Are My Kids Innards Turning into Moldy Rice?

Good question, eh?  Perhaps it is not the typical question a father or mother may ask themselves.  How about a teacher, mentor or grandparent?  Still no?  Maybe it should be.

It is now one that I ask myself every day and almost every time I have one of those moments of choice as a parent:  how should I respond?

Why in the world would I be asking myself this reflective question about bacterial growth and grains? Let me just say that it is one of God's most unusual yet powerful answers, and it came in response to a question I asked on Sunday.

That question?  How can I help my sweet Papaya, my beautiful five-year old daughter.  I have been struggling with my little Papaya.  She has been lashing out severely, extremely, violently. I have heard the phrase "oppositional defiance disorder" and that seems to fit, although I tend to shy away from generic labels.  I have tried many things but it seemed she was still struggling.

And as I held her and watched her on Sunday, I had a flash of insight.  My little girl was battling, not me and the rest of the world like it appeared, but she was really battling something within her.  She was hurting; she was crying out for help.  Her little five year old brain just didn't know how to communicate it.  Later that night, as I sat awake nursing little Zsa, I wept. I wept for my little girl as I saw that we as a family were all lined up against her in many ways, prepared to fight back, prepared to protect ourselves and our belongings, prepared to be strong in response to whatever she threw at us.

And there she was, precious little soul, facing this army of family, friends and community who were all armed and ready to fight.  Sure, "fight" may be a strong word, but it seems to fit.  Even if we were "seeking what was best for her," we had labeled her without words, identifying her difficult and often disturbing behavior as "just Papaya."

And her mother was at the forefront, battle gear ready.

As the tears flowed, I humbly opened up my heart to my Father and pled with Him, pled with Him so that I may know how I could reach her and help her.  His answer was to spend every possible waking moment with her, watching her, loving her, helping her, and to ask the rest of the family to pray for her.

Remember the rice?  I will get to it, I promise.

The next morning, I spread the word gently. "Please pray for Papaya.  She is little.  She is hurting and she is scared.  Don't worry about changing how you treat her.  Just pray for her."  Even that petition, just to pray for one of our number that was suffering, has softened the attitude and language towards her from her siblings.  Just pray for her.

As I continued along, seeing glimmers of improvement and thinking of ways I could help Papaya, I still felt a little helpless in moving forward.  On Tuesday morning, almost as an afterthought, Avot brought up a video that a friend had shared with her that Avot felt applied to what we had watched and discussed for devotional: the rice experiment.

Just looking for this experiment online brought up example after example of people who, like me, probably thought "Really??"

As my skepticism battled with the "evidence" before me, I thought, Why not?  Why not believe it enough to accept that how I think about something (or someone!) affects them?  I knew that was true.

Months ago I was really struggling with one of my children.  They were bitter, battling and antagonistic...and so was I.  No matter what my husband and I did, we weren't reaching them.  The child was dark and I felt dark too.  The child was aggressively anti-everything we had to do and say.  Many times I wondered, what in the world am I doing wrong?  And, even as I knew I loved this child, I was at war with them and sometimes in those desperate moments many parents experience wished either they or I would leave so that the battle would be "over."  It was horrendous.

As I prayed for what I should do one frustrating night, I had one of those flashes of insight.  My child was hurt. My child was tired. My child was bruised.  My child was suffering.  And they needed my love.  What?!  How could I show love and still be the strong parent I felt like I needed to be? It felt so fake sometimes and this child could see through fake.   And yet...God opened to me a glimpse of how He saw my child and my heart was overwhelmed with love. I knew that I needed to change my thought processes from battle-mode to "see the genius and beauty"-mode.  I knew, deep down, that my child's emotional life, their future life, depended a great deal upon my choice at that moment.

How to do this?  Flash of insight.  Inspiration. I started by buying a notebook.

I opened to the first page and wrote down: "You were born for greatness and I see it everyday.  Today I saw it as you..." Then, I wrote down something that I saw that was good in that child's behavior.  Everyday, I would write down on a new, dated page, "You were born for greatness and I see it everyday. Today I saw it as you..." and then follow it with a new specific observation. Some days it was very, very hard.  We still fought.  We still didn't see eye to eye.  Sometimes I wrote a lot and sometimes I wrote one line.  But it was always true.  And it was always every day.  Every once in a while I would miss a day, but I always went back and wrote down something for that day.

