Jennifer Lambert

A Sacred Balance

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Hospitality

This blog may contain affiliate links: disclosure. Please see my suggested resources.

December 19, 2022 By Jennifer Lambert 3 Comments

I used to stress out over having dinner parties, birthday parties, gatherings in our home.

Now, I refuse to sponsor events in my home.

I protect our home as a sanctuary.

For years, the church told me that I must be ever ready for hospitality. I believed that – a little too much perhaps.

I wanted to be a good wife and mother. I thought that included planning and having parties.

I remember my mother having my birthday parties in our home. I’m an only child. My aunts and cousins and some school and neighborhood friends would come. My father was always on a business trip. My mom planned it every year while he was away.

I remember going to my aunt’s house for every holiday. It was festive and exciting. The decorations made it special – because my aunt went all out and it was just gorgeous. The foods and punch were only available those wonderful moments each year so I looked forward to them even more. My father stayed home alone every single year. My mom and his mother and I would go.

As a military family, we never got to experience holidays with family. We’ve always lived hours – or even oceans away.

When we planned our own little family holiday dinners, I was so stressed about making everything perfect that I would make myself physically ill. Every holiday, I would burst into tears because something wasn’t just right at dinner. The wine was spilled. The meat wasn’t cooked just right. I would forget something important, like cranberry sauce. But, I had no help. My kids were babies. My husband stayed out of the way while I worked myself into a frenzy. My mother had my two grandmothers for help and I just don’t think they really cared all that much about the details.

My kids are teens now and we cook together like a symphony.

I feel like a really horrible mom about not having birthday parties for my kids, but we bought all the themed decorations and I baked cupcakes and planned games…and no one showed up. Like, no one showed up for an entire year for my kids. No one RSVP’ed and no one came at all. We sat around as a family, staring at the cupcakes and snacks, until I went to the bathroom and cried because I realized what was happening. Then we turned on music and had our little family party.

I stopped planning my kids’ birthday parties about ten years ago.

After that year, we did everything almost the same for birthdays, but we invited no one. It’s not about getting lots of presents. It’s about celebrating my people.

My kids don’t get invited anywhere either because we homeschool and don’t go to church anymore and we just don’t have any one.

The people we thought were our friends promptly forgot about us the moment we moved away. We were even unfriended on social media. This was before I even knew what ghosting was. I’m still hurt by the lack of closure. Did I say or do something to offend? Did my kids hurt the other kids’ feelings? Did my husband upset someone? We will never know.

It was hard to socialize with my husband’s coworkers because we were often admonished for intermingling with different ranks. Even now that he’s retired and working at a local hospital, work events take place at work, so families aren’t involved.

The quarantine with COVID thankfully didn’t affect us all that much, but we’re even more isolated now. There is a gap in my son’s experiences since he has aged out of most the homeschool classes his siblings got to take. All the extracurricular activities were closed during COVID and now it’s too late for him at almost age thirteen.

My kids used to play in the neighborhood with a couple kids, but no one was ever allowed inside houses, and that’s so strange to me who grew up in the 1980’s and we were everywhere all at once. My kids lost the few acquaintances they had in the neighborhood the last year because they’re from ultra conservative families who were antivax and told us my trans kid is going to hell. My kids chose not to compromise.

I used to dream of being that house all the kids congregated at – with cookies and snacks and safety. No one over the age of ten is outside anymore. Kids are kept in classes, planned activities, rec sports, school-related extracurriculars. They have no time anymore. They have no freedom.

In Utah and Ohio, we invited people from church for celebrations and a few times it even turned out ok. I’ve been criticized by not having my kids more involved or cutting corners with store-bought cookie dough. But even when people brought a side dish, it was so very expensive hosting. I even learned how to make fun and delicious vegan dishes for the vegan pastor’s family.

It’s amazing how quickly turn against you when you begin questioning sexism and racism and capitalism in the church. We were only as valuable as we were available to work harder and spend our own money on entertaining the church. I was told to have a nice life as a dismissal. So, that chapter is closed in our book.

“Don’t leave the church because of the people who hurt you. Nobody is perfect, only God.” I’ll explain why this comment is not only not helpful at all, but also very harmful.

Jo Leuhmann

I tried to be kind to my eldest child’s friends. I invited her people over for dinner a couple times, but it’s stressful on my younger kids to feel they have to perform.

Now it’s about keeping us safe from antivaxxers.

Yes, I realize I sound whiny. But to constantly beat my head against brick walls eventually gets tiresome. We’ve been hurt and ignored and abused for so many years that it’s really hard to keep trying. I refuse to stay where I am not appreciated or celebrated. I would rather be alone. I would rather save my energy.

We desperately tried to be hospitable over the years.

My home is safe and a sanctuary from the world. I want my kids to feel safe inside our home and not hypervigilant against someone who might pose a health danger.

My introverted self is safer and happier alone in my home with my cats and my kids.

We don’t need Bible verses spouted in hate admonishing us to try harder.

Books That Have Helped Me:

  • Gabor Maté
  • John Gottman
  • Harriet Lerner
  • Susan Cain
  • Elaine N. Aron
  • The Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma by Bessel van der Kolk 
  • Jesus, the Gentle Parent by LR Knost
  • Motherwhelmed by Beth Berry
  • Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents: How to Heal from Distant, Rejecting, or Self-Involved Parents by Lindsay C. Gibson

You might also like:

  • I Tried Therapy
  • Grieving Family Who Are Still Alive
  • Toxic Positivity
  • Teaching Kids About Healthy Relationships
  • Introvert Holiday Survival Guide
  • What If I Don’t Have Friends?

Linking up: Pinch of Joy, Create with Joy, Suburbia, Random Musings, Homestead, Eclectic Red Barn, God’s Growing Garden, Jenerally Informed, InstaEncouragements, OMHG, Artful Mom, Life Beyond Kitchen, Slices of Life, Joanne Viola, Soaring with Him, Fluster Buster, Ridge Haven, Answer is Choco, Lisa Notes, Pieced Pastimes, Being a Wordsmith, LouLou Girls,

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Filed Under: Faith

Exvangelical

This blog may contain affiliate links: disclosure. Please see my suggested resources.

October 10, 2022 By Jennifer Lambert 19 Comments

I didn’t grow up in church.

I do feel that my parents failed me in this way, not having a church community or knowledge of religion while living in the Bible belt.

I was taught to recite a simple children’s dinner blessing and bedtime prayer. I attended church with school acquaintances occasionally and my paternal grandma twice a year.

I remember being invited to and attending AWANA once for that “bring a friend night requirement to earn a jewel in the crown button.” It was a horrifying experience for me. I didn’t know any Bible verses. I didn’t know anything about church or religion. It was loud and I was anxious and I felt very out of place. I didn’t know the script or what was expected of me. I felt lost and alone.

I remember embarrassing myself and my Jehovah’s Witness friend and everyone else listening at our lunch table in 6th grade when I announced that God was dead and lived up in heaven.

I really didn’t know any better.

I remember in my Georgia public high school, being accosted in the hallway between classes by Christian classmates:

“Are you saved?” demanded a preppy white boy holding up a thick black KJV Bible, gesturing with it, like a weapon.

“From what?” I countered. I really wanted to know what he would say, but I was offended and offensive.

He stumbled and stuttered because he had no real answers for me beyond his script that he learned at his Baptist church and youth group rallies. He’d never been questioned or been taught critical thinking. All throughout high school, I could never get any real answers that satisfied me about church or God or Christians from anyone.

I remember attending a youth group meeting when I was sixteen because it was one way I could socialize that my strict parents approved of and didn’t ask questions. The youth pastor (24-year-old son of the head pastor) taught a lesson about doing everything for Christ. It was probably based on Colossians 3:17, but I didn’t know the Bible very well then. I had no reference point for this sermon. I do remember being very confused by his analogy that we should play football for Jesus. I wondered how Jesus could really care about football. We were told to keep Jesus in everything. The message was completely lost on me. And the line in the CCM song about a “big, big yard where we can play football” always makes me think of that night and I remember my confusion and I am still thinking that Pastor Beau failed to make his point.

