...the eyes have it

"The eye speaks with an eloquence and truthfulness surpassing speech. It is the window out of which the winged thoughts often fly unwittingly. It is the tiny magic mirror on whose crystal surface the moods of feeling fitfully play, like the sunlight and shadow on a still stream."

...outside of the lines

It’s an intriguiging thought to me – colouring between the lines, building a sandcastle with a bucket and following school rules vs. freeform.

What is it about rules that are more sensible? Is it because more people are convinced to follow them?  And if so, why?

One of my earliest memories at school was a scribble challenge with my best friend. We both had a school book to read and we dared each other to desecrate the other book with a pencil. Why? Because we shouldn’t, because the following actions were unknown, new and fresh.

My best friend was a boy …not sure what that says…if anything.

So what do lines in life say to you?

Are you the type who waits behind the red traffic light line…or who creeps forward as the light turns to amber? Or at school sports day, would you be the runner edging to get away at the starting gun or perhaps looking over at your classmates desk to cheat at the weekly spelling test?

So what is in or outside of the lines for you?

How does it feel when you are told to colour in the lines, do you like the instructions and control? If you accomplish the rules do you feel a sense of pride? Or do the lines make you feel constricted and restrained?

How does life feel for you?

Biblically we are set quite firm guidelines, no matter how much we cross reference, the basics remain unchanged. So does God give us room to colour outside of the lines?

We are all given the opportunity to repent – so the answer is Yes. What about if we know the lines and yet we still stray? Well, we have the opportunity to truly repent until our final breath, except we don’t know when that will be. But what if our stray into unknown ‘territory’ is God’s plan to get us back on track? How do we truly know or discern God’s will?

Peace is the answer.

We each need to seek and hear God within the lines and patterns we create in our lives. Often these boundaries can be created out of a sense of duty or normality. Following the pattern and lines of the lives that go before us or the friends that create their lives around us.

The clock ticks…

The patterns persist…

Your lines, God’s lines are unique…follow them and be brave enough to step out of the black and white.

They may take a lifetime to understand but if you listen and follow, they will make you truly happy.

...patterns

Patterns are part of our lives whether we feel the desire to rebel or not.

Our world has been created with a season or pattern for most things. Night follows day, winter follows summer and our lives have a pattern from birth to death. However, we each have the ability to influence the patterns and details of our lives don’t we? But what if we believe that God has a pattern and plan for our life created from the very beginning?

Patterns, shapes, forms are a part of me – how I see and interact with the world. I never simply see what is in the foreground but also see what is around and behind that. What animate shapes can I see within inanimate objects and what shapes and patterns does the space around a form create. Seeing the background is often as important to me as the main feature, the subtle, the hidden, the mistakes…

And I think this is how I feel about life too…

A pattern or blueprint is all well and good – God had a blueprint for creating mankind but I wonder how much our individual uniqueness is our own deviance from God’s pattern or whether our wondering from the pattern is also part of God’s plan?

To me patterns, blueprints and plans initially seem dull…

My immediate reaction to following a pattern is a sense that I am creating something that is not unique or individually crafted into being. The roughly hewn clay pot that contains the fingerprints of the creator that you can see and touch, feels more real than the fine china pottery that is meticulously and precisely produced to a set pattern.

Discarding the ‘less than pattern-perfect’ even extends to the deselection of fruit and vegetables that don’t conform to the supermarkets rigid patterns of accepting standards.

God may well have created patterns within our lives and our world but the free will we are each given enables us to have the freedom to explore and be creative. Perhaps to explore and become the best example of our own blueprint.

Biblically we know that Jesus was certainly not the blueprint King that God’s people expected. And whilst we know that Jesus spent time in prayer, I wonder how prescriptive God’s pattern for Jesus’ life was? Surely to experience life in all its human frailty, Jesus also needed to create, see and recognise his own life patterns?

So maybe a pattern can be a good starting point but by finding the time to explore what is not in front of our eyes, to look for a pattern where none should exist or in looking beyond the foreground, an all together different pattern might emerge.

