Author: mlfc15

This year has been one big open door to complete transformation for me (and I’m DEFINITELY the only one who’s had this experience. Ha.)

I’ve found that the only path through is to meet myself where I’m at, greet the emptiness, confusion, failure and the cactus like nature of reality with open arms and curiosity, and decide what I want to create out of all this pain. It’s really just play dough in the end.

Here’s a few lines I wrote in processing my process.

You Are Served

Here she comes again

Long skirt swishing through the tables and chairs

She serves me where sit alone

I was nodding off

I start awake as my plate hits the table

Full of steaming pain

With a side of raw ache

No garnishes here

Or laughing dinner companions

But in spite of the harshness I find

I am growing stronger

From eating this varied diet

Of my shortcomings

The things I can’t change

Bitter exile

Stark reality

Heartbreak

I find it teaches me, far better than any other

To do what I can do

To not back down

To demand what I know I deserve

It transforms this little bonfire

Into a holy pillaging

Of all that keeps me

At this table

Viento

The wind knocks at my door

Her fingers pull and scratch

Her body rocks at my walls

“Open up,

Come lean your face into the unknown

Be thrilled by the threat

By the promise of change

The leaves are messengers

Are you listening?”

Hi folks!

It’s been an interesting time to be human recently. The personal drama of my unique life journey is not connected to general world events, nonetheless it is an excellent time to nurture oneself.

I have found great pearls of wisdom and comfort in writing letters and poems to myself recently, and invite you to consider how you encourage and nurture your own growth at this time in your life.

Here’s mine:

Come here, baby

Let me hold you

I know, sweetheart

You waited such a very long time

For something you weren’t even sure was real

You remember the sweet incredulity in asking

“Are you sure you’re real?”

And the thing I didn’t say

“Because you feel an awful lot like a home I’ve never actually seen

Like water just an in inch beyond my fingertips”

And now we way fare once again

Sailing through this desert

But baby I chose this

I want to taste the salt on the wind

Feel the sand under dry feet

I am made to be an oasis here in this desert

So love will have to come find me

Because I belong here in the wild

Surrounded by my true loves

Hair whipping around my face

Making love to everything

To every sip of chocolate

Every savory bite

To every step

Kissing the ground

Dancing with children

With fire

Pulling magic out of the air

And pouring it into hungry bellies

This is my dearest dream, sweet one

I am the dream of someone who poured water and fire into the same jug

Marrying them together

Into the woman that I am

So I will run

And I will burn up the night

Body churning

Laughter bursting

Until the day

My Lover

Comes for me

Mathematics has had a special place in my heart since I was a child. Falling in line with “things that make me weird”, like never wearing shoes, loving butterfly (I swam competitively for 9 years), and getting irritated with my classmates for interrupting class because I actually wanted to learn, my love of math was never very well received.

Fast forward to the one year I spent in college (despite my love of learning I can’t stand institutionalized education) – my double major was mathematics and theology. I always sensed that there was a very strong connection between the two, despite not being able to find enough evidence of others thinking the same thing to write a paper on it. 

Fast forward another 13 years and as I delve deep into the heart of God in an experiential way those connections are becoming crystal clear. I’ve a hunger so deep that I want to drain every last drop of joy, love, meaning, and communion with God, people, and nature out of this short blip I’ll be in a body. Nothing else will do. So, how to solve for x here? What will satisfy this hunger? I don’t get more time, or more of anything than anyone else, so how do I get more life out of life? (Algebra, by the way, is my favorite form of math).

Have you ever thought how if you take any number and divide it in half, over and over again, you could do so eternally and never hit zero? Fascinating, huh? So infinity, then, doesn’t just go up, it goes down, too. *insert mad scientist hands here* If I stay ever so present, attentive, breathlessly focused on how my heart is perceiving the world, in every single moment, I can access the power of infinite tininess. Ha! I can allow what might be a trickle, or perhaps total dryness, to be a raging river of joy, calm, love, silence, gratitude, playfulness…you get the picture. The main idea is to make my mind a conduit for my heart.

Another, sort of related mathematical concept that has swept me off my feet is just, zero. Nothingness. Death. It’s so deeply restful, and makes an infinite amount of room for pure mystery which is all I care about.  Vast, empty space, that makes breathing easy, and dancing easier. In order for my heart to have free rein, there must be exactly zero of anything not my heart (a clean heart is a direct line to God, which is where the theology bit fits in).

I also love that visually, the number zero is a portal. Definitely not a door, just a mysterious gateway for things to pass from one world to another. When you are no-thing, anything can happen. Anything at all. Miracles become as normal eating cereal for breakfast and tying your shoes. There can’t be “rules” when you are no-thing – rules apply when things are defined – a road is not a cup, etc. When you are no-thing, you regain the ineffable joy of the child, who sees everything for the first time, so everything appears fascinating, and life full of awe and wonder. Children inherently understand that all humans feel and desire the same things, from the homeless person to the business man and the mail woman. 

No-thing is the foundation for understanding everything. 

No-thing, is the doorway to God.

