Playing for Keeps

When it comes to this whole "living life" thing, I think I actually forget more than I learn each day. And the thing I forget more often than anything else is this:  when it comes to how I spend each day and choose each little choice - I matter. My actual ideas, my likes and dislikes, "all that jazz" that lives in my own two jazz hands; it should all have an awful lot more to do with my every day than it actually does. I should matter more to me.

I'm reading another Brené Brown book - The Gifts of Imperfection - and today it reminded me to notice the things that I like to do to "play." Play time is that time when the world all at once gets wide and narrow. Wide because the possibilities are endless, but narrow in how the rest of the world just disappears.

Playful colors make a happy Katy!

My play time last night was coloring in a book I bought from the local art store. Tonight it was to start reading a new book, something fluffy, full of magic, fairies, and ominous evil forces. It has no purpose but to help me get away for a bit - the only point is enjoyment.

But tonight something happened when I set my book aside. I cleaned my desk. This is a Big Deal. Like winning a medium-sized lottery big deal. And it's the part I always forget. When I spend time in restful play, I always -- always, every single time -- come out of it with a desire to do something good for myself. I have sudden motivation where there wasn't any before. Even this writing is coming from that place of new energy.

I've really thought about this pattern, because it still surprises me even though it happens every single time. I think what happens in my sub or semiconscious self is this:  when I celebrate something just for the sake of my own enjoyment, I accept for a moment the reality that I'm worthy of joy. And I feel motivated out of that joy. I want my future self to have that joy too, so I clean or organize or do whatever it was that I was putting off.

But why don't I do this all the time?!

This pattern is so easily repeatable (I say again: it happens every - single - time) yet I continue to forget and go back to the exhausting habit of procrastination and blame and negative self-talk. A big part of the problem is simply an unrested brain. And an unrested brain is a foggy brain. The longer I go between playful times, the more taxed my brain is; there's never time to recharge. (Also, I tend to eat a lot of fast foods and caffeine, which I also thinks adds to a foggy brain.)

When I'm brain-tired, the tempting thing is to follow the path of least resistance. If a TV show will play a story for me, why read and bother my brain with the task of imagination. Why sit at the table and create a drawing on paper when I could just watch a YouTube clip of someone else doing it. (Or even more tempting/demoralizing is the self talk that says those creative things are a waste of time.) Why bother writing if someone else has already said it, and probably better than I would.

But as it turns out, that is all a bunch of balderdash! (That's right - balderdash!) When I'm brain-tired, it's because the world's been taking pieces out (or I've given them) and I haven't been putting anything back in.

Doing creative, playful things that I enjoy is not about healing what is broken in me. It's not about having done something wrong and now needing a break from reality. Instead, this kind of play and creativity is the only thing that I can count on to get me to do my best work, to treat myself well, to live my most "wholehearted" life, as Brené Brown would say.

Play and creativity, in whatever form it takes, isn't my response to stress or frustration or depression; it's my shield, the glue I can count on to keep me whole despite hard times and dark days. Let's keep ourselves from forgetting. Let's help each other create and celebrate, and stay stuck together with the goodness of play! 

How do you make time for creativity and playfulness? Post a reply below!

31 things... the idea

Happy New Year!

If you’ve been missing my blog posts, let me first say: Thank you! And I’ve been missing you too!

This year is possibly the ‘newest’ New Year that I’ve had in quite some time. Three months ago I packed up, gave away, or threw out most of my worldly possessions (minus some odds and ends hidden away at Mom & Dad’s house). I moved downstate to a small town in the big area of metro Detroit and started a new job. And so far it has been quite a ride.

Now, I usually *hate* the tradition of making a New Year’s Resolution, but this seems to be a season of all things ‘new’ and I just can’t resist.

But here’s where I need your help… For the year 2013, I’ll be making a list of 31 things to do before the year is up. (One of those things will be – turning 31!)

So far I have 18 19 things that include (in no particular order):

• make one new recipe a month
• perform at a poetry slam
• get a physical
• take an art or photography class

 And lots of other things...

