The Beatles Revisited:  I Want to Hold Your Hand

     Sometimes if we are awake enough,  profound lessons can be found in the simplest of acts.  One night several of the grandchildren were spending the night in the camper out back with Granddaddy (otherwise known as Gary).  But one of the little guys, Isaiah (over 6 feet tall now!), had a stomach ache and he wanted to sleep with me in the house.  He tossed and turned and I consoled till the wee hours of the morning.  I had drifted off for a little while, when about 3 a.m. I felt this small poke and heard this sweet little voice say, "GoGo, can we hold hands?"  I took his hand in mine, but he adjust his hand until we had interlocked hands finger by finger.
      Those were simple words, yet an invitation to a king's banquet would not have birthed so much delight.  The invitation that spoke without speaking.  It's dark. I'm alone.  I hurt.  So would you join me?  I need you.  Let's touch, because if your big hand will take hold of my little hand, then we'll lay here together.....connected....and that will make me feel better."
     I couldn't help but wonder, is God moved to that extent and that deeply when we say, "God, can we hold hands?  It's dark and I'm alone, scared, hurting, or whatever, and i need you."  Does he thrill at the sound of his children's voices call on Him to meet their needs?  Is He as honored as I was to take that little hand?  Even though I was the one comforting, I felt such comfort.
      I call my writings "musings' because I muse a lot.  Often when I am carrying in all thee bags of groceries, I marvel at my hands and particularly think of the usefulness of fingers.  My hands are very small and my fingers relatively short, yet I can carry about 6 of those plastic bags stuffed full.  What strength is in a hand?
     But there's so much strength in the hand besides the physical.  Someone taking your hand in the right time and place can impart romantic fireworks, comfort for the brokenhearted, encouragement for the weary, and bring peace and solace to a fragmented soul.  God again, shows Himself brilliant, as our Creator  He even made those fingernails which women use as artist's palettes.  Of course, hands have not escaped the notice of songwriters.  I certainly remember bouncing around the house as a teenager to "I wanna hold your hand."  And around that same era came, "Put your hand in the hand of the man who stilled the water.  Put your hand in the hand of the man who calmed the sea."
      In that most sacred event of marriage, the minister finally asks the couple to "join hands" and later the ever symbolic completed circle is placed on the finger of the hand.  Often we are asked to "lend a hand" or someone will say, "could you give me a hand?"  Jesus often "lent a hand."  Many times the touch of His hand carried healing such as with the blind man.  God's hands are mentioned a great number of times in scripture, especially His right hand.  Probably my favorite reference to His hands is the thought of being clay in the Potter's hands.  And then there's the scene where Peter walks on water and begins to sink  He cries out, "Lord, save me!"  Scripture says, "and immediately Jesus stretched out His hand and caught him." Oh, the times He does that for us and we don't even know it.  But thankfully there are times we do recognize that it is His hand who is holding ours.
   
   
   
   

“Let’s Talk About Me” : The Life of a Narcissist

     I thought the song by Toby Keith was very entertaining.  It begins:

           “We talk about your friends, and the places that you’ve been

            We talk about your skin and the dimples on your chin

            The polish on your toes and the run in your hose

            And God knows, we’re gonna talk about your clothes.

           You know talking about you makes me smile but every once in awhile

           I wanna talk about me, wanna talk about I, Wanna talk about number one

           Oh my me my, What I think, what I like, what I know, what I want, what I see,

           I like talking about you, you, you, you

           But occasionally, I wanna talk about me (me, me, me, me)

           I wanna talk about me (me, me).

For more, go to http://artists.letssingit.com/toby-keith-lyrics

      Narcissism seems to be showing up everywhere we turn.  Go figure.  In an age of such little true self-worth combined with high value on power, success, fastest, loudest, most expensive, we are truly set up for it.  So long ago, because Narcissus turned away from all his pursuing lovers, especially a beauty named Echo, an avenging goddess named Nemesis, cursed him by making him fall hopelessly in love with himself and especially his own handsome face.  And thus narcissism, the tendency to self-worship was birthed.  Common attributes include excessive ‘lots of things’:  self-absorption, self-centeredness, attention-seeking, excessive reaction to criticism, self-importance, grandiosity, and entitlement.  The emphasis here is on excessive.  These are people who are quite seductive to be around, often smart and early on, can make you feel great about yourself.  However, further in relationship, one will discover that they are always in control.  I call them the chess meisters.  They are the meister and you are the pawn on the board.  They hold the keys to the kingdom and you are slave to do the bidding.  In Toby Keith’s song, it is difficult to really distinguish which one of the parties is the narcissist.