I went to college and grad school. I taught English in both private Christian and secular public schools. I am smart and educated and was told I could do and be anything. But Southern society, my parents, family, friends, acquaintances, the media, and my schooling sent me so many mixed messages. The Christian-proscribed gender roles permeate every aspect of North American society.

As an adult, I look back on all the lost years when I desperately tried to fit into church culture, Christian culture. The things I didn’t understand then and was just encouraged to accept, never questioning, has me regret not listening to my gut feelings more.

The charm and flattery of abusive leaders makes it difficult to trust. The Christian celebrities don’t interest me as I read about their egregious fall from too much pride and power and money every day.

My first experience of regular church attendance was with my first husband’s family. It was the Pentecostal church – Church of God, complete with Prosperity Gospel. I was shut down when I tried to ask questions.

After two failed marriages amid so many visits to Christian therapists who told me such lovely things as being available – ready and willing – for sex anytime, being more submissive, more forgiving of his porn addiction, less angry, doing better with housekeeping and meal planning – even while working full-time, keeping the baby quiet, not discussing my income or job details so as not to make my non-college-educated or out-of-work husband feel inferior, to be more cheerful and not rock the boat or nag.

Unhealthy enmeshment makes wives feel like their husband’s porn use has something to do with them. It does not.

Kimberly Stover

I was desperate to do the right things. I thought I was the problem and if I could just find the right formula, all would be well. Then I would be happy.

I wanted to raise my children with more than I had, but I thought religion was what we were missing. Our society and the church teaches that there can be no morality or goodness without Christian teachings.

I was taught that everything I loved was sinful and wrong – books, movies, music, art.

What do unbelievers do for the glory of God? Nothing. Therefore, everything they do is sinful.

John Piper

I married a third time. We began homeschooling my eldest daughter and I was pregnant back to back with my middle two kids.

I researched and thought I was doing the right things, but I was very easily swayed into almost cult-like evangelical Christian homeschool circles. The Christian science curricula is dumbed down and we struggled with finding any good alternatives. Many Christians don’t learn or teach real science in all its nuances because they don’t encourage curiosity or questions and can’t handle subtleties. Also, I was constantly criticized for our literature material and the freedom I wanted my kids to have. I had to constantly monitor my language and vocabulary. Obviously, no cussing, but I had to censor words like luck and charm and learn to replaces those with Christianese words.

My kids remind me of this time of our lives when I became so strict and legalistic. We only listened to Christian hymns. I was in agony and so lost. I hated myself. They were scared of me.

I had no voices of reason and no religious background to realize the red flags waving in front of me for years. My husband didn’t realize how insidious these conservative homeschoolers are or how close we came to falling into their clutches. There was always a small part of me that rebelled.

We barely escaped the abuse of Christian fundamentalism and extremism. We certainly were scarred by many of their teachings that I allowed to infiltrate our worldview.

So many people completely miss the point of it all. I missed the point for many years and it has taken more years to heal myself and my kids.

I’ve spent several years reading books by Richard Rohr, Diana Butler Bass, Barbara Brown Taylor, Peter Enns, and others.

I read the works of many authors of other faiths. I read a lot about liberation theology. I educate myself. I have gone back around to being an intellectual, proud and not worried about being wrong or sinful. I can be happy and comforted that I won’t go to a hell I don’t believe in.

I now laugh at Pinterest recipes for “Christ-centered cupcakes.” What even is that? Christian contemporary music with lyrics about positivity and prosperity and Jesus being compared to a boyfriend is trying desperately to merge pop culture, pseudo-psychology, and religion.

I shared a joke on social media and hurt someone’s feelings. I then had to admit to myself and others that I am anti-church. I want and expect more from church than they’re willing to offer.

I am enraged that the church told me I had to purge all my books and DVDs that were “inappropriate.” We didn’t celebrate Halloween one year and I threw out all my vintage decorations and I just sick about that. I am saddened that my husband didn’t stop me or say anything at all about it. He didn’t realize the loss. He didn’t care. I gave up so many books – like my Anne Rice collection, with many signed copies, and I stopped reading her new works. I cherished those books and the memory of meeting her at the book signing and how she said she liked my ruffled jacket cuffs. I wish I had them back. I got rid of so many DVDs that had erotic content or sex scenes or vulgar language, but told a human story in all its realness and rawness. I was told that anything rated R was evil and if I couldn’t view something with my three-year-old child then I shouldn’t be watching it.

The church really does want its people infantilized, especially women. We are told that our entire purpose is to serve husband and children, no matter what else we do with our lives – careers, hobbies, interests. Those should take backstage or be obliterated completely. This is why reproductive rights are being fought about in our country. Men feel they can control women more effectively if women can’t choose when or if to be pregnant. Gender roles are strictly enforced within the church, sometimes by social conditioning, but we attended one church that actually had brochures with Bible verse citations, in the lobby, written by the pastor about how women and men should dress. I was admonished by many mentor ladies how to plan ahead in case I ever got sick, so as to never be unprepared and have to leave my husband or kids to fend for themselves.

This is brainwashing. I am embarrassed I let it go on as long as I did. I continue to unteach and reteach my kids about what’s ok and what should not have happened. I am slowly acquiring many of the books and movies and decorations I sold or threw away during our darkest times.

I experienced such cognitive dissonance trying to reconcile my intellectual curious mind with trying to learn church history and doctrine while homeschooling and teaching my children. I regret that I was horribly mean and abusive to my three young kids at the behest of the church, trying to control them and demand blind perfect obedience. Interestingly, most schools and American homes buy into this abusive obedience concept in spite of being secular. And we wonder why so many of us are mentally ill – depressed and anxious?

Church perpetuates abuse. It encourages parents to break the wills of children. It encourages women to stay unseen and unheard. It discourages questions because that is a threat to authority.

I realized recently how deeply ingrained the western church is with racism, white supremacy, patriarchy, and sexism. While so many churches say “all are welcome, ” and “come as you are,” very few are affirming or inclusive. These are just popular catch phrases to get people in the door. Enough stay and find their community, I guess.

Without these hateful ideologies, the church cannot maintain control it so desperately needs over a fearful people. The American Christian church just wants to control and it does so by preaching about Others, a duality, Us vs. Them. Whether or not a church agrees or aligns with all or some of Calvinism, those ideas are permeating churches.

White American evangelicalism teaches that western culture is what Jesus is all about. That is incorrect. We have seen so much imagery and realized so many conservatives are actually leading the country towards a theocracy. We have a big problem when churches have national flags and guns and pray for a political agenda instead of spiritual reconciliation.

I tried several denominations and churches and we moved around a lot – Georgia, Texas, Hawaii, Utah, Germany, and Ohio. We tried churches on military bases. We tried churches all over the cities near where we lived. It was exceedingly difficult to find community in a nonjudgmental and welcoming church. And it was hard feeling like we could fit in, knowing we would move in a few short years.

I’m tired of being blamed for being a bad and sinful parent because I don’t force my kids into a church that hates them and wants to change them “in the name of Jesus.” I can’t look the other way anymore as they preach about exclusivity, nationalism, white supremacy, prosperity, sexism, homophobia, transphobia – no matter how veiled and carefully so they seem to be loving and admonishing.

I want my kids to know that I extravagantly and unequivocally love them for who they are – gay, trans, pierced, tattooed, however. It hurts me to see them get side-eye at a church that is meant to love them in the name of Jesus. Jesus is love, right?

I don’t want my kids around elders, deacons, pastors who abuse their spouses and children – calling them names and belittling them, criticizing and encouraging hitting as discipline. I don’t want to be around that either and these people don’t want to hear my opinions about it. They didn’t want my opinions about anything.

I don’t want to feel exhausted anymore as churches demand more time, more money, more effort on my part and to help plan and implement events in which I have little to no interest – for evangelism and outreach and community building and fundraising. My husband completely bought into the serving mindset and I had to explain multiple times how we were taken advantage of with our desire to serve and our love languages of gift-giving and service. There were never any thanks, no appreciation. Just more, more, more. We could never do or give enough.