But I could really use some help because as it turns out, the first thing on my list is already stumping me: #1 -- Come up with a list of 31 things to do in 2013.

I’ve already received some great suggestions from friends, and I’ve been able to add quite a few to my list. So if you have suggestions, I’m looking for challenges! The idea is to step out of my comfort zone in a variety of ways from the mundane to the terrifying, and to give myself permission to be vulnerable and emotionally aware in these new experiences. And of course -- to get some great pictures and crazy stories.

I’ll be posting my completed list by the end of this week and then blogging about some of my experiences as the year goes on. Here’s to a year of taking chances, opening up, and telling everyone all about it!

A Love Story

Sometimes when I’m driving a topic will come to me that I know I want to write about. Often times it’s certain words or even complete sentences, and in that moment I know it will probably never make it onto a printed page. Because when I write, I release, and even if I’m writing only in my head, by the time I make it to my iPad or a computer, I’ve already let it go.

I’m hoping this is not one of those times.

Today is Maundy Thursday and I’m writing in what little time I have between leaving work and heading back for worship. Today kicks off a series of services that revisit and reflect on the days in Christ’s life leading up to his trial, execution and Easter resurrection. It is generally a time I revere with a mixture of morbid respect and genuine worship. It is also somewhat exhausting.

As I was driving to catch a quick bite from Burger King (who gets my thanks for having veggie burgers on the menu) I was thinking about why it’s so exhausting. Today, for example, I didn’t do much at all in terms of preparing for the services. That was done weeks, even months, ago. I spent today planning for worship services happening weeks from now, answering emails, hanging posters; in all, I spent today like I would normally spend today. But as I left the office, I felt totally spent and zeroed in on the reason. Guilt.

Guilt is this nasty cloud that hangs over the season of Lent and especially this weekend. At some point in every service I’ll go to, I will hear the words that Christ died for me. And for you and the salvation of the world. How can I not feel guilty? Christ died for me and I overeat. Christ died for me and I forgot to wear my good shoes to church. Christ died for me and I ran out of toilet paper. Christ died for me and I do all sorts of stupid things that don’t honor his sacrifice at all.

Last year I (and half the planet) discovered the songstress Adele, and I fell completely and totally in love with her. On her first album she recorded Bob Dylan’s Make You Feel My Love. God, with generous help from Miss Adele, has imprinted those words on my heart. This is what I hear…

Katy,
When the rain is blowing in your face and the whole world is on your case, I could offer you a warm embrace to make you feel my love. When the evening shadows and the stars appear, and there is no one there to dry your tears, I could hold you for a million years to make you feel my love.

I know you haven’t made your mind up yet, but I would never do you wrong. I’ve known it from the moment that we met; no doubt in my mind where you belong. I’d go hungry; I’d go black and blue; I’d go crawling down the avenue. No there’s nothing that I wouldn’t do to make you feel my love.

The storms are raging on the rolling sea and on the highway of regret; the winds of change are blowing wild and free. But you ain’t seen nothing like me yet. I could make you happy; make your dreams come true – nothing that I wouldn’t do – go to the ends of the earth for you to make you feel my love.

To make you feel my love, God

So those are the words I sang in my car while I was driving to Burger King with a supersized case of guilt and exhaustion. Jesus loved me. I mean, the human Jesus maybe didn’t, since he didn’t know me yet, but that part gets a little confusing and trinitarian. But I definitely believe he loved his friends that he shared Passover with, the last supper we remember tonight on Maundy Thursday. If there was ever a time to start laying on the guilt trip, it was that night. But Jesus didn’t do that.

For Jesus, the many days we have come to honor as Lent were not about a shadow of guilt or doom. They were about a singular purpose: Love. There’s this line in the song: “I’d go hungry; I’d go black and blue; I’d go crawling down the avenue. No there’s nothing that I wouldn’t do to make you feel my love.” It doesn’t say: “there’s nothing that I wouldn’t do to make you feel like you owe me” or “there's nothing that I wouldn't do to remind you that you don’t deserve this.”

