I am so excited about Christmas. Starbucks menu started weeks ago and the first taste I had of Christmas cake was magical. Now I feel like I am ready to start my own personal official Christmas season…
For this is my first real Christmas. The first one when I can know the joy of my dear Saviour’s birth – ‘cause now He is that. Where a nativity scene makes me go actually wow and I don’t think about consumerism or any of that crap but truly have a different priority (despite the Starbuck’s reference!). I’m going to have a Christmas that is all about what it’s supposed to be…
Except, really there isn’t a biblical model for Christmas is there? No-one from the New Testament went around on the 31st December (or any other date) saying let’s keep Christmas about the important things. There is no guidance on how to be a Christian at Christmas and, especially given the fact that it was first based upon a pagan holiday, one might suggest the best way to be is to take down the tree and carry on as normal. Or at least break with the world traditions and any habits that aren’t strictly “kosher”.
But I like the tree. And I love buying presents for people (get me I’m already four up and have a whole month to go! That is organisation…). Jingle Bells do make me rock and I have been listening to Christmas music for a while now with no shame whatsoever. Sparkly lights and port by the fire, could you want for more? Can’t wait for the open air ice rink so I can get out my skates from Geneva and I LOVE a good Christmas classic on the telly. The way I see it there is no set formula for Christmas cheer and I am not giving up my crackers and baubles on a whim.
I am going to be intentional though. Starting today it is Christmas season and I want to spread joy and good cheer too all mankind. Wishing peace, showing love, delighting in the good things of life. Really this is just all things that being a Christian is kinda about and I don’t want to limit it to seasonality so I’m going to kick start it now but the plan is that the attitude of Christmas remains around a long time after the tree comes down.
Talking of which, it goes up today (and is Hot Pink!). ‘Tis the first year in my own home and I am excited to be starting my own traditions… which include decorations going up a month before to enjoy the season all the longer and also because it will be my half birthday every year. That’s right, 6 months since the B and going strong!
There are some really wonderful ideals for Christmas that do go beyond the cheesy superficial overcommercialised notions. But honestly, they aren’t just great ideas every now and then are they? In the same way dog is for life not just for Christmas I don’t really get why we would limit hope, peace, good will, love, generosity, joy, celebration and (maybe) talking about Jesus to once a year. The one thing I would say is perhaps we need to add in to the mix self-control…
Bring on Christmas with all your manmade glitz and idealism. Man gets a lot of things right too and it can be all too easy to focus on the bad things. Made in the image of our creator I reckon this is the season to share these good things and I don’t want to slag off something which values loads of good things too. It is a shame “They” have taken the Christ out of Christmas and that people call in the “winter holidays” instead but that does not mean we can’t enjoy being people together and sharing the love of our kindredness.
Showing posts with label The Man. Show all posts
Showing posts with label The Man. Show all posts
Tuesday, November 25, 2008
Friday, November 7, 2008
Don't Let The Man Get You Down
Now, I know that the issue I am about to address isn't specifically about men being in the wrong. Nor is it always about women being attacked (though I think most would agree they they bear the brunt of it). But "The Man" doesn't necessarily mean people with willies, just a mechanism that is controlling The World, so the title stays.
I have talked about this several times before. Like here and there. But this is going to be a bit of a remix so don't run off, please!
I am becoming ever increasingly passionate about issues pertaining to women stuck in the world, being forced into an unobtainable mold with superficial expectations. There is SO MUCH more to humanity than that and it is SO not what God says it is about. Sure attraction comes into relationships and God created beauty and loves it, I know that, but having seen what the world is saying and how it is controlling, nay destroying lives, I think it is time we stopped. "We" as a race would be incredible. "We" as a faith group - can we settle for less?
Eating disorders are KILLING people in the minority, taking over and disrupting lives in a much larger proportion not to mention other kinds of disorders (tanorexia for example, addiction to plastic surgery...) and consumerism gets US ALL. (Watch this - it's a cool film and yet of course it is still both advertising and about beauty products!)
Every time we acknowledge a "flaw" and stress over it we are guilty of:
a) the dismissal of the person God made us to be, and
b) being distracted from what is actually important.
There are many things tied in here, enough to write a book about (watch this space...!) and definitely you can say to me that it is a fine line to balance keeping healthy with not caring at all; that self control comes into it; that God wants us to be the best we can be. I know and I may or may not address these things and others at some later time [for sure you can still please tell me what you think about them, I'm very much working this out as I go]. However, today I just want to say that it is time those of us in the church (as C.S. Lewis describes it: a terrible army across time and space) at the very least get out of that mind set.
