Anita Mathias: Dreaming Beneath the Spires

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At the End of Broken Dreams, an Open Door

By Anita Mathias

images paysages

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, right?

* * *

Well, well, well…

My daughters, choosing their own paths, ask me what my goals were when I was their age. I confess–with a wry smile–that my life barely resembles the dreams I had at 21.

Well, hello there, “failure.” Except the word has lost its sting. Sadness has given way to a shrug.

My life hasn’t worked out as I wanted…more dreaming than writing….though I perhaps have some good decades ahead of me.

And had a career worked out as I had wished, there would have been a lot more stress, busyness, pointless work, self-promotion, and exhaustion, and I would have reached middle age substantially more tired. And in worse health!

There are gains to all our losses—and some loss to all our gains. Tweet: There are gains to all our losses—and some loss to all our gains. From @AnitaMathias1 http://ctt.ec/12dfq+

The best thing we can do then is throw up our hands in acceptance and worship. Tweet: The best thing then that we can do is throw up our hands in acceptance and worship. From @AnitaMathias1 http://ctt.ec/p2l5A+ 

Failure. The beautiful thing about achieving failure is that we no longer fear it. Tweet: Failure. The beautiful thing about achieving failure is that we no longer fear it. From @AnitaMathias1 http://ctt.ec/Q6rf1+

Failure is a re-direction. We have been whisked into a different plot. Tweet: Failure is a re-direction. We have been whisked into a different plot. From @AnitaMathias1 http://ctt.ec/dg1ds+

* * *

The dreams of 20-30 years ago are not entirely “broken,” though they have morphed.

I wanted to write as beautifully as the writers I then idolised…Salman Rushdie, Vladimir Nabokov, Toni Morrison, Annie Dillard, Laurie Lee; to write with that beautiful texture, almost music. Yeah, I’d still like to.

However, that kind of writing comes out of immersion in literature, and the way life has happened…I haven’t read enough.

I took four years out of reading and writing to establish a business. At the end of that four years, I faced my broken dreams. My fingers had got stiff. My writing felt like the flightless cormorant of the Galapagos– bland, music-less, poetry-less compared to what it had been just four years ago. The instinct had gone dormant. That intricate lace-like writing which had once won me a National Endowment of the Arts award of $20,000– I couldn’t do it any more. I had lost the knack.

Broken dreams.

Once the business no longer needed my involvement for my husband is now running it, I wondered what I was going to do, how I was going to wriggle back to writing.

And I did perhaps the only thing I really know how to do… I prayed.

* * *

And, four months in limbo, I heard God suggest blogging…

That sounds like a grand way of putting it, but it’s the only accurate way!

My readers when I started were my Facebook friends…but slowly through the miracle of Google and the web and social sharing, they grew. About 10,000 people read my blogs each month, unique monthly visitors Google calls them.

And, ironically, my blogs may touch more people’s hearts, spirits and lives than the exquisite, artful writing I wanted to create. They may influence people for good on a daily basis. May help shape the way people think and perceive; help shape spirits. Blogging has been an unexpected adventure, and an unexpected gift!

* * *

I want to write beautifully, of course I do, and I will keep trying to write well until I die. Keep practising.

But what I am primarily aiming for in blogging is not a lace-maker’s artistry.

I think instead of a leaf, a kite, a raptor, catching the wings of the wind, flying high and higher as the wind lifts it.

I think of recording what God whispers to my heart.

* * *

I am trying to write–if it’s not too grand a word–“prophetically.” I try to hear what God is saying to me, and write it down. Record what I am struggling with…and the answers I have discovered. Answers which may perhaps help someone else up to the next step of the ladder.

And that’s more satisfying, healing, and enriching for my mind, heart, soul, and body than writing the beautiful literary books I wanted to.

Blogging…the open door at the end of broken dreams.

Will I ever write the books I wanted to? I believe so, though they will be different, more products of Spirit than of blood, sweat, toil and tears.

And that’s all to the good, isn’t it?

                                                                                                                                    * * *
Anyway, it’s become second nature now, when I face the rubble of broken dreams, things not turning out as I had expected, to ask, “So what’s the plot, Lord? Where’s the open door in this rubble? Show me the road I am to take.”

You come to a dead end, and there is hope in the deadness. For nothing in this world truly dies; dead seeds reappear as sheaves of wheat. Tweet: For nothing in this world truly dies; dead seeds reappear as sheaves of wheat. From @AnitaMathias1 http://ctt.ec/nV6G9+ Every death has some resurrection in it.

This world whispers of infinity. Pi has been computed to 10 trillion digits. 10 trillion of an infinite number of digits? Is that success or failure? It’s interwoven. There’s some failure in our bright successes, and our failures have ironic gains and golden lessons.

* * *

There are no dead ends. The door which seems closed whispers of windows.

And that window swings open….and you see the stars.

 

Tweetables

For nothing in this world truly dies; dead seeds reappear as sheaves of wheat.  From @AnitaMathias1  Tweet: For nothing in this world truly dies; dead seeds reappear as sheaves of wheat. From @AnitaMathias1 http://ctt.ec/nV6G9+

The best thing then that we can do is throw up our hands in acceptance and worship. From @AnitaMathias1 Tweet: The best thing then that we can do is throw up our hands in acceptance and worship. From @AnitaMathias1 http://ctt.ec/p2l5A+

The beautiful thing about achieving failure is that we no longer fear it. From @AnitaMathias1 Tweet: Failure. The beautiful thing about achieving failure is that we no longer fear it. From @AnitaMathias1 http://ctt.ec/Q6rf1+

Failure is a re-direction. We have been whisked into a different plot. From @AnitaMathias1 Tweet: Failure is a re-direction. We have been whisked into a different plot. From @AnitaMathias1 http://ctt.ec/dg1ds+

Every death has some resurrection in it. From  “At the end of broken dreams, an open door.” Tweet: Every death has some resurrection in it. From “At the end of broken dreams, an open door.” http://ctt.ec/rPodp+ @AnitaMathias1

 

 

Filed Under: In which I am amazed by the love of the Father, In which I bow my knee in praise and worship, Work Tagged With: blogging, broken dreams, failure, grain of wheat dying, literary writing, open doors, redemption, Resurrection, writing prophetically

When, For a Season, God Himself Blocks You

By Anita Mathias

 desert_cactus_flowers
You intended to harm me, but God intended it for good, to save many lives,” Joseph quietly tells his brothers. (Genesis 50:20)

Oh they did; they sure did, first throwing him into a disused well, then uncaringly selling him on for thirty shekels of silver to the Ishmaelites, not caring what became of him.

And what came out of his experience of betrayal, slavery, false accusation, and imprisonment was elevation—promotion—influence–the ability to save many lives.

* * *

I used to feel stressed and a bit hopeless if I had enemies, if I thought there were people with inveterate animosity, jealousy, competitiveness, or malice towards me, who would block me, who might slander me. The thought of such people still does not make my heart sing!

