Anger. And Truth.

1. Do you think there is an important distinction between anger and the way one expresses anger?

I tend to think so. I think anger the emotion is like any other emotion — having no moral content in itself, as valid as any other feeling, just as permissible. Even when the anger is irrational, or out of proportion, it’s still just a feeling — it’s possible to recognize its irrationality or disproportion and still acknowledge the fact of the feeling.

How one expresses anger is different, though. I don’t think it’s generally okay to hit or kick or bite or yell at people, for example. And I think one should be careful about banging and slamming and stomping, too, making sure that nothing important is broken or hurt. It does seem that anger needs some sort of forceful physical outlet, but it still needs to be a safe and appropriate one: chop wood, punch a pillow, go running, throw darts (at a dartboard, of course), etc.

It’s not pleasant when someone is angry at you, whether their anger is rational or proportional or not.

But it’s more manageable when the someone can still speak with respect, and can delay the physical expression until a safe time and place. There have been times when I’ve been so angry I can’t speak with a pleasant tone of voice, but I CAN tell the other person that I’m speaking to communicate, not to attack, even though my voice sounds nasty.

What do you think?

2. The children’s lesson in church today was about the armor of God metaphor in Ephesians. One item is the belt of truth. It has never occurred to me to associate it with TELLING the truth — for me it’s usually connoted KNOWING the truth.

Not that I think telling the truth is unimportant. Just that what we need to stay strong in faith is not so much keeping our behavior up to a certain standard, but in knowing the Gospel and being open to it speaking to all parts of our life.

What do you think?

Missing no more!

The missing children I posted about in September are no longer missing!

Their kidnapper (non-custodial mother) is in jail, and the kids, who seem okay, will be fetched by their grandparents and their father is on his way for the reunion.

Please rejoice with us, and continue in prayer for healing and recovery.

How green is your tree? And do you care?

Just about every Christmas, our NY pastor prints the Wendell Berry Christmas tree poem in the church bulletin. No offense to our pastor, whom we respect and love, but I hate that poem. It’s all about how the amazing and saintly Berry doesn’t desecrate his tree with anything so yucky as artificial lights, and so on. Or at least to us it comes across that smug and arrogant.

As with so many things, I find myself equally offended by (instead of equally gracious towards) those who are smugly green and those who are cheerfully fashionable.

My tree is artificial. It may have involved a yucky manufacturing process and transportation to the store, but it was only made once and is reusable. And doesn’t need to be watered. It is too big in diameter for our taste — one of these days, if we can, we’d like to trade it for a skinny one. I’m also increasingly interested in the kind with short needles — what are those, fir? instead of bushy branches.

It bears ornaments that I grew up with as well as more recent gifts. I don’t think I’ve made or bought an ornament since we lived in Richmond and I made one with the kids at the Montessori school where I worked.

They are all materials, natural and synthetic.

The ones I like best are sentimental (like mom’s cross-stitch or nunny’s bead wreaths) or about Jesus and faith (like the ones I made in college, which are also sentimental), or just pretty (like the flower or the snowflake or the bell), or kitties.

I have a length of some kind of gold trim / braid — much skinnier than garland — but it’s not long enough for the tree. So we do without garland. I don’t like the bushy kind. A string of cranberries or popcorn or both would be pretty but more work than I care to put into decorating (and only oil-popped popcorn strings well) — or a string of red beads to look like cranberries.

The topper is an angel — handmade, I believe, in what feels like cotton fabrics and threads.

There are also some felt bows that give some sense of unity to the tree.

And colored — but tiny — lights.

So what’s your tree like?

Are you super-Berry green, with an outdoor living tree decked out all winter in edible treats for the deer, squirrels, and birds?

Are you super-faithful, with only ornaments that reflect the reason for the season?

Are you unabashedly passionate about your kitschy big bubble lights and retro silver tree?

Do tell!

What kind of apples are these?

Toddler routines

Your turn! If you’re a mama or daddy, please add your two cents in the comments.

Do you (or did you) bother trying to structure your toddler’s day?

If so, what elements of structure were important to you? (I.e. meals, baths, different kinds of play time, chores (yours or theirs), naps, etc…)

How did you go about creating and managing the routine?

The decision that seems to be making itself

Have I had much positive to say about my current therapist?

It seems that, while it hasn’t been a catastrophic failure, this round of therapy has been relatively unhelpful from the beginning.

