" to more than I can be...."

"I only hope
someday you find,
that you can believe
in me..."

I was reading some of the emails and notes I have received about a post I wrote, for this blog last winter, about my niece, Lily, and her mom, Laurie.  It brought to mind both Dan Fogelberg's, "Believe in Me," and Westcliffe's version of "You Raise Me Up."

The emails, notes, and FB messages only confirmed for me, how much we all hunger to have someone in our life whole believes in us with all their being. 

Some wrote about their own mothers, fathers, aunts, teachers who encouraged them to live their lives boldly and courageously.  Others wrote of their heartbreak, their hunger for someone, anyone to believe in them.  There were so many teens who felt that "if only" they had someone's encouragement, they could become someone who would change the world.  And there were the moms, dads, and grandparents who still wondered if they could have made a difference in the world themselves...if only.

Today's post has a simple message.  It is never too late. 

I want to repeat that again.  It is never too late.  If all it takes is for someone to believe in you...then its done.  I believe in you.  But that isn't going to do it.  That isn't going to make it happen.  You have to believe in yourself.  You have to believe in the you that God created you to be...perfect, whole, complete, filled with inspiration, beauty, creativity, fully resourced with all that you need to "make it happen."

When I was a girl, I was a dancer, a writer, a painter.  I loved these things.  I saw myself as these things.  My mom and dad had seven (count 'em) seven other children...all younger than I was.  I mourned the fact that my parents could never see me dance in a performance, rarely had a moment to read my report card...much less my poetry, and didn't have the resources to support the purchase of canvases, paints, or charcoal. 

So, slowly my vision of myself as a deeply creative person seeped away like a slow-leaking pool...until all that was left were a few hobbies that I indulged in when everything else was done and all my real tasks were accomplished.

Until one day, I started spending time with the best cheerleader in the universe...God.  I began spending lots of time listening to what He had to say about me.  In the silence of this listening I started to remember what I loved and Who it was who put that love in my heart.  In honor of my love for God, I started honoring those loves.  Not self-indulgently, but God-encouraged, God-inspired, God-impelled.

I loved to write, so I wrote.  And if I wrote, I was a writer, a poet, a lyricist.  I loved to paint, so I painted.  And if I was painting, I was a painter, an artist.  I loved to sing, and if I was singing, I was a singer.  Get my drift?

The more I wrote...the more I would find myself writing.  I put writing, not at the end of my list of the day's priorities, but at the beginning...right after my time with God.  I let that first-things-first time with God, set the agenda for my day.  And God is Love, so if Love said "write first," that's what I did.

You, every one of you...every one of us...has someone who believes in us and stands behind us, saying, "You are amazing, you can do it.  Go ahead...sing, write, paint, climb, run, speak....

Don't let anyone tell you anything about what you can't do.  They are lying to you.  I don't care who they are.  They can be a parent, a school administrator, a church leader, a counselor...it doesn't matter.  If God, Love, is telling you that you love to sing...then sing. 

As Dan sings:

"Too many hearts have been broken,
failing to trust what they feel..."

Trust what you feel.  Trust that it is Love, that is moving you to love...whatever it is you love.  You do it, and keep doing it.  Practice really does make perfect.  Do it because you love it, and others will love it too.  You will inspire them with your courage...and God will always be there to celebrate with you...to encourage you, to cheer you on. 

I hope that you will never forget to love the you that dreams big...

always,

Kate
Poet

*the photo is of my dear friend, and talented artist, Brooks Anderson...I thought you might enjoy visiting his website.  His paintings bless our home with generous beauty.

"If I could ever say it right..."

"If I could ever say it right
And reach your hostage heart...despite
the doubts you harbor
Then you might,
Come to believe in me.

If I could only do one thing,
Then I would try to write, and sing
A song that ends your questioning
And makes you believe in me
Oh, you can believe in me...."
- Dan Fogelberg

Does God say it right...to you?  Does Love reach your hostage heart...despite the doubts you harbor?  He does in my life...and often, through "the Word."  The Word comes to us in many forms.  There are the more accepted and obvious literary vehicles.  The Bible, the Koran, the Torah, the poetry of Hafiz, tablets of stone carried down from Mt. Sinai, spiritual texts from many philosophies, religions, belief systems...all satisfy our hunger for something enriching, comforting, and edifying.  And then there is the presence of the Word as the Logos.  The Logos is often defined as "divine reason" the presence of Truth in the heart, divine discourse, an indwelling grace.  This is where God's voice feels most real to me.  This doesn't lessen, but enhances, my love for reading the Bible, Science and Health, and other spiritual texts. In their company, I find a timeless sense of community. 

