Spiritual Direction nyc

February 6, 2019

Write a 5-word Mission Statement: Spiritual Practice of the Month (February)

Create a 5-Word Mission Statement

So far – except for the Great Northeast Polar Vortex, in which some places in the country got colder than Antarctica (Antarctica!) – my New Year hasn’t seemed all that new. I’ve been trying to catalog the actual novel and unprecedented things I’ve tried so far in 2019, and all I’m coming up with is:

Put chia seed in my smoothies: Great for the digestion. Although they tend to clog up straws.
Used a new ointment my allergist recommended.* (Side question: Does the word “ointment” make anyone else cringe? It just sounds like only smarmy people in smarmy situations should say it. I have the same feeling about “lubricant.”)

Basically, I am an old person whose body needs help. Any day now I’ll be tottering around braless in my pastel house dress, looking for my false teeth.

Meanwhile, my friend had a new baby! That’s the best kind of newness.

However – and I do think this is typical for the new year – in many of my conversations lately – with my directees, with church members, with my college-bound daughter – the question of purpose has come up. How do you find your purpose? Once you have, what do you do about it?

A few of us at church have been reading a book called One Life by Scott McKnight. I think it’s especially helpful for young people but also for anyone who feels like exploring – or refining – their understanding of why God has put them on this planet, and how to begin to live out God’s dream for them.

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A few insights that I thought were important:

Jesus didn’t expect perfection or surround himself with it. He gathered around him a bunch of raw, untrained, and at times petty and self-aggrandizing individuals. He loved them, taught them, corrected them, and empowered him with his Spirit to carry out his mission. Whatever you choose to do, allow yourself to be discipled by Jesus. Allow yourself to be flawed, to fail, to be taught and loved and empowered over time. Most growth doesn’t happen overnight.

If we love Jesus, we are on his mission, too! The how and the what will be different – we’re not all called to be evangelists or healers or teachers or artists or accountants or grocery checkers – but the why is the same: “When you give yourself to Jesus, your life becomes the Kingdom life” (118). Your life becomes part of Jesus’ stated goal to reshape humanity and all creation to God’s original vision: one of wholeness, health, harmony, joy, and unity with God.

Once you’ve committed to the why – to Jesus and the furthering of his Kingdom – you can begin to discern the specifics of how his dream for you as an individual fits into his dream for the world.

One exercise I’ve learned of recently to help in this discernment process is to write a five-word mission statement. For example:

To facilitate people experiencing God.

Teach others to live well.

Live creatively in all things.

Use business to end poverty.

Feed people, body and soul.

Compassion for self and others.

Five words aren’t a lot! You’re not going to get down to the granular details of your calling. (That might come later.) But these words can function as a kind of guiding star. For example, if the person whose mission is to “Use business to end poverty” is making a decision about a potential partnership, he or she could ask these questions: Do this company’s values align with mine – and the Kingdom’s? Do they pay their employees a living wage? Do they make use of materials that are responsibly sourced and made without slave labor? Do their executives make out-sized salaries to the detriment of their workforce?

What if your mission is to “Teach others to live well?” First of all, you’re probably a teacher, even if that isn’t your mode of gainful employment! And encapsulated in this phrase is probably a lot of unspoken beliefs about what living well means. As you unpack those beliefs, you’ll be able to use them to shape your decisions about who to focus your teaching efforts on. Who do you see that isn’t living well? What skills or mindsets can you offer that will help them? What skills or mindsets might you need to learn in order to help others?

I confess that I haven’t quite nailed down my own five-word mission statement yet, although I have some candidates, like “Do what brings you joy,” or “Be fed by God’s hand” (both things that God has said to me in prayer at one time or another).** Part of the problem is that I struggle with focus. I do a lot of things, but I’m not necessarily sure all that energy is productively used. I sometimes feel like an octopus, flailing my arms in all directions. Maybe – I hope – writing a mission statement will help me!

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Here is a prayerful process to go through as begin writing a personal mission statement – remembering that (to borrow a phrase from feminism) the personal is the Kingdom! Your life is a Kingdom life! The process is essentially a modified Daily Examen, but looking back at your life instead of a single 24-hour period.

First, ask Jesus to come and shed his light on your prayer time. Ask him to show you who you truly are and how you fit into his dreams for you.

Second, ask yourself: What gifts, talents, dreams, and drives are constant in your life? Which ones bring you life, and bring life to those around you? Which ones help bring all created things just a little more into alignment with the Kingdom? Ask Jesus to help bring to the forefront current or past experiences, or words from other people, that show you working/playing/living most completely in your “Kingdom” zone. Pay attention to those memories and experiences that make you feel light and free, relaxed, hopeful, joyful and loving.

Third, ask yourself: What are the things in your life that do not bring life to you and to others? What dreams might not come from Jesus and the Kingdom? What false messages and ambitions may be claiming your attention? Ask the Holy Spirit to show you clearly lies that you may have believed or desires that are at bottom empty and will lead to destruction rather than life. Consider asking the Lord for forgiveness and freedom.

Finally, ask Jesus to help you look back over this prayer time and put what you’ve noticed into words! Perhaps ask the Holy Spirit to highlight key words, phrases, images, even smells or sounds, from your prayer time. Pay attention to which seem to have the strongest hold on your imagination or emotions. These will be the building blocks for your mission statement.

It may take several tries and some tinkering, but see what you and Jesus come up with together!

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*Vaniply – Actually awesome for winter-dry facial skin. Works better than my staple for the rest of the year, the much more outrageously priced Dermalogica Active Moist, which I can only justify (kind of) because it lasts forever and because every other lotion I’ve tried makes me break out, burns my skin, or both.

**Here are some of my discarded mission statements:

Limit procrastination to Netflix only.

Poison no one with cooking.

Beat writer’s block into submission.

Make a living wage . . . someday.

Just use your Ph.D. already.