But they are a fact of life. “Some are jealous of your face. Some are jealous of your lace. And some will be jealous of your grace,” as RT Kendall writes in The Anointing.

However, Shakespeare’s young Henry V puts it well, “We are in God’s hands, brothers, not in theirs.”

I sigh if I realize someone is reflexively blocking me or my ideas, putting in a bad word for me, but I am not afraid.

I do not fear them.

Because there are always two stories going on in our lives: the plot we see, and the story God is still writing. There is the story people think they are forcing onto your life–in which you may miss the chance to lead, speak, get the prize, the invitation, because someone feels threatened by you, is jealous of you, or just plain dislikes you.

Often you are unaware of these machinations, and that’s best. When you do know, you wring your hands with a sense of loss.

But all is not lost.

You were not meant to lead at that time. You were meant to quietly follow the One. You were not meant to speak at that time. You were meant to listen.

Sure, it will take you longer to achieve your heart’s desire. The Spirit is taking you on the scenic route. You are in the desert, where all voices are silent, but the voice of God;   Tweet: You are in the desert, where all voices are silent, but the voice of God. rom @AnitaMathias1 http://ctt.ec/ot7J1+ where is no trophy but his companionship; no wine but his spirit; where your progress is not measurable, and, anyway, there’s no one to praise it.

Why, even your prayers aren’t working. Every avenue of showing off is blocked.

Welcome to the desert, fellow pilgrim, where God himself blocks you. Tweet: Welcome to the desert, fellow pilgrim, where God himself blocks you. From @anitamathias1 http://ctt.ec/1AB5R+

* * *

You say: “See here, God, I have wasted my life. Look at me, mid-life and achievement-poor. Remember, God, those years I was promising; remember that award for a writer of unusual promise? Why I was in my twenties then. The snazzy university, the snazzy prizes, the early publications, the blushing peach down of promise, remember?

Well, I’ve failed, and you’ve failed me; we’ve failed together, you and I.

Yeah, you really haven’t managed my life too well, Lord, and neither have I. Let’s just go eat some worms.

My twenties are over, my thirties, my… Let’s just say “my hasting days fly on with full career, but my summer little bud or blossom showeth.”

How can you make up to me, God for the years when I wanted to build much, but instead built little?

You have behaved rather badly towards me, my God, my friend. You have let me down. You are my friend, and so I forgive you, but I am sad about this. I am.

But if I love anyone, I love you. So yes, I will follow you because, you’ve sure ruined my appetite for following other paths of glory.

I believe you can restore the years the locusts have eaten. The prophet Joel said so, and Christians have attested to it. But I don’t see how. Jesus, let’s be honest here, I sometimes feel as if nothing can compensate me for those wasted years, the years in Joseph’s dungeon.

I really do.

Though they were what you gave me, and I accept them because I love and trust you. I accept them from your hands in trust as I accept the full years of your goodness.

* * *

And you, Lord, reply:

“Child, child, friend, beloved, Anita, what you wanted was a lesser good, and so I withheld it.

You saw the success of your writer friends—their whirl of book readings, teaching gigs, speaking gigs, lectures, prizes, prolific writing, book contracts, money, fame, fascinating friends, travel. All the trappings of a career. And you wanted it too.

And I knew you wanted it.

But I also knew you better than you knew yourself. Don’t make that face. I truly do.

You were not ready for the busyness of travel, deadlines, speaking, teaching, crises, midnight oil.

Fame and glory–what made you think it would make you happy? I knew it would not. It would not. Rushing to planes, trains and automobiles has never made you happy. Rush has never makes you happy, or busyness, or deadlines. You love quiet unscheduled days at home, or in your garden.

But I promise you this: You will write the books you want to write. You will not die before your pen has gleaned your teeming brain.

All the things you deeply love and want to explore and preserve in words, I will ensure you explore and preserve them,

All the things I kept from you, I kept not for your harm, but that you might find it in my arms.

You are sad that success came later than you wanted it, but trust me.

The bright lights of the big cities would have obscured me.

The noise would have silenced my whisper.

A hammer had to be taken to all those idols.

There had to be a gotterdamerung, a ragnarok. You wanted to be Ms. Famous Writer, to dazzle the world with your creativity. You wanted fame, glory, money, success, as you saw your friends get it.

I gave you quietness, I wooed you to the desert, and there I showed you my love. Tweet: I gave you quietness, I wooed you to the desert, and there I showed you my love. From @AnitaMathias1 http://ctt.ec/c4e_8+

You had but one shot at investing in your children. I slowed down your career so you could teach them all you had to teach them. And could your marriage have withstood the rush in peace, not pieces? Did you want to be Ms. Divorced Famous Writer? You did not.

You have reached mid life with a full heart and full spirit, into which I have poured and poured and poured myself and my words. And now it is time to write.

* * *

“Oh God, could you not have poured both? Both yourself and the other things I wanted?”

“But then there would not have been room for me. I had to pry your fingers from other things, so they would clasp me. Had to silence other sounds, so you could hear me.

I gave you not what you thought you wanted, but what you love, quiet and peace and silence. And in the quietness of your country garden, I shaped you, I formed you, I made you into a woman of integrity, a woman aligned with me, a woman I can trust.

You sometimes feel you’ve wasted your life.

But child, you’ve given your life to me. It’s now my story, not yours. I am the author, not you.

Accept the plot twist I chose. Forgive me, as I forgive you. It was not time before. It’s time now. It’s time.

* * *

Lord, I accept the plot you chose. I accept my years in the wilderness. I accept your judgement that they were necessary. I forgive you.

And I will go forward in joy, in alignment with you, your joy filling my heart.

* * *

Open your hands wide, and I will fill them. Your heart has been reformed in the silent years.

Now I know, and you know, that while your hands are full of my blessings, your eyes will be on me and your heart will be full of me.

* * *

Tweetables

Welcome to the desert, fellow pilgrim, where God himself blocks you. From @anitamathias1  Tweet: When God stills all the noise, and you say “See here, God. I have wasted my life.” From @anitamathias1 http://ctt.ec/0Icc0+

You are in the desert, where all voices are silent, but the voice of God. From @anitamathias1  Tweet: You are in the desert, where all voices are silent, but the voice of God. From @anitamathias1 http://ctt.ec/5m83M+

There are always two stories going on in our lives, the story we perceive, and the story God is still writing From @anitamathias1 Tweet: There are always two stories going on in our lives, the story we perceive, and the story God is still writing From @anitamathias1 http://ctt.ec/M4v4b+

When God stills all the noise, and you say “See here, God. I have wasted my life.” From @anitamathias1 Tweet: When God stills all the noise, and you say “See here, God. I have wasted my life.” From @anitamathias1 http://ctt.ec/2fI1E+

Questions

Have you experienced a period of great silence? Have you experienced God more deeply as a result?