I understand that the church is and should be made up of broken people. The big difference I have discovered over the years and in many different cities is that while I strive to improve and learn and truly live a good spiritual life, too many are just going through the motions while being insulated in their hatred of others while having superiority complexes and being power-hungry and controlling. Too many professing Christians are complacent and lazy in their spiritual growth.

Yes, it is unfortunate that this has been my family’s experience in every church we have ever attended. I’m tired of apologizing to strangers who surely mean well that we do not and will not attend. Yes, I know there are affirming churches out there. I follow several pastors and teachers online. We visited a UCC right before COVID, but we didn’t have time to make any connections and now everything has changed and we have moved on and my family doesn’t care to try again.

Am I thrilled that your church is different? Absolutely! I read comments all the time on my blog posts and social media #notallchurches and how I should keep trying and that I am sinful for not gathering! Please stop. You’re not helping in any way. I just feel worse and more guilty. Do you not think I have tried and tried and tried again?

The pastor’s husband of the last church we attended got so offended when I shared an article about issues in the American church that he typed on my Facebook wall “Have a nice life.”

No one ever tried to keep us around when we left these churches. There were no check-ins. They don’t miss us.

Resources:

  • The Inclusive Bible: The First Egalitarian Translation
  • The Forgotten Creed: Christianity’s Original Struggle against Bigotry, Slavery, and Sexism by Stephen J. Patterson 
  • The Bible and Mental Health: Towards a Biblical Theology of Mental Health by Chris Cook and Isabelle Hamley
  • Womanist Midrash: A Reintroduction to the Women of the Torah and the Throne by Wilda Gafney
  • A Women’s Lectionary for the Whole Church: Year A by Wilda C. Gafney
  • The Color of Compromise: The Truth about the American Church’s Complicity in Racism by Jemar Tisby
  • The Cross and the Lynching Tree by James H. Cone
  • Black Theology and Black Power by James H. Cone 
  • Jesus and the Disinherited by Howard Thurman  
  • Dear Church: A Love Letter from a Black Preacher to the Whitest Denomination in the US by Lenny Duncan
  • White Too Long: The Legacy of White Supremacy in American Christianity by Robert P. Jones
  • Jesus and John Wayne: How White Evangelicals Corrupted a Faith and Fractured a Nation by Kristin Kobes Du Mez 
  • Sisters in the Wilderness: The Challenge of Womanist God-Talk by Delores S. Williams
  • Black Church Empowered: Examining Our History, Securing Our Longevity by Isaiah Robertson 
  • #ChurchToo: How Purity Culture Upholds Abuse and How to Find Healing by Emily Joy Allison
  • The #MeToo Reckoning: Facing the Church’s Complicity in Sexual Abuse and Misconduct by Ruth Everhart
  • The Great Sex Rescue: The Lies You’ve Been Taught and How to Recover What God Intended by Sheila Wray Gregoire
  • You Are Your Own: A Reckoning with the Religious Trauma of Evangelical Christianity by Jamie Lee Finch
  • Pure: Inside the Evangelical Movement That Shamed a Generation of Young Women and How I Broke Free by Linda Kay Klein
  • The Making of Biblical Womanhood: How the Subjugation of Women Became Gospel Truth by Beth Allison Barr
  • Recovering from Biblical Manhood and Womanhood by Aimee Byrd
  • Shameless: A Case for Not Feeling Bad About Feeling Good (About Sex) by Nadia Bolz-WEber
  • Empty the Pews: Stories of Leaving the Church by Chrissy Stroop and Lauren O’ Neal
  • Leaving the Fold: A Guide for Former Fundamentalists and Others Leaving Their Religion by Marlene Winell
  • Love Wins: A Book About Heaven, Hell, and the Fate of Every Person Who Ever Lived by Rob Bell
  • God Land: A Story of Faith, Loss, and Renewal in Middle America by Lyz Lenz
  • No Longer Strangers: Transforming Evangelism with Immigrant Communities
  • When Narcissism Comes to Church: Healing Your Community From Emotional and Spiritual Abuse by Chuck DeGroat
  • Outside the Lines: How Embracing Queerness Will Transform Your Faith  by Mihee Kim-Kort
  • Affirming: A Memoir of Faith, Sexuality, and Staying in the Church by Sally Gary
  • Transforming: The Bible and the Lives of Transgender Christians by Austen Hartke
  • Queer Theology: Beyond Apologetics by Linn Tonstad
  • Outlove: A Queer Christian Survival Story by Julie Rodgers
  • Unashamed: A Coming-Out Guide for LGBTQ Christians by Amber Cantorna
  • Embracing the Journey: A Christian Parents’ Blueprint to Loving Your LGBTQ Child by Greg and Lynn McDonald
  • Baby Dinosaurs on the Ark?: The Bible and Modern Science and the Trouble of Making It All Fit by Janet Kellogg Ray

You might also like:

  • Secular Curriculum
  • We Stopped Going to Church
  • Statement of Faith
  • How I Teach Religion
  • I Don’t Want to Be a Christian Blogger
  • Deconstruction
  • How I Pray
  • What can we do?
  • Why I Don’t Teach Purity
  • Learning Lessons Series

Linking up: Eclectic Red Barn, God’s Growing Garden, Pinch of Joy, House on Silverado, OMHG, Ridge Haven, Random Musings, Jenerally Informed, InstaEncouragements, Suburbia, Mostly Blogging, Create with Joy, LouLou Girls, Simply Coffee, Joanne Viola, Anchored Abode, Life Abundant, Homestead, Penny’s Passion, Try it Like it, Katherine’s Corner, Soaring with Him, Slices of Life, Being a Wordsmith, Lisa Notes, Pieced Pastimes, Monticello, Answer is Chocolate, Momfessionals, Pam’s Party, April Harris,

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Filed Under: Faith Tagged With: church, faith, mental health

Regret

This blog may contain affiliate links: disclosure. Please see my suggested resources.

August 8, 2022 By Jennifer Lambert 14 Comments

What is your greatest regret?

Does it keep you awake at night?

Do you regret that romantic encounter?

Do you regret something you said?

Do you have regrets for others? Secondhand embarrassment is real and I suffer.

We usually regret something left undone, rarer the accomplished tasks.

What derailed your dreams?

Where did your intention go?

Who failed you?

Do you fear?

Are you angry?

Do you hear?

Listen.

Your walls are ever before me.

Isaiah 49:16

Walls are a protective shield. They’re not necessarily good or bad. They’re neutral.

I have built up more walls than I care to think about.

I build them up. I tear them down. I build them back up.

God tears them down. People knock and try to peer inside.

I build a wall of fear.

I build a wall of distrust.

I build a wall of doubt.

I build a wall of low self-esteem.

I build a wall of anger.

I build a wall of grief.

I’m tired of walls.

When I began blogging back in about 2005, it was more a scrapbook our homeschooling.

We have evolved and come full circle and continue to grow in our family and homeschooling journey.

When I began homeschooling, I had no idea the heartache and challenges and soul-swelling that I would undergo as I learned to step back and watch my kids explore in spite of me and my trauma.

I live in that liminal space between hope and despair, clarity and confusion, resolve and surrender.

Amazingly, I am able to recognize and catch glimpses of harmony in the hell that is military life and the thanklessness of being a housewife and parenting teens.

The zen view is something you glimpse in passing and that comes as a surprise—to wake you to the moment and a flash of hidden truth.

Rivvy Neshama

The last few years could have broken me had I not stepped back to see a bigger picture. I had to learn not to take things personally. I have had to re-parent myself. I have had to give myself timeouts and rest and relearn and shut my mouth. I had to be alone in my grief and work it out inside myself.

After years of survival mode, I suddenly felt lost and alone and almost at rest, so there was too much time to think, feel, wonder, regret.

I had to set hard boundaries with my parents and they stopped communicating with me altogether.

My eldest child and therapist asked me why I stay with my husband. It surely seems like an easy question from young, single, independent women. I have never been that.

I feel that I failed my eldest child all her life, and recently she moved out and quit college. What could I have done better, more, different – to set her up for success? What will her future hold now? She’s had COVID twice. She has so many financial worries that I didn’t want her to experience.

