Candles and Prayers.

"Let my prayer rise up as incense before you, and the lifting up of my hands as an offering to you." -Psalm 141:2

The sun rises and each day; people around this world encounter death and birth every day.  Yesterday, in particular, the minds of people here in the US were focused on the bombings in Boston.  There was the same stirring of anxiety within our hearts as the Sandy Hook elementary shooting and the Batman movie shooting in Aurora.  We pour over the headlines and Facebook statuses, hoping for assurances of safety for all of our loved ones.  But for some, that day is a crack that will be permanent on their family's structure.  These tragedies in our own individual lives are not reserved for massacres and acts of violence, but our own deaths that we grasp in our hearts and the deaths of the people we know and adore.  Every day, there are many life stories that have ended here on Earth; maybe it's the celebration of life of someone who lived for 93 years, or it's the silence found in the sadness of losing a 9 year old child.  Every day these senseless acts change the reality of people; these stories are the ones that affect us all many times throughout our lives.

When is the grief done?  It isn't done now; the tears are still being held behind our eyes.  When will the groans of pain cease? I don't know, but I do know that I want to be a part of the love that hugs the pain.

My adopted grandmother asked me last week, "Why am I breathing here still when I am old and wrinkled and that young child died? What am I doing here still while that kid is gone?"

I told her that she is here to support and help.

Last night, a group of us in our apartment complex met in a living room for a prayer vigil, around a table adorned by candles and Salvadorian crosses.  Together, we held the pain, the prayers, the love, and the scars.

All around us, every day, people are left with only themselves and other creatures around them (I say creatures because animals are such a great comfort during times of trial).  Together we face events that are so strange because they are inherently inhumane or senseless.  We join the the endless song and prayer that says that we are deeper than the pain and grief.  There is love, there is kindness, there are helpers everywhere.

I think I might have inhaled you.

"I think I might have inhaled you,
 I can feel you behind my eyes,
 You’ve gotten into my bloodstream,
 I can feel you flowing in me."--Bloodstream, Stateless

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V3b1CDLsiGU

This is one of my favorite songs to dance to that I've encountered in my past two months of blues dancing regularly.  The first night I danced to it, I went home and danced by myself with this song on repeat the rest of the night.  It touches the deep recesses of my soul, just as blues dancing has these past months.

The first time I encountered blues dancing, I absolutely hated it.  It made me nervous, being so close to someone.  Following a lead dancer seemed difficult because I was too anxious to stop and listen to the beat the lead dancer was trying to show me.  It's hard work to stop our bodies and minds to tune ourselves to the heartbeat of another person.

How often does that happen in our regular lives?  We run about our days so quickly that our interactions are prepared sentences or our own shit circulating outside of our heads with others doing the same thing towards us.  We walk around with our own worlds constructed around us and these worlds collide together in community, for better or worse.

Dancing teaches you to drop your self conceptions and listen.  If I don't attune myself to the beat of the person leading me in a dance, I end up looking like an ass.  And dancing doesn't just call me to listen; it calls me to boldly step along with another person.  Sometimes that means being unsure that the move I am about to make is the one my partner intended and messing up.  Within that mistake lies me, covered in the fear and shame of being unsure and having to admit that.

We hold these masks over our faces that let other people know that we know exactly what we are doing and that we are doing just fine always.  This assumption that we make up for ourselves is so far from the truth and it not only damages others into thinking that they are alone in their insecurities, but it tears apart any hope we have of development.  How can you change if you teach yourself to believe that you are fine and have things in control?  Because you do not hold the control.  You never will.  And that is a gift.  Revel in the fear of being wrong or not knowing what comes next and laugh at it.  Be content with the mystery because there is nothing else to do.

Dancing has taught me to face the mystery and see the gracefulness of what happens when you tear away the insecurity and just be.  Be the body that moves to a beat that matches the music and a dance partner.  Be the lead dancer and move to the rhythm as it unites with your soul and the wooden floorboards.  Dance by yourself and see how graceful it is to move to the feeling before thinking about it; letting your soul soar through your body's movements.  Be the embodiment of the music-you hold the musicality of every song with your fingers, toes, shoulders, and hips.

