tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-74391952024-03-07T02:16:59.428-06:00In TheoryThe Official Blog of Chris J. Gonzalez Ph.D. Fajitahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/05704189756009543355noreply@blogger.comBlogger1004125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7439195.post-10182651671460193902018-02-26T08:38:00.003-06:002018-02-26T08:38:54.383-06:00Why I Am Against Arming Teachers
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<br />
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
Why I am Against
Arming Teachers<o:p></o:p></div>
<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;">
I am 100% against arming teachers as a way to resolve the mass shooting problem. Below are seven of my reasons. As a former public school teacher in Houston, Texas and father of two children. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;">
<u>Escalation</u></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;">
Arming teachers puts the power of death in the hands of teachers and puts the power of death into the classroom in an escalated way. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<o:p><u>Adversarial</u></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<o:p>There are some teacher-student relationships that are already very adversarial. Bad teacher? Bad student? Bad student-teacher chemistry? I am not really sure it matters, but introduce a gun into the most contentious student-teacher situations and the conversation can go to places when there is a gun present that it could not have otherwise. </o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<o:p><br /></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<u>Burden</u></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">Sets yet another burden on already overly burdened and
undercompensated teachers. The skill set of teaching is a complex and focused skill set that must balance content and standards with creativity and as many learning styles as there are children in the classroom. Setting a law enforcement burden on teachers is too much and run counter to the creative impulse teachers need. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br /></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;"><u>Expense</u></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The training of teachers to be as good as they would need to be given an active shooter situation is very high. What is the cost teaching someone how to engage in an active shooter situation? For their specific school? In coordination with other teachers who also have guns? School specific training with policies and procedures would have to be written, trained, and maintained for the life of the school for teachers who are and are not armed. Would the costs for guns, ammunition, and training come out of the teacher's pocket like school supplies do? Are taxpayers going to foot the bill? </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<u>Hit Rates</u></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Teachers will not be as good at policing as actual police. When the NYPD has a hit rate under 1 in 5, and that is their job, then how are teachers going to do any better? Furthermore, the context is chaos with a dense population of children. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<u>Physiology</u></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
When the heart rate tops 100 beats per minute, rational thought is replaced by fight or flight. Humans cross the physiological arousal state and get flooded. This will always be the case in an active shooter situation. Now put a gun in the hands of people whose training is to teach, not kill, and expect shooting accuracy to be perfect when a bullet always hits the shooter and never hits a child or other teacher or staff. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;"><u>Vulnerability</u></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Were a student to show up intoxicated, high, or in a very bad mental state and knew there were guns on campus, they may have an impulse to get that gun. They may not have the planfulness to do all that would be needed to be a premeditate school shooter, but the emergence of spontaneous school shooters would be an elevated risk. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;"><u>Perpetuates Myth</u></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">Further perpetuates the myth that the answer to violence
is more violence. It doesn't. More violence is by definition not less violence. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<u>Simple Answer To Complex Problem</u></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Presumes that there is one way to solve the problem of
mass shootings. There is no simple answer to mass shootings and school shootings. Not only is arming teachers not part of the solution, it increases and complicates the problem. <o:p></o:p></div>
<!--EndFragment--><br />Fajitahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11028194082067400240noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7439195.post-40613047191206711082017-05-21T18:21:00.001-05:002017-05-21T18:37:58.454-05:00On Being Single and the Marriage Assumption<div class="" data-block="true" data-editor="8u8cq" data-offset-key="c136c-0-0" style="background-color: white; letter-spacing: -0.24px; white-space: pre-wrap;">
<div class="_1mf _1mj" data-offset-key="c136c-0-0" style="direction: ltr; font-family: inherit; position: relative;">
<div class="" data-block="true" data-editor="8u8cq" data-offset-key="c136c-0-0" style="letter-spacing: -0.24px;">
<div class="_1mf _1mj" data-offset-key="c136c-0-0" style="direction: ltr; font-family: inherit; position: relative;">
<div dir="ltr" style="color: #1d2129; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 5pt;">
<span style="font-family: "arial"; letter-spacing: -0.24px;">Even as much as the legitimization of the diversification of individual development, relational development, and family formation has entered into American culture, the marriage assumption continues to hold great sway. The marriage assumption is an intergenerational process, religious process, cultural process, and economic process that many people between the ages of 20 and 40+ are almost required to navigate so long as they remain unmarried.</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="color: #1d2129; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 5pt;">
<span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "arial"; font-style: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">In short, with a few exceptions, there are few pathways for being single that appear legitimate. The marriage assumption seems to require families, churches, and society to be anxious until the single person gets married. Once the single person person gets married, everyone (usually highlighted in family and in church) can finally take a sigh of relief, clap the dust off their hands and say "our work is done here." It is as if the final task for parenting, for socialization at church, and for broader cultural structures, pronounces marriage as ultimate goal. Marriage crowns the adult ascent to total and complete legitimization.</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="color: #1d2129; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 5pt;">
<span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "arial"; font-style: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">For the person heading into their 30's without being married, family, church and culture seem poised to leverage energy and resources to help solve the singleness problem.</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="color: #1d2129; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 5pt;">
<span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "arial"; font-style: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">By the time someone enters their 40's without being married, it is as if family, church, and culture looks at them holding back the tears trying not to say, "How have we failed you?"</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="color: #1d2129; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 5pt;">
<span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "arial"; font-style: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">By the time someone enters into their 50's without being married, family, church, and society just hopes they are a viable economic unit with some spoken and a lot of unspoken regret.</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="color: #1d2129; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 5pt;">
<span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "arial"; font-style: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">What is ironic about the marriage assumption is that it assigns the problem of developmental legitimacy to the unmarried individual when the reality is that these institutions themselves are finding it difficult to see themselves as legitimate while the marriage assumption is being broken.</span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "arial"; font-style: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br class="kix-line-break" /></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "arial"; font-style: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">The question that social systems must face is this: Can a family, a church, and even a culture that depends heavily on the marriage assumption broaden its identity allow for legitimate singleness? Can the structure itself survive without the marriage assumption? Can social structures shift from the marriage assumption to broad and diverse acceptance?</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="color: #1d2129; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 5pt;">
<span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "arial"; font-style: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">If individuals who are single and social structures that have singles in them want to survive together in healthy ways, there needs to be legitimate ways for single people to be single and legitimate ways for a social structure to be sustained where people who are single have meaningful and legitimate status.</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="color: #1d2129; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 5pt;">
<span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "arial"; font-style: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">One way to help individuals and social structures broaden their scope of legitimate ways of being, narratives for singleness legitimacy must exist and be widely accepted.</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="color: #1d2129; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 5pt;">
<span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "arial"; font-style: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">Here I offer 4 simple narratives of singleness. These are by no means that end of the matter, but hopefully a way for a conversation to start in some areas where it is stuck inside the marriage assumption. I want these to offer some relief for people who are single and are tired of constantly having to outflank the marriage assumption. I want these to be grist for families, churches, and other social systems to think through in order to become self-aware of their systemic and perhaps invisible support for the marriage assumption, but also to broaden their scope and perhaps rewrite some unwritten rules. Here goes:</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; color: blue; font-family: "arial"; font-style: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><b>Narrative #1: Single For A Reason:</b></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "arial"; font-style: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br class="kix-line-break" /></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "arial"; font-style: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">This narrative for singleness highlights the need for a person to dive into their vocation, career, or service in ways that are incompatible with marriage. This person realizes that they may owe the world something, but that thing is not marriage. It is not that this is a narrative of marital incompetence, but rather of choice. This person resolves that the best things they have to offer the world are not found in marriage, but rather in some other vocation that marriage would only diminish.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; color: blue; font-family: "arial"; font-style: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><b>Narrative #2: Single For A Mission:</b></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "arial"; font-style: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br class="kix-line-break" /></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "arial"; font-style: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">This form of singleness can be due to a specific ministry or service call from God, perhaps like the Apostle Paul. Mother Teresa never married and gave her life to the sick and dying in Calcutta. This form of singleness is because there is a mission so great and so necessary to accomplish that being married would absorb too much energy and the mission would never make it. There are people who are clergy, nuns, monks, and many non-clergy people who determine that they simply must respond to God giving their everything to the mission or cause.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; color: blue; font-family: "arial"; font-style: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><b>Narrative #3: Single Forever:</b></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "arial"; font-style: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br class="kix-line-break" /></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "arial"; font-style: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">This form of singleness is a choice to be single, but not necessarily due to a specific mission like Mother Teresa or for any vocation, but rather because it is the preference of the individual. There might be some reason, but there might not be. It does not have to be justified to the world.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; color: blue; font-family: "arial"; font-style: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><b>Narrative #4: Single For Now:</b></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "arial"; font-style: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;"><br class="kix-line-break" /></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "arial"; font-style: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">This form of singleness is for a season or time period. It could be to accomplish something in life that is time limited (e.g. a two year mission) or to become mature enough to marry or perhaps to heal over some past experience. It could be an effort to become financially more stable or to find oneself. It is understood that whenever whatever needed to be accomplished is accomplished, then marriage is available. This is a way of being single that seeks growth, healing, and improvement while keeping marriage open as a possible, but not determined, future.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "arial"; font-style: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">There are certainly more narratives that exist, but these are four legitimate ways to be single.</span></div>
<div dir="ltr" style="color: #1d2129; line-height: 1.38; margin-bottom: 0pt; margin-top: 5pt;">
<span style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: "arial"; font-style: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">One final note: I am a Christian who loves the church and believes that Jesus started a very good thing in the church. It has so much potential to bring about peace and justice in this world. With that in mind, I think churches should be a social system that is the most hospitable for people who are single to be safe and accepted. The theological impulse from the singleness of the Apostle Paul and Jesus himself should be enough to push back on how fully and completely too many churches have become dependent upon the social force of the marriage assumption - often to the point of practicing a kind of marital idolatry and family idolatry that places an undue, inappropriate, and theologically bankrupt burden on people who are single. Clergy, church elders, and other religious leaders should be actively and aggressively solving for how to expand the identity of their congregations to be so safe for single people that they are not marginalized, not tolerated, but embraced as fully legitimate members who do not have a singleness problem to be solved. If their congregation is incapable of making such a change, these leaders should consider how they might start a new church where singleness is as much in its DNA as marriage.</span></div>
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<span style="background-color: white; color: blue; font-family: "arial"; font-style: normal; font-weight: 400; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; white-space: pre-wrap;">PS: As a married man of over 20 years, a father, and a marriage and family therapist, I affirm marriage as a beautiful, meaningful, and legitimate decision for many people to make. I reject the notion that there is something wrong with someone who does not get married. Marriage can be a gift. Being single can be a gift. It is not about your status, but rather it is about who you are in that status.</span></div>
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</style>Fajitahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11028194082067400240noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7439195.post-64110964363642154392017-03-28T13:00:00.002-05:002017-03-28T13:00:57.818-05:00Family Systems and Cancer<div class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: left;">
Here are the notes from my talk on cancer and family systems. Rough draft and needs help, but it got me through. </div>
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Family Systems and
Cancer<o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
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Introduction: <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst" style="margin-left: 1.0in; mso-add-space: auto; mso-list: l5 level2 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">a.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->Contemplating the impact of cancer on a family
is a complex endeavor. A family is a social system of two or more people that
are inter-related and is itself a unit of analysis that behaves differently
than an assortment of random people. A family is different than a random
assortment of people in that it has developed its own pattern of interactions,
its own set of rules, each person in a family is nominated to fill particular roles.
A family both inherits and constructs its own forms of homeostasis and seems to
know instinctively how to maintain its own patterns of functioning and seems to
know instinctively how much change it can tolerate through a complex set of mostly
unwritten rules that are somehow both invisible to the family and at the same
time followed with a fierce allegiance. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin-left: 1.0in; mso-add-space: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin-left: 1.0in; mso-add-space: auto; mso-list: l5 level2 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">b.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->But each individual in the family is herself or
himself a complex psychological system comprised of thoughts, feelings,
behaviors, and spiritual impulses comprising what some call a personality.