Image Credit

This post is kindly sponsored by mordocrosswords.com. Thank you for your support.

Filed Under: Blog Through The Bible Project, Field notes from the Land of Suffering, Genesis, In which I explore writing and blogging and creativity, Writing and Blogging Tagged With: blog through the bible, desert, failure, Genesis, Joseph, suffering, writing

A Spiritual Late Bloomer, I Learn from Failure in my Messy Beautiful Life

By Anita Mathias

happy_childWhen my daughter Zoe was born, twenty-one years ago, frazzled between nursing, and impractical plans of still writing, I made a mental prayer list to pray through as I pushed her stroller round our neighbourhood.

And blush: All those items are still on my prayer list.

1 Losing Weight. I still have 12 pounds more to lose of the 20 pounds I gained when pregnant with Zoe. Another pregnancy, with Irene, didn’t help, though that weight I have lost!

2 Running an orderly house. Well, we are now doing so,  though, alas, there’s still clutter. I am doing the hopeful 365 Less Things project—a concrete way of getting rid of things by shedding one thing a day–and am hopeful that I will eventually have nothing in my house that is not both beautiful and useful.

3 I wanted to wake up at 5 a.m. because I have romantic associations with 5 a.m., and am still trying! I now go to bed around 9.35 p.m. so waking earlier will gradually becoming easier

4 I wanted to write a big beautiful book—and I still do!! And though I now write pretty much every day, having so organised my life that I feel sad and uncomfortable on the days that I don’t write : that book, ah!—I work on it in fits and starts.

Ouch! Same goals, 21 years later.

* * *

That’s what life is like for an ordinary Christian.

Oswald Chambers (of My Utmost for His Highest), aged 27; Bill Bright, founder of Campus Crusade for Christ, and Bill Wilson, Founder of Alcoholics Anonymous, absolutely surrendered themselves to God, once and for all.

Jack Miller made fun of Samuel Johnson’s continual efforts to wake early, saying that that was because Dr. Johnson had not learnt to rely on the power of the Holy Spirit.

And Priscilla Shirer writes that a failed diet is “a direct sign that we have not submitted ourselves completely to the Lord.”

Yup, that’s me. Just learning how to lean on the Holy Spirit. I have surrendered myself to Jesus, but then indiscipline gets the better of me, or grumpiness, or laziness, or… most of the deadly seven!

* * *

However, there are many ways of being a Christian, many concentric circles of discipleship. There is John, the beloved disciple who leans on Jesus during the Last Supper, hearing all the secrets of the universe.

There are Peter, James and John whom Jesus took with him at the Mount of Transfiguration, when they saw his glory, and at Gethsemane, when he wanted moral support. Then there were the twelve apostles, the seventy-two, the hundred and twenty, the five hundred and, of course, the 5000 men, in addition to women and children, who listened spellbound to the Sermon on the Mount.

It is possible to walk through the Sinai desert in ten days, I’ve read. It took the Israelites forty years, as they wandered in circles, grumbling, dispirited, losing their bearings. They are ordinary believers. They are our grandfathers and grandmothers in the faith.

* * *

Wandering in circles: That’s true of things people struggle with for forty years.

One could get one’s house decluttered and organised in six months Marie Kondo says; 9 months according to Joshua Becker. Many struggle with this for decades, all their lives.

Most people could lose their surplus weight in a year through healthy eating and exercise. I could do so myself! Yet, many battle with this for decades, or for all their lives.

One could write a book in a couple of years, at 250 words a day. But many…the blushing, flushing woman you see is me!

Mark Batterson writes in his brilliant book, The Circle-Maker, that the biggest factor in spiritual and occupational success is waking early. We all know it’s better to be awake from 6-8 a.m. than from 10 to 12 p.m. Yet, many struggle with staying up too late, and sleeping in too late all their lives. And I am still grasping at 5 a.m.

* * *

There! I now feel thoroughly downcast over issues I have battled with for two decades when perhaps I could have had them sorted in a year.

What beauty could there be in this mess? What gold among the shards?

1) It’s given me patience, compassion and understanding of my own and other people’s struggles.

Two steps forward, 1.9 backwards is progress. Slow, but definite.

It’s made me realistic about how  hard it can be to follow Jesus. And he was realistic about it. Think about his metaphor. Carry your cross and follow him. Walk the narrow path into life.

We are not all fire like Beth Moore or Billy Graham who go for Christ, 100 %, though I’d like to be!

Some of us have feeble arms and weak knees.  But we are still in the fight.

2) I have learned the limits of my will, my resolve. Trying to do life on my own and failing has taught me that I need Jesus. It has taught me that it is hard for me to accomplish my goals without the power of the Holy Spirit.

Becoming a Christian for me was, initially, and for many years, an intellectual decision. I was—and am!!—convinced that Jesus was God, and the Bible inspired, and reorganised my life accordingly. Sweeping changes: tithing, prayer, Bible study, church attendance, trying to obey what Jesus taught, implementing the wisdom of Proverbs in my life, that sort of thing.

The true magic of being a Christian is now rose-tinting everything, like sunrise. I am moving from grammar to poetry, from chords to the symphony.  The magic: That I can ask Jesus to change my heart. To make me love vegetables. To love to walk and run. To love to sleep early and wake early. To love order. To love the discipline it takes to write.

3) We value virtue through experiencing the opposite.  The beauty of domestic order through knowing chaos. The endorphin glow after a run through knowing the misery of physical sluggishness. The joy of writing through knowing the misery of not creating.

4) My failures have given me an increased awareness of the love of God. I have had successes. I opened a letter saying I had been admitted to Oxford University to read English. Opened a letter saying that I had won $20, 000 from the National Endowment for the Arts for my writing!

But I am most conscious of the love of God when I lean into it in failure and low spirits and realise that he loves me anyway. Who knows, perhaps he loves me more fiercely because of my failures and weaknesses, as we fiercely love our toddlers, puppies and old dogs!

5) I note that I have partially failed in all those goals I had as a woozy young mum, pushing my stroller around the neighbourhood, and wryly smile.

Because failure has lost its sting for me. Honestly! My failures make me wryly smile.

Because they are not final.

They are a way of learning. Who I am. What works for me. What does not work. How to pick myself up and go on after “failure.”

I have rarely stumbled on something which has worked for me at the first attempt. It takes trial and error.

And failure has taught me to answer a question of the catechism: Where is God?

God is not over there somewhere, experienced by the perfect and prayerful and good, but right here, in middle of failures; food instead of prayer; newspapers instead of writing; coat dropped on the living room floor; hello, snooze button.

God is not only encountered in prayer and Bible study. He appears, like the beneficent beings of fairy tale, when I most need him. In the trenches of struggle.

* * *

 Yes, taking a lick at a dragon, desultory sword thrust by sword thrust, instead of cutting off his head as I might have done were I St. George or a better girl has taught me many things.

Humility for I am not as A type as I imagine. Mercy with others who struggle. The importance of persisting and continuing looking for solutions.