  

      But let me be clear.  The lay definition is someone in love with themselves.  Clinically, this is not how we see it.  Clinically, we see the person with a narcissistic injury as someone who suffered rejection for who they were, early in life.  Therefore they are terrified of people seeing the real person inside, so they present the “more than” version and hope everyone is dazzled and entertained by the “false self.”  I said to one of my clients, “Imagine you have 7 rooms inside of you.  How many have you let your wife in?” He looked puzzled and immediately spilled out this answer,” Let her in?  I haven’t let her in.  I have nice rockers on my front porch and a great swing set in the back yard.  She isn’t coming inside the house.”  This leads to another discussion:  what it is like to be married on in a serious relationship (boss? father? mother?) with a narcissist.

       Being married to a narcissist can have tragic results.  However, this can be a slow process because in the beginning, you can be so charmed.  Your duty, however, is to constantly bring the “narcissistic supplies” to the over-significant other.  Eventually, the show will end, the lights will come on, and you will find yourself standing on the stage of life, worn out, needs unmet, with a tattered and torn self-worth.  You have listened, given, admired, applauded, sacrificed, and on and on it goes.  Because, you see, the un-recovered narcissist has serious holes in his soul.  Or her soul.   As the case may be.  And for the un-recovered, you are carrying buckets and buckets of water and pouring them into a sieve.  They are in addition, looking for symbiotic relationships: remember to mirror the narcissist, which means, thinking their thoughts, see what they see, hear what they hear, and feel what they feel.

  

     Can I take an aside to say that all untreated addicts and all individuals with diagnoses of antisocial, borderline, histrionic, and paranoid personality disorders will have all the symptoms of the narcissist.  It goes with the pain that will call for attention inside.  If you were to visit me and I had a migraine, I might nod in your direction, but the pain inside would be screaming for attention.  That is the case with all addictions.  

What to do?  Is there any hope?  Where would one start if one decided that he/she is a true narcissist?

One would have to risk stepping off the pedestal.  They would have to join the ordinary people of life.  They would have to begin paying attention , focusing on others.  Listening .  Being willing to let others have the limelight.  They would have to deal with the harsh judgments that reside inside.   They would have to dare to BE.  They would have to risk vulnerability.  They would have to do all these things to realize the sky didn’t fall.  

Wayne Muller in his book, Legacy of the Heart,  included a chapter on Grandiosity and Humility.  In that chapter he gives an exercise  he calls, “The Practice of Being Ordinary”.  Here are some parts of the exercise:  “Several times a day, wherever you are, take a moment to examine your relationship to the people around you.  Whether you are driving down the road, sitting in a meeting, in line at the supermarket, or with a group of friends, notice how you see yourself in relation to everyone else.  Do you feel special, somehow different from everyone else?  in what way?  Do you feel more intelligent, more complex, harder to understand?  are you more introspective, more sensitive, somehow deeper than everyone else in line at the bank?  Perhaps you feel more wounded, more insightful, or maybe you just feel you have more (or less) potential than every else.  Once you have examined the sensation of being “special,” take a moment to imagine the possibility that you may, in fact, be quite ordinary; that you are, in fact, nobody special. “  Imagine saying to the person next to you, “I am just like you.  We are exactly the same.” “ I am as ordinary as they come.”

       Muller suggests you ask yourself this question:  “What would I have to give up in order to be ordinary, to be just like everyone else?”  Great question!  Reminding ourselves that we are all made from the dust of the earth, the same clay, and to dust we will return, could be a great antidote to narcissistic thinking that sets us apart from others.  The narcissist has taken a life position of “I am NOT OK.”  He or she will compensate to cover this in inordinate ways.  And this always leads back to learning to accept oneself, learn to love oneself, in order to love others, a basic tenant of human relationships.

For more on this subject, here are some suggested readings:

Prisoners of Childhood,  Alice Miller

Transforming your Dragons, by Dr. Jose Stevens

Trapped in the Mirror, Dr.  Elan Golomb   

Legacy of the Heart, Wayne Muller

Run to the Roar

Run to the Roar

     I was introduced to this concept by my friend, John Cadwalader, several years ago when we were taking groups out on a ropes course.  It means, "Run into your fears, no away from them." I think sometimes we back away from situations so quickly and so automatically, we may not identify the culprit as fear.  There are conscious voices and subconscious voices influencing us, so some voices may be audibly heard like negative chatter in our brains.

     Obviously in many areas, we may be running into the roar in life.  After all, getting out of bed in the morning and brushing your teeth, can be an act of courage some days!  But here I am speaking of the myriad walls we hit, most of them small, but some rather large daunting walls.  Those of us who have been through the Encounter workshop have learned to ask, "What are the payoffs for backing away and what are the prices we are paying for backing away?"  We complete thoughts like, "If I do not change this behavior in my life, what I can expect is......" and "if I do change this behavior in my life , what I can expect is......"