We are allowing consumerism to take over and I have met very few people, and certainly am not one myself, that are totally above the worldly attitudes of attraction. There is also another debate in here as to how much preferences (still ideally kept internalised in my view) are acceptable given that, while we all seem to "fancy" different things, if our ideas come directly from our exposure to the world's view of what is and isn't "beautiful" maybe we just need put some of those aside. I don't know, sometimes I really don't know.
What I do know is that it is hard to be a "normal" person who is aware of all the judgment that flies around, that if it wasn't for Jesus' love for me I wouldn't be able to ignore it so well and that even so it can still be a struggle some days.
We need to rise above it. Christians and non- alike. We need to stop whoever baddie we believe in, be it "The Man" or "The Devil", from winning this battle and inserting insecurity and judgment into our hearts. We need to break out of the trap that tells us to dedicate time and money to insignificant nay unhelpful things. We need to stop harbouring ideas that alienate people and make them not love themselves as they should. As God does. I need to change my set of standards entirely and rethink what it is that God would say when he saw me walk into a room. What image He wants me reflect back in a mirror, not what other people want and not what I want.
It is a challenge. I don't know how to start really... Any thoughts? Do I set a budget on my moisturiser or just stop using it altogether?! First off I need to stop accepting the things I see, the things I hear, the things I think, the things I say... as, well, acceptable. The one thing I do know is that being in the place of constantly trying to live up to these expectations sucks really really hard and I am SO glad to not be there anymore.
One or two people said they liked it when I wrote poems so here's one I made earlier. You can stop reading now if you don't like it so much, I won't mind. I won't know! It's an early draft and I'm not sure about how the punctuation captures the lilt so you may have to use a bit of imagination...
Look at me
Look at me straight
In my eyes my ass, don’t hesitate to tell me what you think
My face my teeth my clothes, what lies beneath
It’s all fair game.
I’ll be ashamed or feel a queen
Or somewhere in between,
Depending on your dreams
View my soul
Then judge the whole package as it were
Do I ring your bell
or deviate from the curve?
Normal, a cycle on the machine?
Or a sign that all is well with me.
What parameters are these?
Indeed! What the hell
Look at me straight
Tell me I’m ok
With a word a look a smile a touch
I need to know that I’m enough
Don’t hesitate
All of me, right here, right now
On a plate
For the joys and for the sorrows
In sickness and health
Till death do us part, or the fire wanes in your heart
Is it death already?
Or was that here from the start.
More’s the pity
If only I’d been pretty.
I have talked about this several times before. Like here and there. But this is going to be a bit of a remix so don't run off, please!
I am becoming ever increasingly passionate about issues pertaining to women stuck in the world, being forced into an unobtainable mold with superficial expectations. There is SO MUCH more to humanity than that and it is SO not what God says it is about. Sure attraction comes into relationships and God created beauty and loves it, I know that, but having seen what the world is saying and how it is controlling, nay destroying lives, I think it is time we stopped. "We" as a race would be incredible. "We" as a faith group - can we settle for less?
Eating disorders are KILLING people in the minority, taking over and disrupting lives in a much larger proportion not to mention other kinds of disorders (tanorexia for example, addiction to plastic surgery...) and consumerism gets US ALL. (Watch this - it's a cool film and yet of course it is still both advertising and about beauty products!)
Every time we acknowledge a "flaw" and stress over it we are guilty of:
a) the dismissal of the person God made us to be, and
b) being distracted from what is actually important.
There are many things tied in here, enough to write a book about (watch this space...!) and definitely you can say to me that it is a fine line to balance keeping healthy with not caring at all; that self control comes into it; that God wants us to be the best we can be. I know and I may or may not address these things and others at some later time [for sure you can still please tell me what you think about them, I'm very much working this out as I go]. However, today I just want to say that it is time those of us in the church (as C.S. Lewis describes it: a terrible army across time and space) at the very least get out of that mind set.
We are allowing consumerism to take over and I have met very few people, and certainly am not one myself, that are totally above the worldly attitudes of attraction. There is also another debate in here as to how much preferences (still ideally kept internalised in my view) are acceptable given that, while we all seem to "fancy" different things, if our ideas come directly from our exposure to the world's view of what is and isn't "beautiful" maybe we just need put some of those aside. I don't know, sometimes I really don't know.
What I do know is that it is hard to be a "normal" person who is aware of all the judgment that flies around, that if it wasn't for Jesus' love for me I wouldn't be able to ignore it so well and that even so it can still be a struggle some days.
