Exposed

The Mystery within

As I worked in my kitchen I had the T.V. tuned to a PBS special on the author Maya Angelo.  The program looked familiar. I thought I had previously seen it but as it continued to play I realized I had only watched part of it some years earlier. I faintly remembered losing interest in it, and even feeling a bit scandalized by Angelo’s telling of her difficult young life.  Remembering my feelings now intrigued me so I sat down to watch the program to its end.  My interest was peaked in my previous more closed reaction, and my now more open attitude.  I saw Angelo in a brave new light and admired her honesty, zeal and love of life and writing.  I empathized with her young, difficult journey and saw how it was her trials that formed and informed her and her writing.  My previous judgment made me uncomfortable.  But I was also grateful for its exposure.  And I wondered, what more judgments do I still need to let go of?     

Nadia Bolz-Weber, Author of "Pastrix, the Cranky Beautiful Faith of a Sinner & Saint" cautions us against judging others through the lens of our own personality.  When we do so she says “…we are distracted from the better part”.  I want to be open to the better part in what others have to offer.  I do not want to be judgmental.  I pray my past, more narrow parochial learning, will continue to be exposed. 

There is much to sort out from what I had been taught and experienced in my younger life.  “God Never Hurries” tells of my honest inquiry.  The darkness of patriarchy was made known to me and the natural world became my solace and teacher.  No doubt I too have scandalized some in its writing as I struggled to claim my life and voice.  But it is those  struggles that informed, and continue to inform, my life and my writing.  

What if we were grateful more often when our judgments of others are exposed?