David Baily Harned, in his book, Patience: How We Wait Upon the World, notes that
"patience seems to have lost its power to reconcile and heal and comfort. In its truncated and withered form the virtue has been isolated from both theology and common experience--not to mention common sense."
The following definition of the word "patience" comes from the book, Patience: How We Wait Upon the World by David Baily Harned:
"A person's triumph over all the diversions and afflictions that can test our powers of endurance, forbearance, and discipline."
We hear and talk so much about forgiveness.
The actuality of arriving at that place, however, is so unique to each one of us due to the specific attributes of each person and situation that it is often tough to define.
The only way to really forgive, is to just begin to want to, and then to actively do so, in all sobering thought that considers our role too, whatever that may look like from the perspective of naiveté, family culture, personal meekness, being bullied or made fun of, and our own hurtful acted-out animosities.
But once we have done the work—and by that I mean with God’s leadership so as to maintain a semblance of objectivity instead of a closed-minded path of “woe is me"—then we move on.
And by that, I mean we at some point close the door on the past, and let the new owners move in.
And those new owners are this: our transformed attitude and resulting confidence that the sincerely desired and honestly attained forgiveness can now be lived out.
We can thrive in this hard-won forgiveness by accepting and allowing those we have forgiven to be who they are, and the past be what it was (meaning we can’t change it, so don’t forgive and then attempt to change things going forward).
Again, this assumes we have actually done the mental assent of forgiveness through logically and objectively examining ourselves, others and the past under the microscope of God’s guidance and revelation.
This forgiveness does not need to condone anything or anyone, and it does not give permission to the past or the persons we have forgiven to continue to impact or touch us.
Instead, in a forgiving, accepting manner, we have no part in the people or places we have confidently put behind us via forgiveness (for family members or co-workers with whom we must continue to be around, we separate ourselves with appropriate emotional and mental boundaries, and keep a cordial physical distance between us, bowing to no pressure whatsoever to reveal personal details or to “join in” and place ourselves in their control).
We meet our own expectations for our own behavior, not other people's expectations. And we drop our expectations for others to be what they clearly are not and have no intention, at this time, of being.
Neutral impartiality is our new normal with those we have forgiven when we must be in their presence.
We simply live and let live, in a fresh paradigm of healthy guardrails, under no illusions that any continued attempts on our part to change another person or situation will solve anything.
If the person we have forgiven chooses, at some future point in time, to mature, that is up to them.
If they desire a sincere reconciliation and exhibit a contrite heart of apology—we decide whether their motivations are honest and humble, or mere manipulation to pull us back in to assuage their insecurities.
As The Who song goes, “don’t be fooled again.”
A forgiving state of mind establishes us in steadfast wisdom and strength of unwavering integrity and self-respect.
We focus on, invest in and come alive with the joy of appreciation for those with whom we do remain grounded in reciprocal, authentic love and compatibility, all the while at peace with those we have taken deliberate steps to contextually understand and thus, forgive.
Copyright Barb Harwood
Habitual complaint derives from lack of gratefulness--that deep-seated, top-of-mind appreciation for what we do have materially, in health, and in relationships.
A state of habitual complaint derives from a perspective or motive of concern, worry, resentment, hurt, anger, disappointment or self-imposed inadequacy, and thrives because it makes our vulnerability less scary.
In complaint, we feel control--but it is a chimera.
And while we strut in the false esteem of criticisms, hoping to be something, we miss the sound foundation and peace of what is genuinely good, joyfully true and miraculously right with our world, and the world at large. All of which, ironically, check vulnerability's fear with a serene confidence and grounded hope.
copyright Barb Harwood
Each new day begins a blank, and very clean, slate.
Do we take it?
Do we stand in the face of morning and decide, desperately or calmly, as circumstances would have it, that within that virgin moment, we will own it and not merely let it slide with the residual momentum of all the days that preceded?
Will we make today a different beginning, an alternative reality that can actually occur through our simple choosing?
