The Widow's Mite & Punchbuggy Sara

Actor Crush of the Day: Ewan McGregor (I just love his accent, among other things . . . .)

I have more on a variety of aspects of issues that I've been thinking about regarding unconditional positive regard, but I haven't pulled them together yet.

I've also had alot of other things occur to me this week, and last night one of them was a different take on the biblical story of The Widow's Mite. You know, where more well-to-do people place many coins in the box, but this widow, who has so little it's practically nothing, puts in the only coin she has.

Last night, I was thinking about things as I was praying my bedtime prayer, as well as afterwards. I thought, "Lord, I am so sorry that my life is such a poor dedication to you; such a poor gift I have to give, is this struggle of a life with little to show in the way of external results/accomplishments, for it." I thought about this for awhile, and about another analogy that has been at least somewhat helpful for me to learn to accept myself a little bit and not be as judgemental about my failings/failure to be and do much.

Picture everyone as a car (I'm a cute punchbuggy . . . .!) In this analogy, all cars use the same amount of gas per mile. Now, my car has a really twitchy/funky steering performance; I spend most of my time weaving back and forth, sometimes completely perpendicular to or even angled slightly backwards to, the path of progression. Everyone else (yes, I know everyone has struggles, but this is a rough analogy of mental illness vs. non) gets to toodle along on their somewhat merry way, proceeding at least somewhat efficiently and markedly farther, along the road laid out in front of us. After everyone's gas runs out at about the same time, it's quite clear to see that I got nowhere near as far as anyone else. You see, all that struggling with the twitchy and mind-of-it's own steering, as it swung me back and forth and I struggled to mitigate the effects of such, caused me to travel the same physical miles as the others, but much of that mileage was criss-crossing the path of progression, and even going against the flow. I like this analogy because, while I know it can be perilous to compare how much one does/can do compared to others, I think this analogy can help others to understand, a very little perhaps, of one way in which mental illness can affect people. And can help them, perhaps, be a bit less judgemental of them, or even others who are not mentally ill, but just have different struggles in life than they do. I'm all for promoting less judgementalism (is that a word? hee) in life.

Back to the widow's mite. As I pondered these analogies, the widow's mite story popped into my head, and it felt so natural to think, hey, my life is not a poor gift to the Lord after all; I am giving what I have, what I am; this is not valueless, and, in fact, is probably of great worth to Him. I say probably, because I am not all conceited and thinking I'm All That. Lol!

I felt, though, that being ME, as I often feel is such a poor excuse for anything, was perhaps not such a bad thing/person to be, and was, perhaps, in some way I cannot fathom or approach or accept (as yet, and most of me feels, NEVER! could I accept myself), something . . . well, maybe not worthy, but something . . . . tangible? concrete? something . . . . useful? something . . . VALID.

I also thought, hey, this biblical allegory is often used in lessons, talks, etc. to teach the principal of tithing, service, and other things. It really struck me, though, that it had so much meaning to learning to accept what one has to give from one's self, what one has to offer, what one has or does not have in the way of ability, capability, efficacy, and the ability or lack there of to be and do in the ways and means that the world generally measures one's worth and place in life.

I don't mean to preach or anything, but I did feel that this experience last night helps illuminate a bit more of my struggles with what I go through.