Back and then...

I should be preparing my lesson

backandthen — Sat, 14 Jan 2012 21:29:37 +0000

…instead of bloging but I have been thinking about something lately that I wanted to write about.
Then I came across Ray’s new entry for today and I thought: that’s it! I have to blog.

Of course his is like long and thoughtful and I have not really read it all yet because I have been busy in self satisfaction that I will account for later. A little self congratulation does not hurt

Anyway, back to being serious what I have realized recently is that God is not our father (which was supposed to be the title of my post).
Nope.

Our Father is god.

Please note the capital letters that I use on purpose.
To make it more clear: Fireman is not our father. Our father is a fireman
And I invite you to read Ray’s blog to get some more thought about what it means because although I never knew about the jewish concept of Godhead (nor do I cared actually) this way of envisioning my relationship with our Father/God has lead me to a similar path of thought as Ray’s.
It brings me both peace and humility when I ponder and turn to my Father this way. ultimately it brings be a righteous joy that makes me giggle inside. I know this sounds silly but I feel at peace in a way that I know where to turn to find peace and the strength I think I need. Strangely the fireman allegory (don’t analyze the subject of my allegory, I am fully capable of doing so which actually makes me laugh at myself) with all that it implies for me makes me feel more comfortable in the future and in the plan that has been set for me. Being at ease I have realized that I have been a tiny bit more capable of asking Him questions instead of just opening about my feelings. The past days I have asked Him direct questions requiring direct answers no matter what form they would take. This allegory leading my to a similar path of ponder as Ray I am very eager to learn the new things I can learn at this stage.
Like when I was in elementary school and be given a new chapter to open and study, I loved the perspective of learning something new, with a difference, though, I know the delight of the new learning never wears off.

Bra

backandthen — Tue, 10 Jan 2012 17:18:02 +0000

Yes, this is the title of my post.

Part of my concern when I was coming back was about having all my blessings restored which meant that I would have to wear those “sacred garments” again. One of the thing that I thought was absolutely dumb was the fact that we had to wear our bra ON the garments. I don’t know about the US but in France it is considered by the medical field as a sign of mental unbalance and this can get you really in trouble. A very candid friend of mine told me that you just tell them that it is for religious purpose. this gentle young man never had to deal with those people.

With my mother’s situation I have learned that once they have decided something about you anything you’ll say will just make it worse so if they decide that you are crazy because you wear your bra above any type of close you should NOT tell them it is for religious purpose. We are NOT in the US where crazy religious habits are ok. You are allowed to believe the craziest things ever such as someday you can become like God and that God has a wife. Whatever you believe is ok as long as you don’t dress or behave differently.
Anyway it is now ok to wear your bra above you garments. Not that it is encouraged, young women going through the temple for the first time are invited to think about the garments and what they represent and to decide for themselves what is best.
I don’t need to think about what those garments represent but what my bra is.
Is it a piece of sassy clothe that I wear out of lust to feel sexy and seductive?
It could be but then I would totally and absolutely remove it all!
No, my bra is there for health and comfort reasons not to drive my mind away from any sacred purpose!
For now I still wear my bra ON the garments out of habit and I don’t think I will change this because eventually I have come at peace with this issue (the bra was not really the issue, it was only the top of the iceberg) but now I feel better that if someday for some reasons I feel better wearing it UNDER I won’t have to have a second thought no matter what the reason could be.

YESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS

That was the positive part of going through the temple with my sister.

New header

backandthen — Tue, 03 Jan 2012 13:09:35 +0000

This is the kind of thing I do for a living. Too bad I can put here the full pic because it looks much better I think.

A pain in the…

backandthen — Fri, 30 Dec 2011 12:44:39 +0000

I think that part of my issue about what I know I should be doing is fear, pain and PRIDE.

The pain both past and future: I know how much strength and sacrifice it took me to reach the point I have reached in the past. I feel I am not as much resilient as I used to be. Or maybe I was not resilient, just better at burying what should not have been kept secret.

Fear of not being able to protect myself this time again.

Pride in the fact that I don’t want to give away what I believe not everybody deserves.
The problem is that I know God is not asking me to judge who deserves what I can give and who does not. He has told me so many times in different ways how precious and important I am to Him that I have a hard time bringing myself back to where I should be in the plan. Kind of like being puffed up and flying aimlessly above my path when I should actually be walking it if I want to get anywhere both in this time of my life and on a broader scale.

He knows if He stops making me feel special I will just lose all desire to do what is good for myself. But in the mean time this is what fills me with pride right now and makes me feel like I have rights above mine.
Gosh I bet I am special!
Always either too high or too low. Seriously who would want to be a deity and would would want to have a bunch of children being a pain in the…neck like I am right now?
I feel really sorry. I am not being sarcastic or looking down at who I am. I am sincerely sorry.

