What’s your irritation quotient? Do you find yourself with a constant underlying sense of irritation about the little things in life that should only be annoyances? Or does your irritation quotient go up only for select instances? Do you feel this is a function of not voicing some of the things that maybe should have been voiced along the way or do you see that you could have taken better care of yourself with more rest and more regular food? Maybe all of the above, since speaking up for ourselves can also constitute taking care of ourselves, unless it becomes a regular habit of speaking up over everything, which possibly we should break.
I can be irritable with the best of them, but it doesn’t necessarily make me feel better. I try to pray my way out of it before it settles in, so it doesn’t come out in ways I would prefer it not to. And sometimes I pray my way not to rehearse it in thought when it is something that isn’t immediately fixable.
What do you do with irritation? There are opportunities every day to overcome it or to be overcome by it. No life is free of it completely. Do you suppose some people have higher thresholds of irritation?
I find it helpful not to let a little river of irritation run in me that can go up with the slightest spark. Of course, that is, if I catch it in time. It would be saying too much to say that I always do.
Karin
The subhead on the story said, “Little acts of revenge can feel so good.” [the person refused to call the sizes of drinks at Starbucks by their Starbuck names]
This notion is potentially useful in plotting a novel or TV show, but in the real world it fails on two levels. First of all, disputing the terminology of a cup size or other marketing detail just makes life harder for the clerk, who has no power over company policy. Why expend time and energy hassling an innocent bystander who’s just doing a job?
Second, and perhaps more important, if minor annoyances create enough agitation within you that seeking little acts of revenge becomes a priority, where do you draw the line? Can you even tell the difference between getting pushed around and just feeling bothered? And what if your “I’m fighting back” gambit causes someone else to want revenge on you?
To me, it wouldn’t matter if a company wanted to call its cup sizes “glork,” “koopa,” and “zeralack.” I could work with that. Some people might say this proves I’m just a big talking marshmallow. Not true. It’s just that I’ve set a high threshold for annoyance, and I keep issues in perspective.
It wasn’t too many decades ago that business owners in America could offer selective service to patrons based on skin color. Knowing this, making a fuss about cup sizes or a long line, or berating the clerk because you got incorrect change, is pretty lame.
If revenge is on your personal agenda for today, consider erasing it. Everyday life is full of bumps. Most of them are not the little hills you want to die on. They aren’t even worth a small skirmish. Jeffrey Shaffer To read the whole article go here Don’t take revenge, be happy .
Norris Burkes had another thought provoking column this week.
Andi Bowsher, author of Praying the Pattern …says , “Paul [when he said to pray without ceasing] was suggesting making life into prayer rather than making prayer into a life.”…I can spend all week praying for fresh inspiration and still get nothing but a frustrated editor muttering some pretty unspiritual words about my column being past deadline. But when I seek to make my life a prayer, when I seek to serve and to become the answer to the prayers prayed by others, I get real inspiration…I pray to become the prayer… Norris Burkes (to see the full article go to his website.
I keep coming back to the idea that our lives are really the answer to someone else’s prayer when we live our life as a prayer or are conscious of it. I think I’ve been aware of that on occasion, but not as a guiding principle. (Elsewhere in the article Burkes talks of ‘living the principle that Bowsher describes.’)
Can you think of a time when you were the answer to someone’s prayer? Perhaps you didn’t recognize it at the time.
Norris Burkes writes thought provoking essays about real life and God. This essay talks about almost losing his daughter to a bee sting, but her new boyfriend thought fast enough to be aware. I like the analogy he gives with it.
…The whole thing got me thinking how we constantly obsess over the cataclysmic possibilities of life and pay little attention to the common stings that life is capable of delivering.
For instance, when it comes to family, we obsess over the possibility of losing a child to illness, accident or shark attack. We worry about monumental things such as losing the house to the current mortgage crisis, or being laid off in this recession we’re not supposed to be having.
In our prayer life, we say multiple prayers designed to stave off calamity, but we fail to pray for the everyday things like marriages, families and relationships. These are the areas that, if unattended, can deliver powerful stings…
When it comes to the devastatingly debilitating catastrophes of life, we know how to employ our prayers and our faith, but those faith principles also apply in the little things.
