Mr B is, as I have doubtless whined before, HOPELESS at understanding insomnia. He doesn't get it. His 2am bathroom visit used to raise my hopes of him tending to my needs by warming my milk and renewing my hot water bottle. Years of experience have taught me to stay disillusioned. He will, he just did, emerge from the loo looking like a mole fresh out of hibernation, squeak an odd noise at me and then pat me on the back. He usually manages a brief mumbled random and useless jumble of words before sloping back off to bed and leaving his 'mouth guard' (which is supposed to stop him grinding) spat out on the bedside table.
married life is so romantic
Thursday, 16 October 2008
Blogs are great
The wonderful thing about a Blog is you can bore your audience to the point of insanity and not end up in a divorce court for 'irreconcilable differences'...a Moose-hair flannel being a case in point. If I was a Moose I wouldn't want to end up as a flannel.
Sleep continues to elude me, crafty little creature that she is creeping away from me and hiding in a corner behind a tempting midnight feast, saying 'eat me and then I'll come back to your pillow'. She has even convinced me that if I write endless, inane monologues about The History of Moose-flannel manufacture in Alaska
she'll come back...but she won't...because she is
Out to Get me
Last night was another one of her little games. The 'just watch a little bit of Psychic for the Stars'...it surely can't do any harm' revelry. So I snuck downstairs and thought, Sleep is right when she says 'you can't go to bed now, you haven't 'wound down', a little Psychic for the Stars is what you need. I sat guiltily watching in disbelief morphing into convincement (yes it is a word,I borrowed it from the Quakers) listening to this nauseating bauble of a woman blowing bubbles of artificial sweetener into innocent fake-tanned faces. She was so atrociously awful and in the end I loved her for being so unashamedly appalling. Then, as sleep sat mocking me in the corner I started to believe her. Then all the spirits started creeping into the room.
Well, as spirits go they were a bit rubbish. The main one kept pretending he wasn't really pushing the door, it was just 'caught in a draft, honestly'. I wonder why these spirits have got nothing better to do than pretend to be drafts that slightly rattle doors at midnight. You'd think if you were a spirit you'd be in California on the beach not lingering around Linda Lusardi wittering on about David Seaman.
Spirits these days...
Sleep continues to elude me, crafty little creature that she is creeping away from me and hiding in a corner behind a tempting midnight feast, saying 'eat me and then I'll come back to your pillow'. She has even convinced me that if I write endless, inane monologues about The History of Moose-flannel manufacture in Alaska
she'll come back...but she won't...because she is
Out to Get me
Last night was another one of her little games. The 'just watch a little bit of Psychic for the Stars'...it surely can't do any harm' revelry. So I snuck downstairs and thought, Sleep is right when she says 'you can't go to bed now, you haven't 'wound down', a little Psychic for the Stars is what you need. I sat guiltily watching in disbelief morphing into convincement (yes it is a word,I borrowed it from the Quakers) listening to this nauseating bauble of a woman blowing bubbles of artificial sweetener into innocent fake-tanned faces. She was so atrociously awful and in the end I loved her for being so unashamedly appalling. Then, as sleep sat mocking me in the corner I started to believe her. Then all the spirits started creeping into the room.
Well, as spirits go they were a bit rubbish. The main one kept pretending he wasn't really pushing the door, it was just 'caught in a draft, honestly'. I wonder why these spirits have got nothing better to do than pretend to be drafts that slightly rattle doors at midnight. You'd think if you were a spirit you'd be in California on the beach not lingering around Linda Lusardi wittering on about David Seaman.
Spirits these days...
Back to life...Back to reality
And now I am chilled out no longer. Sooooo NOT Zen. Stillness and listening my arse!
Am totally unable to sleep or to stop beating myself up. My mind is in chaos and I'm convinced its a full moon but I can't see it because you can't see the sky in Birmingham.
Nothing works, if I go and make hot milk I'll get bad breath in the morning and if I make chocolate I will have to deal with the guilt on top of it all.
Its all hormones and hysteria round here. Why, pray tell, would the good Lord in all his wisdom pick me to be still, peaceful etc etc? I feel like I just stuck my finger in a socket
Total paranoia set in without warning about 12 hours ago and seems to be currently resident. This makes me behave like a strange, badly house-trained puppy scratching at the door to go out and then beggin to come back in.