A year from now, when 365 mornings have passed—365 individual moments of decision—will we reflect upon the metamorphosis from existence into a full experience of patient refusal to repeat the unthinkingly habitual?
Will we take that slant of light emanating from the east and declare each day for what we’ve often envisioned and hardly dared to hope for, in spite of everything (attitudinally and physically present in the necessary of the daily and professional but forgoing passive resignation, auto-pilot negativity and absent-minded time-fillers?)
We can take that day.
We can emerge from our sleepy beds, or places of nemesis of sleep, and just take it.
Copyright Barb Harwood
Henry Kissinger on the Internet's impact on truth:
"...our age is on the verge of a changed conception of the nature of truth. Nearly every website contains some kind of customization function based on Internet tracing codes designed to ascertain a user's background and preferences. These methods are intended to encourage users 'to consume more content' and, in so doing, be exposed to more advertising, which ultimately drives the Internet economy. These subtle directions are in accordance with a broader trend to manage the traditional understanding of human choice. Goods are sorted and prioritized to present those 'which you would like,' and online news is presented as 'news which will best suit you.' Two different people appealing to a search engine with the same question do not necessarily receive the same answers. The concept of truth is being relativized and individualized--losing its universal character. Information is presented as being free. In fact, the recipient pays for it by supplying data to be exploited by persons unknown to him, in ways that further shape the information being offered to him.
Where, in a world of ubiquitous social networks, does the individual find the space to develop the fortitude to make decisions that, by definition, cannot be based on a consensus? The adage that prophets are not recognized in their own time is true in that they operate beyond conventional conception--that is what made them prophets. In our era, the lead time for prophets might have disappeared altogether. The pursuit of transparency and connectivity in all aspects of existence, by destroying privacy, inhibits the development of personalities with the strength to take lonely decisions."
Henry Kissinger, in his book World Order
The following quote from Henry Kissinger looks at the impact of the Internet on humans' sourcing and ultimate use of what they read online.
"In the contemporary world, human consciousness is shaped through an unprecedented filter. Television, computers, and smartphones compose a trifecta offering nearly constant interaction with a screen throughout the day. Human interactions in the physical world are now pushed relentlessly into the virtual world of networked devices. Recent studies suggest that adult Americans spend on average roughly half of their waking hours in front of a screen, and the figure continues to grow.
What is the impact of this cultural upheaval...?
For all the great and indispensable achievements the Internet has brought to our era, its emphasis is on the actual more than the contingent, on the factual rather than the conceptual, on values shaped by consensus rather than by intersection. Knowledge of history and geography is not essential for those who can evoke their data with the touch of a button. The mindset for walking lonely political paths may not be self-evident to those who seek confirmation by hundreds, sometimes thousands of friends on Facebook.
...philosophers and poets have long separated the mind's purview into three components: information, knowledge, and wisdom. The Internet focuses on the realm of information, whose spread it facilitates exponentially. Ever-more-complex functions are devised, particularly capable of responding to questions of fact, which are not themselves altered by the passage of time. Search engines are able to handle increasingly complex questions with increasing speed. Yet a surfeit of information may paradoxically inhibit the acquisition of knowledge and push wisdom even further away than it was before.
The poet T.S. Eliot captured this in his "Choruses from 'The Rock'":
Where is the Life we have lost in living?
Where is the wisdom we have lost in knowledge?
Where is the knowledge we have lost in information?
Facts are rarely self-explanatory; their significance, analysis, and interpretation...depend on context and relevance. As ever more issues are treated as if of a factual nature, the premise becomes established that for every question there must be a researchable answer, that problems and solutions are not so much to be thought through as to be 'looked up.' But in the relations between states--and in many other fields--information, to be truly useful, must be placed within a broader context of history and experience to emerge as actual knowledge. And a society is fortunate if its leaders can occasionally rise to the level of wisdom."
Henry Kissinger, in his book, World Order
