My life is an open book
Jun. 5th, 2006 05:35 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
coffeesnob318Well, actually, my life is reflected in how I react to books. Really, life is reflected in how we react to everything. But books are what I'm talking about now.
Yeah. It's Monday.
So it's been a while since I updated on resolution progress. As for running and paying off the car...yep. Still doing both. Making progress, although not as much as I would like to make.
Same goes for the books, but here is the progress that I have made. It seems that I'm taking longer to read than I normally would because the books I'm reading strike me with something about my life. I've been more introspective than usual lately (which means it's amazing that I leave the house at all) - writing in my paper journal more. So these "reviews" may give a little away about the books, but they're really more about how the books affected me.
Ok, since I'm even boring myself here, I'll move on.
Previously, in coffeesnob's journal...
1. The Ragamuffin Gospel by Brennan Manning
2. Me Talk Pretty One Day by David Sedaris
3. Blue Like Jazz: Nonreligious Thoughts on Christian Spirituality by Donald Miller
4. Flipped by Wendelin van Draanen
5. Yeah, I said it by Wanda Sykes
6. Found in Translation by Kim Moor
7. My Point...and I do have one by Ellen DeGeneres
8. Why Girls are Weird by Pamela Ribon
9. Velvet Elvis: Repainting the Christian Faith by Rob Bell
And now....
The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd
Maggie let me borrow her library copy of this book, and I'm very grateful. I can't believe I've never read this before. I love the way she writes. It was an easy read, but there were also points of depth. Meaning doesn't have to be hard to muddle through.
My favorite part of the book was the notion of a kindness that doesn't have to always be right. She let Lily lie to her and let her believe that she was actually deceiving her, patiently waiting for the time she would confess and unalteringly loving her the same when she did. It was more important to be trustworthy than to be trusted. I'm not sure I'm at the place yet that I can do this - I enjoy calling people on their bs too much - but I hope to be there someday. And the kindness in letting Lily's father save face. !!! Knowing that they could easily overpower him but giving him an out. Giving him a chance to leave with dignity and make the outcome his decision. It was the most effective thing that they could have done. Any other course of action would not have ended it, but since they let him make the decision to leave, he will never bother them again. There is such wisdom in knowing that real justice is not served by the oppressed becoming the oppressor. Having the ability - and in this case, arguably even the right - to exert power and control over another person yet purposefully and deliberately choosing not to do so - this is how the world should be.
Anyway, I enjoyed it very much. I can't wait to read more that she's written.
Undomestic Goddess by Sophie Kinsella
Yes. I got something about life out of a book written by the Shopaholic author. You know what? Shame on you if you think you're too sophisticated to do so. You're missing out. :)
Wow. Humility and patience. Enough with these lessons, already! Although perhaps growing impatient with the lesson is a sign that perhaps I need more of them....grr...
[Aside - the sunrise is gorgeous right now. Seriously breathtaking. Just wanted to share.]
This is my favorite of the books I've read by Kinsella. Sure, the others were about shopping, and there is a very special place in my heart (if not in my reality) for spending frivolous amounts of money on crap I don't really need, but this one was better. And, after being smacked about by all the non-subtle references to biting one's tongue and the time for humility, and what happens when it doesn't...happen, there was a really lovely quote near the end: "There is no such thing as the biggest mistake of your existence. There's no such thing as ruining your life. Life's a pretty resilient thing, it turns out."
Also, it makes me want a cottage in the English countryside.
The Velveteen Woman: Becoming Real Through God's Transforming Love by Brenda Waggoner
OK. I admit. Parts of it were as cheesy as it sounds. But I loooooved the Velveteen Rabbit, so, despite the subtitle, I picked it up and gave it a read. And this David Crowder quote - "I'm so bored of little gods while standing on the edge of something large" - kept running through my head all the way through. David Crowder makes a nice soundtrack.
The book is mainly about honesty with God and others about where you are and the freedom that that brings. And I constantly need this message. I'm so sick of religion. I'm especially sick of the religion that I see in me. It's just a coverup to mask where I really am. It's a lie to think that if I could just be good enough that God would love me more. It just makes me think of me and not of God. I just want to be with God. I just want to feel loved again. Why is this so hard? Why do I insist on making this so hard? "When I realize I'm a whole lot worse than I ever thought I was, I can finally accept God's love, because it makes grace necessary. Then I can freely open my arms to God's love, instead of trying to earn his approval."
And it was so funny. Just as she would begin to talk in circles and I was screaming, "But I don't know how!" she would say, "But not knowing is ok." Hence the circles, I suppose.
