Consider the Lilies of the Field…

 

 

Consider the Lilies of the Field…

...how they grow: they neither toil nor spin.

For when the sound and fury wanes...& all falls quiet…

 

You can hear the quieter things.

 

You can do that.

When the room is quiet…you can review- with certain clarity- those things that have come to pass in times of war, but have gone unnoticed in the din...

And I have been at war- such a long time.

 

With myself.

Is the war over?

 

Is it too soon to declare an armistice?

Hard to say; only I can answer that.

And I’m not sure I know myself well enough to say with any kind of certainty.

I know only unpredictability.

What I want to be…

Is settled.

'He’s so settled so at peace with himself.'

So sure.

So reliable.

That is what I want.

Not in a boring way…doing nothing, saying nothing, going nowhere...

 

But in a productive way.

When I gave up smoking, drinking, eating dead animal flesh...

 

It was no battle.

I just surrendered to health and wellbeing.

Will it be the same for my past and most persistent addiction?

Hatred and Anger?

I would like to thinks so.

Less a proactive measure- something I am DOING…

More a question of something I am ceasing to do.

Giving up the anger…letting it pass through me, rather than fighting it...

& surrendering to love.

I said before that this is not something we can do alone.

And a conversation with my good friend Danaan reminded me of this.

You can lead a horse to water…but you cannot make it drink.

That is because horses are more evolved than men.

You usually cannot even lead a man to water.

He will avoid with every fibre of his being…those things that might heal him.

‘A man would go to heaven with half the effort he goes to hell’, as Johnson said.

I have spent a lifetime wandering in the desert, my preference to suffer and die in the sands of hate…than drink from the cool clear waters of love.

I think because we do not trust what we know to be good and right, true and life giving.

Things like home…& family.

The truth is...the trauma of life at home…I never trusted it.

It gave me nightmares. Apocalyptic nightmares.

Home life...father...was a nightmare.

A perpetual horror. 

I never trusted the ‘so called’ love…the tough love of the fist and the belt…

Which left me accursed to wander the wasteland of hate, rather than trust love, family, home and hearth again…which I knew to be poison, stagnant waters...

My conversation with Danan reminded me of my propensity for hate, and anger toward people.

 

The hatred and anger I was weaned upon.

Taken out on others as my father took it out on me.

 

Even people on FB.

Whatever it is that Father carried trapped in his soul..

 

Whatever wrong doing he carried with him...& unable to take action against the true source...

 

He took it out on us.

 

Just as I take it out on those around me, most who do not deserve it.

 

I feel, somehow...I must take it out on someone.

 

SOMEONE must pay for this injustice, trapped inside my soul? 

 

right?

 

& I disguise it with righteous indignation…

But call it what it is.

Hate.

I get angry with a comment perceived as an attack on me; & I fly into battle as if waging some mighty crusade…

When it is merely a war with myself.

And I defriend and block…

And it is only then…in the peace and quiet between battles…

I realise some of these people have shown me who I am.

They are just like me.

No wonder I hate them.

Because I hate me.

As long as I wage war with me…

I will wage war with people just like me.

I need to accept peace…once and for all.

Trust it.

I will need time to trust people…

But as long as I trust myself.

How do I learn to do this?

How can I let myself drink from the waters of my own peace?

By allowing people to help.

Like…Danaan.

She has had MANY opportunities to defriend and block me over the time we have known each other.

My flying off the handle…

Talking to her reminded me of two things.

How the anger…

The mood swings…

Are just like my father's.

One minute he was fine, happy, peaceful…

Next thing he would roar in anger, and beat the living daylights out of us.

Walking on eggshells. That was home.

No wonder I don’t trust it.

And I am just like him.

No wonder I don’t trust me.

But…

She trusts me.

She has been patient with me.

And kind.

She has NEVER judged me.

She has more grace, faith and compassion than anyone I have ever met.

She has not even tried to lead me to the water.

 

No sign of any evangelistic zeal. 

She has simply been here for me, offering gentle encouragement…

This has engendered in me a curiosity.

About her.

And admiration.

‘Wait a second’. I think to myself.

‘She has seen who I am; my anger, my mood swings…even with people she knows.’

‘So had Ken’.

For that matter- so have a lot of my friends here.

Just a couple of examples…unexpected sources of courage and inspiration.

James has always been here for me.

Quietly supportive.

Pinky is a fairly new friend…& I suspected from the start it might be touch and go.

And yet…he has persisted.

His patience…when others have torn me to shreds for my indignation…

Saw something else in me.

He had faith. God knows why.

Actually..I DO know why.

These people…in fact, all my FB friends…

Have had something I WISH/WANT to have a little of.

Patience.

These are people who seem to be quite ordinary…

 

& yet extraordinary. In a quiet, peaceful, unassuming way...

They have more going for them than Ghandi or the Dalai.

They don't have the same PR machine.

 

Quiet achievers.

People with the gift of patience, grace, and kindness.

And humanity.

I often ask…why have they not blocked and defriended me yet?

I am cautious about any club that would have me as a member…

But my curiosity is too much for me.

I have to find out more.

What have they got?

What well do they drink from?

It seems to be good.

Can I get some too??

And slowly, but surely…

I creep gently toward the well.

Will I drink?

 

Maybe.

 

If I can learn, more often to...

 

Consider the lilies of the field.