These complex cognitive, emotional, behavioral, and spiritual subsystems are at
times unified and whole within a person while at other times are in deep
conflict. And while each individual human has their own psychological
complexity, these become even more complex when one person’s psychological
complexity interacts with another person’s psychological complexity to form
relationships, construct shared meaning, and reside situated within the larger
social contexts such as family, church, neighborhood, and workplace. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin-left: 1.0in; mso-add-space: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin-left: 1.0in; mso-add-space: auto; mso-list: l5 level2 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">c.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->Focusing in even further, these complex
psychological systems are contained within a complex physical system called a
body, an amazing assortment of interrelated subsystems: respiratory system,
digestive system, skeletal system. These systems are meant to work in an
amazing harmony in order to grow and sustain this miracle we call life. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin-left: 1.0in; mso-add-space: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin-left: 1.0in; mso-add-space: auto; mso-list: l5 level2 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">d.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->But these bodily systems do not always function
as intended. One of these dysfunctions comes at a cellular level: cancer. When
cancer develops in the bodily system, the effect of that bodily dysfunction
does not simply reside only in the body. There is not just a physical effect of
cancer on the body, but there is also the psychological effect of cancer on the
individual. It touches the thoughts, feelings, behaviors, and spirituality of
the person. Panning out further still, when cancer touches the body of a person
and the psychology of a person, it also touches the social systems in which
each individual resides. Marriage, family, family of origin, church, workplace,
neighborhood – this abnormal cell activity, that for the most part cannot be
seen by the naked eye, has a powerful and often fierce impact on the many
systems in which it is contained. Cancer is biological of course, but is also
psychological and social. It is biopsychosocial. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin-left: 1.0in; mso-add-space: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin-left: 1.0in; mso-add-space: auto; mso-list: l5 level2 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">e.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->For each of these levels, there are tasks that
must be accomplished. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin-left: 1.5in; mso-add-space: auto; mso-list: l5 level3 lfo1; mso-text-indent-alt: -9.0pt; text-indent: -1.5in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;"><span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span>i.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span></span><!--[endif]-->At
the level of the body, the task at hand is to stop the cancerous growth with
surgery, radiation, chemotherapy, hormone therapy, special diets and a whole
array of physical interventions. If the body is not taken care of, the cancer
is likely to kill the body. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin-left: 1.5in; mso-add-space: auto; mso-list: l5 level3 lfo1; mso-text-indent-alt: -9.0pt; text-indent: -1.5in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;"><span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span>ii.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span></span><!--[endif]-->At
the psychological level, there are many tasks of belief, emotion, behavior, and
spirituality. Beliefs about health, the medical community, the course of
cancer, how much to accept or not accept the diagnosis and many others touch
the cognitive part of the individual. Fear, sadness, depression, anxiety,
anger, guilt, and all manner of emotion must be engaged or suppressed – there is
no way not to manage these emotions, some of which can be all-consuming. There
are decisions to make, hundreds and hundreds of decisions. The extent of one’s
faith in God are challenged. Bad faith systems and bad theology are exposed, if
the person is fortunate, but also not easily replaced with better ones. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin-left: 1.5in; mso-add-space: auto; mso-list: l5 level3 lfo1; mso-text-indent-alt: -9.0pt; text-indent: -1.5in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;"><span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span>iii.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span></span><!--[endif]-->At
the relational system level, the social context must reorganize in order to
heal. The rules, roles, patterns of interactions, relational boundaries, and
homeostasis in general must all be renegotiated because cancer has imposed so much
that the system cannot remain the same. Even if the social system is determined
to remain the same, to keep all the same patterns and rules and roles, it
shifts from supportive to unsupportive, from honest to dishonest, from
responsive to non-responsive. If the social system does not reorganize, then
the system itself has become a threat to the health of the individual. <o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin-left: 1.0in; mso-add-space: auto; mso-list: l5 level2 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">f.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->Within each systemic level comes along with it a
level of abstraction. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin-left: 1.5in; mso-add-space: auto; mso-list: l5 level3 lfo1; mso-text-indent-alt: -9.0pt; text-indent: -1.5in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;"><span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span>i.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span></span><!--[endif]-->On
the physical level there is actually a thing, or so it is perceived, that is
the cancer itself. It is the collection of cells that are driven to behave in an
abnormal and threatening way. They are something that can be seen using medical
and scientific procedures. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin-left: 1.5in; mso-add-space: auto; mso-list: l5 level3 lfo1; mso-text-indent-alt: -9.0pt; text-indent: -1.5in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;"><span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span>ii.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span></span><!--[endif]-->On
the psychological level, there is more abstraction, but the experience is no
less real. Fear is real, but much harder to see. Denial is a real thing and can
be threatening to health, but again is not easily grasped. These psychological
abstractions are hard to detect, but even more so are hard to evaluate. What is
the wrong emotion or right emotion to have in response to cancer?<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin-left: 1.5in; mso-add-space: auto; mso-list: l5 level3 lfo1; mso-text-indent-alt: -9.0pt; text-indent: -1.5in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;"><span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span>iii.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span></span><!--[endif]-->On
the social system level the abstractions can be even more abstract. There is no
way to put a family rule under a microscope, but a family rule that is followed
might be the difference between life and death. The meaning a social system
constructs in response to cancer and assigns to cancer and each other is not
simple to detect or comprehend while at the same time it cannot not happen. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin-left: 1.5in; mso-add-space: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin-left: 1.0in; mso-add-space: auto; mso-list: l5 level2 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">g.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->The more abstract the unit of analysis, the more
it may be subject to metaphor, comparison, and social construction. <o:p></o:p></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin-left: 1.0in; mso-add-space: auto; mso-list: l5 level2 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">h.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->For example: <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpLast" style="margin-left: 1.0in; mso-add-space: auto; mso-list: l5 level2 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">i.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->Cancer, the Systemic Bully. When the diagnosis
of cancer is given to an individual, it is also given to a set of social
systems. Cancer barges in and, in a moment, assigns everyone a new identity like
a bully gives a really lousy nickname that just happens to stick and now that
is how everyone knows you. It changes your name and how people understand you. It
intrudes and renames every relationship you have. Cancer can turn a marriage into
a cancer marriage. Cancer can turn a family into a cancer family. A small group
at church could become a cancer small group. A workplace may become, at least
in part, a cancer workplace. When knowledge of this cellular abnormality seeps
into the awareness of a social context, it leaves its mark like a bruise, or
perhaos like a drop of red food color into a clear glass of water – you can’t
uncolor it. Identities change. Relationships change. Priorities change. You can
add more color to the mix, but you can’t uncolor the water once it is colored. What
must be highlighted and what must be obscured are reorganized in such a
profound and urgent manner that whatever was once considered normal appears no
longer accessible. The Bully, Cancer, is located inside a person, but it is by
definition also located inside every social system containing that person. <o:p></o:p></div>
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Another
Example of metaphor to help understand the biopsychosocial reality of cancer: <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin-left: 1.0in; mso-add-space: auto; mso-list: l5 level2 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">j.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->Cancer, the Dark Inquisitor. <span style="background: white; color: #1d2129; letter-spacing: -0.2pt;">Cancer is the Dark
Inquisitor that comes without invitation to interrogate the essence of your
life: your body, your mind and your social context. Under interrogation,
everything must be renegotiated and re-ordered.</span> The Dark Inqusitor comes
to interrogate the mental toughness, interrogate the emotional stability, and interrogate
the spiritual sustainability of a person. And this interrogation is not in
isolation. No. It is a socially situated interrogation within a marriage and
within a family and within a collection of social systems. But further still,
the interrogation is not just for the individual, but also it is for everyone
connected to the person with the diagnosis. The social system is diagnosed with
cancer and therefore the social system is also interrogated. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpLast" style="margin-left: 1.0in; mso-add-space: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "calibri light"; mso-ascii-theme-font: major-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: major-latin;">What questions does this Dark
Inquisitor of cancer ask? What is the interrogation like? It might go something
like this? </span><span style="font-family: "calibri light"; mso-ascii-theme-font: major-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-hansi-theme-font: major-latin;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Questions of
Diagnosis and Acceptance:<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst" style="mso-list: l2 level1 lfo3; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">1.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->How long will it take to accept this diagnosis? <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l2 level1 lfo3; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">2.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->Will you ever accept this diagnosis? <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l2 level1 lfo3; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">3.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->How many different strategies will you use to
deny the reality of this diagnosis? <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l2 level1 lfo3; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">4.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->Will you change in order to comply with treatment?<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpLast">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Questions of Meaning
Making:<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo2; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">1.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->What meaning will you make of this diagnosis? <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo2; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">2.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->What does it mean to be a cancer family? A
cancer marriage? A cancer church? <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpLast" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo2; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">3.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->What does it mean to carry death with you
everywhere you go? <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Questions of
Relationship Durability:<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst" style="mso-list: l3 level1 lfo4; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">1.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->Will cancer heal or further exacerbate the existing
relational fissures that already exist in your family system? <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l3 level1 lfo4; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">2.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->What communication strengths will be accessed?<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l3 level1 lfo4; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">3.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->What communication weaknesses will be exploited?<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l3 level1 lfo4; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">4.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->How will the family reorganize in response to
this diagnosis? <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l3 level1 lfo4; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">5.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->Who are you going to tell and when? How? <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l3 level1 lfo4; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">6.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->How will you tolerate it when word of your
cancer is new to someone, but painfully old to you? <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l3 level1 lfo4; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="font-family: "times new roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">7.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->How will your identity change in your social
contexts? Friends? Church? Work? <span style="font-family: "times new roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpLast" style="mso-list: l3 level1 lfo4; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="font-family: "times new roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">8.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->Who no longer knows how to relate to you? <span style="font-family: "times new roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Questions of
Self-differentiation:<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst" style="mso-list: l1 level1 lfo5; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">1.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->How emotionally mature are the individuals of
your family? <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l1 level1 lfo5; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">2.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->How emotionally mature is the family as a system?
<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l1 level1 lfo5; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">3.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->How will your assumptions about medical
professionals be given voice? <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l1 level1 lfo5; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">4.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->Will you have the courage and clarity to
advocate for your own healing? <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l1 level1 lfo5; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">5.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->How does hope and despair ride on the relationships
in the family? <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l1 level1 lfo5; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">6.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->How will existing family roles deepen?<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l1 level1 lfo5; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">7.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->How will relational pathologies be exposed? <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l1 level1 lfo5; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">8.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->How will you manage other people’s empathy
failures?<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l1 level1 lfo5; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">9.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->Are you ready to be more gracious than the
people trying to comfort you?<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l1 level1 lfo5; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">10.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span></span><!--[endif]-->How
will you tally the losses?<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l1 level1 lfo5; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">11.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span></span><!--[endif]-->How
will you manage the griefs?<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l1 level1 lfo5; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">12.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span></span><!--[endif]-->Where
is your courage while staring fear in the eye? <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpLast" style="mso-list: l1 level1 lfo5; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">13.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span></span><!--[endif]-->How
will you process the guilt of everyone else having to take care of you and
everything costing too much? <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Existential and
Spiritual Questions:<o:p></o:p></b></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst" style="mso-list: l4 level1 lfo6; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">1.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->Can you make friends with uncertainty,
ambiguity, and powerlessness? <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l4 level1 lfo6; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">2.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->Will you let them be your teachers?<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l4 level1 lfo6; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">3.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->What will you have to say when cancer threatens
to take it all from you against your will? <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l4 level1 lfo6; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">4.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->Are you able to drill for hope in a desert of
despair? <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l4 level1 lfo6; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">5.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]-->Do you have anything worth saying? <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l4 level1 lfo6; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="color: #14171a; font-family: "calibri light"; mso-ascii-theme-font: major-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: "Calibri Light"; mso-bidi-theme-font: major-latin; mso-fareast-font-family: "Calibri Light"; mso-fareast-theme-font: major-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: major-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">6.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]--><span style="background: #f5f8fa; color: #14171a; font-family: "calibri light";">How much do you love? <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l4 level1 lfo6; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="color: #14171a; font-family: "calibri light"; mso-ascii-theme-font: major-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: "Calibri Light"; mso-bidi-theme-font: major-latin; mso-fareast-font-family: "Calibri Light"; mso-fareast-theme-font: major-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: major-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">7.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]--><span style="background: #f5f8fa; color: #14171a; font-family: "calibri light";">How much are you prepared to lose? <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l4 level1 lfo6; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="color: #14171a; font-family: "calibri light"; mso-ascii-theme-font: major-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: "Calibri Light"; mso-bidi-theme-font: major-latin; mso-fareast-font-family: "Calibri Light"; mso-fareast-theme-font: major-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: major-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">8.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]--><span style="background: #f5f8fa; color: #14171a; font-family: "calibri light";">What do you really value? <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l4 level1 lfo6; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="font-family: "calibri light"; mso-ascii-theme-font: major-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: "Calibri Light"; mso-bidi-theme-font: major-latin; mso-fareast-font-family: "Calibri Light"; mso-fareast-theme-font: major-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: major-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">9.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span><!--[endif]--><span style="background: #f5f8fa; color: #14171a; font-family: "calibri light";">What is your life truly about?</span><span style="font-family: "calibri light"; mso-ascii-theme-font: major-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-hansi-theme-font: major-latin;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l4 level1 lfo6; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">10.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span></span><!--[endif]-->What
is your theological fortitude?<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l4 level1 lfo6; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">11.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span></span><!--[endif]-->Are
you ready to relearn everything you ever thought you knew? <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l4 level1 lfo6; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">12.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span></span><!--[endif]-->Are
you ready to relearn it all with no promise of ever getting to use any of that
new learning? <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpLast" style="mso-list: l4 level1 lfo6; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">13.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span></span><!--[endif]-->Who
are you when you are perpetually, completely, and totally exhausted? <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Are you tired? <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Are you tired, yet? <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The interrogation of the Dark inquisitor is relentless. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
How could a relatively small cluster of cells cause so much
struggle – and make us so tired?<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And yet there are stories of life that emerge from this
sickness of death. From the millions who rally and run and wear pink to find a
cure to the raw and honest comedy of cancer survivor Tig Notaro. Yes, cancer
humor is a thing – if we can laugh we are alive. As individuals embedded within
social systems, we respond to cancer. We rally each other. We rally the medical
community. We rally technology, researchers, hospitals, philanthropists, and
devise all manner of ways to push back against this monster. Cancer and the
death it wields against humans and human systems gets a response and that
response is an indicator that life matters. Cancer does not seem to be giving
up too easily, but neither are we. We have taken on many casualties in this brawl
with the bully, we have been buried in questions by this Dark Inquisitor, but
we keep on trying to live. In response to cancer, we seek life at the cellular
level. We seek life at the psychological level. We seek life in our
relationships. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
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<!--EndFragment--><br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="background: #f6f7f9; color: #1d2129; font-family: ".sfnstext-regular"; font-size: 9.0pt; letter-spacing: -0.2pt;">I also experience moments when I feel triumphant:
"Cancer---You. Are. Not. Going. To. Win....ANYTHING." And I have
moments when I feel so defeated: "You have taken everything." Most of
the time though, I dwell somewhere in between, and this "Dark
Inquisitor" forces the question perhaps we ALL should really be asking
often and that is, "However long or short it may be, how do we live this
Life well?" Not such a bad question to ponder I suppose. ---Kathy</span><span style="font-family: "times new roman"; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman";"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
Fajitahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11028194082067400240noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7439195.post-15872775307559724062017-03-18T08:34:00.001-05:002017-03-18T10:03:14.757-05:00When Revisiting The Boneyard of Regret...<div class="MsoNormal">
When Revisiting the Boneyard of Regret…<o:p></o:p><br />
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj8E8CU8iwDut5fhjJYkNmaLm5OeaxP25fyIHUri47ZUbMh0t_XNxJUh3QmGXC8_vd4WVdPWGt9L0bQ5iucyTG9vvED8Zh8x-BOk829mUwJx4XMIFKNomdGU3PKxNEBILuPmflySQ/s1600/bones.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="126" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj8E8CU8iwDut5fhjJYkNmaLm5OeaxP25fyIHUri47ZUbMh0t_XNxJUh3QmGXC8_vd4WVdPWGt9L0bQ5iucyTG9vvED8Zh8x-BOk829mUwJx4XMIFKNomdGU3PKxNEBILuPmflySQ/s200/bones.jpg" width="200" /></a></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-size: 12pt;">In </span><a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c_-cUdmdWgU" style="font-size: 12pt;">Sufjan
Stevens 2005 song Chicago</a><span style="font-size: 12pt;">, there is a refrain that repeats over and over, “I
made a lot of mistakes; I made a lot of mistakes.” For a song that might be
cloaked in ambiguity lyrically, it resonates emotionally. Who can’t repeat the
refrain and mean it? There are few feelings like the angst of aching regret giving
way to the humble relief of confession. The nature of regret is torment,
suffering, and persistent psychological self-harm. The nature of confession
however, is freeing. Confession frees to leave the boneyard of regret, frees to
learn from failure, frees to remember without suffering.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Sooner or later, everyone pays a visit to the boneyard of
regret. Strewn with the carcasses of hurt feelings, corpses of stupid mistakes,
and skeletal bones of all manner of failures, the boneyard of regret is a place
where parts of people go to die. Embarrassment, shame, and humiliation haunt
this boneyard where it is always midnight, always foggy, and always looks like
there is no way out. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
For some people, it is tempting to do anything possible never
to visit the boneyard. Avoid, deflect, rush to pleasure - there are many ways
to run from regret. For other people, it is tempting to pitch a tent in the
boneyard, endlessly trying to solve the unsolvable equation – time travel. They
torture themselves with “If only I had…” as though they can unfail. Whether
avoiding the boneyard or taking up residence in it, each results in the
construction of a realm of suffering that is unnecessary. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Visiting the boneyard of regret is an unfortunate
requirement of being human. It cannot be avoided. So, when in the boneyard,
here are a few things to consider. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<u>Confess and be free.<o:p></o:p></u></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
There is truth in the boneyard. It is a hard truth, a very
hard truth. The bones found rummaging around in the boneyard are the historical
facts. All of the facts are true. They are the mistakes, injuries and failures
of the past. Just looking at them can be overwhelming. No matter how hard it is
to look at them, owning those mistakes, injuries, and failures is required. This
boneyard is a place of responsibility and honesty – courageous responsibility; hard
honesty. However, the facts must be confessed as just the facts, and nothing
more. Just confess and be free. It is the road to self-acceptance. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<u>Learn everything you can.<o:p></o:p></u></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
There is pain in the boneyard. Extreme pain. Sometimes the
pain is extraordinary and can be unbearable at times. No one in their right
mind wants suffering and pain. However, there is more than suffering in pain.