It could be that what I most needed at that point back in May was to try Zoloft again, and that talk therapy wasn’t as needed.

It could be that the improved social situation has boosted my resilience, hope, and confidence.

It could be that my current therapist really is fairly simplistic; perhaps good in crisis, but not so helpful in the subtleties of fine-tuning during functioning non-acute seasons.

The two bits of art therapy we’ve done were pleasant, but not particularly useful or insightful as far as I can tell.

Talk is usually short, full of generalities, and platitudinous. She points out negative self-talk. Reminds me not to try to read minds. Wishes I could get out of my head more and not overthink everything. Something about our interaction puts an end to conversations. It’s not so much that I feel she is wrong, or that I think she wants me to stop talking about something, but that when she brings out a statement of the obvious, I no longer have anything to say about the topic.

I tried to talk about that today, but it didn’t really go anywhere either. She expressed complete willingness to get specific and in depth, but it seems dependent on me to direct, and I’m not sure how to go about that.

Previous thoughts about quitting this round of therapy have been alarming and dismaying, but now I’m feeling a little more steady about it — I think I can survive without therapy right now. Not that I’m all better and no longer have any issues, but that I have some skills to practice and ideas to remember, and my life situation is fairly supportive.

I have another appointment in two weeks. I plan to go to that one and see how I feel then.

Meanwhile, some questions for y’all:

Do you think some people, sometimes, act out of mere politeness without actually being interested in you (or someone else), or do you think that people will let you know if they don’t want you around? How do people send the message if they don’t want you around?

What do you do when there are people in your life you don’t particularly want to be with much — do you try to send that message (if so, how?) or try to hide it?

Missing children

The kids are found! The kidnapper mother is in jail!

These children are related to a family in our church. They are asking for help locating them and their abductors — the mother and stepfather.

Our grand daughters were abducted by their non-custodial mother and their step-dad (who may be armed and dangerous) over three months ago. U.S. Marshals have been searching for them, but have run out of leads. We need your help. Keep your eye out for them. Copy this email and post it in any public place you deem appropriate…even your church bulletin board. Many years ago, Snell was a preacher at a Baptist church and might be using unknowing churches to help them. They may have changed hair color, etc. to avoid detection and may be traveling in a 2006 white 4 door double cab Chevrolet Silverado pickup bearing Lousiana license plate #W768358. If sited, do not approach…call police immediately! Please pray for their safe return…Rodney and Freida Brown.

Missing Person Details

Date Picture Updated: 9/13/2008

Name: Grayson Danel Brown

Case Number: A0808002

Case Type: Involuntary – Family Abduction

Last Seen in: Ft. Worth ( Tarrant County )

Last Seen on: 7/17/2008

Height: 4′ 06″

Weight: 60 lbs.

Age Missing: 7

Eye Color: Blue

Hair Color: Blonde

Date of Birth: 10/8/2000

Race: White

Sex: Female

State Missing From: Texas

Country Missing From: USA

Circumstances: In the company of the non-custodial mother Dawn Kathleen Brown-Snell and 2 siblings that also listed as missing. They may be traveling in a 2006 white 4 door double cab Chevrolet Silverado pickup bearing Lousiana license plate #W768358. A warrant has been issued for Brown-Snell

=========================

Date Picture Updated: 9/13/2008

Name: Canon Riley Brown

AKA: Cannon Riley Brown

Case Number: A0808002

Case Type: Involuntary – Family Abduction

Last Seen in: Ft. Worth ( Tarrant County )

Last Seen on: 7/17/2008

Height: 3′ 06″

Weight: 45 lbs.

Age Missing: 4

Eye Color: Blue

Hair Color: Brown

Date of Birth: 12/26/2003

Race: White

Sex: Female

State Missing From: Texas

Country Missing From: USA

Circumstances: In the company of the non-custodial mother Dawn Kathleen Brown-Snell and 2 siblings that also listed as missing. They may be traveling in a 2006 white 4 door double cab Chevrolet Silverado pickup bearing Lousiana license plate #W768358. A warrant has been issued for Brown-Snell

Date Picture Updated: 9/13/2008

Name: Sawyer Elise Brown

AKA: Sawyon Elise Brown

Case Number: A0808002

Case Type: Involuntary – Family Abduction

Last Seen in: Ft. Worth ( Tarrant County )

Last Seen on: 7/17/2008

Height: 2′ 06″

Weight: 30 lbs.

