole thing, that's what's disturbing. There's just so much to like that it becomes... uninteresting. I know this is a harsh thing to say... but loving almost becomes too easy and I lose interest. I need a challenge. Something to anchor my love in.
I'm in the middle of preparing for my trip to the States (also the reason why I'm blogging, too busy not to do something else). In researching articles and stuff I stumbled over the name of Jars of Clay's new label; Gray matters. I love that name. If you've known me for a while you know how I constantly come back to accusing the church of dividing life into black and whites. I think one of the biggest mistakes we do when it comes to young people is that we make them believe that this world can be divided into good and evil. And then, suddenly, we all realize that the world is actually a gray mess and the church has nothing to say about it.
I love hanging out with people who are accepting their gray little marshy ground called life. And not accepting it like giving up but accepting it as in wanting to build something real out of it. Something worth fighting for. People who make the gray matter. If I look around on the people I truly love or look up to, most of them have been through some real ordeals but they are building. And they are not building chessboards, they are building nice gray mushy things that will last. That I can drop anchor in. Me like.
Maybe then, if we accept that, relationships doesn't have to be so hard? Maybe the times when we do give up on each other, cause I truly think we're entitled to sometimes, is when we can't get out of our chess board way of looking at the other person. When someone is looking at me and trying to understand the good and the evil rather then the whole mess that in the end defines me.
Have no idea what the Jars boys were thinking in naming their label but they got me thinking long enough to avoid packing for another couple of minutes.
Monday, April 14, 2008
That ******* Jesus
When I was at the gym the other day (oh, how I love that I can start a sentence like that... I go to the gym... Like a lot) I ended up in a funny conversation with one of the PTs. We started talking about job and education and she told me she was a certified personal life coach and medium. Hm... that's and interesting combination. She wants to guide people in life through wisdom and a little help from the spirits on the other side. She asked me my education and when I told her it was theology her face looked both bewildered and curious. She said she wasn't a Christian herself but that she of course knew Jesus. And then there was some new glow in her eyes and she suddenly said;
"He's so fucking loving! I love him. He's like the person I wanna hang with the most. That Jesus. So fucking cool"
Couldn't help but smile. I cant remember when anyone talked about my savior in such passionate way. Or in such bad language... The thing that struck me was that she talked about him like she really knew him. Like really, really knew him. Like they spend a lot of time together. Actually, she sounded more close to him than people would say me to be in talking about him. And, I don't know... It just struck a chord in me. She says she's not a Christian, yet she seems to have this very personal relationship with Christ. I guess the whole medium thing kind of has something to do with it in some unexplainable way but... Two questions: How come she loves Jesus but doesn't seem interested in Christianity, what experiences with church did she have that made her turn to new age instead and how can I help? And, secondly, how do I speak about my Jesus? About that brilliantly, loving revolutionary? About my best friend, my savior? My Jesus, That f**** Jesus...
"He's so fucking loving! I love him. He's like the person I wanna hang with the most. That Jesus. So fucking cool"
Couldn't help but smile. I cant remember when anyone talked about my savior in such passionate way. Or in such bad language... The thing that struck me was that she talked about him like she really knew him. Like really, really knew him. Like they spend a lot of time together. Actually, she sounded more close to him than people would say me to be in talking about him. And, I don't know... It just struck a chord in me. She says she's not a Christian, yet she seems to have this very personal relationship with Christ. I guess the whole medium thing kind of has something to do with it in some unexplainable way but... Two questions: How come she loves Jesus but doesn't seem interested in Christianity, what experiences with church did she have that made her turn to new age instead and how can I help? And, secondly, how do I speak about my Jesus? About that brilliantly, loving revolutionary? About my best friend, my savior? My Jesus, That f**** Jesus...
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