There can be learning along with the pain. All pain and suffering can be
instructive. Of all the teachers, guides, and mentors, pain is among the most
profound and prolific, if the teaching methods can be tolerated. There is no
end to the learning that can be acquired in the boneyard. It can make people
better people. Wise people will get all the learning they can. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<u>Give it your grief.<o:p></o:p></u></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
There is grief in the boneyard, but not until it is placed
there. Every bone in that bone yard will not be satisfied until it is grieved.
Something was lost and that is how the bones got there. There are things there
that cannot be undone. There are losses that cannot be regained. There are
mistakes that cannot be perfected. One mistake people make when visiting the
boneyard is to invest energy into solving something that should be grieved. Go
to the boneyard to grieve and then leave a portion of the grief there once you leave.
<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<u>Visit, but leave. <o:p></o:p></u></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
There is no home in the boneyard. Everything in the boneyard
is dead. It is an inhabitable place where no one can survive staying there too
long. It’s the surface of the moon. It’s Mars. Yes, visits are necessary and
can do some good – but leave. The boneyard exists so there is a place for those
painful moments of the past to reside so that people can move forward with
their lives. It exists so that people can have it if they need a visit every
once in a while as they go about their lives trying to make sense of it without
having to carry it all with them all the time. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<u>Leave the bones in the yard. <o:p></o:p></u></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
There are regrets in the boneyard - and that is where they
belong. There is no need to carry that past around all the time to every place.
The boneyard is a great mercy in that there is a place to put all that pain and
then be separate form it for a while. Learning to leave the boneyard is one of
the most important spiritual disciplines a person can humbly enter into.
Learning to leave the boneyard is the learning how to have a mature
relationship with pain and suffering, paying visits, but only for so long.
Learning to leave the boneyard is about how to have a mature relationship with
grief and loss, when to carry it in and how much to leave there. Rather than
avoiding the boneyard or being buried in it, the point is to develop a
relationship with it that has good boundaries. And good boundaries means leaving
the bones in the boneyard. Exhuming the bones for living room decorations is
not hospitable for anyone. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<u>Seriously, Leave The Bones There. <o:p></o:p></u></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
It can be overwhelming looking at all those bones. Owning
the bones is hard, but when making claims to the bones, do not go beyond making
the claim. It can be tempting to generalize past the facts. It is one thing to
confess, “I made this mistake,” but it is quite another thing to assign
additional meaning, “I made this mistake and therefore I am a terrible person /
disqualified / worthless” and on and on. See the difference. It is responsible
to own the bone, but it is irresponsible to assign a psychologically
self-harming meaning to the bone. Own the bone and then drop it in the
boneyard. People are not worthless. People have infinite worth; it is how
people are created. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
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<div class="MsoNormal">
The boneyard of regret serves a very important purpose in
people’s lives. It is a mercy filled with wisdom that demands growth, learning,
and maturity in order to access. It is a hard mercy, like a cemetery. It is an
unyielding mercy that cannot be avoided. It is an hard, but benevolent mercy
that, given the circumstances and when accessed with wisdom, provides the best
chance at living for the length of one’s life – thus being the best option
overall. <o:p></o:p></div>
</div>
Fajitahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11028194082067400240noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7439195.post-62191696376924170622016-08-29T09:28:00.000-05:002016-08-29T09:28:00.647-05:00A Prayer For White Awakening (Get Woke)<div style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">
<u>A Prayer For White Awakening (Get Woke):</u></div>
<div style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">
God of wisdom. God of mercy. God of reconciliation, unity and peace, we gather together:</div>
<div style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">
to engage discomfort as a reach for healing</div>
<div style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">
to risk releasing anxious self-protection as a reach for connection</div>
<div style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">
to inquire what humility might ask of us as a reach for wisdom</div>
<div style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">
God, convert us!</div>
<div style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">
May we notice times when we feel defensive and convert that defensiveness for self to affirmation for our sisters and brothers who experience injustice</div>
<div style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">
May we notice times when we feel resistance and convert that resistance into generosity to share our lives with our sisters and brothers </div>
<div style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">
May we notice how comfortable we have become with the privilege we do not even see and convert our energies from protecting our unseen privilege to sharing comforts of new friendships</div>
<div style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">
May we notice that the desire not to be racist does not alone eradicate our participation in racism</div>
<div style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">
May we notice that we participate in social systems that perpetuate generous distributions of privilege to us and meager distributions of privilege to others. </div>
<div style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">
May we love our sisters and brothers enough not to be paralyzed by guilt when we begin to notice these things</div>
<div style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">
<br /></div>
<div style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">
Give us eyes to see right through our own privilege</div>
<div style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">
Give us ears to hear oppression in our own voices</div>
<div style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">
Give us humility not merely to see and to hear, but to acknowledge </div>
<div style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">
Give us the wisdom to adjust our lives because of what we have seen and have heard</div>
<div style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">
Give us the courage to leverage what privilege we have FOR, NOT OVER, our sisters and brothers. </div>
<div style="background-color: white; color: #222222; font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 12.8px;">
Infuse within us a grace so genuine that our very actions become the healing apologies for sins that have reverberated for generations and for centuries</div>
Fajitahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11028194082067400240noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7439195.post-55087240981921453852016-08-26T21:45:00.002-05:002016-08-27T08:26:32.383-05:00A Delightfully Defiant and Subversive Woman<div class="" data-block="true" data-editor="35l5t" data-offset-key="dms25-0-0" style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: helvetica, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 18px; white-space: pre-wrap;">
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<div style="line-height: 19.32px; margin-bottom: 6px; white-space: normal;">
The Delightfully Defiant and Subversive Woman (A True Story)</div>
<div style="line-height: 19.32px; margin-bottom: 6px; margin-top: 6px; white-space: normal;">
I have a friend. Her name is Kathy Osborne. She and I have been friends for a long time - since before I was a teenager. I'm a couple years younger than she is, but that's part of what made being friends when we were so much younger so cool for me. When a high schooler pays any attention to a middle schooler it means a whole lot to the middle schooler. But that was the thing - Kathy either didn't really know the age rules about not being friends with people younger than you are, or perhaps, and this is even more likely, she thought those rules were ridiculous.</div>
<div style="line-height: 19.32px; margin-bottom: 6px; margin-top: 6px; white-space: normal;">
Kathy has always thought a lot of things were ridiculous. But not in the snarky or bitter way people think things are ridiculous and then share it on Facebook trying to score some likes. Kathy didn't care about likes. She still doesn't. She found things to be ridiculous when someone got the short end of the stick, when someone got slighted, when injustice spread it venom. What Kathy has always found to be ridiculous are things that are, in fact, loaded with ridiculosity.</div>
<div style="line-height: 19.32px; margin-bottom: 6px; margin-top: 6px; white-space: normal;">
She could spot this kind of stuff a mile away. But what makes Kathy unique is the manner in which she responds to it. When most people find something to be ridiculous, they have a blustery outrage about it, they fume about it, they mock it into oblivion, or they rally a pompous superiority about the matter. Kathy doesn't do anything like that. I wonder whether she even knows how.</div>
<div style="line-height: 19.32px; margin-bottom: 6px; margin-top: 6px; white-space: normal;">
When Kathy finds something ridiculous, she becomes nice. Ok, she's already super nice. But she gets nicer. How nice? She's so nice it's like the air temperature changes a little when she walks in the room. Whatever the temperature was before she walked into the room, it got closer to that perfect temperature where it feels like there is no temperature at all. She is that kind of nice. Her defiant and subversive response to the ridiculous is niceness - creative niceness. It's innocent niceness. It is a crushing niceness that manages to subvert and defy the power of the ridiculous, no matter how massive it happens to be. It's an undoing kind of niceness that rather innocently drags the ridiculous out into the light, but not to shame it. No. Her niceness redeems it.</div>
<div style="line-height: 19.32px; margin-bottom: 6px; margin-top: 6px; white-space: normal;">
Wait. Nice? That's it? Nice isn't special, it's not defiant and it certainly isn't subversive. If that is what you are thinking right now, you don't know Kathy. You and I find would find her to be nice. That's because we are also nice. Not as nice as Kathy, but we see nice for what it is and we like it. But if you were evil and if you were horrible, you would find her niceness to be an assault, a barrage, an over the top aggressiveness that felt cruel. Her smile would be threatening. Her simple way of going about doing the right thing innocently and nicely, even though it may break the social, cultural, or theological rules, would feel to the evil version of yourself to be diabolical. If we were evil, we would be worried about Kathy because we would feel defenseless against her defiant and subversive weapons. We would wonder why no one else could see what she was up to. She just gets away with it - no accountability. Unrelenting, unmitigated, and irrepressible nice.</div>
<div style="line-height: 19.32px; margin-bottom: 6px; margin-top: 6px; white-space: normal;">
So when Kathy got cancer, it was ridiculous.</div>
<div style="line-height: 19.32px; margin-bottom: 6px; margin-top: 6px; white-space: normal;">
It doesn't make any sense. How does the delightfully defiant and subversive woman get cancer? It's not fair. It's not right. It's certainly not something to be nice about.</div>
<div style="line-height: 19.32px; margin-bottom: 6px; margin-top: 6px; white-space: normal;">
And yet...</div>
<div style="line-height: 19.32px; margin-bottom: 6px; margin-top: 6px; white-space: normal;">
She did it again. I have been following the reports that her husband Brett (the rarest of men who deserves the privilege to be married to the delightfully defiant and subversive woman) posts on Facebook. Kathy, in her subtle ways, even under the pressure and pain of tests, reports, more tests, chemo, radiation, and surgeries, still she finds a nice way to be defiant and subversive.</div>
<div style="line-height: 19.32px; margin-bottom: 6px; margin-top: 6px; white-space: normal;">
For the record, I am pretty sure if I had to run the course Kathy has been forced to run, I'd be cursing things, calling down fire from Heaven, and feeling justified for the wake of ruined things left behind what should be regretful words flung off into servers around the world for everyone to see.</div>
<div style="line-height: 19.32px; margin-bottom: 6px; margin-top: 6px; white-space: normal;">
Not Kathy. She's nice.</div>
<div style="line-height: 19.32px; margin-bottom: 6px; margin-top: 6px; white-space: normal;">
In one of Brett's updates, he reported that as part of her treatment for cancer, Kathy had a tube or some highly intrusive thing most of us never knew existed, stuck in her. A thing, an object - part of it inside of her and part of it outside of her. It's not right. It's not natural. It's ridiculous. People weren't made to have tubes sticking out of them.</div>
<div style="line-height: 19.32px; margin-bottom: 6px; margin-top: 6px; white-space: normal;">
So, what does Kathy do about this ridiculous tube? Complain? No, that would been my move. Rip it out? No, that would have been my dad's move. Does she engage the pity of the world? She could have and would have gotten it. No. So what does Kathy do?</div>
<div style="line-height: 19.32px; margin-bottom: 6px; margin-top: 6px; white-space: normal;">
She names it.</div>
<div style="line-height: 19.32px; margin-bottom: 6px; margin-top: 6px; white-space: normal;">
That's right. She named the tube. She named it Axel Larry Osborne. First, middle, and last names. Delightful. Defiant. Subversive. It was nice. She included the tube - into the family! It's an Osborne. She threatened the tube - with inclusion. It's ridiculous to have a tube sticking out of her body and she turns the tables and welcomes it into the family.</div>
<div style="line-height: 19.32px; margin-bottom: 6px; margin-top: 6px; white-space: normal;">
And it's not just about being nice to the tube. It's being nice about having a tube. If you were the nurse having to attend to that tube and your patient named it Axel Larry Osborne, wouldn't that be a story to go home and tell? Wouldn't that has made an otherwise difficult job a little more worth it? If you were the nurse, how many other patients had been so hard to deal with? Many of them, as you can imagine. It makes sense to be miserable when the condition of your body is so ridiculous. What makes sense to Kathy, in the middle of her own cancer treatment, is to do something that immediately makes everyone a better person. It's funny. It's innocent. It's so Kathy.</div>
<div style="line-height: 19.32px; margin-bottom: 6px; margin-top: 6px; white-space: normal;">
That's it. That's what makes Kathy's nice so diabolically nice. The beast explodes out of the woods and she paints a flower on its tusk.</div>
<div style="line-height: 19.32px; margin-bottom: 6px; margin-top: 6px; white-space: normal;">
This is Kathy throwing her fists into the air.<br />This is Kathy fighting like Hell against a monster.<br />This is full on Kathy at her very finest.</div>
<div style="display: inline; line-height: 19.32px; margin-top: 6px; white-space: normal;">
If I were fighting cancer for one thousand years I would never have come up with naming the tube. It's genius. It's brilliant. It is delightfully defiant and subversive. And nice - it's Kathy Osborne's native language.</div>
</div>
</div>
Fajitahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11028194082067400240noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7439195.post-13129152661282855412016-08-15T04:53:00.000-05:002016-08-27T08:33:11.471-05:00Though I ResistThough I resist,<br />
Time is my teacher,<br />
Anticipating my awareness,<br />
Slow to take as it is<br />
At some enlightened place;<br />
All the evidence<br />
Already accessible<br />
Slow as I am,<br />
Time believes in me<br />
<br />
Though I resist<br />
Struggle is my master<br />
Countering my every impulse<br />
Making me earn twice<br />
What I think should take once<br />
Without explanation<br />
Without justification<br />
Frustrated as I get,<br />
Struggle believes in me<br />
<br />
Though I resist<br />
Suffering is a misunderstood genius<br />
Sculpting my soul<br />
With ruthless chisel<br />
Into something more like me<br />
Deaf to my cries<br />
Blind to my wounds<br />
As I rage,<br />
Suffering believes in me.Fajitahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11028194082067400240noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7439195.post-85965239124435660712016-08-14T08:03:00.000-05:002016-08-15T04:36:14.299-05:00Thus ends... Thus begins...We leave in an hour to drop Sierra off at college to start her Freshmen year.<br />
<br />
Thus ends...<br />
Thus begins...<br />
<br />
She is on this verge of the miracle of launch into adulthood, independence, and freedom like she has never experienced before. It is an exciting time of exploring new contexts, new relationships, and new opportunities. It is the time of making up her mind like she has never had to do before, defining her boundaries likes she has never had to do before, and growing up emotionally and spiritually like she has never had to do before. <br />
<br />
She will have the time of her life and she will be bored.<br />
She will meet incredible people and she will meet some real dogs.<br />
She will experience inspiration and she will experience discouragement.<br />
She will rediscover herself because new cultures and contexts for the rediscovery.<br />
She will discover new parts of herself that are a joy, a relief, and are confidence building while she will also find new parts of herself that require attention, management, and care.<br />
She will face questions for which she will have well rehearsed answers and she will face questions which demand more wisdom of her than she has ever had to produce.<br />
<br />
These are important days for Sierra Joy Gonzalez.<br />
<br />
And we won't see much of any of those days. We will get rare and intermittent dispatches from the frontier - for we, too, are on the verge of the miracle of launch. For 18 years, four months, and 6 days the only way we have ever known how to relate to her landed on the "responsibility for her life" spectrum. And now we're launching from that spectrum to another one called, "watch her fly."<br />
<br />
We have only limited experience with this new "watch her fly" role - and we're not very good at it.<br />
We don't know what it's like when she goes "home" to a different bed.<br />
We don't know what it's like for her room to be empty at night - where is the blue glow of her iphone?<br />
We don't know yet how to eat dinner, the three of us rather than the four of us.<br />
