Sunday, March 30, 2014

Doing Forgiveness

The following is an essay I very recently wrote for a project that one of my classmates and dear friends put together as a sort of yearbook for our 1st year class of seminarians at One Spirit...

Forgiveness is a fucking bitch, man. It’s also the Holy-Mother-Fucking-Grail. I had always thought of myself as a compassionate person because I’m vegan, I’m passionate about a number of social and environmental justice causes, and I have that super-hero, Leo personality that makes me think I’m destined to do great things in the world. I must be compassionate! Doesn’t having the desire to do the good or right thing and to make the world a better place constitute compassion?

When I really spent some time reflecting on forgiveness and what it takes to be a forgiving person, I realized that compassion and forgiveness go hand-in-hand. And man, was I one wretched, unforgiving son-of-a-bitch. Matthew Fox (one of my favorite theologians ever) says this of compassion: “Compassion is not sentiment but is making justice and doing works of mercy. Compassion is not a moral commandment but a flow and overflow of the fullest human and divine energies.” I got the first part about making justice. I’m not sure I really got the mercy part. And I was certainly living my life according to moral commandments. What I have recently come to understand is something about the “flow and overflow of the fullest human and divine energies.”

A Course in Miracles defines forgiveness as the healing of the belief in separation. I’m not sure I would define compassion much differently. When I truly opened myself to forgiveness, to understanding others as no different from myself, to accept the profound capacity we ALL have for fucking shit up, some profound shifts began taking place in my life. Some of it has involved some pretty intense Cosmic ass-whoopings, which I’m pretty sure were, if not well-deserved, at least necessary for beating the lessons through my thick skull (trust me, it’s thick). Some of it has been mind-blowingly wonderful. It has been healing and gratifying. I’ve seen myself break some pretty unhealthy patterns of behavior--rooted in separation, aka unforgiveness, aka a lack of compassion--that I had been repeating for years.

I’ve taken some scary steps to have some brave conversations that I never would have had before. I would have taken my damn ball and gone home and fuck-you-very-much. This, I’ve done in the past, and I now live with the regret of letting go of some deeply meaningful relationships because, how dare you mistreat me? How dare you not live up to my expectations?? How dare you be a flawed human being… like ME??? I’m learning that this forgiveness thing is not a one-time thing. It’s an attitude, an awareness, a way of being in the world and a way of DOING in the world. It is the way of compassion, and the only way to love. As I’ve started doing the hard work of accepting others in their flawed and beautiful humanity, it has enabled me to begin accepting my own broken, beautiful self. And WOW.

Saturday, March 29, 2014

Razor Reboot

This blog is about to get a reboot. It's time to start blogging again and for real. I could have started a new blog, but I like this one. Anything written before 2014 was from Consciousness Razor 1.0 and the blog was described as follows:

Political, social and spiritual commentary from a passionate thirty-something feminist, vegan, angry, peace-loving, magickal, rational, hetero-partnered queer woman. Enter at your own risk.

"Feminism is not simply about achieving the power and status typically held by men. It's about protecting and supporting the rights of women of all classes, races, cultures, and beliefs."

"Veganism is compassion in action. It is a philosophy, diet, and lifestyle."


I'm proud of the little bit I've written before now, but I have been stepping more fully into who I am, and it's time for that to be reflected in my writing. Don't worry, it'll still be brash and full of profanity and unapologetically opinionated, because that's me. But as my first year of seminary nears completion, it is time for me to start exercising my ministerial writing chops. There will still be lots of feminism, veganism, some politics and other juicy stuff... it's just that the lens will be a little different, or perhaps simply more refined.

And so it begins...