     Al Siebert, Ph.D. writes in his book, The Survivor Personality, that the payoffs for having a negative attitude include:  attention, avoiding failure, it takes less energy, don't feel burdened by others problems, avoid responsibility for bad outcomes, and avoiding difficulty.  Wow! Sounds like the easy way out, doesn't it?  But if you look closely, this could be a narcissistic lonely life when you account for all the isolation it would entail.

     We have to constantly weigh things like, "How much do I want x?' I like us use a scale of 1 to 10 and declare it in my head.  Problem is, with some things, I have quit wanting x because climbing over the wall seems too daunting, so I just told myself that I didn't really want it.  I think they call that "self-sabatage", or better yet, "lying to yourself." I love this passage concerning hitting walls:

     "For You will light my lamp; the LORD my God will enlighten my darkness.  

      For by You I can run against a troop, with my God I can scale a wall." Psalm 18: 28-29

     So let's think about all those things we SAY we want:  to quit smoking, to quit drinking (so much!), to have a better job, to have more fun, to have more friends, to have a better marriage, to meditate more in God s word.  You see, running into the roar can mean thousands of different paths.  Running to the roar always always means we must summons courage, enter struggles, enter fears, and let go of some safe piece of ground that we call our comfort zon.e  I was so drawn to a passage in Uprising by Erwin McManus, titled "A Passion to live."  He says, "So many of us have abdicated our passions for obligations, as if passion is a luxury for the young, and we must all grow up on day.  We, even if reluctantly, fall into place to live a life of conformity what we describe as "maturity."  We've made acting like an adult synonymous with living apathetic lives."  Ouch!  What an indictment!

     I believe if we all pay attention to the many things we find ourselves backing away from, we will really be awakened.  And if we summons up the courage to move toward those things, I think our lives will change.  I think we will create a new experience for others, but importantly, we will experience ourselves in a different more powerful impacting way.  Try it.  I think you will be please with the results!

The Power of Focus

Thank goodness that everywhere I have been, there have been the sights and sounds of Christmas constantly before me. It helps me focus on "the reason for the season." I have contemplated the journey of Jesus from the wooden manger to the wooden cross, how joyous was his coming with angels on high celebrating and how tragic his death with loved ones mourning. And then the resurrection with victory finally ours and HIs.

I have chosen this season to do an advent reading each night before going to bed to support my mind to keep this priority. But actually, that is my challenge every day: to remember why I am here and what it is all about. Like a sheep, I am drawn to the next little patch of grass, forgetting for the moment that I was on a journey foll0wing the Good Shepherd .

I pray that as the manger scene takes place in my heart day after day, as Christ is born afresh, that He will not be aborted in my heart, nor that He will be stillborn, but that He will be birthed and made known through my life. My favorite passage for Christmas is Galatians 4:19: Paul laboring in birth "until Christ is formed in you". Making room in our "inn", clearing a space, for the formation of Christ, must be a conscious, daily, intentional choice. So let it be.

The Extraordinary

There I sat in a sanctuary, listening to the choir, amidst the beauty of stained glass and cathedral-like ceilings. The voices sang of the beauty of baby Jesus from everyone's perspective: heavenly hosts, visitors, shepherds, parents. No matter who took note of the moment, each beheld Him in awe and wonder. A Savior was born, and oh, how we needed One.

Somewhere in all that, I saw in my mind's eye, people in their homes surrounding the scene and those walking by outside, minding their everyday dailiness, unmindful of the extraordinary taking place in the ordinary. some in fact, most, were not aware that a miracle was taking place.....that God was actually being birthed on the earth...than an amazing miracle was happening in a wooden manger....one day leading to a wooden cross. Yes, a Savior was born, and oh, how we needed One.

And then I saw us, you and me, in our everyday dailiness and wondered if miracles were happening in our very midst as we walk on our roads or sit in our houses or sleep in our beds....and that we too are unaware....of God's continued hands touching the earth. Heaven still touching earth in miraculous ways....

It was a comforting contemplation...the miracle of god reaching down, touching hearts to birth grace, love, forgiveness, hope, and other life-giving forces....right in our midst and sometimes right inside our own hearts.

Inner Conversations

There was a little boy named Ruller found in the Flannery O'Connor's short story The Turkey.

Nothing he tried seemed to work. As is common to man, he yearned to be a hero and a conqueror, and this would of course lead to the accolades of his family. But every time he gave himself the luxury of this fantasy, he would be taunted by the skeptic within. The skeptic thinker conjured up a tyrannical and sinister God, setting up a bar just out of reach and getting His pleasure of watching Ruller reach for it and miss. This God was capricious, punitive, and ultimately one who set us up to lose.

