choosing

there's this quote from the shack that i want to share...it touches me in a kind of soggy, hazy place...lots of things that can and probably will trip me up there...but not an altogether bad place either.

"I already told you that forgiveness does not create a relationship. Unless people speak the truth about what they have done and change their mind and behavior, a relationship of trust is not possible. When you forgive someone you certainly release them from judgment, but without true change, no real relationship can be established."

ok, i needed to put that there so i could find it more easily...it took me forever to figure out which dog-eared page had the quote about trust i was looking for.

now, i am always being told we can choose happiness. and while i've rested some in that soggy place this morning (and quite a bit lately), i am going to make a choice today to let my heart be light. it came to me when i looked at my kids watching this winnie the pooh movie we rented. seems it doesn't matter how old you are, watching winnie the pooh makes your face look about four years old. it made me remember when my second born fell in love with the song from the heffalump movie a little over a year ago, when he was nine years old. he loved that song so much that he holed up in his closet with the portable dvd player so he could play the song over and over and write the words down, they were that important to him...meant that much.

and here's one last quote i wanted to include, that goes along with the choosing happiness for me today...

You can kiss your family and friends good-bye and put miles between you, but at the same time you carry them with you in your heart, your mind, your stomach, because you do not just live in a world but a world lives in you.
--Frederick Buechner, Telling the Truth

i love that quote. something they also say in the shack, that i'm sure has been said before...

if anything matters, everything matters.

see that light starting to shine? feel it?
peace

lots of influences

reading, music, paintings, conversations, the world, whatnot. all raining, drizzling, sometimes pouring into my being and changing me, filling me, making me someone different, even if just a little, every moment, it seems.

here are some words from a book i'm reading right now called the shack, by william young.

I suppose that since most of our hurts come through relationships so will our healing, and I know that grace rarely makes sense for those looking in from the outside.

You don't play a game or color a picture with a child to show your superiority. Rather, you choose to limit yourself so as to facilitate and honor that relationship. You will even lose a competition to accomplish love. It is not about winning and losing, but about love and respect.

"It's one reason why experiencing true relationship is so difficult for you, " Jesus added. "Once you have a hierarchy you need rules to protect and administer it, and then you need law and the enforcement of the rules, and you end up with some kind of chain of command or a system of order that destroys relationship rather than promotes it. You rarely see or experience relationship apart from power."

"Then it is you who determines good and evil. You become the judge. And to make things more confusing, that which you determine to be good will change over time and circumstance. And then beyond that and even worse, there are billions of you each determining what is good and what is evil. So when your good and evil clashes with your neighbor's, fights and arguments ensue and even wars break out."

these words make me think a lot about my spirituality (obviously), and how i live it. my understanding of my life and the lives of others...some close to me...like, maybe some that i married....you know, those guys....a little. it also makes me reconsider my worldview and my philosophy...ideals...junk like that. i picked this book up on a whim, really. and it says a lot. so much, i'm not playing with everything it's putting out there...just too many toys. but i am glad i picked it up.

then i heard this song today. i've heard it lots and can't explain why today it touched me, but it really did. it's been a rough week being married, i guess...but there was something that felt like acceptance in this song that i was feeling a bit of healing from...a place to plant my feet for a little while...weird, i know, but i'm trusting myself here...(this last part was kind of forced, in case you didn't feel it...)


i think that's about all the influences i can handle writing about right now. i do have life to live and whatnot... oh! but i am starting dr. andrew weil's eight weeks to optimum health today.

(geez, if there was ever a time we could all use a little more health...)

so i'm off to buy some broccoli, some salmon, and some vitamin c...oh, and some fresh flowers...i'm supposed to get myself some fresh flowers, too...
peace

ps--i just watched the sheryl crowe video again...i might just be liking the dress and high heals with the electric guitar and strings section behind her...i don't know...i guess it really doesn't matter in the long run...snort. peas