I started feeling persecuted about church chairs this evening, you could make up the most random thing, select anything and i would turn it round to some kind of failure on my part. All the Moose in Alaska are catching foot and mouth (for example...and no, I had no idea...I thought I'd made it up). It isn't that I would blame myself for the plight of the Moose with immediate effect, I would just convince myself that you had a point and that I was partly responsible. I would somehow turn it around. I'm not sure how I do it in theory, but in practice it works. I might (for example)assume that you assumed that I had a Moose flannel with which to lather my Radox. I would argue that you had been shocked that I would use a Moose-fur flannel and should be ashamed of myself for lathering my Radox with it. Especially when that poor Moose had been battery-farmed in Alaska, the source of the outbreak of Moose disease. I would then be perfectly at ease explaining to the long-suffering Graham that I thought maybe you were right and that my flannel really was developed from Moose-hide in an appalling fashion resulting in a foot and Mouth outbreak in Alaska.
Furthermore...it would seem reasonable, until the next morning when I read my Blog and wondered what on earth was going on...in Alaska, with a Moose taking a shower with my flannel.
...I've lost it
Am totally unable to sleep or to stop beating myself up. My mind is in chaos and I'm convinced its a full moon but I can't see it because you can't see the sky in Birmingham.
Nothing works, if I go and make hot milk I'll get bad breath in the morning and if I make chocolate I will have to deal with the guilt on top of it all.
Its all hormones and hysteria round here. Why, pray tell, would the good Lord in all his wisdom pick me to be still, peaceful etc etc? I feel like I just stuck my finger in a socket
Total paranoia set in without warning about 12 hours ago and seems to be currently resident. This makes me behave like a strange, badly house-trained puppy scratching at the door to go out and then beggin to come back in.
I started feeling persecuted about church chairs this evening, you could make up the most random thing, select anything and i would turn it round to some kind of failure on my part. All the Moose in Alaska are catching foot and mouth (for example...and no, I had no idea...I thought I'd made it up). It isn't that I would blame myself for the plight of the Moose with immediate effect, I would just convince myself that you had a point and that I was partly responsible. I would somehow turn it around. I'm not sure how I do it in theory, but in practice it works. I might (for example)assume that you assumed that I had a Moose flannel with which to lather my Radox. I would argue that you had been shocked that I would use a Moose-fur flannel and should be ashamed of myself for lathering my Radox with it. Especially when that poor Moose had been battery-farmed in Alaska, the source of the outbreak of Moose disease. I would then be perfectly at ease explaining to the long-suffering Graham that I thought maybe you were right and that my flannel really was developed from Moose-hide in an appalling fashion resulting in a foot and Mouth outbreak in Alaska.
Furthermore...it would seem reasonable, until the next morning when I read my Blog and wondered what on earth was going on...in Alaska, with a Moose taking a shower with my flannel.
...I've lost it
Wednesday, 15 October 2008
Odanadi-uk.org
Last night we went to the official launch of the charity which my niece helped to set up. She is now a trustee. It was a fabulous occasion in London's Docklands/Canary wharf at the Docklands Museum which has been concerned to address the issues of Slavery in the past. It was particularly apt as this charity Odanadi-uk.org is specifically concerned with present day Slavery. Odanadi-uk is set up to fund-raise and awareness-raise for Odanadi-India who work with the results of Sex-trafficking, sexual exploitation and abuse in India. The charity works with women, girls and boys enslaved to the sex-industry, exploited and then subsequently destitute in Mysore, India. They house the children of women forced to become prostitutes.
The evening was very moving because it was intensely personal, we had a very positive and affirming photographic exhibition to look at. We were even given the names and stories of the women. We had a photographer's commentary of the experience of photographing some of the young girls in India. We watched a film of the place and heard more heart-wrenching stories. We were inspired by the founders of the charity in India, listened to a speech by Katherine Hamnett and all the time were reminded of the charity's name 'odanadi' which means 'soul-mate'. The charity has an ethos which is concerned with equality, it is not patronising, does not put any conditions on the money given and insists that people work in a voluntary capacity for the organisation. Therefore all the money goes directly to India without being wasted on admin costs. The venue was given free-of-charge, and everything was done at minimal cost.
What impressed me most was that the founders of Odanadi-India and Odanadi-UK all insisted that this kind of work is concerned with global-solidarity. Words like 'brotherhood', 'sisterhood', 'soul-mates' and other words concerned with intimacy and relationship were used frequently. The founders of Odanadi-India had flown over to speak to their UK fund-raisers, and there was a film made of the charity by a woman who had visited the area to witness for herself the work being done there.
At the end of the evening we were given some little bags made from re-cycled newspaper by the women in India and on each bag was a photo of the project. We were constantly reminded of our connections.