I see the road out of the messy beautiful desert, and I walk down its zigzag paving stones, less conceited than had I achieved my goals quickly; with more to teach, perhaps; with more inspiration to offer such as I who wander in circles until they find the straight path, but finally leave the desert, radiant, leaning on their beloved.

Carry on, Warrior.

Filed Under: In which I celebrate discipline, In which I explore Living as a Christian, In which I explore the Spiritual Life Tagged With: failure, spiritual growth, the Messy Beautiful

He Makes the Failures of Friday Beautiful in His Time

By Anita Mathias

Ravaged by grief,

she saw you standing right there,

but did not recognize you.

 

She was living in Friday,

That traumatic Friday.

 

But it’s Sunday now,

And there you stand,

In front of Mary.

 

It’s a new day,

The only day that really counts.

Today.

* * *

Lord Jesus,

I give you the Fridays of my past.

My Fridays of trauma and grief

The Fridays I was betrayed,

The Fridays I failed.

 

It’s Sunday now,

And there you stand in front of me,

Oh Lovely One!

 

And you make all things new.

* * *

Cleopas walks downcast,

His hopes have crumbled.

He has seen betrayal, and he has learned

Religious leaders can be evil.

He walks, sad, foolish

And slow of heart,

Thinking of crumbled hopes

And his beloved

Humiliated teacher

 

Who walks beside him,

Always walks beside him.

* * *

Forgive me, Lord,

For the times I walked in darkness,

Shrouded in self-pity,

Unable to get over past betrayal,

Past evil, past disappointment;

My vision darkened as I considered

Other people’s evil

Instead of clearing the logs from my eyes.

 

Living in Friday.

 

Not noticing you

Walking beside me,

Always walking beside me,

Even in my valley of suffering

 

Offering this heart,

Still puckered with yesterday’s vinegar,

Fresh bread.

 

It is Sunday, today,

And you feed me

With the breaking of the bread,

 

And beauty and creativity,

And you say, “Be not afraid of broken things.

Even the Christ had to suffer.

Be not afraid.”

 

“When you walk through the waters, I’ll be with you

And the floods shall not overwhelm you,

When you walk through fire, you shall not be burned,

And the flame shall not consume you.”

* * *

 Thomas says:

“Oh, the failure was dreadful,

Humiliating.

How could it be the Lord?

 

I saw hasty nails pierce

Those exquisite hands.

The impatient spear

driven into his side.

 

He failed

despite his prayer,

our prayer,

all the love, the preparation,

the hopes,

He failed.

They killed him.

 

But if prayer worked,

as he said it would,

If faith could move mountains,

as he said it would,

if his Father loved him,

As he said he did,

If he was God,

As he said he was

 

Would there have been that disgrace,

The mocking crown of thorns,

The mocking scarlet robe,

The stripping, the crucifixion?

* * *

 

“Thomas,” they say.

“He’s alive now.”

 

Faith!

I have no faith left.

I am bereft of faith.

 

Unless I see the nail marks in his hands

 and put my finger where the nails were,

 and put my hand into his side,

I will not believe, I say.

 

* * *

And then, I see him,

And words fail me

And I kneel,

 

And all I can say is

My Lord and My God.

* * *

Oh stupid Thomas!

 

Forgive me, Lord for my stupidity.

For believing you come

Only in day, and not in night,

Only in summer and not in winter

Only in success and not in failure.

Only in glory, never in shame.

 

My Lord and My God

Forgive me for needing

to see your radiant, risen body

 

To realize that there was beauty too

In the three hours on the cross

When you were the voluntary scapegoat

For a selfish world.

 

I believe.

Help my unbelief.

 

Help me to accept from your hands

Whatever you give me

With praise, and thanksgiving.

 

The lacerated hands,

The mauled side,

They too are part of the beautiful body of Christ

 

Things you make beautiful in your time.

 

May I never forget this,

lovely Lord Jesus.

 

 

 

 

 

Filed Under: In which I play in the fields of poetry Tagged With: Beauty, brokenness, failure, redemption

Where Good Stories are to be Found

By Anita Mathias

aboriginal
Image Credit

 

My tender-hearted children hated sad stories. Neither would let me read Oscar Wilde’s exquisite short stories to them, or even Hans Christian Andersen’s because they were too sad.

When I recommended a book or movie, they wanted to know if it was sad, and especially if it had a sad ending.

But there is no story without sadness, I keep telling them. It’s an old creative writing maxim: No story without conflict.

* * *

Who needs the stress and emotional trauma of conflict with others? And who needs internal conflict—when the self is at war with itself, knowing what is good to do, but doing the very things it hates, punishing itself by over-eating, or over-working, or under-sleeping? By psycho-somatic illness?

But without this internal conflict–this struggle against our very selves: to corral ourselves to rise early, work hard, stay focused, self-educate, eat healthily, exercise, read, write–our lives would be flaccid and formless, with the structure of obstacles, both within and without, to overcome.

And, as Donald Miller writes in A Thousand Miles in a Million Years, dealing with these obstacles head-on (losing 150 pounds in his case, and tracking down the father who abandoned him) gives our lives a shapely story.

Because stories and blogs come out of sadness, and struggle, and failure, and eventual triumph over Resistance.

* * *

And ironically, each failure, and sadness and step backwards gives us more of a story than our successes.

Where are stories found? Not in quiet times, not in scripture study, not in money you gave away, not in fasts, not in the meals you took around, or your turn in the coffee rota, these good, shiny things, which, anyway, by the strictest Scriptural injunction we are commanded to keep secret.

Where are our stories found?

In the places where you learn about yourself, and you learn about God, and you learn about shame and grace and self-forgiveness and God’s forgiveness in the crucible of failure.

When your daughter says, “I don’t want to play scrabble today, Mum, because you get snooty about my words,” and you say “Oh no, of course I won’t get snooty about your words!” and then you do indeed get so snooty!

When the house could so do with some loving up, and indeed, so could those who dwell in it, and you’ve resolved to do both, but words are flowing, and you dance in the flow.

When you had solemnly resolved on that run today and yoga, and weights—you know, flexibility, strength, cardio-vascular, the three elements of fitness!–but an idea presents itself, and you want to explore it, express it,

And the word count may be good at the end of the day, but your Pilgrim’s Progress….well, it hasn’t progressed.

And you wonder why today joy doesn’t throb,

Or peace flow like a river.

And you remember: He who loves his blog more than me is not worthy of me.

She who loves her writing more than me is not worthy of me.

And all you can say is Kyrie Eleison.
Lord, have mercy.

 

And you kneel down and repent

Till peace flows again.

And you say, “Lord, I am not worthy of you.
But say but the Word
and I shall be healed.”

And he says the Word.

The word like manna,
The word like honey
Coursing through your brain.

And you, the unworthy, are healed

And, again, sing.

* * *
And, besides, you have a story!

