A few years back my father gave me a book about grief that he thought I should read.  He gave it to me along with several others and because I have more books to read than time to read them it somehow got lost in the shuffle of my life.  Unpacking the other day the book resurfaced and something in the title grabbed me.  I put the book on my nightstand thinking I might actually stay awake long enough some evening to peak into it. 

 I was hesitant about a book on grief but finally I took a look.  It’s not an easy read but I’ve been very touched by the meditations in it.  I think we’re all grieving something at any particular stage in life and for me right now the stories in this book have been timely.  One of those is a Tibetan fable.  It is the story of Krisha Gotami.  If you are a Buddhist it’s a story that you are probably familiar with.  Where Christian’s know the story of Job and his suffering Buddhists know the story of Krisha.

For a variety of reasons I just haven’t been able to get this fable out of my mind.  One of those is that my friend Kelly who I’ve written about in a previous post is daily fighting the good fight of faith as she watches her son suffer.  With every coming and going from my house when I look across the street I whisper a prayer for this family.  At times I feel like I’m begging for God’s intervention in these prayers and in some ways I am but certainly not like Kelly must be.

I have not walked in Kelly’s shoes but I know that as a mother I struggle with wanting things for my children that at times seem out of reach.  This morning a teacher working with my youngest son was sharing with me some struggles he was having and it was all I could do in the meeting to stay composed and not start crying.  I saved my tears for later when I shared my feelings with my own Mom. 

Perhaps that is why the tale of Krisha has come to mean so much to me lately.  If you’re not familiar with it Krisha is a young woman who gave birth to a son.  When he was year old he fell ill and died.  In her grief Krisha walked through her city holding her son in her arms begging for medicine to bring him back to life.  She was ignored, scoffed at and others thought her mad.  She came upon a man who told her that Buddha could help her.  She went to Buddha and told him her story.  He listened and then told Kisha that he would help her if she could bring him a mustard seed from a home in her city that had not known death. 

Believing this was possible Krisha set out to find a mustard seed.  She went door to door and at every household was told by the owner that she could not be helped.  Every home had seen death.  Krisha was then finally able to say goodbye to her child and bury him.  She returned to Buddha to tell him that she understood what he was trying to teach her admitting that she was too blinded by her own grief to see that we all suffer. 

I’ve read the story over and over and I’m moved by it for more reasons than I can possibly write about.  However, one detail in the story strikes me more than anything and that is the mustard seed.  Krisha only had to find one mustard seed and Buddha would have restored her child to life.  I realize this Buddhist tale is meant to point out the universality of suffering.  This is an idea that is not readily embraced by the American outlook on life where we look at health and happiness as a promise life makes to us.  Buddhists, however, believe that all of life is suffering and that only by eliminating desire can we eliminate suffering. 

If you’re a Christian and believe what the Bible says you have to consider what Jesus said, “I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.” (John 16:33) This tells us yes we are going to have troubles and suffer and yet we can take heart.  That is a statement filled with promise and counters the idea that desire is the root of all our suffering. 

When you tell someone to take heart you are telling them to hang on to something.  You’re telling them to hang on to their hopes and dreams.  This says that hopes and dreams are okay to have which means we do get to want for things.  We get to want to see people healed physically, emotionally, spiritually, and even financially.  We are allowed to desire life abundantly.  The Scriptures tell us this over and over. This has to mean it is never wrong to seek after healing of any kind.  Never – ever!   I’m thankful to know this because I pray for healing everyday for my children.  Not in every area of their life but I ask God to heal what needs healing. 

Was Krisha a fool to be seeking out healing?  Should she have just acquiesced to her suffering? No, especially when all she needed to find was a mustard seed.  Oh how I wish she had met a disciple with a worldview different than Buddha.  A disciple could have told her that she didn’t have to go out and find a mustard seed.  A mustard-seed-sized faith was already available to her.  Through the power of the Holy Spirit available to every believer in Christ she could have a faith that big. 

This is a poignant reminder for me because what I know from experience is that faith is a fruit of the spirit which means I don’t have to go out and find it I just have to nurture it.  This is a relief because as hard as I try I can’t always find a mustard seed in my heart or anywhere else.   Intellectually I have that much faith but often my heart just isn’t there.  The faith I muster up in my mind doesn’t sink into my heart.  I wish it did because then I would have an enormous faith. 

I think this is where honesty is required.  If we can believe that our desire for healing and wholeness in life is acceptable to God then we can ask for the faith to believe that healing is possible.  We can admit that we have the desire but we don’t have the faith or maybe one should say “hope” to go with it.  This frames the picture differently.   Without the necessary hope to accompany our desire our spirit is flat.  The animating energy that we need to sustain us just isn’t there. 