I was also particularly impressed by the aims of the Charity which are to rehabilitate not to encourage dependency and therefore further enslavement and inequality. The charity uses a lot of highly creative ideas, a photography project developed from our discarded cameras, an interactive theatre project, and funding to set up small businesses to encourage and enable the women's independence. The project is passionate about stopping the cycle of abuse which is developed when these people are exploited, working with the children and in training the people in counselling and support work. The families are supported as a whole where appropriate, the children are housed as far as the limited resources of the charity will allow. The consequences of sexual exploitation such as physical illness, mental health issues and the difficulties faced by these women when they wish to get married are all confronted and addressed. The charity is also working tirelessly to raise awareness of the all-pervasive culture of social stigma associated with sexual exploitation.
I left feeling a powerful need to 'do something' and hope to compile a list of contacts for Odanadi-uk so that they can develop links with the Asian community here in Birmingham. I am also going to pray for them daily and ask others to pray too. We have set up a standing order but cannot currently afford to give more. We are thinking of creative ways of supporting this charity.
The heartening thing about this charity and the location of its launch in the heart of our capitalist, finance centre in the middle of a credit crunch was that many of the women who had developed Odanadi-UK had reduced their working hours, taken pay-cuts to work in charity work, even a top clothes designer had designed a t-shirt for nothing. The launch was filled with young middle-class well-connected Londoners and they have a social conscience which many people of my generation are only just discovering.
They are absolutely determined to change the world. They are not religious or pious or pushing an agenda they are just so entirely human. The founders of the UK branch of Odanadi are all gutsy, strong women, feminists at their best determined to fight for their fellow women and bring justice. Idealism is not dead. Thank God
Please visit odanadi-uk.org and see what I mean
The evening was very moving because it was intensely personal, we had a very positive and affirming photographic exhibition to look at. We were even given the names and stories of the women. We had a photographer's commentary of the experience of photographing some of the young girls in India. We watched a film of the place and heard more heart-wrenching stories. We were inspired by the founders of the charity in India, listened to a speech by Katherine Hamnett and all the time were reminded of the charity's name 'odanadi' which means 'soul-mate'. The charity has an ethos which is concerned with equality, it is not patronising, does not put any conditions on the money given and insists that people work in a voluntary capacity for the organisation. Therefore all the money goes directly to India without being wasted on admin costs. The venue was given free-of-charge, and everything was done at minimal cost.
What impressed me most was that the founders of Odanadi-India and Odanadi-UK all insisted that this kind of work is concerned with global-solidarity. Words like 'brotherhood', 'sisterhood', 'soul-mates' and other words concerned with intimacy and relationship were used frequently. The founders of Odanadi-India had flown over to speak to their UK fund-raisers, and there was a film made of the charity by a woman who had visited the area to witness for herself the work being done there.
At the end of the evening we were given some little bags made from re-cycled newspaper by the women in India and on each bag was a photo of the project. We were constantly reminded of our connections.
I was also particularly impressed by the aims of the Charity which are to rehabilitate not to encourage dependency and therefore further enslavement and inequality. The charity uses a lot of highly creative ideas, a photography project developed from our discarded cameras, an interactive theatre project, and funding to set up small businesses to encourage and enable the women's independence. The project is passionate about stopping the cycle of abuse which is developed when these people are exploited, working with the children and in training the people in counselling and support work. The families are supported as a whole where appropriate, the children are housed as far as the limited resources of the charity will allow. The consequences of sexual exploitation such as physical illness, mental health issues and the difficulties faced by these women when they wish to get married are all confronted and addressed. The charity is also working tirelessly to raise awareness of the all-pervasive culture of social stigma associated with sexual exploitation.
I left feeling a powerful need to 'do something' and hope to compile a list of contacts for Odanadi-uk so that they can develop links with the Asian community here in Birmingham. I am also going to pray for them daily and ask others to pray too. We have set up a standing order but cannot currently afford to give more. We are thinking of creative ways of supporting this charity.
The heartening thing about this charity and the location of its launch in the heart of our capitalist, finance centre in the middle of a credit crunch was that many of the women who had developed Odanadi-UK had reduced their working hours, taken pay-cuts to work in charity work, even a top clothes designer had designed a t-shirt for nothing. The launch was filled with young middle-class well-connected Londoners and they have a social conscience which many people of my generation are only just discovering.