Over time I would see him leave it out where I could find it easily in the dark, or see some pages turned back from where I had left it.  No matter how hard the day had been, I would find it.  It was never mentioned.  Never discussed.

One notebook became two.  One was lost during one of the many moves we experienced earlier this year so I bought another one.  When the other one was found, I went back to the first and finished up that one then continued on the new one.

Every day.

I saw some softening, some glances of pondering: Does she really mean it?

My mind went back to this experience when I saw the moldy rice video.  Through some additional challenging times for us all, my husband and I continued to imperfectly love and reach out and our child continued to imperfectly try to make things work at home.  However, over this time I had seen that my attitude toward the child had become not one of  "Oh no, what are they going to do next? How should I prepare for the next battle?  The next challenge?" to "I know they will get it eventually; I just need to keep loving, praying and hoping; they are awesome and I love them so much!"

The miracle was the softening of my own heart.

So when I saw the rice experiment, I decided to accept it as a truth, because my application of that truth has already changed my family and my parenting.  As I looked at little Papaya, I saw the years since our move to Hungary when her assertive, confident behavior began, the years full of thoughts of darkness, frustration, anger and even (horribly!) moments of hate directed at this spunky little body.  Hate at what I felt she was making me become, when I knew it was me.  Hate at myself and my behavior and thoughts that I directed at her.  I thought of the rice.

I thought of how I looked at her when I was upset.  How did that lady look at her jars, the one labeled "hate," the other labeled "love"?  I thought of the rice.

Yesterday, as she thrashed and yelled in my arms, I directed thoughts of love at her.
When she threw toys and ran away from me, I directed thoughts of love at her.
Late last night as she finally dropped off to sleep, I directed thoughts of love at her.

Since then, I have taken so many moments with my children to think thoughts of love their direction, shaping their "rice," their hearts, with their mother's love.  And do you know something?  I am less abrupt, less forceful, less coercive, less demanding, less critical already. It is hard to feel despair and criticism when you are directing thoughts full of pure love emotion to them.

Imagine the jar. Imagine what someone would have to do to the jar to "give love." Look, talk gently, think love to it.  Seems corny but, hey!  What are the fruits? Is there any possible way that doing this to our children, our spouses, our friends would produce a negative outcome?

Not that I can think of.

So what if it did make a difference and the only thing we had to change was how we directed our thoughts?

For the last 36 hours I have been looking at my children as jars of cooked rice, and I may say, as Robert Frost did in his poem, that this has made all the difference.

Road less taken, baby.  

Powerful stuff.  

Just think "rice" and the power of your thoughts.  

Anyone can think "love."

Try it.

Adorning the heart

...and I am not talking about pinning a corsage onto the internal organ of our body. :)

I am referring to the phrase Peter uses in 1 Peter 3 when speaking to wives (although the application would obviously bless us all):

3.  [Your] adorning let it not be that outward adorning of plaiting the hair, and of wearing of gold, and of putting on apparel; 

4. But let it be the hidden man of the heart, in that which is not corruptible, even the ornament of a meek and quiet spirit, which is in the sight of God of great price.

So how do we adorn our hearts?

What a beautiful and deep image...would love some feedback below and I will muse about this concept as well.

 

Thy waste places will blossom...

Get this ugliness out. I am frustrated this morning because it feels like every step forward I try to take I run into all sorts of complications:

-make breakfast: have to wash the bowl first
-read my scriptures: the garbage has to be run out to the curb before the garbage man gets here at 7 am
-ponder: the baby boys need diaper changes
-write in my journal to vent: the kids are fighting up where the baby is sleeping
-try to start a new, private blog/journal to download "garbage"...getting out those negative, probably unreal emotions, blaming and frustrations per Kirk Duncan's advice: have no idea how to operate wordpress.com.

Whatever!

My mind wanders to my scripture reading I WAS able to get in: "Thy waste places will blossom."  Feeling pretty wasted.  Grateful for the Spirit that is now descending to help me find peace in the middle of garbage.  Crazy!  Glad I was able to get in what I got in and that God's power is truly enough to make these waste places (my emotional place!) blossom...how He does it is beyond me. 