We don't yet know how much or how little to communicate and by which means.<br />
We don't yet know how much of her life we'll even get to know.<br />
How will we balance "we've parented our best" and "she's going to need some help"?<br />
How will we navigate so much no knowing?<br />
What will we do with the space left open now that she is filling other space?<br />
<br />
These are important days for Chris and Gail Gonzalez.<br />
<br />
I rest on these things in this miracle of launch:<br />
<br />
1. God's love transcends challenges (Romans 8:38-39)<br />
2. God's still working on us (Philippians 1:6)<br />
3. God can make good out of anything (Romans 8:28)<br />
<br />
<br />Fajitahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11028194082067400240noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7439195.post-11270712158528307182016-07-15T11:35:00.002-05:002016-07-15T12:06:52.262-05:00Beginning To See in Color<div>
When I was born:</div>
<div>
<ul>
<li>The Watts Riots were less than 5 years old. </li>
<li>The Voting Rights Act was less than 5 years old.</li>
<li>MLK and RFK assissnations were less than 2 years old.</li>
<li>Racial tension was high</li>
<li>"Jesus loves the little children" was a big hit in Vacation Bible Schools</li>
<ul>
<li>"Red and Yellow, Black and White, they are precious in His sight."</li>
</ul>
</ul>
<div>
Growing up in suburban, white Minnesota, however, I was buffered from so much of the racial turmoil. Suburban life provided a sort of privilege that kept me located in a place that did not have racial tension, but not because people of different races got along so well. Instead there was no racial tension because there was so little observed racial diversity in Bloomington and Apple Valley, Minnesota - at least not observed by me. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
I had no idea the social, cultural, and political context of the cute little VBS song. I recall my mother making the point, too strongly it seemed at the time, that all people are equal no matter the color of their skin. I also knew jokes about race were not acceptable. </div>
</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
My childhood years took place in the lingering hangover of the racial violence of the 1960's, but I was not aware of it. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
When I was a teenager in the 1980's, I recall President Reagan aspire to a color-blind approach to race relations. To me, it seemed progressive and fair. And it was, compared to how I understood racism - a collection of offensive jokes and things that happened in history "a long time ago." However, I was not attuned well enough to observe the stark contrast between "red, and yellow, black and white" and being color blind. Frankly, the same people in my life were saying both messages. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
So I was left in a swirl of mixed messages of which I was unaware. </div>
<div>
<ul>
<li>I was unaware that one message highlighted difference while the other message dismissed difference - both messages intended to resolve the huge problem that difference was something people had divided on. </li>
<li>I was unaware that difference was used to rank people. I couldn't see it because social structures such as housing, economics, churches and the social networks within them kept me deeply buffered into my own kind. </li>
<li>I was unaware that history is not static, but sets trajetories. I knew some bad stuff happened once upon a time, but I was unaware of </li>
<ul>
<li>how moments in history, ranging from individual behaviors to massive societal systemic processes, served to create the framework for the future, </li>
<li>how moments in history gave us the vocabulary for very current conversations, </li>
<li>how moments in history caused wounds that were slow to heal</li>
<li>how moments in history highlighted and obscured what seemed availabe to grasp as reality. </li>
</ul>
</ul>
<div>
Many of these processes have come to light to me - the older I get the more of them I see. I am certain there are more to come. It is unnerving seeing the processes set in place that keep people ranking each other's value, that keep people objectifying each other based on arbitrary criteria, that keep people living their lives by perceived threats that perpetuate strategies of threat management. For example, the accumulation of aggressive and violent means of eliminating threat and keeping these mean in reserve just in case - resulting in a silent arms race that seeks to resolve our fear by show of force. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
I think we can agree that skin color is not the problem. </div>
</div>
<div>
I think we can all agree skin color differences do not deserve violence. </div>
<div>
I think we can all agree skin color should not change a person's risk of being killed. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
Where people diverge is how meaning has been and is currently being assigned to skin color. From assigned meaning flows how much people will tolerate someone being treated badly. The paradoxical and problematic process in place is that the people most invested in articulating a message of "race doesn't matter" are the very same people for whom race has served very well - and mattered quite a lot in their favor. Admittedly, it is much easier to notice suffering due to race when you are the one suffering than it is to notice privileges and opportunties due to race when you are the one experienceing the privileges and opportunities. Suffering is seen as unjust while privileges and opportunities experienced long enough simply register as normal - like "what have you done wrong NOT to be getting these privileges and opportunities? Look at me - I did it."</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
I see color now. I see "Red and Yellow Black and White" and Brown and Olive and... I see how the distribution of justice is skewed one way and distribution of privilege is skewed the in the opposite way. I still believe skin color does not cause problems. At the same time, I do believe that the assigned meaning to skin color by humans has gotten us to where we are right now. And where we are today needs improvement. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
I see color. I see color and I think everyone should see color as well. But when we see color, </div>
<div>
<ul>
<li>I want to see color redemptively, not by some ranking system.</li>
<li>I want to see color and have all manner of positive assumptions be the first thoughts I have.</li>
<li>I want to see color as God's imagination.</li>
<li>I want see color as an indicator that I have something to learn.</li>
<li>I want to see color and wonder what special thing God has hidden within that culture He has not hidden within mine. </li>
<li>I want to see color and feel relieved that there are more people than people just like me.</li>
<li>I want to see color and wonder what great strength has emerged within the cutlure that has arisen around that color.</li>
<li>I want to see color. </li>
<li>I want to see color. </li>
<li>I want to see color. </li>
</ul>
<div>
What do you want to see when you see color?</div>
<div>
What do you want to look for when you see color? </div>
<div>
What will you need to get over in order to see color redemptively? </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
We can do this. </div>
<div>
<br /></div>
</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
<br /></div>
<div>
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Fajitahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11028194082067400240noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7439195.post-91661692407352738282016-07-12T20:40:00.000-05:002016-07-12T20:46:34.318-05:00I say "Black Lives Matter"<div style="background-color: white; color: #1d2129; font-family: helvetica, arial, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 19.32px; margin-bottom: 6px;">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjEJokQxJQ5n8njH_X-CTeDGtLX3XW36Wcgnmu8UtqyNqzVQEBpRkq8YVAjZVbtd_CCklGs7RPSN8B_Yual7kvG8Qp527NK4UBuhB-VR4r7V-PgBr9orTJBsCDHJCg2UVq5qBgz3Q/s1600/BLM.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjEJokQxJQ5n8njH_X-CTeDGtLX3XW36Wcgnmu8UtqyNqzVQEBpRkq8YVAjZVbtd_CCklGs7RPSN8B_Yual7kvG8Qp527NK4UBuhB-VR4r7V-PgBr9orTJBsCDHJCg2UVq5qBgz3Q/s1600/BLM.jpg" /></a></div>
I say <a class="_58cn" data-ft="{"tn":"*N","type":104}" href="https://www.facebook.com/hashtag/blacklivesmatter?source=feed_text&story_id=10153894704579092" style="color: #365899; cursor: pointer; text-decoration: none;"><span aria-label="hashtag" class="_58cl" style="color: #4267b2;">#</span><span class="_58cm">Blacklivesmatter</span></a> because there is so much history and current events suggesting that black lives have not mattered enough and still do not matter enough.</div>
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In slavery, Black lives did not matter enough<br />
In the US constitution, Black lives did not matter enough<br />
In the Jim Crow era, Black lives did not matter enough<br />
In the Selma, Black lives did not matter enough<br />
In department stores, Black lives do not matter enough<br />
On roads and highways, Black lives do not matter enough<br />
<br />
<br />
In prisons, Black lives do not matter enough<br />
In Baton Rouge and Falcon Heights, Black lives did not matter enough</div>
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Until we have experienced no fewer than three generations of unquestioned equality, we will not have said #Blacklivesmatter enough.</div>
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Currently, we have not had five straight minutes of unquestioned equality.</div>
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Let's get to work.</div>
Fajitahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11028194082067400240noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7439195.post-73115559356820863302016-07-10T16:07:00.000-05:002016-07-10T16:09:11.583-05:00Uhm, I Don't Have Any Black FriendsHere is a somewhat awkward post about white privilege and black lives matter by a guy named Gonzalez, but here it goes.<br />
<br />
I have friends who are Black. Real friends. Life long friends who I went to church camp with as a kid, who I went to college with when I was trying to learn how to be an adult, who stood up for me as groomsmen in my wedding, and continue to be great friends.<br />
<br />
So how did that happen? Luck. Honestly, it was luck. Perhaps it was more than luck and it was an act of God. All I know is that it did not happen by any effort on my part to connect with Black people.<br />
<br />
I grew up attending nearly all white schools.<br />
I went to a nearly all white colleges for undergrad, masters and doctorate.<br />
I have always lived in nearly all white neighborhoods.<br />
I have always attended nearly all white churches. <br />
All of my jobs except 1 have been in nearly all white workplaces.<br />
I married a white woman.<br />
I have white children.<br />
I shop where white people shop. <br />
I eat out where white people eat out.<br />
<br />
How in the world am I supposed to have a bunch of Black friends if everywhere I go is filled with white people?<br />
<br />
And that is exactly the right question. I have made choices within the existing institutions, social structures, and geographies that were presented to me. In short, I have lived my whole life in the flow of a culture that made being with white people the easiest, most obvious and most advantageous choices for me to make - over and over and over again. Other options were available, yes, but mostly obscured from my eyes.<br />
<br />
I would have had to work and work hard to choose otherwise.<br />
<br />
I do not have friends who are Black because I ever traveled a cultural divide of any kind, but rather because my friends who are Black have lived, for whatever reason, in my predominantly white world. I am grateful for that, humbled by it. It costs them something (every single day) to live in this world that it does not cost me.<br />
<br />
When I talk about white privilege, it is (usually) not some sinister thing white people intentionally do to be extra super white. It is not about white people saying, "hey, look at me, I'm all white and we all know what that means." Instead it means that there are institutions and social processes already in motion that highlight options, possibilities and expectations for white people that keep white people all together and obscure a broad scope of options, possibilities, and expectations that would integrate people. The available options often times have benefits to them provided the individual works hard and plays by the rules (and sometimes working hard and playing by the rules are optional). These benefits are enticing and who doesn't like benefits?<br />
<br />
The problem is that these same options are not highlighted for non-whites as often as for whites and they are often not nearly as accessible. The options, possibilities, and expectations for non-whites are different and often have fewer benefits. Much of these options are obscured from view for non-whites. The cultural flow passes by non-whites differently than it does whites - and sometimes it is not even the same cultural river flowing by.<br />
<br />
These processes are generally not sinister on the individual level (the level at which most people take offense when they hear the world "privilege"), but they are on the cultural and institutional level. Very few white people wake up each morning and say to themselves, "Ahhh yes, another day to cash in on my white privilege at the expense of non-whites." And no one is really making the accusation that white people are saying such things (with the exception of a few corrupt CEOs of major corporations). What is so sinister about the societal and institutional levels of white privilege is that they are mostly so invisible to the people accessing them that they feel normal.<br />
<br />
<i>But Chris, aren't you Latino? How can you even talk about white privilege? </i><br />
<br />
It is a fair question if we have never met. I assure you, I have my white card. So here goes: I do get junk mail written in Spanish sometimes (that I can't read), get a sweet farmer's tan in the summer and three generations ago my great grandparents who I never met lived in Mexico. But I am as Mexican as Tom Fischer from Nebraska is German. Family processes and American culture have effectively scrubbed so much Mexican from my identity. I love being a Gonzalez, but that's now you learn Spanish or have a cultural identity. Yes, I have had some moments that remind me I am not always seen as white, but generally I pass as white and if my name were Smith, I would probably always pass as white.<br />
<br />
My point in all of this is that what we are facing is not only on the individual level, but it is also on the cultural level and includes institutions and social processes with long histories that perpetuate divisions between people - even if those divisions are not part of the current intention of the institution. The divisiveness survives because they are not overtly intention and "normal."<br />
<br />
What I need to do is to create space in the normal and consistent flow of my life where I am in a context where I am not part of the dominant culture. I need to situate myself into places where I am the learner, the student, the one who has to work hard to understand what the assumptions, expectations, and options are. Sometimes I need to be in a context where it is impossible for me to ever be the expert or the hero.<br />
<br />
Perhaps if I can find a way to get the privilege of being invited into the flow of another culture I could have more non-white friends.<br />
<br />
<br />
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<br />Fajitahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11028194082067400240noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7439195.post-75923813750963287572016-07-08T02:14:00.000-05:002016-07-11T09:56:17.069-05:00Black Lives Don't Matter...EnoughPhilando Castile and Alton Sterling are dead. Unnecessarily dead. They were killed by police officers whose job it is to protect and serve. Somehow in their efforts to protect and to serve, two men are dead.<br />
<br />
How could this ever happen? How could this ever happen again? There is no indication that these men did anything worthy of being killed. Not even close. So if they did not do anything that required their deaths, then why are they dead?<br />
<br />
There are lots of things we want to be true that are not true. We want some things to be true because it sure would make it a lot simpler. We want this to be an isolated event. <a href="https://www.buzzfeed.com/nicholasquah/heres-a-timeline-of-unarmed-black-men-killed-by-police-over?utm_term=.is0667Y3b3#.leWrrlBANA" target="_blank">It isn't. </a> We want the killing to be justified in some way. It isn't. We want it not to be about race. It is getting to be an impossible argument to justify given how often this happens.<br />
<br />
Under what conditions does it make any sense that black men keep getting killed by police? Is it the same processes that allow my white law breaking friend with no front license plate get away with it for 8 years while my black friend who one time broke an obscure law about dog walking get cuffed and stuffed? Maybe. What are those conditions, if they even exist?<br />
<br />
The energy that is perpetuating the sense that Black Lives Don't Matter Enough could possibly flow from three different, but related social processes<br />
<br />
None of us feel the upper level winds. The upper level winds are not something we feel on our skin. However, these winds can push a hurricane toward us or away from us. They can move a massive blizzard north or south. No one can see or feel the upper level winds as they are imperceiveable, but the implications of what they do to the things that do impact people are highly consequential.<br />
<br />
Perhaps we can think of prevailing cultural norms and performed cultural assumptions as the upper level winds that push the hurricanes and blizzards of discrimination, objectification, and ranking of people's value based on arbitrary categories such as skin color. My point is that there may be some very powerful forces at work that are not easily observed (by some)<br />
<br />
One might rush to call out racism as the problem - and I agree that it is, but what if the word racism did not exist? What if we had to describe the processes at work using other terms? What are these processes at work that make it more likely that people with darker skin will get worse treatment, in general, than people with lighter skin?<br />
<b><br /></b>
<span style="color: #e69138;"><b>Resisting White Privilege Erosion</b></span><br />
The privileges that white people enjoy in the world and in the United States are many. However, these privileges have been modestly eroding over time (and that is very good and a very "Declaration of Independence-ish" thing by the way). With civil rights progressing slowly and in fits and spurts as well as demographic shifts from white to non-white accelerating, the power structure of people who are white owning and controlling most things, organizations, and political offices is in modest decline. Make no mistake, Whites are still the most privileged by far, but there is modest decline and it is being detected by some whites.<br />
<br />