They are absolutely determined to change the world. They are not religious or pious or pushing an agenda they are just so entirely human. The founders of the UK branch of Odanadi are all gutsy, strong women, feminists at their best determined to fight for their fellow women and bring justice. Idealism is not dead. Thank God
Please visit odanadi-uk.org and see what I mean
my prayer before leaving
This is a prayer which I prayed before leaving the Retreat. I prayed it in front of a small ornamental lake and threw something into the water as a symbol of that comittment. It was, sadly, a stick...not an attractive rock, but it was all I could find and it made me laugh. I cried a lot as a I did this, it was a significant comittment and I knew what I was getting into, it was as if I was finally standing up and being counted, finally deciding to serve God and the Church graciously, without moaning about it or pretending I can't do it.
As the pitiful stick hit the water it caused ripples which extended out and touched he ripples of the other objects and rivulets spilling into the water. It was a glimpse of God in that it caused a movement on the water and represented to me the way in which all our different gifts ripple against each other to create a beautiful pattern.
This prayer is based on an exercise where we were asked to make sense of our journalling exercise from beginning to end. We were asked what God might be saying to us, where God might be leading. It became clear from my journal that I was called to a role of listening in many senses. I was called to being still and at peace, present to God and others and listening, but I was also called to laughter and prayer. Most of all I was called to listening in whatever sense I could to God. This was a revelation to me, but not to anyone else, mostly people sighed with relief when I told them. "At last, she finally 'gets it'"
It was news to me really, I think most people would have expected a more tangible idea with goals and objectives and purpose, but this is a strange role to be given and although I am already developing it and enjoying it it never seemed to me like a vocation in itself. I have never heard of such a thing! Anyway, here is the prayer:
God
You
Know
Me
I
Know
You
Use me to hold others in your embrace
To show them your smile
To trust you
To be unashamed
Bring me to accept
That I must be still
Be listening
Be present and at prayer
To claim my gifts with gratitude
And to use them with humility
To know that you will be present
To accept that I too must be present
and bring healing through your presence
With your people
I pray that I will trust that
What I have been given I have responsibility to share
and what you ask of me
I must do
Use all of me Loving God to your Glory
Amen
At the end of the retreat we sat together and shared. I made a gesture by laying down my journal in the centre of the room next to another woman's work. It was a form of gratitude, we had been pilgrim's on a journey together and we had changed each other, for that I am eternally grateful because they helped me to be fully myself and to start enjoying being Jess simply for who I am
As the pitiful stick hit the water it caused ripples which extended out and touched he ripples of the other objects and rivulets spilling into the water. It was a glimpse of God in that it caused a movement on the water and represented to me the way in which all our different gifts ripple against each other to create a beautiful pattern.
This prayer is based on an exercise where we were asked to make sense of our journalling exercise from beginning to end. We were asked what God might be saying to us, where God might be leading. It became clear from my journal that I was called to a role of listening in many senses. I was called to being still and at peace, present to God and others and listening, but I was also called to laughter and prayer. Most of all I was called to listening in whatever sense I could to God. This was a revelation to me, but not to anyone else, mostly people sighed with relief when I told them. "At last, she finally 'gets it'"
It was news to me really, I think most people would have expected a more tangible idea with goals and objectives and purpose, but this is a strange role to be given and although I am already developing it and enjoying it it never seemed to me like a vocation in itself. I have never heard of such a thing! Anyway, here is the prayer:
God
You
Know
Me
I
Know
You
Use me to hold others in your embrace
To show them your smile
To trust you
To be unashamed
Bring me to accept
That I must be still
Be listening
Be present and at prayer
To claim my gifts with gratitude
And to use them with humility
To know that you will be present
To accept that I too must be present
and bring healing through your presence
With your people
I pray that I will trust that
What I have been given I have responsibility to share
and what you ask of me
I must do
Use all of me Loving God to your Glory
Amen
At the end of the retreat we sat together and shared. I made a gesture by laying down my journal in the centre of the room next to another woman's work. It was a form of gratitude, we had been pilgrim's on a journey together and we had changed each other, for that I am eternally grateful because they helped me to be fully myself and to start enjoying being Jess simply for who I am
Thursday, 9 October 2008
A Prayer of Consolation
We are known
You, lover of our souls, know our resting places
Our rest is in the healing heart of God
The God who is our sleeping and waking
Our God of mercy and compassion
Whose nature is never to blame
Heal our broken hearts
it is your promise
And you will not let us go
Our wholeness is your embrace
You, lover of our souls, know our resting places
Our rest is in the healing heart of God
The God who is our sleeping and waking
Our God of mercy and compassion
Whose nature is never to blame
Heal our broken hearts
it is your promise