Moving forward.  Time to go and do what I can with laundry on the kitchen table, 2 year old playing with toilet in the bathroom and three little girls who seem to need, need, need.  Breakfast must happen soon or emotions will erupt!

Think blossom.

Musings about happiness and complacency

My mind is awash with different emotions.  Part of me is soooo excited that I have countertops!  And then there is that ugly negative side of me: the whining side :(.  "But what about the sink?!  It is not hooked up yet!"

Really?! 

I am quite frankly getting a little tired of hearing myself whine.  I am sure Quinn is, but he just smiles, hugs me, and gives up even more of what non-existent "free-time" he has to work on anything he can in the kitchen, which inevitably means going to the store for more parts or trying things one way and then another. 

So I took a minute and just looked at my counter-tops, my kitchen, my beautiful new kitchen and realized something.  As happy as I am to have a place to prepare food, store it and clean it up without doing it over dirt, it is not a happiness that is deep in my soul.

Maybe that is my problem. I am seeking for external indicators to make me deeply happy and that will never work.

On the other hand, when Papaya was flying off the handle last night after I turned off the videos they were watching, I took her gently in my arms and soothed her. I opened up a book to read to the little ones at night which I haven't done for a few days and instead of putting Spooner in bed, I set him on my lap and snuggled while I read, "Did I Ever Tell You How Lucky You Are?"  I smiled as the words of the book reminded me of all the blessings I have.  I did get tired and grumpy when Baby Zsa was up most of the night and I did the semi-comatose nursing, but as I looked at my beautiful sleeping Papaya and Spooner, my soul warmed with that deep, true happiness that reaches everywhere.

What is it about human interaction and service that can do that?  Crazy.  These little ones also fill it deeply. As I called my dear friend Angie and we discussed Thanksgiving plans, she brought up how wonderful that it will be to have little ones around.  Yes, they can be noisy and mischevious, we both agreed, but there is something about having them around that makes holidays and life in general just a little sweeter and more magical.

Another thought that I brought up with Quinn last night was "what is the difference between contentment and complacency"? I have been doing the vision board of Kirk Duncan and an interesting side effect for me: I find myself seeing more of the beauty in my life.  I want to just be content. I want to slow down the moments, enjoy the snuggles, smile at my kids more and see their faces light up with the knowledge that in the moment, their mother loves them. It is amazing to see the effect of geniunely shown love...and it's ugly opposite of selfishly driven scorn and harsh judgement.  Unfortunately I have seen both, both the lighting of the eyes and the crushed spirit following unjust or overly harsh or critical chastisement.

Back to the issue, though: at what point does contentment become complacency and how do I determine which is which?  Sigh.  I know the answer :).  Follow the Spirit.  Why "sigh," Mary!!  You will know it is true and you will recognize when to act on it.

More of a rambling entry, I suppose, but if anyone has any thoughts or responses to my musings, I would welcome them!

Too Much Beauty?

The other day, we were driving around on some errand and I took a moment to really look at the beautiful barns, fields and forests of this beautiful upstate New York area.  Once again, it took my breath away.   But how often do I acknowledge or even get think about it?  Do I forget or does it become less beautiful?

When we are surrounded by beauty and blessings, we tend to get used to them, to take them for granted.  As I thought about this, I realized that perhaps this is one of the advantages of trials, deprivations, tribulations...it makes us appreciate the beauty and peace of what was "normal."

If we truly lived in beauty all the time, would we acknowledge it?  Would it take our breath away after the 100th morning of waking up to it?  Or would we take it for granted and still find ways to be discontent and ungrateful?

I do.

These thoughts sent my head spinning into new directions: how blessed my life is with healthy children, a husband that not only is faithful to me but honors and respects me, a roof over my head, food to eat, clean air to breathe, water to drink, friends who smile when they see me, fingers that work, hair that is thick and curly...yes!   It may seem crazy, but how many times do we miss the things that are beautiful in our life because we are so preoccupied with our expanding waistlines, our missing countertops, the unfinished floor, the arguing, our busy schedules,...the many things we don't have and think we should have?

What would we do with all that beauty, if we had truly beautiful, perfect lives all of the time?  Would we see it? Do we see it now? 

