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aerieofgrace
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Interests: astrology, tarot, my calico Amber, my orange tabby Lil Mudd, my houseplants, music, dance, movement, feminism, recovery from childhood sexual abuse, economics, microfinance, leadership, ministry, discovering commonality and dialogue in the midst of religious differences, grace, grassroots social change, activism, skillful communication, ritual, laying new patterns in my soul/brain, having kids someday, shamanic journeying, art, swimming, beach vacations, down time, plotting updates and repairs to my 70 year old house, interior decorating, McCoy pottery, comfy but stylie clothes, retro accessories, assertiveness, boundaries, investing in myself, learning how to cope with bipolar II disorder and the effects of my medication, OkGo, finding a partner with whom to create a satisfying life
Expertise: finding God/Love/Hope/Possibility everywhere
Occupation: financial analysis / ministry
Industry: information technology
Message: message me
Member Since:
12/26/2006
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| significant shiftingI am so grateful tonight. Grateful I had my husband in my life for the time I did. Grateful I'm emerging intact from the grief of losing him. Grateful for my house. Grateful for my kitties. Grateful I get to move on. Granted, I never wanted to say that, but here I am. I feel like I've turned a corner on the grief. I cried massively and profoundly on Friday the 6th after finishing Picture Perfect by Jodi Picoult. [Spoiler alert] The main character Cassie realizes she has to divorce her abusive husband, even though it will hurt her so much because she loves him. Looking back, I realize this was a foreshadowing of the conclusion I came to in therapy on Wednesday the 11th. But before we get to that, Tuesday the 10th I chatted on Facebook with a friend from Diana's Grove who was on [ex-husband]'s Rites Team, someone I don't think I'd talked with since Rites weekend 2001. As I told her about losing [ex-husband], I mentioned I've thought about having a funeral for him over the years, but have never done it. That night, I did a tarot reading about "[ex-husband]'s funeral." I cried so hard. Journaled a lot. Got a LOT of information about what it means to me to say good-bye to him, to who he was to me. The next night in therapy I may have cried harder about losing [ex-husband] than I ever have. I said out loud a lot of things I've hardly let myself think, even though they were true for me. Stuff about not wanting to accept that he's really gone. Except there's this surreal experience where my ex has made a reappearance in my life. So he's not gone. He's changed . . . . he's . . . *she*. He's changed.
He's changed.
He's changed. Damn him, he went and changed on me. I did NOT want to accept that. I just didn't want it to be true, you know? But if it is true (and it sure as heck is), I want to change, too. I don't want to be the one who is still pining away for someone who hurt me so much. I don't want to be committed still to someone who hurt me so badly. I don't want to still be in love with someone who changed on me the way he did. None of this coming out quite right. Tonight, my chest still aches and the tears are hot and fat running down my neck. Well, they were hot on my face anyway. Kinda cool pooling in my collarbone. I took my rings off. I no longer want to be in a committed relationship with him. This is huge. And heart-breaking. And heart-mending. Heart-respecting and heart-soothing. Looking at my wedding pictures tonight, I could sense how I've changed, maybe not in specifics, but I can sense it. I'm not the woman who married him. It doesn't make sense to me, but I don't want to go back to how things were. I can't. I'm not her anymore. I don't love him anymore. It's hard not being that person anymore. I liked loving him. I liked having him love me. But he stopped, damnit. So I'm stopping, too. Still sad. But grateful to be coming out on the other side. Finally. Rejoice with me. | | |
| mixed upI'm feeling mixed about two things right now: Jesus and my ex-spouse. And I feel incredibly sad about both of them.
I feel like it means something if I want to have a relationship with Jesus. Like I'm a sell-out or I'm like all those weird evangelical Christians who have a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. I want a relationship with Jesus on my own terms. Why is this making me cry?? I don't actually think Jesus existed, or if he did, I'm confused about whether he was God. I don't know why this matters so much to me. It's upsetting me terribly. I have this huge lump in my throat and I keep collapsing into tears. I think it's fundamentally uncool to have a relationship with Jesus. Only wackos do that. Only people who are weak and can't stand on their own two feet. And yet, that's what I want - to have a relationship with Jesus. I don't know why I have such a low opinion of people who have a relationship to Jesus. It just seems so hokey to me. I'm OK with having a relationship to God. And I'm OK with people having relationships with other faces of the Divine, e.g. Artemis or Freya or Persephone. Yet I feel so judgmental about my own desire to have a relationship with Jesus who I do think is a face of the divine. I'm feeling devestated that this might exclude me from Unitarian Universalism. I really need/want to know if there are doctrinal standards regarding Jesus when there don't seem to be for anything else. And I am starving for meaningful study of Jesus. So much of what I've run into at Therese is leaving me less than inspired. I want to be inspired. I'm tired of being challenged, though I feel like I have no choice about being challenged. I feel like that's going to keep coming at me whether I want it or not. And probably some part of me wants to be challenged. Or at least I believe that's part of what faith is about - being challenged. I want to be comforted, too. I want to be soothed.