Filed Under: In which I explore writing and blogging and creativity, In which I Pursue Personal Transformation or Sanctification, In which I'm amazed by the goodness of God, Writing and Blogging Tagged With: failure, Stories, the goodness of God

On Long Walks, Spirituality and Creativity. And Images of Lucca, Tuscany, Italy

By Anita Mathias

I discovered a new pleasure this year which has become vital to my spiritual life and my ability to hear and God; my emotional balance and shalom; my psychological well-being; my ability to deal with stress; my creativity, and my happiness.

And no, it’s not prayer, though prayer, theoretically, offers all these benefits.But we are body as well as spirit, and so it is something akin to prayer–long walks.

* * *

I started long walks in January because I had signed up for a pilgrimage to Tuscany on the Via Francigena.

I was not fit, and have not found it easy to acquire the new habit of long walks every day. There have been many, many days lost because it was cold, icy, rainy, or I was too absorbed in my writing.

But I have got back to the stamina I had 16 years ago, when Zoe was 2, and I used to walk with other mums, pushing her in her stroller, for the whole 4 mile trail in Kingsmill, the beautiful resort-like community in Williamsburg, where we lived for 9 years.

* * *

It’s just a first step. Having been sedentary for so many years, four miles is a challenge! And my speed, I have discovered is not yet normal-person-speed.

So here I am on this pilgrimage in Tuscany on the Via Francigena, and I quickly discovered that I hadn’t trained sufficiently!

So I am doing a “pilgrimage lite” which has included exploring: San Gimingnano on Sunday, Volterra on Monday, Monteriggioni and Siena on Tuesday, more Siena today.


* * *

One of my personal mantras is, “If you can not succeed, fail better.” Success is the result of a dozen, or a hundred “better failures.”

So though I have failed in my training for this pilgrimage—I did not get my stamina up to 11-14 miles a day (more like 4!) or my speed to 2. 25 miles an hour on hills—I am going to continue long walks, which give me the opportunity to spend long concentrated hours with God, and tie in with my love of travel.

* * *

Oh, I love travelling. I am, sadly, somewhat addicted to books, reading, writing, and the internet, and getting away is the only way to unhook myself from these things.

Getting away re-sets my mind. Left to myself, I begin to run down after some time. It takes me longer and longer to get going, and longer and longer to get my work done.

After a break, however, I come back with a new mind. Refreshed, able to read fast, think fast, write fast, and write for long hours.

* * *

Also, it is, sadly, easy for me to get my life, my heart, my spirit, and my schedule slightly unaligned with God. And, if one is even slightly unaligned with God, if you lean slightly away, what you land up with is the Leaning Tower of Pisa. Very beautiful still, but, well, if it were not shored up by engineers and millions of euros, a disaster in the making.

But when I travel, when I walk alone contemplatively, when I walk in the hills or on the beaches, praying, I slowly re-align myself with God. I ask if I am on the right track. I ask him to reveal the plans he has for the next six weeks of my life, and the next year, or decade.

* * *

We explored bits of Switzerland, France and Italy last month in our camper van. And just on our way to Dover, we were caught in the most dreadful traffic jam and were barely crawling. I’m reading Donald Miller’s Blue Like Jazz, which was also on my iPod, but I can no longer easily read in a moving car.

So Zoe suggested listening to the book, and following along, as a dual pleasure which I did for a bit, and enjoyed

And then, I thought, “Heck why all this striving? I am the child of a good God. Let me just rest in his love.”

I thought of Wordsworth’s poem, “Expostulation and Reply,”
“Nor less I deem that there are Powers

Which of themselves our minds impress;

That we can feed this mind of ours

In a wise passiveness.

“Think you, ‘mid all this mighty sum

Of things for ever speaking,

That nothing of itself will come,

But we must still be seeking?

Ah, doing nothing, resting, waiting. How alien to this modern world of scrambling, doing, achieving!

I closed the book, turned off the iPod, lay down, and rested. If God were to speak to me, fine. If not, I was content to rest in his love.

* * *

And he did speak that holiday, in fiction. Short story after story came, holy and mysterious, and I rapidly wrote them down. I told them to my husband and children; they got emotionally involved and totally drawn in. One was heart-breaking and ethically ambiguous, having come in a dream, and the children were outraged and saddened by it. I think the stories were lovely, and they came in their own tone and voice.

They belonged to a sort of dream-time, written in our camper van in Switzerland, Italy and France. I returned from holiday on August 15th, and I have not looked at them since.

What’s going on? Fear that they were not as good as I remembered? Interestingly though, letting first drafts sit is standard creative advice.

* * *

And now again on this holiday, short stories are coming, one or two or three a day, and I am rapidly writing them down.

Anyway, I need to have a plan if I am to finish in addition to my blog and my memoir. And part of having a plan is to have a trigger, a specific time/slot when I am going to write them.

So on my return from Tuscany, I am going to devote the first half-hour or so of the day to working on these stories. Quiet time, I will still have, even if I put it second; and the memoir, I am deep enough into that I will still write even if it’s in the semi-comatose last hour of the day.

And I might also work on my stories last thing at night for as long as my mind works. The writer Andrea Barrett once told me that her most creative times are first thing in the morning, and last thing at night.

So I might experiment with last thing at night, the sleepy, in-between phase, when the stern critic, the assaulter of creative work, is off dozing, and the muse appears, in her voluminous garments, and says, “Come, Dance.”

Anyway, enjoy images of Lucca which we visited last month. I particularly enjoyed walking around the city walls.

Aerial view of Lucca. The green strip round the old city is the top of the very wide Renaissance wall. (credit)

 

 

 

 

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San Frediano

 

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The Duomo (Cathedral)

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San Michele in Foro

 

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Filed Under: In which I get serious about health and diet and fitness and exercise (really), In which I Travel and Dream Tagged With: Creativity, failure, Lucca, Pilgrimages, Travel, tuscany, Walks

In which Failure can be a Greater Blessing than Success

By Anita Mathias

Pastor, pastor Adam Barton, Adam Barton Akron Ohio, Akron Ohio, Akron, Ohio, Adam Barton, pastor Adam Barton Akron Ohio, reverend, minister, The Chapel, Pastor Adam P. Barton, Adam P. Barton, famous art worship1[1]

Image Credit

 I would like to have been successful in everything I did the first time round. Sure, I would.

And some things I have failed in, yeah, sure, I would rather have been successful in.

However, what failure has taught me is to learn to lean.

In that way, ironically, it has brought me peace, even more perhaps than success which merely propels you up the ladder, substituting one level of hard work and stress for another.

* * * *

I am learning to substitute God-confidence for self-confidence. When faced with something challenging, I say to myself, “Well, who knows how I am going to manage that, negotiate that, keep my head above water during that, but I guess I will lean on God, and God will help me, and will tell me what to do, minute by minute.”