Octopus image credit: https://drawception.com/panel/drawing/nqkg6336/confused-octopus/

January 3, 2019

Get Centered in the New Year with Centering Prayer: Spiritual Practice of the Month

One of the things that makes me laugh when I read love stories, whether adult or YA fiction, is that moment when the boy and girl or man and woman kiss for the first time and the woman’s mind just . . . empties. All those fizzing synapses get burned out by the sheer electric power of the meeting-of-the-mouths, and all thought ceases. Not just all rational thought, but all thought. Period.

kiss

This is in some ways a lovely fantasy. The problem is, I don’t think this is the way it actually works. At least not to most women I know of. And this is not a drag on the guys we’ve been kissing. It’s simply to point out that, anecdotally speaking, women are capable of thinking of many things at once and even the most mind-blowing kiss does not negate this ability. Perhaps it’s our more bilaterally-symmetrical brains and the fact that our two brain hemispheres talk to each other more.

I remember an old episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation, where Data the android gets a human girlfriend. It’s doomed to fail, of course, but the death knell of the relationship tolls when she kisses Data and asks what he’s thinking. He matter-of-factly reels off a laundry list of about 15 things, including the limit of pressure he can put on her lips without caving her face in with his superhuman robotic strength. Her face falls and she walks away. She knows what it means that she doesn’t totally occupy his thoughts: he doesn’t love her.

When I watched the show a teenager I thought this storyline was romantic and star-crossed and bittersweet, even if more than a shade past believable (specifically, actor Brent Spiner’s pasty shade of pancake makeup, back when extreme pallor was supposed to indicate “android” and not “hot teenage vampire”). Poor girl, always falling for the unavailable guy! Poor Data, longing to be human but unable to understand love.

Don’t get me wrong, I think it was a lousy idea for Ensign-of-the-Week to try to date a robot, and I have no idea whether it’s true for guys that physical contact makes your brain spontaneously combust, but I know for a fact that women can be kissing their significant other and enjoying the experience while simultaneously running through their grocery list, their best friend’s relationship woes, that upcoming project deadline, the sale at Zulily, and whether they have clean unmentionables for tomorrow. Sure, the kiss works better – a lot better – when your attention is undivided, but generally speaking, that single-minded focus happens because you decide you want it to, not by some sort of hormonal fiat over your gray matter. You can tell your brain to shut up, if you want, but you’re still giving yourself over to the moment with the full assent of your thought and will.

Ghost kiss

Remember Ghost? I don’t care what the CGI and camera angles are telling you, Demi’s character is perfectly aware she’s kissing a dead guy borrowing the body of another woman. (For a gender-swap variation on this plot, read Alice Sebold’s The Lovely Bones.) She might not care, but that’s different from her brain turning completely to mush and disconnecting her from reality. Even if Patrick Swazye’s lips are literally glowing with light from heaven. (Which would give most anyone trouble, I think.)

What I am working up to saying, in a roundabout fashion, is that, contrary to years of received wisdom from Danielle Steele, Hollywood, and Team Edward, it’s hard to shut off your brain. It’s hard if you’re a woman. It’s hard if you live in a city, especially one of loud-talking, fast-moving overachievers like New York. It’s hard if you have any kind of stress in your life. It’s probably hard if you’re a guy, too, but I don’t have the same kind of personal experience with that situation.

So how to quiet all that noise in your head and just . . . be present? Especially during the first days of the year, which are – let’s face it – kind of like the hangover to the just-concluded holiday season. You know what I mean. Christmas and New Years are over but their detritus is still with you – your dried up Christmas tree, shedding needles faster than your Uncle George’s scalp is divesting itself of its hair, needs to be hauled to the curb (or, in the case of my tabletop Charlie Brown-esque model, smooshed back into its box and schlepped to the basement), the ornaments returned to their packing, and those peppermint bark and champagne-induced love handles need to be melted posthaste by some New Year’s juice cleansing and Soul Cycle. Oh, and you’re back to work and the kids are back in school, but the government is still shut down.

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How, amidst all this bustle and chaos, can you find time to be with God, to invite him to step through your busyness and defenses and consent to his presence the way you would to a kiss?

One way is to practice centering prayer. This ancient practice is designed to shut down distractions from inside and out, to help you become completely open to God. Here’s how it’s done:

First, find a quiet place and get comfortable in a seated position. Then, breathe. Slowly, in and out, becoming aware of your breath as it flows in and out of your body. Feel the rise and fall of your chest, your breath slowing, your body gradually loosening, your thoughts slowing down to the pace of your respiration.

Now, choose a focus word or phrase, something that will help anchor you in the moment, a word that resonates with you and where you are with God. For me, the word is often “Holy.” Begin to repeat the word in your head as you breathe, so that the word falls into place with the rhythm of your body.

Then – and this, for me, is the hardest part! – try to empty your mind of thought. You’re trying to achieve inner silence, a total openness to God and God alone. This takes practice! Almost certainly a billion little thoughts will zoom in like industrious bees. Rather than trying to swat them away with your mental fly swatter, simply notice them, without guilt or frustration, and go back to your anchor word for a time. Repeat it until you reclaim your focus and inner stillness. When you’re ready, let the word go and try to empty your mind again and simply be with God. Pray as long as you feel able to sustain your centered state.

Centering Prayer (1)

If you need a bit more support, there’s a Centering prayer app! You can use it to frame your practice with music and scripture or to set a timer. The organization that created the app, Contemplative Outreach, also offers online communities and workshops for those interested in centering prayer.

Title photo credit: Ilya Naymushin / Reuters via theatlantic.com

Find me on Instagram @ravishedbylight.

November 1, 2018

Take Your Meds For Jesus: How to Turn Any Daily Routine into a Prescription for Contentment (Spiritual Practice of the Month)

Surrender (Instagram.Blog)

This post is part of my ongoing series on monthly spiritual practices. I’ve adapted this practice from friend, fellow spiritual director, and glowing newlywed Kimberly Malone. Her original suggestion was to turn taking your daily medication into an opportunity to relinquish control to God.