I’m twice divorced from abusive men. I escaped. I don’t know if I would have had the strength merely to save myself. I rescued my daughter. There were situations no one can understand but me.

This man is not abusive. He’s neglectful. He’s often thoughtless. I feel I change and evolve and grow while he is stagnant. There are way worse sins than being boring.

We have history. We have duty.

We share eighteen years of highs, lows, depths, cross-country moves, deployments, births, deaths, sickness, pain, joy.

Our society encourages everything and everyone to be disposable.

I’ll stay and wait and see what’s next.

I don’t like the alternatives.

She had always thought that exquisitely happy time at the beginning of her relationship…was the ultimate, the feeling they’d always be trying to replicate, to get back, but now she realized that was wrong. That was like comparing sparkling mineral water to French champagne. Early love is exciting and exhilarating. It’s light and bubbly. Anyone can love like that. But love after [four] children, after a separation and a near-divorce, after you’ve hurt each other and forgiven each other, bored each other and surprised each other, after you’ve seen the worst and the best—well, that sort of a love is ineffable. It deserves its own word…It was so good to find that their relationship could keep on changing, finding new edges.

Liane Moriarty

I know under certain circumstances I had so few good choices and I chose what I felt was best at the time. I might even choose the same again if I could go back with what I know now. Who knows?

This is who I am and those choices molded me into this person. Do I really want to be someone else?

I can’t continue to twist and turn and lie awake at night in anxiety of what I should have done, should have said. It’s over and done and there’s no going back. We have to keep moving forward. We have to seek the blessings and stand firm on hallowed ground.

One should hallow all that one does in one’s natural life. One eats in holiness, tastes the taste of food in holiness, and the table becomes an altar. One works in holiness, and raises up the sparks which hide themselves in all tools. One walks in holiness across the fields, and the soft songs of all herbs, which they voice to God, enter into the song of our soul.

Martin Buber

I count the summers, months, days that I have with my three kids still living at home. It’s not enough! I want to go back and be kinder, nicer, more loving, patient. I want to hug them more. I don’t want to say, “just a minute.” I don’t want to be tired. I don’t want to be distracted. What was more important? Nothing! Why did I think that would have enough time? Did I make enough good memories to push out the bad? Did I make them feel special? I imagine them as toddlers – trusting, seeking, demanding. I’m alone in my regret, bombarded by toxic positivity.

Now, the tables are turned and they’re often too busy for me and my heart is breaking.

My middle two kids begin college later this month and I lie awake strangling on my own doubts and fears and lack of control. Why doesn’t my husband, their father, have any worries? He’s already asleep, in oblivion. I want to shake him awake at 2 AM and pour out all my fears and regrets, but he never knows what to do with me, so I keep it all inside. I can’t protect them from the world, from abusive men, from arrogant professors, from false friends, from themselves. I make up scenarios in my head to warn them about. I feel I am running out of time. I’m late; I’m late; I’m late! What else can I teach them, impart from my own experiences? What script can I help them memorize for an unknown circumstance? What situation can we anticipate together?

I feel prickly with fear of the future.

I don’t want them to live in fear but to walk in wisdom.

(I need to remember this and stop wallowing in guilt and shame.)

I tell my kids often:

Almost everything can be fixed. The consequences may be unpleasant and people may get upset, but almost every mistake can be remedied.

You might also like:

  • Dealing with Disappointment
  • What Depression Feels Like
  • Parenting with Depression
  • I’m Angry
  • Breaking the Cycle of Negativity
  • Personal Growth
  • Advice to My Younger Self
  • Raised Better
  • Ashamed
  • Tired
  • Grieving Family Who Are Still Alive

Linking up: Random Musings, April Harris, Ridge Haven, Create with Joy, Pam’s Party, Pinch of Joy, Mostly Blogging, LouLou Girls, OMHG, Jenerally Informed, Pieced Pastimes, God’s Growing Garden, InstaEncouragements, Suburbia, Eclectic Red Barn, Simply Coffee, Ducks in a Row, Fluster Buster, Ridge Haven Homestead, Soaring with Him, Silverado, Anchored Abode, Joanne Viola, Shelbee on the Edge, Lisa Notes, Momfessionals,

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Filed Under: Faith Tagged With: depression, grief, growth, mental health, parenting

Deconstruction

This blog may contain affiliate links: disclosure. Please see my suggested resources.

May 2, 2022 By Jennifer Lambert 8 Comments

I spent 27 years maintaining a broken façade.

It’s taken me over 15 years to tear it all down.

I was a never good enough daughter. I was an average student. I was a terrible wife to an abusive husband. I can’t hold a successful job.

Then I was striving to be a good military wife.

I struggled to be a certain kind of homeschool mom.

Now I’m rebuilding.

I have an irresistible impulse to go home again in order to find myself.

But I don’t know where home is.

Deconstruction is a philosophical movement and theory of literary criticism that questions traditional assumptions about certainty, identity, and truth.

Jacques Derrida

Deconstructing into Wholeness

We’re all living in a time of deep social and spiritual upheaval. We’re off autopilot, all of us, reassessing everything.

Bob Holmes

Evaluation

When I didn’t know any better, it was hard.

I occasionally caught glimpses of a different perspective that I wanted but I didn’t understand it nor how I could achieve it.

I questioned everything. It was so important to me that I judged everything and wanted to know why instead of just blindly following.

I think we live in a very sick society and too few question how and why we are complacent.

But maybe every life looked wonderful if all you saw was the photo albums. People always obediently smiled and tilted their heads when a camera was put in front of them.

Liane Moriarty

When I had kids, I knew I wanted a good life for them, better than what I had. I knew I needed to completely reevaluate every single priority and choose wisely.

I tried so many different paths and it was terrible for my kids to have to walk with me while I discovered who I wanted to be.

What is truth? What do I want our truth to be?

Choices

Every single day, we experience choices.

Some choices don’t seem important or life-changing. There are articles, studies, books about making good choices and how even very simple decisions can impact our lives.

I didn’t have good choices. I didn’t have mentors or role models to help.

It’s taken me years to unravel and begin making better choices. My kids have good choices.

Making good morning choices is very important to ensure a good day.

I am not a morning person, but I try to get up at a reasonable hour.

I exercise three times a week before going downstairs to start my day. Sometimes, it’s just a few minutes but it makes a difference.

I make my bed every single day. It pleases me to see it neat and pretty.

I make a hot breakfast for my kids every weekday morning.

I wash a load of laundry every day and I put it away.

We read every day – aloud, together, separately. Reading is important.

We have a hot dinner together as a family every evening.

I take a walk outside every single day. Outside time is important.

I choose not to give into depression.

Reset

If I notice something off or someone seem excessively irritable, I look for a source for those symptoms.

I realize we have to reset.

We’ve maybe gotten too busy or rushed if someone is feeling stressed or anxious. We need to reevaluate our priorities and make some changes in our choices.

Nothing is certain. Everything is fluid and mutable.

Some weeks are just stressful and busy. I look to the light at the end of the appointments and meetings and sports practices for when I can rest a bit.

Self-Control

It’s super important for me to model self-control and help my kids learn to self-regulate.

We all experience big emotions sometimes and few of us has ever learned healthy ways to recognize or express those big feelings. It’s good to sit with feelings and learn to understand them.

I try to take time to talk through conflicts or issues rather than just reacting. Often a child experiences something and I feel triggered and have to take a break to experience that and realize I am not under attack.

We’ve come a long way and we are still learning.

Remodel

I still feel like I am searching for my identity.

Layers of irrelevant desires have peeled away during my 46 years. I am still seeking meaning and peace.

Just like I’m always updating my home and cleaning, adding, or removing, improving…I am doing the same things to my soul.

We’ve tried so many churches and spiritual paths over the years. I have gone full circle to the natural spirituality of my youth. We stopped going to church with all its racism and sexism and abuse a few years ago.

I remodel myself and remove all the false teachings I learned as a child from people who didn’t know any better or struggled with themselves. Many adults caused more harm than help and I am relearning healthier ways.