I was thinking that my angst about Jesus was unrelated to my angst about my ex. But I'm thinking they are actually related. I am lonely for God, in the person of Jesus. I crave him. I am incredibly lonely right now. I'll come back to that.
I don't know why I think it's so uncool to have a relationship with Jesus. I feel like there must be something broken about me, something wrong with me to want that.
So yeah, incredibly lonely. And having a hard time seeing myself as divine, as precious. I just feel so broken.
I saw my ex yesterday. It was amazing. She is so much more integrated than the last time I'd seen her, maybe about 3 years ago?
And I still miss him so much. SO. MUCH. Why'd he have to go away? It just seems like it must have been because of me. That there was something wrong with me. I know that's not true but it's how I feel. And more than that I just feel devestated. So, so sad.
I think my desire for a relationship with Jesus is messing with my story about myself as an outsider. Having a relationship with Jesus just seems so mainstream. So boring. So suburban. So unconnected to anything cool. And then on the other hand, having a relationship with Jesus seems to put me squarely outside what my friends are doing. I don't have any friends who have relationships with Jesus. At least not that I know of. It just seems so wrong to do that, have a relationship with Jesus. I feel like telling myself to just get over myself already. Jeez! And yet I'm not there yet. I'm stumbling all over this.
How can I be pagan and want a relationship with Jesus? How can I really consider myself earth-based and want a relationship with Jesus? Hmmmm? Fuuuuuck. I don't get it.
My ex considers herself christian now, among other things - agnostic, buddhist, pagan, gnostic. She had some really beautiful things to say about Jesus. About resurrection. About sacrifice.
Why does Christianity have to be associated with so much crap? I'm embarrassed to call myself Christian.
I wish my parents didn't have a vested interest in me being Christian. I'm definitely feeling resistant to their desire.
Part of it's that I don't want people to think I'm something that I'm not. But then I'm also afraid I'll turn out to be the cliched Jesus freak. Yikes.
I'm tempted to make this private, but I don't think I will. So there. ::razberry:: | | |
| new plans for the futurefirst, a side note: my ex sent me a card (in response to a holiday card I sent her) that said, amidst the typical greetings, "I have kind of turned a corner in my life. Divine intervention can do that, even for fools like me. Maybe sometime we could get together and converse. Yours in faith, [ex]" Did I tell you my ex-fiance' became a Christian? It was really surreal for me finding that out. He had been at least agnostic, if not atheist when we were together, though he had dabbled with Christianity when in middle school. So I don't know what to make of my ex's message. I'm intrigued. And part of me really doesn't want to see her. In other surreal ex news, my ex's first ex-wife found me on facebook and would like to talk on the phone. She seems to think that our having an ex-spouse in common is meaningful. She said she's trying to make some peace with the past, or something like that. My understanding from my ex is that she left him . . . opposite of my situation where s/he left me. But who knows, first ex-wife may have other perspectives. Part of me also doesn't want to talk to first ex-wife, but I'm going to. seems like the universe is sending opportunities for me to get more closure.
okay, new plans for the future.
I've been thinking a lot about going into the ministry. specifically, finding a church home and a tradition/denomination to work within. my explorations haven't been going very well. let me explain. since June, I've been attending Therese of Divine Peace inclusive community, a parish led by two Roman Catholic Women Priests. my therapist wanted me to give it 6 months, so I did. in August, I started attending services at First Unitarian as well. for much of the fall I was attending two services most Sundays. I'm coming to the conclusion that's too much church for me. which begs the question whether church is the right context for my vocation if two services a week seems like too much church. part of it's that I'm an introvert and the small-talk with acquaintances doesn't come easily to me. another part is that I'm looking for a church home, which seems to me to be about a safe, comfortable context for exploring and celebrating my personal spirituality. but I haven't thought about church as a place for that in a long time . . . and neither of these church communities is really emerging as a place for me to grow myself spiritually. that may be an over generalization, but really, I'm under-whelmed.
where I am incredibly impressed and challenged and fed, on the other hand, is Havi Brook's blog . I have been growing so much in terms of loving myself and accepting myself just through reading her daily posts. not everyone would consider that spiritual or religious work, but for me it is.