The Song of Songs has a beautiful line, “Who is this coming up from the desert leaning on her beloved?” (Song of Songs, 8:5).

She who has failed, who is no longer supremely self-confident, who knows she needs to lean.  That’s who.

* * *

I am reading the story of Jacob in Genesis. Jacob is self-confident, tricky, unscrupulous. He’ll stop at nothing to get what he wants. He exploits Esau out of his birthright, deceives Isaac into giving him Esau’s blessing.

And all this achieves is that Jacob is now on the run from Esau, hiring himself out to his uncle Laban, who tricks him into serving seven years for Leah whom he does not want, besides the seven year for Rachel, whom he does want.

But Jacob is strong and he does it.

And Leah gives him four sons.

* * *

Jacob has been unstoppable. Smart, strong, hardworking, tricky, manipulative.

Had God not intervened, Jacob would, in fact, have been condemned to a hard life of getting everything he wanted through cleverness or trickery or hard work. What a treadmill!

So God, for now, does not allow Rachel to bear children.

* * *

And Jacob is faced with something hard, something inexorable which he could not get around by trickery, or deceit or even hard work.

He is faced with his powerlessness in all the really huge things—such as life itself.

And in despair, Rachel says, “Give me children, or I’ll die.”

And Jacob became angry with her and said, “Am I in the place of God who has kept you from having children?” (Gen 30:2).

* * *

And this perhaps is a turning point in the story of Jacob.

He has reached a barrier which neither charm, nor guile, nor hard work could cross.

He needed God, and acknowledges his need for him.

And from this point, his story begins to turn.

* * *

All his trickery achieved was that instead of gaining Esau’s birthright, he had to run away from home with just the clothes on his back, fleeing from Esau’s wrath.

But now, broken, he acknowledges his powerlessness and need for God.

And God begins to bless him. Though his bumbling experiments with cattle breeding have no basis in science, God allowed them to succeed (Gen 30).

By the end of the chapter, we are told, “Jacob became exceedingly prosperous, and came to own large flocks, and maidservants and menservants and camels and donkeys.” (Gen 30:43).

He has moved from the realm of addition, of what we can achieve with our puny efforts, to the realm of multiplication, of what can happen if God steps in to bless us.

* * *

Not everyone comes to the end of themselves, to the end of their resources to make things happen, to the point of exhaustion, when you throw your weapons down in helplessness.

For me, reaching that point has consistently opened the door to better things, to learning to listen and lean.

My first business, embarked in 2006, with enthusiasm, but without much prayer, was unsustainably exhausting. It was through desperate prayer, that, in 2007, I “heard” God whisper the idea for a new business, which now supports our family.

And, in 2006, my memoir had reached top agents in the UK and the US, but each wanted changes, and I didn’t know how to make them, and had lost enthusiasm and love for the project, and so laid writing down, to found a business so my girls could go to the very academic private school I judged right for them.

I resumed writing in 2010, after “hearing” God suggest blogging, and the pressure of writing every day in public smashed my perfectionism about writing, my fear of writing anything that was not unassailable, my preciousness, my fear of criticism.

When I first started, a mean reader at a Writers’ Conference criticised the grammatical structure of a sentence, and I lost confidence, more so when a powerful woman assailed my style, (along with lots of praise, but the criticism froze me). Now when my writing is criticised, I no longer take it personally. I say “Yeah,” and fix it. Or “Yeah,” and leave it.

I am constantly putting my writing in God’s hands, again and again, because it is the easiest thing to take out of his hands. But in his hands, it has the possibility to reach more people, and do more good than it ever would in my own hands, so take it, Lord Jesus, bless it.

Filed Under: Blog Through The Bible Project, Genesis Tagged With: blog through the bible, failure, Genesis, Jacob, Rachel, Success

10 Lessons from Heartbreak Time and Death and Resurrection in Writing my Memoir (Part I)

By Anita Mathias

Crows_Lake_in_North_Sikkim_MIND_HAS_MOUNTAINSSo, around 1987, when I was reading English at Somerville College, Oxford, Salman Rushdie read from Midnight’s Children at the Oxford University Majlis, the Indian society. And I stay up all night reading Midnight’s Children, transfixed. At least 95% of the novels, plays, poetry I had read until then had been written by British, American and European authors. Unconsciously, I thought of their countries, their lives, as the proper subject of literature.

Rushdie’s India was 15 years older than mine, but definitely recognizable. So all lights blaze: the moment many writers describe when they realize: “I can make literature out of what I know and have experienced.”

I quickly write about 25 pages in a green felt pen. I must dig them out.

* * *

I move on to America, to a Master’s in Creative Writing, in Ohio State University, 1987-1989 and I choose to specialize in, not memoir, but poetry, the form in which, like many beginning writers, I instinctively wrote.

So, it’s all poetry: courses in poetry, reading it, writing it, in the interstices of taking classes, and teaching Freshman composition. And then I go on to a Ph.D in Creative Writing at SUNY Binghamton in 1989–taking classes, teaching classes, writing papers, grading papers, a romantic busyness: lots of reading,  thinking and a little writing, but still…all I want to do is write.

I quit my Ph. D to get married, and suddenly get to write full time, as I had always wanted to. We wander around the US–to Cornell, New York, where Roy did a post-doc; to Stanford, California, another post-doc; and then to William and Mary, where he teaches. And I write poetry full time! And then I realize I’ve written through all the poem ideas I have, and am running dry.

* * *

I pick up memoirs, almost by chance. Patricia Hampl’s, A Romantic Education, describes, with verve and verisimilitude, a family in which food, and eating and drinking were shorthand substitutes for love—much like mine. Annie Dillard in “An American Childhood” describes an intense girlhood in Pittsburgh, a steel city like Jamshedpur in which I grew up. I read Frost in May, and Mary MacCarthy’s Memories of a Catholic Girlhood.

Dostoevsky describes his Prince Myshkin before an epileptic fit

“His brain seemed to catch fire at brief moments…. His sensation of being alive and his awareness increased tenfold at those moments which flashed by like lightning.  His mind and heart were flooded by a dazzling light.”

So too mine. About 4 years after the original idea, I saw my childhood and adolescence as a subject over the next few week and months, and hundreds of little memories rushed in.  I jotted them down and I burned with the desire to write the memoir. (As I do now).

* * *

And in the providence which shapes our ends, my husband, who had been teaching at William and Mary was offered a postdoc the University of Minnesota. I believed I could write anywhere, so was cool with going to Minneapolis, and my two years there turned out to be absolutely one of the most stimulating and creative periods of my writing life.

The Twin Cities, Minneapolis and St. Paul, had an active literary community, particularly in Creative nonfiction and memoir. I applied to a graduate course in Creative Nonfiction  at the University of Minnesota to which I had to turn in a 10 page piece of writing. I wrote my first essay, “The Goblin Market” about the raucous open air markets, magical to a young child, and it won a Roberts Writing Award, $200.

