SheLoves Magazine

TGIF: Woman Thou Art Hungry!

On dunking goldfish in tartar sauce, Zen Elmo and finding my true hunger.

by Tina Francis | Twitter: @teenbug
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About four years ago, I got in a heated discussion  screaming-sobbing-snot-filled-straight-up-gangsta-fight with a family member who will remain anonymous–let’s call this person “Jo”–about finances (or lack thereof) and my futile attempts at looking for a job. After a month of sending out cover letters and resumes, Jo gave me a newspaper clipping  and suggested I apply for a position I was insanely overqualified for.

“ You can’t get emotional about it,” Jo said. “You just have to be a grown-up.”

I knew in my heart that if I did this particular job, I would start dimming my light, thinking small and believing that this was the best I could do. It broke my heart that Jo wanted me to settle,  didn’t want me to strive for more and couldn’t see why I was offended.

I started crying so hard, tears were pouring out of every orifice of my (upper) body. I grabbed my purse, car keys and started barreling down the street.

With one hand on the steering wheel and the other hand on my phone, I started calling my “lifelines.” You know, the peeps you call when your jeans don’t fit, your credit card blinks “Insufficient funds” and your grandmother is really sick.

After two unanswered calls, something in my gut pushed me to call Idelette, who was still a relatively new friend at the time.

Idelette has a secret superpower–I think of her as “Zen Elmo.” With two seemingly simple words, “Oh sweetie,” and her head cocked to the side, all mortals feel accepted, understood and smothered in love.

A Big Hunger

I sobbed as I breathlessly recounted the details of the fight with Jo. To clarify, this was not a drama-queen “I’m not getting my way” tantrum cry. This was a “I don’t know what I’m doing/ My life is a mess/ I have officially hit rock bottom/ I did six years of school and have no marketable skills/ I’m a freaking liability/ Does anybody care?” gut-curdling cry.

“I had to leave the house,” I told her. “If I stayed, I’d eat everything in the fridge and the pantry. I’d eat till I was sick, and then I’d cry because nothing I ate would satisfy me.”

“Oh sweetie …” she said. “You’re hungry.”

“No,” I replied, “I’m not hungry.”

“No, I mean, you are huuungry. You are hungry for more out of life. You are hungry to live out your purpose, your dreams, your passions. You are hungry to use your talents. You have BIG dreams on the inside of you. You have a BIG hunger you are trying to fill.” She paused. “Sweetheart, you are hungry!”

A Sick Heart

This was the first time I had heard the word “hungry” being used in a positive way. I’d been medicating my “hunger” on the surface but never acknowledged my real hunger, my real desires, that were thrashing around like an angry tidal wave on the inside of me.

Proverbs 13:12 says:

“Hope deferred makes the heart sick,
but a desire fulfilled is a tree of life.”

Good Lord, my unmet desires were making my heart sick.

Fast forward to March, when I’m talking to my friend Julie. Much like Idelette, Julie too has a superpower; she has an uncanny Yoda-like ability to look into my eyes and see the muddy backroads of my soul. I told her the story of the straight-up-gangsta-fight with my family that eventually led to my big moment of enlightenment.

I told her how I’d been learning that “being hungry” is not a bad thing and how I’d noticed a gradual change in my eating habits. I now ask myself, “What are you really hungry for?” before eating. I realized that I tend to eat even when what I really need sometimes is sleep, a hug, a bath or a phone call with a friend.

“Have you heard of Rachel Cole?” Julie beamed, “This is exactly what she talks about.”

What are you truly hungry for?

When I Googled Rachel Cole I was thrilled to find out she was having a “Retreatshop” in Seattle called “The Well Fed Woman.” The words “well fed” made my toes curl. It oozed abundance, acceptance and affirmation. I knew she was my kind of girl when I read the tagline on her website, “What are you truly hungry for?”

Rachel affirmed some truths I’d been learning on own my journey and taught me some new ways of articulating my relationship with food and hunger.

Here are some nuggets that resonated deep in my belly:

1. Identify your Primary Hunger.

One of the things Rachel articulated beautifully was distinguishing between your Primary Hunger and Secondary hunger.

She gave an example, “If you want a date night with your husband, perhaps the primary hunger is connection, physical touch, intimacy, play or communion.”

So on the surface, it may seem like what I want is to lose weight (secondary hunger), but what I really want (my primary hungers) might be unconditional love, or to feel accepted, or to feel at home in my body.

It takes courage to dig deep and unearth the raw hunger sitting at your core.

2. We can’t feed the hungers we don’t know. 

It’s like dunking a goldfish in a creamy tartar sauce, instead of water.  Sure, I love lemony mayo, capers and tarragon as much as the next girl, but that little Petsmart fishie needs water to breathe and live!

Soooo … [scratching head] when I’m watching Real Housewives of Vancouver, “just-to-see-what-all-the-fuss-is-about,” with a bag of Cheetos,  what I really need after a long day at work might be a hug?

So many times I’m the goldfish sputtering about in tartar sauce,  self-medicating with food, Facebook, Netflix, blogs or Pinterest.

I needed to create pockets where my true hungers could be made known.

Rachel says, “The practice of digging deeper is essential to being a well-fed woman. We must look under the covers, peel back the layers and expose what wants to be fed.”

3. When we receive our beautiful hungers, the “how” takes care of itself.

Once I figured out the hungers I was denying and misplacing, it got easier to make decisions that truly feed me. The habits that are right for me, may not be right for you, but here are some things that have really helped me:

- Before I eat I ask myself, “Tina, what are you really hungry for?” Is it food, sleep or a pee-break? Sometimes it’s a plate of good ol’ fashioned food. But every once in a while, I’m pouring myself a cup of coffee, when I actually want to shampoo my hair and read my new Joan Didion book in a towel turban.

- I don’t buy fashion magazines. They hijack my mind and make me ache for Heidi Klum’s legs and crave a Wendy’s Jr. Bacon Cheeseburger in the same breath.

- I still have a long way to go on this one, but I got rid of all most of my clothes that fit Mini Me.

- I surround myself with healthy friends who affirm me, but also hold me accountable when I need a reality check.

