In which I pursue happiness and the bluebird of joy | Anita Mathias: Dreaming Beneath the Spires

On Not Wasting a Desert Experience

Anita Mathias — Sun, 13 Sep 2020 14:44:20 +0000

So, after Paul the Apostle’s lightning bolt encounter with the Risen Christ on the road to Damascus, he went into the desert, he tells us… And there, he received revelation, visions, and had divine encounters. There he pondered on the simple teachings of Jesus in the context of the logic and story of the Old […]

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On Breaking the 22 Minute Mile, and Stumbling on Happiness

Anita Mathias — Tue, 29 Sep 2015 15:09:16 +0000

When I was 12 years old, I read Roger Bannister’s account of breaking the 4 minute mile, pushing himself to the outer limits of human possibility, “collapsing almost unconscious, like an exploded light bulb”. I was inspired–and astonished. Run a mile in four minutes. The thought of it still baffles me! I walked a mile […]

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When Shackles become Wings: On Domesticity, Creativity, and Me

Anita Mathias — Mon, 07 Sep 2015 13:13:51 +0000

I was married 25 years ago, while in a Ph.D programme in Creative Writing at the State University of New York Binghamton. I had just earned a BA and an MA in English from Somerville College, Oxford, then an MA in Creative Writing from Ohio State University. My husband probably hoped for a traditional marriage, […]

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At the End of Broken Dreams, an Open Door

Anita Mathias — Sun, 22 Mar 2015 11:05:20 +0000

About 20 years ago, in Williamsburg, Virginia, we used to sing this in church, “At the end of broken dreams, an open door.” I sung it because I liked the lyricism, but I had no interest in the open door at the end of broken dreams because then the dreams would have to be broken, […]

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My One Word for 2015 : Joy

Anita Mathias — Mon, 19 Jan 2015 14:04:31 +0000

I had wanted to choose “Accelerate” as my One Word for 2014 but God impressed “Alignment” on my heart, and it proved to have been useful through a tumultuous year—a cancer diagnosis, and surgery, the death of my beloved border collie Jake from cancer, a burglary. And some nice things too… being invited to Cambodia […]

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In which Rest is an Essential Part of the Creative Process

Anita Mathias — Fri, 24 Oct 2014 11:25:31 +0000

The first chapter of Genesis explodes with creativity! God creates sun, moon and stars; banyans, baobabs and butterflies; macaws, mice and mastodons from a smile in his brain. He creates the world in exuberance because that is his nature. He is a Maker, a creator. And all of us are inherently creative, because we all […]

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In Which Drivenness Comes from the Enemy of our Souls, but Christ Gives us Balance

Anita Mathias — Fri, 20 Jun 2014 17:51:23 +0000

In her book The Soul of Money, global activist Lynne Twist refers to scarcity as “the great lie”. Twist writes, “For me, and for many of us, our first waking thought of the day is, “I didn’t get enough sleep.” The next one is “I don’t have enough time.” Whether true or not, that thought of “not enough” […]

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Housework as a Pathway to Prayer—with Vermeer’s Women

Anita Mathias — Mon, 16 Jun 2014 10:32:25 +0000

You can almost hear the silence. The milkmaid is quiet, so quiet, and time is suspended as she pours milk. The hands work while the mind thinks. Is it a life of drudgery, or is it a gift–her trivial chore a window into eternity, time to think, to pray, to look out of the window […]

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The Ten Habits of the Happy Christian

Anita Mathias — Sat, 15 Mar 2014 21:18:36 +0000

Irene Mathias, aged 4 1 Seek Happiness George Mueller considered happiness the normal emotional state of the Christian. “I saw more clearly than ever, that the first great and primary business to which I ought to attend every day was to have my soul happy in the Lord. The first thing to be concerned about was not, […]

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One Secret of Joy: Be More Dog

Anita Mathias — Fri, 07 Feb 2014 17:04:55 +0000

So what’s the secret of a dog’s wild energy and wagging tail? Their warm heart, their boundless capacity for love? Their short memories, their natural ability to forgive? Be more dog. http://youtu.be/yu9sWjnJFHU And here is Jake the Collie, in the buttercup meadow behind my house And me and Merry, my Labradoodle

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