Learn to appreciate the less than perfect patterns and in creating the You that God desires, don’t be scared to occasionally draw outside of the lines.

...siren all at sea

...to question

Do you love?

Do you need love?

...an impression or an imprint?

I love words and what they convey, or not. I love how words have a common meaning that enable us to vaguely understand each other. I guess if I didn’t love words, I wouldn’t be writing a blog and I wouldn’t be trying to express my thoughts and feelings in this way.

However I’ve been interested by what impression or imprint my words leave on myself and those who may come across this blog, because impressions and imprints are important. Sometimes in life we don’t know how we affect others and perhaps others themselves don’t truly know or understand that either. But to know our impression or imprint how cool would that feel?

So to start, I wondered about the difference between an impression and an imprint? And if I could or had to choose, which of these would I or maybe you, like your life to be?

For me an impression is fleeting, an essence that is captured in a specific moment, that may never be the same again. It’s something that is created to be interpreted just at that time – as with Impressionism. Art that captured light in a landscape at just that moment, creating a sense and feeling that could make the viewer feel that scene would never entirely be seen in the same way ever again. Unique?

There are times in life when we may be told or tell ourselves to “make a good (first) impression” – perhaps as we go for a job interview, or meet some-one new. For me this feels like creating something, back to the 19^th century paintings. Portraying or revealing an image of you that may never be quite the same again, something that cannot be replicated.

So maybe my words may have done that for you…had a fleeting impression…

On the other hand making an imprint is that more significant?

An imprint sounds more determined, something that is undertaken with more conviction. Something that intends to be lasting. To print is to make an indelible mark; I’m back to artistic analogies again without even meaning to be. So is an imprint the indelible mark that we make and leave? It sounds incredible that we each can have the ability to leave an imprint – I don’t think I want to leave something physically indelible like an invention but to imprint another’s life in some way, now that feels unique.

In terms of my faith, I’m pretty sure that if Jesus had a mandate as the son of God, it wouldn’t have included making an impression – let alone a good impression. Jesus is not fleeting and what He portrays has been and is the same now as it was 2000 years ago. Jesus’ imprint however remains indelible across the centuries and certainly in my life.

My imprint is of course less significant, however I do want to thank those who have encouraged me as they have made a real imprint on my life knowingly or unknowingly and maybe on the lives of others if they ever find and read this blog.

If not, it’s my space and my imprint…

...communication problems

What does the word Communication mean to you?

I was pondering this thought recently when in an extreme & harsh geographical environment. It occurred to me that now, perhaps more than ever in our fast, high tech world we can communicate and be connected to almost anyone, anywhere in the world at any time. Communicating verbally by mobile or satellite connection, through high speed worldwide internet space - typing, talking, seeing. But this made me wonder whether any of these methods actually make us any better at communicating with each other?

Have you ever received a text message where the communication was ‘lost in translation’? Or an email where the communication had one meaning and the recipient interpreted in an entirely different way? In our urgent fast moving world we seem to have lost the nuance of communication. Speed and urgency have replaced subtle facets and in removing these we often get it wrong or miss the real essence of what is being ‘said’ or meant.

Often we say one thing and actually mean something entirely different –body language can convey so much more than words. So in a world of noise and speed it feels ever more important to continue to develop the subtleties of communication – this could be deciphering a look, understanding a touch, hearing what is not being said or simply being and listening in a space with another.

Using non verbal or written communication feels like a real challenge but something we should all try to do more of. It makes us work harder to focus on others and tune into physical signals. How can your eyes communicate? What about your breathing, speed of movement, consciously think about communicating only in these ways and see how perceptive others around you are. Equally try shutting out the noise and really see and sense what others around you are communicating. Discard the obvious and try to perceive what is not being spoken.

There are occasionally people in our lives who we can be in silence with. Who we sense and understand, with the absence of words. Communication of mood, thought and emotion through a real sense of non verbal but intense physical connection, helping us to understand, ‘hear’ and communicate more effectively.

So in a world where God is increasingly marginalized, where we don’t look, see or hear perhaps one of the only ways to really communicate is to slow down, be and physically hear what is not being said.