Maybe God really knows what He is doing when He saves beauty for the moments that matter most...or maybe He is waiting for us to acknowledge the beauty that he has already placed in our lives.  Hmmm...

...and sometimes the greatest beauty is found in the heart of a trial...

or in the heart of a friend's sorrow as you mourn together or grow together to a deeper level of friendship on the other side of a storm...

What is my work?

"I will give unto him a commandment that he shall do none other work, save he work which I shall command him."--2 Nephi 3:8

How often do we spend our days, busily looking sideways to compare our paths with those around us as some kind of "measure" of how we are doing?

How can we do that when they are doing their own work?  We cannot possibly do the same work as everyone else, so why do we use that as a measuring stick?

What is my work?  Hmmm...so fun to think about!  I can think about a bunch of things I wish it would include: fencing (the sport, not building ones in my yard :)...),...well.  Strange.  I guess that is my only "love" that has not fit in somehow or other during this "work of motherhood"!  

Maybe I just want more time to do all the little things I do get to do: art, reading, snuggling with cute kids, scrapbooking, spending time laughing with and loving my best friend Quinn, discussing, visiting, walking, playing basketball, traveling.  How wonderful that my work could include fantastic tidbits of all my loves!  How many hours have I spent wishing my "work" looked different!  The other day I was even watching Mormon Messages and all I could think about was how beautiful the lady's completed kitchen looked :).  Silly.  How easily Satan can get us distracted from what matters most.  

May I move forward and look at the work that is before me with joy and anticipation...and content.

Charity and hatred...a daily choice

More from Lewis...this time on "charity":

"Do not waste time bothering whether you 'love' your neighbor; act as if you did. As soon as we do this we find one of the great secrets. When you are behaving as if you loved someone, you will presently come to love him."  

(And I believe Lewis is referring to REALLY acting as if you love someone; not doing it to make yourself look better or to jump through some hoop. It means thinking of them first.) 

smile emoticon 

"This same spiritual law works terribly in the opposite direction. The Germans, perhaps, at first ill-treated the Jews because they hated them; afterwards they hated them much more because they had ill-treated them. The more cruel you are, the more you will hate; the more you hate, the more cruel you will become--and so on in a vicious cycle for ever.
"Good and evil both increase at compound interest. That is why the little decisions you and I make every day are of such infinite importance. The smallest good act today is the capture of a strategic point from which, a few months later, you may be able to go on to victories you never dreamed of."

 

Divorce and Marriage

C.S. Lewis had some deep thoughts on these subjects, in "Mere Christianity":

 The Christian idea of marriage is based on Christ's words that a man and wife are to be regarded as a single organism--for that is what the words 'one flesh' would be in modern English.  And the Christians believe that when He said this He was not expressing a sentiment but stating a fact....The monstrosity of sexual intercourse outside marriage is that those who indulge in it are trying to isolate one kind of union (the sexual) from all the other kinds of union which were intended to go along with it and make up the total union. 
As a consequence, Christianity teaches that marriage is for life.  They regard divorce as something like cutting up a living body, as a kind of surgical operation.  Some thing the operation so violent that it cannot be done at all; others admit it as a desperate remedy in extreme cases.  They are all agreed that it is more like having both your legs cut off than it is like dissolving a business partnership or even deserting a regiment.

Divorce, even when considered necessary, is painful.  All would agree on that, I believe, and just like in this kind of operation Lewis compares it to, the side effects and long term ramifications can be tragic and hard.  My heart goes out to those considering or in that situation!

Putting the matter of divorce aside, let's move forward to Lewis's beautiful thoughts on marriage and love:

What we call 'being in love' is a glorious state, and, in several ways, good for us.  It helps to make us generous and courageous, it opens our eyes not only to the beauty of the beloved but to all beauty...Being in love is a good thing, but it is not the best thing.  There are many things below it, but there are also things above it.  You cannot make it the basis of a whole life.  It is a noble feeling, but it is still a feeling.  now no feeling can be relied on to last in its full intensity, or even to last at all.  Knowledge can last, principles can last, habits can last; but feelings come and go.  

And in fact, whatever people say, the state called ' being in love' usually does not last.  If the old fairy-tale ending 'They lived happily ever after' is taken to mean 'They felt for the next fifty years exactly as they felt the day before they were married,' then it says what probably never was nor ever would be true, and would be highly undesirable if it were. Who could bear to live in that excitement for even five years?  What would become of your work, your appetite, your sleep, your friendships?   