Someone asked me recently, "Why do you read the Bible?  Is it so that you will have the right ideas to heal someone?" I didn't have to pause long to think about my answer.  It's one that I've given a lot of thought to.  It came in the form of a quote I read once on a Celestial Seasonings teabag:

"We read to know we are not alone."
- CS Lewis

I believe that CS Lewis got it right.  Since Mind is All-in-all.  We already include all intelligence, all knowledge, all inspiration.  So we are not reading to discover something new.  We are reading to discover we are not alone in the thoughts that keep us company in our silence, in the sweet sacred waking hours of the night, in the holiest of holies...the space of prayer.

I do not read the Bible to find something I think I have never known. I read the Bible, the Tao, Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, Lewis' "Screwtape Letters" to remember more of what I already know, already include, already delight in.  I read to feel fellowship with another thinker who can't stop him/herself from writing a "song" that forwards someone else's questioning, and helps them believe in themselves...in the presence of the great I AM within themselves.

Spiritual thinker and thought-leader, Mary Baker Eddy, said it so beautifully when she wrote:

I have nothing new to communicate;
all is in your textbooks.
Pray aright and demonstrate your prayer;
sing in faith."

Tonight I was listening to Dan's song, "Believe in Me" and I found myself wandering into the pages of the Gospels, walking with Jesus on his journey from the baptism, through the wilderness, and towards his destiny as a healer and pathfinder for spiritual thinkers of every age and tradition. 

Poetry is "my native tongue" as I wrote in this linked post from September of 2007.  And the poem that follows below, is one that I found my heart singing...again..as I kept pace with him along the dusty road earlier today.  The words and rhythm felt familiar but I couldn't remember where I'd heard it before, until I was led to finally clean out a folder that had been recovered from an old hard drive two years ago.  This poem was there.  It is one I'd written in 2005 and had not read since.  It had poured out late one night when I was hungry for a more genuine relationship with Jesus.  I'd been feeling a like he was someone I spoke about...not to...or more importantly, with.  This poem was the beginning of something more timeless, present, and rich with fellowship between us.   

This is just the first poem of dozens.  Dozens of conversations with him that flow in poems.  Conversations that I've experienced on our walks through the holy land of consciousness:

the gift
descended
like a dove
...surprising

surprising
to see a dove
descending from
heaven

to hear
a
voice

to
feel the water
pouring
like
silk over
my forehead
and through dust-coated hair
and lashes

the gift descends
from
where there seems to be no
reservoir of
hope

and yet from the
unseen...
from somewhere
beyond the
clouds
there is a voice
that whispers
thunders
roars
a promise
of
love

the gift descends
and
we are caught
off guard,
breathless,
driven to our knees
in awe
wet from the
baptism,
spent with
surrender,
dazed by the
anointing

we are
on our
tiptoes
waiting
without
sandals
feet bare
unshod
on holy ground

we are
naked before
His
knowledge of
our hearts' most
unspoken
longings

egos are
shattered by His
grace,
by His
love,
by His
gift....

I am His son
He is pleased?


then why
then...
ah..."then"

the wilderness
the hunger
the temptations
the taunting
the false promises and
coercion,
hypnotic offers of bread and
celebrity

but
we
are
not
afraid
of this jeering...
snake
pharoah
satan
baal
herod
devil...

I am well-prepared...
a childhood of study...Hebrew school
Shabbat, Passover
conferring
with the elders
a stolen afternoon at twelve
alone with
doctors, lawyers, holy men
learned Rabbis
hours with the Torah
mornings in the temple
I am ready

I remember

I know...I have always known

"It is written..."

and the Word was made flesh...
and angels
ministered...
the sweetest bread
the Word...

ah yes, the gift...

you remember too...
don't you?

shared with Love,
Kate
Kate Robertson, CS

[photo credit: Stacey Vandermast Barton 2010]