- I now receive and share wisdom. Three amazing women helped me find deeper clarity on the issue of hunger. Idelette first reframed the word “hungry” for me. I shared Idelette’s story with Julie, who affirmed my journey and pointed me in the direction of Rachel. Rachel gave me fresh language and tools to identify and connect with my true hunger. Now, I’m sharing what I learned from Rachel with you to come alongside you on your journey. See how this works? Karma baby.

- I read what God says about me in the Bible. One of my faves: “You are altogether beautiful, my darling, And there is no blemish in you.” -Songs of Solomon 4:7.

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We are hungry people.

Idelette is right about me, I have big dreams and a big hunger I’m trying to fill. While it seems so much easier to numb or ignore my true hungers, I’m learning that denying them leads to an unsatisfied, famished life.

I want to savour, delight and relish life. I don’t want to be imprisoned by insecurity, jealousy, exhaustion, criticism and guilt.  I want a better life, a life for freedom, for myself, and my girlfriends.

What would a world with women unified with their true hungers look like? 

In the words of Michaelangelo, (the orange-masked turtle whirling pizzas, not the Italian Renaissance artist): “Cowabunga!”

Mind. Blown.

Marianne Williamson says it beautifully in this prayer:

Dear God,
Please free me
from false appetites
and take away my pain.
Take from me my compulsive self,
and show me who I am.

Dear God,
Please give me a new beginning.
Unchain my heart
so I might live
a freer life at last.

Amen.

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So, dear ones, I want to leave you with some of Rachel’s brilliant questions:

- Today and tomorrow the hunger I need to feed is _______ .
- What gets in the way of you feeding your truest hungers?
- If you have a busy schedule and are really strapped for time, what is one way you could feed yourself in the shower, in traffic, in the kitchen, etc.?

Love you more than Coconut Mango Oat Muffins,
xoxo,
Teen

To read more TGIFs from Tina: Click here.

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My name is Tina. Loved ones call me: Teen.

Words are my chocolate. Music, my caramel. Photography, my bread. Girlfriends, my butter.

Confession: Some girls dream about Manolo Blahniks or their next Hermes bag. Not me. I dream of freshly baked bread, perfectly barbecued meat & steaming bowls of Pho. My dream lover *cue Mariah Carey song* is someone who would read out a menu to me in Barry White’s baritone voice.

I celebrate food, ask for help, interrupt conversations, laugh and cry hard, acknowledge the elephant in most rooms, fight for the underdog and believe in the power of storytelling.

I was born and raised in Dubai and currently live in the beautiful city of Vancouver, known for some of the best sushi in the world.

Wellness Wednesday: From Fear to Release

“I’ve had two opportunities in my life to look death in the eye … but one was governed by fear and the other by joy.”

By Ali Valdez

For a long time in my life, phobias were the fears other people dealt with—traumatic, life-limiting fears that put up invisible walls and stop people in their tracks. I had none to speak of—at least none that you could classify as phobias—until 15 years ago when I met my fear dead-on.

I had begun traveling regularly for work. Soon the trips became long-haul flights. I thought I had it down until a particularly traumatic summer flying out of O’Hare when the plane needed to make an emergency landing. The cockpit was on fire.

In the instant I knew what was happening, the fear of flying and falling overwhelmed my body, my mind, my life.

We had to fly around to drop fuel so we wouldn’t explode upon landing. The energy in the plane grew from panic to sorrow and then heaviness as everyone began to pray. As the voice of the pilot cracked, the flight attendants cried.

There were no rational indicators that this would have a happy ending.

As I bowed my head, emergency-landing style, I fixed my eyes on a bag from the Chicago Shedd Aquarium. Inside, a set of toys I had bought for my little brother Giordano. My greatest sadness in that moment was that I would probably never see him again. I prayed that God would allow me to give Giordano those toys.

When we approached landing, the runway was lined with fire trucks, emergency crews and rows of gray body bags. It was the moment of truth: was I coming home, or going Home?

Miraculously,  the pilot managed to bring us all down safely. I’ve lived to tell my story, but for years I was paralyzed by fear. Flying became very difficult; I imagined myself buckled into a plane seat floating among the clouds without the shell of the plane.

I was no longer able to sit by the window because I believed watching the wings and witnessing their buoyancy was a bad omen. I refused to fly Continental Airlines and I still check the crossing of my legs when there is turbulence in the air (I have this weird idea that if my legs are crossed, God will bring the plane down.)

I would dream I was falling, which according to “experts” on the Web, means anxiety over letting go. It could also be a drop in blood pressure. One site suggests the dream stems from our monkey days when we slept and sometimes fell from trees. For me, I suspect it had to do with that flight from O’Hare.

After this experience every flight I took I believed would be my last. I reached a point where I had to make a choice: continue to spend half my working life feeling afraid, or pass through the door of fear into a place of release. I had to begin to enjoy flying.

My opportunity to face my fear came a few years back when I was invited to go sky-diving in Santa Barbara. I knew plenty of intelligent, capable, sound-minded individuals who did this regularly and I admired them. I also knew that I needed to confront the behavioural patterns that stemmed from my fears.

There are some things people don’t tell you about sky-diving. The airtime itself is nominal—twenty minutes max—but the wait for your turn can be hours. Not that I minded; I wanted the parachute folders and the pilot mechanics to be laser-focused.  But then there’s the reams of waivers you have to sign that use words like injury, death and mortal—it’s enough to make your knuckles white.

Everyone diving that day showed signs of nervousness, but I was so calm, strangers assumed I was a regular. For me it was simple—this was something that needed to be overcome. Nothing, including this long drawn-out waiting period, would stop me.

Flying was part of God’s plan for my life. I knew I could no longer begin every journey in a state of anxiety and panic. I also knew I had to be a role model for my daughter, teach her courage and to not be afraid, to live life fully, with focus and without fear.

The plane itself was enough to motivate even the most acrophobic (those afraid of heights and falling) to want to leap from it. A rickety old thing, plied together in places (I’m not joking) with varying types of duct tapes, it had a little too much breeze and rattle for my liking.

Once airborne and almost ready to dive, I sat right at the opening of the jump door. I noticed the first knocking of my knees when the hatch opened and a cold gust of wind slammed against my face. It was the window seat from hell. As the plane turned sideways to dump the free fallers, there I was, open sky, a droning engine in my ear and down below, planet Earth.

