Category: Phoebe and Luther

For the past 6-ish weeks, I’ve been engaged in an experiment known as Get It Done Lab, the brain child of Samantha Bennett and her team.

First… the punch line. I have, in fact, been getting a whole lot of “it” done!

Next… a bit more of the story.

As part of our adventure, Sam has been sending out daily emails. Super quick. Pointed, even. And they all begin with the same two words…

What if?

If you’ve been reading along for a bit, you’ve probably already guessed that this is an approach that really works for me!

Day 40’s email said this:

What if…. you forgave everyone everything?

What if, indeed?

But, for many of us, there’s another obvious question… How?

If we’re being real, forgiving can be really hard. And that sentence led me on the proverbial rabbit trail – figuratively, at least – to the endless bookshelves in our basement.

(Okay, with a bit of help from Google, I found what I needed to know in my phone and didn’t need to tackle the stairs!)

The book in question is titled, Is Human Forgiveness Possible? by Dr. John Patton.

John was one of my seminary professors. I read the book for a short course while I was doing my DMin. and serving a church in Virginia.

Here’s the gist of what I remember…

No, we can’t make ourselves feel forgiving.

We can choose – or intend, as I’d say these days – to allow forgiving to happen within us.

Which doesn’t make it any less a challenge!

Think about our world.

For me, it often feels overwhelming with the need for personal forgiveness – which is sometimes the easier part – to political forgiveness and ancestral forgiveness and… well, fill in what works for you.

Here’s what I do know…

Feeling forgiveness might just be connected to feeling thankful.

And symbolizing forgiveness often helps. (Think paintbrushes, or music, or…)

And forgiveness doesn’t mean putting up with whatever harm others might heap on us. It just means declining to harm ourselves further by holding onto hate.

At the risk of being redundant… it’s hard. Perhaps the hardest thing many of us will ever learn. And one of those things we probably need to learn over and over.

But, all that being said, what might we do with the energy it takes to hold grudges? To hate? To look back instead of forward?

I’m feeling blessed by a whole lot of teachers who’ve helped me learn – along a pretty complicated road – to intend forgiveness.

And by the possibility that I might just be one of those teachers for someone else.

For this moment, though, there is a Hearth to tend and an email to write and a big dog who needs to be brushed.

A big dog who, by the way, has taught me a whole lot about forgiveness.

And about being thankful for the kind folks in the world. Like you!

Blessings, from Phoebe and Luther and the Legendary Husband and me!

ps… should you be tempted to shop for creative gifts, I’d be thrilled if you’d wander through the updated FierceArtWithHeart shop and let me know what you think. There’s even a print of “Heart of Creation”! (The elves have decided that holiday discounts are in order and shipping is free in the USA!)

pps… Intentional Creativity® can help with the forgiving thing. There are new things on the horizon! email me if you’d like more information… suesvoice@gmail.com

I suspect you’ve been here, too!

Lots of things on your list. Many of them feeling huge. It’s not necessarily the most comforting place to be.

Especially on about four hours of sleep!

At some point in what passed for morning around here, I happened to check the groovy moon phase app on my phone. (This is definitely a growing edge in my education!)

We are currently in a waxing Gibbous phase, which means growing toward the full moon.

According to the app elves, my advice for this day was:

Break new ground, get back to the things you have been putting off, turn your creativity into success. Your family and home will benefit the most from this lucky day.

Maybe it was enough to shift some of the stressful stuff from right in front of my face to a bit farther out of focus. Or, maybe, the lack of solar guys crawling all over the house improved my perspective.

In any event, for some reason, today I could see how many things I could make better just in the course of wandering through the house.

So, I spent the day putting away and straightening and recycling as I made my way from one official thing to another.

You know the way..

On the way to the studio? Take the new box of neurographia pens and put them away!

Waiting for soup to bubble on the stove? Clean some stuff out of the fridge. (I mean, how many tiny partial bowls of bar-b-que sauce do we really need???)

Stashing a book on the bedside table? Scoop up a load of sheets and head for the washer!

Is a day like this going to save the world?

Nope!

But, it did let me get some stuff done on a very tired day.

Possibly because I put the energy it takes to ignore things to good use… And, I got some extra movement in there, too!

