Sorting through what was mine, what was projection, and what was never real to begin with.
Driving through Compton, my boys, knowing just enough about the area, questioned a billboard boasting, “We love Compton” inside a giant red heart. Baffled, they asked– “Why would anyone love Compton?” The organic opportunity to explore and share my thoughts on love in the moment was pretty sweet– that love is not just for people and things when they please us or make us feel good– That just means we enjoy them. The billboard is communicating that there are people who care for Compton and are contributing to better living for the families of a struggling community. Laughing, I added- “While I always want what is best for you, you don’t always make me feel good, nor do I always enjoy you. But, I do and always will love you.” (more…)
Discovering loyalty, which, fingers crossed, will come bundled with learning to forgive betrayal- is a BIIIIIG part of my journey. Forgiveness is something I struggle to do the way my family demands grasp. Or maybe I fully understand it and am ill-at-ease with the fact that my definition not accepted, by those who do not accept me differs from those who think it means pretending It never happened. Deep sigh. (more…)
Not stoic enough to be silent or aloof, I am practicing saying and doing nothing in response to underhanded invitations to enter into indirect conflict. While I
now set boundaries for only myself, without arguing to be heard, my abstinence from standard entanglement is labelled abandonment—“cutting them off” because that is how silence is used in my family. I just say No. Or Sorry that won’t work until it no longer makes sense to say it again.
So, I have mostly quieted my mouth, but my head still spins with all the things I wish to say or stop feeling and thinking. Silence with a trusted other is golden.
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Wow...I think this is worth sharing--maybe not their prayer, just their story. Always.
