The Gift of Feeling

It occurs to me that one of God's greatest gifts is the ability to feel. I mean in a sensory way, but I also mean the deep, visceral way of knowing and feeling. Looking back on my life, I am not sure that it was normative in my family to feel. I remember not feeling well physically, and not being given the ability to just be sick. Do you know that it is a gift to be allowed to be sick?

I had stomach pains that were never explained as a child. I certainly don't remember going to the doctor to figure out what they were about. I also suffered with asthma, and though I had medication that was so nasty I still recall it's disgusting flavor, I always felt like I couldn't breath deeply. So, I learned to get by without breathing deeply, and didn't find relief until I learned to play the flute. Playing the flute gave me the ability to breath more deeply, and the skill helped my entire life. Somehow, God knows how to work like Flip Wilson's old character Geraldine, "...in the back, in the corner, in the dark..." All in all, what I began to believe is that it was normative to repress dissatisfaction, joy, illness, sadness, love, and fear. Eventually, as a teenager, I was attracted to the quick fixes that mimicked deeply emotion and feeling, but was left wanting.

As an adult, I finally figured out that I didn't hear "I love you" enough. I figured out that I missed too many kisses from my mother, and too many compliments from my father. And though I am now a confident, high-functioning person, I am going to work on giving permission to myself to feel in spite of. Someone I love very much doesn't appear to love me back--at least not as I wish this person would. So as I am writing, I'm crying. How liberating! I'm so glad that I can cry and know love in such an abiding way, even when it is painful. I'm so proud of Barack Obama I can't help but smile when I think about how history has turned, and how he has participated in that change. I smile until my face hurts sometimes! As I got out of the bed to write this entry, I shut the door on my fingers by mistake. After my initial reaction and assessment of whether or not I was hurt, I was struck by the pain. I'm not sadist or crazy, but I was glad in that moment to have the ability to feel! I know it is a gift to feel in whatever way, because if I can hurt like that physically, I also have the capacity to be joyful and fulfilled.

In my maturity as a human, as a woman, in all my gifts and faults, I am so proud of my decision to live more fully. This includes loving myself and others more intentionally, experiencing life more fully, even when I am afraid, and feeling deeply. After years of believing whatever is holy must be the opposite of what is divine, finally I realized they can be one in the same. Just breathing is a holy act, so I offer to you that everything you are--even the parts you fear or don't understand--can be a gift that leaves you standing on holy ground. Maybe the next time you look in the mirror, you should breath deeply... and take off your shoes.

A Prayer for the Inauguration of President Obama

Creator God,
God of life, and provider of new opportunities for wholeness and healing,
I pray to you this day a new prayer.
I have no formulaic incantation or dance for you.
Today, is too important to regurgitate the prayers that worked for my grandfather or for my mother.
While I may pray those ones in my prayer closet, for they are deep, abiding and powerful, I pray today what is on my heart.
I will not pray, "Keep me and mine safe, to include my president,"
Because this is too puny for who I see you to be, O God.
Essentially, I believe you want safety and goodness for President Obama, his family, and for all your children.
O, God, I just want to thank you.
I am privileged to be alive, to be the daughter of daughters of the whip.
I just want to thank you.
I am so glad that my grandmother's eyes, eyes that have seen palpable hate etched on a metal sign over her water fountain, a sign that told her rusty, warm water was what she deserved--
Those eyes will see that you are Sovereign, that you are able, in her "son'' Barack Obama.
So, if you don't do another thing for me, for this I say thank you.
I thank you that you kept her alive long enough to see this day.
I want to thank you that your child fast forwarded his political plans to step up to the plate, because if we ever needed an innovative and God-inspired leader, we sure do need him now.
When bad things happen, religion and religious people have often wrongly assumed that you are off the job, that you are silent for no reason, allowing us to swim through life on our own.
But I know you are here, always here, always providing, always loving, always intervening.
I believe that those of us who decide that we know better shut you down.
You can't work, for we give you no clean hands to function with, and because everyone has not learned how to hear your voice, some assume you must be as untrustworthy and mean-spirited as any human can be.
No.
It is time for a new belief in who you are, Dear God.
Help us to be hopeful, to know in our hearts that you love us, and that you are a Creator and not a destroyer.
Help us to give humanity the benefit of the doubt, for often good people enter evil plots because all the grace has been squeezed out by fear, anger, and doubt.
Today, I pray for President Obama's safety and success with every fiber of my being.
I pray that assassins' bullets won't fly, and that you change and soften the hearts of a society that produce terrorists and assassins who believe that one can kill another that one didn't create,
Who believe that one's ideology can be so important and righteous in one's mind that the way to make change is through violence.
I believe that if our hearts are changed to honor life, and to respect and value others, there will be no bullets.
We will see a generation of peace that many only dreamed would come.
We have seen leadership that only existed for itself, and we are tired.
That kind of selfishness can produce wars on a whim, and not care a bit as long as pockets grow fat.
I pray that his leadership will help each of us as citizens of the world become a part of the solution--for all people.
I hope that such fierce and focused light is shined on oppression, privilege, and evil that finally this country can have real healing to wounds that still gape from neglect and from being ignored.
I pray that we will not let President Obama stand alone so that if he tumbles, he falls down with no support.
Let us rush to his aid, to be a fence all around him, to support him with our prayers and with our right actions to build the Kin-dom of God through our schools and our communities, here and across the world.
Let this inauguration be the beginning of a new way to govern and be governed, a new way to live.
Let this occasion remind us who we are and whose we are.