In fact, I submit they probably matter most in the little things. We may feel that God is too big for the small things in our lives, but in reality, God is so big that he can be in every small detail of our lives — before they become the big things.
W — or Warren Schaefer as I now call him — could have easily ignored the seemingly insignificant sting of a garden variety bee. But he didn’t. He saw in the small sting the capacity to do a much more devastating act.
He saw the significance of the little thing. May we all seek such wisdom in our everyday lives.
You can read the entire essay at Norris Burkes website. I have a link on the front page here also so you can check out what he’s written periodically.
This is a great story about a Chinese adoptee who was chosen to be the voice of Kai-lan. Don’t miss the rest of the story.
Hearing what her adoptive mother has been through and seeing the IHappy license plate brought tears to my eyes.
Karin
Jade-Lianna Peters steps into an audio recording booth at I V Media in Brookfield. Jade-Lianna Peters, 10, the voice of Kai-lan, rehearses before a recent recording session at I V Media in Brookfield.
Kai-lan and YeYe are among the characters in “Ni Hao, Kai-lan.”
Jade-Lianna Peters , 10 - with her mother, Kathleen “Candy”; sister, Alexis-Mariah, 7; and father, John - began appearing in commercials when she was 2.
Half a continent away, at Nickelodeon Studios, an animation production team marvels at the 10-year-old’s voice, one that is as natural and light-hearted as a songbird’s, with a sandpapery edge that adds just a rasp of mischief. It’s the pitch-perfect tone for Kai-lan, the lead character of “Ni Hao, Kai-lan,” a preschool series coming to Nickelodeon in August. Executives at the children’s network hope the half-hour episodes will be to Mandarin Chinese what “Dora the Explorer” has been to Spanish. Production continues on a first season of 20 episodes, animated and partly designed in Taipei, Taiwan, and Shanghai, China.
I am deeply saddened by the fires in Greece and my thoughts and prayers are with all who are there.
Helg and others, let us know you are safe.
I so much enjoyed our time in Greece. Seeing Olympia and Athens and other Grecian places makes me long to return. It is hard to imagine fires threatening Olympia and ashes falling on the Acropolis. Seeing the Acropolis lit at night was one of the highlights of our trip. I was glad to read that the museum in Olympia is safe. The artifacts are irreplaceable.
Helg writes about it here. A tragedy of epic proportions. I’m glad you are safe. It puts our day to day joys and sorrows in perspective.
And it shall come to pass, that before they call, I will answer; and while they are yet speaking, I will hear. Isaiah 65:24
Isaiah 65:24 is sometimes called God’s phone number.
I’ve had a number (no pun) of occasions when what I needed arrived at the exact moment I needed it, sometimes even before I knew I even had a need. I always think of this verse during those times.
I’ve received phone calls just as I was needing support. I had a house guest who is a RN visit during a time in which a family member needed his services. Once we ran out of gas, in a new car in which the gas gage was not working properly, but someone stopped to help us quickly. They only asked that we pass it along. This was long before the concept of Pay it Forward.
I think respite care begins with ourselves. We have to know (or seek to know) what we need, then take some steps, even baby steps, to find space in our lives for respite. We need to ask and let others know, if we need it.
Respite care is talked about in the adoption community, for some children have needs (or problems) greater than one or two parents could fulfill or even handle. It can be very tricky finding any kind of care, and it sometimes involves residential care for the child/teen.
Respite care is likely also talked about in other communities of folks dealing with specific health issues or other.
Of course, there are other kinds of caregiving and caregivers, but the bulk of caregiving still falls on a woman’s shoulders, whether she is caring for her or her spouse’s parents, for a child, a house, or for her husband.
The need to call 911 can be life defining whether it involves something as ’simple’ as lift support or as complex as emergency care or transport.
A friend writes:
I guess we don’t really understand how much we need people until there’s a crisis. Without the health issues [that some face with their husbands], I’m having the same feelings about my husband. I don’t think I’ve ever been so solicitous or considerate of him as I’ve been these last two months since he took this new job. Maybe __________’s husband is seeing what I’m seeing- just how much he needs her.