And you will not let us go
Our wholeness is your embrace
Penitence and Confession
I am sorry for nt wanting to enter the darkness
For being afraid to stay there
For forgetting that darkness is a shared space
That we must visit it so that no one goes there alone
For not wanting to accept that communal confession is concerned with healing
For not wanting to enter, to share that room full of brokeness
I am sorry, and I do repent with my whole heart
For not wanting to cry before others when the tears of others heal our own wounds
It is part of the running - this remorse
This fear of sharing more and more deeply
The mutual darkness
I confess to you, Loving God, God of Mercy
Compassion and Kindness
I have nt done what I ought to have done
I have not stayed with the darkness for long enough
Without the depth of it
I cannot be dazzled by your healing light
Forgive us; for we know not what we do
For being afraid to stay there
For forgetting that darkness is a shared space
That we must visit it so that no one goes there alone
For not wanting to accept that communal confession is concerned with healing
For not wanting to enter, to share that room full of brokeness
I am sorry, and I do repent with my whole heart
For not wanting to cry before others when the tears of others heal our own wounds
It is part of the running - this remorse
This fear of sharing more and more deeply
The mutual darkness
I confess to you, Loving God, God of Mercy
Compassion and Kindness
I have nt done what I ought to have done
I have not stayed with the darkness for long enough
Without the depth of it
I cannot be dazzled by your healing light
Forgive us; for we know not what we do
Lectio Divina
Quakers have borrowed from St Benedict's ideas about meditating on the Word of God
I took Psalm 139 and studied it out loud and in meditation.
I took one message from it, but it had a much deeper resonance than it would have if it had simply been said. I found it written, three simple words circled
You Know Me
I took Psalm 139 and studied it out loud and in meditation.
I took one message from it, but it had a much deeper resonance than it would have if it had simply been said. I found it written, three simple words circled
You Know Me
Intercessory Prayer: A prayer for my husband
29 September 2008
My prayers for you are always for your happiness
For your freedom, joy, fulfilment and fullness of life
I pray for you to have courage
For you to live
For you to stay, here, happy and with me
My prayers for you are always for your happiness
For your freedom, joy, fulfilment and fullness of life
I pray for you to have courage
For you to live
For you to stay, here, happy and with me
reflections on my thanksgiving
29 Sept 2008
I notice:
The absence and inadequacy of words
Reaching for non-verbal mediums
The extension of prayer into life and movement
The recurrence of healing
Is there a link between healing and gratitude
Is gratitude in itself 'healing?
I notice:
The absence and inadequacy of words
Reaching for non-verbal mediums
The extension of prayer into life and movement
The recurrence of healing
Is there a link between healing and gratitude
Is gratitude in itself 'healing?
A Prayer of Thanksgiving
29 September 2008
You astonish me God
This nameless shapeless enormous space
Filled with something like liquid
Gratitude is a luscious, moving expansive form of poetry
Thankfulness is a meaning which emerges
Slowly
Gently
In increments
And then suddenly swallows us whole
Thanksgiving doesn't welcome structure
It delights in surprises
Creates mischief
Leaps up and blocks our throats
Smarts our eyes
Shivers our spines
Feeling grateful is a movement with a life which cannot be accounted for
It will never stand up and be counted
Will not stand still and speak up
It isn't even eloquent
When I am thankful I am suddenly afflicted
I am brought closer to God and myself and those I love
Without warning, speechless, voiceless, amazed
Gratitude is an incarnation of love
It beats in our hearts, takes that beat to its wings, flies and carries us beyond a million thank yous into an unspoken sky
Perhaps laughter is a form of gratitude
It is a volume of celebration
A claim to life and vivacious spirit
and maybe song is also thanksgiving
and music
and other wordless offerings and words which reach beyond speech
giving something back in exchange for a gift
A clasped hand
An embrace
Tears of relief, of joy, of healing
A simple touch, a flat hand on a shoulder
A smile
Even memory
Even dance
You astonish me God
This nameless shapeless enormous space
Filled with something like liquid
Gratitude is a luscious, moving expansive form of poetry
Thankfulness is a meaning which emerges
Slowly
Gently
In increments
And then suddenly swallows us whole
Thanksgiving doesn't welcome structure
It delights in surprises
Creates mischief
Leaps up and blocks our throats
Smarts our eyes
Shivers our spines
Feeling grateful is a movement with a life which cannot be accounted for
It will never stand up and be counted
Will not stand still and speak up
It isn't even eloquent
When I am thankful I am suddenly afflicted
I am brought closer to God and myself and those I love
Without warning, speechless, voiceless, amazed
Gratitude is an incarnation of love
It beats in our hearts, takes that beat to its wings, flies and carries us beyond a million thank yous into an unspoken sky
Perhaps laughter is a form of gratitude
It is a volume of celebration
A claim to life and vivacious spirit
and maybe song is also thanksgiving
and music
and other wordless offerings and words which reach beyond speech
giving something back in exchange for a gift
A clasped hand
An embrace
Tears of relief, of joy, of healing
A simple touch, a flat hand on a shoulder
A smile
Even memory
Even dance
My Gratitude Journal
If you are not on the 'friends' list, please don't think I'm not grateful (and you are in no particular order, these were just the people for whom I was grateful at that particular moment)!