No one likes to lose privilege. It is not a person's "whiteness" that makes them not like losing privilege, it is their humanness. Being white is not a sin and no one should be made to defend themselves because of their skin color. Not liking the loss of privilege is a human thing. The privilege in the USA just happens to be distributed in vastly greater quantities to whites right here and right now - and often, if not usually, it is at the cost of non-whites.<br />
<br />
When people feel like they are losing something that they believe belongs to them, they are going to put up some resistance. With the the modest erosion of white privilege occurring in the USA, there is a coalescing resistance to the erosion that appears to be gaining momentum. In some cases, there is a no holds barred resistance to the recent modest erosion of white privilege and it gets ugly.<br />
<br />
Resistance to white privilege erosion manifests itself in claims of reverse discrimination, in knee jerk reactions to immigration policies, in convenient amnesia concerning the relatively short history of the nation in general and what appears to be the betrayal of the melting pot impulses that made this country great in the first place.<br />
<br />
For example, when a black man is killed by police and it is highlighted in the news, it is almost certain that someone will post something like this on social media: "White man killed by police and no one cares" or someone will post the pseudo enlightened statement about how All Lives Matter. Yes, all lives matter. The white lives matter, but this fact is not even in question. The extent to which the Black Lives Matter or matter enough is most certainly in question. These are a couple of the many, many ways that resistance to the erosion of white privilege plays out. The irony of the resistance to the erosion of white privilege is that it can only be considered a just response based upon the assumption that the very privilege being defended doesn't exist.<br />
<br />
Furthermore, resistance to white privilege erosion necessitates identifying who the "eroders" are - which of course ends up being those with less privilege - non-whites. Resisting the erosion of white privilege must have enemies and people who are considered the "takers." Resisting the erosion of white privilege is a social process that is divisive and can be very immoral, and runs a terrible risk of being vulnerable to the seduction of unthinkable things. The narrative of White Supremacy can filter its way in and take root before it is even recognized - some otherwise honest person could become an accidental White Supremacist. Not good.<br />
<br />
Black Lives Matter is hard to accept for the person who is resisting the erosion of their privilege. If resisting the erosion of white privilege is paramount, then Black Lives Don't Matter...Enough.<br />
<b><br /></b>
<span style="color: #e69138;"><b>Indifferent White Silence</b></span><br />
If resisting the erosion of white privilege is one process that foments the conditions where hostility could erupt, the indifference of white silence is white privilege leveraged against non-whites. Being socially situated to have the option of apathy can feel like a neutral non-response to events and social processes that occur seemingly outside of circle of influence or circle of concern, but indifferent white silence is anything but neutral. The "not my problem" mentality is itself an act of hostility. Indifferent white silence is potentially lethal.<br />
<br />
How is it that the (mostly white) right to life people are silent when people are killed?<br />
How is it that the (mostly white) NRA is silent when guns are used to kill people whose right to carry is leveraged against them?<br />
How is it that white church is silent on these matters? And if not silent, almost completely inactive?<br />
<br />
The social process of indifferent white silence means there will never be the necessary relationships that allow for the strengths of diversity. It perpetuates the distance that makes the kinds of devastating losses experienced in Baton Rouge and Falcon Heights not hurt white people. Indifferent white silence serves to insulate white people from the pain experienced by Blacks that would otherwise motivate action. If lots of white people were friends with the people who were killed, the white people would experience the loss in ways that would not be tolerable. When your friend is unjustly killed, it is impossible to be indifferent. It is impossible to be silent. When it is someone unlike you or anyone you know, who lives way over there, and might be in a group the appears to be involved in the erosion of your privilege, it is pretty hard to care much about the loss. In such a case, caring about such tragedies is optional.<br />
<br />
Black Lives Matter is hard to accept while maintaining a social process of indifference and silence. If protecting the right to be indifferent and silent is paramount, then Black Lives Don't Matter...Enough.<br />
<b><br /></b>
<span style="color: #e69138;"><b>Perpetuating White Obliviousness</b></span><br />
One of the most insidious conditions of privilege of any kind is how much obliviousness can be up and running. Obliviousness is a difficult condition to remove because by definition there is no awareness of its existence. People who have more privilege do not need to know the assumptions, experiences, or burdens of people with less privilege because there is no perceived gain worth putting forth the effort. The perpetuation of White obliviousness is almost impossible to detect, and in the rare cases it is detected, it is difficult to motivate the unraveling of the obliviousness in order connect with less privileged people. People with less privilege, however, have to be aware of those with more privilege because it may be that there is some stake in it for them.<br />
<br />
I want to make the point that obliviousness is not the same as stupid. Obliviousness is to be unaware of knowledge or information while being stupid is incapable of having the knowledge or information. It is not about intelligence, but it is about perspective.<br />
<br />
Now, obliviousness can operate at the individual level, and that is problematic enough. However, obliviousness does its best and most sinister work at the level of social process. The unwritten rules, the unspoken rules, and even the unknown rules that keep entire groups of White people unaware of the everyday realities of non-Whites generally operate in ways that are experienced as "normal." No one is trying to be oblivious, but when all of the options highlighted before someone are all different ways to continue to be oblivious of certain things while being aware of others, there is little chance to break through the social forces at work to become aware.<br />
<br />
However, the way to break the obliviousness is to take initiative and make friends with people who have less privilege. The blinders can come off quickly when you are friends with people who do not carry the same sets of assumptions as you do.<br />
<br />
Black Lives Matter is hard to accept while perpetuating White obliviousness. If the commitment to simply choosing from the easy options available without exploring what it is like to be someone with less privilege is paramount, then Black Lives Don't Matter...Enough.<br />
<br />
Are the upper level winds of White Privilege in America pushing hurricanes and blizzards of horrific outcomes like the killings of Philando Castile and Alton Sterling? Are the social processes of resisting white privilege erosion, maintaining indifferent white silence, and perpetuating white obliviousness actually social processes and if they are do they have any bearing on the recent violence? I don't know for certain. What I do know is that these processes increase the likelihood of division between people, weaken the social safety net, and make genuine empathy between Whites and non-Whites next to impossible.<br />
<br />
When Black Lives Matter Enough to everyone, then we collectively take away the current and completely unnecessary risks of being Black in America. Until then, we are all partially complicit in contributing to the conditions that make killing make sense..<br />
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<br />Fajitahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11028194082067400240noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7439195.post-17141831388919926592016-06-27T07:29:00.000-05:002016-06-27T07:32:55.850-05:00Wonder BeesMorning Reflection<br />
Isaiah 48:6-7<br />
New International Version (NIV)<br />
<br />
6 You have heard these things; look at them all.<br />
Will you not admit them?<br />
“From now on I will tell you of new things,<br />
of hidden things unknown to you.<br />
7 They are created now, and not long ago;<br />
you have not heard of them before today.<br />
So you cannot say,<br />
‘Yes, I knew of them.’<br />
----------------------------------------------<br />
Fear-driven contempt for not not-knowing can drive the wonder right out of a person, the humility extracted out with cruel efficiency. Discomfort with anything not known can drive one to believe that there is little that is unkonwn, that all is already known. Nothing a surprise. Nothing new. All for the sake of comfort.<br />
<br />
The lust for certainty can constuct illusions of control that prompt delusions of power. The only change desired is controlled change, managed change, manipulated change. Such demands and requirements for certainty factor out the kind of awe-producing spontaneity that opens wide the hearts of children and unleashes unmitigated creativity and joy.<br />
<br />
Fear of the not known, a lust for certainty, the demand to be in control not only erodes any sense of need for God, but perhaps even more devastating, it wears aways at any sense of want for God. An unneeded and unwanted God will disappear, or worse, be a god that looks remarkably like me.<br />
Finding the not known so utterly intolerable such that all must be known, all mysteries solved, all change predicted promises that this pathway will lead to comfort, peace, and even joy when it actually leads to more discomfort, increased injustice, and the increas of suffering.<br />
<br />
This morning, it is not a surprise that the bees are in the clover, but their flight paths, their precarious dangling on the tips of the flowers, their dance among each other tells me a little story of wonder. The math and science of the bees are lost me for the art of the bees.<br />
<br />
I am left with the spontaneity of the experience.<br />
I am left with the anticipation of what they will do next.<br />
I am left with the great blessing of.<br />
"I didn't know that would happen."Fajitahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11028194082067400240noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7439195.post-91741890493870968412016-06-17T06:35:00.000-05:002016-06-17T06:37:11.759-05:00From the Soil of Fear (Ramblings On Fear as a Social Process)Fear is a gift. Fear, as a physiological reaction to danger, is what has allowed humans to survive for thousands of years. Were it not for fear humans would have been eliminated from the face of the earth long ago. Fear is a response that is triggered from the deep part of the brain that energizes the body to run from danger, fight off threat, or try to be invisible until the environment is once again safe. In short, fear saves lives.<br />
<br />
We should all be grateful that we have brains that, without even trying, protect us from all manner of danger with a fear response. However, if humans live only with that part of the brain funtioning, most of the brain remains neglected. The fear response is great when there is immediate danger, but what the brain has to do in order to effectively save us from danger is to turn off the rest of the brain for a while. In short, in order to have an effective fear response, thinking must be disabled. So, when the danger is gone, the brain must re-enable its thinking capacity in order to function in relation with others.<br />
<br />
So, fear saves lives, but at the same time fear is no way to live.<br />
<br />
Fear, once the immediate threat is gone, should also go away. Fear is simply an indicator of danger, not a way to live. Fear is an indicator to do something now and not a way operate all waking hours. Fear is no way to live as an individual. It is no way to live life in a marriage or family. It is no way to live life in a community. And it is no way to live life as a nation.<br />
<span style="color: magenta;"><br /></span>
<span style="color: magenta;">**************************************</span><br />
<span style="color: magenta;">Wait a minute, what is an "immediate threat?" </span><br />
<span style="color: magenta;"><br /></span>
<span style="color: magenta;">Gun to your head = immediate threat</span><br />
<span style="color: magenta;">Political views you disagree with = not immedaite threat</span><br />
<span style="color: magenta;">Grizzly bear chasing you = immediate threat</span><br />
<span style="color: magenta;">Person with different color skin = not immediate threat</span><br />
<span style="color: magenta;">Intruder in your house = immediate threat</span><br />
<span style="color: magenta;">The existance of refugees = not immediate threat</span><br />
<span style="color: magenta;">Tornado hitting your house = immediiate threat</span><br />
<span style="color: magenta;">Annoying Facebook post = not immidiate threat</span><br />
<span style="color: magenta;">*************************************</span><br />
<br />
Relational and communal fear as a social process rather than an individual situational necessity can debilitate a society.<br />
<br />
Fear-based living can result in debilitating paranoia<br />
Fear-based marriage can result in toxic suspicion, false accusationn adn endless blame<br />
Fear-based parenting can result in parental over-protection and youth rebellion<br />
Fear-based community life can result in isolation or rigid tribalism<br />
Fear-based nationalism can result in soul-crushing discrimination and war<br />
<br />
Fear in its place is good, but living in a constant fear state is possibly the most toxic way to live in relationship to oneself and to other people.<br />
<br />
In order to live with other people there must be empathy, but fear disables empathy.<br />
In order to live with other people there must be kindness, but fear disables kindness.<br />
In order to live with other people there must be understanding, but fear disables understanding.<br />
In order to live with other people there must be vulnerability, but fear disables vulnerability. <br />
<br />
From the soil of misplaced fear grow the poison berries of society. When fear is up and running all the time, everything looks like a threat. When fear is up and running, it is easy to be convinced that something, anything is a threat. Why? Becuase when the fear response part of the brain is up and running all it is capable of doing is 1) identifying threat and 2) shutting down all other parts of the brain that are trying to solve for other things (e.g. what is it like to be a refugee and what can I do to help?)<br />
<br />
When the fear part of the brain is up and running, if someone says, "there is a threat," the individual is likely to agree, even if there is no logic to it. It can even feel like logic. Even if statistically the odds are almost zero, when fear is up and running, the threat claim seems plausible.<br />
<br />
Let's be clear, it is not because the person with the fear part of the brain up and running is stupid. Instead it up because the rational part of the brain cannot run when the fear response is up and running. The fear response literally trumps the rational response.<br />
<br />
More than any other appeal in the Bible, "Do not be afraid," is repeated over and over again. Why? It is not merely about having indiviudal peace and inner peace, although that is extremely important. "Do not be afraid" emerges from a deep wisdom about how fear plays out socially. Fear as social soil is bad soil and cannot grow anything good. "Do not be afraid" is a call to a social process as much as it is a call for inner peace.<br />
<br />
The good news is that you do not have to be afraid. You do not HAVE to be afraid. Even when politicians, news stories, social media posts and all manner of conversation invite your fear response more than the thinking part of your brain - you do not have to be afraid.<br />
<br />
Give that thinking part of your brain a chance to flex its muscle. Everyone will be better off for it.<br />
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<br />Fajitahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11028194082067400240noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7439195.post-67152951275504391972016-06-14T10:06:00.000-05:002016-06-15T15:47:01.983-05:00What About The Kids?<div align="center" class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: center;">
What About The Kids?<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The terror attack in Orlando has once again demonstrated
that there is violence, horrific and lethal violence in this world. It has also
demonstrated that we do not know where and when this violence will erupt. Night
club, school, mall, movie theater – it could be anywhere. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Tragic events such as the one in Orlando can trigger anxieties
and elevate fears. For those who are parents, the anxiety and fear can be
multiplied because of the love we have for our children and the responsibility
we have to keep our children safe. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Certainly Orlando deserves our compassion and our concern,
but does it deserve our fear? Should we lock up our kids to keep them safe from
the world? <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The answer is a resounding, “no!”<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Here are a few things to consider when dealing with yourself
and your children in light of the Orlando terror attack. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>Calm Presence.</b> First,
what you need from yourself is the same thing your children need from you – a
calm presence. When you are calm it demonstrates to your children that they are
safe, that there is nothing to worry about. Your calm presence lets your
children know that even though there are bad things that happen in this world,
nothing bad is going to happen to them. Right here; right now – they are safe. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>Assess Exposure.</b> Second,
determine how much of this story your children have been exposed to. Have they
watched hours of television news stories? Listened to repeated loops on the
radio? Do they have access to other devices and social media? How much have
they talked with their friends about this? Knowing your child’s exposure level
to the story can help to guide how much to engage with them. The younger the
child is the less likely they have had some exposure to the story. For example,
if a young child (under the age of 6) has not had any exposure to the story,
then let it pass. There is no real need to bring up such terrible things to a
child so young.<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>Engage At Their
Level.</b> Third, if your do engage your child, make sure to engage at their
level. When a three year old asks, “why did this happen?” it is a very
different question than a 15 year old asking the same question. All a three
year old may need to know is that “sometimes there are bad things that happen
in the world, but the good news is that you are safe here with me and …. (list
other safe adults).” A teenager may need a deeper and more developed conversation.