I wonder if in the big picture scheme of things what Krisha Gotami was really asking for was the peace hope brings.  In the face of any devastating loss isn’t the faith to survive it part of what we seek?  We want what was lost back but we also want to know if that is not possible that we can endure without it. 

This is a hard place to be at emotionally and yet it’s the best place to truly meet the Holy Spirit.  This is where you can learn that it’s not through your strength that hope is created it’s through the Spirit.   The fruit called “faith” is a spontaneous filling up by the Spirit of God and is available simply by asking.  Not door to door from others, like Krisha was told to seek, but in our daily conversation with God - if necessary, in our minute by minute conversations with God.  To humbly ask for hope the size of a mustard seed or as big as a tree is a request God will always honor. “The Lord is close to the brokenhearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit.”  (Psalms 34:18)

I won’t promise to make this my last post about Buddy Too (B2) our new puppy because he’s just so darn cute.  I’m sure he’ll inspire lots of ideas for me but I don’t picture another “Marley and Me” type story coming from his life with us.  It’s only been a week though so who knows! 

B2 is timid little guy and he sticks very close to his “Mama” as my son Chase likes to refer to me.  I would tell you this is just because he know who feeds him.  My own Mother, however, would tell you it’s because he’s found a spot on my bed where he feels safe and warm so he’s just working me.  One little whimper and flash of the sad eyes and he’s got me under his paw and he knows it.  The little guy follows me around just waiting for me to stop long enough to scoop him up and shower him with attention except when we are outside. 

Out in the big world of his backyard he’s a sight to behold.  For such a shy little guy you might think he’d be intimidated outside but he’s not.   He comes alive.  On his first night in our home last week I was determined that he would go outside before everyone got tucked into bed.  He’s paper trained but he has to be house trained and so determined Mama that I am out we go.  I didn’t expect it to go well but I had to try. 

It was a beautiful Colorado night.  The air was perfectly still with a mix of clouds and clear sky.  Snow was falling and the quiet was piercing.  I took a deep breath in and exhaled with a genuine reverence for the beauty of God’s creation.  I wondered in that moment who it really was that needed to go outside me or Buddy? 

I set my little bundle down and wondered what he would do.  For a few minutes he just sat in a puppy lump on his tail with his paws spilled in front of him and then something, I don’t know what, caught his attention.  Before I could figure out what it was he was off frolicking on the grass.  He’s so small and light that he doesn’t even seem to touch the grass or the snow he just grazes it.  He treads so lightly that you wonder if he’s actually making contact with the surface below.  What gives him traction to move I don’t know but he moves and it’s incredibly fun to watch?

Buddy, however, is not one to let you just watch him he wants you in on things and so before you know it I’m playing chase with a puppy on a snowy night in my high heeled boots and cashmere coat not worried at all about ruining either.  We played for 20 minutes which is a long time for an 8 week old puppy and a 40 something at the end of the day but it was worth every minute. 

Later that night, bundled up in bed I pondered why it is that Buddy can tread so lightly and my steps fall so hard on the ground?  It’s not just a matter of size.  He has an advantage there, of course, but being light on your feet isn’t always a matter of size.  Muhammad Ali could float like a butterfly. 

I think for Buddy and Ali it’s has something to do with resiliency.  Buddy is just a dog, of course, so he doesn’t really ponder all that much but one thing he’s figured out is that when he’s playing if he falls down he can just get right back up again.  No big deal.  It might take a little doing for his uncoordinated puppy body but that makes it all the more fun.  Ali being a boxer knew how to take a punch and keep fighting.  When pushed to the ropes you fight your way out that’s what boxing is about.  Pretty simple stuff really but why is it so hard for some of us. 

I read recently that the elderly, who are typically thoughts of as fragile, are far more resilient than their juniors because they have figured out that they can weather emotional upheaval and still survive.  Resiliency is after all the product of surviving difficult emotionally demanding situations.  A resilient person internalizes the knowledge that they can and will prevail.  Stress only comes into play when a person doubts their ability to overcome. 

It’s doubt that makes a person’s steps heavy.  When we feel confident and capable we are light on our feet but when we question every move we make we hit the ground hard with our uncertainty. 

Unfortunately life can regularly challenge any confident spirit we might have prompting us to question our internal and external resources. 

On my part I forget that, “I can do all things through Christ who gives me strength”!  I lose sight of every resilient quality God has instilled in me.  I forget that God has given me a mind capable of solving problems, gifts and abilities, a sense of humor to laugh at myself, family and friends that love me and that with His help I can adapt and change with the circumstances around me.  I can get knocked down and get back up again and keep going. 