Introspection

I wasn’t always like this. I had to be reduced to ashes before realizing not everyone can withstand my darkness or sustain my light.

L.L. Musings

I’ve long known that I feel and seem different from most women. I never had close female friends. I didn’t fit in. I don’t have the same likes as many of the moms I’ve known over the years.

I don’t know what to do or what to say in many social situations.

There were too many shallow interactions. I don’t want to be in your wino book club, drunk Bunko, or shopping/lunch bunch. I don’t want to be in a Bible study where the ladies just sit around and brag how much better they are than others.

I prefer more to life than drinking and capitalism.

I don’t want shallow interactions or relationships. I would rather be alone.

Now, I just refuse to participate. I’m mostly fine being alone. It does seem odd to most people that I have absolutely zero friends, no support system, no one to put as an emergency contact.

Words like neurodivergence fly about and maybe I am… Maybe I’m on the spectrum. I know when and where and how I am comfortable.

I don’t want to compromise myself anymore.

I expect to continue to spend many more years learning and leaving behind the self I don’t want to be as I slowly become who I am.

Resources:

  • Hold on to Your Kids by Gordon Neufeld 
  • Adult Children of Emotionally Immature Parents: How to Heal from Distant, Rejecting, or Self-Involved Parents by Lindsay C. Gibson
  • The Myth of Normal: Trauma, Illness and Healing in a Toxic Culture by Gabor Maté
  • When the Body Says No: the cost of hidden stress by Gabor Maté
  • The Body Keeps the Score: Mind, Brain and Body in the Transformation of Trauma Kindle Edition by Bessel van der Kolk
  • Motherwhelmed: Challenging Norms, Untangling Truths, and Restoring Our Worth to the World by Beth Berry
  • The Power of Now: A Guide to Spiritual Enlightenment by Eckhart Tolle
  • Falling Upward: A Spirituality for the Two Halves of Life by Richard Rohr

Linking up: Pinch of Joy, Grammy’s Grid, Silverado, Eclectic Red Barn, Anita Ojeda, Random Musings, Shelbee on Edge, Suburbia, InstaEncouragements, LouLou Girls, Jenerally Informed, God’s Growing Garden, OMHG, Create with Joy, Mostly Blogging, Wee Abode, Soaring with Him, Anchored Abode, Fluster Buster, Ducks in a Row, Life as LEO Wife, Penny’s Passion, Artful Mom, Try it Like it, Good Random Fun, Imparting Grace, Ridge Haven Homestead, Slices of Life, Momfessionals, Simply Beautiful, Modern Monticello, Pam’s Party, Lauren Sparks, Being a Wordsmith, Answer is Chocolate, April Harris,

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Filed Under: Faith Tagged With: church, faith, mental health

What can we do?

This blog may contain affiliate links: disclosure. Please see my suggested resources.

April 27, 2022 By Jennifer Lambert 5 Comments

One of the last times I attended church, I was dismayed by one of the deacons/elders proudly exclaiming that he gave lots of money to charities and that was all he was required and convicted to do as a Christian. He went on to say that Jesus wasn’t political and citizenship didn’t require any more of him than his comfortable middle class life allowed.

I stared at him with my mouth open. Nothing I could think of to say mattered or would change his mind.

I realize this attitude is common in the church. No one wants to get his hands dirty or actually work for justice. They don’t even realize injustice exists since they are protected in their privileged lives. Some people seem to think that injustice is just something in movies or made up for sensationalism in the news. It doesn’t affect them in any way. They shake their heads at people who somehow cause their own problems instead of seeing the systematic injustices for what they are.

That has been pretty much the mindset of most people I’ve known in church and we just don’t attend church anymore. It still hurt to hear it said out loud, in front of the pastor and their family.

The last few years have been hard.

The news has been awful.

We are living in a time of continuous war, pandemic, an attempted coup, domestic violence, racism, and child abuse.

Most people just shake their heads and nothing affects them. They are desensitized. They are untouched.

Yes, some are simply surviving. Many have taken a financial downturn or have health issues and it’s reasonable to take some time to cocoon and rest and hopefully emerge triumphant later.

But there’s almost always something we can do to improve the world we live in.

What can we do?

What bothers you?

It’s easy to be a social media warrior or armchair activist. Too many want to be performative in their charitable activities, taking selfies while donating or providing a service.

If you’re not angry, you’re not paying attention.

Sit and seethe and learn from your feelings, especially the feelings deemed wrong or negative by caregivers and authority figures when we were growing up.

Ask questions of your soul about how your religion alienates and ostracizes others who might look or live or pray differently than you do.

What do you think needs to change?

Where does your heart, passion, talent lie?

What can I do where I am?

Learn

Read, read, read. Find book lists of authors of color, LGBTQA+, those who survived poverty, mental illness, or war, anyone different than you. Internalize their struggle and experiences. Realize your privilege.

Follow people different than you on social media and watch, read, listen. Don’t feel the need to comment in outrage, sadness, or solidarity. That is not for you.

Start making friends with people who look or live differently than you do.

Volunteer

There are lots of opportunities for volunteering. You can start small. Give an hour. Let your children help or see you.

There are lots of needs in our parks and public communities, schools, libraries, women’s centers, shelters for the unhoused, your workplace.

Look at the organization’s purpose and vision to determine if it fits your beliefs and values.

Protest

Join a peaceful protest in your community, city, school, or workplace.

Yes, there could be potential consequences. Plan accordingly.

What are you willing to risk?

Get Involved

Learn about how local, state, and federal government decisions affect you and your children and neighbors.

Be a concerned citizen.

Attend community and city meetings.

Vote.

Write to local leaders.

Write to your Congress people.

You don’t get to complain for not knowing the facts or not making a difference.

Donate

Yes, it’s good to donate, but do so mindfully and intelligently.

Look at the organization and make sure the people they claim to help actually receive the assistance they need and not so much the CEOs making the big bucks.

Also, look at where you use your money and why. Spend more wisely. There are lots of great companies that have better products and pay better wages to their employees and treat their customers and employees better than the huge conglomerates where you’re just a number. We use the Buycott app to choose better products when we’re shopping. We can slowly change our habits to get better sourced chocolate and coffee, more sustainable clothing and cleaning supplies.

What will you do?

There’s a lot we can do other than doomscrolling and lamenting the state of the country and world.

We can begin by being mindful where we spend our money and how we spend our time. We can learn about the world and how we can improve conditions for everyone.

We live in the dumbest dystopia where people on social media are casting movies about wars while they are taking place. I am tired of fragile white men cry about beer and wanting to continue to abuse women and revel in their toxicity.

It’s frustrating that most of our news comes from companies owned by billionaires who just want to rule the world and have all the power with none of the responsibility.

Linking up: A Pinch of Joy, House on Silverado, Grammy’s Grid, April Harris, Anita Ojeda, Random Musings, Uncommon Surburbia, Mostly Blogging, Create with Joy, Eclectic Red Barn, Stroll Thru Life, Shelbee on the Edge, LouLou Girls, God’s Growing Garden, InstaEncouragements, Jeanne Takenaka, Jenerally Informed, Anchored Abode, Ridge Haven Homestead, Ducks in a Row, Fluster Buster, Imparting Grace, Slices of Life, Artful Mom, Try it Like it, Good Random Fun, LEO Wife, Simply Beautiful, Modern Monticello, Answer is Chocolate, Bijou Life, Lauren Sparks, CWJ, Pieced Pastimes, Momfessionals, OMHG,

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Filed Under: Faith Tagged With: faith

The Power of Now Chapter Ten

This blog may contain affiliate links: disclosure. Please see my suggested resources.

April 22, 2022 By Jennifer Lambert Leave a Comment

This concludes my book study of The Power of Now.

It’s been interesting these last few weeks.

My eldest child got COVID, but they harassed her to return to work too early and she is not healing. I am upset about a situation that I can’t help.

My middle daughter got her wisdom teeth out.

My third child got their cast off their leg and is starting physical therapy.

I have lots of responsibilities and my schedule is full.

