An optician in a town in Ireland
I am getting my eyes tested, it is a routine check up.
The optician is really nice, and as the tests are quite extensive and
take some time, we chat a bit, and I tell him how things are difficult
for me at the moment.
«What you should do», he advises me, «is to go and buy the book
«The Power of Now» and read it».
This I did. I read it, it helped me and I felt relieved.
I understood that what happened to the author, is what happens when
the mind cannot sustain itself any longer, and it gives way, it surrenders.
And another life opens itself up, one where peace reigns.
On a human level, that book gave me hope.
Subsequently, I realized that the space of the No-Mind needs to have
The Living God in it, otherwise it is just a matter of time before the mind
takes over again, maybe not as it was before, but still in a worldly way.
That showed itself in the author's follow-up book, because everybody
agreed that it was not anywhere as good as the first one.
A town in Ireland
I am with my friend one day as I am telling her what happened the night
before when my husband came home: he was like a mad person, ranting
and raving, and throwing the food around the kitchen.
She looked at me and says: «Well, you do know that that is not normal
behaviour, he clearly has a problem», and from that moment on, she
supported and encouraged me in my efforts to improve my situation.
«Listen»,she said one day, « I am in a prayer group, why don't you
come along and join us?»
«That sounds a bit boring», I thought to myself, but to her I said that I
would think about it.
After she had mentioned it a few times in the next couple of weeks,
I said that I might as well go, since she was my friend.
I arrived in the little side chapel of the main church.
That first meeting was the beginning of my surrender, giving way.
That night, the moment everybody started to pray, I started to cry;
I cracked.
I was crushed and that is what allowed Him to help me.
Not being able to manage myself anymore, was what was needed for
God to get access.
Coming to deep awareness of the true reality of things.
"God wants his omnipotence to reside in your powerlessness."
Saint Padre Pio
https://greatsaintspage.blogspot.com/2019/04/st-padre-pio-on-suffering.html
«The Lord is close to the
brokenhearted
and saves those who are crushed in spirit.»
(Psalm 34:18 New International Version (NIV)
«Gracefully Broken…
«God will break you to position YOU
Break you to promote you
And break you to put you in your right place
But when He breaks you He doesn’t hurt you, He doesn’t
destroy you, He does it with; grace»
(https://godsanointedprincesses.wordpress.com/2018/01/20/gracefully-broken-2)(#thereisablessinginthebreaking) (Posted on January 20, 2018 by Siphe)
Surrender All To
Him and
Let Him break you.
-Let Him take you from Glory to Glory.
-Let
Him multiply your blessing.
-Let Him birth that purpose that He
has for you ( Jeremiah 29:11).
Surrender.
Once he breaks you using grace, you start receiving love, joy and knowing
that He never leaves you nor does He forsake you (Hebrews 13:5).
He will use you shift atmospheres.
Time to be Gracefully Broken
(Tasha Cobbs Leonard, “Gracefully Broken”) (#thereisablessinginthebreaking#WonderfulGrace)(https://godsanointedprincesses.wordpress.com/2018/01/20/gracefully-broken-2/)
After that, I went every week, I never missed a meeting, the prayers supported
me and gave me hope, they made me stronger. We always prayed The Rosary.
My friend was always there for me, she was always praying for me, and she knew
how to put love into practice.
«Two are better than one, because they have a good return for their labor:
If either of them falls down, one can help the other up. But pity anyone
who falls and has no one to help them up.»
(Ecclesiastes 4:9-10)(NIV)
She was a friend who I appreciated a lot.
She was a great laugh, even though she had herself suffered a big
loss in her life; the death of her husband after only a couple of years of
marriage.
At this stage she had been a widow for many years, and I presumed she
wanted to meet somebody new.
«No, no »she said, «I just can't be bothered with a man, and anyway I don't
need a man to be happy», which sounded reasonable enough, but still did
not make quite sense to me.
Surely it is better to be with somebody, than to be alone, especially as you
are middle aged, and you are looking at a future old age, all alone?
But she resisted all attempts from any man that showed any interest in her.
A town in Ireland
Lighting the candle every night as I prepared to say my special prayer to
Our Lady, my heart was heavy as I wondered if I would ever meet someone
who would be able to love me. I realized that there was no shortage of people
who wanted to use me, even though it might pass as love.
