Anita Mathias's Blog on Faith and Art
Prayer is conversation for all seasons, and in the January season—when the cold and fog and grey have been stealthily trying to sneak into my soul despite my valiant efforts to evict them–my prayer-life becomes a child-like “gimme.”
Oh, pour your love into my heart, for on its own, it’s barren.
Oh, give me love for others, for I have none.
Oh, give me wisdom, for I am quite without it.
Oh, give me grace.
Oh, come into my heart.
Maranatha! Come Lord Jesus!
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| The tall thin Indian Runner was killed; the fat Aylesbury mourns |
Climbing out of our pond
When I was a child, I had a huge, fat bunny, two hens, two ducks and a dog. We had a large house with an acre around it.
When we bought a house in the English countryside in 2006, one of the first things I did was get two hens, two ducks, two rabbits and a dog. I bought a large house with an acre and a half around it.
Yeah, unconsciously recreating my childhood which sort of ended when I was sent to boarding school when I was nine. When my mother sent pressed flowers from whatever was in bloom, mulberries, mustard…I cried, and I cried when we left that garden when I was 14 for a flat which came with my father’s post-retirement job. Oddly, I seemed to have missed the garden and its inhabitants more than my family!!
Well, Oxfordshire has perils that Jamshedpur, India did not: foxes.
A fox ate one of our chickens, and the survivor was so traumatised that we gave it away. No more chickens.
The fox kept coming for our ducks—I looked out one evening to see a white duck seemingly levitating in a fox’s jaw. It dragged one away at 11 a.m. and though Roy chased the fox and rescued the duck, it died of shock. Another was mauled once by the fox, nursed by us, but then mauled again, and put down by the vet.
So we gave up on ducks for a while. But, oh, it was an idyllic picture to see them cluck around our yard. Ducks are the dearest birds, always happy, always cheerful, running to see you in a manic, quacking way!!
So after a duckless year or two after the maulings, we got ducks again, vowing to be very careful and put them away before dusk.
* * *
And then one day, we forget. When we remembered, and searched for them, one was killed by the fox.
The other duck was traumatised, and has spent a day and a half quacking for her friend. Ducks don’t search for a friend; they quack till the friend quacks back.
Unable to stand this desperate, agitated quacking, we have released her—well, put her on a lovely public duck pond on a river in a park, where we can go and see her. She took to it like, well, a duck to water.
I love ducks, I love watching them run and cluck and quack and eat and live so happily. But it’s really not safe having ducks out in the country—the fox comes even in the day, especially at dusk, and there are always the odd occasions when one forgets to put them away. Though I support Tony Blair’s hunting ban, and feel sorry for the mangy, terrified foxes I often see on my walks, I also hate them for their habit of killing for the sake of it.
I must admit I cried a little. I was very fond of my ducks.
When Job faced far, far more bitter losses, he said, “The Lord gives; the Lord takes away. Blessed by the name of the Lord.”
In the case of Job’s devastating loss of his children, there was no bright side.
In our case, there is. No unsightly duck house and run in our back garden. Ducks are messy critters, their droppings are unsightly, their splashing in their bathtubs we gave them destroyed the lawn. They quack to be let out of their house in the mornings, waking us up. There is a constant stress about remembering to put them away: Many a family dinner has been paused while someone runs out to herd the ducks! And their food attracts garden rats. Yeah, Ratty and Mole, not great friends of the garden.
So give up the dream and idyll of ducks quacking in my garden?? I feel sad to think of it—but yeah, I guess so. I guess having free-range chicken and ducks in fox country is a recipe for stress and failure.
At some point, one just has to accept the life one has and not the idyll we dream of. Foxes are a fact of life if you live in the country, and we will have to give up the dream of free-range poultry, or just-laid-that-morning eggs.
* * *
I adore the ocean, and often dream of living by the sea. But I have lived in Oxford for a total of 14 years. I have many friends I am fond of here, many friends on whose shoulder I could cry (and vice-versa!). I do not have the energy to move, and start again with friendships which, for me, are a vital part of life. So, maybe a small beach cottage if God provides the money, but no more moves. I am living in my dream house, and so I am going to abandon dreams of something dreamier to focus on my work.
* * *
Ah, mid-life, the restless season, mimicking our twenties in many ways. In my women’s group, almost every fortnight, someone tells of their friends or family divorcing.
Mid-life: it’s a Reality Show. You realise that barring the intervention of God (and of course, that’s an immense thing to bar) your spouse is unlikely to change. What you see is what you get. WYSIWYG. So you bail–or you accept, or you pray mightily; Roy and I are going for the last two options.
