Jeanne H Barnett's Blog

God looks different to me than He does to you and,
in fact,
He looks a lot different to me today than He did
5 years ago or 10 years ago—
even the way He looked to me yesterday is
slightly different than He looks to me today
because every moment “stuff” happens or
I think of something differently than I did 5 minutes ago
or I hear something that makes me start thinking
about something I had never considered before that moment . . .

I’ve heard it said that we create God in our own image or,
at the very least, we assume He has characteristics
that fit some sort of a list of expectations we have in our minds.
This list seems to change over a period of time because it
draws from our experiences, examples of people we admire,
and how we internalize and respond to our daily existence—
we draw conclusions often without being consciously aware
that we are drawing conclusions—and
we incorporate these conclusions into our basic belief system
including how we view what we call “God.”

The puzzle of my life includes periods of dark traumas
mixed with periods of “blue skies” interspersed with
some periods I can’t recall very well because nothing very good
or very bad was happening to place a marker on that period.
And, so it is with my view of God—
sometimes I view Him in the “blue skies” above and
sometimes I see Him as a force against a very dark, stormy backdrop
and
sometimes I see Him as a part of the “structure of organized religion”
and
other times I see Him up in the clouds of a non-descript sky floating freely;
sometimes I think He is a very formal entity who wants my bowing down
and other times I feel He is a caring friend who is close to me;
sometimes I don’t think I can see Him at all and
sometimes I feel I can see Him clearly—and
I think that is all okay with God
as I wander on my path and wonder about God . . .
spirit seeking Spirit . . . always . . .
wait! is that a light I see just ahead . . .
does it look like . . . could it be . . . God?

“SOCIAL”
directly from Latin socialis of companionship, of allies; united, living with others

Dinosaurs likely worked AS A COMMUNITY, laying their eggs in a common nesting ground. Juveniles congregated in “schools,” while adults roamed and foraged for the herd.
—-
RECENT experience on “social” media—
—two sites – both “openly religious” in nature
site ONE—admin promoter of “one true church” I grew up in
expresses strong opinions, often judgemental
and condemning of those who disagree
site TWO—admin encourages discussion without judgement
more accepting of others posts
discussions are varying opinions from others

—my observations
site ONE—when someone offered a different opinion, the
admin and other posters attacked, some with degrading
comments and the admin would make a meme of one of
the most scathing attacks and post it on the site as a
“new” post which basically “honored” meanness
(I have posted in the past questioning the meaning of
a post by admin and experienced very strong, negative
push back so I do not post any opinions to this site and
rarely even look at its posts – it is very obvious that they
are not interested in “discussion” but only in declaring
their “opinions” as the ONLY “truth”)
site TWO—when someone offered a different opinion, the
responses were mostly offering ideas about other ways
of looking at the content of the original post and I did not
see any harsh judgements during exchanges of thoughts
even though some were stronger in their wording of
their opinions – but no name calling or demeaning words
(I have posted an opinion to this site and did not feel
“attacked” when someone disagreed with my opinion
and, when I further clarified my thoughts, I felt that others
on this site were okay with not making ONE perspective
the ONLY perspective but allowed disagreement without judgement)

The dinosaurs that lived in community seemed to last longer than those who did not—
repeatedly, nature shows us that living in community and working together for the common good is the better choice.
—may each of us work to make “social media” truly “SOCIAL“
consider BEFORE interacting or reacting on social media:
• posting as allies against challenges not against each other;
• united to make the world better for all not just me or my group,
• building community to live peacefully with others so
WE CAN OUTLAST THE DINOSAURS!

a “challenge” meaning: from the 1570s, “having been called to a contest”

For the month of January 2023, a group of bloggers chose to participate in a “challenge” to post every day in the month to a daily prompt. I was one of those bloggers and there were some who had participated before who knew what to expect—I did not know what was coming, but it sounded interesting. I wrote for the first day, but the second and third day were prompts that I did not feel able to write about, so I did not (my record was 29 days completed out of 31).

This challenge caused me to stop and consider a much more difficult “prompt”—how do I show up daily in my world, a world that seems so cold and obviously fractured—people not working together in most ways and some very combative.

The January blog challenge showed me that a very diverse group of people could exchange thoughts, opinions, ideas, pain, joy, and pieces of their life story without becoming hateful or insulting or judgemental. There were different belief systems represented, different occupations, different lifestyles, different countries, different cultures, different ages . . . and yet, as I read the different posts and the comments made by others on those posts, I was struck by a non-combative tone by people who were only connected through their blogs and, as “strangers” could have felt free to express some degree of “negative feedback” as some pretty strong posts were shared, but I did not see any of that—rather I saw most often expressions of care and concern for those revealing struggles with many different challenges, voices of comfort and encouragement.

WHY was this “world” different than the one I see every day?
I think, perhaps, some would say that participants chose to participate or not
and that is true and the “prompts” guided the focus of the posts which could be accepted or not, each person’s choice, and each person would choose to read or not read the posts of others.
However, would that not also be true in the world we live in?
• I can choose to participate or not in the daily challenge of facing the day
• I can choose to accept or reject the “prompts”: the loud voices, the news, the gossip, the rumors—what guides my focus
• I can choose to “read” or listen to what others are putting out or I can filter the overwhelming chaos and noise according to my values
• I can choose my response—what will I post on the wall of my heart/mind and what will I share with others

Me, You, Us – the challenge is real, but each of us has the option to come daily to the challenge . . . our lives are our daily “post” to the world we live in—what am I choosing to “post” today? Me, You, Us . . . increasing the fractures or focusing on the tiny points of light coming through the cracks—I choose . . .