Great Thing About God #234,643,684,906 - My pain is of great significance to Jesus. It is not measured in comparison to his own. I've been spending a lot of time apologizing for being so whiny and bratty, but if whiny and bratty is where I am, that's what he wants. He takes it because he wants to.
Mainly, it just reiterated what I've been leaning toward lately of just relaxing - I don't have everything all together, and that's ok. Seeing scars as life experiences with God means I'm not so busy trying to hide them. To be more comfortable with - no, to revel in - uncertainty.
So, after muddling through some of the cheese (mmm...cheese...), that's what I took away from it.
I'm about a third of the way through the next one - Down to the Dirt. It's a little different than I'm used to reading. Someone in Toronto called it Angry Young Man Fiction. Interesting. I picked it up because I am always thinking, whenever I read something by certain feminist authors, "If only ____ (insert name of one of a myriad of highly conservative Texas men that I am graced to know) would read this and really try to understand, it would do him a world of good." It's so easy to say, "If you would just...it would be good for you," until you = me. I have this compulsion. I want to help people undertand others who are very different from themselves. And in Texas, particularly when I go to visit The Parents in West Texas, I'm that weird other. But I can't make other people understand my point of view. Sure, I can share it - and it's my responsibility to do so if I want to be heard. But I can't make them want to listen. Even if I can get them to agree that it is good for us as humans to hear things we don't agree with, they usually just take that as an invitation to share their point of view. I get a lot of chances to understand things outside my bubble. In that sense, Texas is a friggin' cornucopia of opportunity. But I can't make anyone want to return the favor.
What I can do is be the change I want to see in the world (thanks for the tip, Gandhi). I can choose to listen - not just to the messages which inevitably bombard me, but to those that would never reach me unless I decide to become a willing audience. So picking up this book is my decision to do just that.
So far, so good. I'm not as offended as I expected to be. I am expecting to disagree with a lot of the attitudes portrayed - either by a character or by the author himself - but so far, I'm finding that angry young men and angry young women are more similar than different. It's been interesting so far.
Yeah. It's Monday.
So it's been a while since I updated on resolution progress. As for running and paying off the car...yep. Still doing both. Making progress, although not as much as I would like to make.
Same goes for the books, but here is the progress that I have made. It seems that I'm taking longer to read than I normally would because the books I'm reading strike me with something about my life. I've been more introspective than usual lately (which means it's amazing that I leave the house at all) - writing in my paper journal more. So these "reviews" may give a little away about the books, but they're really more about how the books affected me.
Ok, since I'm even boring myself here, I'll move on.
Previously, in coffeesnob's journal...
1. The Ragamuffin Gospel by Brennan Manning
2. Me Talk Pretty One Day by David Sedaris
3. Blue Like Jazz: Nonreligious Thoughts on Christian Spirituality by Donald Miller
4. Flipped by Wendelin van Draanen
5. Yeah, I said it by Wanda Sykes
6. Found in Translation by Kim Moor
7. My Point...and I do have one by Ellen DeGeneres
8. Why Girls are Weird by Pamela Ribon
9. Velvet Elvis: Repainting the Christian Faith by Rob Bell
And now....
The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd
Maggie let me borrow her library copy of this book, and I'm very grateful. I can't believe I've never read this before. I love the way she writes. It was an easy read, but there were also points of depth. Meaning doesn't have to be hard to muddle through.
My favorite part of the book was the notion of a kindness that doesn't have to always be right. She let Lily lie to her and let her believe that she was actually deceiving her, patiently waiting for the time she would confess and unalteringly loving her the same when she did. It was more important to be trustworthy than to be trusted. I'm not sure I'm at the place yet that I can do this - I enjoy calling people on their bs too much - but I hope to be there someday. And the kindness in letting Lily's father save face. !!! Knowing that they could easily overpower him but giving him an out. Giving him a chance to leave with dignity and make the outcome his decision. It was the most effective thing that they could have done. Any other course of action would not have ended it, but since they let him make the decision to leave, he will never bother them again. There is such wisdom in knowing that real justice is not served by the oppressed becoming the oppressor. Having the ability - and in this case, arguably even the right - to exert power and control over another person yet purposefully and deliberately choosing not to do so - this is how the world should be.
Anyway, I enjoyed it very much. I can't wait to read more that she's written.
Undomestic Goddess by Sophie Kinsella
Yes. I got something about life out of a book written by the Shopaholic author. You know what? Shame on you if you think you're too sophisticated to do so. You're missing out. :)
Wow. Humility and patience. Enough with these lessons, already! Although perhaps growing impatient with the lesson is a sign that perhaps I need more of them....grr...