Another untold for the novice skydiver: tandems have to hold on, hurl your body out, bring it back in, then jump—all to gain enough momentum for the dive. That knee-knocking foxhole moment of hurling my body out only to have to come back in was too much—this had to end. I remember shouting an expletive and taking the leap.

The free-fall drop, the moments before the parachute opened, was the ultimate adrenaline rush. Floating on my belly with my limbs lifted, I felt complete liberation. A smiling photographer floated across from me, loving life. Contagiously, there was nothing but joy racing through my limbs.

This was my time with God: viewing the planet through that rounded film of atmosphere—the perfect Santa Barbara coastline, the majestic weather. What a momentary indulgence in His creation. It felt smooth and safe. I was praying, but unlike my Chicago flight, I prayed with praise and joy for this wonderful experience of feeling alive and fearless in the sky. The landing was triumphant, my feet like feathers touching the ground.

The experience taught me that I must face my fears head-on—to go through the door I was too afraid to open. I have had two opportunities in my life to look death in the eye, and through both I was deep in prayer, but one experience was governed by fear and the other by joy.

In passing through my fears, a whole new world awaited me, one of infinite possibility where I now define my life through faith in Him.

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My dear SheLoves friends, I would love to hear:

• Are there any doors that represent fear in your life?

• What would happen if you opened the door?

• What awaits you on the other side of your particular fear?

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About Ali:

My name is Ali Valdez and I live between Seattle and Houston. I am a Christian yoga instructor, academic and writer, and devote most of my time in servitude to my students, who are yoga teachers or studio owners developing yoga communities in their cities and towns. I have also worked and led Kindergarten and small groups at my church. I love religion, philosophy and man’s inquiry on all things of higher order. I have devoted my life to study and am versed in the metaphysical, philosophical and topics of comparative religion. Practically, I love wellness, nutrition, the gross and subtle energy bodies, healing, alternative medicine, fitness, exercise, and healthful levels on many levels. I have done crazy things like marathons, sky-diving and state-of-the-art spa treatments. I look forward to connecting with you all and sharing whatever insights I may have that serve you in your aspirations. For fun, I travel the world, host retreats globally, read and write on my blog, the Gadabout. I also party with my Bun, a little five-year-old named Mathilde. You can learn more about what I do at sattvayogaonline.com

Photo credit: flickr.com 

Mary Magdalene: Mother of Easter

“She arrived a simple Jewish woman. She left an empowered messenger endowed with a message for the disciples.”

By Pam Hogeweide | Twitter: @pamhogeweide

I’ve never been to seminary and I have no ministry accolades to showcase. I work in an entry-level job at a hospital and before that I was a professional cleaning woman. I have a family to manage and a household to run. There is no earthly reason why anyone ought to pay attention to anything I have to say.

Sometimes I think someone else should have written the book I just published. It’s an important message about the equality of women in the church, and though I’m proud of the book, I worry that my lack of credentials will stunt the reach I think this vital and timely message needs.

There was a sense of divine mission upon me as I wrestled the words out of my bones. I felt it was an important assignment, and though I struggled with getting the words out–one sentence at a time–the bigger struggle was believing I had something to say that others would take seriously.

This has been the backdrop of my story: low-paying jobs and domestic duties. Discovering my voice and my God-breathed power has been a long process. In the way of the world, a woman like me doesn’t become a published writer. Yet in the kingdom of God, there are endless possibilities that transcend my so-called station in life, for God is no respecter of persons.

This is probably why I love the story of Mary Magdalene so much. She was the first person to see and announce the resurrected Christ. This is especially significant, because she was a mere woman of no high standing. The resurrection of the Son of God is one of the greatest testimonies in history and it was entrusted to a woman. In her own culture, Mary was not permitted to testify in a court of law because of her gender. The temple was not much better in how they treated women. The religious and judicial systems of her culture did not recognize or affirm the worth of a woman.

Mary’s backdrop–the setting of her story–was to be born a female in a culture where Jewish men could be heard praying, “I thank you God for not making me a Gentile, a slave or a woman.” It was in this setting that Jesus came along and disrupted the story of her life. He flipped the script. He did not treat her the way her culture did.

Empowered Messenger

The Gospel accounts portray a Man who was counter-cultural in his relationships with people, especially women. This is so evident in the setting of that first Easter morning when Mary came to the tomb. She arrived a simple Jewish woman. She left an empowered messenger endowed with a message for the disciples. For this reason, the early church fathers dubbed her the “Apostle of apostles.”

Mary’s story resonates with me because it shows how God does not judge my life’s appearance as the world system does. He has no interest in sizing me up according to my earning power or blog ranking. God’s wisdom does not match the world’s wisdom.

Flip the Script

God chose Mary Magdalene to be the first witness of his Son’s resurrection. She became the mother of Easter. By the grace and will of God alone, Mary was cast into a role that flipped the entire script of her life. God did not choose someone of higher status.

I identify with that. I am a working class woman with no education credentials. I have no platform of influence to speak of and my social power is ordinary at best. I am no-one special in the realm of humankind, just another mom trying to balance work and home. And yet—there is the beauty of the “yet”—God does not assess me the way I assess me or culture assesses me. God entrusts me with opportunities to serve him regardless of my station in life, for God sees my full personhood rather than just my gender or intellectual prowess.

Mary did what she had been entrusted with. She announced, “He is risen!” to the disbelieving disciples. She told it true, she told it strong. The empowerment of Jesus surpassed the devaluing of her personhood from the culture and world system she’d been born into.

I am inspired by her life. She became an untamed woman who threw off the story the world system had placed upon her. Mary Magdalene began living out the kingdom of God within the story she found herself in.

She flipped the script. This inspires me to do the same.

I wrote a book. And I’ll write another. Uneducated working mom that I am, I have my own script to flip–for the kingdom of God is within me, too.