She is off to Utah first

backandthen — Wed, 28 Dec 2011 17:02:05 +0000

for six days with friends, then she is to report to the MTC where she is supposed to spend 2 months but since she already speaks Italian I bet she’ll stay only a month. Then she will be sent to the Roma mission

Taking the plane tomorrow

backandthen — Tue, 27 Dec 2011 08:18:49 +0000

My sister is taking the plane tomorrow. She gets to spend a few days in Utah so some friends before entering the MTC to which she is to report on January, 2nd. I am extremely excited about her leaving because this is just the greatest thing in her life so far but I am also extremely stressed out because she wanted both of her parents to be there when she is set apart AND at the airport.
Her father already said he did not want to be there because of me and my mother. Then he said he would come but not stay in the same room.
He may hate my mother but as far as I am concerned if he is not pleased with what I said he should NOT have come in my bedroom. The jews have a great saying: “If you don’t want people to know about it, don’t do it.”
I wanted Natacha (the stake president’s wife that I told you about before) to be here for support but they have family for the whole week.
So no Natacha for me.

I am a little mad at my sister. Not really mad. I don’t know.
It is just that she knows they have not changed, I wonder what she expects from their presence. This trial is going to be the last one of the year and this is what I am going to focus on

Edit:

I have wondered about my sister’s wish/desire to have a whole family for both her setting apart and at the airport. I really don’t understand it since she knows how much hatred and pain this revives. I wonder if she is deeply hoping for a miracle or think it is her job to “help” everybody by forcing everyone in the same room/place.
She may be able to do something but I am SURE that the way she does it is the wrong one because I judge her action by its fruits and the fruits are bitter and burning and devastating. As I have said before to her I am tired of being 14 years older than her. I know it is ridiculous because there is nothing she can do about it but I wish she would consider what she is doing and creating instead of what she wishes would happen. This is just not a good time for me. Lately I have regretted even deeper than before to have talked about what my adoptive father did. I have felt even more angry than before because if I had kept my mouth shut less of the bad things would have happened. I know it is not my fault at all and that he is the responsible. I know I can’t take responsibility for him but right now would be more peaceful and easier on me if my little sister did not want us all to be together where I can feel the hatred he has for me and feel my mother’s disease “sweating” all over the place. This is just not fair. I am angry and it is not at her. Sometimes I just hate this plan to “make us grow”.
I have been pondering A LOT about my own mission that I would not call a success. So far I haven’t had any reasons not to think that God wanted to send me on a mission to protect me. Just about an hour ago it came to my mind that part of the reason God wanted me on a mission was because it was the only way I would dare to tell what had happened. I know that if I had not gone I would have kept my mouth shut and denied everything.
Ok so here I am with this new understanding.
Nice.
So now what do I do with it? Because frankly the fruits of it have not been obviously for the better. I understand that my sight is short and that someday I will understand how it fits in the plan but so far the fruits are very disappointing.
I don’t know.
Maybe the reason I had to talk is the same reason she stubbornly wants “all her family” together. I know I don’t know or understand it all but this is of no comfort.
This time of trial for me has a good thing in it though: this time I am able to feel that God is trying as much as He can to be by my side but he can’t lighten up the weight. He can do his best to help me carry it but He can’t remove any rocks because He did not place them there.

Merry Christmas

backandthen — Sun, 25 Dec 2011 08:23:35 +0000

Ca c’est fait

backandthen — Fri, 23 Dec 2011 19:54:14 +0000

“Ca c’est fait” is an expression we use to express that this did not need to be done or said. It means “This is done” and you say with a tone of voice that would be used if you really had finished a job and you were checking out how much work you still have to do. This is a type of ironic joke.
For example if I were at a wedding and asked the bride “where is your mother? Still alive?” and if for example the mother had died a month before I could say “Ca c’est fait” when I would realize my mistake.
We also use this expression when something very unpleasant happens such as for myself being caught in a bank robbery this morning.
I really needed a hug and to be comforted and I still do actually. This song is about where was my “home” when I was a little girl and where I longed to be. This song (the whole album actually) means a lot to me.
Nothing spiritual again (like when I talk about Aïkido) I just feel very down and this song helps me raise a little my chin up.

v=BN0MdqGBXe8

Là où les eaux se mêlent / Where waters meet

Là où se finit la terre / Where the land ends

Là où est si grand le ciel / Where the sky is the biggest

Là où se bat la mer / Where the sea fights

Là où je deviens celle / Where I become

Qui pour toi reste un mystère / The one who remains a mystery for you

Même si tu me trouves si belle / Even if you think I am so beatifull

Sous les feux de ta ville lumière / When lighten up by your city of lights.