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I’ve always aspired to be a shower and go kind of gal: Throw on some leggings and a comfy shirt, run a comb through my hair, slap on some sunscreen, and run out the door looking as glowy and pure as a Dove commercial. (Except clothed. Clothing is good.)

Screenshot 2018-09-25 at 12.28.12 PM — The ideal. (*Not what I look like in the a.m. Or really ever.)

Unfortunately, God had other plans for me: a DEFCON-threat level assortment of allergies and skin issues including year-round eczema that ranges from mildly irritating to infuriatingly itchy. As a result, I have a twice-daily routine that includes oral medications, nasal spray, and smearing various over-the-counter and prescription creams on myself. By the end of all this, I’m about as greasy as an arctic seal dipped in Crisco, but my skin will still be dried out within a few hours.

Then, I have to add in the time it takes me to deal with contact lenses, the allergy eye drops, and the retainers I’ve worn since high school. At bedtime, I kick my routine up a notch by adding in the nightly warm compress that keeps my tear ducts from backing up and swelling my left eyelid up to the size of Jupiter. I didn’t know you could have both oily tears and dry eyes, but, hey, I’m a complicated woman.

Screenshot 2018-09-25 at 12.32.16 PM — The Reality: Hot Mess Barbie (Except Asian. And itchy. And not a 5’11” Double D.)

Basically, by the time I get myself to bed in the evening, my husband is already having a cigar with his BFF the Sandman over scotch, a cheese platter, and a roaring fire.

(Does scotch go with cheese? I actually have no idea, since I think scotch is a gustatory experience somewhere between cough syrup and drinking gasoline.)

But back to the spiritual part of this whole mess. Although that’s a misleading statement, because the truth is there is no division between the spiritual part of our lives and all the rest of it. God is in all of it, from the mundane to the awe-inspiring.

That’s why I love my friend Kimberly’s suggestion to turn your medication routine into a time of giving up control to God. And it’s why I am adapting it into this month’s spiritual practice. Medication is not usually something I approach with surrender. It’s something I do grudgingly – because I have to. I dislike the time, the expense, and most of all, the daily reminder that my body is flawed and that I am literally physically uncomfortable in my own skin.

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But what if I approached taking and applying my meds not with tolerance at best, resentment at worst? What if I spent that time giving thanks for the ways that God is present to me each and every day, and especially in my body? What if as I took a pill or slathered on a cream, I offered up control of my body and my life to the Holy Spirit? If I was less focused on the way my body falls short and instead marveled at how I am fearfully and wonderfully made? How God used my hands and my feet over the course of the day? How he might choose to use them tomorrow? What if I used this Thanksgiving season to be thankful for all the ways God is present in my life, even those things I’d rather avoid? How might God turn my grumbling into gratitude? My discontent into contentment?

While I’m going to apply this practice of surrender and gratitude to taking my meds, it can work in any daily routine you have, anything you might normally do by rote: Drinking your morning coffee, getting dressed, brushing teeth, tying shoes, folding laundry. Once you’ve identified the routine you want to invite God into, here is a simple, basic three-step prayer to follow on a daily basis.

As you practice this discipline of relinquishing control and giving thanks, may God bring you new awareness of his gifts and grace in your life. And may your Thanksgiving season be blessed!

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Come find me on Instagram @ravishedbylight.

October 24, 2018

Fighting for a Win-Win in Dating and Marriage: Tips for Handling Conflicts from the Gottman Institute (Book Review)

V1NYC_Dating & Church of God_InstaPost

This coming week, my church’s Biblical Dating in the Digital Age series will focus on “Dating and the Church of God” – or how a love relationship between a man and a woman that starts with dating will eventually become, in marriage, a visible sign of the invisible grace of God: the relationship between Christ and his bride, the Church.

At the same time as the series has been running, my husband and I have been co-leading a premarital counseling course for several couples that are approaching marriage. The bulk of our course is based on research from the Gottman Institute. Researchers there have been taking a scientific approach to the study of marriage (and divorce) for the past twenty years. Gottman’s book, The Seven Principles for Making Marriage Work, is based on those insights, which include an over 90% ability to predict a couple’s eventual divorce simply by the way they react to each other over the course of a normal conversation or day spent together. Many of these insights, though discovered in the context of marriage, are also applicable to dating.

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One of the most helpful insights Gottman uncovered is this: Couples are going to argue. Expect it. In fact, 69% of conflicts between even happy couples are what he terms “Unsolvable.” In other words, they are issues that may appear surface and temporary, but at root are core differences in temperament, values, and beliefs that are not going to go away. Ever. What’s key is not whether you fight, it’s how.

So what’s a dating or married couple to do when faced with the billionth fight over the same topic, whether it’s the frequency of date night, someone’s inability to buy good gifts, or who gets to wield the remote?

Screenshot 2018-10-24 at 12.33.14 PM.png — *etsy.com/shop/bitterwhimsy*

Simple. (Sort of.) You realize that you, buddy, are not going to win this one. Neither is your partner. Not completely. You recognize that you are two people who think differently about what’s important and you agree to disagree.

Let’s say, either while you are already married with kids, or while you are projecting your dating life into its possible future, you begin discussing holidays with the parents. You think it’s important to spend every Christmas with your parents, and your partner wants to take vacays to Disney with the kids. You are adamant that your family is the most important thing in your life and you want your kids to spend time with their grandparents. Your partner (who is as not as close to his or her parents) is equally adamant that getaways for your nuclear family will help cement your bond and create lasting memories. At the core, the two of you are fighting not about a holiday, but about definitions of family and priorities that you’ve been forming since childhood. Neither of your experiences or values is going to change.

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You could fight about – or sweep under the rug – both the surface and the deeper issue every Christmas for the rest of your lives, and let the bitterness of the perpetual conflict – or perpetual repression – seep into the rest of your relationship. Or, you negotiate. You compromise. You find a middle ground in which neither of you is right, neither of you is wrong, and neither of you gets completely what you want. But both of you win.