I think I might have inhaled the divine.  I can feeling it in my bloodstream; I can hear it in the pumping of the bass line and the pauses in the music notes.  I feel the divine flowing in me.

Silence that Soars.

It's funny
the lyrics of my own
that flow
to my lips
when there is nothing
but silence infiltrating my ears.

Giving space for growth, making room for acceptance of the changes.

This past weekend, I made the time to be quiet with my own self.  Worries and unresolved issues bubbled up and I had a space to dwell on it rather than plugging into my Ipod or chatting with someone about something irrelevant.  It is a rare occasion when I have nothing scheduled ON PURPOSE.  It felt delicious; I was anxious that it wouldn't be as satisfying as it was.  I often find myself filling my schedule not necessarily because I want it that full but because I want to keep moving rather than reflecting.  It's easy to avoid meditation when you aren't ready to hear what your soul needs to tell you, or what God needs to tell you.

So simple it is to slip into self ignorance; the journal gathers dust as I spend my extra time watching a TV show, picking up extra tasks, or spending all my extra time around people.  What do you find yourself doing to avoid listening to yourself and God?  Try as hard as I might to be in touch with my feelings, I watch myself distracting rather than focusing.

I gave myself some space this weekend and repercussions of this self-reflection time are strength and genuine laughs when I got back into the swing of my daily life as a student, barista, leader, and friend.  I've felt more energy these past days than I have in the last few months (probably also has to do with the amazing amount of sleep I got this weekend).

Mantra for this week:
My foundation is love and with that love, I am kind to myself and the needs of my soul.
My heart is my own, right here in my chest.  It stays with me and I can give it freely yet wisely.

Luther Coffee, HI and Dusty Mysteries

Right now, I'm sipping on some coffee that was farmed and roasted in Hawaii. Can you freaking believe it?  My coffee/espresso obsession is reaching an all-time high in regards to the degree of separation between the beans on the tree and my cup.  The woman's house that I am staying at is the person who owns the coffee farm in Hawaii; she lives mostly there but is back for the week and brought back coffee beans and homemade banana chips! I'm quite impressed.

View right outside of Los Alamos

Yesterday, I hiked through Bandelier Park with Pastor Bruce.  It's one of the many archeological sites of Native American dwellings in this area and it was an amazing walk through and reflection of the lives that have come before us.

Plaza

 

Pueblo

These peoples had a rich life and community; it's lovely to see the ghosts of what used to make up this village of families.  Because the rock is volcanic due to a huge volcanic eruption thousands of years ago, it's easy to carve out dwellings as well as carve pictures in the almost chalk-like rocks.

the pegs are where logs that head up the roofs were--these were 2 story buildings

About to head into the kiva that is within an alcove 140 feet above the ground!

beautiful blue NM sky

amazing artistry dating back hundreds of years!

Brown Grass.

New Mexico is gorgeous. It's dry, brown grass reminds me of Colorado and makes me long for home.  The mountains look as if they pop up out of the desert randomly.

Downtown Santa Fe is full of buildings that look like this; it feels as if I walked into a different world.  A world that my heart didn't know it was missing until now.

Art, architecture, vendors, cathedrals and delicious cuisine.  It's really hard to go wrong here.

Cathedral Basilica of St. Francis of Assisi

Moving sculpture in the garden of Laredo Chapel

At the Cathedral, there is a huge purple sign that reads: "LENT: A Good Time to Come Home."  That really hit me; Lent is a time of contemplation within the parts of our lives that are uncomfortable: temptations, weakness, shame, and our own deaths.  Maybe the action of coming home really isn't about physically moving anywhere but really a coming home to yourself and taking time to reflect in the depths of your heart.  I think of the prodigal son and think, "Now is as good a time as any to come home. The father will always welcome his son back. Why Lent?"  Lent calls for dwelling in the pain. Within this pain, there is the joy of union.  A union in your own heart between what you believe and how you act or what you feel and what you do.  The union we long for that is found in self-love and acceptance.  The union I am agonizing over constantly.  It's time to come home to myself. It's time for you to come home for yourself.  Everyone deserves to feel appreciated by themselves.

