To be able to not only recognize emotions and pain but to acknowledge them openly and seek to identify what is really happening is a powerful skill...one I am still working on.
It is interesting how God works with us. For the past few nights I have awakened for a 4 am feeding with the baby unable to sleep. Powerful thoughts and emotions course through my mind and body as I struggle with an ongoing situation in my life. I am awake for a few hours, catch a little more sleep, but spend too much of my days in a daze as I wage this inner, emotional war seeking for truth and resolution.
Well, this particular morning after feeding my wee one, I went out into the family room to download all my emotions onto my personal journal pages--seeking in the process a little more clarity, refinement and understanding of the maelstrom within. As I pulled up my gmail to log-in, I felt drawn to the most recent article by Stephen Palmer: "Man Up." (Click for the link...worth the read.)
This article reminds me of one of my favorite scenes in Macbeth: Macduff has just discovered that Macbeth, in retaliation against Macduff for fighting against him, has slaughtered everyone in Macduff's castle, including his wife and children. Macduff is beside himself with grief and his new leader, Malcolm, basically says, "Buck up. Be a man. Let's go fight like men and be revenged." Move on, Malcolm is urging, and leave your womanly emotions behind!
Let me mourn, Macduff is pleading! Let me feel these powerful emotions that course within me! Let me identify them. And in the process of acknowledging and identifying my pain, it will make me stronger to do what I must do.
The emotional warfare in my soul this morning is just beginning, but I hope it will be worth it.
--Da Vinci, "War"
(Here is the actual, cool Shakespearean version from "Macbeth" :)...)
ROSS Your castle is surprised; your wife and babes
Savagely slaughter'd: to relate the manner,
Were, on the quarry of these murder'd deer,
To add the death of you.
MALCOLM Merciful heaven!
What, man! ne'er pull your hat upon your brows;
Give sorrow words: the grief that does not speak
Whispers the o'er-fraught heart and bids it break. 210
MACDUFF My children too?
ROSS Wife, children, servants, all
That could be found.
MACDUFF And I must be from thence!
My wife kill'd too?
ROSS I have said.
MALCOLM Be comforted:
Let's make us medicines of our great revenge,
To cure this deadly grief.
MACDUFF He has no children. (Love that line! Amen!) All my pretty ones?
Did you say all? O hell-kite! All?
What, all my pretty chickens and their dam
At one fell swoop?
MALCOLM Dispute it like a man.
MACDUFF I shall do so; 220
But I must also feel it as a man
--
ACT IV SCENE III Macbeth, Shakespeare
It is interesting how God works with us. For the past few nights I have awakened for a 4 am feeding with the baby unable to sleep. Powerful thoughts and emotions course through my mind and body as I struggle with an ongoing situation in my life. I am awake for a few hours, catch a little more sleep, but spend too much of my days in a daze as I wage this inner, emotional war seeking for truth and resolution.
This article reminds me of one of my favorite scenes in Macbeth: Macduff has just discovered that Macbeth, in retaliation against Macduff for fighting against him, has slaughtered everyone in Macduff's castle, including his wife and children. Macduff is beside himself with grief and his new leader, Malcolm, basically says, "Buck up. Be a man. Let's go fight like men and be revenged." Move on, Malcolm is urging, and leave your womanly emotions behind!
Macduff's response touched me when I saw the performance on stage.
"I shall do so; But I must also FEEL it as a man."
Let me mourn, Macduff is pleading! Let me feel these powerful emotions that course within me! Let me identify them. And in the process of acknowledging and identifying my pain, it will make me stronger to do what I must do.
The emotional warfare in my soul this morning is just beginning, but I hope it will be worth it.
--Da Vinci, "War"
NEVER underestimate the strength that comes with being able to acknowledge and deal with powerful emotions.
------------------------------------------------(Here is the actual, cool Shakespearean version from "Macbeth" :)...)
ROSS Your castle is surprised; your wife and babes
Savagely slaughter'd: to relate the manner,
Were, on the quarry of these murder'd deer,
To add the death of you.
MALCOLM Merciful heaven!
What, man! ne'er pull your hat upon your brows;
Give sorrow words: the grief that does not speak
Whispers the o'er-fraught heart and bids it break. 210
MACDUFF My children too?
ROSS Wife, children, servants, all
That could be found.
MACDUFF And I must be from thence!
My wife kill'd too?
ROSS I have said.
MALCOLM Be comforted:
Let's make us medicines of our great revenge,
To cure this deadly grief.
MACDUFF He has no children. (Love that line! Amen!) All my pretty ones?
Did you say all? O hell-kite! All?
What, all my pretty chickens and their dam
At one fell swoop?
MALCOLM Dispute it like a man.
MACDUFF I shall do so; 220
But I must also feel it as a man
--
ACT IV SCENE III Macbeth, Shakespeare
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