You win because you’ve stopped an unsolvable disagreement from spilling into those areas of your life where are in accord. You’ve drained the toxin from a conflict that has the potential to poison your marriage. Now, you agree to spend most Christmases with the grandparents, but every third year you see them on Thanksgiving instead and head to the Magic Kingdom for Yuletide. Is either of you getting exactly what you want, every time? Nope. But both of you are getting some of what you want. Both of your needs and concerns are being valued. And you get to keep a healthy relationship. That’s the definition of a win-win.

(Just know that for me this is an imagined scenario only. In reality, I think I’d commit seppuku with a rusty nail clipper rather than be anywhere near Disney on Jesus’ birthday. I’m not anti-Disney, exactly. Just anti-peak holiday crowds, interminable lines, and exorbitant prices for a stupid sipper shaped like Mickey’s head that, btw, is both creepy and bad for the environment. Let me tell you: it’s exhausting to spend a whole day on your feet while feeling morally superior to the people you are elbowing out of your way.)

christmas-trees-sleeping-beauty-castle-disneyland — Remember, it’s a beautiful castle, but the wicked witch and her spinning wheel are hiding upstairs. (image from disneytouristblog.com)

That’s just one example of how couples might begin practicing the art of the “win-win” while they are still dating. Whether it’s who pays for those Broadway tickets or how many evenings you need to spend with just the two of you vs. hanging out with friends . . . find a way to negotiate. Give a little to get a little. It sounds manipulative, but it’s not. It’s practical. And it’s loving. You have a perspective that your partner needs. And your partner has a perspective that will help you grow into a fuller, richer person.

I’m not saying don’t have non-negotiables. I’m saying be realistic about how many you have. And ask yourself: If I bend on this a little, what am I losing? What am I gaining? What might my partner lose or gain?

You might gain years together. You might get a marriage as it was meant to be: two people who are willing to mutually sacrifice for the other’s good.

Or, on the flip side, you might decide your non-negotiables are exactly that and save yourself years of fruitless friction in a relationship that doesn’t allow you to express your authentic self, nor appreciate who your partner truly is.

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Either way, it’s a win for both of you.

Find more resources for couples from the Gottman Institute on gottman.com

To follow Vineyard One’s Dating and God series, watch the sermon series on Facebook Live at 10:30 am EST, or at any time after the live stream concludes, or visit vineyardone.nyc.

October 13, 2018

Everything I Know About Love, I Learned from “Bachelor Nation” (Book Review)

dating

In tribute to my church’s current series on God and Dating, I’m continuing to review some of the books I’ve read relating to love, romance, dating, and marriage.

Bachelor Nation: Inside the World of America’s Favorite Guilty Pleasure isn’t really about dating, in the sense that it’s not a “how-to” primer, the way The Four Man Plan, which I wrote about last week, is. But entertainment journalist and author Amy Kaufman definitely uncovers some of the secrets to making people feel the pulse-pounding onslaught of love (or maybe just lust) – whether or not they’re there for the “right reasons.”

Screenshot 2018-10-11 at 10.11.45 AM

Let it be said, right off the bat, that the Bachelor producers come off in this book as beyond Machiavellian. They make the author of The Prince, the scourge of the Medicis, look like a rank amateur. They are manipulative, scheming, ratings-grubbing, and drama-mongering. And they are obviously geniuses at what they do, because, well, we’re still watching.

Screenshot 2018-10-11 at 12.09.03 PM — An Actual Bachelor Producer

Well, I’m not. Anymore. Mostly because it’s faster for me to skim the recaps.

What were my “right reasons” for beginning to watch the voyeuristic marvel that is the Bachelor franchise? Way back in 2002, my husband and I had a new baby that Would. Not. Sleep. After four months of stumbling around like zombies on Ambien, we gave up and sleep-trained her – an esoteric process otherwise known as “let the baby cry herself to sleep, already!” The problem was, we were in a very small apartment and had nowhere to go away from the crying. So, we turned on the tv, and lo and behold! Like a light shining out on our desperate existence, there was Chris Harrison! And the Bachelor! And 25 Bachelorettes!

Reader, it was the distraction we needed. We were hooked like big, bug-eyed catfish and stayed hooked through the second season, when the lovely former cheerleader Trista graced our screen and flitted out with a proposal from Fireman Ryan, he of the sweetly terrible – I mean just horrendous – poetry. We watched their wedding, when the couple bizarrely decided they only needed to recite thirteen-and-a-half out of fourteen lines of Elizbeth Barrett Browning’s sonnet, “How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.”

People, you just cannot truncate a sonnet of its final couplet. It becomes a painfully unfinished thing. It’s like . . . if Pygmalion hadn’t wanted to bother with styling Galatea’s hair and just left her brainpan open. IT CANNOT BE DONE.

Screenshot 2018-10-11 at 10.37.53 AM — Etienne-Maurice Falconette, The Walters Art Museum

Screenshot 2018-10-11 at 10.39.01 AM — Trista and Ryan, ABC

Sorry, had to get that off my chest.

Anyway, back to the book. Here, in no particular order, are the 10 secrets to falling in love a la Bachelor Nation. (Have no fear, I will also list more broadly applicable secrets for the rest of us who like to visit Reality TV Land but wouldn’t want to live there.)