Qui voit Ouessant, voit son sang / Who meets Ouessant island see his blood

Qui voit Molène, oublie sa peine / Who meets Molène island forgets his burden

Qui voit Sein, n’a plus peur du lendemain / Who meets Sein island needs no fear of the morrow.

Qui voit le Fromveur, entrevoit le bonheur / And who sails the Fromveur gets a taste of true happiness.

J’aimerais tant que tu me comprennes / I wish you could understand

Je ne serai jamais ta parisienne / That I’ll never be your Parisian woman

j’aimerais tant que tu me comprennes / I wish you could understand me

Qu’ici ma place n’est pas la mienne / This place here is not mine

Mais sur les rives de la Seine / Cause on the banks of the Seine River

Je rêve toujours de pleine mer / I always find myself dreaming of deep sea

Ce n’est pas pour te faire de la peine / I don’t mean to hurt you

Ce n’est pas pour jeter la pierre / I don’t mean to reproach you anything

Ce n’est pas pour faire de scènes / I don’t want to make a big fuss about anything

Ce n’est pas pour croiser le fer / I don’t want to fight over it

Mais sur les rives de la Seine / But on the banks of the Seine river

Je suis au bout de la terre / It feels like I could not go a step further

Qui voit Ouessant, voit son sang
Qui voit Molène, oublie sa peine
Qui voit Sein, n’a plus peur du lendemain
Qui voit le Fromeur, entrevoit le bonheur

J’aimerais tant que tu me comprennes
Je ne serai jamais ta parisienne
j’aimerais tant que tu me comprennes
Qu’ici ma place n’est pas la mienne

The Seine River is the river going through Paris. sorry for the change in the translation. I should have written “island” first but I guess I was really not in the right state of mind to do a translation. To forget that those places are islands is a good way to be banished forever from Bretagne.
Oh wait, it is not as if I had been back there in the past 20 years.

Because I am my Father’s daughter

backandthen — Thu, 22 Dec 2011 21:27:41 +0000

These past months have been just really hectic. Full of disappointments or spiritual challenges maybe, I don’t really know. What I know is that last week I was in Switzerland and spent a week in the temple again. I have done more temple work in 2011 than in my whole life as an adult member before I was excommunicated. It does not mean anything but it makes me smile ironically inside. It has not even been a goal. It just happened.
Last week was very very very hard and I knew it was up to me to turn this into a growing experience or just be my old self. It took me two days but I was eventually able to enjoy and benefit from the temple. I now know for sure that even in the temple it requires efforts to obtain the peace we have come to receive even if we are worthy of it.
Long story short: I am giving up on this friendship that has been so important to me for the past ten years. When I exchanged a few messages with this person over the internet I realized that going back to France without all the preparation, tools, weapons that are available would be suicidal and as I have said before I know what we are given here to come victorious out of our trials.
So I asked for a blessing right away. Sometimes when I doubt I should ask for a blessing I remember what a friend of mine answered when I expressed my doubts “Do you want the Lord to bless you?”.
As usually I did not tell the brother what I wanted this blessing for. He did not know me at all. He is German and gave me this blessing in English.
You need to know something before I go on.
There is a special word/code/sentence between God and me. When the brother giving me the blessing says it I know he is inspired. It is a special spiritual experience not only when I hear but also when it is worded the way the brother CAN’T know my state of mind is. Let me be more specific. Let’s say that the “code word” is “table” and I am thinking about a specific table with certain specific details.
Then I hear the brother describing the exact table I am thinking of right before and during the blessing.
I know I am awful because I am putting much pressure on the brother’s shoulders but it is not that bad because they never know of my little code with my Heavenly Father.