“The great thing, if one can, is to stop regarding all the unpleasant things as interruptions of one’s ‘own,’ or ‘real’ life. The truth is of course that what one calls the interruptions are precisely one’s real life—the life God is sending one day by day; what one calls one’s ‘real life’ is a phantom of one’s own imagination. —They Stand Together: The Letters of C.S. Lewis to Arthur Greeves (1914-1963) (20 December 1943).
I am tired, and sad, and mourning my duck, and the prospect of a duckless life.
But, in fact, this is my life, and I love it most days, and I will rejoice and be glad in it, in all the many things God has given me. Blessed be His Name!
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| Our Aylesbury and Indian Runner duck resting in the snow with beaks tucked under their wings. |
They Stand Together: The Letters of C.S. Lewis to Arthur Greeves (1914-1963) on Amazon.com
They Stand Together: The Letters of C S Lewis to Arthur Greeves 1914-1963 on Amazon.co.uk
Bookshelf BEFORE — Jan 20
Bookshelf — AFTER
C. S. Lewis famously said, “When first things are put first, second things don’t diminish, they increase. You can’t get second things by putting them first; you can get second things only by putting first things first.”
Michael Hyatt spells this out this work-life balance.
“I think it is really important that one’s career come after God, self, spouse, and children. I have seen too many people sacrifice the other four on the altar of work. Usually when that happens, their work life crumbles, too.
Work can be a rewarding experience if you keep it from becoming an idol. However, if you don’t put it in its place, it can suck the life out of you.”
(From Hyatt’s ebook Creating your Personal Life Plan).
* * *
My current challenge is developing my blog while not neglecting the other important components of my life—my marriage, my parenting, my physical fitness and my home. (My spiritual life I rarely neglect for blogging. I cannot do without prayer and scripture—I slip into depression and lose focus.)
I would love beautiful art to spring from a beautiful life, a happy marriage and happy parenting. That not many have managed it is no reason not to try.
So I am planning one walk a week with Roy, usually on Mondays, and one family outing with the girls. We are going to watch The Winter’s Tale at Stratford on Avon this Saturday, and also walk around that beautiful town. And on Friday, Roy, Zoe and I are going to see Mr. Darwin’s Tree, a monologue/ “memoir” of Darwin’s life.
* * *
Ann Voskamp, that splendidly productive woman, swears by the Pomodoro Technique. Basically, it’s work for 25 minutes by a timer; take a five minute break; repeat 3 times. After the fourth Pomodoro, 100 minutes of work, take a 20 minute break.
I am giving this a trial to see if it might work for me.
Disadvantages—Creatively, it takes me a while to settle down and start writing. I do a bit of reading, both books and online to build up momentum and have words coursing through me before I start. So a break in what I am writing every 25 minutes might be hard.
Advantages—
1. Sitting for long hours slows down your metabolism and your body kind of goes into shut-down, whereas moving every hour raises it.
2. A short break of 5 minutes can break the spell and give you perspective on what you are writing. And new ideas.
3. I might be able to work for longer because of the oxygenation the breaks give me
4. Adherents say the Pomodoro Technique sharpens one’s focus. Heck, anyone can do anything for 25 minutes.
5. It might be a way to get boring tasks like tidying up done without allocating a slot for them
6. It would give me a slot for things like weights and yoga, and apparently even 5 minutes of push-ups or surya namaskar has an incremental effect. You are stronger than if you hadn’t done them!!
7. I could use the 20 minute slot to do things that often drop off my day like gardening, or working on my procrastinated chore it.
So am going to try it. Will let you know how I get on.
Schedule.
Ann Voskamp has written a splendid post —25 ways to save your sanity in 2013—which gives us an insight into her holy, near monastic life!! and how she does it all—runs six children, a blog, writes a beautiful book, and remains a sweet, godly, Scripture-saturated woman. She is my role-model blogger in this respect. (When it comes to leading a disciplined, organized life, my role-model blogger is Michael Hyatt).
Now, if I tried all of Ann’s 25 ways to save sanity this week, I would, well, perhaps not lose my sanity, but certainly, exhaust myself.
But I will slowly work through her list, adapting what’s right for me and my life.
Here’s Ann on the importance of a schedule
“Forty-five percent of what we do every day is habitual,”
“To sing new songs, we need to pay attention to our rituals, the beat of our days, even more than focusing on self-discipline.”
She suggests thinking of the rhythms and actions of the day as a symphony, established note following note.
“Create your rhythm, a harmony of habits. Living in cacophony is more wearing than the hard work of practicing habits. “Laziness means more work in the long run,” writes C.S. Lewis. Flubbing away at whatever strikes our fancy leaves us in far worse dire straits than applying ourselves to the work of playing concertos.”