This sounds so cliché like a pep talk and I hate pep talks which is funny because I give them all the time.  I hate them because often they minimize a person’s internal turmoil and they tend to ignore the idea that we are opposed in this lifetime.  You can call that opposition whatever you like.  Call it the enemy, Satan, adversity, negative energy or just simply resistance.  By whatever name we all know it’s invisible and it’s insidious.   It’s a destructive force that rises up whenever we are trying to do for ourselves or others something that might be good.  It will take shape in almost any form possible and weigh you down and this is when your steps become so heavy.  You can’t float like a butterfly and everything feels like a bee sting because you’ve given in to resistance lost sight of the resilient person God created you to be. 

What then is the antidote?  For everyone I suppose it’s different.  For me it’s a matter of acknowledging that my heart and therefore my steps are heavy and that I need my perspective changed.  I need the voice of God to be louder in my mind than the voice of resistance so that I believe I will bounce back even if I make a mistake.  When my internal dialogue is saying I can’t bounce back I probably won’t.   When the voice inside of me is shouting that I can - I become more resilient.   I can tread through life with more spring in my step knowing that even if I make a wrong move and fall God will help me get right back up so that I can keep chasing after His will for my life.  He loves me that much and He created me for that much.  I might ruin a coat or even a pair of boots in the process but I won’t ruin my life. 

Just last week I started the crazy effort of moving back into my home in Colorado and suffice it to say I have too much stuff! Anytime you move you always have that period of time where you can’t find this or that and you have no idea at the moment where that particular thing is.  You walk around for days looking for something wondering where it is.  For me it hasn’t been the sofa pillows or mixing bowls, that are indeed missing, it’s been our dog Buddy. 

His absence from this house that I have only known with him in it is palpable.  I knew how much I was missing him when on the first morning I woke up in the house I went down to the laundry room to let him out of his kennel  - only to remember that Buddy isn’t with us anymore.  The next morning I didn’t wake up looking for him but I noticed that when I walked into my son Chase’s room I subconsciously expected to see him sitting on the end of the bed.  This was a favorite spot for him to perch and stare at the path next to our house watching for possible intruders.  He was a faithful guard dog.

Chase noticed right away that the house didn’t feel the same without Buddy.  He’s been talking about another dog for months so I’m wasn’t surprised by this.  He’s an animal lover and was ready for another dog friend right away after Buddy’s passing.  I wasn’t as ready because the attachment scares me.  Like most mother’s, however, I find it hard to resist my son’s charms and so another puppy it is.

Years ago when our beloved Buddy was having health problems as a result of bad breeding practices I swore that if I ever got another puppy it would be from Brien and Sandy.  I only refer to them by their proper names in person.  Behind their backs I lovingly call them the Schnauzer Nazis’.  This is a spoof of the Seinfeld episode about the Soup Nazis - a man so who is so intense about his soup making craft that you can be banished from his shop if you don’t behave reverently. 

Brien and Sandy own a grooming shop and breed and show miniature Schnauzers.  They are passionate about their dogs and won’t let just anyone purchase their puppies.  You have to prove that you will provide great care or you are out.  Fortunately we have some history with them.  When Chase and I walked into their shop and told them we were looking for another puppy Sandy told me she’d just been wondering who her last male puppy would be going to. 

I don’t know who was more excited Chase or me.  We came home and shared the news with his Grandma and brother and everyone was smiling from ear to ear.  We all want another furry friend.  We talked about it and agreed that the new puppy would be named Buddy Too.  He’s not Buddy the second he’s named Buddy “also”.  The first Buddy is irreplaceable and we have no doubt we’ll feel the same about our next Buddy.  In fact, we’ve been told by the Schnauzer Nazis’ that his temperament is very different which adds to the fun.  He’ll be a new friend for us to get to know and love.

As I’ve been rolling all this around in my head wondering why we’re so excited I realized that it’s the loving part that means so much to us as a family.  If I’ve learned anything in the last year it’s that life is a cycle of loving and grieving.   Being alive requires of us experience with both holding on and letting go.  We cling to what we love and yet life requires that we also let go of what we love.  These daily experiences mark our existence.  The two things we do together as humans are experience love and sorrow.  The joy of loving is something we readily embrace but as hard as we might try we cannot sidestep the sources of grief.  They are all around us – violence, hatred, greed, ignorance, revenge and the complete disregard for human life.  The sources of grief are as varied as the grief-stricken. 

I think this is why after a year of riding an emotional rollercoaster with highs, lows, and unexpected twists and turns our little family is looking for something to love together.  We all know it won’t solve any of our problems but we know from experience that something to love collectively will remind us that we are standing next to each other.  We are not alone.  The daily experience of living in a broken world is not something we have to do by ourselves.  The bumps and bruises we endure won’t hurt as much when a pair of hopeful eyes is staring up at us. 