God chose things the world considers foolish in order to shame those who think they are wise. And he chose things that are powerless to shame those who are powerful. God chose things despised by the world; things counted as nothing at all, and used them to bring to nothing what the world considers important. -1 Corinthians 1: 27-28, New Living Translation)

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Happy Easter, my dear SheLoves friends! I’d love to hear:

• What inspires you about the story of Mary Magdalene?
• What is the backdrop of your story that you have flipped or need to flip?
• What keeps you from speaking the message you have been entrusted with?

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About Pam:

Pam Hogeweide is the author of the newly released book, Unladylike: Resisting the Injustice of Inequality in the Church. She lives in Portland, Oregon with her husband and two teenage children. You can find Pam on Facebook and on Twitter, as well as through  her website www.pamhogeweide.com.

Image credit: Early morning, by Andreas Øverland

Finding Our Place in the Easter Story Today

On “bodied faith” + the meaning of the cross + participating in the story of Easter.

By Idelette McVicker @idelette | Twitter: @idelette
And Kelley Johnson-Nikondeha | Twitter: @kelljnik

I was in my pyjammies when Kelley’s HeyTell message came through this morning, wishing me a Good Friday. She mentioned how it’s ironic for her that we call it “Good” Friday when it involves the suffering, mockery and death of a revolutionary.

I had had a similar conversation with my kidlets in the car last night. It went something like this in the back of the car:

Tomorrow is Good Friday–yayyy!
But it really is a bad Friday, because Jesus died.
But it’s also good because He died for us, right?

As Kelley and my HeyTell conversation progressed and we each shared our interaction with the cross–thoughts on justice and freedom–I wondered: Perhaps we need to take this conversation to our SheLoves friends and invite others into the conversation.

While Kelley put another load in the dryer and finished boiling eggs, I put on some clothes and lipgloss and made a tray of food and drinks for my kids, asking them very kindly to please give Mommy a quiet moment to do a Skype video call.

Then we recorded our conversation. These 17 minutes are as real as real can get.

We’d love to invite you into this conversation between friends on Good Friday. Please join us in thinking about this day, what it means to all of us and where we find ourselves in this story.

Here are a few of the thoughts we touch on (and get pretty vulnerable) on:
- The cross–not accepting this reference in our faith language blindly, but wanting to have a revelation of its meaning.
- Jesus as a freedom-fighter–how He carried His pursuit of justice all the way to the cross.
- Jesus as non-violent revolutionary, yet crucified as terrorist.
- Remembering the woman who broke open her alabaster jar–her most precious–and anointed the feet of Jesus.
- Asking ourselves: Am I in the crowd, watching, or do I participate in the suffering of Jesus?

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Our dear SheLoves friends, we’d love to hear where YOU find yourself in the story of Easter today.

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About Kelley:

Kelley Johnson Nikondeha is co-director of Amahoro Africa and international staff member of Community of Faith with her husband Claude. She’s a thinker, connector, advocate, avid reader and mother of two beautiful children. Kelley lives between Arizona and Burundi. She loves handwritten letters, homemade pesto and anything written by Walter Brueggemann.

About Idelette:
I like soggy cereal and I would like to go to every spot on the map of the earth to meet our world’s women.

I dream of a world where no women or girls are for sale. I dream of a world where women and men are partners in doing the work that brings down a new Heaven on earth.

My word for the year is “Roar,” but I have learned it’s not about my voice rising as much as it is about our collective voices rising in unison to bring down walls of injustice.

I have three children and this place–right here, called shelovesmagazine.com–is my fourth baby. I am African, although my skin colour doesn’t tell you that story. I am also a little bit Chinese, because my heart lives there amongst the tall skyscrapers of Taipei and the mountains of Chiufen. Give me sweet chai and I think I’m in heaven. I live in Vancouver, Canada and I pledged my heart to Scott 11 years ago.

I believe in kindness and calling out the song in each other’s hearts. I also believe that Love covers–my gaps, my mistakes and the distances between us. I blog at idelette.com and tweet@idelette.

ShePonders: Black and Beautiful

“In the shade of the trees on that sunny afternoon, all we could do was cry and pray that our children would be spared the hurt of prejudice and the injustice of discrimination because of their dark skin.”

By Kelley Johnson-Nikondeha | Twitter: @kelljnik

The most intriguing and intoxicating woman of the Bible, for me, has always been the Shulamite woman we find in The Song of Songs.

“Yes, I am black and radiant!

O city women watching me –

As black as Kedar’s goat hair tents

Or Solomon’s fine tapestries.

 

Will you disrobe me with your stares?

The eyes of many morning suns

Have pierced my skin and now I shine

Black as the light before dawn.”  (Song of Songs 1:5-6, translated by Marcia Falk)

Such a bold introduction as she declares with pride that she is black and beautiful! She announces her dark complexion as a definitive beauty mark before the crowd of watchful city women; she stands against any words to the contrary. This ravishing beauty has confidence laced with moxy–maybe part of the reason I find her so compelling!

The Hebrew poetry here is a tour de force. She is black and radiant. She is black as the renowned tents that the Kedarites weave with only the wool of black goats. She is black as the mysterious curtains or tapestries in Solomon’s temple. She is like the shining blackness, pregnant with light, the moment before dawn breaks. These are all images of blackness as a deeply mysterious and luxurious kind of beauty. And as such, she embraces her full compliment of dark, sun-kissed, beauty.  She is the IT girl for the ancient “Black is Beautiful” campaign.

But the Hebrew poetry is always a bit elusive, never conforming to only one reading. And so we also have this translation for verse six:

“Do not see me only as dark:

The sun has stared at me.”  (translated by Ariel & Chana Bloch)

Hearing the Hebrew words in this manner, brings the Shulamite woman closer to my heart this week.  She carries an awareness not only of her stunning beauty, but also of how her dark skin can sometimes be all that people see. Even for this woman, dark skin holds connotations of a lower social class.  She knows that not everyone sees beyond her blackness–we can be thankful that Solomon possessed greater wisdom.

How Others See

Flashback to The Justice Conference in Portland this past February where I sat between Idelette and Tina. I heard that black young men are more likely (to a staggering degree) to be arrested, accused, convicted and incarcerated for crimes they did not commit. I heard that black young women are more likely to be victims of sex trafficking. Something in me broke. A geyser of tears pushed from deep in my belly, exploding on the floor of the event center.  My uncontrolled tears matched the realization that I could not control how others see my son and daughter.