Areas of life...Home, Church, Friends, Writing, Health, Work
Home:
Graham
Graham's smile and soul, his laughter, joy and care
I am grateful for his constant un-relenting love and devotion
I am grateful that I married my soul mate
The cats and their comedy and simplicity
The beautiful home I live in
For having money for food, lighting, heating
For luxury and contentment
Church:
For...
Freedom
Healing
Beauty
Spiritual formation
People
Prayer
Candlelit Church
For constantly being humbled by astonishing people
Friends:
Graham !
Pauline
Rob
Mina
Myra
Camilla
Catherine
Steve
Ann
Anna
Crystal
Anne
Christian
Pamela
Rebecca
For shared sorrow and hilarity
For acceptance
For being cared for
Writing:
For release
For healing
For truthfulness
For Pam Lunn and this course
For poetry
For prayer
For creativity, imagination, pen, paper, computer and keyboard
For Blogs
For writers
For Freedom of Speech
Health:
Bliss, Bliss, Bliss
For my recovery from fits and despair
For my happiness
For my body
My teeth
For good dentistry and a fantastic GP and medicine and money
Work:
For my vocation
Areas of life...Home, Church, Friends, Writing, Health, Work
Home:
Graham
Graham's smile and soul, his laughter, joy and care
I am grateful for his constant un-relenting love and devotion
I am grateful that I married my soul mate
The cats and their comedy and simplicity
The beautiful home I live in
For having money for food, lighting, heating
For luxury and contentment
Church:
For...
Freedom
Healing
Beauty
Spiritual formation
People
Prayer
Candlelit Church
For constantly being humbled by astonishing people
Friends:
Graham !
Pauline
Rob
Mina
Myra
Camilla
Catherine
Steve
Ann
Anna
Crystal
Anne
Christian
Pamela
Rebecca
For shared sorrow and hilarity
For acceptance
For being cared for
Writing:
For release
For healing
For truthfulness
For Pam Lunn and this course
For poetry
For prayer
For creativity, imagination, pen, paper, computer and keyboard
For Blogs
For writers
For Freedom of Speech
Health:
Bliss, Bliss, Bliss
For my recovery from fits and despair
For my happiness
For my body
My teeth
For good dentistry and a fantastic GP and medicine and money
Work:
For my vocation
A prayer inhabited by Joe
Walk with me Joe
You have left me with a memory of a life lived in God's presence
Share my ministry Joe
I would be inhabited by Christ as you were
Would be genuine as you were
I share your intentions, I am continuing your work
You would understand how small that privilege makes me feel
Walk with me until my tiny-ness is God's greatness
Bring me laughter Joe
More of your joy
Something of God's smile
Listen with me Joe
Teach me more of compassion and kindness
Walk with me through this open door
Accompany me on my walk
Shepherd me as I shepherd others
You have left me with a memory of a life lived in God's presence
Share my ministry Joe
I would be inhabited by Christ as you were
Would be genuine as you were
I share your intentions, I am continuing your work
You would understand how small that privilege makes me feel
Walk with me until my tiny-ness is God's greatness
Bring me laughter Joe
More of your joy
Something of God's smile
Listen with me Joe
Teach me more of compassion and kindness
Walk with me through this open door
Accompany me on my walk
Shepherd me as I shepherd others
The Rule of St Benedict
Our retreat took shape around the Rule of St Benedict and the shape of life in monastic communities and so around each of these journalling sessions we spent hours in silence, alone and together. We also followed a liturgical form of prayer and so we worked with concepts such as gratitude and thanksgiving, penitence and offering.
As part of our response to the idea of gratitude we were encouraged to keep a daily journal of our gratitude on that day. Then we were asked to follow a process of thinking of someone to whom we have never expressed our gratitude in person. The person 'chose you' from our list of people, who might be dead or alive or just not the kind of person to whom you could write or speak in this way. We were encouraged to write a prayer and reflection around the person who jumped out of our list and demanded attention, however uncomfortable.