I’m not saying we don’t owe Jesus and I’m not saying we do deserve forgiveness and the promise of peace after we die. I suppose I must be saying that we do owe Jesus and we don’t deserve it. But my point is: that’s not what He is saying. 

He is saying something more like “I could make you happy; make your dreams come true – nothing that I wouldn’t do – go to the ends of the earth for you to make you feel my love.” 

God, I confess I have not loved you with my whole heart. I have not remembered in my weaker moments that you are there with me, within me. And yet I draw from your strength in my weakness and from your weakness in my strength. You are my source of humility and honor. You are love. Amen.

Four minutes

If I had four minutes to tell you something meaningful and blog-appropriate it is this: 

Welcome everyone. 

Listen without inserting your own inner monologue. 

Do not multi-task. 

When someone gets mad at you for a bunch of little things, ask them what is actually wrong; and don't take it personally. 

When something is wrong, don't get mad at someone for a bunch of little things; tell them what is wrong.

Take one moment each day and imagine something.

Write your prayers and don't edit them.

Love yourself as you would have others love you.

So It Begins

In my book, fall isn’t officially over until Thanksgiving. This means that the winter season can not officially begin until the leftovers are finished. Because I might love fall, but I pretty much hate winter.

The only thing I don’t hate about winter is Christmas. It is totally cliché, but I love Christmas. I love lights and garland and Christmas trees. And I especially love early evenings spent reading by a fireplace or watching one more holiday movie. (As always, I suggest: Elf.)

Christmas is one of the few protected holidays in my family. We don’t go anywhere. We make no plans. We simply get up, stay home, and practice being a family. I know that as my brother and I get older, we will eventually have families of our own and may want to start new traditions. But that only serves to make these remaining Christmas Days all the more special.

This year, Christmas falls on a Sunday. Now for you, that might not make you shake in your boots. In fact, you might think that sounds awfully nice, kind of fuzzy and warm, to celebrate Christmas Day on the traditional day of weekly worship. I would wager that you probably didn’t have a small panic attack when you looked at the calendar and in fact, it’s not unlikely you didn’t even know Christmas was on a Sunday until I just wrote it here.

Well not me.

I knew since last Christmas that this year’s Christmas was on a Sunday because I work at a church and Sundays are kind of our thing. I love the church at Christmas time. It feels warm and friendly; Christmas is the time when I’m reminded that the church still has hope, still has a chance to reach people, to help people, to be a good and tolerant place. But it’s also where I have an office during a crazy busy season.

Earlier in November when work was a relatively normal state of busy, I started to wonder if maybe I exaggerate the work load of the weeks leading up to Christmas. I mean, shouldn’t it really be one of the easiest seasons at a church? We basically do the same things as last year and the year before that. Jesus was born, away in a manger, while shepherds harked to herald angels on the very first noel. Joy to the world!

And I have another tradition each Christmas season – believing that this year won’t be so crazy. Each year I enter the season thinking that this is when I’ll get everything right. I won’t work long hours, won’t commit myself in too many places, won’t wait to do Christmas shopping until the week of Christmas. This year will be my year.

Basically that means my tradition is to lie to myself. But please don’t burst my Christmas bubble. I need some denial to get through the season.

So if we see each other, maybe we should just talk about blinking lights and frosted cookies. Maybe you shouldn’t mention that I have two concerts in as many weeks and don’t know the music to either. Or that my brother is moving away and this might be the last regular family Christmas we have. Or that our office is barely managing a schedule change for the New Year and I’m feeling pulled in so many directions I might actually fall apart. Or that I don’t know how I’ll afford any Christmas presents this year.

And when Christmas Sunday finally does arrive, maybe you could let me lean on you just a little bit. Maybe you could remind me that Jesus didn’t enter the world so that we could run faster through the check out lines or become trapped in traditions or exhaust ourselves for the bigger and the better.

Maybe on Christmas Sunday you could remind me that Jesus was about peace and love and rest. And if you feel like reminding me of any of those things a little early, that’d be okay too.

And who knows – maybe this really will be the year.

Do you find yourself overwhelmed during the Christmas season? Or is it a season of rest and renewal? How do you make time for family and traditions during Christmas?