But of course ceasing to be 'in love' need not mean ceasing to love. Love in this second sense--love as distinct from 'being in love'--is not merely a feeling.  It is a deep unity, maintained by the will and deliberately strengthened by habit; reinforced by the grace which both partners ask, and receive, from God.  They can have this love for each other even at those moments when they do not like each other; as you love yourself even when you do not like yourself.  They can retain this love...'Being in love' first moved them to promise fidelity: this quieter love enables them to keep the promise.  It is on this love that the engine of marriage is run: being in love was the explosion that started it."

Each Fracture Tells a Story

Earlier this month we took a trip to Watkins Glen.  It was amazing.


I walked along in awe, feeling peace suffuse me.

At one point in our hike, the kids had wandered ahead or strayed behind and I found myself alone. "How I wish I could capture this moment in art," I mused, trying to soak in the beauty so I could take it with me.

You can do it with words, a voice inside me whispered.

Reaching inside the backpack, I found the token book I carry with me always ("just in case"...just ask Quinn about backpacking and "Les Miserables" :), lol!).  This time, it was "Mere Christianity" and I opened the cover, quickly scribbling down the words that came to mind.

In front of me, a information sign-board read, "every fracture tells a story," and this phrase sent my thoughts spinning in a direction I didn't foresee:

Each fracture tells a story, 
Revealing the beauty that lies beneath
The Water of Life, Living Water, cuts and grinds
Carrying away debris and life

Millions come
To gain inspiration
To gain rest

All from the fractures and their untold stories that
Reveal the beauty that lies beneath.

I looked at the ground above,...you can see it in the picture above: lush and green forested area.  I thought of how many times I have relished such scenes back here in the east and then thought, "but if it weren't for the erosion by the water and the falling away of the fractures, we would have missed all this that lay beneath the forest."

How often in my own life do I look around and love the beauty that is my life, the calm, peaceful forest? And how often do I protest when God says lovingly, gently, "My daughter, this is good; but there is so much more that lies beneath."

I thought about the fractures in my life: depression, the death of my son, my imperfections and blunders in relationships, heart ache, betrayal, misunderstanding and saw them in new light.  The fractures in this glen lend almost magical beauty to the ravine, with life growing along the sides in lush profusion.   The water that slowly, gently curves its way through the bottom sculpted new treasures in the rock, creating bends and twists that unfold delights to the traveler at every turn.

True, what lay above was beautiful...
...but what lay beneath was breath-taking.

Is this true with me? Do my trials, my imperfections, my fractures also make me beautiful?  As I struggled with a particular situation last week, the impression came to my mind, "This is Me, my daughter.  We are uncovering a new depth within you.  It may be painful and rocky and thick, but it is a layer that must go."  This layer was self-pity, selfishness, and it is thick and painful to "wear through"!

How interesting it is that, when filled with the memory and peace of that ravine, God can use that comparison to give me peace in change, peace in refinement, and perspective of what may come.

I thought of all of us and how drab and monotonous it would become if we were all peaceful fields,...or even if we were all ravines.  We each have our own soil, our own composition, our own potential landscape, whether it is ground pushed up to the heavens to create mountains, soft rolling hills, stark deserts or inspiring ravines.  Not everyone will desire the beauty that is revealed and not everyone will be equipped or make the effort to enjoy the unique beauty that is ours...


Each fractures tells a story and there is eternity to tell it.

How does God show His love?

EPIPHANY!

When it rained on my birthday, I used to tell my friend, my dear Sister Rausch, that it was a sign that "I was His favorite." Whenever we noticed amazing blessings or happy things, we would comment, "See? I am His favorite!"

Yesterday, I got some bad news. For some reason, even though I ordered the countertops back in August, it will still take two and a half more weeks before I get a sink and countertops on these gorgeous cabinets recently set up in my kitchen. I know that I am blessed, but sometimes it can be so darn hard to focus on that and not whine!


Well, back to the "epiphany": this morning I was reading in my scriptures about the children of Israel being selected IN the furnace of affliction. It hit me, "Maybe my TRIALS are a sign that 'I am His favorite'?"