I love how this chapter reflects on illness and injury and how being present, conscious, in The Now gives enlightenment to tragic circumstances in our lives. I have longed to express that inner knowledge that I knew in my soul for decades.

I have felt saddened by so many who wear an illness on their sleeves like a badge of honor. Many American Christians attest to suffering as following Jesus and I am always bothered by that sentiment.

Chapter Ten: The Power of Surrender

Favorite quotes:

To some people, surrender may have negative connotations, implying defeat, giving up, failing to rise to the challenges of life, becoming lethargic, and so on. True surrender, however, is something entirely different. It does not mean to passively put up with whatever situation you find yourself in and to do nothing about it. Nor does it mean to cease making plans or initiating positive action.

Surrender is the simple but profound wisdom of yielding to rather than opposing the flow of life.

Let me give you a visual analogy to illustrate the point I am making. You are walking along a path at night, surrounded by a thick fog. But you have a powerful flashlight that cuts through the fog and creates a narrow, clear space in front of you. The fog is your life situation, which includes past and future; the flashlight is your conscious presence; the clear space is the Now.

It is true that only an unconscious person will try to use or manipulate others, but it is equally true that only an unconscious person can be used and manipulated.

Then one day, in the middle of an argument, you will suddenly realize that you have a choice, and you may decide to drop your own reaction — .just to see what happens. You surrender.

Nonresistance doesn’t necessarily mean doing nothing. All it means is that any “doing” becomes nonreactive.

Remember the deep wisdom underlying the practice of Eastern martial arts: Don’t resist the opponent’s force. Yield to overcome.

In Taoism, there is a term called wu wei, which is usually translated as “actionless activity” or “sitting quietly doing nothing.”

Until there is surrender, unconscious role-playing constitutes a large part of human interaction. In surrender, you no longer need ego defenses and false masks. You become very simple, very real.

What the ego doesn’t know, of course, is that only through the letting go of resistance, through becoming “vulnerable,” can you discover you discover your true and essential invulnerability.

Surrender does not transform what is, at least not directly. Surrender transforms you. When you are transformed, your whole world is transformed, because the world is only a reflection.

When you are ill or disabled, do not feel that you have failed in some way, do not feel guilty. Do not blame life for treating you unfairly, but do not blame yourself either. All that is resistance. If you have a major illness, use it for enlightenment. Anything “bad” that happens in your life – use it for enlightenment.

Become an alchemist. Transmute base metal into gold, suffering into consciousness, disaster into enlightenment.

Are you seriously ill and feeling angry now about what I have just said? Then that is a clear sign that the illness has become part of your sense of self and that you are now protecting your identity — as well as protecting the illness. The condition that is labeled “illness” has nothing to do with who you truly are.

As far as the still unconscious majority of the population is concerned, only a critical limit-situation has the potential to crack the hard shell of the ego and force them into surrender and so into the awakened state. A limit-situation arises when through some disaster, drastic upheaval, deep loss, or suffering your whole world is shattered and doesn’t make sense anymore. It is an encounter with death, be it physical or psychological. The egoic mind, the creator of this world, collapses. Out of the ashes of the old world, a new world can then come into being.

Full attention is full acceptance, is surrender. By giving full attention, you use the power of the Now, which is the power of your presence. No hidden pocket of resistance can survive in it. Presence removes time. Without time, no suffering, no negativity, can survive.

God is Being itself, not a being. There can be no subject-object relationship here, no duality, no you and God. God-realization is the most natural thing there is. The amazing and incomprehensible fact is not that you can become conscious of God but that you are not conscious of God.

Choice implies consciousness — a high degree of consciousness.

Nobody chooses dysfunction, conflict, pain. Nobody chooses insanity. They happen because there is not enough presence in you to dissolve the past, not enough light to dispel the darkness. You are not fully here. You have not quite woken up yet. In the meantime, the conditioned mind is running your life.

It always looks as if people had a choice, but that is an illusion.

You cannot truly forgive yourself or others as long as you derive your sense of self from the past. Only through accessing the power of the Now, which is your own power, can there be true forgiveness. This renders the past powerless, and you realize deeply that nothing you ever did or that was ever done to you could touch even in the slightest the radiant essence of who you are. The whole concept of forgiveness then becomes unnecessary.

When you surrender to what is and so become fully present, the past ceases to have any power. You do not need it anymore. Presence is the key. The Now is the key.

You might also like:

  • Chapter One
  • Chapter Two
  • Chapter Three
  • Chapter Four
  • Chapter Five
  • Chapter Six
  • Chapter Seven
  • Chapter Eight
  • Chapter Nine
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Filed Under: Faith

Top 6 Essential Supplies For Teaching Young Children In Sunday School

This blog may contain affiliate links: disclosure. Please see my suggested resources.

April 14, 2022 By Jennifer Lambert Leave a Comment

Volunteering to teach Sunday School to the young children of your church can quickly become overwhelming. Fortunately, with a little bit of prep work and the right supplies, you’ll be able to map out your lessons so you’ll have a solid plan in place ahead of time. There are a number of essentials that every well-prepared Sunday School teacher should have. While some of these are available for free online, you’ll also find a wealth of great Sunday School materials for sale.

1. A Good Curriculum

No matter how well you know the Bible and all the lessons it can impart, there is no substitute for a strong written curriculum. Make sure to know the general age range of your students before selecting one. An age-appropriate lesson plan ensures the material will be easily understood and absorbed by your pupils. If you are very ambitious, you can even create your own curriculum. Write one that focuses on specific themes that are woven throughout the Bible, or make one based on different Bible stories.

2. Craft Supplies

Young children are very tactile learners, so incorporating a hands-on activity into your Sunday School lesson is sure to get their attention. Consider filling a plastic tub with things like glue sticks, markers, construction paper, stickers, feathers, popsicle sticks, cardboard, and other similar items. Check to see what your church has on hand. You may discover items you can utilize for your lessons, saving you a trip to the store. Base your craft projects on something from a specific Bible story. For example, you could have the children make cotton ball sheep to go along with teaching Jesus’ parable of the lost sheep found in both Matthew and Luke.

3. Games

Sunday School games provide a wonderful way to reinforce key concepts you’ve covered in class. Searching online will yield a range of game ideas that only require basic supplies you may already have on hand, or that are easy and cheap to find at the store. Young children can get restless when having to sit for an hour or more, so having a game break with something active can help them to regain focus.

4. Age-Appropriate Books

Having age-appropriate books on hand can be very useful when teaching Sunday School. There’s a good chance your church will have a collection for your use. Browse through your available options and pick a few out for the upcoming Sunday. Public libraries also provide an option for finding books to read to your class.

5. Chalk Board or Whiteboard

Drawing and coloring materials can encompass a wide range of items. If the room you are teaching in doesn’t have a chalkboard or whiteboard, consider buying a small one that you can put on an easel. As an alternative, you could use a large pad of paper. Make sure to have kid-friendly markers for using with these.

6. Coloring Supplies

A quick online search for free printable coloring pages will bring up many options. Print out multiple options and take them with you each Sunday, even if you don’t have plans for using them. If you get through your lesson sooner than expected, passing out coloring pages or plain paper to draw on can be a good way to fill some empty time.

Leading a Sunday School class should be a rewarding experience and one that you’re able to enjoy for as long as you’re needed. When you have the right tools and materials in place for teaching your young students, you’ll find that the class will go much more smoothly. It just might become the favorite part of their week.

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Filed Under: Faith

The Power of Now Chapter Nine

This blog may contain affiliate links: disclosure. Please see my suggested resources.

April 13, 2022 By Jennifer Lambert Leave a Comment

Whew, I feel like this chapter, it all started coming together.

I’ve felt an awakening coming the last ten years or so. I knew there was more to religion than how American Christians teach and live. I’ve gone through many cycles of despair and joy; it’s a constant spiral of learning.

I feel like I’ve come back around to the mystic spiritualism of my youth from evangelical Christianity and seeking Truth.

I’ve grown on a path to inner healing despite all the outside forces trying their darnedest to keep me stagnant, comfortable, status quo. I lost so many friends and even family members in my quest for Being.