Music.

All the songs quoted here are from Page CXVI, "Hymns - IV". I strongly encourage you to visit their site here to stream these songs live. If you do it now, you can even listen as you read!

\\ The air feels thin \ Hard to breathe \ Fill our lungs Lord, fill our lungs \ On darker days \ We lift our eyes \ We find a trace, we find a trace \\ Bursting through the sky with glory \ A savior comes to save the saints \ Redemptive eyes, we see your mercy \ You made the choice, you took our place \\ I’m coming home \ I’m coming home \ To a place, to a place \ Of love and mercy, truth and glory \ I’m home, I’m home \\ I’ve got a home in glory land \ Outshines the sun \ Outshines the sun \\ ("Song of the Saints", track 4)

This weekend has been a reminder that I’ve been missing something in my life. Music. On one hand, my every day is filled with nothing but the business of music. But just like the business of worship is not worship, the business of music is not music.

On Saturday, at a children’s festival, I saw anew the joy of experiencing music with one’s whole body. An amazing reminder that through music we praise a loving, living God, who revels in our dancing and loud clashing cymbals and full expression of the Creator-placed love within us.

Saturday night I went to support a friend’s band and was filled to overflowing with the peace of music, the way in which music can fill you with a feeling of contentedness. I was in exactly the right place, in need of nothing outside the music. His is an eclectic sound – a melting together of rhythms and melodies that speak into the night.

Music draws us together. It calls to a deep, ancient part of us that seeks connection and understanding. A part of us that acknowledges our lives continue only in relationship with those rhythms – internal, external and eternal.

\\ I will sing to you this song of thanks \ For giving me abundant grace \ You broke the stones around my heart \ In you I’ve been redeemed \\ Amazing grace how sweet the sound \ That saved a wretch like me \ I once was lost but now I am found \ Was blind but now I see \\ ("Amazing Grace", track 1)

In my world, I have a tendency to ask how music can serve others. So much so that it can become the only way I look at music – supply and demand. And in my experience, that is exactly the point at which music ceases to be. Music is never about supply and demand. We don’t sing along with our favorite song because it’s demanded of us. Most any musician would say that if they made music on a supply and demand schedule alone, they’d probably never make music.

But indeed music is my job, or at least a big part of my job. As such I get lots of emails and samples of new music to preview or download. Sometime earlier this year I received a sample of some new tracks by a band called Page CXVI and have become enamored by their collections. (Even as I type, I have my headphones on and find myself pausing every few minutes to close my eyes and rest in the sound.)

Maybe that is the center of what divides music from the business of music – rest.

\\ God is my shepherd \ I won’t be wanting, I won’t be wanting \ He makes me rest in fields of green \ With quiet streams \\ Even though I walk through \ Through the valley of death and dying \ I will not fear, ‘cause you are with me \ You’re always with me \\ Your shepherd staff comforts me \ In all my fears and the presence of enemies \ And surely goodness will follow me \ In the house of God forever \\ ("House of God Forever", track 6)

I have been reading and seeking a deeper meaning of rest. Of sacred, spiritual rest. Only very recently have I been rediscovering the power of music as mediator; its power to bring about this sacred rest.

I’ve been told that when people who self-mutilate are asked why they cut they respond that cutting makes sense of the pain. It gives the pain a center, a tangible location. And don’t we do this in less drastic ways all the time? Lash out at our friends, our children, our parents, our colleagues – ourselves. We find a center for the pain; a point to focus pain that otherwise confuses us and spins away.

\\ Don’t lose your heart \ To doubts and fears \ Take in his word \ And rest in his grace \\ He laid out a path for me \ That I may see \\ I sing because I’m happy \ I sing because I’m free \ For his eye is on the sparrow \ And I know he watches me \ Ah… \\ ("His Eye Is On the Sparrow", track 2)

The storm has begun to feel like a familiar place. In some ways, I suppose that’s just how it is sometimes. Certain times of our lives are stormy times. But there is a difference between the storms that surround us and the storms that are self-inflicted.

