The healing journey of a widowed, unschooling badass in Delaware.
Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength.
-Deuteronomy 6:5 NIV
When you pour your love into the Highest, you are transformed. When embracing my love for God, I embrace those around me and find deeper ways to act as a messenger of God’s love.
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When I first met my girlfriend in person, I doubted it would become romantic. She was seeing someone, lived an hour away, and had been clear about not wanting to be pursued.
It created a safe space, there weren’t games of seduction.
We talked about what we wanted in all our relationships, not just the romantic ones. I told her I wanted contenders, men and women who would push me as hard as they loved me.
Kristen has become one of the main contenders in my life. She loves me deeply and pushes me to be more than I am. She didn’t let me make excuses to skip jiu-jitsu training tonight. She called me out on my bullshit.
I got myself to Elevated Studios and got beat up.
I don’t think I could be more grateful for my lack of conditioning and flailing technique tonight. I pushed my self to dizziness and got off the mat before I got hurt.
We don’t voluntarily go to our uncomfortable limits often enough. Voluntary stress limits the power that involuntary stressors can have over us.
I yelled at my sons after a long day of getting a hard time from them. I feel like I ruined a happy day of celebrating the Resurrection.
I feel unworthy of all my blessings. I have to stop these outbursts. I have to do better.
Hear O Isreal: the Lord our God, the Lord is one.
-Deuteronomy 6:4 NIV
And I will doubly recompense their iniquity and their sin, because they have polluted my land with the carcasses of their detestable idols, and have filled my inheritance with their abominations.” O LORD, my strength and my stronghold, my refuge in the day of trouble, to thee shall the nations come from the ends of the earth and say: “Our fathers have inherited nought but lies, worthless things in which there is no profit. Can man make for himself gods? Such are no gods!” “Therefore, behold, I will make them know, this once I will make them know my power and my might, and they shall know that my name is the LORD.”
-Jeremiah 16:18-21 RSV
I hear this in Samuel Jackson’s voice:
“…they have polluted my land with the carcasses of their detestable idols, and have filled my inheritance with their abominations…and they shall know that my name is the LORD.”
It’s the night before Christ rose from the dead. On this night, Mary and his loved ones thought they would never listen to his voice again. I imagine they went to sleep heavy with exhaustion from watching him die on the cross and burying him the day before. Not a contented sleep, but the weighted kind that feels like its own death. The next day their bodies and spirits will feel reborn along with the risen Christ, but they don’t know that tonight. Tonight is only darkness.
Tomorrow the Lord will be heard.
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“He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning nor crying nor pain any more, for the former things have passed away.”
And he who sat upon the throne said, “Behold, I make all things new.” Also he said, “Write this, for these words are trustworthy and true.”
-Revelation 21:4-5 RSV
Holding onto a vision of the joyous end, we can lighten our pain and create a more heavenly world.
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Widowhood has taught me about my body. I have learned how much emotion and energy I carry in all parts of my body. When I don’t work that energy in physical ways, my whole system feels backed up and tight to the world.
This week has had a lot of soccer with some yoga and jiu-jitsu and the usual rough housing with my sons. These usually come in the evening after various combinations of church, Lego club, home education meet up, and field trip.
There’s a limit, but I need this pace. I have energetic boys, but I need time for me to work on my body. This morning during yoga I laughed and cried. I love hot vinyasa because I sweat like I have a condition and the tears are hidden as I slowly move through the posses. Soccer and jiu-jitsu are escapes from my anxieties, yoga allows me to feel. I always open my practice with a thankful prayer to Jesus and a request to help me heal and learn all that I can stand. God is good and always delivers.
https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/your-health/covid-by-county.html
https://www.cnbc.com/2022/04/11/-philadelphia-reinstates-indoor-mask-mandate.html
These things are happening at the same time.
The studies that denounce masks as protective far outnumber the ones that presume to promote their protective function. Nearly all the studies that support the narrative that masks work have been published since the Covid propaganda machine went into effect. Fauci and his public health bureaucrats have been caught pushing narrative over scientific exploration.
It’s just superstition now. Politicians and government functionaries are witch doctors more interested in protecting and increasing their power than protecting people. It is becoming more obvious every day.
I am heartbroken that arts organizations are making it harder for people like Clifton Duncan and my sons to act and work in the arts.
These organizations are dividing people with their medical demands and promoting a segregated society.
And for those of us devoid of talent; yet who feel deeply when we sit down and experience humanity distilled into a moving performance, the arts are shutting out some of their most fervent supporters.
Masks? Who still has an argument for this? Fauci and his acolytes have been lying for two years and now they are caught out. Why are arts organizations so far behind the truth?
Vaccines? What does “fully vaccinated” mean? It changes depending on location and political climate, neither of which has any basis in truth. How can you continue to pressure your neighbors into medical decisions when there is so much uncertainty and more signs of deception from public health officials?
You are forcing the emergence of an alternative community that will supplant you. Those who respect human sovereignty are driven to create truly inclusive communities. We are celebrating the great works and producing our own without poking into each others political and personal lives.
You have taken the first step towards becoming a relic of superstition. To quote Duncan from another podcast, “There aren’t enough wealthy white theater goers…” to sustain the industry.
Do not love the world or the things in the world. If any one loves the world, love for the Father is not in him.
-1 John 2:15 RSV
Everything in this world decays and disappears. God’s realm is eternal. When your love is focused on the eternal, you can care for the things of the world without attachment to death and decay.
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Humble yourselves therefore under the mighty hand of God, that in due time he may exalt you.
Cast all your anxieties on him, for he cares about you.
Be sober, be watchful. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking some one to devour.
Resist him, firm in your faith, knowing that the same experience of suffering is required of your brotherhood throughout the world.
And after you have suffered a little while, the God of all grace, who has called you to his eternal glory in Christ, will himself restore, establish, and strengthen you.
-1 Peter 5:6-10 RSV
I am praying to cast all my anxieties on the Lord. His grace is a gift of peace.
Disclosure: The links below are affiliate links, meaning, at no additional cost to you, I will earn a commission if you click through and make a purchase.