Alcohol. Lots and lots of alcohol. So much alcohol. Because people without inhibitions can be coached to do anything!
Sleep-deprivation. Also not known to promote rational, self-protective behavior.
Isolation. You know all those women can’t leave the house, right? Not even to run to CVS for toothpaste.
Complete lack of privacy. Cameras everywhere! Eventually, contestants can’t keep their guard up all the time any longer and that’s when things really get rockin’.
Ruthless editing. By manipulating camera angles, cuts, and voice-overs, and splicing together exactly the words they want someone to say, the producers can make a perfectly pleasant one-on-one date seem like an encounter between Attila the Hun and the Roman army. Or vice versa.
The same interrogation techniques used by police when they’re trying to get someone to confess to murder. “Oh, come on, Ashley. You know you’re for falling for Justin. We’ve been in this room for 15 hours without daylight or water or even those little 100 calorie cookie packs from the vending machine. Why don’t you just cry a little and say you’re ready to marry him and we can all go back to our tequila?”
Pursuant to numbers 4, 5 and 6: An iron-clad contract. Everything you say and do can and will be used against you in the court of reality television. Even if you didn’t actually say or do it.
Boredom. There is nothing to do in the Bachelor/ette mansion. No books, no tv, not even jenga. Eventually, there is nothing to do to entertain yourself except fall in love, form Survivor-like alliances, and acquiesce to whatever cunning narrative the producers want to tell the viewing audience. They want you to wear a tiara and a ballgown? Sure, what else have you got to do?
Using women’s biology against them. Did you know that when a bunch of women stay in the same place for an extended time, their menstrual cycles start to sync up? The Bachelor producers sure do. Mass outbreaks of crying, moodiness, and exhaustion make for must-see-tv!
The producers conspire against you. They cultivate your friendship and then they lie, lie, lie. Say Rudy tells Tania – to her face! – that he doesn’t know how he feels about her but he does think she’s great in the sack. The producer whom Tania trusts the most will then assure Tania that Rudy is a deep, sensitive guy who is already halfway to the altar.
Did I mention the alcohol? Because I think they might fill the swimming pool with it.

Screenshot 2018-10-11 at 12.33.26 PM.png — The Bachelor Pool: Powered by hormones, mixed drinks, and impaired decision-making.

Now, for those of us who have no designs on the Fantasy Suite, here are Bachelor-inspired dating insights for normal people:

Love is many things, but among the most measurable is a neurochemical state. The culprit is dopamine, “a stimulant that gives us motivation, energy and focus” (Kaufman 135). When you’re in love, dopamine floods your brain and you feel elation, drive, even obsession. The Bachelor puts its contestants in situations that prime them for dopamine surges. Maybe we can’t all have twenty-five people vying for the favor of our attention, but there are some things we can do to stimulate dopamine production on our way to finding that fairy-tale ending:

Go looking for love. Just the expectation that you might meet someone drives up your dopamine levels. Proximity to other people looking for love can also increase dopamine production.
Put yourself in novel situations. Combine your romantic quest with new experiences. Try new things in order to meet new kinds of people. And when you’ve met someone, try new things with them.
It’s even better if the new thing is something you’re slightly afraid of. Conquering fear or facing imagined danger with a potential or actual romantic partner will bond you even more. The Bachelor calls these “adrenaline dates” (Kaufman 133) – rappelling down a cliff, zip-lining over a forest, swimming with sharks, dashing to Macy’s on Black Friday. The surge of endorphins on top of all the other hormones will increase your feelings of connectedness and euphoria.
Keep your clothes on. Also known as the “Don’t Give Away Your Goodies For Free” postulate.* Why? Because when you’re in a state of heightened dopamine – which everyone at the beginning of a relationship is – it’s hard to distinguish between lust and love. The instant sex enters the picture, your dopamine system basically explodes your brain. It conspires against your reason, wisdom, and self-preservation. You can go instantly from a superficial interest in someone to feeling like he is the Romeo to your Juliet, the Lancelot to your Guinevere, the Jason Mesnick to your Melissa Mycroft. And we all know how well those stories turned out.**

*I heard a mom tell her teenage daughter this on the subway. It was probably the funniest #overheardinnyc moment I’ve heard yet, even if the daughter didn’t feel the same way.

**Also, because reportedly the number one reason would-be contestants get turned down for the show? Previously undiagnosed STDs.

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Want to learn more about love? Join Vineyard One NYC for our sermon series on “Biblical Dating in the Digital Age.” Find us at vineyardone.nyc or stream our services Sunday mornings at 10:30am EST on Facebook Live.

October 1, 2018

Breath Prayer 1: Breathing with God Through Your Day

Breathe

This is the first installment of my Spiritual Practice of the Month series. Each month, I’ll post a description and a guide to a new spiritual expression meant to help us experience God and the freedom he desires for us in deep and fresh ways. You will also be able to follow this series on my Instagram account, ravishedbylight, where I will also be posting a new Bible Verse of the Week every Monday.

Breath prayer, like most contemplative practices, helps us become increasingly aware of God with us in every moment and circumstance of our lives. There is more than one way to engage in breath prayer: one focuses on concentrated periods of prayer while another disperses the prayer throughout your entire day. For this post, I’m going to focus on the latter. It’s particularly good for busy seasons where stillness is hard to find or for people who may struggle with what’s typically thought of as prayer in evangelical circles (an unscripted conversation with God, eyes closed, while sitting or kneeling).

I’m going to shamelessly steal most of this post from my husband’s newsletter to our church earlier this week. He writes about his initial skepticism about spiritual direction as well as his encounter with God through breath prayer. I’ll follow with a step-by-step guide to experiencing breath prayer for yourself. (Use this link to skip the story and go directly to a printable breath prayer guide.) Here’s my husband’s story:

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I meet once a month with a Spiritual Director, Bill. He’s a man of wisdom, peace, and curiosity. He helps me explore my relationship with God, asking me to get specific about what God is saying to me and what God might be inviting me to. Honestly, when I started meeting with him, I wanted to quit after about 2 sessions. At first, I didn’t get the point – I already read the bible, I pray, I try to obey what God is telling me – I thought, “Why do I need somebody else to do this with?”

Then God started talking to me.

During our times of discussion, prayer, and reflection, God began to show up and say things to me that were completely new and unexpected! It usually wasn’t Bill telling me “I think God is saying….” it was just us being quiet & reflective together, giving me space for God to speak his voice to me directly. Those things that God has been speaking to me have shaped the direction of my life and ministry.

Let me give you an example: recently, meeting with Bill, as we were talking about the kind of life that God desires for each of us, as we prayed, I heard the Lord say to me “A life governed by the Spirit.”