I've been watching Havi birth her Next Big Thing (At the Kitchen Table with Havi & Selma) this week, and I'm really intrigued. maybe even completely inspired. she's setting up a way to work with her Right People in a way that's sustainable for her and seems absolutely genius to me. she's figured out how to market herself and her business through writing her blog, which is, for her, free therapy. and it's free therapy for me!
so I'm wanting to step back a bit from my pursuit of all things church to ask myself, what do I really want about being a minister? what does it mean to me when I say I want to be a minister? I want to get specific about this because I'm not sure whether what I really want is a church. part of me still thinks a church is what I want, but maybe one that I start myself. and how about a virtual church? how cool does that sound? to me, it sounds amazing. and brilliant.
I'm so excited about this. and scared.
so. writing in the form of a blog. maybe e-books or e-pubs or something. consulting. coaching. community building. nurturing. counseling. listening. witnessing. sharing. being a part of folks' rites of passage. helping them ritualize the important moments of their lives, even when those are small, daily moments.
and trusting that I can find my Right People who will "get" what I'm about and what I offer.
my mind is spinning right now with the possibilities. I've always wanted to be my own boss. eeeeeeeee! | | |
| all in all, a good weeka week ago, I would not have expected this week to have gone as well as it has. it wasn't a particularly stellar week or anything, but I remained relatively calm at work. I realized I had been approaching my workday as: I have 8 hours to get through, I have 5 hours to get through still, etc. instead of: cool, I have all day free to get a bunch of stuff done; wow, I still have 3 hours left. I wasn't quite that chipper, but the difference is profound. I think my stomach sank significantly only once all week. before the break, it was sinking several times a day. it was awful. I'm noticing that quality non-work time seems very appealing to me, too, and I'm thinking a necessary balance to a job I am less than excited about. I am actually thinking, how would I really *like* to spend my weekend, rather than, ugh, another day/evening/weekend to get through. I was really thinking about my personal time that way. something really shifted for me over the break and I am very grateful. | | |
| a toast courtesy of Rob Brezsnyhttp://www.freewillastrology.com/horoscopes/allsigns.html
 
Describing my writing, one critic said that I was "like a mutant love-child of Anais Nin and Jack Kerouac." That also happens to be an apt description of the spirit you should bring to life in the coming weeks. So be like the memoirist Anais Nin: a collector of secrets, a connoisseur of intimacy, a fiercely sensitive alchemist who knows her own inner terrain better than anyone else knows their inner terrain. And also be like the novelist Jack Kerouac: a free-wheeling, fast-talking, wide-open traveler in quest of the spirit as it makes its wild plunge into matter.
 
"Obstacles are a natural part of life, just as boulders are a natural part of the course of a river," notes the ancient Chinese book the I Ching. "The river does not complain or get depressed because there are boulders in its path." I'd go so far to say -- this is not in the original text, but is my 21st-century addition -- that the river gets a sensual thrill as it glides its smooth current over the irregular shapes and hard skin of the rocks. It looks forward to the friction, exults in the intimate touch, loves the drama of the interaction. Sound like a pleasure you'd like to cultivate, Leo? It's an excellent time to try it.
 
Please don't wear a t-shirt that says what I saw on the canary yellow t-shirt of the Japanese tourist at JFK airport: "Sorry, I'm a loser." I also beg you not to read Ethan Trex's book How to Seem Like a Better Person Without Actually Improving Yourself. It's very important, in my astrological opinion, that you not demean or underestimate yourself in the coming days. In fact, I'll go so far as to say that you have a sacred duty to exalt your beauty and exult in your talents. Now go read Walt Whitman's Song of Myself, and periodically murmur the first line all week long: "I celebrate myself, and sing myself."
Here's to ~
~ knowing my inner terrain
~ plunging my spirit into matter
~ exulting in the pleasure of interacting with obstacles
~ celebrating myself | | |
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