Meanwhile, I think that we get caught up in the non-reality of a situation and don’t really grok what exactly is going on. That was true on the street in NYC when I almost lost our son while my husband went to get the wheelchair. We didn’t seem to have much of a clue. I think that could be said for another friend and her son, that the surreal-ness of the experience at the end there had so overwhelmed them, created a disbelief and an inability to actually SEE what was going on. I think calling 911, for the average person, is an act of huge significance. We are taught to be so polite and to ask for little, not to take up too much space.
I’m currently reading Inner Peace for Busy Women by Joan Borysenko. I’m a little put off by the cutsy green ink, but I like what she writes about, and it is another book that I will own.
I was surprised to find a chapter on caregiving. Again, I borrowed this book from the library, as I’m reading several of her books having just ‘found’ her as an author.
She writes:
On a trip to India in the 1980s, I spent a few weeks in a small village, where a schizophrenic woman, talking to herself continually with great agitation, lived under a large banyan tree. Different villagers visited her every few hours, brought food, and cared for all her needs. But most of us no longer live in extended families of close-knit communities where such care is common. We live neither in the welcoming shelter of a banyan tree, nor in the warm embrace of one another. Those who do reap significant benefits as far as health and peace of mind are concerned. p 141
I think especially this phrase stood out to me: warm embrace of one another. I suspect many of our homeless have been left to fend for themselves now that they have been de-institutionalized, but there wasn’t another embrace for them, nor a way to be sure they were sound enough to care for themselves wisely.
Contrast the scene in the Indian village with a trip my then 11 year old daughter and I took to Paris about 10 years ago. We were surprised to find in the heat of summer, in a new hotel, there was no air conditioning. Our first room was in the back among sheltering trees and whether it was hot or not, the trees made the heat bearable. Through the night there was a woman who yelled continually, but there was no traffic noise. It was impossible to sleep. At some point, a man yelled out the French equivalent of SHUT UP! The next day we moved to the front of the hotel, no trees, with tremendous road noise right up until about 3 am when it quieted down until about 5 am, and not a breath of air, but the sounds of the traffic muffled any noises she was making. I saw her on the street at one point later in the day. I think I prayed for her just about the whole night.
We could learn a lot from societies such as India. How many of us would long for a banyan tree, for the warm embrace of another to help us get through?
Take the time to figure out, if you can, what would nurture you, if you are care giving. Often it comes in unexpected ways, if we are open to it.
Karin
The Lord is my care-giver
written for all those in need of care and for all those who are giving it
Casting all your care upon him; for he cares for you.
Psalm 23 and Luke 10:25-37
The Lord is my caregiver; I will not fear.
How precious is this thought: that He cares for me!
I love the parable of the Good Samaritan –
its gentle message stands forever,
as the epitome of God’s own care:
the wounded left for dead by thieves in certain dread
the passersby who left him for their own chagrin
the neighbor true who bound the wounds, though not a Jew
the hotelier who offered place in which to find embrace
the simple ease with which the wounded had release
the money found to deal with every round
the needs all met by tender ministration in this vignette.
The mercy of the Lord is shown in ever-sweet accord:
whether I am care-giver or care-receiver,
I will not fear that I am alone, or that I will be uncared for.
The presence of the Lord ensures my care.
He enables care to be given that is not a burden.
He brings the care I need so I have intercede.
Both care-giver and care-receiver are in His plan.
O Lord, I give this care to You, for I know
that You are both my care-taker and my care-giver.
With You, I know that my burden is easy, for You are there.
Help me to appreciate my neighbor: each one to know as he is known.
Help me to see myself as You are seeing: forever in the care that You have shown.
Surely care-giving and care-receiving have followed me all the days of my life,
and I will dwell in His mercy, well-cared for everyday, forever. (c)
I first saw this at a friend’s blog. It is a song detailing the deep desire to have a child. It is very touching. Kelly took time off from singing to pursue having a child. She now has a son.
I think of this song as a kind of prayer. I knew the feeling. I too had five miscarriages after our daughter.