And that was it. It honestly didn’t seem like much at the time, but I could tell it was important. Bill asked me how I could explore that thought and we came up with the idea of “Breath Prayer.” Basically, I walk around all day and I pray a simple, one-sentence prayer under my breath wherever I go.

“Holy Spirit, govern my life.” I try to say it 100 times a day, reflecting on the meaning and letting the prayer speak to me and change me. In the days since I started praying this prayer, it’s meaning has exploded to me with implications I had never realized!

I work through it piece by piece – I’m asking my life to be governed by the Holy Spirit – not governed by my wallet (money), my watch (time & schedule), my will (selfish desires), etc. I don’t want my life to be governed by anyone or anything else by the Holy Spirit – that’s my prayer and declaration as I pray this 100 times a day.

As I ask the Spirit to govern my life, I’m asking him to rule, to make the decisions, to set the course, to provide for me, to protect me. I want his governing presence in the decisions I make myself, and in the circumstances that I find myself in.

When I ask the Spirit to govern my life, I’m submitting myself to him in every aspect of my life – my decisions, my interactions, my activities, my day-to-day life and looking ahead to the whole rest of my life. He gets to govern my body, my mind, my heart, my words, my actions – my whole life!

It’s a simple prayer – Holy Spirit, govern my life – but prayed over and over every day, it’s had a huge impact on me in just a short amount of time!

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Below is a guide to practicing breath prayer for yourself. You can also find the instructions in a printable pdf form if you click the link.

Breath Prayer

Ask the Lord for a simple word or phrase that encapsulates his invitation to you at this moment of your life. It may be a verse, a snippet of a song, something has said to you recently, or something entirely new from God.

Once God has spoken this word or phrase to you, commit to saying it to yourself throughout the day, during your morning routine, as you go to work or spend time with your family, as you do your household chores, watch sports, hang out with your friends, go on a date, brush your teeth. (You get the idea.)

As you spend time with the prayer, be aware of how its meanings deepen and change. What happens if you emphasize one word instead of another? How is the prayer beginning to make itself known in different aspects of your life? Notice how God is changing you through the prayer.

Stay with the same prayer, even when you may experience boredom or resistance, until you sense God inviting you into something new.

August 21, 2018

Doing the Examen with Kids

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For around 2 years now, I’ve been using the Reimagining the Examen app before I go to sleep. It’s a modern take on the Ignatian Examen of Conscience, in which you imaginatively re-live the hours of your day with God. You ask God to shed light on those things he wants to bring to your attention, and what your response to them should be (gratitude? repentance? a request for help?) both in the moment and in how you prepare for the day to come.

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The app comes with over a dozen variations on the traditional examen, and you can either go through the previously set order or pick and choose according to how you feel that day. Some of the examens have a musical accompaniment, and you can choose the type of music or sound as well (quiet piano, guitar, rainfall, ocean waves, etc.). Screenshot 2018-07-05 at 12.28.45 PM

Probably around a year ago, I started doing my nightly examen with my seven-year old as part of our tuck-in routine, and it quickly became one of the highlights of my day. We don’t always do every question, but we almost always do question 2, which asks us to review the blessings of the day, both big and small. Usually her blessings are simple, joyful things like, “I got to play with my cousin today” or “I got to eat ice cream” or “My mommy is my blessing.”

She’s too young to really process some of the more high-level questions, but with a little translation and explanation, she’s able to engage on a surprisingly deep level. For example, one of the examens asks, “Where was Jesus with you today?” Her answer: “On the playground, during break time. He was watching me play.”

Several weeks ago, after a long day at the beach for the kids and their dad (I was home working but also in the deliciously cool air conditioning), our examen topic was “Am I Free or Unfree?” This wasn’t her first time around the contemplative block, so she knows by now that “free,” in Ignatian Speak, means filled with hope, faith, and love and drawn towards God, while “unfree” means the opposite: filled with fear, mistrust, and selfishness and drawn away from God. Still, I was not expecting her response. She immediately jumped in with, “I was unfree today. Definitely.”

When I asked why, she said – very emphatically – “because I was terrorized because the waves were so big and I got water in my eyes.” After I’d gently corrected her – “I think you mean terrified” – she elaborated. “Yeah, I was terrified and traumatized because the waves were so strong.”

The next step was to imagine that moment of unfreedom – in this case, fear – but this time imagining God there with you. I asked her, “Can you see God there with you? How does God being there change what you felt or experienced?”

She said, “He helps me to not be terrified and traumatized because I know that he’s with me and my Daddy’s with me too, and he’ll help me if I drown.”

“What do you think God is saying to you?” I asked.

“I think he’s saying I don’t have to be terrified and traumatized the next time but I can just have fun.”

I was blown away by the simplicity and insight of her response. I am beyond grateful for the way the examen has acclimated her to expect to encounter God every day, to hear his voice, to access and give expression to her inner life, to build her faith through direct experience. Doing the examen together has also built our relationship as we communicate about our emotions and pray together at bedtime. I wish I had known about this tool when my two older children were at this age.

If you have children of any age, I encourage you to find an examen routine that works for you. If you prefer a paper version to an app, you can try the Reimagining the Examen book or ebook or, as an alternative, try Sleeping With Bread: Holding What Gives You Life. (Read a short description of Sleeping with Bread on my Spiritual Direction Links and Resources page or read my review of the book for a more in-depth approach.

Header photo credit: https://www.crosswalk.com/faith/prayer/prayers/10-childrens-prayers-simple-and-easy-for-kids-to-pray.html

August 14, 2018

Tacos, Tires, a Tofu Box: A Story of God’s Providence

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A few weeks ago, my husband Ryan, our daughter Deise, and I drove up to Syracuse for a regional church conference. While there, we hung out with our good friends Kurt and Amy at their apartment complex pool. Our girls got to swim together while the adults caught up. As we left the complex, this happened:

We were driving down a busy street in front of a large shopping complex, and an elderly gentleman pulled out without seeing us. My husband braked hard, and no one was hurt, but our car was toast. (Or rather, it was fixable, but it was so old and its mileage so high that the insurance company decided the repairs would cost more than the worth of the car.)