I was totally unprepared for the person who chose me. His name was Joe Foster and he was one of the first people in my life who made Church seem like a good idea. He worked for our Anglican Parish Church but I think he worked in a 'Lay'capacity i.e. like me. He worked with young people and established a youth group with my friend's Mum. I don't know how I had forgotten his influence, but he recently died and I was sad not to have been there at his funeral. As you will see he has been a great influence.
As part of our response to the idea of gratitude we were encouraged to keep a daily journal of our gratitude on that day. Then we were asked to follow a process of thinking of someone to whom we have never expressed our gratitude in person. The person 'chose you' from our list of people, who might be dead or alive or just not the kind of person to whom you could write or speak in this way. We were encouraged to write a prayer and reflection around the person who jumped out of our list and demanded attention, however uncomfortable.
I was totally unprepared for the person who chose me. His name was Joe Foster and he was one of the first people in my life who made Church seem like a good idea. He worked for our Anglican Parish Church but I think he worked in a 'Lay'capacity i.e. like me. He worked with young people and established a youth group with my friend's Mum. I don't know how I had forgotten his influence, but he recently died and I was sad not to have been there at his funeral. As you will see he has been a great influence.
Silence and Stillness
The silence and stillness needs to somehow encourage a pace of life where stillness, attentiveness, patient listening guides everything else
A Prayer for what I want and need from this workshop
29 September 2008
This prayer is distilled from this journey of writing. It is authentic for me.
I prayed this prayer twice a day for the entire retreat.
Plunge me deeper than my breath will allow
But float me safely on your own breath
Stretch your arms widely so that I can see your embrace from a distance
Envelope me
Each step floating on your tide
Until I know that the door is on solid ground
and you will keep me still
listening
This prayer is distilled from this journey of writing. It is authentic for me.
I prayed this prayer twice a day for the entire retreat.
Plunge me deeper than my breath will allow
But float me safely on your own breath
Stretch your arms widely so that I can see your embrace from a distance
Envelope me
Each step floating on your tide
Until I know that the door is on solid ground
and you will keep me still
listening
Reflections on Memories of Prayer
Woodbrooke 29 Sep 2008
As I read it I felt calm, amused, happy and excited
It seems that prayer is linked for me with acts of trust and a feeling beyond control
Falling, sinking, floating, moving, suffused, overwhelmed, enveloped, plunged, embraced, 'last breaths underwater'
and
it is intrinsically linked to my Mum. Which is an extraordinary and wonderful discovery because it means that a part of her is always with me and within me
Perhaps teaching me to pray was the greatest gift she ever gave to me
It is forever connected to her embrace
As I read it I felt calm, amused, happy and excited
It seems that prayer is linked for me with acts of trust and a feeling beyond control
Falling, sinking, floating, moving, suffused, overwhelmed, enveloped, plunged, embraced, 'last breaths underwater'
and
it is intrinsically linked to my Mum. Which is an extraordinary and wonderful discovery because it means that a part of her is always with me and within me
Perhaps teaching me to pray was the greatest gift she ever gave to me
It is forever connected to her embrace
Memories of Prayer
Woodbrooke 29 Sep
Depth and sinking
Floating deeply, moving and falling
God Bless Mummy, God Bless Daddy, God Bless
Our Father
Who Art in Heaven
Hallowed moments
Hollowed moments
Times of desperate moaning, pleading, begging
Answers and questions
Calm in the chaos
A last breath underwater
The Lord make his face shine upon you
and
Grant you His Peace
The Lord Bless you and keep you
Kept safely in his keeping, alone beneath the stars
Pining for mercy, longing for justice
Calling for comfort
Recieving a gift
My Mum taught me to pray
She taught me to pray in company and alone
I have never been able to stop
Prayer is remembered lots of ways
it is most profoundly an experience of being held
Prayer in the ancient stones of Iona Abbey contained me
Prayer in the eucharist consumes me; for gratitude is all i feel
Prayer is a person held tightly in the form of a hand-picked pebble, wrapped in my thoughts, love, connections and tears
Prayer is remembered as connecting to God, to others
It is wholeness and it is healing, it is being allowed to hold our questions, and to scream our 'why'
My memories of prayer are of moments of utter clarity of being overwhelmed, enveloped, plunged into otherness and enormity with every thing I am being plunged together.