My son is highly intelligent and inquisitive, he has a depth of emotion and such physical velocity that I sometimes struggle to parent him well. My daughter is affectionate, cheerful, unflappable and so fearless that it both inspires and frightens me!  They are my children. That is how I see them. But on that rainy afternoon I slammed into the reality that others see only their black skin. They could be at peril in this precarious world so permeated with injustice. And there is nothing I can do …

Packing Skittles

Fast forward to recent weeks where a tragic story broke in Florida. A teenage boy was shot. He was wearing a hoodie and packing Skittles and an iced tea. He was black. His blackness made him suspicious. This is, we are learning, a complicated case. But there is little doubt that race played into the chain of events. I avoided the story at first–turned the channel or walked out of the room to fold some laundry or put away dishes in the kitchen. I did not want to go there; I did not want to feel that uncontrollable hurt and fear again.

But my son is black. He wears a hoodie to school on cold mornings and he likes Skittles. It could be him walking home some day. I feel that chock of pain vibrate through my body again. He is at greater risk because he is black. What do I, as a mother, do with that?

I am a white woman, raised with every advantage and every privilege–what do I know of living with blackness? But now I have been entrusted with two stunning black babies and I am to be their guardian and guide in this world–it feels a bit ironic. And as I consider what it is to be black in this world, I feel heaviness and heartbreak have moved in to my maternal psyche.

Discrimination

This week I sat in the park with my friend as our children played together. I cried about how the world sees my black babies, who I adore. She cried too – because as an Arab woman she knows the world sees her lovely boys as future terrorists. In the shade of the trees on that sunny afternoon, all we could do was cry and pray that our children would be spared the hurt of prejudice and injustice of discrimination because of their dark skin.

I feel like I am “obeying the sadness of our times,” as Frederick Buechnersays. I am sitting with this raw sadness now, not trying to escape it. I am coming face to face with this reality that not everyone has the wisdom of Solomon to see that black is beautiful and the ability to embrace those with dark complexion and bright countenance. Sometimes you have to feel the pain before you can transform it, and that is where I am right now.

Today I am keeping company with the Shulamite woman. But it is not because she fascinates me with her confidence or display of gender equality or even her robust expression of affection, but because I need to be with someone who understands me. She and I agree: black is beautiful. My daughter is like her–dark and radiant, absolutely glowing with that just-before-dawn-beauty. The Shulamite woman understands that kind of gorgeous.  But she also knows the world will misunderstand it. She knows, better than I, that some people can never see beyond skin color. But we hold hands and hope things will get better.  We commit to do our part to break the prejudice in our world.  But for today, we sit together and say, “do not see them only as dark … “

This is one Mama’s prayer.

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My dear SheLoves friends, I’d love to hear:

• What “sadness of our times” are you carrying?
• What’s your greatest fear or pain for your children?
• Any other comments?

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Audio: ShePonders: Black and Beautiful

Click on the link above for an audio experience of Kelley’s post.

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About Kelley:

Kelley Johnson Nikondeha is co-director of Amahoro Africa and international staff member of Community of Faith with her husband Claude. She’s a thinker, connector, advocate, avid reader and mother of two beautiful children. Kelley lives between Arizona and Burundi. She loves handwritten letters, homemade pesto and anything written by Walter Brueggemann.

Living with Open Windows

[FROM OUR ARCHIVES]

“What I experience as interruptions—outages of my expectations—my fellow Chennaites often take in stride.”

By Stacy Wiebe

People in my adoptive city of Chennai, India live with their windows open. Neighbor kids dart in and out of each other’s houses. On the roads, drivers tap-tap-tap their horns to let you know they’re behind you. In church services and at weddings, children run up and down the aisles (and no one’s too distracted).

Our doorbell rings 10 times more often than it did in the US: the water delivery guy, the ironing lady, the landlord escorting a barefoot electrician in to change our lightbulbs—all within half an hour.

The 10 million people of this city are largely unruffled by the constant hum of human activity.

I’ve got a lot to learn from them.

North Americans, quite often, are planners. We like to be proactive, set goals. And when our goals get blocked and our plans get changed, we are not happy. The infrastructure and choices that frame life in North America give us at least the illusion that we’re in control. Life and time and people are things that our books tell us must be managed.

Indians tend to be fantastic adapters and improvisers. They may set goals, but they accept obstacles as well, and are ready to make adjustments. Life and time and people are often simply enjoyed in present tense.

Adapting

In our city, the electricity goes out daily for 1-4 hour intervals. When it went off in the grocery store today, there were no gasps; the shoppers just carried on, squinting at the shelves in the dark.

What I experience as interruptions—outages of my expectations—my fellow Chennaites often take in stride.

The last three years in India have been forming me into a more whole person as I see both the values and the blindspots in myself through the eyes of another culture.

Dance

It’s a dance, balancing goal-orientation with people-orientation, responding gracefully to interruptions, especially when they come in human form. Jesus is the only one who’s gotten it exactly right. When the unsightly, the broken and the desperate clamored for His time and touch, He turned towards them and gave them His full attention. He was never in a hurry. He made plans, but changed them as easily. When He suggested the disciples go away with Him for some prayer and downtime, and a huge crowd ran ahead to meet them, His heart was moved to speak with them and give all 5,000 of them dinner. Only after that did He resume His pursuit of solitude.

Another time, Jesus was on His way to Jairus’ house to heal his sick daughter, and He stopped to bring healing to the woman who touched His robe. Meanwhile, Jairus’ daughter died. But the delay provided an opportunity to draw out Jairus’ faith and demonstrate His power in speaking her back to life.

So, with Jesus as my teacher and India as my classroom, I’m learning. I can view people as goal-blockers or as people to love. I can choose to be present. To keep going in the dark. To spot opportunities in the detours. To allow delays to remind me that God’s in charge. To keep the windows of my soul open wide.

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Your thoughts?

• No matter what culture or continent we’re from, our personalities may tend towards task-orientation or people-orientation. How do you balance these in your life?
• What interruptions can you welcome in Jesus’ name?