Here’s the crazy part. Less than half an hour ago, we’d gotten four new tires. Which were now on an undrivable car. Wanna know why we’d gotten those tires?

It happened like this: While driving up to Syracuse, we stopped to see my son, Daniel, who was at a math camp at Bard College for a few weeks. (Yes, my son is a math nerd. Since he’s returned from camp, he’s been busy trying to discover algorithms to solve Rubix cubes.) We rescued him from cafeteria food for the afternoon (“They serve tofu dogs. They’re terrible.”) and let him pick his food of choice. He picked tacos. So we drove to this little place we’d seen in town. As we entered the driveway, we heard a loud pop or crack under the car. We stopped; Ryan checked around to see what had hit us and saw nothing. We found out the taco place was closed and went elsewhere. End of story, we thought.

Except, that when we got to Syracuse, it turned out our tire was leaking. Ryan filled it with air once, but that was only a temporary solution. There happened to be a tire store close to Kurt and Amy’s house, so while we girls swam, Ryan and Kurt took our car to the tire store. The tire guys took one look at our tires and said all the treads were dangerously worn down. So Ryan got all the tires replaced, then hopped in the car to pick Deise and me up. That’s when the accident happened.

So, let’s review the sequence of events:

Daniel’s taco craving leads us to a leaky tire. And the taco place isn’t even open!
We replace all 4 tires, to the tune of $200.
15 minutes later, we get into a car accident. Those $200 tires are now on a worthless car. (We joke about posting the picture of our wreck on Instagram with the hashtag #look ma, new tires!)

Oh, yes, and we’re on vacation!

Not a great story, right? $200 down the toilet, plus a wrecked car, during what’s supposed to be a rejuvenating getaway.

But what if we tell the story a different way? What if Daniel’s taco craving actually ended up preventing us and the other driver from serious injuries? What if, because we had four new tires with new treads instead of four old tires with substandard treads, those new tires were able to slow down the impact of our collision enough that we all walked away, unhurt? What if God used Daniel’s hankering for Mexican and a mysteriously flat tire to look out for us all?

Now, can we prove that’s what happened? Empirically, beyond a shadow of a doubt? Of course not. It’s absolutely possible that this sequence of events was random. We could absolutely choose to lament those beautiful, shiny new tires that are going to waste on a busted car somewhere in a collision repair shop in Syracuse. But we’ve chosen to focus our attention elsewhere, to tell a story of God’s providential timing and protection.

Life of Pi author Yann Martel summed up the meaning behind his novel like this: “Life is a story; you can choose your own story; a story with God is the better story.”

Sometimes faith is not just believing in God in the abstract; it’s the story you choose to tell.

What’s your story?

sdr P.S. Here’s our “new” used car, a Toyota Scion XB. When we briefly lived in Hawaii, we had an older version of this car that the locals called a “tofu box” because, well, that’s what it looked like. This more recent model is less boxy, but the name has stuck.

June 13, 2018

The Dandelion Days of Summer and God’s Unconditional Love

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If you have allergies like I do, and like my kids do, the arrival of warm weather in New York is like a birthday party and a mildly horrific movie wrapped up into one. We love the sunshine, taking out bikes and scooters, shrugging off the coats and sweaters. We love far less the itchy, swollen eyes, stuffy noses and clogged throats, eczema, sneezing, and chemical dependency on every over-the-counter remedy in the known universe.

The other week as I tromped to the drug store in search of antihistamine eyedrops with my son (13) and younger daughter (6), I was struck by how utterly and completely themselves they both were. Deise (pronounced “Daisy”) was in ecstasy over the dandelions populating our neighbors’ lawns. She wanted to pick all of them and bring them home. She kept saying, “They’re so beautiful! Look how beautiful they are!” Daniel, however, was impressed neither by his sister’s enthusiasm nor by its objects. “They’re weeds,” he pointed out. “They’re an invasive species and they’re bad for the rest of the plants. You shouldn’t pick them.”

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If you know my kids at all, these reactions typify their personalities. Deise lives in an enchanted world of play clothes and pretend. She’s been sleeping at night in a multicolored tent in our living room, surrounded by the stuffed animals that “I love so so much, even though I know they aren’t real.” I took her to her piano lesson not too long ago and the trees by her teacher’s apartment were in full bloom. She was enthralled and spent time gathering not only tree blossoms but more dandelions. She named each one of her blooms: Blossom, Berry, Cherry, Pitter, Patter, Packer, Mrs., Droopy, Goldilocks, and Bitter (because it was small). She also picked up individual petals from the ground and gave them the catch-all name “Hatchling.” She is the embodiment of joie de vivre.

(Her names reminded me of the classic children’s book Make Way for Ducklings, with its eight siblings Jack, Kack, Lack, Mack, Nack, Ouack, Pack, and Quack.)

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Daniel, my chess player, mathematician, and pessimist, is interested in facts, strategy, and planning for worst-case scenarios. (Also, Marvel comics.) When Daniel looks at a dandelion, he sees not “scope for the imagination,” as Anne Shirley would say, but an invasion waiting to happen. His response to dandelions is to leave them alone lest anything worse come to pass.

(Sophie (16) wasn’t with us that day, but if she had been, she would’ve had a snippet of a Broadway song and a playfully sarcastic comment for all parties. Her spiritual gift, like her father’s, is snark.)

What I felt as I watched Daniel and Deise respond so differently to the same environment, and even as I waded in to stop them squabbling over their different perceptions, was an overwhelming wash of love, acceptance, and delight in them, exactly as they both are. And I also felt God’s love for them – unconditional, perfectly knowing, perfectly celebratory of their uniqueness, gifts, and potential.

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I think this is how God loves each one of us: whether we are imaginative and sunny or rational and gloomy, an Anne Shirley or an Eyore.