All of which suggests, not only with the moon app elves, but with a lot of the things I’ve been learning lately, that I am, indeed, a bit closer to creating good things with creativity.

Also, for the things that weren’t going so well, but need to, I actually asked for some help!

One day, as the old saying goes, at a time… with much love from me and the Studio Angels who are, not surprisingly, sound asleep!

ps… the painting is deep under-layers of a journey called Codex.

You know how an old story or an old song will suddenly burst with new meaning when you’re in a different place on your journey? Well, I’m having one of those moments!

Fair warning… this may be one of those stories where you kind of had to be there but, if you’ll hang with me, I’m betting you’ll find a spark of something just for you!

The story seems to start — but of course it doesn’t — on a teaching retreat I was blessed to attend with the folks from Channel Your Genius Academy this weekend.

Our topic was, in its most basic sense, getting un-stuck. (At least that’s what I heard through my filters from other traditions!)

The ah-ha moment for me had to do with MOTION as a key to getting where I want to go.

(Time out for duh’s and laughter!)

The thing is, we were talking about both literal and metaphorical motion.

After years of pain and orthopedic challenges, I’m all over the metaphorical kind of motion but more than a little resistant to the literal.

We’ll return to this in a bit.

First, calendar check!

“Today” is Halloween. Here’s our coping strategy…

But, today being Halloween means that tomorrow is All Saints Day and that gives me a chance to tell, once again, one of my favorite seminary stories.

Dr. Walter Brueggemann preaching in chapel on All Saints Day… After acknowledging that it was, perhaps, a bit outside the Reformed theology world view in which we were being “raised,” Walter said this:

The Saints are all those who believe for us on days when we can’t quite believe for ourselves.

Leaping a bit, but perhaps not so very far, we come to one of my personal Saints, a guy named Puddleglum.

For the for the uninitiated, Puddleglum is a Marsh Wiggle, who, with the Prince and some children, is being held by the Witch, who is busy explaining why their journey to Narnia is juvenile and futile. Puddleglum isn’t having it. Let’s listen in…

“One word, Ma’am,” he said, coming back from the fire; limping, because of the pain. “One word. All you’ve been saying is quite right, I shouldn’t wonder. I’m a chap who always liked to know the worst and then put the best face I can on it. So I won’t deny any of what you said. But there’s one thing more to be said, even so. Suppose we have only dreamed, or made up, all those things — trees and grass and sun and moon and stars and Aslan himself. Suppose we have. Then all I can say is that, in that case, the made-up things seem a good deal more important than the real ones. Suppose this black pit of a kingdom of yours is the only world. Well, it strikes me as a pretty poor one. And that’s a funny thing, when you come to think of it. We’re just babies making up a game, if you’re right. But four babies playing a game can make a play-world which licks your real world hollow. That’s why I’m going to stand by the play world. I’m on Aslan’s side even if there isn’t any Aslan to lead it. I’m going to live as like a Narnian as I can even if there isn’t any Narnia. So, thanking you kindly for our supper, if these two gentlemen and the young lady are ready, we’re leaving your court at once and setting out in the dark to spend our lives looking for Overland. Not that our lives will be very long, I should think; but that’s small loss if the world’s as dull a place as you say.”

C.S. Lewis, The Silver Chair, The Chronicles of Narnia

Now, I’ve loved this story for ages, but yesterday, in the midst of our retreat, I realized that part of the power is that Puddleglum is MOVING, even though anybody with half an ounce of sense knows it’s scary!

If you’ve been reading along for a bit, you know that I’m partial to questions. So, predictably, I asked a few in that retreat, which involved rather a lot of risking being the odd kid on my part.

One of those questions had to do with HOW we started putting what we were learning to work for us.

The answer, from Mellissa, our slightly quirky fearless leader, following in the footsteps of one of her biggest teachers, was GIRAFFE.

Really!

And then I got it. You see, the glimpse of the painting with which we began is known as Blossom and Aria. Aria is the Abundance Muse with the winged eye. Blossom is the mystical giraffe who appeared beside her in the last stages of the painting, despite the fact that I had no idea how or why to paint a giraffe.

Now I know more.

Specifically, that MOTION, now known as GIRAFFE, is the key to the abundance of body, mind, spirit, and community I so desire. I suspect it will take many kinds of motion. Today, I’m starting with dog brushing!