But no matter the age of your child, when you have a calm presence with them it
communicates safety. Your calm curiosity about what they know is a good soft
start up for a conversation of this kind. A good rule of thumb is to say as
little as you have to and as much as you need to. Overtalking the topic gives
the story more power than it deserves and can create anxiety rather than
resolve it. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>Assess Symptoms.</b>
Fourth, sometimes events such as these can trigger anxiety in children. What
parents need to be looking for is a change in pattern of the child’s behavior,
not one off instances. For example, if the child indicates being afraid one
time, that calls for attending to their concerns, but is not a mental health
concern. If, however, the child begins a pattern of irritability, being
withdrawn or has endless worrisome thoughts that cannot be resolved with calm
attention over time, then that might be something to check into. Again,
overreacting at this point only makes matters worse, not better. If your calm
engagement over time and maintaining the normal and everyday routine does not
resolve the new pattern of behavior, a check in with a family therapist would
be worthwhile (for younger children a play therapist would be good). <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Some parents might find their young children introducing
some parts of the Orlando story into their own play. This is actually normal,
not a symptom of anxiety. A child’s mother tongue is play, not words. Thus, how
a conversation functions for an adult is how play functions for a child. In
most cases, the tragic topic will enter into play and then exit as quickly as
it entered – just like one conversation moves to the next with adults. Only if
the content of the play persists over time and gets progressively more violent
and does not resolve should there be any concern. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<b>Boundaries.</b>
Finally, managing your own concern, anxieties, and fears is essential. Your
child should not serve as your conversation partner about tragedies such as
these. Using your child as a sounding board or conversation partner can result
in the adultification or parentification of your children. In short, what this
means is that you ask your child to perform an adult role with you for your
benefit, not theirs. As a parent, it is your responsibility to have adult level
conversations with adults and to relieve your anxieties with another adult who
can meet them head on equipped with adult maturity. Children are not equipped
to do that, even if they are fully willing to enter into it. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Even though the terror attack in Orlando is tragic and
terrible and deserves our compassion, it does not mean we must become afraid.
In fact, the most powerful response to terror is calmness, the kind of calmness
that results in peace within yourself and peace between people. Terror is
designed to remove calmness; therefore, calmness in the face of terror is the
most powerful and subversive response. It is also the most healthy way to
parent your children. <o:p></o:p></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
Fajitahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11028194082067400240noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7439195.post-64179863409904194572016-06-11T22:37:00.002-05:002016-06-11T22:37:17.396-05:00An Anxious Heart Can Be Many ThingsAn anxious heart can be many things.<br />
<br />
It can be a call to silence.<br />
It can be a call to prayer.<br />
It can be a call to creativity.<br />
It can be a call to work.<br />
It can be a call to come clean.<br />
It can be a call to slow.<br />
It can be a call to organize.<br />
It can be a call to risk.<br />
It can be a call to forgive.<br />
It can be a call to stand up for yourself.<br />
It can be a call to humility.<br />
It can be a call to surrender.<br />
It can be a call to rise up.<br />
<br />
Oh this anxious heart,<br />
So honestly undone,<br />
Speaks the way it knows,<br />
Unignorable voice,<br />
Anxiety, like fire to the touch,<br />
Communicates, talks, SCREAMS like Jagger<br />
And you cannot be the same,<br />
With a voice like that,<br />
Committed to you.<br />
<br />
Try, try to quiet the voice,<br />
Try to smother in mud,<br />
Try to suffocate it with pill-ohs<br />
It will scream ever louder,<br />
Until you hear nothing else,<br />
<br />
Oh anxious heart,<br />
Never forsake or abandon,<br />
For without you,<br />
How would we know?Fajitahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11028194082067400240noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7439195.post-34451435354511730602016-06-01T04:46:00.002-05:002016-06-01T04:49:18.448-05:00It's Just Politics<div style="background: white; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin: 0in;">
<span style="color: #1d2129;">It’s Just Politics</span><br />
<span style="color: #1d2129;"><br /></span>
<span style="color: #1d2129;">When the ocean mocked the desert's thirst, </span><br />
<span style="color: #1d2129;">When the mountain taunted the flat prairie,</span><br />
<span style="color: #1d2129;">When the tree dismissed the flower,</span><br />
<span style="color: #1d2129;">When all creation turned on itself,</span><br />
<span style="color: #1d2129;">In self-preservation,</span><br />
<span style="color: #1d2129;">The planet slowly went dark and cold,</span><br />
<span style="color: #1d2129;">Slowly slipping into eternal night,</span><br />
<span style="color: #1d2129;"><br /></span>
<span style="color: #1d2129;">And then </span><br />
<span style="color: #1d2129;">Suddenly: </span><br />
<span style="color: #1d2129;"> Blizzardmidnight! allatonce,</span><br />
<span style="color: #1d2129;">Everywhere,</span><br />
<span style="color: #1d2129;">Stopping clocks,</span><br />
<span style="color: #1d2129;">Stopping Seraphim,</span><br />
<span style="color: #1d2129;">Stopping meaning,</span><br />
<span style="color: #1d2129;"><br /></span>
<span style="color: #1d2129;">Everyone found a way to be alone</span><br />
<span style="color: #1d2129;">And forgetful</span><br />
<span style="color: #1d2129;">And terribly busy</span><br />
<span style="color: #1d2129;"><br /></span>
<span style="color: #1d2129;"> <i> Oh for a dash of purpose,</i></span><br />
<span style="color: #1d2129;">Sandpounders whimpered.</span><br />
<span style="color: #1d2129;">But from somewhere big,</span><br />
<div style="text-align: right;">
<span style="color: #1d2129; font-size: x-large;"><i><br /></i></span></div>
<div style="text-align: right;">
<span style="color: #1d2129; font-size: x-large;"><i>"Resist!" </i></span></div>
<span style="color: #1d2129;"><br /></span>
<span style="color: #1d2129;">Shouted some light,</span><br />
<span style="color: #1d2129;">And that was it,</span><br />
<span style="color: #1d2129;">But that was enough,</span><br />
<span style="color: #1d2129;">The Lightvoice echoed,</span><br />
<span style="color: #1d2129;">Like the universe was a canyon,</span><br />
<span style="color: #1d2129;">One word broke a hole,</span><br />
<span style="color: #1d2129;">In the dark.</span><br />
<span style="color: #1d2129;">And the dark was beyond repair.</span><br />
<span style="color: #1d2129;">The dark now riven, </span><br />
<span style="color: #1d2129;">Gashed mercilessly by Mercy</span><br />
<span style="color: #1d2129;">Gushing Light of Mercy</span><br />
<span style="color: #1d2129;"> <i> Gosh I needed Mercy</i></span><br />
<span style="color: #1d2129;"><br /></span>
<span style="color: #1d2129;">Can't stop blinking</span><br />
<span style="color: #1d2129;">Remembering</span><br />
<span style="color: #1d2129;">Hugging</span><br />
<span style="color: #1d2129;">We again </span><br />
<span style="color: #1d2129;">Finally, we again</span><br />
<span style="color: #1d2129;"><br /></span>
<span style="color: #1d2129;">Chris J. Gonzalez</span><br />
<span style="color: #1d2129;">31 May 16</span><br />
<br /></div>
Fajitahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11028194082067400240noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7439195.post-46112951032789866572016-05-10T09:13:00.001-05:002016-05-10T09:13:39.158-05:00Class of 2016: Congratulations: I hope you fail (and a little advice for when you do)<div class="MsoNormal">
Class of 2016: Congratulations: I hope you fail (and a
little advice for when you do)<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Dear Class of 2016, you graduate high school in a few days
and will walk across that stage and receive that diploma you have earned. You
will be cheered. You will be freed. You will gain greater access to this great
big world than you have ever had before. This is the one and only time in your
life that you will do this exact thing and let’s be honest – it is amazing!<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
You are eager to launch out in this world and be free. This
is normal. At the same time there may be a hidden anxiousness about the unknown
that you don’t wear on your face, but it lurks somewhere in your heart. This is
also normal. Having two seemingly opposing feelings at once is not new to you,
but having these specific feelings in these specific ways is probably new to
you. Again, it is normal. Having the “I can’t wait to get out there and do
whatever it is I am going to do even though I have no idea what it is” feeling
is normal. Transitions in life end up being like jigsaw puzzles where there is
a picture you are putting together, but you can’t see it yet. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
If you feel excited and anxious, ready and not ready, eager
and apprehensive, this is all normal. Engaging the complexity of life is part
of what it means to be an adult. You won’t know everything before it happens.
Life has its way of providing surprises despite the best planning. Still plan,
sure, but also leave some room for surprises.
<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
The freedom you so greatly desire and will now grasp more
fully than ever before is exciting to be sure, but it also comes with some high
expectations. Really high. This world expects a lot of you. And let’s be
honest, you expect a lot of yourselves as well.
And sometimes those expectations can seem overwhelming. You want to do
well. You don’t want to disappoint. You don’t want to come up short. You don’t ever
want to fail. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Well, I hope you do fail. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
And I hope that when you fail, as you most certainly will,
that you will do something constructive with it. Do! Not! Quit! Deciding that
failure is a reason to quit is the one failure you will not recover from. When
you fail it feels like the end of the world. It feels like there is no sense
moving forward. It can lead you to believe that perhaps you’re not good at doing
this, or you’re not good enough for that or that you can’t do anything right. Failure
can lead to feeling like quitting. Don’t quit. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
How? How do you not quit after failure? <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
Here are ten things to do when you fail:<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]-->1.<span style="font-size: 7pt; font-stretch: normal;"> </span><!--[endif]-->Let
it hurt for a moment. You’re human. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]-->2.<span style="font-size: 7pt; font-stretch: normal;"> </span><!--[endif]-->Decide
that failure does not require quitting. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]-->3.<span style="font-size: 7pt; font-stretch: normal;"> </span><!--[endif]-->Convert
that hurt of failure into meaning (e.g. failure is your teacher, not your
enemy)<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]-->4.<span style="font-size: 7pt; font-stretch: normal;"> </span><!--[endif]-->Seek
out a mentor who is both where you want to be and at the same time has failed
more than you. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]-->5.<span style="font-size: 7pt; font-stretch: normal;"> </span><!--[endif]-->Invite
feedback from people smarter than you are (relax, we are all well acquainted
with failure and do not expect you will be the first person ever to avoid failure).
<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]-->6.<span style="font-size: 7pt; font-stretch: normal;"> </span><!--[endif]-->Be
prepared to have that feedback create discomfort (and then repeat #1). <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]-->7.<span style="font-size: 7pt; font-stretch: normal;"> </span><!--[endif]-->Gather
all that failure and your mentor have taught you and try again. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]-->8.<span style="font-size: 7pt; font-stretch: normal;"> </span><!--[endif]-->Understand
that failure is the only true way to rule out bad ideas you could not have anticipated.