Charlie Sugnet, my writing teacher at the University of Minnesota, and the weekly book excerpts he gave us to read opened the world of creative nonfiction to me. Annie Dillard says moving from poetry to creative nonfiction is like playing with the whole orchestra rather than a single instrument. Indeed.

* * *

Mini-magic happened. I had written two long essays that term in Charlie Sugnet’s class, one about my conversion experience, and one about working at Mother Teresa’s convent.

Within a few months, the two pieces won a Minnesota State Arts Board grant ($6000), a Jerome Foundation travel grant ($1800), a mentorship award with an established writer from the Asian community: David Mura.

Sugnet said that he could see my having a career. He suggested submitting a book about my experience in Mother Teresa’s convent to editors and agents. It was not, however, the book I wanted to write–I wanted to write a memoir of my early childhood. I visualized this period as the last 20-30 pages in it

But heck, I so wanted a published book and so I embarked upon a foolish quest that saddened and poisoned many years of my life–trying to write a book I was not truly in love with, and did not want to write with my whole heart. (Samina Ali, who was in one of these classes with me, described how she wanted to write about her arranged marriage to a Muslim gay man, but was so desperate for affirmation that she almost signed on to write a book called Demon Lover, about an incestuous relationship with her father.) 

Lesson 1: Write the book YOU want to write, the one you are in love with, not the one you think might be successful

 

So I was trying to spin a book out of 14 months of my life, wasn’t whole-heartedly in love with it, and craved validation. I joined a writers’ group with my friend, the lovely writer (and human being!) Erin Hart. Took more writing and literature classes at the University and the Loft, a literary centre, at which I taught a course in creative nonfiction. I submitted my essays to magazines and for grants and prizes and fellowships, instead of keeping just writing, and finishing the doggone thing. Which meant I was always backing up and polishing what I’d already written instead of just writing. Going forward.

And since American creative writing classes are based on the workshop model: much time waswasted reading and critiquing other amateurs work instead of communing with the greats! And this is true, for both teachers and students!

Lesson 2 Get it done, get it down, get it written. Don’t seek validation. Seek mastery.

 

In my second year in Minnesota I went to a writers’ conference in New England, trying to get an agent and editor and a hypercritical, ungenerous teacher there shredded my work at the sentence and grammatical level (she didn’t like my contorted pretzel-like sentences) destroying my confidence, making me analyse my sentences,  instead of just writing by instinct,

I took a course in grammar and editing which I perhaps did not need, but which helped me to write with the left brain too, and write better).  More tiredness, more distraction, more time wasted.

Lesson 3: Take the critique of teachers with a grain of salt, assessing them. Avoid mean-spirited, frustrated, bitter ones: tormentors rather than mentors.

 

I used a tenth of the $6000 State Arts Board grant to work one on one with Carol Bly (ex-wife of Robert Bly!), who could go off on wild riffs of rage about ideas and sentences or grammatical constructions she did not like, or, but was also hyperbolically lavish with praise. All rather alarming for someone who was moving from poetry to prose and was just learning to write beautiful prose.   She promised to send it to her agent when I had 100 beautiful pages.

More stress, more backing up and looking over my shoulder and obsessing over each word, each phrase, each sentence instead of looking at the big picture.

I started to write self-consciously, analytically, analysing each word, phrase, sentence, wanting them to be unassailable, joy turning to stress.

Lesson 4—Quit over-analysing. Write freely, write like a river.  You will never write perfectly in this life. Why should you? You are not God.

Learn to let things go. Ship.

 

Knowing my work would be critiqued as it was being written I started getting frozen and blocked. There was a four page chapter over which I got blocked for four months in my perfectionism, which turned out to be–unnecessary!

Lesson 5 when blocked, read, read, read. You might instinctively stumble on a form and language. If you are blocked on a chapter, move on. Perhaps you don’t have to write it.

* * *

In the summer of 1993, I go to the Squaw Valley Writers Conference in California and meet Harper and Row editor, Ted Solotaroff and an agent, Virginia Barber, who express an enthusiastic interest in my manuscript about working with Mother Teresa.

I come back walking on air to Williamsburg, where we had returned despite my desperate desire to stay in Minneapolis.

My husband wasn’t hugely supportive; he was establishing his own career as a mathematician. Life was stressful, lots of battles about who’d do the dishes and the laundry and the cleaning and the tidying. And then we had Zoe, a lovely grinny baby–and writing time and energy was at a premium. I wrote and revised the manuscript through the tired first two years of her life.

When my second revision of my manuscript was rejected by the agent and editor in October 1996, I lay face down on the carpet and wanted to die.

Lesson 6: Never confuse strong enthusiastic interest for a signature on a piece of paper.

(I later met at least three established writers who this editor had expressed a strong interest in, led them on and dumped. Why?

Read Part Two here

Filed Under: In which I explore writing and blogging and creativity, Writing and Blogging Tagged With: failure, memoir, writing

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My Books

Rosaries, Reading, Secrets: A Catholic Childhood in India

Wandering Between Two Worlds - Amazon.com
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Wandering Between Two Worlds: Essays on Faith and Art

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Francesco, Artist of Florence: The Man Who Gave Too Much

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The Story of Dirk Willems

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Premier Digital Awards 2015 - Finalist - Blogger of the year
Runner Up Christian Media Awards 2014 - Tweeter of the year

Recent Posts

  • Change your Life by Changing your Thinking
  • Do Not Be Afraid–But Be as Wise as a Serpent
  • Our Failures are the Cracks through which God’s Light Enters
  • The Whole Earth is Full of God’s Glory
  • Mindfulness is Remembering the Presence of Christ with Us
  • “Rosaries at the Grotto” A Chapter from my newly-published memoir, “Rosaries, Reading, Secrets: A Catholic Childhood in India.”
  • An Infallible Secret of Joy
  • Thoughts on Writing my Just-published Memoir, & the Prologue to “Rosaries, Reading, Secrets”
  • Rosaries, Reading, Secrets: A Catholic Childhood in India. My new memoir
  •  On Not Wasting a Desert Experience

