Kindness, try it sometime.

"I suppose the thing I most would have liked to have known or been reassured about is that in the world, what counts more than talent, what counts more than energy or concentration or commitment, or anything else - is kindness. And the more in the world that you encounter kindness and cheerfulness - which is its kind of amiable uncle or aunt - the better the world always is. And all the big words: virtue, justice, truth - are dwarfed by the greatness of kindness." ~ Stephen Fry

For over 5 years, 6 in May, I have used this blog as a way of expressing my thoughts through a difficult journey. I started it with one premise, a journal. A written account of my thoughts and feelings as I found happiness again. Some months I have written more than others, some entries more lucid, some filled with pain, some angry and some; joyful.

What this blog has been, more than anything else, is an outlet. A way to think through my life, to reread through the decisions, the pain, the joy and to find myself draped within the words so I could finally, after so many years of being told otherwise, find worth in my soul.

I have used initials to guard privacy, made a point to always say the opinions expressed were mine, I owned them and that the experiences expressed were MY PARADIGM. 

I have done my best to hold back the anger and yet at times, anger was seen because I couldn't do that. Some circumstances create an anger that can only be let go by letting go. It has mostly been directed in circumstances I felt unfair. The JOY of this blog is that my feelings are mine and because these are my words I can express them.

Now, I will express words I hope you understand.

Let me tell you in no uncertain circumstances why I LEFT THE MORMON CHURCH.

Three Fold - in specifics.

HISTORY. The church has correlated the truth right out of the history. What I was taught is nothing close to the truth. When you speak about the church, when scholars write about the truth, they are attacked, criticized, excommunicated, villainies. I grew up in a church that valued truth and found out the only truth they valued was their own narrative. I have only addressed this but a few times, I could write posts proving it all and yet, out of respect I haven't.

DOCTRINE: Well, lets see, blacks and the priesthood, polygamy, Adam/GOD, the Kinderhook plates, the Book of Abraham,DNA evidence, rewriting scriptures to hide "white and delightsome", and then, the cracker, the one I couldn't get over. Forcing a woman and her family to stay sealed to a MONSTER. I could go on, but wont.

And then, the one that shoved me out the door;

THE PEOPLE!

Yes, that's some of you who read this blog. You see, for a long time, whether you meant to or not, you truly let me know how you felt by YOUR ACTIONS. Lets see, shoved out of door way, home taught in the middle of a street, accused of being immoral, yelled at in the middle of a chapel, I could go on but I wont. 

It seemed that having an opinion of an other's place in God's eyes is the right of every member of a ward. It never seemed to end for me, I could never do anything right and well, quite a few of you made sure I was aware of what it was in YOUR opinion that I was doing wrong. So Christlike don't you think?

So, WHAT AM I ON ABOUT?????

Apparently some of you have been so concerned about my words it's caused you to go to the Bishop.

Seriously?

I'm done. I am not going private because by doing that my words are lost. I want my words left visible and accessible. I need them to bear witness to whats wrong with a culture that claims love and dispenses hate and judgement.

If your purpose of reading my words is in support, send me an email ( oilgirl2@shaw.ca ) and I'll direct you to my new blog home. For those who simply judged my words and found fault, take some time, watch this. Maybe this will save someone else the pain that I have felt.

huh?

I just got off the phone with my old bishop. He had called again and asked that I call him back.

I did.

I'm confused.

All I have to say.

We talked a fair bit but one thing;

His words; "there are people who are concerned with what you write in your blog and have come to me".

Seriously?

To those people, if you have questions, if you have concerns, why not just ask me.

It is just as cowardly to judge an absent person as it is wicked to strike a defenseless one. Only the ignorant and narrow-minded gossip, for they speak of persons instead of things. ~Lawrence G. Lovasik

Pressure

I love the mountains, that's not news, but the reasons why are buried deep within my very soul. It wasn't until I actually studied geology a few years back in my engineering classes and after working in the study of rocks that I have come to understand what it is about their formation that intrigues me.

When I am up there, in the national, provincial parks I begin to feel very much at home. I am sure part of it has to do with my song, my familiar place and the other, the shear magnificence of it all. Somehow, your perspective becomes very real and your place in the grand scheme of things is soon realized when you see just how small you are in comparison to your surroundings. It's a reality check of sorts.

The folds in the rocky mountain strata amaze me, I could never take enough photos of it. Here, in the Canadian Rockies, like no other place you can see every movement, every catastrophic event that gave us, gave me, what I feel so home in.

