Personal growth.
You realize there is something in your life that you want to change.
You’re aware of it for months or years. You do a ton of work.
That thing you want to change doesn’t budge.
Some other things get better – you’re more authentic, less reactive.
But that thing you would really like to change? Still there.
I made this pair of Arenite shorts not long after I got back from the Cayman Islands. I wore my first pair nearly every day of the trip, and I was looking forward to trying out some mods for the second pair.
The Chaplain has shared a piece of wisdom from Tobago, “More haste, less speed.” I often think of it when I’m sewing. With so much going on at my house, it often feels like if I don’t rush, I will never finish.
Where do you shop for clothes? How often do you shop? Is it medicinal, or is because you have an identifiable need? Do you shop ethically?
I’m a medicinal shopper. I’ve historically been pretty good at making it seem at least part of the time like it’s an identifiable need, but usually, it’s just because I’m stressed out and looking for a way to control my environment.
As a lady in my Late Thirties, I’ve become a bit of a snob with my shopping. I don’t remember how I discovered Anthropologie, but their quirky, European-inspired, artsy offerings appealed to me immediately. I had realized the cheaply made, fleeting styles of third party sellers on Amazon were often disappointing.
I started with Anthropologie’s hand towels. On sale, they are often around $10-14. Which is pretty expensive for a kitchen towel, but these aren’t your average kitchen towel.
Doubles are a street food you can get in Trinidad and Tobago. It’s a flat bread wrap full of channa, which is potato and chick peas in curry sauce. The first time I had it was the only year we were in T and T for Carnival.
We left to go back to the States Carnival Monday or Tuesday, and had a few hours in Port of Spain, Trinidad, to walk the streets before our flight. That year, we had three kids, and the youngest was a baby. Soca music was pounding. There were crowds. I was concerned about the kids losing their hearing with the music blasting from every direction.
The day was a little overwhelming, but I had two favorite moments:
As I finished up Richard Rohr’s The Naked Now: Learning to See as the Mystics See, I was laying on the sofa with a raw throat, feeling feverish. I was surrounded by feverish, coughing kids laying next to me, on me, and across from me. And I knew I was in heaven.
The struggle to forgive reality for being exactly what is is right now often breaks us through to nondual consciousness. -Richard Rohr
That is the spirit of Rohr’s book: Recognizing the Kingdom of God is right now. He introduces Jesus from a perspective I first encountered in Breathing Underwater, and builds from there, using primarily scripture, but also the words of the mystics such as St. John of the Cross and St. Teresa of Ávila, and his own ideas.
His object isn’t to convert his reader, just to encourage another way of thinking about the world, so even if you don’t consider yourself religious, this book is a safe place to explore ideas about God without having to feel like you’re being backed into a corner. Yet the book doesn’t shy away from big ideas.