We need to rise above it. Christians and non- alike. We need to stop whoever baddie we believe in, be it "The Man" or "The Devil", from winning this battle and inserting insecurity and judgment into our hearts. We need to break out of the trap that tells us to dedicate time and money to insignificant nay unhelpful things. We need to stop harbouring ideas that alienate people and make them not love themselves as they should. As God does. I need to change my set of standards entirely and rethink what it is that God would say when he saw me walk into a room. What image He wants me reflect back in a mirror, not what other people want and not what I want.
It is a challenge. I don't know how to start really... Any thoughts? Do I set a budget on my moisturiser or just stop using it altogether?! First off I need to stop accepting the things I see, the things I hear, the things I think, the things I say... as, well, acceptable. The one thing I do know is that being in the place of constantly trying to live up to these expectations sucks really really hard and I am SO glad to not be there anymore.
One or two people said they liked it when I wrote poems so here's one I made earlier. You can stop reading now if you don't like it so much, I won't mind. I won't know! It's an early draft and I'm not sure about how the punctuation captures the lilt so you may have to use a bit of imagination...
Look at me
Look at me straight
In my eyes my ass, don’t hesitate to tell me what you think
My face my teeth my clothes, what lies beneath
It’s all fair game.
I’ll be ashamed or feel a queen
Or somewhere in between,
Depending on your dreams
View my soul
Then judge the whole package as it were
Do I ring your bell
or deviate from the curve?
Normal, a cycle on the machine?
Or a sign that all is well with me.
What parameters are these?
Indeed! What the hell
Look at me straight
Tell me I’m ok
With a word a look a smile a touch
I need to know that I’m enough
Don’t hesitate
All of me, right here, right now
On a plate
For the joys and for the sorrows
In sickness and health
Till death do us part, or the fire wanes in your heart
Is it death already?
Or was that here from the start.
More’s the pity
If only I’d been pretty.
Get Over It
My boiler is playing up. Which is basically resulting in no heating and lukewarm showers. And winter is coming. And it is colder here than in Geneva so I can attribute a slight shock of return as well.
So I have been struggling gallantly through. I still shower as often as ever, I just shiver a lot more and complain and tell myself it is all for a good lesson and some people have it a lot harder this time of year. Then I sit around grumpy 'cause I haven't warmed up yet and spend lots of time on facebook. I discovered I have two extra hours before my seminar, so why not waste them too?
I didn't even think about praying for hot water. That would be too easy. Yet I also didn't take seriously my thought that it was cold so I can learn empathy (*incidentally* something I have prayed for recently 'cause I am quite good at "being autistic" and not noticing other people - I realised this lately when a friend was sharing a prayer request and I was like "Kat(i)e duh they've said this before but you really didn't process did you?" then cut across the next person to add my own request in!).
So the plan is to actually pray for my boiler. Then, if it stays cold to stop my grumpy act. I really haven't got a leg to stand on when it comes to being unfortunate and I have more than enough jumpers to get me through. We in The West (not the South West mind but the Western world) wash too much anyway - it's consumerism and all their ploys for shiny hair, supple skin, nice nails and a perfect complexion.
Kneel to Jesus. Two fingers to The Man.
(I didn't publish that post yet did I? I have more to say about 'The Man', watch this space...)
So I have been struggling gallantly through. I still shower as often as ever, I just shiver a lot more and complain and tell myself it is all for a good lesson and some people have it a lot harder this time of year. Then I sit around grumpy 'cause I haven't warmed up yet and spend lots of time on facebook. I discovered I have two extra hours before my seminar, so why not waste them too?
I didn't even think about praying for hot water. That would be too easy. Yet I also didn't take seriously my thought that it was cold so I can learn empathy (*incidentally* something I have prayed for recently 'cause I am quite good at "being autistic" and not noticing other people - I realised this lately when a friend was sharing a prayer request and I was like "Kat(i)e duh they've said this before but you really didn't process did you?" then cut across the next person to add my own request in!).
So the plan is to actually pray for my boiler. Then, if it stays cold to stop my grumpy act. I really haven't got a leg to stand on when it comes to being unfortunate and I have more than enough jumpers to get me through. We in The West (not the South West mind but the Western world) wash too much anyway - it's consumerism and all their ploys for shiny hair, supple skin, nice nails and a perfect complexion.
Kneel to Jesus. Two fingers to The Man.
(I didn't publish that post yet did I? I have more to say about 'The Man', watch this space...)
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