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Pie

Imagine that all the love, affection, and resources (time, finances, emotional space, etc.) that each of us has is a pie. This pie may be larger or smaller depending on capacity and circumstances in a person’s life. Now, in order to be healthy and satisfied, each person must constantly be consuming an entire pie. But, after eating a single slice of our own pie, the rest of our pie cannot satisfy us or give us any nutritional value. What are we to do? We must give ourselves the first slice of our pie. This is self-love or self-care. That first slice imbues all of the other slices of our pie with nutritional value. But, after we have consumed the first slice of our own pie, the rest of our pie will give us nothing if we eat it ourselves. We must give the other slices of our pie to other people. Still, we must consume a whole pie to be satisfied, so others must give to us as well. In a healthy, functioning society and group, it would look like this: each of us eats our own first slice
Recent posts

Tempting Christ: Luke 4

The fourth chapter of the book of Luke describes the temptation of Christ in the wilderness. Since we are all Christ, we all endure this in various ways:  1 Then Jesus, remembering that He was Christ and fully Divine, returned from the Jordan and was led by the Spirit into a place of lack and hunger 2 so he could be tempted for this time. He had nothing that could fulfill his need, and afterward his need was great. 3 And the tempter said to Him, "You can't really be Christ if you feel so low and down and needy. If you were really Christ, you could provide everything for yourself easily!" 4 But Jesus answered him saying, "It is not what I do that makes Me Christ, but who I AM." 5 Then the tempter, seeing the great need and lack that Christ was walking in, took Him up to a high mountain and showed Him the answer and fulfillment to every one of his needs. 6 Then the tempter said to him, "I will give you everything you need. I will love and support you. I will

The Concept of Good and Evil Leads to Complacency and Complicity in the Things We Wish to Avoid

I am proud to be an American. I love my country, and I think it is the best place for me to live. I know that freedom is a fundamental element of our history and our present. I also know that freedom has not been given equally to everyone. I used to believe that I couldn't be proud of my country or a patriotic citizen if I acknowledged or decried any of the issues that existed throughout our history and still exist today. Yes, I acknowledged slavery, "but that was over a hundred years ago, let's get over it." Yes, I acknowledged racism, "but it's so rare and most people aren't racist today, let's get over it." Or so I thought. I was raised in the dichotomous mental concept of good and evil. Something and someone was either good or evil, never both. Or if they were both, "that was a while ago, let's get over it." And maybe they still had a few issues, but we could only acknowledge the small ones and maybe excuse them with "t

Toxic Positivity

Toxic positivity is a new term going around social media these days to describe what it's like when someone pushes down all negative emotions and experiences instead of processing them. Instead, they focus only on the positive. Some examples of this can include "fake it til you make it" or "speaking only beautiful words."  Before I get into why toxic positivity is so toxic, let me just say that I'm not saying positivity is toxic. It is important to have a healthy mindset which includes hope, the ability to see the good in life, and the ability to plan for future beautiful things. Affirmations and mantras can be wonderful, but they're not enough on their own. Unfortunately, toxic positivity doesn't allow for a brighter future because in order to have all of these things, one must heal from the negative experiences that have happened in the past. In order to heal, one must acknowledge what happened, talk freely about it, and process through to t

Ripping Off the Blanket (Dismantling the Ten Commandments)

There is this idea of a universal truth of right and wrong. In this idea, God makes a blanket statement and rule for all of humanity, and it is the duty of humanity to follow it without question or fail. The problem with this point of view is that it does not allow for individuality. There is almost no situation in which a blanket statement applies to everyone all of the time. I suppose there are some, all humans being worthy of Love for example, but even that appears different in application. (Each human needs different expressions of Love at different times). Thus I would say that any blanket statement of right and wrong is inherently legalistic, but perhaps that is a blanket statement, so I won't be a hypocrite. I will just say that I am learning that we don't have the omniscience that is needed to impose our view of right and wrong upon another person and that our sovereignty extends only to our own lives, never to another's. Some of the biggest religious rules, o

Ripping Off the Blanket

Every religion has this idea that their theology is the best. Many have this mentality that they have to convert others to their religion because their way of life is the only really, truly good way of life and all others are secondary, are less-than, are not as good. When I was a Christian, I loved others as best I could, but I did so by wanting to change them, to give them the things I thought were the best things in my life. I thought the best way I could love people was by making them like me, by making them believe and do what I thought was right, and I thought that was what God wanted because I had been told what I was telling others: this way and no other is the Word of the Lord. I hate theology because it takes the inherent goodness of a person's heart and makes them hateful and abusive toward people they're trying to love or save. If I take a person, a unique individual expression of Yahweh who is doing and being themselves and I tell them that the way they are is in

Why Creation Isn't Waiting For You to Rule and Reign

There's this idea that creation is waiting for the sons of God to take their places and make the world what it needs to be, this idea that some day out there Yahweh will come back and take us to Heaven and reign from His Throne. Once we remember sovereignty and that we are One with Yahweh, we realize that we are the ones sitting on this throne with Yahweh. We also need to remember that time and eternity are One. Time is the instrument of Our growth, and We actually use it to grow eternity. Once we realize these two things, we can see that We are sovereign in our own lives and ruling and reigning from this throne right now. The instrument of Our dominion is Our choices. This is what Paul talked about in 1 Corinthians 3 where he talks about how we each choose what materials to build our lives with. Some choose jewels, some choose clay. I, as the sovereign in my own life, get to decide what materials to build my life with. However, I cannot judge another's life. As each of u