I am a warrior before all else,

A woman to my core,

A lover of the highest degree,

Fiercely loyal

Gently tender

I might flow under you and carry you

Or crush you with the weight of my waves

If you don’t watch the skies

I am good 

I am trustworthy 

I am dangerous 

Unpredictable 

I am real 

I am human

I am God’s temple

So take off your shoes

And be prepared 

To encounter 

The sacred

The mystic

The miraculous

I won’t explain anything, or apologize 

But I will invite you in

And I promise

You will find 

Whatever it is 

You are seeking

From letters to a friend.

And this is my prayer for you: that you lean into the burn, and let yourself be consumed. That peace surprises you like the first crack on a robin’s egg. That you face your own dark forest and enter without hesitation, knowing the light and strength you carry is enough for anything you will encounter. That you experience His love for you in the way the light falls on your plate at breakfast; the thrill of adventure in the sound of the train that pulls in to take you into the wilderness of the unknown. That you learn to obey the arrow of pain. Most of all, that you sleep in peace, knowing the all encompassing care of your Father.

I am alone now. The days, they pour forth in glory from stardust to starlight and faith in God is the only thing that sustains me. I’m ready. 

I made a choice, this evening. I decided that my desires, they will become reality. I decided, I will give this life all that I am – I will love as fiercely as a I desire, I will laugh as loud as I want, and dance and daydream to my heart’s content. I will demand both nothing and everything from life. I will expect miracles every. Damn. Day. I will exercise every ounce of power I have over myself to allow myself to be the hurricane that I know myself to be. I will be the Phoenix and build my own funeral pyre, burn everything for the sake of what can be. Truly, my friend, we walk by faith and not by sight, so all we ever can be is ready.

I found heaven in the unlikeliest of places this evening. My miracle for the day, if you will. It happened during one of these “conversations” I occasionally have with the man I married, the kind that would take about 60-120 seconds if we spoke the same language, but as it is, take about about 60-80 minutes. In the past these things would plunge me into a deep darkness. But tonight, as I stayed connected to my heart, I looked up at one point and saw the way the light was coming in from the hall – burning the doorframe, it seemed, and pouring into the room like a lost beam of heaven’s radiance. It happened twice. The only thing I know is this – heaven is always trying to break down our doors. Let’s let it in.

We’ve touched a bit on how much heaven we can experience here on earth, and it seems we see that differently, which I deeply appreciate. I see this – that each moment of pain and each moment of bliss, the struggle and the longing and the rest – all of it – is simply making us capable of heaven. Building the mansions of our hearts to be the right size and shape and strength and porousness to hold all that our Lover wants to pour into us. I think, when we genuinely desire heaven with every bit of our heart and soul, God will make sure that not one iota of His love is lost on us. He wants us to receive as perfectly as He gives. And this is why we give thanks in all things, this is why in the moments of tears and pain and wretched emptiness, I say “Thank you Father, for this pain.” Blessed be this emptiness, blessed be this burning ache – burn away our overgrown forests and make room for Your new growth, for Your kingdom to take up residence within us. Let it be done to me according to your word.

This is where heaven begins.

The darkness simply holds mystery, and those who are not afraid of it will find their power to do good in this world multiplied beyond imagination. Befriend the night.

• 

• 

Woman

You are my queen 

A sorceress, wielding powers from beyond this realm

I don’t understand it

You destroy as much as you create

Striking terror in the heart of evil

By your beauty

Your softness breaks open the hard edges of reality

Exposing the glory shining from within

Your surrender blinds the underworld

Sending demons scurrying 

Your face is both a terror and a comfort 

Depending on the eyes that view it

You move with the regality of one who knows

The divine origin of your sovereignty 

The genesis of your power

Is your childlike heart

That so intimately knows 

The love of your Father, your Lover, your King

Rise, queen, and take your stand

Beside your King

Be the channel 

For His blinding peace

To vanquish 

Your lands

Today, I woke up and knew what I want to be when I grow up. I’ve been waiting for this day for a very long time.

For quite awhile I’ve wanted to be no one. Nothing. Dust in the wind. Yes, I have a purpose here on planet Earth, of course – we all do – but my grandest dream is to be absolutely no one. Untamed, unnamed, unknown, completely free, bound to nothing but the Spirit that moves from within. 

As I’ve thought about the physical, practical things I know I am called to in this life – to mother, to create a home, to write and speak and counsel and teach, to dance and to play, the most important thing to me is that I am never defined by any of that. What I want most is to be so fully authentic, so fully free, that the one thing I can be counted on for is to be surprising, to be unpredictable, to be a contradiction.

The image that comes to mine is a dryad, a tree spirit who emerges to play, to teach, to comfort, to bestow dreams and blessings, but without warning to vanish into the mystery of her origin. It’s an appropriate image given my deep love of trees and the  wildness, wisdom and feminine spirit I encounter in them.

• 

• 

So much of what I’ve learned about life that is worth remembering, I have learned from trees. A few in particular stand out in my mind. One has a story:

Over the summer as I floated through my neighborhood allowing beauty to jump out and surprise me at it’s own pleasure, I met a lovely tree I called the wild woman.