For now, may you feel your Saints believing for you, and believe for someone else.

ps… Lately, I’ve come to realize that Grandmothers are especially suited for Walter’s notion of being saints… of believing for our littles when they can’t quite believe for themselves!

You know how, before you set out on a journey, your head tends to spin with all kinds of thoughts and things to do? Well, this day has been like that!

The Journey is Legend. Like plane reservations and a safe place to stay, I’ve already begun in the sense of stocking up on paint, washing brushes from Insight, and beginning my journal.

My Muse, known these days as Charlotte, is ready! Ready enough that she had me out of bed at about 4:30 this morning, editing quiz questions and results descriptions. Charlotte doesn’t want anything to be missed while I’m wandering!

Eventually, she was content enough to be quiet while I snuck in a chair-nap.

I woke to about a ton of email, including a very exciting piece I’d been hoping for. Twelve new family members for my tree. (Several of my paintings are thrilled!)

It’s my Gramma Elsie’s family again. All four great-grandparents, 36 generations into the mists! One of them, a woman I know at the moment only as Leutgarde d’ Auvergne who was born in 935 CE. Really!

It boggles my mind!

And, clearly, I have some more exploring to do for I hear, thundering in the background of my awareness, Walter Brueggemann imploring me to, “Just tell the story!”

But, time out for a massage. Charlotte was almost as delighted as I was, for we cannot go adventuring if we’re not taking care of ourselves!

Jessica is amazing in all kinds of mystical energy ways. She’s also a gifted artist! (Stay tuned…)

Wandering through all this, the notion of medicine basket.

The photo is the non-traditional version which followed me home from Italy just about 3 years ago, along with a few other items essential to journeys like Legend.

In a way, a major contextual question of this moment in time is, What’s in our medicine baskets?

It’s not a new question. It is, perhaps, more urgent.

And, just between us, I’m grateful for a powerful journey that is happening in the relative safety of my studio, among the 4-footed angels.

There are many, many unknowns. What I do know is this… I’ll come home with more medicine for my basket.

In fact, I think I’ve already found the first bit.

When I was doing the chair-nap thing this morning, a lioness appeared and strongly suggested that she’d like to be included!

We shall see…

For now, Safe Journeys wherever they lead you and yours…

ps… if you’re looking for another journey option, here’s a fun one… fierceartwithheart! (You won’t need a big bag. We ship!)

I suspect the Weather Channel peeps are feeling like essential workers this summer.

Floods. Tornadoes. Hurricanes. Unprecedented heat waves. Fires.

I’m all for a welcome dose of rain pattering gently on the new metal roof, but this has not been that. In fact, for a huge part of the world, it’s been terrifying. And it’s touched a story that’s lived in my heart for a while.

Since the summer of 1989, to be exact.

I was Camp Nurse and Director2 for the Presbyteries of Orange and New Hope in North Carolina.

On that particular day, the kids – 100 or more of them – were out doing what kids do at Camp. Volley ball games. Sail boats. Arts & Crafts.

And then, as some of my Southern friends would say, “There come a storm”.

A tornado, to be exact.

The staff scrambled to get kids to the closest shelters. For about half of them, that meant the dining hall. My assignment on the emergency plan.

About three quarters of the kids were terrified. The others wanted to watch out the huge glass windows which was, of course, no place to be.

Step one: Get them all sitting in circles on the floor, far from windows. The littlest ones, under tables.

Step two: Prayer. It was, after all, church camp!

Step three: Something to do. We sacrificed some apples and oranges from the kitchen to use as balls for tossing around the circles. (And passed out some of the disgusting pink stuff known as “bug juice” so they’d have something to drink.)

Step four: As they started to calm, songs and stories.

The wind picked up some more. Branches and trees started falling nearby. A lawn chair flew by a window.

We sang louder.

Goin’ on a Squeegee Hunt is especially helpful for such a time! Especially the line that goes, “I’m not afraid!”

If you’re at all like me, the world has felt more than a bit like that stormy day all those years ago.

And most of us have had scared kids we love caught in the middle.

Grammy Camp starts Saturday!

Why?

Because there are things we can learn from each other, and realize in ourselves, to help those littles we love so much to ride out the days when there come a storm.