There are many ways to have a child. I birthed two of mine, and I went to China for two. While I was miscarrying, a friend adopted two children domestically. She was way ahead of where I was during those difficult times. And someone else I know had triplets through infertility treatment.
If you are waiting, hoping, praying, crying, laughing, begging, wondering, puzzled for a child, hang in…and you will find your path.
Kudos to the Vatican for these, even if the Pope may not have approved of, or even read, the document. It made me wonder why no other religious group, that I know of, had come out with something similar.
It’s hard to believe growing up, no one had heard of seat belts. One of the most difficult things was to get our then new Chinese daughter to accept being confined in a car seat. It was torture for her. (There weren’t any seatbelts in China, that I could see, in our taxis or the charter buses, or the van we rented, let alone car seats.)
Sadly, someone in our close experience died in a car accident, hit by someone who should not have been driving and was in fact driving on an expired license, then left the scene.
I sometimes pray my way down the road. How about you?
Karin
1. You shall not kill.
2. The road shall be for you a means of communion between people and not of mortal harm.
3. Courtesy, uprightness and prudence will help you deal with unforeseen events.
4. Be charitable and help your neighbor in need, especially victims of accidents.
5. Cars shall not be for you an expression of power and domination, and an occasion of sin.
6. Charitably convince the young and not so young not to drive when they are not in a fitting condition to do so.
7. Support the families of accident victims.
8. Bring guilty motorists and their victims together, at the appropriate time, so that they can undergo the liberating experience of forgiveness.
9. On the road, protect the more vulnerable party.
10. Feel responsible toward others.
There is a famous prayer often called the Serenity Prayer. Sometimes we simply have to accept what is, while we work it out in thought and prayer, trying to figure out what is the difference between what we must accept and what we must try to change.
Waiting for a Chinese adoption right now falls into this category. But so do a lot of other things.
God grant me the serenity
to accept the things I cannot change;
courage to change the things I can;
and wisdom to know the difference.
–Reinhold Niebuhr
In letting go, we release our mental pictures of how things should turn out and accept what the universe brings us. We accept that we don’t really know how things should be. (p 186)
…surrender [is] a choice, and … it [does] not mean giving up… When we surrender, we accept it just as it is…to see that we always have choices, in every situation, is surrender. To turn away from a situation is to give up. To turn into it is surrender. (p 188-189)
Sometimes we have to turn into the wind in order to take advantage of it. The wind is going to blow anyway. The question is what are we going to do while it does?
…conditions may never change, which makes us victims of their not changing. To say, ‘I will only be peaceful if such and such happens’ is pretty limiting…I’m not talking about accepting everything that happens. If you don’t like the television show you’re watching, you don’t have to surrender to it — change the channel.
…I’m talking about situations we have decided are insurmountable obstacles to happiness….Surrendering into life as it is can be the quickest and most powerful way to get the lesson out of the situation. You can’t change your bad childhood, but you can have a good life… you can stop wasting your time and energy [on things that won't change]…[it] doesn’t mean that life is over.
…if happiness is possible tomorrow, it is also possible today. If love is possible tomorrow, it is possible today. (p 188-193)
If we have to get through a situation in order to get to the other side, then we simply have to do it, a day at a time, making each day count as best we can, making choices for happiness even as we walk the path. Nobody can tell you what works for you, but you can find it for yourself. Don’t let a day go by without finding some happiness in it. Take a moment to notice the good things around you.
…live every day to its fullest. When was the last time you really looked at the sea? Or smelled the morning? … to see the stars… to gaze out on the ocean. Many of us live near the ocean but never take the time to look at it. We all live under the stars, but do we look up at the sky? Do we really touch and taste life, do we see and feel the extraordinary, especially in the ordinary? (p 224)
There are wonderful moments waiting in this day. Go for it!
by Joan Borysenko. I’m a little put off by the cutsy green ink, but I like what she writes about, and it is another book that I will own.
has an interesting chapter on surrender. The book also has chapters on Authenticity, Love, Relationships, Loss, Power, Guilt, Time, Fear, Anger, Play, Patience, Forgiveness and Happiness. 