Avocado+Oatmeal.

I'm currently wearing an avocado and oatmeal clay face mask on my face and letting it dry before I wash it off.  Before that, I rubbed a strawberry all over my face (did you know that fruits, such as kiwis, pears, apples, and strawberries are some of the best exfoliates for your skin because of their citric acid? awesome!).  This is the first face mask that I'm donning and I feel as if I'm an 8th grade girl at a sleepover.

It's times like these that I am astonished at who I am today vs. the person I was even just 9 months ago.

Sometimes I catch a glimpse of myself in a mirror and I think: Woah! Who is that?

Short, cropped hair that occasionally finds itself stylish in a decidedly hipster fashion.

A body that gets up at 7am to go for a run.

A left shoulder blade that is adorned with a tattoo.

This person looks dramatically different from the person that I saw in the mirror 7 months ago.

This person looks bold, daring, and adventurous.

Maybe it's because I am.

It's funny because 7 months ago, I felt bold, daring, and adventurous as I moved here.

Now, I'm still trying to live up to this new identity of Berkeley-ite, runner, pacifist and pixie cut wearing feminist.  Oh, and did I mention seminarian?

Life changes.  I keep thinking, "They told said that the first year of seminary would be heart-wrenching and topsy-turvy. Keep on going."

Always fully broken, always fully whole.  Wholly broken, broken wholly.

The mask is dry--time to wash off this reminiscence time.

Call for Action

 ^{Isaiah 55:6-12}

⁶ “Seek the Lord while he may be found;
    call upon him while he is near;
⁷ let the wicked forsake his way,
    and the unrighteous man his thoughts;
let him return to the Lord, that he may have compassion on him,
    and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon.
⁸ For my thoughts are not your thoughts,
    neither are your ways my ways, declares the Lord.
⁹ For as the heavens are higher than the earth,
    so are my ways higher than your ways
    and my thoughts than your thoughts.

¹⁰ “For as the rain and the snow come down from heaven
    and do not return there but water the earth,
making it bring forth and sprout,
    giving seed to the sower and bread to the eater,
¹¹ so shall my word be that goes out from my mouth;
    it shall not return to me empty,
but it shall accomplish that which I purpose,
    and shall succeed in the thing for which I sent it.

¹² “For you shall go out in joy
    and be led forth in peace;
the mountains and the hills before you
    shall break forth into singing,
    and all the trees of the field shall clap their hands.

My thoughts are not God's thoughts; the human ability to reason and logic and philosophize is not God's thoughts.  The highest good that we can imagine is the bits of divinity in rain water; those drops of divine traveled a long away from the heavens down to where the raindrop thought lands on my skin and soul.

Is the authority of God where this passage ends?  In the lectionary this past week, the highest authority is placed upon God.  But the text continues on to a powerful finish that sent a message of action for me.  God does not rain down the moments of divine that we can only partially feel in our human skin just so that God can demonstrate how powerful and almighty God is.  These tiny drops of eternal life are given to us so that we can cultivate seeds of growth and change into blossoms of love, hope and justice.  In Isaiah 55:11, God says that the words and efforts that God gives are expected to come back with a human spin on them.  We have the urge to fill the void of emptiness and given gifts to be in community with people so that we come to God full of experience.  That experience might be of loneliness and shame, but it also contains glimmers of hope and love because God gave us the droplets of love in the first place.  We are called to be developers of God's word in our life and in the lives of the people around us.  Anyone can take what has been rained on them and cultivate something beautiful; transformation is always an aspect of life.

What droplets have hit your skin and soul?  What do you plan to do with those droplets?


Every day, you wake up as a beautiful child of God.  What do you plan to do with that beauty?  There is plenty given and plenty to do, but the significance lies in how you act in regards to your gifts.