The most interesting part of the story for me was not his outer conversation but his inner one. Come to think of it, this is probably the most interesting part of all of our conversations: the inner one. For there resides the entire committee: all the parts, bantering, running their commentary, taunting questioning, justifying. This is where the demons battle it out. This is also where God's spirit comforts, quickens, and admonishes with Truth. For the inner world is uncensored, but the outer world for most of us, is both monitored and censored.

Ruller's inner conversation reveals so much of his magical thinking about God: the punitive God ("God will probably make me chase that turkey all afternoon for nothing.", the benevolent God telling Ruller, "You were mighty generous", the God looking for the best performer (He knows for a fact God will send him a turkey. Because he is an unusual child, he interests God.").

Often these sound bites of magical thinking reflect our projections from experiences with authority figures. They reflect those who have had the power to give and the power to take away, based on our performance. But maybe, if we hold out our jujubeads and shake them just right, we can fend off the severe God a little longer. The problem is in our wiring. Two wires to be exact: a black one and a white one. I am good when I do X and bad when i do Y. I am loved and worth of approval when I am good and I am worth of nothing but punishment when I do Y

Breennan Manning says that "it takes a profound conversion to accept that God is relentlessly tender and compassionate toward us just as we are, not in spite of our sins and faults, but with them. Though God does not condone or sanction evil, He does not withhold His love because there is evil in us." Back to the wiring, my woundedness distorts my hearing. God says "I love you" and I evaluate the wrong thing. I evaluate me with my own punitive eye and come up short every time through the good/bad grid. Henri Nouwen in The Return of the Prodigal Son writes: "Often I am like a small boat on the ocean, completely at the mercy of its waves. All the time and energy I spend in keeping some kind of balance and preventing myself from being tipped over and drowning shows that my life is mostly a struggle for survival: not a holy struggle, but an anxious struggle resulting from the mistaken idea that it is the wold that defines me. As long as I keep running about asking: "Dod you love? do you really love me?", I give all the power to the voices of the world and put myself in bondage because the world is filled with ifs. The world says: "Yes, I love you if you are good-looking, intelligent, and wealthy. I love you if you have a good education, a good job, and good connections. I love you if you produce much, sell much, and buy much." There are endless ifs hidden in the world's love.

The discrepancy between the standard and our ability to it is an early revelation. We can't even sit still in church as children. We find over and over that putting the spontaneous "me" into the picture causes trouble. If tenderized, our hearts develop a penitent attitude. Hopefully and wistfully, just maybe our "I'm sorries" will bridge the gap of failure. The dilemma is formed: what to do to get rid of such pain. There are two basic avenues. There is the lookin' good mode clothed in overachievement and the hiding mode clothed in invisibility. Either one drives us out of the present moment and dispurses our lives into past and future. When we are busy with apologies and plagued with self-doubt, there is literally N0 One Home to experience the event. If no spontaneous responses are allowed, that leaves only the mechanical ones.

Who will save us from the dreaded plight? There is certainly a moment of surrender. Living this way is maddening. An initation of this house of distorted mirrors has been issued. We have been invited to and live in the king's palace. One there desires to adopt us and make us an heir, invites us to sit at the big banquet table, dressed as we are. You can spill your milk and still be loved. Is it too good to be true? No, it's true. "For I am persuaded that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.' Rom 8: 38-39

Maturity, Seasoning, and Growth

I want to muse on maturity: its marks, its, fruit, and its desirability. I wish I were there....hmmm..but I could wish for a million dollars. However, there may only be one way to get there: exercise. Yes, not just joining the Y, but actually going there, picking up the weights and working out. A tree yields fruit "in its season." A tree planted by the rivers of water takes on distinctive marks over time. In later years, it is strong and tall, not easily uprooted. Here are my top 10 markers:

1. Maturity chooses a response, instead of reacting. It chooses according to a value system that is deeply entrenched.

2. Maturity has a balance between love of God, love of self, and love of others. It is not self-absorbed.

3. Maturity has the ability to see the big picture.

4. Maturity is secure enough to be wrong. Therefore it exhibits a lack of defensiveness.

5. Maturity has the capacity to truly celebrate other's victories.

6. Maturity can be passionate without being phrenetic. The mind governs emotions.

7. Maturity can make distinctions in situations. It contains one of those large boxes of 64 crayons, not just 2: a black and a white.

8. Maturity is grounded in reality. (See "Who Moved My Cheese?")

9. Maturity has God, Jesus, the Holy Spirit on the throne and not self. Wisdom begins with the fear of the Lord.

10. Maturity is able to deal with disappointments and delayed gratification.