She looked like she had a head of hair that went in every direction and while wise and down to earth (literally), was a good bit reckless as well. A trait I deeply admire. I shared her photo with a friend who also appreciates these things as a sort of introduction to her. Several months later I came across her again, heavy with bright red, round apples. Looking just as wild but also pregnant with this harvest of nourishment. I shared this with the same friend who said simply, “She has good fruit.” I have been amazed at how simple statements from people of substance can become a structure in my life. It’s happened before. 

As I have allowed all the experiences of my life to ripen and ferment under the surface, it has become clear to me that this is my one and only desire. To be a wild woman with good fruit. To emerge from the shadows when I am needed for anything whatsoever, and as soon as my presence is no longer necessary, to move onto the next adventure. To scatter seeds, provide nourishment, love, wisdom, mothering, friendship, support – and at any given moment be able to just be present with a stranger, a butterfly, a flower, or a snowflake -or perhaps just a dirty dish or pair neatly folded pants – as absolutely no one.

Here I come, world – I’m ready to play!

Come dance with Me

Let your body

Be held, spun and caressed by the wind

Let me feel the shape of you, bend in the breeze

I am in love with you

Your humanity

The way your laugh bubbles up from your belly

Like a deep, gurgling spring

You are at once a woman, a child, the dance, and the wind itself

Spinning yourself into the tempest of falling leaves 

Queen of these lands

A force of utter destruction and terrifying power

And a child playing in the fields 

I long to swim through your creeks

And play amidst your forest

Seek Me there

I thirst

For your love

Your tenderness

The eyes that hold no guile

The sweetness of your trust

And the wild fury of your spirit

Let us create

Love

Together

Singing the song of creation over these lands

As the dawn breaks

Rise with Me

Do you sometimes feel the shape of the people you know you are meant to love and learn from, like a shadow inside of you that is begging to be lit up? I do.

To the friend I have not yet met,

Hello, dear one. My soul has been waiting for yours for a long, long time. I cannot begin to tell you the way my fingers have blistered from holding on to this burning hope, how many nights I curled around my heart and cried, holding open the bleeding empty space you were meant to fill. 

I already know that I am in love with you, with your smile and your childlike heart and the way your hair shakes when you laugh. I hope you are ready to dance. To be a child, a lover of God beside me, to push and be pushed, to have adventures and laugh until you cry more times than you can count. I hope you’re ready to go skinny dipping in the glorious freedom of God with me, to leave behind everything you think you know about love and life and reality so we can discover the truth together.

I hope you’re ready for pain and glory and messy, muddy humanity, to be broken open wider than the sea itself. The whole universe is our playground and love is free. Let’s take off our shoes and start climbing.

And now these three remain: faith, hope and love. But the greatest of these is love. 1 Corinithians 13 verse 13

Love has been the main theme of my life for a bit more than a year now. Not as I learnt it as a child, but in an entirely different way – learning to love myself, learning as I have read, that there are no others. As I treat myself I treat all beings. It’s just the way life works. As I have fallen in love with myself, and with this process of loving all the annoying, persistent, whiny, needy, hungry parts of myself – learning to govern myself with wisdom, cunning and generosity, I have been able to take much burden off of my loved ones, I have learnt to be the gift. In feeding my self and starving all I am not, I have begun to truly worship God. Turns out, He is my one true desire, my alpha and omega, and everything in between. He is my path.

As I have fed Love, I’ve found myself recently digging more and more into faith and hope as things that are more real than my own body. By believing in the love that is my origin and the fabric from which I am fashioned, I put faith in my own desires, my hopes and dreams, as a hidden road map that God snuck into my existential pocket at the moment of my conception. This is how He tells me my purpose, how I should spend my precious time and energy on this spinning planet. He wrote His plan for me in my heart, with indelible ink. And just as hidden words appear written when Gandalf tosses the ring into the fire, as I have thrown myself into the Fire of His love for me I find His plan for me tattooed into my DNA. As blinding and clear as the Colorado sun on a stark blue day.

But then rises the question- what do I DO with these blueprints for the Taj Mahal as I live my little suburban life? 

Believe in them, hope in them – against all odds.

As it so often unfolds in human life, when a person receives a Divine commission, the people and circumstances closest to them tend to be rather suspicious and doubtful or to laugh them off as a dreamer with their head in the clouds. They end up appearing crazy. Most of the people I model myself after in any way appear this way – Jesus, Mother Theresa, JP2, Theresa of Avila, St. Therese, and countless more. I’m beginning to believe that appearing crazy is a sign of real sanity.

The main thing that has kind of blown my mind in all of this is that exactly that passage in Corinthians states, love is the greatest of the theological virtues, and what I didn’t know about that was that it would give birth to a faith and a hope so real I feel I am made up of them. As I live my little suburban life I deeply and truly believe that God is somehow making the Taj Mahal out of all of this. I believe that my wildest dreams and more are already reality – they’re just hanging out in the quantum field waiting to manifest where the senses can perceive them.

All of this to say that when we trust God and choose him as the King of our hearts and lives, He brings His kingdom in quite beautiful and surprising ways into the world. 

Neither shall they say “lo here!” nor “lo there!” for, behold, the kingdom of God is within you. 

Luke 17:21