 

Hmmm...powerful. I think it might be true.
It would definitely help me stop whining as much.  Maybe that is what Paul realized when he said, "Bring on the affliction!"

From Anger to Healing? Here's hoping!

Conference was awesome.  I feel like I had my cup filled to overflowing with inspiration and direction, with so many personal messages!

However, as seems to happen so often to me after a spiritual high, I hit bottom that week.  It was ugly!  Looking back, I can see so much that I learned but, boy, was it awful to go through!  Looking back, I can see that I asked one of those "fateful" questions...and got my answer.  You know, like praying for patience? Warning!  Never do that unless you want to get answered!!  Know how you develop patience?  Practicing. It can be brutal.

My fateful question was one from conference.  A speaker challenged us to pray for that one thing that we need to work on.  So I did, feeling spiritually comfortable and safe.  The funny thing is that I asked it kind of hesitantly, in the peace of the moment, and then put it in the back of my mind.

Apparently, I need to work with my anger issues.

I used to be a screamer and haven't done it for quite some time.  It was one of those huge spiritual, epic battles...or maybe more one of submission, where God and I worked together for a very long time to put my anger at my kids where it should be: nowhere.  I used to feel that in order to be effective, my correction had to be backed with "steam," like they had to feel the weight of my disapproval to make them listen more effectively.

All that did was make them feel unloved.  The Spirit was already working on their hearts.  They just needed some verbal reproof, encouragement, and then freedom to try again. I love the following quote by the late President Packer:

It is essential for a teacher to understand that people are basically good.  It is essential to know that their tendancy is to do the thing that is right.   Such exalted thought is productive of faith.  It makes all the difference when we stand before...to teach."

I keep this thought on the front of my mentoring notebook where I keep my thoughts about current mentoring methods, ideas, kids' needs, etc.  Many times I find that I mentor my children out of fear: fear of my own imperfect example, fear that I might say or do something wrong to "permanently ruin" them, fear of their behaviors turning into addictions or creating long-term problems.  This idea of inner goodness and good tendancies is a beautiful one and one that I know is true.   As I have corrected my children more in a way that suggests I am merely reminding them of something they would already want to do and perhaps had forgotten, it awakens in them more of a geniune and immediate desire to listen and consider what I have said.

Anyway, I digress :).  Back to being a screamer...

Well, I was a screamer and am now many days "scream-free." (Yes, it is an addiction and I celebrate my freedom from it!)  However, I have learned this week in painful ways another level of my anger that is destructive...I get angry at people I love.  I don't know what it is, or why I do it. I have been thinking about that the last few days.  The safer I feel with someone, the less I try and hold back my irritation at anything.

And it can really flare up (especially when I am tired)! 

Poor people who love me and who have given me that safety net...a net of love that I have used and abused over the years!  How horrible! Now, I realize when I write this in such a public venue, I may be exposing myself to misunderstanding and censure.  However, I feel that maybe, by writing about it this way, I can help others who may feel the same.  I am definitely not perfect, but that is one reason why I have this blog,...to have a place to record my learnings, growings and stretchings.

After a harrowing week last week and some very humbling exposure and revelation, I felt pretty raw. This morning I got another little reminder: I was reading in 1 Nephi 18 when Nephi and his brothers were sailing on the ship and guess who got mad?  And easily?  And at those who loved them?  Yep...Laman and Lemuel, not my heroes.  It was a little eye-opening, the parallels between their attitude and mine.  Gulp. 

Now...this is just the next step: my own little personal revelation for where I need to change and how I can be closer to Christ.  How I can have a better marriage.  How I can be kinder and better to those I love.   Sometimes one of the biggest steps is to recognize the problem so you can work on it.

However,  Quinn and I had a great conversation last night in which he suggested something Kirk Duncan (a motivational writer and presenter) recommends: journaling and venting.  He talks about it in a CD called "The Field."
 
Basically, you keep two journals, a "black" one for all the garbage you just vent with and a "white" one for things you don't mind sharing with others.  The black one you just keep and write in and let it out.  Similar idea with the venting: you find a place that is your "field," and go and verbalize out loud all your concerns and problems, going through conversations or sentiments you would have with those you are struggling with...and let it go.

I am tired of being a Laman and Lemuel.  Time to try on some Nephi :).