«Mother Mary,» I prayed, «you know how much I need someone to hold me
close, to comfort me, to just love me, as I am, please send me someone.»
What a relief for me to discover that I did have a mother, a mother who
looks after her children, who protects them, who guides them, who teaches
them all they need to know, in order to get to know her Son, Jesus;
The Living God.
Staying close to her, I discovered more and more that I was safe,
she protected me.
This was new to me, as I had not had that experience with my
biological mother.
God formed Jesus in Mary, she was the only person worthy of giving
birth to true God, true man.
She is our Mother too. She brings us closer and closer to her
Maternal Heart, and at the same time, closer to Her Son.
Parents are the primary role models for their children, their behavior
and their words are more or less downloaded into the children.
So the children in turn will sooner or later copy their parents,
whether they are aware of it or not.
Our Lady is the mother of Jesus.
Her qualities are Faithfulness, Obedience, and Transparency,
full of grace and light, in a permanent state of surrender to the
will of God.
Jesus is my brother, Our Lady is my mother.
I know that as her child, I will want to copy her behavior and develop
her qualities.
This is what children do by their very nature and I know I am a
child of God.
In regard to the physical child that I once was, I needed love
and direction, from my biological mother.
The child in me has never disappeared, she is, if anything more alive
now than for a long time.
Any therapist will tell you that we all have our child inside us.
And Our Lord never refuses a request from His Holy Mother, she
intercedes for her true children.
Praying with others
I join a Sacred Reading(Lectio Divina) group, where we read the
Gospel of the week together, we meditate on it, we discuss it, and ask
questions about it.
I realize how relevant the Gospels are, and that they speak to me
personally.
I also become aware that I have to discern carefully regarding what is
being said during these sessions.
Because although everybody there is a lot of good will and good
intentions, it does not prevent their own ideas and conditioning
(in other words: worldly views) to be mixed in with the Gospel; the Truth.
And it is important to distinguish between those two things.
“For my thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways my ways,”
(Isaiah, 55, 8) (NIV)
«But Jesus on his part did not entrust himself to them, because he knew
all people and needed no one to bear witness about man, for he himself
knew what was in man.»
(John 2:24-25) (ESV))
The Communion of Saints
On the way out of the church I saw some brochures lying on the little
table near the door.
Picking up one, I saw it was about a novena to Saint Thérèse, the Saint
from Lisieux in France.
I took it with me, and walking home, I read it: it said that praying this
novena to her would not only have your prayer heard, but also you would
receive, as a sign, flowers in some form or other!
«Flowers?» said I to myself, but despite my skepticism, I decided say the
novena anyway, because I was in need of help.
My court case was coming up soon, my husband wanted me ejected from
the house, and our youngest son also, as he was dependent on me to look
after him.
For 9 days I prayed the novena prayer to Saint Thérèse.
A week later, on the way to catch the bus, a neighbor called me from her
window: «Wait, I have something for you ».
Thinking that now I was sure to miss the bus, I was a bit annoyed at first,
but when she came out with a big bouquet of flowers, I was stunned.
After living in this neighborhood for 23 years, it was the first and last time
that any of the neighbor had given me flowers.
Just like that.
«I just felt like giving you flowers», she said.
It was strange.
My prayer life intensified after that.
A Circuit Court, Ireland
«I order the respondent to remove himself from the family home, and he has
14 days to do so»,
announced the judge at the end of the hearing.
The relief I felt was immense, also my gratitude to God for hearing my
prayer, and to Saint Thérèse for her intercession also.
“Therefore I tell you, whatever you ask for in prayer, believe that you have
received it, and it will be yours. And when you stand praying, if you hold
anything against anyone, forgive them, so that your Father in heaven may
forgive you your sins.”
(Mark 11, 24-25)(NIV)
My ex, who had equipped himself with the best divorce lawyer in town,
must have thought it would be easy against me, who had a free legal aid
solicitor.
He denied that he had threatened to have me killed, and that he had physically
assaulted me.
Instead, he claimed that I had been unfaithful, that he did not know anything
about our marriage being in trouble, and that he had grounds for getting me
ordered out of the house.
«If it wasn't for me, you would be living on the streets,», he often said to me.
Institute of Technology , Ireland
The counseling course lecture is underway.
We are on the subject of how to help someone in distress.