Before my Mum's death I sat before the cross in the hospice in the chapel
I was suffused with peace and wholeness
I felt the hands of the people praying with me
The Holy Spirit embracing me
My Mother slipping away from me
and I knew that everything would be alright
Prayer in my memory and now is what allows me to be human but not to be overcome by it. It is reaching out with my soul to touch another so that we can be human together and held in God's exquisite embrace
It brings me the tears of others
The pain of others
The joy and excitement of others
It makes it impossible not to connect
As it shows us our humanity it also shows us the humanity of others and that we share it
As long as I pray I am connected to God and to those God loves
Depth and sinking
Floating deeply, moving and falling
God Bless Mummy, God Bless Daddy, God Bless
Our Father
Who Art in Heaven
Hallowed moments
Hollowed moments
Times of desperate moaning, pleading, begging
Answers and questions
Calm in the chaos
A last breath underwater
The Lord make his face shine upon you
and
Grant you His Peace
The Lord Bless you and keep you
Kept safely in his keeping, alone beneath the stars
Pining for mercy, longing for justice
Calling for comfort
Recieving a gift
My Mum taught me to pray
She taught me to pray in company and alone
I have never been able to stop
Prayer is remembered lots of ways
it is most profoundly an experience of being held
Prayer in the ancient stones of Iona Abbey contained me
Prayer in the eucharist consumes me; for gratitude is all i feel
Prayer is a person held tightly in the form of a hand-picked pebble, wrapped in my thoughts, love, connections and tears
Prayer is remembered as connecting to God, to others
It is wholeness and it is healing, it is being allowed to hold our questions, and to scream our 'why'
My memories of prayer are of moments of utter clarity of being overwhelmed, enveloped, plunged into otherness and enormity with every thing I am being plunged together.
Before my Mum's death I sat before the cross in the hospice in the chapel
I was suffused with peace and wholeness
I felt the hands of the people praying with me
The Holy Spirit embracing me
My Mother slipping away from me
and I knew that everything would be alright
Prayer in my memory and now is what allows me to be human but not to be overcome by it. It is reaching out with my soul to touch another so that we can be human together and held in God's exquisite embrace
It brings me the tears of others
The pain of others
The joy and excitement of others
It makes it impossible not to connect
As it shows us our humanity it also shows us the humanity of others and that we share it
As long as I pray I am connected to God and to those God loves
The Retreat!
I have decided to share step-by-step in date order the journey of my retreat
Woodbrooke Quaker Study Journalling Course
Monday 29 Sep 2008Hopes, Anxieties and Fears
I hope that I will not walk away from the light of the open door
I fear that I might stand still and walk no further towards the door
I pray that I will push the door wider with confidence in the steps that lead me there
I hope that I won't use more words than I need
I fear that I am greedy for words to fill the space which should be still
waiting
I pray that I will have the courage to be
still
listening
I hope the words I use are worth it
I fear that silence is better
I pray for the right words when silence is not enough and something needs to be said
Woodbrooke Quaker Study Journalling Course
Monday 29 Sep 2008Hopes, Anxieties and Fears
I hope that I will not walk away from the light of the open door
I fear that I might stand still and walk no further towards the door
I pray that I will push the door wider with confidence in the steps that lead me there
I hope that I won't use more words than I need
I fear that I am greedy for words to fill the space which should be still
waiting
I pray that I will have the courage to be
still
listening
I hope the words I use are worth it
I fear that silence is better
I pray for the right words when silence is not enough and something needs to be said
Monday, 29 September 2008
Commissioning
For a person who likes words, it is hard when I don't have anything adequate to say
Last night was so completely 'other'. Some theologians argue for talking about God in terms of what 'he is not'.
There were a lot of things that last night was not
There are few words worth using to describe what it was
But it was a moment in time which stood outside of time and brought the past and the present together. A moment which made sense
In that moment everything made sense in ways that it hasn't before and mostly won't in the future
I have felt very small before, but that moment made me feel smaller still
It was an unbearable sense of the enormity and ancientness of God which I felt before whilst looking at the sky on Iona
It is odd to feel so insignificant in such a significant moment. It was my own insignificance and the thought of what God can do with that which made me feel so tiny
The only word worth using is gratitude
Last night was so completely 'other'. Some theologians argue for talking about God in terms of what 'he is not'.
There were a lot of things that last night was not
There are few words worth using to describe what it was
But it was a moment in time which stood outside of time and brought the past and the present together. A moment which made sense
In that moment everything made sense in ways that it hasn't before and mostly won't in the future
I have felt very small before, but that moment made me feel smaller still
It was an unbearable sense of the enormity and ancientness of God which I felt before whilst looking at the sky on Iona
It is odd to feel so insignificant in such a significant moment. It was my own insignificance and the thought of what God can do with that which made me feel so tiny
The only word worth using is gratitude
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