Some days it’s hard. Sometimes I wonder if it’s worth it. I sometimes wish I could be ignorant, mainstream, basic: bliss. It’s often unpleasant seeing all the people around me living under capitalism, in their pain-body, striving to keep up appearances.

I know how far I’ve come from when my eldest was a teenager and would hurt me immensely with her words and behaviors. I would internalize it all and feel so bad, wondering what I did wrong, how could I make it better. Now that my third child is acting out in similar ways, I take it in stride, with so much more peace. I don’t take it personally. I know they are in pain and lashing out and I allow it and I wait for it to pass.

I like how Tolle differentiates between happiness and joy.

I mentioned last week I was also reading The Island by Aldous Huxley.

Lo, and behold, this allusion to the book is in this chapter of The Power of Now! It’s incredible to me that I just happened to decide to read these simultaneously. I often like to read a fiction and nonfiction book side by side. These two go well together.

There is a novel by Aldous Huxley called Island, written in his later years when he became very interested in spiritual teachings. It tells the story of a man shipwrecked on a remote island cut off from the rest of the world. This island contains a unique civilization. The unusual thing about it is that its inhabitants, unlike those of the rest of the world, are actually sane. The first thing that the man notices are the colorful parrots perched in the trees, and they seem to be constantly croaking the words “Attention. Here and Now. Attention. Here and Now.” We later learn that the islanders taught them these words in order to be reminded continuously to stay present.

Tolle alludes to The Four Noble Truths of Buddhism in various ways:

The First Noble Truth: There is suffering. Suffering should be understood. Suffering has been understood.

The Second Noble Truth: There is the origin of suffering, which is attachment to desire. Desire should be let go of. Desire has been let go of.

The Third Noble Truth: There is the cessation of suffering. The cessation of suffering should be realized. The cessation of suffering has been realized.

The Fourth Noble Truth: There is the Eightfold Path—the way out of suffering. This path should be developed. This path has been fully developed.

Chapter Nine: Beyond Happiness and Unhappiness There is Peace

Favorite quotes:

Happiness depends on conditions being perceived as positive; inner peace does not.

And when you live in complete acceptance of what is — which is the only sane way to live — there is no “good” or “bad” in your life anymore. There is only a higher good – which includes the “bad.”

Forgiveness of the present is even more important than forgiveness of the past. If you forgive every moment — allow it to be as it is — then there will be no accumulation of resentment that needs to be forgiven at some later time.

For example, when a loved one has just died, or you feel your own death approaching, you cannot be happy. It is impossible. But you can be at peace. There may be sadness and tears, but provided that you have relinquished resistance, underneath the sadness you will feel a deep serenity, a stillness, a sacred presence. This is the emanation of Being, this is inner peace, the good that has no opposite.

“Accept whatever comes to you woven in the pattern of your destiny, for what could more aptly fit your needs?” This was written two thousand years ago by Marcus Aurelius, one of those exceedingly rare humans who possessed worldly power as well as wisdom.

Whenever you are not honoring the present moment by allowing it to be, you are creating drama.

You cannot have an argument with a fully conscious person.

“No one who is at one with himself can even conceive of conflict,” states A Course in Miracles.

There are cycles of success, when things come to you and thrive, and cycles of failure, when they wither or disintegrate and you have to let them go in order to make room for new things to arise, or for transformation to happen. If you cling and resist at that point, it means you are refusing to go with the flow of life, and you will suffer.

Many illnesses are created through fighting against the cycles of low energy, which are vital for regeneration.

The cyclical nature of the universe is closely linked with the impermanence of all things and situations. The Buddha made this a central part of his teaching.

Whenever a major loss of one kind or another occurs, just become deeply unhappy or make themselves ill. They cannot distinguish between their life and their life situation.

Nothing can give you joy. Joy is uncaused and arises from within as the joy of Being. It is an essential part of the inner state of peace, the state that has been called the peace of God. It is your natural state, not something that you need to work hard for or struggle to attain.

Many people never realize that there can be no “salvation” in anything they do, possess, or attain. Those who do realize it often become world-weary and depressed: If nothing can give you true fulfillment, what is there left to strive for, what is the point in anything?

A Course in Miracles rightly points out that, whenever you are unhappy, there is the unconscious belief that the unhappiness “buys” you what you want.

No other life-form on the planet knows negativity, only humans, just as no other life-form violates and poisons the Earth that sustains it.

I have lived with several Zen masters — all of them cats. Even ducks have taught me important spiritual lessons.

Recurring negative emotions do sometimes contain a message, as do illnesses.

Somebody says something to you that is rude or designed to hurt. Instead of going into unconscious reaction and negativity, such as attack, defense, or withdrawal, you let it pass right through you. Offer no resistance. It is as if there is nobody there to get hurt anymore. That is forgiveness. In this way, you become invulnerable. You can still tell that person that his or her behavior is unacceptable, if that is what you choose to do. But that person no longer has the power to control your inner state. You are then in your power – not in someone else’s, nor are you run by your mind.

Having gone beyond the mind-made opposites, you become like a deep lake. The outer situation of your life and whatever happens there is the surface of the lake. Sometimes calm, sometimes windy and rough, according to the cycles and seasons. Deep down, however, the lake is always undisturbed. You are the whole lake, not just the surface, and you are in touch with your own depth, which remains absolutely still.

True relationship becomes possible only when there is an awareness of Being.

Compassion is the awareness of a deep bond between yourself and all creatures.

One of the most powerful spiritual practices is to meditate deeply on the mortality of physical forms, including your own. This is called: Die before you die. Go into it deeply. Your physical form is dissolving, is no more. Then a moment comes when all mind-forms or thoughts also die. Yet you are still there — the divine presence that you are. Radiant, fully awake. Nothing that was real ever died, only names, forms, and illusions.

To have deep empathy for the suffering of another being certainly requires a high degree of consciousness but represents only one side of compassion. It is not complete. True compassion goes beyond empathy or sympathy.

Just as the images in a dream are symbols of inner states and feelings, so our collective reality is largely a symbolic expression of fear and of the heavy layers of negativity that have accumulated in the collective human psyche.

Your primary task is not to seek salvation through creating a better world, but to awaken out of identification with form.

Only those who have transcended the world can bring about a better world.

When you are fully present and people around you manifest unconscious behavior, you won’t feel the need to react to it, so you don’t give it any reality. Your peace is so vast and deep that anything that is not peace disappears into it as if it had never existed. This breaks the karmic cycle of action and reaction. Animals, trees, flowers will feel your peace and respond to it. You teach through being, through demonstrating the peace of God. You become the “light of the world,” an emanation of pure consciousness, and so you eliminate suffering on the level of cause. You eliminate unconsciousness from the world.

To recognize the primacy of Being, and thus work on the level of cause, does not exclude the possibility that your compassion may simultaneously manifest on the level of doing and of effect by alleviating suffering whenever you come across it. When a hungry person asks you for bread and you have some, you will give it. But as you give the bread, even though your interaction may only be very brief, what really matters is this moment of shared Being, of which the bread is only a symbol. A deep healing takes place within it. In that moment, there is no giver, no receiver.

All evils are the effect of unconsciousness. You can alleviate the effects of unconsciousness, but you cannot eliminate them unless you eliminate their cause. True change happens within, not without.

Without a profound change in human consciousness, the world’s suffering is a bottomless pit. So don’t let your compassion become one-sided. Empathy with someone else’s pain or lack and a desire to help need to be balanced with a deeper realization of the eternal nature of all life and the ultimate illusion of all pain. Then let your peace flow into whatever you do and you will be working on the levels of effect and cause simultaneously.

Remember: Just as you cannot fight the darkness, so you cannot fight unconsciousness.

Raise awareness by disseminating information, or at the most, practice passive resistance. But make sure that you carry no resistance within, no hatred, no negativity.

“Love your enemies,” said Jesus, which, of course, means “have no enemies.”

You might also like:

  • Chapter One
  • Chapter Two
  • Chapter Three
  • Chapter Four
  • Chapter Five
  • Chapter Six
  • Chapter Seven
  • Chapter Eight
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The Power of Now Chapter Eight

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April 8, 2022 By Jennifer Lambert Leave a Comment

What is true salvation?