Last weekend, I went out with my BigMa lens - 150-500 and just shot the peaks. Over and over again, as the snow ridges emphasized the folds I wondered, what was it that made the earth curve and break so. I knew the answers were there so I took this photo, sent it to my mentor (my boss) and asked... how? He knew the peak well, the area was one of his favorite places to hike and he explained, in fine geologic terms the reasoning behind a place I love so much. He then taught me about the application of those principles to area unseen, like where we drill. He explaining logging in a way I had never fully grasped.

I sent the pic to our new young geologist. She has helped me so much as I have shared my knowledge of the geology software she has helped me understand the depositions of rock and the formation of oils and gases. I love my new job, I don't just administer there. I learn every day.

So, what am I on about?

I have been struggling a lot lately. It's winter, that is my first clue as to why but deeper than that, more catastrophic to my soul is realizing in a real way I am giving up. My life is a shadow in some ways of what it used to be. In other ways it is better than i ever imagined. It's hard to explain.

I tried for a time, after I quit my activity in church to keep the friends I had. It took about 6 months to realize that unless I made the effort, the friendships didn't exist and I had an aha moment. Friendship became the slag of it all.  Having been Momo my whole life meant friends, as defined under the rules of the Mormon culture, were gone and that meant everyone. Everyone. I morned for nearly a year and then I decided to see someone, to find a way to make peace. You see, I was the happiest I had ever been but lonely too.

Well, the "transition" councillor taught me many things. Most importantly, about boundaries and about chasing vs. reality.

People choose who they have in their lives. If you aren't important, if their not important, connections just change.

She also gave me some insight into my own soul. I give too much. She helped me to understand the brokenness of the giving. Underneath was a deeply scared and folded strata of a soul and searching for help outside of myself and giving to heal my pain, a kind of purchasing of respect ultimately earned me nothing but emptiness to connections. The second stage of the healing commenced.

I don't chase connections anymore. We come to a moment in our lives where we are who we are. I know my place for myself, I know what I want and I can't keep being disappointed by others not living up to my expectations.

I disappoint a lot of people but more importantly I have disappointed myself. If my actions are my own to own and if I am hurting no one but myself I can't worry about how my actions affect others until I fully understand how they hurt me. I can't keep giving away everything, including my soul.

I am not chasing relationships anymore, family or not and the price I have paid is deep.

I often ask myself how my mother did it, how did she get us to respect her so deeply; to love her so unconditionally?

The therapist said that behavior is modelled. She said my children were taught how to respect me by their father and since he had none for me that was deeply folded into our relationships. There was never enough I could do to earn something that by nature should simply be there. I had to accept that this would be my reality and that I had to choose how to build the boundaries to "protect" my soul. For a long time I made bad choices in forcing the respect, then I went into guilt mode and tried to "buy" it and now, well, that's where I am right now, what's next?

In my heart, I know I've tried, I've sacrificed, I've begged to matter but I just can't do it anymore.

I can't do it for my kids and I can't do it for my Dad, or my other family. It's time to do it just for me.

Deep inside all the souls chaos that is in me is a kind, loving, giving, beautiful women. I can't keep waiting for others to assure me that I have value. I will matter to myself now.

I will matter to myself.

Thinking...... is sometimes very painful and yet...

“No soul that seriously and constantly desires joy 

will ever miss it. Those who seek find. To those who

 knock it is opened.” 

~C.S.Lewis, The Great Divorce

C.S.Lewis is one of my favorite authors. He wasn't a writer I sought out, his words came upon me by necessity. He was a required class for my major in university.

Within the 16 week sememster we read nearly all of his novels. We went so quickly and touched so lightly on his words, the avenue so biased to Mormon think that it wasn't until nearly 30 years later, as I have started to tackle his words again that I seem to be understanding in a different much richer way.

I knew I would revisit all the old classics I sprinted through all those years ago. As I have; with time passing, learning, experience, heartache, I see the words; feel them actually, in a broader more meaningful way. Where I once saw one type of alliteration, a much different meaning exists. 

CS Lewis was a theologist, a humanist theologist. He spoke a universial language of acceptance of Christ. His words have such deep meaning. Even when I began my second journey through his words with "The Chronicles of Narnia", though I fully understand the premise, the parallals seem more profound, more universal.

So, what am I on about?????

Words. How you can spend your entire life thinking words have one meaning and how, though experience, through reality, through time, words will morph to a whole new way of being. 

Is it you that changes ir the words?

I am so grateful for change because it doesn't matter whether I changed or the words did, it's just different.

Less defined. More accepting. Less regimente. More accepting. Less judgemental, and much more accepting.