Our schedule “becomes our everyday liturgy.”
Incredibly, I don’t really have a fixed schedule, a symphony for my days, though there are things I do most days. But, perhaps, through trial and error, I should develop one which works for me.
Anyway, here’s how I have got on with my New Year’s Goals
Writing
On the first things first principle, I have been working on a little book (first draft done, and the whole book should be done next week) and a little bit on my memoir, and have had a good blogging week.
I usually put the blogging first, afraid that if I do it last, I won’t have the mental energy or focus to see it clearly. But I have realized that I don’t need to blog everyday, that the blog still grows with three posts a week since most readers don’t visit every day.
And yeah, since I started putting first things first, and working on the big book and the little book first, the blog has been growing. I have more time to think about, and more time to write my posts.
Wrote Common Grace: Or, Why God Loves Classical Music, Leo Babuata and Gretchen Rubin
And The Parable of the Bridge or “When to Say No to Insistent People”
Which did astonishingly well because of this
Wow, the power of the big guys.
| Time/week | |||||||
| Dec. avg. | Goal: Jan 21 | Achieved | Goal: Jan 28 | Goal – year end | |||
| Writing | 7h 10 min | 19 hours | 9 hrs29 mins | 10 hours | 35h | ||
| Social media | 11h 17 min | 3 hours 30 min | 7 hours54 mins | 3 hrs30 min | 3h 30min | ||
| News, Blogs, Magazines | 5h 21 min | 3 hours 30 min | 5 hrs2 mins | 3 hours30 min | 3 hours | ||
A second week of ice and snow derailed my plans again, but since the thaw I have been making up for lost time.
| Week of | Goal | Actually done |
| (km) | (km) | |
| Jan 7 | 29.6 | |
| Jan 14 | 33.6 | 13.6 |
| Jan 21 | 14.1 | 16.4 |
| Jan 28 | 19.69 |
I need to build up to 11 miles by September for my walking pilgrimage in Tuscany. Yeah, a bit behind, but using Kaizen, and building time and distance and soon, I hope, speed everyday, I hope to get there
Dreaded plateau, which I hope to break with increased exercise, and watching what I eat! Cumulative loss 3.4 lb
BEFORE- some overstacked
before- some not
3 Domestic Order
Here’s the bookshelf I have tidied, and here is the bookshelf I want to work on. Some bookshelves are overstacked, some are understacked, so I guess I’ll have to balance them.
I limit my clothes to whatever fits in two dressers, one tallboy, and one closet. So whenever I buy anything, I get rid of something, what Irene calls, “cutting off my nose to make more room on my face.” Once a year, I purge everything that doesn’t fit, is worn, faded, stained, or that I just don’t like and never wear.
This is the week for my annual purge. Here is my before picture.
Martin Luther King Jr.
Some of us are old enough to remember
the balcony in Memphis,
the sanitation workers’ strike,
the shot that broke flesh,
the loss of Martin,
and then the mule-drawn wagon, and the funeral,
and the riots, the violence, the fear, and the failure.
All of us know the crowd in D.C.
and “I Have a Dream,”
the Birmingham jail,
the broad stream of violence,
and his steadfast nonviolence
in Albany and
in Skokie and
in Selma.
All of us know his awesome, daring speech,
his bravery, his hope, and his generative word.
And we know the relentlessness of our government in pursuit of him
and the endless surveillance and harassment of this drum major for justice.
At this distance, we have little access
to how it was then concerning ambiguity
and fear
and reluctance
and violence
and injustice.
We do not doubt that you have persisted
even beyond Martin’s passion,
even beyond Martin’s brilliance,
even beyond Martin’s fidelity, and his loss.
We do not doubt that through him and beyond him,
you, holy God of the prophets,
are still pledged to justice and
peace and
liberty for all.
We remember Martin in gratitude . . .
and chagrin.
And we pledge, amid our stressed ambiguities,
to dream as he did,
to walk the walk,
and to talk the talk of your coming kingdom.
We pledge, so sure that your truth
will not stop its march
until your will is done on earth as it is in heaven.
Above Everything
By David Ignatow
I wished for death often,
But now that I am at its door
I have changed my mind about the world.
It should go on; it is beautiful,
even as a dream, filled with water and seed,
plants and animals, others like myself,
ships and buildings and messages
filling the air—a beauty,
if ever I have seen one.
In the next world, should I remember this one,
I will praise it,
above everything.