This chapter was a hard one for me.

I struggle with interpersonal relationships.

I have no friends.

My husband and I for sure have our ups and downs. It’s difficult to stay in The Now when we’re constantly hurting each other.

The concepts mentioned seem so simple, but they’re very complicated to implement, and have to be recalled again and again and again.

My parents just turned 80. I just turned 46. I know this chapter is more about partnerships and romantic relationships, but my estrangement from my parents affects every single aspect of my life. My memories swing in and whop me upside the head. I feel triggered by my husband and kids and I have to be still to gather myself so I don’t lash out. I don’t always succeed.

I am reminded of all the marriage counselors, both Christian and secular, who pointed their fingers at me, the wife, the woman. I never did enough, am not enough. I still see this online every day – on social media, from abused wives and girlfriends, from pastors, from Christian counselors – blaming women.

Tolle describes how women are more connected to emotions and the body, but he doesn’t blame women for having to carry an entire relationship between two adult people.

Tolle even discusses how women experience personal and collective pain from misogyny.

I am currently also reading Island by Aldous Huxley and this book espouses similar mystic or alternative ideas about society and relationships.

Chapter Eight: Enlightened Relationships

Favorite quotes:

You see time as the means to salvation, whereas in truth it is the greatest obstacle.

Unless and until you access the consciousness frequency of presence, all relationships, and particularly intimate relationships, are deeply flawed and ultimately dysfunctional.

They do not cause pain and unhappiness. They bring out the pain and unhappiness that is already in you.

For love to flourish, the light of your presence needs to be strong enough so that you no longer get taken over by the thinker or the pain-body and mistake them for who you are.

The greatest catalyst for change in a relationship is complete acceptance of your partner as he or she is, without needing to judge or change them in any way.

What is God? The eternal One Life underneath all the forms of life. What is love? To feel the presence of that One Life deep within yourself and within all creatures. To be it. Therefore, all love is the love of God.

True communication is communion — the realization of oneness, which is love.

But if you accept that the relationship is here to make you conscious instead of happy, then the relationship will offer you salvation, and you will be aligning yourself with the higher consciousness that wants to be born into this world.

To relinquish judgment does not mean that you do not recognize dysfunction and unconsciousness when you see it. It means “being the knowing” rather than “being the reaction” and the judge.

If there isn’t an emanation of love and joy, complete presence and openness toward all beings, then it is not enlightenment.

Your main task as a woman now is to transmute the pain-body so that it no longer comes between you and your true self, the essence of who you are.

A victim identity is the belief that the past is more powerful than the present, which is the opposite of truth.

Being an outsider to some extent, someone who does not “fit in” with others or is rejected by them for whatever reason, makes life difficult, but it also places you at an advantage as far as enlightenment is concerned. It takes you out of unconsciousness almost by force.

If you cannot be at ease with yourself when you are alone, you will seek a relationship to cover up your unease.

I think The Body Keeps the Score by Bessel van der Kolk is a good book to deal with pain-body concepts. We can heal ourselves and our relationships.

You might also like:

  • Chapter One
  • Chapter Two
  • Chapter Three
  • Chapter Four
  • Chapter Five
  • Chapter Six
  • Chapter Seven
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The Power of Now Chapter Seven

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April 1, 2022 By Jennifer Lambert Leave a Comment

I will be glad when I am through this season of busyness.

It’s too easy to feel empty when I am chauffeuring teens to appointments, social events, and sports practices. I love providing the service but get lost in the shuffle and my needs have never been met.

I have been rushing, stressed, tired – for decades now it seems. It’s been difficult to experience The Now and to rest or be still.

I’ve been suffering as a mother as I try to assist a child with depression and anxiety. It’s been a hard journey with medications, hospital visits, doctors, therapy. Some helps and some make it worse or no help at all. Some days, it’s hard to see a vision of a better future.

How am I to teach my children to experience connectedness when I myself struggle to observe it?

As a sensitive, empathic introvert, it’s often easy for me to be silent, to be still. Some might consider it daydreaming and there is a bit of that. I’ve always found it easy to be alone and to be quiet in a busy loud world.

Chapter Seven: Portals into the Unmanifested

Favorite quotes:

The Unmanifested is the source of chi. Chi is the inner energy field of your body. It is the bridge between the outer you and the Source. It lies halfway between the manifested, the world of form, and the Unmanifested. Chi can be likened to a river or an energy stream.

Chi is movement; the Unmanifested is stillness.

When your consciousness is directed outward, mind and world arise. When it is directed inward, it realizes its own Source and returns home into the Unmanifested.

As you go about your life, don’t give 100 percent of your attention to the external world and to your mind. Keep some within.

Feel the stillness deep inside it. Keep the portal open. It is quite possible to be conscious of the Unmanifested throughout your life. You feel it as a deep sense of peace somewhere in the background, a stillness that never leaves you, no matter what happens out here. You become a bridge between the Unmanifested and the manifested, between God and the world. This is the state of connectedness with the Source that we call enlightenment.

You take a journey into the Unmanifested every night when you enter the phase of deep dreamless sleep. You merge with the Source. You draw from it the vital energy that sustains you for a while when you return to the manifested, the world of separate forms. This energy is much more vital than food: “Man does not live by bread alone.” But in dreamless sleep, you don’t go into it consciously.

The Unmanifested does not liberate you until you enter it consciously. That’s why Jesus did not say: the truth will make you free, but rather: “You will know the truth, and the truth will make you free.” This is not a conceptual truth.

The Now can be seen as the main portal.

you feel the God-essence in every creature, every flower, every stone, and you realize: “All that is, is holy.” This is why Jesus, speaking entirely from his essence or Christ identity, says in the Gospel of Thomas: “Split a piece of wood; I am there. Lift up a stone, and you will find me there.”

Another portal into the Unmanifested is created through the cessation of thinking.

Surrender — the letting go of mental-emotional resistance to what is — also becomes a portal into the Unmanifested.

As soon as one of the portals is open, love is present in you as the “feeling-realization” of oneness. Love isn’t a portal; it’s what comes through the portal into this world. As long as you are completely trapped in your form identity, there can be no love. Your task is not to search for love but to find a portal through which love can enter.

The Unmanifested is not separate from the manifested. It pervades this world, but it is so well disguised that almost everybody misses it completely. If you know where to look, you’ll find it everywhere. A portal opens up every moment.

nothing in this world is so like God as silence.

“Form is emptiness, emptiness is form,” states the Heart Sutra.

Everybody pays attention to the things in space, but who pays attention to space itself?

Space has no “existence.” “To exist” literally means “to stand out.”

You cannot think and be aware of space — or of silence, for that matter.

Most humans are completely unconscious of this dimension. There is no inner space, no stillness. They are out of balance. In other words, they know the world, or think they do, but they don’t know God. They identify exclusively with their own physical and psychological form, unconscious of essence. And because every form is highly unstable, they live in fear. This fear causes a deep misperception of themselves and of other humans, a distortion in their vision of the world.

A Course in Miracles expresses this truth poignantly: “Nothing real can be threatened. Nothing unreal exists. Herein lies the peace of God.”

Space comes into being the moment the One becomes two, and as “two” become the “ten thousand things,” as Lao Tse calls the manifested world, space becomes more and more vast.

And the greatest miracle is this: That stillness and vastness that enables the universe to be is not just out there in space — it is also within you.

Even if you have missed all the other opportunities for spiritual realization during your lifetime, one last portal will open up for you immediately after the body has died.

In the Tibetan Book of the Dead, it is described as “the luminous splendor of the colorless light of Emptiness,” which it says is “your own true self.”

Every portal is a portal of death, the death of false self.

I love this idea of portals where we might stand on a threshold of the divine.

I often experienced the miracle of stillness and I long to return to it when the stresses of modern life drag me back to this reality. I keep glimpsing God and try to maintain a semblance of that peace in every moment.

You might also like:

  • Chapter One
  • Chapter Two
  • Chapter Three
  • Chapter Four
  • Chapter Five
  • Chapter Six
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