<o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]-->9.<span style="font-size: 7pt; font-stretch: normal;"> </span><!--[endif]-->Come
to embrace the reality that failure builds endurance. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpLast" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]-->10.<span style="font-size: 7pt; font-stretch: normal;"> </span><!--[endif]-->Your
current failure is the going to be the much needed and desired grace you give
to someone else someday who is counting on you to be a great mentor. <o:p></o:p></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
Fajitahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11028194082067400240noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7439195.post-24655816284437295512016-03-20T19:42:00.002-05:002016-03-20T19:51:16.455-05:00One Brutal BaptismOne Brutal Baptism<br />
<br />
Limping down the bank<br />
Into the current<br />
With one brutal baptism<br />
Standing between here<br />
And the other side<br />
Drowning possible?<br />
Drowning required!<br />
<br />
Flesh awashed on shore<br />
Tossed<br />
Water-logged<br />
Limp<br />
Mouth-to-mouth<br />
Breath of life<br />
<br />
Awaken in wimsy<br />
Animated in wonder<br />
Imagination sprung free<br />
All familiar<br />
All new<br />
"I've never been here"<br />
"I've always belonged here"<br />
"Finally! Finally! Finally!<br />
I know what to do"Fajitahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11028194082067400240noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7439195.post-65295367505952652152016-03-16T14:38:00.001-05:002016-03-16T14:38:40.104-05:003 Layers Deep: An Essay3 Layers Deep<br />
<br />
Humans are complex creatures. We are full consistencies and inconsistencies; predictabilities, and surprises; logic and paradox. We experience tremendous joys and horrific suffering, sometimes at the very same time. We long to live and fight to survive while griping about the manner in which we must live and survive. We long to be good, but often find ourselves acting with selfishness or contempt toward others. We long for people to judge us as good while fearing all the while that they judge us otherwise. The desire to appear good presses us toward complex and intricate strategies to manage the impressions others have of us while trying desperately to crush, hide, or deny that part of us that we believe deserves the kind of self-loathing our hedonism or self-condemnation indicate. In short, we have a hard time being whoever it is we were meant to be and can’t stop trying to figure it out.<br />
<br />
Layer 1: IMPRESSION MANAGEMENT<br />
We all seek to manage the impressions others have of us; furthermore we seek to manage them such that it is advantageous to ourselves. This isn’t always selfish. There are ways to manage impressions altruistically, but in the end, even in altruism we manage the impressions of others toward our own advantage.<br />
<br />
Somewhere deep down we know what we are doing. We know that we have to perform for people. We must do the task at work, show up to class at school, appear productive or smart when we are not. We want people to think the best of us in the context we live. Or, if not the best, then some other thing. The dark Goth teen is managing impressions showing only the dark. The hipster is managing impression hoping for sophisticated status and their denial of it is their best perpetuation of it – and they know it. The professor must be professorly even when everything within screams otherwise.<br />
<br />
We want people to have a particular understanding of us and there is the fashion industry, political narratives, and all manner of ways of being seen and understood to back up the sense that we want control over the beliefs others have of us. The person who says, “I don’t care what people think,” lives within a secret from whom no one is excluded knowing the truth – that they too are managing impressions.<br />
<br />
Layer 2: SELF-LOATHING<br />
Some people are more honest about their self-loathing than others, but mostly we are all dishonest about it. We try hard to conceal it. This self-loathing is our reaction to ourselves and that collection of parts about ourselves that we wish were not real or true. Stupid. Ugly. Failure. Rejection-worthy.<br />
<br />
We “know” these things about us are true. Or we “know” that the meaning we assign to them is true. And these things are undesirable. Some of them are just physical characteristics (I’m short or my nose is too big) while others are potentially humiliating. We will do whatever we can to conceal or hide and misdirect such that these undesirable characteristics cannot be seen or given a value by anyone else. With self-loathing comes fear and with fear comes an inability to love. <br />
<br />
We manage impressions in a particular way that people will both see what we want them to see while not see what we wish to hide from them. We bury underneath the surface these things and they become secrets. Secrets just left to rest untouched or covered up rot and spread to everything else around them. We get sick with secrets as the infections spreads within. Usually, the answer to the sickness of our secrets is greater effort invested into impression management. With so many secrets, there is so much more to manage.<br />
<br />
Layer 3: IMAGO DEI<br />
Buried beneath years and decades of impression management and self-loathing is one more layer of complexity – and innocence. It is the Imago Dei. It is the image of God. Humans are not God, but are in so many ways like God. We are daughters and sons of God. What this means is that we have the impulse within us to create, to appreciate beauty, to reach for infinity. We are capable of love through compassion, peace-making, justice, mercy, grace, and all manner of virtue. There is an endless impulse within us to sacrifice for others, to improve whatever it is we come across in this life, to declare “good” that which is good. <br />
<br />
The divine impulse within each person is always alive in the person. Even when the seduction of impression management and the tyranny of self-loathing pile on layer after layer, this impulse to make all manner of good burst forth is always alive. It may be buried with some, but it is alive, free-willed, and ready to unleash goodness, redemption, and relief.<br />
<br />
When humans are at their best, they have given up on the high cost of impression management and have faced their fears concerning that which seems to deserve self-loathing. When humans go to the third layer deep and reach past their base desires and deep fears, there is something there it is beautiful and infinite.<br />
<br />
Where is God? Well, if humans are an image of God, then I suppose God is partially within each of us. If God dwells in a temple and that temple is human flesh and blood, then God is in you.<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
Fajitahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11028194082067400240noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7439195.post-87911051465773557812016-02-13T09:10:00.000-06:002016-02-13T16:38:11.888-06:00What Little SkyRedemption unignorable<br />
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjszIymIqmfLVgjHKTM1lDOlmm5Ag-qPQhxeIwXPOhbJeoNVg1juQ-NZSk1Ll1rUY2VOkzeb504E42RrSV7ztlzGNCDOobEcY3jNe9RBROXbtuLkFb-eAUS24NSvSiQ0OMTkg1few/s1600/tree+silo.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" height="400" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjszIymIqmfLVgjHKTM1lDOlmm5Ag-qPQhxeIwXPOhbJeoNVg1juQ-NZSk1Ll1rUY2VOkzeb504E42RrSV7ztlzGNCDOobEcY3jNe9RBROXbtuLkFb-eAUS24NSvSiQ0OMTkg1few/s400/tree+silo.jpg" width="287" /></a>Reaches to what little sky it sees<br />
Drawn to the light<br />
From the bottom<br />
Of an open grave<br />
Again again again<br />
Reaching reaching reaching<br />
Unobserved, unseen, unremarkable<br />
Without reward<br />
Besides the hope to reach the light<br />
Without reward<br />
Besides another day to live<br />
Without reward<br />
Besides now<br />
Accumulated moments<br />
Gather into a history<br />
Reaching forever upward<br />
Toward a future<br />
That was never intended to inspire<br />
But can't do anything else<br />
No pride<br />
No pretense<br />
No ego<br />
Just reaching for the light<br />
<div style="text-align: right;">
(Photo Cred Jonathan White)</div>
<div>
<br /></div>
Fajitahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11028194082067400240noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7439195.post-18279923843580199852015-11-17T12:54:00.004-06:002015-11-17T13:53:58.252-06:00An Open Letter To Governor HaslamDear Governor Haslam, <span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre;"> </span><br />
<br />
First I want to thank you for your service to the state of Tennessee in your role as governor. You have done great things in your term as governor including making education accessible to so many more Tennesseans who thought it was out of reach. You have been a model for the nation on how to make meaningful and significant changes in areas of great concern. I am proud of your work and proud to live in the great state of Tennessee.<br />
<br />
As a loyal Tennessean, I have the privilege of praising your good work, but also the obligation to share my concerns for decisions that I see as running counter to the best interest of the state and running counter to the very core of who we are as a nation.<br />
<br />
I recently learned that you have asked the Obama Administration to stop taking in Syrian refugees until a better vetting process can be established and consequently have decided not to take any of the 200-500 Syrian refugees who were slated to be resettled in Tennessee. With my greatest respect, this is a mistake. <br />
<br />
<b><span style="color: orange;">It is a political mistake. </span></b><br />
This is a political mistake because we are in a real and sustained war and, whether we like it or not, this is a war of ideas as much or more than it is a war of bullets and bombs. Governor Haslam, although we have better bullets and better bombs, our much better weapons are our better ideas. This nation is nothing without its refugees and immigrants, as the vast majority of people whose feet are on US soil can trace their lineage back to a people whose feet once stood on other soil, whether that be a year ago or five generations ago. <br />
<br />
We must decide whether these words remain true:<br />
<br />
"Give me your tired, your poor,<br />
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,<br />
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.<br />
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed to me,<br />
I lift my lamp beside the golden door!"<br />
<br />
Governor Haslam, we have better ideas. Our founding documents are guiding collection of ideas for the best government that has ever existed since the beginning of civilization. We are a nation of freedom and justice and we are ruled by the people, not a dictator or warlord. We have an opportunity to live out these ideas with people who have never had such an opportunity to do the same. We have the powerful weapons of better ideas embedded into the DNA of this nation and there is no better way to demonstrate to a people that our ideas are better than showing them through our actions of welcome and hospitality. Let’s participate in giving these people a taste of our better ideas.<br />
<br />
<b><span style="color: orange;">It is a strategic mistake. </span> </b><br />
The fear is that some terrorists posing as refugees will get through the refugee resettlement process. Although it is impossible to guarantee 100% that this will not happen, the refugee resettlement process is not the gaping hole that some people fear that it is.<br />
<br />
<br />
<ul>
<li>There is no evidence that resettling refugees in the US has ever brought a flood or even a trickle of terrorists into the country.</li>
<li>Refugees who resettle in the United States are at a lower risk for becoming radicalized than if they settle elsewhere. We have to think with a broad vision. We are not simply resettling people, we are engaging in a cultural intervention for a people who are having to decide who they will be from here on out. The worse the refugee resettlement situation is for the refugees, the higher the chance of people turning against us – especially if they thought they were going to be welcomed here and then were not.</li>
<li>Waiting until a better vetting process can be established will function as a way permanently block Syrian refugees from entering the US. It may not be intended that way, but it will function that way. While they wait, they will resettle elsewhere in much worse and more dangerous situations. Waiting is tantamount to rejecting regardless of intention.</li>
<li>The way we respond to the Syrian refugees is a communication to the world about the kind of people we are. Will the wealthiest nation in the history of the world be stingy? Will we respond out of fear that is more contained in a propaganda-like fear narrative than it is legitimate threat? The world is watching and everything we do defines who we are. Let’s show the world that we are a shining city on a hill and that the light we shine shines for all.</li>
</ul>
<br />
<br />
<b><span style="color: orange;">It is a cultural mistake. </span></b><br />
One of the greatest parts of Tennessee culture is its special brand of Southern Hospitality. Tennessee specializes in delicious and diverse food, the best and most diverse music in the world, and a particular set of manners and kindness that is unique. Being a native Minnesotan, but in my 6th year living here in Middle Tennessee, I have been a non-stop beneficiary of the great Southern Hospitality of Tennessee. It would be hard to find another place that does hospitality better than Tennessee.<br />
<br />
Therefore, the move to block the resettlement of Syrian refugees in Tennessee sounds like a dark and dissonant chord, out of tune with the prevailing cultural norms.<br />
<br />
What I love best about the culture of hospitality is that is assumes risk. Having someone in your home assumes risk, always – even if you know them well. When I was new here in Tennessee, lots of people assumed the risk of getting to know the new family in town. What I have learned living here for over half a decade is that people are willing to assume the risk as well as the cost of hospitality in order to enjoy the sharing of their food, time, and stories – the sharing of lives is worth the risk.<br />
<br />
Furthermore, Tennessee hospitality is contagious. Once you have been on the receiving end of it, it is natural to want to be on the giving end of it. You open your house, kitchen, and life to me and I want to do the same for you and for others who are new and uncertain about their place here.<br />
<br />
<b><span style="color: orange;">And though it is out of place to address a politician with religion (my apologies in advance), it is also a theological mistake. </span></b><br />
<br />
The driving theme in the Jewish and Christian scriptures is to welcome the refugee and treat them with kindness as opposed to reject or delay them until we have 100% eliminated all risk.<br />
<br />
Governor Haslam, I understand that it would come at a political cost for you to reverse your request to President Obama to halt the flow of Syrian refugees into the US. To express the immediate welcome of Syrian refugees would not be a politically popular move right now with many of your constituents. At the same time, you have time and time again demonstrated your willingness to take political risks to do the right thing. Your persistence with health care coverage is obvious evidence for your political courage. You have a track record of doing good things over defaulting to that which only earns political gain. You are a wise and strong politician precisely because you do not simply make decisions based on making political gains, but rather on making good choices no matter the cost.<br />
<br />
My encouragement to you is to do it again.<br />
<br />
Please reconsider your position on Syrian refugees and let them have a taste of American ideas of freedom and justice now. Let them feel the great acceptance of the unique and wonderful brand of Southern hospitality only Tennessee can offer.<br />
<br />
You have the power to help the world see who we really are.<br />
<br />
Sincerely,<br />
<br />
<br />
Chris Gonzalez, Ph.D.<br />
<div>
<br /></div>
Fajitahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11028194082067400240noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7439195.post-56342238045470791302015-10-13T13:36:00.000-05:002015-10-13T15:15:40.734-05:00Mental Health Fitness<div class="MsoNormal">
How do you take care of
your health? Your body that is. What do you either do or know to do in order
to have a healthy body? We all know how it works, don’t we? Eat lots of
vegetables and some fruit and then take it easy on the carbs, meats and dairy –
right? Do 30 minutes of exercise daily, even if it is just walking – right? We
have systems set up just for this purpose. From Weight Watchers and Jenny Craig
to Curves and Cross Fit, there are many onramps to helping you with your
physical health.</div>
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<o:p></o:p></div>
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But what about mental
health? What are the obvious ways to take care of your mind? Your emotional
health? How do you manage your moods? <o:p></o:p></div>
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When people talk about dealing
with mental health care, usually the first thought is a remedial mental health
approach. You know, going to a therapist, counselor or psychologist. But that
is more like going to a medical doctor when you are sick as opposed to the gym
to make a healthy body even healthier. That is sick care. That is important and
necessary, but what is healthy mental health care? What maintains already good
mental health that buffers against a dive into anxiety or depression? What is
the mental health equivalent to pushups, Pilates and planks? <o:p></o:p></div>
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Just like there are scores
of physical exercises for the body, there are scores of mental health exercises
for the mind. The remainder of this article is a small sampling of good mental
health fitness practices that can improve and maintain good mental health and
even turn around some aching mental health issues such as anxiety and depression.
<i>For significant anxiety and depression it
is best to see a therapist just like when the body has high blood pressure it
is best to see a medical doctor.</i> <o:p></o:p></div>
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<span style="color: orange;"><b>Physical Health:</b> </span>To some this may seem ironic or counterintuitive;
however, the link between physical health and mental health is firmly established
in science. Daily exercise and eating right is a powerful influence on the thoughts
and emotions of a person. A daily diet of Swiss Cake Rolls and pizza is going to
result in weight gain, but it also increases the chances of anxiety and
depressed mood. Plus, what regular exercise and healthy eating also does is
provide some order to one’s schedule and some restraint to one’s appetites. <o:p></o:p></div>
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<b><span style="color: orange;">Contemplative Practice: </span></b><i>Ok,
you lost me.</i> Before you quit reading or just skip this one, humor me. All
this means is taking time to be alone and pondering something intentional and
meaningful. And it can take less than ten minutes. Some people use mindfulness,
some use contemplative prayer, some use breath prayer, some use mediation and
some use relaxation exercises - there are so very many ways to do this. All of
them are good and backed by science. Some of them have a religious or spiritual
bent to them ranging from Christian to Buddhist, but many of them have no
spiritual impetus whatsoever. What this is NOT is sitting and ruminating on
everything going wrong or a special time devoted to worry. That is the OPPOSITE
of contemplative practice. What happens in contemplative practice is the
breathing becomes deeper and healthier, providing rich supplies of oxygen to
the blood. It also calms tense muscles that you didn’t even know were tense.