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About Stacy:

Stacy Wiebe likes biriyani, books and things that grow. She’s lived in Chennai, India for the past three years, writing and speaking with WOW and other non-profits.

If Anyone Has a Reason Not to Forgive, She Does

The Surprise of a Life-freeing Gift

By Musu Taylor-Lewis | Twitter: @mercycanada

“A living nightmare,” is how she describes her childhood.

As I listened to her, I had to get over my stunned disbelief that this open, friendly, confident-looking young woman with the bright smile had come through a soul-destroying childhood. She made one statement on that day that had me thinking and praying for the life-freeing gift I saw in her.

Her words, simple and clear:

“I want to start by saying that I have forgiven all the people mentioned, and I am not sharing what happened to dishonour them in any way.”

This statement could be unremarkable until you realize  the size of the list of people she cares not to dishonour by telling her story:

• There’s the father who raped her and took photographs of her naked body. Then he let his friends rape her for a price.
• There’s a mother who stayed with that father, until her attempted suicide at age 13 forced the secrets out in the open. Then her mother blamed her for the divorce.
• There were the countless, faceless men who used her body as a playground when she started first stripping, then prostituting.
• There was the pimp who threatened her life any time she said “no,” to anyone or anything.
• There were professionals who stole her hope by telling her she would never function normally  in society.
• There was the man who raped her–interrupting her healing process–even while she was grieving the loss of her beloved grandmother.

Just when I started to wonder if a person could really forgive this much violation, she joyfully shared how she recently offered forgiveness to her mother. She’s grateful her mother received it and apologized. “We are now on our way to rebuilding our relationship,” she told me. Her willingness to forgiveness has put her on the road to reconciliation.

Understanding Forgiveness

I’ve always thought that Jesus’ teaching on forgiveness is one of the hardest things He asks us to do. It goes against our instinct for payback, against my independent spirit that says, “I’m a big girl, I can deal with difficult people myself.” Listening to this beautiful woman tell her story against the backdrop of forgiveness makes me wonder if I just don’t “get it,” the way she does.

She “gets” the helplessness of trying to do things her own way. She “gets” the destruction  that comes with holding on to hurt, anger, resentment and pain. Going her own way led her to mental breakdowns, suicide attempts and entrapment in the sex trade. As I watched her tell her story, I realized that–more that anything–now she also “gets” the relief and release that comes from finally surrendering to God’s way.

Brand-new in her faith since coming to Mercy Ministries, she has fallen in love with her Creator. Her eager-to-follow-Jesus attitude, which lights up her smile in a new way, also makes her willing to go along with anything He asks.

I imagine that when He says, “Forgive,” her question is not, “Why should I?” but rather: “How, Lord?”

When He responds: “As I forgave you,” she might say, “Oh, like that?”

Freedom

The fresh memory of His forgiveness and the overwhelming relief and release she experienced through that, frees her to forgive all the people who made her childhood such a nightmare. That is a life-freeing gift.

Lord, keep the memory of the joy of your forgiveness fresh in my mind, so I no longer feel burdened by your command to forgive but am, instead, freed by it.

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Dear SheLoves friends:

• Is there someone in your life you need to forgive?
• Do you know or remember the sweet taste of Jesus’ forgiveness?
• Any thoughts or comments you’d like to share?

About Musu:

My life is lived out of the calling “to advance Christ-centred work.” I am currently Director of Marketing and Development at Mercy Ministries, working to get the word out about the life-transforming work that takes place here. Prior to my work at Mercy, I directed a Crisis Pregnancy Centre, studied Christianity and Culture at Regent College and co-led women’s programs at my local church. I have four great children and am married to Steven, a gift to me from the Creator.

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Image credit: Someday, by Martina Perhat.

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Wellness Wednesday: On Judgement and Separation

“If you judge people, you have no time to love them.”  -Mother Theresa

 By Claire De Boer | Twitter: @Britchic19

Ten years ago, I attended a personal development weekend workshop called Clearmind. I’ve never forgotten it: three days of looking deep into my life’s experiences, how they’ve shaped me and the ensuing beliefs I developed about myself.

The prospect of such a weekend was empowering, enriching, terrifying.

My husband, who was at the time the man I had just started dating, dropped me off at a retreat centre deep in the heart of Langley, BC ready to begin my weekend. As I stood in this peaceful oasis, I couldn’t have felt any less at peace. In front of me stood a group of about 30 strangers, all waiting to begin the same workshop. I wanted to run.

Shrinking

I’m not great with strangers. I’m getting better, but at that point I was a wilting wallflower. Standing in a room full of people I didn’t know, I wanted to become a fly on the ceiling. I was ready to call my boyfriend and ask him to turn around.

In my state of fear, shyness and awkwardness, I watched people with greater social skills than I begin to connect around the room. The more they chatted, the more isolated I felt.

Judging

Then it started: in my weakness, I began to judge. I sought out the leaders, the people who were dressed like they just stepped out of the 80’s, the mean-looking girls, the ones who thought they were better than everyone else.

By the time we all sat down in a circle with the workshop leaders, I had pegged everyone in the room–the ones I could identify with and the ones I wouldn’t get along with. And by summing them up, grouping them into certain personality types without ever having spoken to them, it made me feel less scared, as though I had found my place.

With the workshop underway, people introduced themselves. I continued to judge, put up walls and shrink deeper into my skin. I began to identify with some, but felt threatened or wary of others.

Dividing

The point came where we were asked to find a partner to work with. In my horror, high-school memories of being picked last for the basketball team flashed through my mind.

Then that childhood memory became an adult reality.

We were asked to pick our partners by holding hands with every individual in the room and look deep into their eyes for two minutes each. The intended result was that each of us would find someone we really connected with.

My end result was to be the last person standing. Ouch.

I felt like that 13-year-old-girl standing in the school gym again with no sports team to play on. And in that moment of hurt I felt justified in my judgements, that I had been right all along about these people.

Reality

Ten years later, I know the reality of that situation. Several hours of judgement and making myself invisible had actually separated me from the rest of the group. I had created a dividing line without saying a word.

The weekend progressed and gradually my walls of self-protection crumbled. As each participant exposed their true self—who we really were behind the protective masks—my heart filled with love for every single person in that room. No matter what their story was and whether I agreed with the choices they had made, I couldn’t feel anything but love for them once their true hearts were revealed.