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Sometimes I think we are afraid that he has rankings in his head, that he prefers one type of personality or one set of talents over another, and that whoever we are is far down the list. But the truth is that God delights in each one of us exactly as we are. Zephaniah 3:17 tells us that:

. . . the Lord your God is living among you.
    He is a mighty savior.
He will take delight in you with gladness.
    With his love, he will calm all your fears.
    He will rejoice over you with joyful songs.

If your insecurities are snarling at you today, spend some time meditating on this Scripture passage and letting its truth sink in. You are as beloved by God as the brightest summer bloom. You bring God joy! What could be more beautiful and freeing than that?

June 6, 2018

Imaginative Prayer and “Sticky Faith” for Kids (Book Review + Podcast link)

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I reviewed this book about a year ago, but I’m reposting because its author, Jared Boyd (also my spiritual direction teacher!), is being interviewed on a podcast with the Missio Alliance, a fellowship of churches and other organizations dedicated to the health and vitality of the North American Christianity. You can find the interview, “How Imaginative Prayer Helps Children Connect with God,” here:

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One of the main insights from the book Sticky Faith: Everyday ideas to build lasting faith in your kids, by Dr. Kara Powell and Dr. Chap Clark, is that how parents practice and talk about their faith with their kids is crucial to passing on authentic faith. If parents hope to cultivate a Christian identity in their children — one that survives the tumultuous teen and questioning young adult years when young people are “discovering who they are and making the commitments toward who they want to be” — they have to do more than just go to church, pay their tithes, and send their kids to youth group.

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The authors’ research, conducted under the auspices of the Fuller Youth Institute and Fuller Theological Seminary, concludes that “it’s never too early” to start building faith that sticks into your children. To do that, parents need to go beyond teaching Christianity primarily as a system of “do’s and don’t’s” and obedience, and instead help kids experience what it is to know and trust Christ. Practical ways to do this include: surrounding your child with a Christian community (mentors, peers, family) that will dialogue honestly about even difficult issues and doubts; using rituals and celebrations (like prayer at birthdays) to reinforce identity; focusing on character growth rather than behavior; and modeling a relationship with God.

As I read through Jared Patrick Boyd’s new book, Imaginative Prayer: A Yearlong Guide for Your Child’s Spiritual Formation, I immediately thought back to the lessons of Sticky Faith. In his introduction, Jared invites busy parents to slow down, to recognize and live out their importance as the most important influences in their children’s spiritual development. He writes:

As a father of four girls one of my greatest desires is to pass on to them a deep understanding and awareness of the experience of God. My hope is that they would feel connected to God and the story God is unfolding in their lives and in the world around them. Will they see themselves as part of God’s story? Will they feel close and connected to God as they navigate decisions that come their way and pursue risks on the horizon? Will they say yes to all that God is inviting them into?

Jared’s language and spiritual practices are steeped in the Ignatian tradition and borne of out his long experience as a contemplative practitioner, spiritual director, and teacher, as well as his pastoral ministry in the Vineyard, an association of evangelical churches explored at length in Tanya Lurhmann’s When God Talks Back. Lurhmann’s psychological and anthropological study of the Vineyard and its practices of listening and prayer leads her to conclude that connectedness to God, while full of mystery, is a learnable skill.

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Taken together, Sticky Faith and When God Talks Back (not to mention the larger backdrop of Western Christianity’s well-documented and ongoing failure to pass on faith to the younger generations) provide strong rationales for exactly the kind of imaginative prayer experience and sustained spiritual formation that Jared’s book is meant to guide parents and children through.

Over the course of a year, the book explores six theological themes: God’s Love, Loving Others, Forgiveness, Jesus is the King, The Good News of God, and The Mission of God. Each theme is divided into 7 weeks, with six weeks of imaginative prayer sessions followed by a week of review.

Each (non-review) week is further broken down into repeated sections. “Connection and Formation” introduces the theme for the week, through a theological reflection, poem, perhaps a story. Next, a “Q&A” provides a brief catechism to help children remember the theme. The “Imaginative Prayer” is the heart of each week: a guided prayer, rich with imagery, sensory information, and metaphor that invites children to enter into an experience with God that they can see, hear, smell, taste, and feel. The “Q&A” is then repeated, to emphasize the theme that the child has now experienced in their own imagination. Each week concludes with reflection and devotional prompts for “For the Parent or Mentor” and a reminder for children to journal (write or draw) for twenty minutes, based on a question that will lead them to reflect on their life that week — not “just” the spiritual formation part — in light of the explored theme. The review week wraps everything up by bringing back all the creedal questions (catechism) from that section and through suggested activities and questions.

As a sometime homeschooling parent, a professional educator, and a writer of curriculum, one of the things I appreciate about Jared’s book is how thoroughly it’s planned. Each activity is nested within the credal theme for the week, which is nested within the theological theme for the section, and everything is meant to contribute to the larger goal of the intertwined spiritual development of children and parents. As an example of Jared’s attention to detail, each imaginative prayer script is timed down to a range of seconds! Jared has also created a Conversation Guide for teachers, for those churches that want to bring to book to a Sunday School classroom in partnership with parents. (It’s a supplement to, not a substitute for parental involvement.)

One of my favorite imaginative prayers in the book is Jared’s picture of Jesus coming to defeat the power of sin. He asks the child to imagine a deep cave filled with seven giant faucets, all spouting different-colored water, one faucet and color for each of the deadly sins. Together, the faucets fill a cave that is “dark and murky and smelly.” The child is asked to imagine a wheel that will turn all the faucets off. It’s too heavy – the child can’t turn it. But Jesus steps in and turns the wheel right off, and instantly the cave fills with clean air, with sweetness and light. In this and many other instances, Jared’s metaphors are concrete, vivid, and fresh, and I believe will help children — and their parents and other spiritual mentors — understand, experience, and remember abstract theological concepts in a new and “sticky” way. Jared’s focus on building a shared theological vocabulary to go with a shared experience of God also lays the groundwork for many years of faith-building conversations between parents and children, between siblings and Sunday School peers, and between each member of the family and God.