Age Missing: 2

Eye Color: Blue

Hair Color: Blonde

Date of Birth: 10/29/2005

Race: White

Sex: Female

State Missing From: Texas

Country Missing From: USA

Circumstances: In the company of the non-custodial mother Dawn Kathleen Brown-Snell and 2 siblings that also listed as missing. They may be traveling in a 2006 white 4 door double cab Chevrolet Silverado pickup bearing Lousiana license plate #W768358. A warrant has been issued for Brown-Snell

These three children were abducted by:

Michael George Snell

Dawn Kathleen Brown-Snell

ANYONE HAVING INFORMATION SHOULD CONTACT:

Missing Persons Clearinghouse
Texas Department of Public Safety
P O Box 4087
Austin, Texas 78773-0422
Phone: (512) 424-5074
Helpline: (800) 346-3243

OR

National Center for Missing & Exploited Children
1-800-843-5678 (1-800-THE-LOST)

OR

Fort Worth Police Department ( Texas ) 1-817-335-4222

Becoming me

Thordora wrote a list describing the person she would like to be. An interesting exercise.

To what extent is it possible to become the person one wants to be? I think we can make progress on a great many things — changing certain habits, patterns of behavior — but I don’t think we can ever rid ourselves of all the things we dislike about ourselves. Thordora (and Jabez, if you read his actual prayer and not just the silly book about it) writes about not wanting to hurt people. I don’t think we can ever be free from that in this earthly, fallen life, although we can and ought to try to minimize the frequency and intensity of these hurts, and work for reconciliation and forgiveness when they do occur.

Who would I like to be? Here’s a rather random, surely partial, list.

1. Feminine — to be able to own my femaleness without being strident or ashamed, in the ways I dress and think and interact.

2. Gentle and gracious from strength and security — I want to be so firmly secure in God’s love and protection that I don’t need to be defensively fearful, contemptuous, aggressive, judgmental, threatened.

3. Semi-permeable membranes — I want to have strong but flexible boundaries, so that I can be open for real intimacy, strong enough to be a friend, but wise about the relational risks I take.

4. Centered — I want to be firmly myself, present in each moment, with my various internal parts appropriately balanced, i.e. not ruled by the internal critic, impulse, emotion, or any other aspect, but to live from wise mind, by faith.

5. After God’s own heart — I want to be appropriately related to God my father. To trust him, love him, seek him, even obey him; to repent, to believe; to be honest before him; to be like him; to remain myself and yet be utterly his.

6. Healthy — I want to be more active AND more simple AND more restful. To eat better and make good use of the garden and orchard. To spend less time just sitting, but more time really at rest. To find physical activity that is beautiful and productive, instead of disjointed, separated exercise.

7. Integrated — I want to more fully own and be all the different things that I am, and to fully own and hold together all the different things other people in my life are.

8. Disciplined — I want to better understand how to be lovingly disciplined; to take care of myself, my house, my family, my spiritual life, etc, without being legalistic.

9. Skillful — I want to develop better DBT skills — mindfulness, interpersonal effectiveness, distress tolerance, and affect management.

10. Found — I want to finally and completely and thoroughly understand what it means to lose my life for the sake of the Gospel, and thereby to find it — a concept that seems really important to my faith and that nevertheless seems very confusing and difficult to know how to apply.

Who do you want to be?

Do you have an example of some one thing you have tried to change about yourself, and how the effort has gone so far?

———

Interesting… I didn’t explicitly mention wanting to not be depressed and anxious anymore.

Again

Those of you who pray, please again pray for my friend Thordora, who is going through an awful time right now.

Those of you who know someone (or are someone) with mental illness of any kind know that it’s chronic, recurring, and so “again” is normal, expected, par for the course.

Let’s pray that this acute episode would work itself out without suicide or divorce or anything else horribly destructive. Pray for good helpers to step in. Pray for courage to go find those helpers. Pray for faith that this too will pass, that it’s worth the working through. Pray for the long-term endurance that holds steady under every “again.”

Introducing discipline

I am curious as to what you, my dear readers, have done to introduce or further develop discipline when your child/ren was about Amy’s age / maturity level.

Who’s done time-outs — how do you do them, how did you teach your kids about them, how did it work?

Who’s done something else? Details, please.