I don’t remember much more about that weekend, only that it completely changed my perspective on judgement. I was projecting my own insecurities onto others, searching for weaknesses in them that were really my own. I judged to feel better about myself, but ultimately felt separated.

I think it’s human nature to judge, even when we’re trying hard not to. In western society we have been raised to compete and compare. But underneath we just want to feel connected to one another. Right in the midst of that need is the tendency to try and define where we fit in.

The Struggle

Now when I judge someone, I often think back to that weekend. I consider how I would feel about this person if their defenses were broken and they stood raw and real in front of me. And if someone is judging me, I try reverse psychology: I ask myself, “What are the fears causing them to judge?” If I ask the question, my defenses weaken immediately.

I judged people without knowing them and all that negative energy came right back at me in equal measure.

“Judge not, that you be not judged. For with the judgment you pronounce you will be judged, and with the measure you use it will be measured to you.” Matthew 7:2 (ESV)

I’ve learned the truth in every word.

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So my SheLoves friends, I’d love for you to share your experiences:

• Has judgement taken you on a journey?

• How do you feel when others judge you?

• Have you learned anything about yourself when you have judged in the past?

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Image credits:

Russiablog.org/Beamer2DashaWindow.jpg

coupdegrace88.blogspot.com

I’m Claire and I’m the Wellness Editor here on SheLoves. I love all things writing. I dip my toes in the waters of many writing genres and am currently working on my first women’s fiction novel and a collection of short stories. I’m also the mother of two beautiful children, wife to the lovely James and a treasured daughter of God. I’m a British ex-pat, so when you meet me you might think I sound a little strange. It’s all good.

I blog at clairejdeboer. You’ll also find my story here on Wellness Wednesdays.

On Beauty, B cups and Believing Our Way Back to Innocence

Seeking Eve Monday

“I wish to battle against the perspective that some people are ordinary and others are great … I really believe people can live ordinary lives in extraordinary ways.”

By Christina Crook

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Every woman who has given birth knows this is no ordinary feat. Yet, we are quick to reduce the enormity of our task to a brief remembering, a quaint vignette.

The truth is, every day we do the extraordinary.

We scrub floors on chaffed knees. Treat man, woman, child with dignity, with care. We climb corporate ladders. Extend our hands to the weak. We speak up when it’s uncomfortable. Rise at 3am to feed our babes.

We lead protests.

Carry petitions to the seat of Parliament. We train young eyes to seek Heaven. Deliver lasagna to the family next door. We watch for signs of Spring erupting all around us.

It’s extraordinarily normal women, like Andrea Dunbar, who make the world go round.

I first met Andrea in her tidy little bungalow in New Westminster, BC. The same house where her daughter Eden, was delivered by her father, a nurse, on the bathroom floor. The same home where the kitchen was full with the scent of fresh baking and the living room brim with the found and the made.

When I first asked to share Andrea’s story she declined, feeling she lived too much of a conventional life. For years I’ve hoped for a change of heart. This month, upon my return to British Columbia’s snowy interior, I got my wish.

“I regret my response to you when you [first] asked me to do this … I wish to battle against the perspective that some people are ordinary and others are great. I really believe that people can live ordinary lives in extraordinary ways,” she says from the small town of Mackenzie, where Andrea and her small family are spending the year with her in-laws.

While her husband, Robbie, works at the hospital, she is trying out homeschooling and getting out into the great outdoors with her two kids as often as possible.

Andrea is a public health nurse. When we first met she worked on Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside at a clinic that served many prostitutes and lower income women. Each workday she’d bike the 50-kilometer round-trip.

To those around her, Andrea is a source of inspiration, quietly challenging them with the daily choices she makes.

“She is very conscious of her stewardship of this earth,” says her friend, Renice. “In a way that is not at all brash, she makes every effort to care for the earth and the people in it.

She goes beyond recycling. She uses only cloth diapers, buys local and keeps her home organic inside and out. Aside from all that is “green” related, she supports local talent, whether it be art or music and quietly engages others to do the same. She loves to surround herself with all things beautiful even if it’s as simple as a single flower.

Andrea is a modern-day Eve. Seeking to live as a daughter loved by God, desiring her Father’s purposes, longing to look more like Jesus.

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In her own words …

Faith to me means … growing.

What I mean by that is … the people of faith that I most admire continue growing throughout their lives. When I was at Trinity Western University, 10 years ago, and thought I knew everything, the buzz word that I and my friends never wanted to describe us was “complacent.” When I was in university, I also greeted strangers with, “Did you know that Jesus loves you?” While my approach to people has changed–or “grown”–over the years, I still feel just as strongly about not becoming complacent. Knowing that I will continue to grow and learn, helps me look forward to getting older, despite the pervasive North American disdain for aging.

One of my favourite songs describes the Source of growth, life, beauty:

All this pain

I wonder if I’ll ever find my way

I wonder if my life could really change at all

All this earth

Could all that is lost ever be found

Could a garden come up from this ground at all

You make beautiful things out of the dust

You make beautiful things out of us

All around

Life is springing up from this old ground

Out of chaos life is being found in You

-”Beautiful Things” by Michael and Lisa Gungor

When I was little I … didn’t want my dad to touch me. I have a photo of my bewildered dad trying to pick me up. I am about 12 years old, my face is red, I am crying and my arms are folded self-consciously over my chest. My dad was a man of integrity and was simply trying to connect with his daughter in a playful way. However, my trust and innocence were destroyed by another man in my life, a close relative. He was a very religious man who preached that Christmas trees were idols and girls needed to wear dresses to church. At the same time, he touched and kissed me in sexual ways. When I realized that he was the reason that touch from my dad felt threatening to me, I had to mourn all those lost years when I could have felt safe in my dad’s hug or touch. I now feel grateful for God’s work of restoration and rescuing in my life despite the darkness that tried to bury me in fear and confusion. I still have so much to learn about accepting love from my Father.

My days are filled with … the voices of two special little people. I have a video clip on my iPhone that was taken by my daughter a few days ago. The video shows a side view of me with my head tilted down at a book and my long brown hair shielding my face. The sound track is her sweet little voice,

“Hi Mama! Mama, look! It’s me, Eden. Mama … Mama, look!”

