honesty and courage

Give your sorrow all the space and shelter in yourself that is its due, for if everyone bears (their) grief honestly and courageously, the sorrow that now fills the world will abate.  But if you do not clear a decent shelter for your sorrow, and instead reserve most of the space inside you for hatred and thoughts of revenge - from which new sorrows will be born for others - then sorrow will never cease in this world and will multiply.
- Etty Hillesum

not rocket science

so
i am at work
talking to women with black eyes
women whose kids have been seized by the government
women who have just been kicked out of their homes because of factors they had nothing to do with

and i am listening to a podcast on the upcoming climate disaster
and then one on the holocaust where i almost started crying when i heard about people getting in trouble for throwing bread to those in the concentration camps

and then i said, "what the hell am i doing?"

sometimes i get home from my job and i feel drained. super drained, exhausted, in a bodily way

so maybe if i am working on the real-life effects of poverty all day i should consider what i am putting into my ear
something uplifting maybe

i know its important to know what's going on in the world
i know its important to work against oppression and harm
i know i really really really want a just world and that self-education is a huge part of that, especially through individual stories and through alternative media

but
i also know that sometimes i feel like i am losing my mind
sometimes i feel that these burdens are sitting straight on my shoulders
sometimes my job is too too hard

so maybe i should listen to banjo music or something once in awhile.

unresolved

So...I did it. After months of plotting and planning and working 50 hours a week, i have simplified my life.

And that's great. and holy whoopsie.

So I have time again to sit and to be and to think. To clean my house, to take walks by myself, to sit by the river and on culverts, to be spontaneous, to leave room for god and spirit and myself to collide.

Shoot.

And I remember now why i became so busy two years ago. How this wasn't actually an accident like I have fooled myself into remembering. Time and space means plunging back into deep and sometime dark places which are swirling around somewhere in my heart. It is surprising how quickly they have returned.

It is time to face some of these demons which I have tightly tucked away. I just didn't think they would come back so soon. I feel back in a time warp, being faced with thoughts, feelings, griefs that I thought I overcame so very long ago. Past losses, past hurts, past relationships, self-doubt, anxieties, fears, you name it.

I want so badly to be comfortable with myself; to be able to sit alone in stillness and feel contentment instead of nagging doubt; joy instead of fear; self-love instead of regret.

So. Here is a change, a shift, a new yet familiar journey. It is exciting and terrifying and mostly lonely. But I am thankful for it. Or trying to be, at least.

buckle up, here we go
b

mmmmmhmmmmm.

Time brings us wounds, but time also heals them. - Elana Dykewoman, Beyond the Pale

mondays in august

this is what excites me about life lately.
- simplifying my life
- cleaning my closet (literally, i mean)
- learning how to be a better cook
- only working 2 jobs
- making my apartment feel more home-like
- getting rid of most of my stuff (hello, kijiji)
- thinking forward of one day soon buying a house, maybe having a kid
- taking time to meditate and pray
- having weekends again
- AUTUMN
- paying off my car loan
- exploring, risking, trusting, loving

ok!
b

dramatic. but whatever.

I am not afraid . . . I was born to do this. -Joan of Arc

excellent.

How to be an anti-racist ally

From Academics of Colour in Dialogue.

thank god.

i work too much.

hello good friends

i've rewritten this post about three times now and whatever it says seems too silly, too perfunctory, too obscure to be useful.

blah

that's sort of how i'm feeling lately. too silly, too perfunctory, too obscure

21 days to freedom, when i'm done with working 60 hour weeks. maybe i'll feel like myself again.

an important reminder.

"To love at all is to be vulnerable.  Love anything and your heart will be wrung and possibly broken.  If you want to make sure of keeping it intact, you must give your heart to no one, not even an animal.  Wrap it carefully around with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements; lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness." -C.S. Lewis

i heart you all.

I have always known that at last I would take this road, but yesterday I did not know that it would be today. - Narihara

cartoons and truth. rock it, winnie.

When floating down a river, it's nice to have a friend. - Winnie the Pooh

mindpuke

my head is up down and all around this morning.

HAPPY MONDAY!

and by that i mean, what's going on in my brain? by that i mean why can't i encounter the divine in a real way? why do i always picture God as a crotchety old man with a big cane getting ready to hit me for all of the bad things i'm doing? what happened to my distinct and clear sense of liberation i used to walk around with not so long ago?

fear is pervasive.

i am wondering about my place in my faith, my christianity that has sustained me so long but has also left me with oh so many bruises. i was walking with my friend in ottawa a few weeks ago and we were talking and i said "well, when i was a christian . . . " and then we both stopped and looked at each other and were confused. she was like, "what?" and i was like, "what?" it was a confusing thing to hear from my mouth.

i feel i can't seem to find jesus anywhere anymore.

so what am i?

(please pardon the inherent patriarchal language . . . )

A musician must make music, an artist must paint, a poet must write, if he is to be ultimately at peace with himself.  What a man can be, he must be. – Abraham Maslow

Cliche. But true.

Not all who wander are lost. - Tolkien

i reserve the right to feel differently about this later

so.
i feel cosmically weary. i feel somewhat invisible. i feel sad that all of these people have left winnipeg. i feel i could sleep for a year and a half. i feel unready to leave my pyjamas. i feel wounded and hurt, deeply. i feel personally attacked, although i know i shouldn't take these things personally. i feel proud of our work. i feel inadequate. i feel so happy to have worked with these womyn. i feel frightened i'll never see them again. i feel the future is unknown. i feel like i didn't do enough. i feel i should have held everything together better. i feel really angry. i feel a lot of assumptions and lack of gracefulness has ruined my day. i feel i need to chill out for awhile.

just that sort of day

hello, m'lovelies!

here is some food for thought on this early monday morning;

"I've always wondered why blessings wore disguises.  If I were a blessing, I'd run around naked. - Sophia, Golden Girls

phony war

i really really really really like this article.

click here.

mmmaaaa

hello good friends

life changes fast.

on a totally other topic
i went to church yesterday. it was boring and fulfilling and significant and foreign-feeling and lovely.

i feel a turning.
just not sure where.
bre

whoa

some days, in order to feel anything at all, i need to visualize prying my heart open with a crowbar.
is this normal?
i am only 30 years old and already am finding it difficult to live with an open-heart. to not be shut down to new experiences, new relationships, new friendships, new possibilities.
i feel like every wound i've experienced results in a bandaid or a plastic board or a steel plate put around that part of my heart, shielding it from further hurt
this is . . . not good
it is sometimes a struggle to engage. it is sometimes hard to start the day anew with an intention of living openly, freely, with arms open to the gifts of the day and the gifts of Christ. It is sometimes difficult to engage and to feel things when i know the risks of being wounded again, by anything and anybody, friends, loves, coworkers, new jobs, puppies, mentors.
anyway
this is all sounding very dramatic
what i am saying is that i have the ability to completely shut off emotionally. and i find that sort of frightening.
b