E8PCC7EPSZVE
(Credit )
So I was tidying our bedroom today, putting my stack of CDs back into their cases and listening to Stravinsky, glorious music filling the room.
And though I had been in a bad mood, for no good reason, ungrateful girl that I am, my bad mood lifted. I unconsciously started praying in tongues. I started praying.
I put Beethoven on next, a CD with the Moonlight Sonata, Appassionata, and Pathetique, music my father had loved. It was his private refuge from the stresses of the day, sitting quietly in the living room, just listening.
And grace flooded the room. Common grace.
The love of God which is shed abroad in our hearts through the Holy Spirit he has given us (Romans 5:5).
And sometimes, through the classical music he has given us.
* * *
In my first decade or so as a committed Christ-follower, I honestly believed the only valid solutions to my problems were to be found in Christ, in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge (Col. 2:3).
I even preferred diet books written by Christians–“Biblical diets” which, in practice, meant whatever the writer wanted to emphasise.
I felt dubious about psychotherapists who weren’t Christian, really believing that true happiness and joy were only found in Christ. (Though, in fact, my two most helpful therapists were not Christian. In the course of our moves, I’ve had one good Christian therapist–but tried dreadful ones who were Christian!!)
* * *
And then, I read this article on “common grace” in Christianity Today by David Neff– Why God Enjoys Baseball.
R. T. Kendall in his brilliant book The Anointing says the same thing. Because of God’s overflowing goodness, his blessing—anointing– is poured out on certain mathematicians and musicians and writers and artists and architects, whether they are believers or not. And He rather enjoys the work of their hands.
The goodness of God cannot be restrained. His sun shines and his rain falls on pagan and Christian alike. He is the true light that enlightens everyone (John 1:9). And he bestows the ability to write and paint and invent and suggest ways to increase the sum total of human happiness on Christian and non-Christian alike.
* * *
A Christian friend recommended Gretchen Rubin’s The Happiness Project. And I privately thought, “But happiness is found in God alone.”
But hey, I am a sucker for life-makeovers—being in that phase of creative upheaval called “mid-life”–and bought it.
And it is amazing how much applying Rubin’s simple tweaks increase happiness or decrease unhappiness, which is the same thing, perhaps. Increase energy by exercising, getting rid of the clutter which weighs you down, and going to bed an hour earlier. Deal with procrastination. Keep up with friends. Eliminate as much as possible from your schedule and experience free time again–all these greatly increase our happiness.
As Rubin says herself, after instituting these small changes, “Each day, I felt more joy and less guilt; I had more fun, less anxiety. My life was pleasanter with cleaner closets, and a cleaner conscience.”
* * *
I have recently decided that becoming more organized and efficient was really part of my Christian discipleship, and am becoming passionate about it as I make daily minuscule changes.
A practical blog I highly recommend which will probably make you happier is Leo Babuata’s Zen Habits. I have bought his ebook on the 52 tiny changes which will provide the most leverage and set up virtuous cycles in your life.
Since 2005, Babuata has lost 70 pounds, stopped smoking, gone vegan, started running marathons, started waking early, got out of considerable debt, tripled his income, written successful books and launched a leading blog, Zen Habits, all using a Zen technique called kaizen, used by Japanese companies like Toyota.
Kaizen brings about major change in tiny, incremental instalments. So if you wanted to wake at 5 a.m. instead of just doing it tomorrow, continuing a bit, then crashing (a familiar scenario) you would, tomorrow, set your alarm clock just one minute earlier, and so on, until you were waking at 5.
If you want to take up yoga or weights but are too busy, you’d do a minute of stretches on day one; two minutes on day two and so on, until your own body gets addicted, and becomes its own reminder system and alarm clock.
Babuata has simple wisdom on a way to incorporate fitness with our busy lives. Interperse it with work. Make it social. (For instance, I tweet my Runkeeper records whenever I have broken a personal record, and I tweet and facebook my Fitocracy achievements whenever I move up a level (now on level 6), and looking forward to the showing off is motivational.)
He is excellent on focus, decluttering, simplicity, and healthful living. And, as far as I tell, he’s not a Christian, though not lacking in the true light which enlightens everyone (John 1:9).
So, (though, of course this may have been perfectly obvious to you) if you are trying to lose weight, or declutter or become organized, because of the common grace you can learn just as much from Leo Babuata, or Gretchen Rubin, or Joshua Becker’s Becoming Minimalist Blog as from the Christian Michael Hyatt’s splendidly practical blog—which will also, step by step, make over aspects of your life, (though don’t expect him to talk about housekeeping or cooking any time soon!!)