I spend hours upon hours in an attempt to control the chaos around me and maybe more to control the chaos within me. But music is my safety net. It offers me peace, a lullaby in the storm. It redeems me.

\\ I’m so glad I’ve learned to trust thee \ Precious Jesus, savior, friend \ And I know that thou art with me \ Wilt be with me ’til the end \\ Jesus, Jesus how I trust him \ How I’ve proved him o’er and o’er \  Jesus, Jesus, precious Jesus \ Oh for grace to trust him more \\ Jesus, Jesus \ How I trust you \\ ("Tis So Sweet to Trust In Jesus", track 7)

I truly believe that music can heal us. Music speaks to our spirits, opens our hearts and purges our pain, nurtures our joy. In our creating, appreciating and resting in music we mirror a Great Comforter who creates, appreciates and rests.

In a complex, dissonant, sometimes cruel world, I am seeking just such simplicity. Heart to hand, breath to lips, fingers to dancing.

Tis a gift.

\\ When I feel lost and clouds arise \ I long for a home \ As hope within me dies \\ Jesus is my portion \ He sets me free \\ I sing because I’m happy \ I sing because I’m free \ For his eye is on the sparrow \ And I know he watches me \\ ("His Eye Is On the Sparrow", track 2)

rainbows.

I'm spending this week at God's Treasures Camp on the shores of Lake Huron. (You can read more about the camp here.) As I prepared last night with the rest of the counselors and staff, we practiced with the colored bells that I'll be using with the campers. Immediately my mind went back to the story below; this was originally posted on June 19, 2008.

My friend Megan goes to the same church as me. Every Thursday night, from September to June, I have dinner with Megan and her mom. It’s a high-point of my week and when I’m with them, I feel blessed and loved and understood. Megan is five years old and she has autism.

We met when Megan was two and her mom would bring her to a store where I worked. In those first days, Megan was in a stroller and couldn’t walk on her own. She had no verbal skills and would almost never make eye contact. She was in her own world and had very few bridges to let others in.

Megan and I have come a long way from those days. We now see each other at church instead of the mall and Megan walks and talks and makes connections with lots of people. She still has trouble making eye contact and needs a reminder to use her words but from those first days of our friendship—she is a different child.

Along this path we’ve walked together I have been so blessed by this little girl who is truly a friend. Megan has taught me the truth of unexpected, undeserved, and truly unconditional, love. Not because of how I have come to love her, but because of how she has loved me.

In the beginning and still in many ways to this day, Megan thinks highly of only three people—her mom, her first teacher, and me. For no reason what-so-ever, Megan took it upon herself to love me. And no one loves as an autistic child loves. With Megan I am invited into a new world. A world that exists inside and around and throughout this mundane world that everyone else sees.

In this world there are mysteries around every corner. In this world, green is a magic and wonderful and most beautiful color and it should be on every surface we can possibly touch. In this world there should always be frosting and no cake. In this world, chocolate is made out of moon sand and a broken lightbulb is as dire and distressing as a broken heart.

With Megan I eat tacos from the inside out and bananas from the bottom down. And I watercolor just to color water.

Megan has given me tools I never knew I needed. I’ve learned to embrace my life in a way that I didn’t do before her and couldn’t do without her. Through my friendship with Megan and her mom, I have met other children with autism. And I have begun to open my eyes to the beauty of God’s creation. A beauty that makes itself known in tubs full of lima beans and rice and in purple shaving cream.

Today I sat in a circle with seven of these children—my new friends—and watched them making music with colored bells. After the last resounding chorus a tiny voice reached up from next to me and whispered, that sound was a rainbow. It was the best secret I’ve ever been told.

Spoken word

Note: As a result from the combination of watching too much "Brave New World" (slam poetry) and working to break through this writer's block.... my most recent attempt at a new post very quickly gained rhythm and rhyme. It is somewhat without the same meaning when it is written and not spoken, but I'm still posting it as proof that I have in fact been trying to write.

Inside me is the small and tiny truth that speaks out to why I live like this.

Because I feel like this.

Because maybe I think I deserve this.