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C S Lewis

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From my meditation on being as wise as a serpent h From my meditation on being as wise as a serpent https://anitamathias.com/2023/03/13/do-not-be-afraid-but-be-wise-as-a-serpent/
What is the wisdom Jesus recommends?
We go out as sheep among wolves,Christ says.
And, he adds, dangerously some wolves are dressed like sheep. 
They seem respectable-busy charity volunteers, Church people.
Oh, the noblest sentiments in the noblest words,
But they drain you of money, energy, time, your lifeblood. 
How then could a sheep, the most defenceless creature on earth,
Possibly be safe, among wolves,
Particularly wolves disguised in sheep’s clothing?
A sheep among wolves can be safe 
If it keeps its eyes on its Shepherd, and listens to him.
Check in with your instincts, and pay attention to them, 
for they can be God’s Spirit within you, warning you. 
Then Jesus warns his disciples, those sheep among wolves.
Be as wise, as phronimos as a serpent. 
The koine Greek word phronimos
means shrewd, sensible, cautious, prudent.
These traits don’t come naturally to me.
But if Christ commands that we be as wise as a serpent,
His Spirit will empower us to be so.
A serpent is a carnivorous reptile, 
But animals, birds and frogs are not easily caught.
So, the snake wastes no energy in bluster or self-promotion.
It does not boast of its plans; it does not show-off.
It is a creature of singular purpose, deliberate, slow-moving
For much of its life, it rests, camouflaged,
soaking in the sun, waiting and planning.
It’s patient, almost invisible, until the time is right
And then, it acts swiftly and decisively.
The wisdom of the snake then is in waiting
For the right time. It conserves energy,
Is warmed by the sun, watches, assesses, 
and when the time is right, it moves swiftly
And very effectively. 
However, as always, Jesus balances his advice:
Be as wise as a serpent, yes, but also as blameless 
akeraios  as a dove. As pure, as guileless, as good. 
Be wise, but not only to provide for yourself and family
But, also, to fulfil your calling in the world,
The one task God has given you, and no one else
Which you alone, and no one else, can do, 
And which God will increasingly reveal to you,
as you wait and ask.
Hi Friends, Here's a meditation is on the differen Hi Friends, Here's a meditation is on the difference between fear and prudence. It looks at Jesus's advice to be as wise as a serpent, but as blameless as dove. Wise as a serpent... because we go out as sheep among wolves... and among wolves disguised in sheep's clothing.
A meditation on what the wisdom of the snake is... wisdom I wish I had learned earlier, though it's never too late.
Subscribe on Apple podcasts, or on my blog, or wherever you get your podcasts. It's widely available. Thanks
https://anitamathias.com/2023/03/13/do-not-be-afraid-but-be-wise-as-a-serpent/
Once she was a baby girl. And now, she has, today, Once she was a baby girl. And now, she has, today, been offered her first job as a junior doctor. Delighted that our daughter, Irene, will be working in Oxford for the next two Foundation years. Oxford University Hospitals include the John Radcliffe Hospital, and the Churchill Hospital, both excellent.
But first she’s leaving to work at Sunnybrook Hospital in Toronto for two months for her elective. 
Congratulations, Irene! And God bless you!
https:/ Images from a winter in Oxford—my belove https:/ Images from a winter in Oxford—my beloved book group, walks near Christ Church, and Iffley, and a favourite tree, down the country lane, about two minutes from my house. I love photographing it in all weathers. 
And I've written a new meditation--ah, and a deeply personal one. This one is a meditation on how our failures provide a landing spot for God's power and love to find us. They are the cracks through which the light gets in. Without our failures, we wouldn't know we needed God--and so would miss out on something much greater than success!!
It's just 6 minutes, if you'd like to listen...and as always, there's a full transcript if you'd like to read it. Thank you for the kind feedback on the meditations I've shared already.
https://anitamathias.com/2023/03/03/our-failures-are-the-cracks-through-which-gods-light-enters/
So last lot of photos from our break in Majorca. F So last lot of photos from our break in Majorca. First image in a stalagmite and stalactite cave through which an undergroun river wended—but one with no trace of Gollum.
It’s definitely spring here… and our garden is a mixture of daffodils, crocus and hellebores.
And here I’ve recorded a short 5 minute meditation on lifting our spirits and practising gratitude by noticing that the whole world is full of God’s glory. Do listen.
https://anitamathias.com/2023/02/24/the-whole-earth-is-full-of-gods-glory/
Our family was in Majorca for 9 sunny days, and he Our family was in Majorca for 9 sunny days, and here are some pictures.
Also, I have started a meditation podcast, Christian meditation with Anita Mathias. Have a listen. https://anitamathias.com/2023/02/20/mindfulness-is-remembering-the-presence-of-christ-with-us/
Feedback welcome!
If you'll forgive me for adding to the noise of th If you'll forgive me for adding to the noise of the world on Black Friday, my memoir ,Rosaries, Reading, Secrets: A Catholic Childhood in India, is on sale on Kindle all over the world for a few days. 
Carolyn Weber (who has written "Surprised by Oxford," an amazing memoir about coming to faith in Oxford https://amzn.to/3XyIftO )  has written a lovely endorsement of my memoir:
"Joining intelligent winsomeness with an engaging style, Anita Mathias writes with keen observation, lively insight and hard earned wisdom about navigating the life of thoughtful faith in a world of cultural complexities. Her story bears witness to how God wastes nothing and redeems all. Her words sing of a spirit strong in courage, compassion and a pervasive dedication to the adventure of life. As a reader, I have been challenged and changed by her beautifully told and powerful story - so will you."
The memoir is available on sale on Amazon.co.uk at https://amzn.to/3u0Ib8o and on Amazon.com at https://amzn.to/3u0IBvu and is reduced on the other Amazon sites too.
Thank you, and please let me know if you read and enjoy it!! #memoir #indianchildhood #india
Second birthday party. Determinedly escaping! So i Second birthday party. Determinedly escaping!
So it’s a beautiful November here in Oxford, and the trees are blazing. We will soon be celebrating our 33rd wedding anniversary…and are hoping for at least 33 more!! 
And here’s a chapter from my memoir of growing up Catholic in India… rosaries at the grotto, potlucks, the Catholic Family Movement, American missionary Jesuits, Mangaloreans, Goans, and food, food food…
https://anitamathias.com/2022/11/07/rosaries-at-the-grotto-a-chapter-from-my-newly-published-memoir-rosaries-reading-steel-a-catholic-childhood-in-india/
Available on Amazon.co.uk https://amzn.to/3Apjt5r and on Amazon.com https://amzn.to/3gcVboa and wherever Amazon sells books, as well as at most online retailers.
#birthdayparty #memoir #jamshedpur #India #rosariesreadingsecrets
Friends, it’s been a while since I blogged, but Friends, it’s been a while since I blogged, but it’s time to resume, and so I have. Here’s a blog on an absolutely infallible secret of joy, https://anitamathias.com/2022/10/28/an-infallible-secret-of-joy/
Jenny Lewis, whose Gilgamesh Retold https://amzn.to/3zsYfCX is an amazing new translation of the epic, has kindly endorsed my memoir. She writes, “With Rosaries, Reading and Secrets, Anita Mathias invites us into a totally absorbing world of past and present marvels. She is a natural and gifted storyteller who weaves history and biography together in a magical mix. Erudite and literary, generously laced with poetic and literary references and Dickensian levels of observation and detail, Rosaries is alive with glowing, vivid details, bringing to life an era and culture that is unforgettable. A beautifully written, important and addictive book.”
I would, of course, be delighted if you read it. Amazon.co.uk https://amzn.to/3gThsr4 and Amazon.com https://amzn.to/3WdCBwk #joy #amwriting #amblogging #icecreamjoy
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