I heard this the other day, got it off the web and am posting it for everyone... Hope you like it as much as I do....Ruth is an amzing lady with a lovely voice. Mum of two, (one poorly) and her books, "Casting Off" and "Slipstreams" (on Amazon) are wonderful affirmations of us as being just OK...fine where we're at just now.... (and even if you're not religious; she's spiritual but just finds herself stuck on the 'religious' shelves...! She refuses a 'church of her own' as she doesn't go with the politics of 'religion'...just being human...)
From Rev'd Ruth Scott, an Anglican Vicar in Richmond
Friday 28 September 2007
Every so often in my work people say to me, ?I couldn?t do what you do. I?m not good enough.? Their words are based on two assumptions. One is that I?m good, and the other is that our capacity for compassion and care is directly proportional to our degree of goodness.
Both assumptions, thankfully, are wrong. My lovely husband and children will quickly affirm that I?m as messed up as the next person. And it?s precisely because I understand from personal experience how easy it is to get things wrong, and to fall flat on my face, that the faults and failings of others tend to provoke compassion in me rather than condemnation. It?s also true that when I make a hash of things the people I turn to are not those who consider themselves ?good?, but those wonderfully warm, vibrant human beings who?ve passed the same way as me, and understand from first-hand experience what it is fall short, and what I need in order to pick myself up again and carry on. In such situations, the criticism of others who can?t admit their own short-comings and so look down on ?lesser mortals?, can be paralysing rather than empowering.
A priest friend once got himself admitted to hospital because he was feeling suicidal. The nurse who admitted him told him to see what he was now experiencing as part of his on-going ministerial training. When he finally returned to work his parishioners found him far more understanding about their problems than he?d been before his breakdown. The Dutch philosopher, Spinoza, wrote, ?I have striven not to laugh at human actions, not to weep at them, nor to hate them, but to understand them.?
Johnnie, (interviewer) we can?t understand in others what we haven?t come to terms with in ourselves, that?s why we shouldn?t be afraid to own our messiness of being. And the good news, as my priest friend discovered, is that it?s in such human compost that the seeds of compassion germinate, take root and flourish.
(I think Ruth's summed up MWO don't you?...)
Love, Messy Old FMF!! XX
From Rev'd Ruth Scott, an Anglican Vicar in Richmond
Friday 28 September 2007
Every so often in my work people say to me, ?I couldn?t do what you do. I?m not good enough.? Their words are based on two assumptions. One is that I?m good, and the other is that our capacity for compassion and care is directly proportional to our degree of goodness.
Both assumptions, thankfully, are wrong. My lovely husband and children will quickly affirm that I?m as messed up as the next person. And it?s precisely because I understand from personal experience how easy it is to get things wrong, and to fall flat on my face, that the faults and failings of others tend to provoke compassion in me rather than condemnation. It?s also true that when I make a hash of things the people I turn to are not those who consider themselves ?good?, but those wonderfully warm, vibrant human beings who?ve passed the same way as me, and understand from first-hand experience what it is fall short, and what I need in order to pick myself up again and carry on. In such situations, the criticism of others who can?t admit their own short-comings and so look down on ?lesser mortals?, can be paralysing rather than empowering.
A priest friend once got himself admitted to hospital because he was feeling suicidal. The nurse who admitted him told him to see what he was now experiencing as part of his on-going ministerial training. When he finally returned to work his parishioners found him far more understanding about their problems than he?d been before his breakdown. The Dutch philosopher, Spinoza, wrote, ?I have striven not to laugh at human actions, not to weep at them, nor to hate them, but to understand them.?
Johnnie, (interviewer) we can?t understand in others what we haven?t come to terms with in ourselves, that?s why we shouldn?t be afraid to own our messiness of being. And the good news, as my priest friend discovered, is that it?s in such human compost that the seeds of compassion germinate, take root and flourish.
(I think Ruth's summed up MWO don't you?...)
Love, Messy Old FMF!! XX
c: :heart:
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