I can't get over the idea that the goal of creation is the product. Or, rather, I can't get my head around the idea that the value of creating is in the creating, not the creation. I love to read books and listen to podcasts and blah blah blah that talk about the healing power of creativity, or how to unblock your creativity, or how creativity is excellent....catch my drift....but ultimately I don't create because I don't know WHAT to create.
In fact, my anxiety over my lack of creative focus is historic and epic. It's what directly led to my being an atheist for most of my adult life. The connection is thus: I have always felt anxious and defeated by my inability to produce worthwhile art, even as a very young person. Being contrary and prideful and independently-minded, when I started to analyze the concept of "creative expression" I determined that I was being told by "them" that "everyone is creative, and/or everyone has some need for creative expression or outlet," and I could see that was false, because I was not creative nor did I "need" a creative outlet. In fact, I felt very outraged at what I determined was some sort of oppressive or tyrannical requirement that I have a creative outlet. So, I rejected that message. Subsequently, when I learned that everyone is spiritual, and/or everyone has some form of spiritual practice or belief, I felt the same outrage at the oppression of the message, and I rejected it.
I don't regret my skeptical nature, nor do I wish I hadn't developed mentally and emotionally the way I did. There's no use wanting the past to be different than it is. I'm glad for all the experiences I had that brought me to this moment. I just wish I could learn to love the pain and peace and joy and anxiety of the creative process as much as it seems others do, and see its value realized in my own life.
In the old testament, we are given examples of how to love God. In those times, right obedience to the Law and right sacrifice was what it took to make someone a person "after God's own heart." David wasn't perfect, Abraham wasn't perfect, Noah wasn't perfect, (in fact, Job, the closest to perfect, did this too); what made them God's men was that they understood their place in relation to the sovereign God. Their submission and humility and proper portioning of sacrifice was what was demanded. One could be an important man like David, a conquering king, as long as victory is attributed to God instead of oneself. And that's good, that's great! Humility and willingness to submit, willingness to sacrifice, those are important qualities. Clearly valued by God.
But then Jesus came, and everything changed. I feel that those qualities that God values that came from the old system were a preparation or a foundation. Humility and willingness to submit to God and willingness to sacrifice are necessary to take your relationship to the next level, which is what Jesus came to teach us. God himself came and said, "okay, you know how to do that old way (or sort of, or you pretend to), now let's see it in action. Instead of a fat lamb or a white dove burnt for me, how about you give me your money? Something that MEANS something to you. How about you lower your voice and let someone else have the glory that you want? How about you leave this job that you think makes you important, and go live with the poor? How about you WASH THE FEET OF SOMEONE YOU DESPISE?" God gave us himself in the Law. He taught us that he values humility and submission and sacrifice. BUT THEN he gave us himself in the flesh. And he taught us how love is what comprises those qualities, and that there's a new system: he gave us each other on which to practice the new way of love. The next level beyond the law. THE FULFILLMENT OF THE LAW. That's what Jesus means to me.
I struggle with the idea of the atonement because I struggle with hell. But I have no doubt that Jesus the God-Man was killed for what he said and for who he was and he died willingly for us so we could see who he was and how much loving meant to him, that he was willing to do it to show us he loves us, and that he was raised from death to demonstrate that we are no longer bound to the law or to our bodies, but that with him, we are made new and the thing that it is that we are, not our mind or our personality or our beliefs or our bodies, but what the "I" is that possesses each of those "aspects," that "I" will never die. So, for his message of love, his teaching of how to love, his demonstration that love is important enough to die for, and his promise that who I really am is who he knows and loves, for those things, I follow him.
What prompted to write this is the sadness I feel when I think of Christians who are stuck at the first step. I've even heard it taught many times that obedience is God's "love language." That we show God we love him when we are humble and submissive and willing to serve. But that is just another performance. In the new testament when the mother of two disciples asked Jesus to reserve a place of authority for her sons, he used that as a teaching moment for the others (who were indignant) that they all must take their own self-importance and destroy it. I feel like Christians who think they are loving God when they perform the obedience to the Law ritual are missing everything. They are living as if Jesus never even came. And that's too bad, because loving Jesus makes life better.
A while ago I read an article in the New Yorker online about how shoes are hurting our feet.
I had been experiencing a lot of heel pain in my right foot; I can't point to one particular reason, I mean, I had been wearing crocs and chacos almost exclusively, shoes that are not supposed to hurt your feet!
So, as an experiment, I started wearing my cheapest, thinnest, $6 flipflops from Target. Because they most closely replicate being barefoot (very thin and flimsy) I decided to try using them as my only foot protection.
I don't know what to say: it's ironic, considering that until very recently, I worked for a company that was built on convincing people that shoes are vital to their lives. Because now I don't believe in shoes. There, I said it. My heel pain is gone.
That article convinced me completely. I hope to get some barefoot shoes by wintertime.
I started needle felting. I got a kit:
Here they are, unrepentant:
Today is May Day. May Day is celebratable for a number of reasons, the first being that it's 2 months that we're here in Albuquerque and we haven't had to get "reglar" jobs yet!!!
Since I get most* of my info from Wiki and anyone reading this knows how to click, I will only mention a couple hi-lites:
Beltane is the exact opposite of samhain on the calendar. In Ireland in the middle ages it was referred to as Céad Shamhain. It seems to have been about a communal coming together after the winter and spring. It is the first of summer, and the herds are driven into the hills to graze for the season. There were large bonfires lit on hillsides from which individual hearth fires could be lit. The herds may have been driven between two fires to purify them and to gain the blessing of whatever god was responsible for the harvest at the end of the summer, samhain. Just in case you've never heard anyone say that, it's most usually pronounced "sow-in."
Oddly, the Wiki article on beltane doesn't say anything about fertility and fertility rites, which, as far as I know, is what most spring/summer sabbats are about in pagan and neopagan traditions. But the May Pole is obviously linked to this day; the celebrants often "erected" May Bushes, which usually consisted either of a branch of rowan or whitethorn (hawthorn) which is in bloom at the time. There was also a practice of decorating the May Bush or Dos Bealtaine with flowers, ribbons, garlands and colored egg shells, which survives in some Easter celebrations, and on the May Pole we know of today, especially ribbons and garlands, in the UK.
The other celebrating today, around the world, is for Int'l Worker's Day. The article is more straightforward and less manipulated, in my opinion, so I won't reproduce it here. I will say, however, that it's very interesting to me that the reason we don't celebrate "Labor Day" with the rest of the world is because of a rivalry for power and supremacy between one labor organization and a bunch of others. Hmm.... a lefty who wants things a certain way (by implication, for their own glory) and the rest of the left saying no, can we unify and heal to become a part of something bigger (i.e., the rest of the known world)? Who woulda thunk?
*Finally, the asterisk: I get most of my info from Wiki, and the rest from here.