[Aside - the sunrise is gorgeous right now. Seriously breathtaking. Just wanted to share.]
This is my favorite of the books I've read by Kinsella. Sure, the others were about shopping, and there is a very special place in my heart (if not in my reality) for spending frivolous amounts of money on crap I don't really need, but this one was better. And, after being smacked about by all the non-subtle references to biting one's tongue and the time for humility, and what happens when it doesn't...happen, there was a really lovely quote near the end: "There is no such thing as the biggest mistake of your existence. There's no such thing as ruining your life. Life's a pretty resilient thing, it turns out."
Also, it makes me want a cottage in the English countryside.
The Velveteen Woman: Becoming Real Through God's Transforming Love by Brenda Waggoner
OK. I admit. Parts of it were as cheesy as it sounds. But I loooooved the Velveteen Rabbit, so, despite the subtitle, I picked it up and gave it a read. And this David Crowder quote - "I'm so bored of little gods while standing on the edge of something large" - kept running through my head all the way through. David Crowder makes a nice soundtrack.
The book is mainly about honesty with God and others about where you are and the freedom that that brings. And I constantly need this message. I'm so sick of religion. I'm especially sick of the religion that I see in me. It's just a coverup to mask where I really am. It's a lie to think that if I could just be good enough that God would love me more. It just makes me think of me and not of God. I just want to be with God. I just want to feel loved again. Why is this so hard? Why do I insist on making this so hard? "When I realize I'm a whole lot worse than I ever thought I was, I can finally accept God's love, because it makes grace necessary. Then I can freely open my arms to God's love, instead of trying to earn his approval."
And it was so funny. Just as she would begin to talk in circles and I was screaming, "But I don't know how!" she would say, "But not knowing is ok." Hence the circles, I suppose.
Great Thing About God #234,643,684,906 - My pain is of great significance to Jesus. It is not measured in comparison to his own. I've been spending a lot of time apologizing for being so whiny and bratty, but if whiny and bratty is where I am, that's what he wants. He takes it because he wants to.
Mainly, it just reiterated what I've been leaning toward lately of just relaxing - I don't have everything all together, and that's ok. Seeing scars as life experiences with God means I'm not so busy trying to hide them. To be more comfortable with - no, to revel in - uncertainty.
So, after muddling through some of the cheese (mmm...cheese...), that's what I took away from it.
I'm about a third of the way through the next one - Down to the Dirt. It's a little different than I'm used to reading. Someone in Toronto called it Angry Young Man Fiction. Interesting. I picked it up because I am always thinking, whenever I read something by certain feminist authors, "If only ____ (insert name of one of a myriad of highly conservative Texas men that I am graced to know) would read this and really try to understand, it would do him a world of good." It's so easy to say, "If you would just...it would be good for you," until you = me. I have this compulsion. I want to help people undertand others who are very different from themselves. And in Texas, particularly when I go to visit The Parents in West Texas, I'm that weird other. But I can't make other people understand my point of view. Sure, I can share it - and it's my responsibility to do so if I want to be heard. But I can't make them want to listen. Even if I can get them to agree that it is good for us as humans to hear things we don't agree with, they usually just take that as an invitation to share their point of view. I get a lot of chances to understand things outside my bubble. In that sense, Texas is a friggin' cornucopia of opportunity. But I can't make anyone want to return the favor.
What I can do is be the change I want to see in the world (thanks for the tip, Gandhi). I can choose to listen - not just to the messages which inevitably bombard me, but to those that would never reach me unless I decide to become a willing audience. So picking up this book is my decision to do just that.
So far, so good. I'm not as offended as I expected to be. I am expecting to disagree with a lot of the attitudes portrayed - either by a character or by the author himself - but so far, I'm finding that angry young men and angry young women are more similar than different. It's been interesting so far.
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no subject
Date: 2006-06-05 02:25 pm (UTC)so you liked the velveteen woman? i will have to check it out. i am so intrigued because i preached the other day on the velveteen rabbit - as i am frequently doing with good children's books - i just love that one. it's brilliant.
thanks for the post..
no subject
Date: 2006-06-06 07:39 am (UTC)Glad you enjoyed reading the post. :)
no subject
Date: 2006-06-06 03:07 pm (UTC)I like the fact that you can get something about yourself from books. I want to be like that too...I am, sometimes, but it's rare.
Thanks for the hugs too.
no subject
Date: 2006-06-07 06:15 am (UTC)