Lord, this doesn't sound like the prayers I've often heard, but I pray to you with a liberated and open heart, knowing you hear and answer prayer.
This I lift this pray to you as we celebrate this joyous and pivotal occasion of your grace, Amen.

A penny for your thoughts, $1.5 million for your kidney

Today, I was listening to the news as I was walking through the house attempting to wake up. So, through my haze, I passed by the television just as I heard, "A man is divorcing his cheating wife, and now he wants back the kidney he gave her." What the...? I couldn't move. I had to listen to the rest of the story. He went on to say something like he didn't think she deserved it. He wanted it back, or the value of that kidney--$1.5 million. Ummm...I've been hurt, y'all. I've been so hurt by someone that I didn't know that my tear ducts could produce that many tears. My goodness, just thinking about it makes me sad. I've also been so disappointed that I felt justified in wanting revenge. In the moment, I didn't feel like the person even deserved oxygen! He was so lowdown that he was stealing it from humans and animals that needed that oxygen. Nobody human could do to me what he had done. That kind of pain sends you into a pit so dark and deep you end up looking like a villain on a Disney movie, furrowed brow and all.

Well, I got over it. The rush of emotions subsided. After considering things, I didn't hate the person. Eventually, I got over him, and was glad that I didn't participate in any mean-spirited things that I fantasized about. Because I've lived a few years, I knew that life would one day show him the kind of pain he caused me, and that there was no need for me to wish him suffering. I'm sharing all this to say that if I gave that man one of my kidneys, and we broke up, I think I would have to chalk it up to the game. If I gave him a kidney as an insurance policy to stay with me, then I have problems, and should rush to the therapist. I understand that this man is hurting. She has allegedly withheld his children from him, and she cheated on him. He is scrambling for anything to get her back, but this is ridiculous. I really hope that he learns to forgive, withdraws the case, and moves on. I also hope he directs all this energy somewhere positive, like pursuing joint custody of the children. Ultimately, I feel sorry for him, and sorry for a world where when we hurt, we often run to the lawyers office first to sue our pain away. The really sad thing is that it rarely works to alleviate the suffering. I will pray that this family reconciles in some way. And...if this man wins the case, I hope that his ex-wife lives near a good butcher. There, she can get him all the kidneys and innards he wants.

It's a new year, and though I am not a huge fan of resolutions--which often become opportunities for guilt and failure--a new year does offer the opportunity for fresh ideas and transformation. I am years and pounds past the weight loss resolution, a marriage past meeting Mr. Right, a therapist past coming to terms with my childhood. This year, these things just don't seem as important as they were. This year, I feel like I just want to do some work on me, for me. Here are my action steps for the year, and I am sure more will come as I do the work:

• I will be kind to myself. I will not call myself names, or repeat and perpetuate negativity. I will understand that this work is primary, and will support the success of the other steps.
• I will respect myself and respect others.
• I will look for beauty, and spend time with it, knowing that the beauty I experience is a reflection of my own. I can only see what I see or experience as beautiful if I acknowledge and own the beauty in me.
• I will care for the earth. I will determine how my lifestyle impacts her and make changes toward her healing. I will spend less time blaming government and big business, and more time owning responsibility as part of the problem and the solution.
• I will make community wherever I go. I have found that I can be with people without being impacted by them, or without sharing my life in meaningful ways. I will be open to the possibility of new relationships. I will stop pushing people away, and lamenting that I am alone.
• I will be transparent. As a minister, as a mother, as one who is in relationship, I will stop refusing to engage until I "get myself right." I will believe that people can love me just for me. I will have faith that people are kind and desire to have a leader who is engaging and open.
• I will be honest that I sabotage my success. Instead of longingly admiring the success of others, I will congratulate them as I am successful in my writing, in my business, in my music, in my relationships.
• I will risk! I will ride a rollercoaster, learn to ski, do something daring. Safety is important, but it can lead to bitterness and to a life unlived if being safe is the only goal. I am not on earth only to turn 80 one day with no scars.
• I will speak on behalf of someone with no voice. I will sing to someone who longs to hear their song. I will touch a hand that has forgotten how a kind touch feels. I will surprise someone with a image of God and of themselves that is healing and relevant to their life and circumstance. I pray fresh prayers, in my hands, in my feet, and in my heart.
• I will be a lender and a borrower. I will ask for help when I need it, and be grateful for when I can help others. I will remember that grace is not just giving in a spirit of unconditional love, but learning to receive without feeling as if I have to repay the gift.
• I will start a business, not to make money only, but to share who I am with the world, and to offer a new way of doing business that is not about the bottom line or the status quo.

This year, I pray you find steps that will push you to a better you. I pray that your life is full of goodness, and understanding and grace when the bad times come. I pray that you are open to the gift within you, and that you experience peace for your journey.