The lecturer; a former catholic priest, is telling us a little anecdote
about his mother, who seemed to have been a very religious woman.
«One day», he says, «as Mass was over and people congregated outside
the church, a friend of my mother came to her, very upset, because her
husband had left her.
My mother's reaction was to say: «I will pray a novena for your husband
to come back to you».
Then he laughed mockingly.
I do not know why he was telling us this, apart from wish to deride and
disrespect his mother and the faith of his country.
«Honor your father and mother. Then you will live a long, full life in the
land the Lord your God is giving you.
(Exodus 20:12) (NIV)
Another day he asked: «Is there anyone amongst you who are spiritual;
any buddhists?»
I was stunned. He seemed to think that you had to be a buddhist to be
spiritual.
Some time later he told us mockingly during another session about a priest
who believed in the Holy Spirit. This time too, he laughed.
Again, what had that to do with a third level course in psychotherapy and
counselling?
«Anyone who speaks a word against the Son of Man will be forgiven,
but anyone who speaks against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven,
either in this age or in the age to come».
(Matthew 12:32 NIV)
I told him I was a practicing catholic, a believer in Jesus.
«Put on the full armor of God, so that you can take your stand against the
devil’s schemes.
For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers,
against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against
the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.
Therefore put on the full armor of God, so that when the day of evil comes,
you may be able to stand your ground, and after you have done everything,
to stand.
Stand firm then, with the belt of truth buckled around your waist, with the
breastplate of righteousness in place, and with your feet fitted with the
readiness that comes from the gospel of peace.
In addition to all this, take up the shield of faith, with which you can
extinguish all the flaming arrows of the evil one.»
(Ephesians 6:11-16 (NIV))
Another
lecturer on this course said something very significant one day,
which I knew was true:
«It is important that the client believes in you, that he /she really believes
that you can help them.
Because that faith is what will help them.»
It is true; in the same way that a sugar pill; a placebo,
despite the fact that it is void of active ingredients, will work for the patient,
due to the patient's faith in it; a person that believes in the counselor, is also
likely to feel better.
And if the person is getting better principally due to his/her own belief,
what might the outcome be if the person
believes in God and His only Son Jesus, true God and true Man?
«But to all who did receive him, who believed in his name, he gave the right to
become children of God»
(John 1:12 ESV)
The training on the course concentrated on the performance, the ability to
act confidently, it enforced the importance of believing in yourself,
in order that a client would also believe in you.
I once had a councilor who told me that she thought that my boyfriend
«had nothing to offer me».
Then I had another councilor who thought that
«he was lovely, and just the right man».
I had not asked either of them for advice on the matter and neither of
them knew him.
«Stop trusting in mere humans,
who have but a breath in their nostrils.
Why hold them in esteem?»
(Isaiah 2: 22)(NIV)
«Thus says the Lord: “Cursed is the man who trusts in man and makes flesh
his strength, whose heart turns away from the Lord.»
(Jeremiah 17:5 ESV)
A Church Tribunal Office, Ireland
The priest sitting at the other side of the desk listens to me as I responded
to his questions.
Then he said: «Well, you certainly have grounds for an annulment, based
on psychological factors, due to immaturity.
There does not seem to have been an understanding of what marriage
actually is, at the time that the marriage was entered into. Alcoholism
precludes that. Would you yourself agree to a psychological test?»
«Yes, no problem,» I answered.
«Also, you will need 2 witnesses that will testify for you», he continued.
«Ok», I said.
A Church Tribunal Office, Ireland
The psychologist had quite a range of tests, my friend had testified for
me, and also my sister had been interviewed twice in the Catholic Church
in Norway.
Even though she had not seen much of what was going in my marriage,
she had seen a bit of what my ex was like, when we still lived in Norway,
after the marriage.
It being a Court tribunal, my ex had of course been asked to enter into the
proceedings, and he had been generously accommodated regarding the city
that would suit him, as he first said that he could not come
«because he was working elsewhere»
He never turned up
anywhere, no matter how much they accommodated him.
January 2012: A town in Ireland
«You have been granted an annulment by the Court Tribunal»
the statement read.
That means, I have never actually been married.
Yes, there had been love there, but that was not enough.
We both suffered from dependency; he was dependent
on alcohol, and I was dependent on him.
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