Just like a baby changes a family so will our new puppy albeit on a smaller scale.  He’s going to have to be cared for, loved, and trained.  He’s going to be lots of fun and lots of trouble and this is going to require some teamwork.  His little discoveries will become ours and so will his misadventures.  We’ll talk about him, laugh about him, and probably even complain about him. Then ultimately one day we’ll cry about losing him but it will all be done together and that is where we’ll find the joy.  Life is cyclical.  Endings are beginnings.  Beginnings don’t take away the pain of endings but they do remind you that you are still alive and connected to something bigger than yourself. 

It’s the end of January and I’m just realizing that I missed the start of a new decade.  I’m embarrassed to admit this but today when I was listening to a podcast and the speaker mentioned the start of a new decade I thought to myself, “What?”  Then it hit me that today am January 30^th which means we are 30 days into a new decade and I barely noticed the end of the last one. 

If this admission isn’t embarrassing enough I’m also admitting to the fact that I didn’t realize millions of American’s consider the last decade to be one of the worst in history.  According to Time Magazine the first 10 years of the 21^st century are thought to be some of the worst years in American history.  I heard this news, which is actually now old news, just today while I was driving through the middle of New Mexico on a farm road.  The road was icy, my knuckles were white and I felt a little stressed about a whole number of things but I still couldn’t accept this pronouncement. 

When I think of the worst years in American history things like the Great Depression and Civil War come to mind but I hung in there with the podcast and listened to why people felt the way they do and I was a little more empathetic.  My travel partner and son Chase was surprised too and asked me if it had been a bad decade for me.  I thought about it and one part of me wanted to say yes but I’m thankful that a larger part of me said no. 

If I measured the last decade by some of what I’ve been going through recently I might get on board with the Time magazine folks.  I missed the start of the New Year because I’ve been completely distracted by a few painful realities in my life that require my attention.  If only I’d had time to read Time I would have realized how much more depressed I could be.   

If I had I might not have ever surfaced from the abyss to realize that a new year has started.  I would have kept my head down for fear of discovering yet another sad thing and not risked looking at the horizon to see what might be ahead.  That’s a terrible way to live.  Fortunately, a drive 1200 miles across the country is a good way to get your perspective changed.  You simply have to keep your eyes on the horizon. 

What occurred to me today driving toward Colorado where I’ll be living is that the problem lies in how we think about being “blessed”.  If your only definition of the word blessed is “happy” you have a very incomplete picture of the word.  If you think of the word bless in terms of “increase” you can travel much further with your understanding. Getting a little further down the road when you feel weary is a good thing.

Of course the words bless and blessed have different meanings but one of the meanings speaks to being prospered.  The minute you say the word prospered or prosperity people begin thinking about success in financial terms.  Even the phrase, “getting ahead” is thought of in financial terms which is also very limiting.

If being blessed either means a person is happy or getting ahead financially then tragically very few people could consider themselves blessed.  If, however, we could use the word increase synonymously with bless we might finding that we are far more blessed than we would acknowledge. 

Increase means to multiply, enrich or enlarge and in its prevalent usage today it doesn’t have the happiness/financial baggage attached to it.  We understand the idea of something increasing with greater ease than we do the concept of something or someone being blessed. 

If being blessed in your life is equivalent to experiencing increase in your life then growth would equal blessing.  Growing in your faith is being blessed.  Paul in 2 Thessalonians says to the church he is trying to encourage in Thessalonica, “We ought always to thank God for you, brothers, and rightly so, because your faith is growing more and more and the love every one of you has for each other is increasing.” 

This is a very easy thought to swallow. What’s unpalatable to us is the idea that growth can come without happiness, financial prosperity, or some other feel good thing along the way.  We typically don’t equate that kind of growth to being blessed and subsequently our praise for the learning is very shallow. 

If only we could look at how we weathered a tough set of circumstances and say they weren’t curses they were blessings.  They were blessings because there was an “increase” in the area of understanding, tolerance, self-control, goodness, knowledge, perseverance, or brotherly kindness in our life.  Perhaps we aren’t as nearsighted anymore and our worldview has grown making our faith bigger not smaller.  As a result we just might be more effective at living a Christ-centered life! Wouldn’t that be worth celebrating? 

Just like the Time magazine readers I could say that the last decade of my life has not been easy but what I will say that maybe they won’t is that is has been blessed.  It has been blessed because without a doubt my love for God, my faith in Him, and my understanding of how He works in my life has grown bigger and bigger.  Adversity has enlarged my view of God reminding me continually that my life is not defined by circumstances.  My life is defined by my relationship to Him and subsequently how I respond to what life brings me.  Hopefully those “responses” are improving with the increase in learning as I grow in him. 

I don’t know what the next decade holds for me but I can say without hesitation that I know it will be blessed beyond compare.  I’m making space for the unknown to fill up my life with surprises.  I’m not poised with an attitude of relief that the first decade of the 21^st century is over.  I’m stretching into the New Year (albeit a little late) thankful and with my mind wide open to all the new learning I know God has for me.  That will be a blessed life.