So last week I asked this brother for a blessing without telling him why. I talked to him after the blessing to explain to him why I was asking this blessing and I needed to talk anyway because God asked me something I have been scared of doing like hell.
The brother explained to me how blessings works for him. He told me sometimes there are words, sometimes pictures and he turns it into words.
He told me that this time he felt an outpouring of love that he tried to interpret anyway he could. And I know he got it right.
I am one “strong” person. I am not really strong it is just that I have never tamed or bottled up the vibes people get from me when I am experiencing something. If I am in pain or angry, anyone and everyone in a distance of six to seven feet will feel like they have hit violently a wall.
Same goes with positive vibes. And this is my issue.
When I was younger and until I was excommunicated I gave myself away. I have worked my “love power” and I have given it out so much that I have found myself empty, hurt, desperate, weak and so on. I have had the feeling that I had given way too much and eventually to people who did not deserve it OR who may have deserved it but then God had failed me because I was not given as much as I was giving out.
I have learned what had been the mistakes I have made despite my positive disposition. But still after three years back in the church I have the hardest time just wanting to do what I have done in the past but with more wisdom this time. In French we say that a boiled cat is afraid of cold water. It takes so much effort to do what I know God wants me to do, it takes so much strength that I am afraid to use again. I feel like an athlete who got injured in a bad accident and who is back for practice and just can’t do it because of what could happen.
Sometimes over the past three years it has even felt as if I had forgotten how to do it. Love is a spiritual muscle that takes training.
I felt terrible because I felt the gentle urge. Not that the world will stop spinning if I don’t do what He needs me for but He needs me to be who I can be. It feels like I can take as much time as I want as long as I am working out toward the direction I know He has been pointing out. But in the mean time I have felt as if this is extremely important.
As I am typing those words I am scared.
Last sunday I felt crushed because I had been hurt again badly when I thought it was time to recover and I feel what God wants me to do.

I felt like a child on the verge of a swimming pool shaking out of fear and cold and whose father is in the water already and encouraging to jump. He can’t jump for me, He can talk with the sweetest words in the world and use all His persuasive power to make me jump but the leap of faith is mine and He can’t do anything about it.
So I asked for another blessing on Sunday and I jumped without letting my fears paralyzed me again.

As I am typing this words I am in the water and I am trying desperately NOT to drown. I am probably not calm enough so water keeps on getting in my mouth and I am moving my arms and legs too fast to be able to swim properly. I am trying to keep HIs face in my sight hoping He won’t let go of me. I am trying to keep calm so I can hear what is the next step to swim but I know He is already thrilled that I just jumped, He is smiling and eager to tell me the next step. I know because there has been something that I feel compelled to write as a blessing fulfilled although my carnal mind wonders if this is not blasphemous to rise this detail has a promise from God. But a voice tells me that there is more in this than what I can see even if what I see fills me with joy.

I almost interrupted the last blessing on Sunday. Let me tell you this little story: just before receiving it I prayed to create a direct communication with our Heavenly Father. I DID NOT TELL HIM not to use our “secret” code but I really wanted to tell Him that it was ok, I knew the blessing would come from Him even if He did not use it.
Let me repeat it: I DID NOT TELL HIM what was on my mind.
The very first thing the brother told me, and these are the exact words: You already know this but…..(and then the secret word). I almost laughed and I wanted to pull my head out because I knew what were going to be the next words, I knew for the first time in years this blessing was going to be a very, very, very short one. I knew the words that were going to be said. I understand as I am typing these words that it is because I knew what He was going to tell me that I got enough faith in myself to jump. I have all the faith in the world in Him but I have doubted myself until this very minute. I have doubted I was capable of not getting injured again but now that I know for sure that my communication with Him is good enough that I can anticipate what He can tell me…

As I am typing these words again I realize that I am ready to hear His voice even in the water and that I am not franticly moving my arms and legs around.

I leave you this experience in the name of Jesus Christ.
Amen.

Too much

backandthen — Tue, 20 Dec 2011 21:23:13 +0000

So many things have happened the past weeks I really can’t do a proper follow up.

I am now a part of the “plot” to destroy my mother. I totally expected this to come soon but what has surprised me is that my younger sister is part of it too. I am finding out that it is harder on her than I thought. This is the very latest news, it is only about two hours old and there are a thousand things I could write about but each would take a full day of writting. It would be both boring for you to read and tiresome for me to write.

I got a surprising immediate effect of the changes I am bringing in my life: I can fall.
Don’t laugh. I was surprised today to be able to fall on the tatami just perfectly and beautifully. I did ALL the exercises. I just can’t believe it. My head did nut turn at all. I am going now to progress very fast. I know this is not telling you much from where you stand but this is a victory that almost made me cry both because it has frustrated me the past years and because I know this is a blessing a brought upon myself because of the choices I have made. God never said “have a good attitude in life and you’ll be able to do beautiful fall on the tatami” God is trying to show us the power of good and positive vibes in our life. Some call it Karma, some call it a blessing. Whatever the power involved in this it is real. I have experienced it tonight in an aspect of my life that is not life endangering or about the salvation of my soul but this is a personal token that speaks tones to me.

I MUST write about the blessing I asked for last week and last Sunday. But right now I need to go to bed and think about how to write this experience so it can be uplifting one way or another for anyone reading my blog.