I’d be okay if we skipped the bug juice, but some skills for listening, for taking their fears seriously, and for not shaming or blaming them for being where they are would be a great start!

A medicine basket, if you will, helping to get conscious of what you have to offer in the midst of wherever they are.

And, in order to help them with their fears, we need help with our own!

Bandaids and M&M’s are not enough for these days!

Journaling and painting and sharing in circle work better for the Grandmother-Elder-Teacher- types. Even very brave Grandfathers!

In a moment I’m going to ask you to take action. Even if you’ve done it before and decided that now was not the time.

Now is the time.

And, due to a gift from a generous donor who knows how much this matters, the price has become more affordable.

There’s not much time left to choose. Hobby Parent and I are ready with a plan. A plan to worry less and help more.

Isn’t that what you need???

So, here it comes. Our request…

CLICK THIS THING!

ps… The resident Studio Angels have their camp t-shirts ready and they’re so hoping you’ll come, too!

pps… The art is my Work-in-Progress for today. (Which is a lot like all of us!) It began a year ago, when Congressman John Lewis passed… the stormy weather in my heart and in our world. Let’s look these storms in the eye and help our kids!

It has, as the old saying goes, been a bit of a day!

We’ll skip the early morning tree surgery next door and move on to the the fact that I had a massage appointment today. First time in 3 or 4 years! Part of the healing formerly scared muscles plan in Sunday’s not-quite-as-bizarre post.

This adventure occurred at home as I haven’t been driving much lately. (The whole brake thing feels really tricky!)

Fortunately, my new buddy, Jessica, had a Newfie when she was a kid and was thrilled to meet the official greeters. They, of course, were thrilled to meet her.

We did the brief history of all the scars, the allergies, and the positioning challenges with Phoebe sulking outside the door because there wasn’t room for her and the massage table.

Then, complete with aromatherapy, bird music, and some insights about Intentional Creativity®, I was reminded why massage can be a very good thing.

THEN, for reasons completely unknown, we wound up locked in the room where we’d been working.

Yep, locked in!

I didn’t even know there was a lock on the door.

Texting Bill brought no immediate rescue attempt from the basement and Jessica had more appointments scheduled.

Fortunately, there’s a drawer in that room with an odd collection of household tools that don’t have another place to live.

Hammer and screw driver in hand, I managed to get the hinge pin out of the top of the door. Bill arrived about then and somehow forced it open.

And, yes, I’ve already notified Greg, the fix-it-wizard, that his list just got a bit longer.

Here’s the thing, though, amidst all the weirdness.

While we were working, Jessica asked me about my girls and I told her that since the first moment I found out that the first granddaughter was on the way, my life has been changed.

Changed as in, I have two granddaughters growing up in this world and it could use a bit of work.

These days, more than a bit.

So, I had a chat with my Grammy-Sister-Art-Buddy, Hobby Parent, and, as part of our plans for Saturday’s workshop, we’re going to squeeze in a bit more really useful information and reduce the price.

You see, Saturday is the first anniversary of Congressman John Lewis’ passing, after serving 34 years in the US House of Representatives (D, GA-05). Lots of concerned Grandmothers, Elders, and other wise people are planning events across the US to encourage some Good Trouble, Lewis style.

And our workshop, Healing the World… starting with the Ones You Love is Good Trouble with paint!

Our kids… especially the teens and young adults, are facing unprecedented challenges and way too many of them are not making it. We can help. So, among lots of other cool things, we’ll be learning the three most crucial I am… statements we can help our kids learn. And we want you to be able to join us.

That’s the reason the new price, which is even lower than the early bird price was, is $134 for one or $234 for two.

Here’s the challenge!!!

I don’t know how to make the price change in the checkout process. I’ve emailed Veronica, the tech-wizard, and she’ll fix it as soon as she finds out I’m messing with the world again.

For now, CLICK HERE to read all the good stuff about when and why and what you’ll need. Share this with a friend. Maybe wait until Thursday morning to sign up. I promise we’ll make the money thing work!

Comment on the post or email me at suesvoice@gmail.com if you need help.

Our kids are counting on all of us. And Good Trouble is a good way to be!

ps… That’s Phoebe, up there, right under my feet, helping with the webinar last week. (Complete with toe licking!) She likes to help. And she’ll be sad if you’re not there! (Yes, I’m that committed!)