A space so cluttered with garbage and trash and dirt that it makes my head spin

and physically forces me out before I’m ever really in.

That small and tiny voice has become my daily enemy and I’m fighting.

Fighting to keep my sanity and my spirituality.

Today I am going to begin to listen to that voice more carefully

and recognize its cry for help.

The crying out to help myself

out from under this mess where I’ve stored myself.

I will remember to listen to me,

to be a friend to me,

to be the life I was created to be.

I will see God’s child in me and not God’s enemy.

I will clean and wipe and sanitize and take time out from other, lesser things.

Things I do to earn my place but have become just time I waste.

I will write and dream and think out loud,

unashamed of what comes out

because who I am is good enough.

Who I am is strong enough and smart enough.

And who I am is made of tougher stuff.

Who I am will listen to me

and be that friend to me.

That small and tiny place will be erased

and I will rise up,

rise above and love the me in me.

I will learn again to know the truth and see

that I am not God’s enemy.

I will forgive and see that what I have, I am,

God’s child in me.

I will embrace and love and see that who I am, whose I have come to be:

God’s child in me and not God’s enemy.

rainbows.

My friend Megan goes to the same church as me. Every Thursday night, from September to June, I have dinner with Megan and her mom. It’s a high-point of my week and when I’m with them, I feel blessed and loved and understood. Megan is five years old and she has autism.

We met when Megan was two and her mom would bring her to a store where I worked. In those first days, Megan was in a stroller and couldn’t walk on her own. She had no verbal skills and would almost never make eye contact. She was in her own world and had very few bridges to let others in.

Megan and I have come a long way from those days. We now see each other at church instead of the mall and Megan walks and talks and makes connections with lots of people. She still has trouble making eye contact and needs a reminder to use her words but from those first days of our friendship—she is a different child.

Along this path we’ve walked together I have been so blessed by this little girl who is truly a friend. Megan has taught me the truth of unexpected, undeserved, and truly unconditional, love. Not because of how I have come to love her, but because of how she has loved me.

In the beginning and still in many ways to this day, Megan thinks highly of only three people—her mom, her first teacher, and me. For no reason what-so-ever, Megan took it upon herself to love me. And no one loves as an autistic child loves. With Megan I am invited into a new world. A world that exists inside and around and throughout this mundane world that everyone else sees.

In this world there are mysteries around every corner. In this world, green is a magic and wonderful and most beautiful color and it should be on every surface we can possibly touch. In this world there should always be frosting and no cake. In this world, chocolate is made out of moon sand and a broken lightbulb is as dire and distressing as a broken heart.

With Megan I eat tacos from the inside out and bananas from the bottom down. And I watercolor just to color water.

Megan has given me tools I never knew I needed. I’ve learned to embrace my life in a way that I didn’t do before her and couldn’t do without her. Through my friendship with Megan and her mom, I have met other children with autism. And I have begun to open my eyes to the beauty of God’s creation. A beauty that makes itself known in tubs full of lima beans and rice and in purple shaving cream.

Today I sat in a circle with seven of these children—my new friends—and watched them making music with colored bells. After the last resounding chorus a tiny voice reached up from next to me and whispered, that sound was a rainbow. It was the best secret I’ve ever been told.

cel•e•brate

cel·e·brate – to make known publicly; to proclaim; to praise widely or to present to widespread and favorable public notice; to have or participate in a party

What if every moment of worship was a celebration? Imagine if each praised-filled moment we spent with him was filled with games and balloons and cotton candy. And spinning round and round with our arms stretched straight out until we fell and looked up at the twirling world around us.

Sometimes all that we see is that swirling, twirling, out of control world. We can be distracted from the calm and beauty and grace of the flowers on the trees and the colors on each bird and the music within us and around us. Yet still we are invited into this daily celebration! Every moment—alone or together, in the front or falling back, happy or hurried—every moment is an invitation to join the party.

Bring your friends and your family and your gifts and feel the rush of worship around you! Sing or dance or clap your hands! Laugh and love and learn—and don’t forget the joy of spinning round and round with your arms stretched out. And of falling into arms that will catch you and cradle you with love.