At this point I move for the first time to look up with a dazed smile on my face, “Hi, how are you?”

When she showed me this video, we laughed together. I couldn’t believe how profound it was to see me through her eyes.

I wish … I could say that was my first delayed response to my kids. But it wasn’t. It happens far too often. Sometimes it happens when I am *gasp* texting or looking at Facebook. This little video has made me so much more aware of what that looks like to my kids.

On a larger scale, I also wish that the demand for child and women sex slaves and pornography would stop. I want this generation of boys and young men to be different than so many of their fathers. I want this generation of girls and young women to know how beautiful they are and to know that beauty is so much more than skin and shape. I raise and educate (home school) my son and daughter with these hopes. I am so grateful for the honourable example of my husband, Robbie, and my dad, Fritz. These men infuse hope into my life for a world that has more justice, peace and love for women.

Today I give myself permission …

- to have moments where I feel like a terrible mom and know that He makes beautiful things out of the dust.

- to be 5’3” with funky glasses, long straight hair, ‘athletic’ build, A sometimes B cup breasts, little white bumps that keep popping up on my face including one that is right at the corner of my eye, dark moles all over my body, and fair skin and to feel beautiful, confident and loved.

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Would you like to add your story to Seeking Eve Monday?

We’d love to hear your story. Please share it by emailing Christina at seekingeve[@]gmail.com

To find words for your story, try following these lines, as Andrea did:

Faith to me means [community / hope / food / sacrifice / art / etc] …

What I mean by that is …

When I was little I …

My days are filled with …

I wish …

The thing is …

Today I give myself permission …

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About Christina: 

Christina is a Toronto-based writer whose articles on culture, religion and technology have appeared in Vancouver, UPPERCASE and Geez magazine. She, her husband and two young children attend Grace Toronto Church. She is the founder of SeekingEve.ca and blogs at www.christinacrook.com.

A Picture of Divine Love: For Sarah

“Go ahead, try me … Give me a chance to show you how much I can love you when you have gone out of your way to be unlovable.”

By Shekinah Jacob

The first time I saw you in the flesh, your body was still attached to mine, breathing my oxygen, sharing the same sheath of skin.

The unbroken umbilical cord made us one body, and when they placed you on my belly I struggled to register that moment in history, my mind panting to grasp it through the haze of exhaustion and the memory of the abyss of pain I’d been lost in just seconds before that.

I held your bloody, slimy fingers and croaked, “Hi there.”

Your eyes, filmed over with mucous and afterbirth, gazed out at the world you’d only heard but never seen.

And then they severed the umbilical cord; you were returned to me bathed and wrapped up, your face emerging from the bundle of linen like a newly-bloomed rosebud, an oven-warm loaf of bread– fresh delivery from another world.

When you were on your way out of my body, I felt as if I was at the butcher’s, being torn apart in a neat vertical line separating my right pelvic joint from the left, as if I were cleaved in half, all the way up to my cranium in order to make a passage for your entry into the world.

Extreme pain is like being stuck in the vortex of a fire. And they say fire purifies; it burns out the dross and births gold. I know that is true, because the pain distilled my love for you: drop by sweaty drop. It collected in an eternal reservoir of unfathomable, immeasurable love that never runs dry.

Catching my Breath

Although you are now four, you are still too young to know that the sight of your small eager face gazing at mine makes me catch my breath. Every now and then, I pull you close and hold you for a few moments. Sometimes you toss your head like a perky horse and wriggle out of my grasp, and then I use some guile to keep you there–a redundant question, a whispered nonsense of a secret, a silly joke. And while I keep you this close, I drink in the smell of your nutbrown skin, nuzzle your twig of a neck, rub my nose in your wayward hair.

Sometimes you turn around with a giggle or a puzzled stare and I stare back at you with all my strength, willing my eyes to send you a message that says I love you for being you.

Because you are mine.

Because you have my eyes and because your chipped tooth is the cutest imperfection I’ll see in my lifetime. And I want you to know that I will always love you.

Go ahead, try me.

Get impossibly fat, fail at something big, hate me for no reason, take your anger at the world and direct it at me. Give me a chance to show you how much I can love you when you have gone out of your way to be unlovable.

I keep telling you that God loves you just the way I do.

I tell you that I know he loves me too. But the truth is that often I lose my way in the maze of my own rational thinking.

God Loves Me 

I build walls with my imperfections, so I can blot out a perfect being. Just to help Him out, you know, so He can have his morning cup of tea without having to take me in with the view. On these days when I can’t look at myself in the mirror, I have moments of lucidity when I feel God’s pain at being left on the other side of my wall.

I want to believe that He loves me the way I love you, but it’s real hard.

It’s as if I can see all that love, but my heart tells me it’s just a pretty mirage in this desert of my making, that if I walked over for a closer look at it, all I’d be left with is the shadow of myself in the sand.

Wild Hope 

You’d think it would be easier, that my crazy mother-love for you would give me some insight; would help me hold onto the fact that perhaps a God who illogically courted pain for me, who deliberately picked out the worst kind of death to prove his love, might enjoy loving me, no matter what … despite my “what if’s” and “but why’s,” despite the manic Mondays and frivolous Fridays, despite the endless nail-biting, self-hating hours spent running after love.

But it’s real hard because often my heart refuses to keep up with my mind.

So, give me one more chance to hold you close again, to hear myself speak the unintelligible language of love, to keep murmuring until I detect in it the faint echoes of the real thing. Until my wild hope turns into the quiet certainty that I’m keeping a similarly insane love waiting, for me, on the other side of my wall.

About Shekinah:

Shekinah is a drama queen who lives in Chennai, India, with her knight (not always in shining armour because it tends to get too hot to wear metal clothing) and their two toddlers who make her laugh, and love her on bad hair days. Her idea of heaven is coffee, a good conversation, and cupcakes with zero calories. She likes writing about her family because it’s a good way to preserve the memories, and more enjoyable than taking photographs.

Image credit: EXISTENCE © Sara Robinson | Dreamstime.com; S Olsen via Pinterest