Ok, so the brave start made by my first post sort of exhausted me....and as it turns out, I am still afraid. Afraid of not being perfect, mostly. So, at least for today, I am trying to relax my idea that each post has to be a masterwork and am settling for the mere sharing of thoughts...
Recently I found myself driving on a nice stretch of open road, complete with blue sky and interesting-looking cloud formations, enjoying some alone time with one of my sons. The clouds overhead were practically begging us to name them, so of course we obliged. As I had to keep at least one of my eyes in the general vicinity of the road, my son got to do most of the identification. Primarily he found animals, many of them prehistoric, and after a time, he began to suppose out loud that the sky in fact might be the final resting place for animals. His logical mind and its scientific bent usually keep him at odds with such non-tangible conventions as an afterlife, so I was intrigued. (Whereas Mass for me is something to look forward to and God someone to grow in love with, sadly, church, for him, is something to tolerate, and divinity merely a human construct.) I wanted so badly for him to come to a place where maybe, just maybe, his hungry little mind could get a glimpse of its creator, so I encouraged him to postulate. What about us, I asked. Do we go to the sky as well? He continued to put forth theories of how it all works, testing one idea, then another. The conversation twisted and turned as he sorted through things, and whether any of the ideas of that day will remain with him is yet to be seen. I still hope, so intensely it hurts, that one day all my children will find peace, that they will feel the relief that comes from not having to be The One in Charge, that they will be comforted by Someone much bigger than I am.
However, the real wisdom of that day comes from something he said when he was knee-deep in his hypothesis.
“Hmmph. I’m starting to believe what I’ve been saying.”
And it occurred to me that those nine little words contain a whole lot of wisdom. I believe faith is a gift, but perhaps our words open the door to it. It occurred to me that if my son in his musings could lead himself to belief, then we all have that same power within us. We are led by our words.
I have a dear friend who belongs to a Christian denomination not known for its acceptance of Catholics. Against the odds, we enjoy sharing our common and variant beliefs, and so I was happy both that she agreed to join me for Mass, and that she enjoyed it as well. Most meaningful to her was our Profession of Faith: the recitation of the Creed, our statement of beliefs. She loved that we spelled it all out, and wished that there were an equivalent in her service. Her words reflect what religious leaders have known for centuries: the value of the spoken word. Speaking our beliefs not only declares them to others, it cements them within ourselves.
And if this works in celestial matters, then what about the more mundane? What about the things we ‘say’ to ourselves? What lies do we allow to live within our heads? I believe too many of us reinforce our negative self-images every time we pass a mirror, or look down. What if we, as suggested by the psychology of positive thinking, said good things to ourselves instead? What if we re-purposed all that negative self-talk and allowed it instead to lead us into a healthier state of belief? As I am a lifelong connoisseur of internal negativity, I recently decided to give this a try. Instead of dismaying about the expanse of my rear end or the origin of the newest spot on my shirt, I now try to step back, look at the bigger--and there really is no pun intended--picture, and give myself a compliment:
“What a pretty smile you have. That body squeezed out 5 kids?! Lookin’ good, girl.”
“You have this job for a reason. You can handle what comes your way.”
And if this works for our self-beliefs, what about the things we believe about others? How about trading ‘She drives me nuts’ for ‘She is helping me grow in patience.' Or even, ‘I am thankful for his unique way of looking at things.’ I can say from experience that the things we say to ourselves, the things we fill our minds with, become the way we see reality. I suppose it can be argued that we could lead ourselves to believing actual untruths simply by the repetition of them. But that is rather the point. What DO you lead yourself to believe? I challenge you, dear reader, to look within to the things you are saying to yourself. Root out those that are not true, and replant the ones that are!