Books to check out
R.T. Kendall The Anointing on Amazon.com and The Anointing on Amazon.co.uk
Gretchen Rubin The Happiness Project on Amazon.com
BEFORE (on Jan 14)
AFTER (Jan 20) — Roy tidied it by removing lots of stuff
So I’ve spent some time browsing around my blogosphere and social media world to ferret out my friends’ most common New Year’s resolutions.
And they are: Exercise more, read more, write more, be more organized.
Hmm. Eerily familiar.
* * *
What’s the common denominator in these?
More.
Exercising more, reading more, writing more, decluttering more will all take MORE time.
But our time remains stuck and unbudging at 168 hours a week.
So for all these excellent habits to come in—exercising, reading, writing, being organized—something has to go.
What?
Every I Will Do resolution must include a I Won’t Do or I Don’t Do resolution or it will be doomed to failure. For every hour we plan to spend reading, writing or exercising, we must subtract an hour from ?? TV, the black hole of the internet? Repetitive home-tidying? [Read more…]
The King’s Speech—I loved it. Partly because my father had immigrated to England in the forties and fifties when George VI was King. My father was imaginative, and read the newspapers like a novel, and made the events of the forties as real to us as the plot of any story he told us.After many abortive attempts at therapy with high-society therapists, the Duke of York forges a relationship of trust and affection with Lionel Logue, an Australian, and in this context, overcomes his debilitating stammer.
Logue, a failed actor, drifted into speech therapy as he dealt with the shell-shocked victims of the First World War who returned to Australia barely able to speak.
“My job was to give them faith in their own voice,” Logue says. And that involved revisiting the scene of the trauma, bringing it to the light where all the darkness, spider-webs and bats-wings associated with it lost their terror.
* * *
Going back to the great theme of love, what separates one professional from another is his ability to “love” his clients. I wonder if it is this quality more than skill that makes a superb psychotherapist, hair-dresser, speech-therapist, life-coach, writing teacher, Oxbridge don…
In fact, I am so convinced of it that I will not closely work with anyone, a personal trainer, say, a therapist, an agent, an editor, a spiritual director, or even a regular hair-dresser unless I like them and they like me.
It was the personal affection between the men, and Logue’s insistence on uncovering the roots of the stammer in fear, dread and trauma that ultimately enabled George VI’s stammer to virtually disappear.
The King’s Speech on Amazon.com and The King’s Speech on Amazon.co.uk
* * *
As a writer, I loved this film about finding your own voice. You find your own voice when you face the fears which make you “stammer”. You find your own voice when you stop worrying about what your voice sounds like. You find your voice when you write about what was taboo. You find your voice when you just speak, and let the chips fall as they may. You find your voice when you are willing to fail.
* * *
The Life of Pi—Stunning cinematography again. I first watched it in 3D like the Hobbit. I think the temptation of 3D is to overemphasize visual special effects to the detriment of the old-fashioned movie elements—the screenplay, the acting, you know…
The Indian scenes were absolutely charming, and the scenes in the lifeboat anguished, especially when the dying tiger, Richard Parker, permits Pi to place its noble head on his lap.
What struck me: Caring for the tiger, Richard Parker kept Pi alive. Love kept him alive.
Pi proved unable to resist the appeal in the tiger’s eyes as he tried to clamber onto the life-boat, and being busy about finding food and water for Richard Parker saves him from succumbing to despair.
Was the fanciful story of the tiger, the hyena, the baboon and the zebra true, or the story of the cook, the sailor and his mother? The insurance adjusters chose the former because it was a better story.
And that is why one might choose to believe in God, Pi says.
The Life of Pi on Amazon.com and Life of Pi on Amazon.co.uk
* * *
The Hobbit: The cinematography was stunning, and I enjoyed re-meeting Tolkien’s characters: Bilbo Baggins, the honourable and blinkered Thorin Oakenshield, quirky Gandalf, the ethereal Lady of Lorien, and the beautiful, noble elves.
So Bilbo leaves the comforts of his cosy hobbit hole, cluttered with the accretions of sentimental inheritances (much like many Oxford homes) for the wild and adventure.
A crazy choice—and the right one. Had he not journeyed, he would have been the same content Hobbit all his life. Circumscribed by his small comfortable pleasures. Stuck.
By accepting challenge and journeying, he changes, becomes wiser, more open-eyed, more experienced, different.
Sacrificing comfort, safety and the predictable is the price he pays for experience, maturity and hard-won wisdom.
We encounter the choice all too often. A spirit-breathed challenge and adventure is probably the better choice. After all, your hobbit hole will still be waiting for you when you return.
The Hobbit on Amazon.com and The Hobbit on Amazon.co.uk