Those muscles might stay tense all day long and go undetected. That’s tiring. Contemplative
practices bring rapid calm to the body and mind. <o:p></o:p></div>
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<b><span style="color: orange;">Highlight Strengths.</span></b> Knowing what you are good at, what your
positive characteristics are and what you have that is valuable to the world is
incredibly important. An honest awareness of your own assets is neither
boastful nor is it narcissistic. How you communicate with and engage with the
rest of the world is what makes for pride when it comes to abilities and
assets. Some people downplay their strengths and assume that everyone is as
intelligent, strong, attractive, funny etc. as they are or that their asset
doesn’t count. Often times they do this because they fear being boastful so
much that they overcompensate and by default tear themselves down. They interject
a constant dose of negative to inoculate themselves against pride. Ironically,
that is another more sinister and stealthier kind of pride – false humility.
Here are three ways to highlight your strengths without being boastful: <o:p></o:p></div>
<div align="left" class="MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst" style="margin-left: 0.75in; text-indent: -0.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]-->1.<span style="font-size: 7pt; font-stretch: normal;">
</span><!--[endif]-->Write them down in short sentences: <i>I am hilarious. </i>Then in your
contemplative time just review them and be glad you are the way you are. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div align="left" class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="margin-left: 0.75in; text-indent: -0.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]-->2.<span style="font-size: 7pt; font-stretch: normal;">
</span><!--[endif]-->Use your strengths often. <o:p></o:p></div>
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<!--[if !supportLists]-->3.<span style="font-size: 7pt; font-stretch: normal;">
</span><!--[endif]-->In certain settings, when your strength would
help, humbly offer to do that task that no one else knows how to do, wants to
do, or is not any good at. <o:p></o:p></div>
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<b><span style="color: orange;">Appreciation.</span></b> This is one of the healthiest things you can do.
There are two major categories of appreciation that can really help with mental
health fitness. The first is to tell someone how much you appreciate them. When
someone does something that benefitted you or when someone is simply just a
wonderful person, tell them. From small things to large things, initiating a
genuine expression of gratitude means a lot to that person and usually it turns
around and means a lot to you. If you can bring a smile to someone’s face
because of what they did that made your life better, then you will likely also
smile. Endorphins for all. Also, and this one is hard, telling someone you do
not like what good you see in them is good for you. It accesses the empathy
that soothes angry and bitter soul sores. The second form of appreciation comes
when you are actually tempted to compare yourself to someone else. <i>She’s so pretty and doesn’t even try</i> or <i>I wish I was an all-star dad like he is.</i>
When this temptation hits, convert the comparison into appreciation. Be glad
for the other person and the assets they have. What this does is gets you
outside yourself and allows for people to have the advantages they have without
it being a threat to your value, meaning or purpose. <o:p></o:p></div>
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<b><span style="color: orange;">Play Inbounds. </span></b>Life happens and sometimes it is really hard.
Frankly, some things about life are impossible. When people are overwhelmed, it
can seem like all of life is one ginormous blob of responsibility and knowing
where to begin can make a person want to just crawl in bed until the return of
Haley’s Comet. Whether life is overwhelming or not, sorting life into two specific
categories is a really healthy thing to do. One category is, “Things I have the
power to do something about” and the other category is “things I do not have
the power to do anything about.” Yes, it is that simple. After doing that,
start working on what falls in the category of “things I have the power to do
something about.” And to get started, do an easy one first. <i>Take out the trash. Go to the store. Wash
the dishes. </i>Just do something you can get done quickly and start the momentum. What to do about the the things that fall into the other category? Some people use that to populate their prayers while other people freely let those things go. Investing energy into something you can't do anything about will wear a person out - fast.<br />
<br />
Playing inbounds also applies to what you agree to do. The word, NO, is so hard
for some people to say. They like the affirmation they get for being wanted.
The problem comes when there is no place to put another responsibility. They have
committed to something they may have the ability to do, but not the time. The
result is converting some other previous YES into a NO, which inevitably increases
stress and anxiety and can even form resentment or regret. <o:p></o:p></div>
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Mental Health Fitness is easily
as important as physical fitness. However, we do not live in a culture that
values mental health fitness. Mental health is assumed and if it deteriorates,
then usually we wait a really long time, until crisis, and then get help -
maybe. Many people just suffer in silence. Using mental health fitness
practices can create more capacity in your life, help you be better at the
things you are already good at and help to maintain and nurture your
boundaries. These mental health fitness practices are very introductory, but
are a good place to start. <o:p></o:p></div>
Fajitahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11028194082067400240noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7439195.post-92162073660099947552015-09-28T08:29:00.003-05:002015-09-28T08:46:14.620-05:00Prayer In A Snap<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;">Having a hard time praying or knowing what to pray for?
Maybe you get so busy that there is no time to pray. Maybe you think prayer is
so important and sacred that it requires a lot of time to set aside to do it,
but you can’t find the time and don’t want to half do it. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<br />
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<span style="font-family: Calibri;">If you are the kind of person who feels like you should pray
more, but has a hard time doing it, then this may be of some help to you. Prayer
doesn’t have to be this long and drawn out process all the time. Sometimes
prayers can be super short and simple, like a quick text or snap to a friend –
just checking in or sharing a quick little thing that has momentary importance,
but nothing of global consequence (or perhaps maybe it is majorly important). <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<br />
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<span style="font-family: Calibri;">Here are 9 Snap Prayers you might want to try. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<br />
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<span style="font-family: Calibri;">9 Snap Prayers<o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<br />
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt 0.5in; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -0.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;"><span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">1.</span><span style="font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; font: 7pt/normal "Times New Roman";"> </span></span></span></span></b><!--[endif]--><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="color: orange;">Morning prayer & Evening prayer.</span> </b>Quick
morning and evening prayers can be as simple as checking in with God in the
morning asking for a good day (help me on my math test) while in the evening
being grateful for at least one good thing that happened that day (thanks that
my locked wasn’t jammed today). <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><o:p></o:p></b></span></div>
<br />
<br />
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpLast" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt 0.5in; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -0.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;"><span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">2.</span><span style="font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; font: 7pt/normal "Times New Roman";"> </span></span></span></span></b><!--[endif]--><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="color: orange;">Prayer of desperation.</span></b> This sort of
prayer comes when there is an immediate need. “God, help!” is enough. <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><o:p></o:p></b></span></div>
<br />
<br />
<div class="MsoListParagraph" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt 0.5in; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -0.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;"><span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">3.</span><span style="font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; font: 7pt/normal "Times New Roman";"> </span></span></span></span></b><!--[endif]--><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="color: orange;">Interceding prayer.</span> </b>When you see
someone else who needs something or is in trouble, this quick snap prayer can
help you empathize with others and call upon God for help. <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><o:p></o:p></b></span></div>
<br />
<br />
<div class="MsoListParagraph" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt 0.5in; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -0.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;"><span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">4.</span><span style="font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; font: 7pt/normal "Times New Roman";"> </span></span></span></span></b><!--[endif]--><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="color: orange;">Confessing prayer.</span> </b>Sometimes you just
blow it. You said something stupid, hurt someone’s feelings, or realize that
you just did that thing you promised you would never do again. Tell God what
you did and share the burden rather than carry it all. <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><o:p></o:p></b></span></div>
<br />
<br />
<div class="MsoListParagraph" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt 0.5in; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -0.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;"><span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">5.</span><span style="font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; font: 7pt/normal "Times New Roman";"> </span></span></span></span></b><!--[endif]--><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="color: orange;">Listening prayer.</span> </b>This sort of prayer
can really have two parts. Part one is like sending a text to God, “Hey, what’s
up?” and then awaiting the rest of the day for the return texts. <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><o:p></o:p></b></span></div>
<br />
<br />
<div class="MsoListParagraph" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt 0.5in; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -0.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;"><span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">6.</span><span style="font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; font: 7pt/normal "Times New Roman";"> </span></span></span></span></b><!--[endif]--><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="color: orange;">Gratitude prayer.</span> </b>A quick “thanks” is
always nice when something good happens. Plus, it helps you remember to be
grateful. <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><o:p></o:p></b></span></div>
<br />
<br />
<div class="MsoListParagraph" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt 0.5in; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -0.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;"><span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">7.</span><span style="font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; font: 7pt/normal "Times New Roman";"> </span></span></span></span></b><!--[endif]--><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="color: orange;">Seeking virtue prayer.</span></b> Sometimes you
realize that the task before you requires something more than what you feel you
have (e.g. patience). A quick text asking for growth is good. "Gonna need help with this one - patience please."</span></div>
<br />
<br />
<div class="MsoListParagraph" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt 0.5in; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -0.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;"><span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">8.</span><span style="font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; font: 7pt/normal "Times New Roman";"> </span></span></span></span></b><!--[endif]--><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="color: orange;">Spontaneous prayer.</span> </b>Randomly thinking
of God for any reason and just checking in is good. Again, you randomly text
your friends and this is really not that much different. "Rainbow this morning. Nice"</span></div>
<br />
<br />
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt 0.5in; mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -0.25in;">
<!--[if !supportLists]--><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;"><span style="color: orange;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">9.</span><span style="font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; font: 7pt/normal "Times New Roman";"> </span></span></span></span></b><!--[endif]--><span style="font-family: Calibri;"><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="color: orange;">Lord’s Prayer.</span></b> This 71 word prayer is
slightly longer than a quick text, message or snap, but it is simply 71 words
of awesome that takes less than 20 seconds to say. <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><o:p></o:p></b></span></div>
<br />
<br />
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpLast" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt 0.5in;">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><span style="font-family: Calibri;">Our
Father who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come. Thy will be
done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive
us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us, and lead us not
into temptation, but deliver us from evil. For thine is the kingdom, and the
power, and the glory, for ever and ever. Amen. <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><o:p></o:p></b></span></i></div>
<br />
<div class="MsoNoSpacing" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;">
<o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"> </span></o:p></div>
Fajitahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11028194082067400240noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7439195.post-66779406569061040092015-09-26T09:42:00.003-05:002015-09-26T09:42:27.423-05:00Pride
<span style="font-family: Calibri;">Pride. It’s ugly, it’s toxic and it’s part of the human
condition. Whether humans are born with it or just pick it up along the way, there
is little doubt that pride walks along with us, climbs inside of us and so
often just takes the over controls and makes us a walking impersonator of
ourselves. <o:p></o:p></span><br />
<br />
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;">Pride is clever and crafty as it wears many faces and does
impressions of other attitudes and even virtues. Pride is so invisible at times
that it can be up and running without anyone detecting it for long stretches of
time – infection without detection. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<br />
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;">
<span style="font-family: Calibri;">If pride were not so much a stealthy, complex, and
perpetually reincarnating individual and social process, it might be easy to
quickly diagnose and treat. But the reality is that pride has no interest in
being diagnoses and treated, it has no interest in compromise, and it has no
interest in sharing. It is a relentless force that seeks to fill every single
little patch of real estate in your soul it can find. Any little crack where
humility has not filled, pride will occupy, take up residence, and defend as
its sovereign domain. Pride is nothing to be trifled with. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri;">One of the great ruses of pride is to define itself in
obvious terms. Arrogance is a form of pride that is often obvious and overt,
but pride would like us all to believe that arrogance and pride are synonymous –
that arrogance is the only form of pride. Pride would like us to look at
overtly arrogant people and compare ourselves and find ourselves to be
something other, better than they are. Pride invites us to separate ourselves
from that overtly arrogant person and declare ourselves humble since we are not
like that arrogant person. That is a major win for pride. Any occasion that
results in some declaration of immunity to pride allows for the undetected
processes of pride to continue unfettered. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri;">Pride, though it has its obvious and overt expressions, spends
most of its time behind the scenes and under the surface, carefully
constructing houses of cards that look and feel real, but in the end result in
seemingly irreversible devastation. Pride likes to hide and lurk<o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri;">One of pride’s favorite ruses is false humility. With enough
practice, there are people who can simultaneously be consumed with and
controlled by pride and be regarded by friends, co-workers, and family members
as <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">the most humble person I know.</i>
When pride engages the power of the social system and event he culture to
perpetuate itself, it is almost impossible to detect. It is up to the prideful
person to do all the work of detection and remedy. And if detection and remedy
is initiated by the prideful individual, the social system around them will
actually work against the remedy. Why? Social systems do not like to change,
especially when the change feels like an indictment. In short, the prideful
individual who is seeking to change is essentially telling the social system that
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">you have supported and helped perpetuate my
prideful living.</i> No one really wants to hear that, so they’ll usually
persist and dismiss that the person was ever prideful in the first place. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri;">Another ruse of pride is internal defiance with external
compliance. Sometimes this process isn’t pride because it is a redemptive
subversion of oppressive forces, but much of the time it is simply just pride. This
process of pride can emerge in work, in family, in school, at church, with God or
in just about any situation when there is a power difference or intimate
relationship. In short, this manner of pride says <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">you can compel me to change my behavior, but I will not soften my
heart.</i> <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri;">Another of the many ruses of pride is depressed defiance.
There is a particularly clever strain of pride that leverages perceived
helplessness to gain, power, control, and even dominion. This manner of pride
can emerge when there is legitimate helplessness (this is distinguished from
resilience and resourcefulness), but does its best work when conceptual helplessness
transcends actual helplessness and it is the conceptual helplessness that is
acted on. It preys on the goodness of people to do for the individual what the individual
could do for themselves. In its most extreme form, it will lead the individual
to perpetrate on oneself and then endure dangerous suffering in order to
control others. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri;">If pride is so clever, so stealthy, and so…intelligent, what
can a person do? <o:p></o:p></span></div>
<o:p><span style="font-family: Calibri;"></span></o:p><br />
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<span style="font-family: Calibri;">The first act of humility is to recognize one’s own
perpetual vulnerability to and propensity for pride. This is not easy; however,
working from the assumption that you are always at least vulnerable to some
form of pride is itself a very humble posture. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri;">The second act of humility is to seek an ever increasing sensitivity
to pride, to be willing to detect its presence. Depending on comparison to
other people as a barometer of one’s own pride is too crude a measure. It is
unnecessary, but it may be a fair place to start. However, it is best to go
past comparison as quickly as possible as it has a whole set of built in
pitfalls. Introspection is important and necessary, but it, too, is likely to
be insufficient. Some other ingredients to getting better at detecting one’s
own pride includes having a small group of people (1-3 others) who you invite
to help you detect it, tell you when they detect it, and have zero judgment in
the manner in which they relate to you concerning pride. Another is to have an
external code for processing experiences. Some people use the wisdom of the
Bible to help them along. Submitting oneself to legitimate sources of wisdom
helps to make one sensitive to one’s own pride. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri;">A third act of humility is to submit oneself to an authority
of some kind. Many people relate to God in this way. Having someone to whom you
consistently seek to show respect and honor allows for you to practice the kind
of humility with another that would work well in lots of relationships, even
people who are not an authority to you. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Calibri;">Pride is nasty. Pride is ubiquitous. The discipline of
humility is the kind of the medicine that remedies and extinguishes the scourge
of pride. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
Fajitahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/11028194082067400240noreply@blogger.com0