My heart breaks for these dear creatures....and I JOIN MY JEWISH SISTERS AND BROTHERS IN SEEKING TRUE REPENTANCE...not easy, but I will make the effort to examine my relationship with all of CREATION .
I am challenged by your words, as I realize I seldom give thought to what unintended harm could be done to those around me, My mother, I remember, saying to me at times when she was very frustrated with my actions “ The Highway to hell is paved with good intentions “ your words have touched me and I pause to consider what harm do I cause when I do not consider the impact my actions may have on those to follow me. A simple example: when I come into a clean kitchen and prepare food for myself and then leave without cleaning up, the next person ( my wife) is burdened with cleaning up my mess before tending to her purpose, I have changed at least in the kitchen.
I appreciate and respect your reflection and willingness to change in areas where you realize your behavior has created a burden for another. If we could all do that, together, our world would be so different. A few months back I snapped at a health care worker when he questioned my request for a vaccination. He was following a newly instituted protocol, but it seemed as though he was questioning the need at all for the vaccine. I regretted that I had snapped at him and went back a week later to apologize in person; I felt bad that his day had been impacted by my behavior. He was surprised and said he hadn’t remembered until I mentioned it. But the repair was needed, for both of our hearts, but also so that I held myself accountable.
Today I have been feeling despair about the world precisely because of the lack of reflection in adults that I see around me and their unwillingness to admit that unintended consequences of their actions still did harm - and then here is Rev Trimble’s writing. Good timing.
Robert Greenleaf, a Quaker who came up with the idea of servant leadership said this: “The urgent problems of our day…exist because of human failures, individual failures, one person at a time, one action at a time failures.” And, so, we get the world we live in. Unless we’re willing to be accountable for the outcomes of our behaviors- regardless of intentions. The level of reflection that it takes to understand this is challenging for many.
“Let’s be clear that saying that you didn’t mean to do or say something may be a statement of fact but it is not an apology. Saying, “I apologize,” or better yet, “I’m sorry,” is an apology. I’m not splitting hairs here as there is a difference that goes beyond mere semantics, and that difference lies in understanding that you were actually in the wrong and letting the person on the receiving end of that apology know that you admit it and realize why you were wrong. The former is dismissive while the latter is heartfelt.
While we are at it, let me say this about gratitude. When someone tells me, “You shouldn’t have,” right after I’ve gone to the trouble to do something nice for them, I wonder why I did it in the first place? This is not a thank you but a self-absolution that borders on the ungrateful. There’s no better thanks that you can give anyone than a simple, and again a heartfelt, “Thank you.”
All of which leads us to a discussion on being helpful. When you know that someone needs help just go ahead and help them. Don’t ask, “Do you need help?” because oftentimes pride will get in the way and they will say, “No,” despite the fact that they obviously do. Rarely will anyone tell you to stop helping after you have started, and they therefore do indeed get helped. Even if they utter the dreaded, “You shouldn’t have,” it doesn’t negate the fact that you have extended an act of human kindness and the world sure can use a lot more of that.”
Your words "urgency", "extinction" and " before it is too late" are resounding across our home planet right now. The Rice whales, our water, our air, our playing loose with our "new fire" of AI agents-- all existentially on the brink. Joining this moment of teshuvah, calling us to turn and repair, will hopefully shake us into a new way of being, before our very web of being is broken beyond repair. Choosing life means our grandchildren may live!
Thank you for this. It's so hard for me to read about the terrible things we continue to do to our planet - and especially to animals. Unfortunately, I think that the powers that be DO mean to do these cruelties - because they are motivated by greed and their greed justifies all their actions.
I read today’s meditation and felt a big lose. Trump and his Reich/Administration do not care about LIFE!!! They are driven by greed and power alone and are willingly destroying America and by their same actions, the world. The scariest thing about all this is that America is allowing it by its inaction.
The rest of the free world is scrambling to work around America and by the time change happens in America, the world will have moved on and America will be left alone.
Trump and his people are already threatening its closest friend and ally and we are trying to get out from under America and are basically being called traitors.
When a bully becomes unbearable, you have to find friends who want to walk with you, not over you!!!
My heart breaks for these dear creatures....and I JOIN MY JEWISH SISTERS AND BROTHERS IN SEEKING TRUE REPENTANCE...not easy, but I will make the effort to examine my relationship with all of CREATION .
I am challenged by your words, as I realize I seldom give thought to what unintended harm could be done to those around me, My mother, I remember, saying to me at times when she was very frustrated with my actions “ The Highway to hell is paved with good intentions “ your words have touched me and I pause to consider what harm do I cause when I do not consider the impact my actions may have on those to follow me. A simple example: when I come into a clean kitchen and prepare food for myself and then leave without cleaning up, the next person ( my wife) is burdened with cleaning up my mess before tending to her purpose, I have changed at least in the kitchen.
I appreciate and respect your reflection and willingness to change in areas where you realize your behavior has created a burden for another. If we could all do that, together, our world would be so different. A few months back I snapped at a health care worker when he questioned my request for a vaccination. He was following a newly instituted protocol, but it seemed as though he was questioning the need at all for the vaccine. I regretted that I had snapped at him and went back a week later to apologize in person; I felt bad that his day had been impacted by my behavior. He was surprised and said he hadn’t remembered until I mentioned it. But the repair was needed, for both of our hearts, but also so that I held myself accountable.
Today I have been feeling despair about the world precisely because of the lack of reflection in adults that I see around me and their unwillingness to admit that unintended consequences of their actions still did harm - and then here is Rev Trimble’s writing. Good timing.
Robert Greenleaf, a Quaker who came up with the idea of servant leadership said this: “The urgent problems of our day…exist because of human failures, individual failures, one person at a time, one action at a time failures.” And, so, we get the world we live in. Unless we’re willing to be accountable for the outcomes of our behaviors- regardless of intentions. The level of reflection that it takes to understand this is challenging for many.
Extinct Rice’s Whales?
At high risk… protect, protest!
Maybe 50 left.
I second that! Thank you for sharing this important post with me, Marisol.💜🐋🙏
Dear Rev. Cameron,
Thank you for alerting us to the word, Teshuvah. I will write it in my journal. It will be my day's meditation. I need to work on living this word.
I confess to almighty God,
and to you, my brothers and sisters,
that my love for this blue planet
we all call home only goes so far.
I confess that I know the car
I drive every single day,
the one with the V-6 engine,
is poisoning the air,
fossilizing our future,
but with hardly a care, I drive on,
slow down to let other cars in or out,
breathe deeply at red lights,
give a little wave at four-way stops,
cede my right of way to another,
and when I see one of those EVs,
I nod approvingly.
Meanwhile, the trees I confess to love,
the ones I drive by every day,
the ones that teach me
diversity and shade and resurrection
hang above me, absorbing the sins
of millions of cars like mine.
They catch the wind of God, wave at me,
and I drive on.
From a post of mine with a same general vibe.
“Let’s be clear that saying that you didn’t mean to do or say something may be a statement of fact but it is not an apology. Saying, “I apologize,” or better yet, “I’m sorry,” is an apology. I’m not splitting hairs here as there is a difference that goes beyond mere semantics, and that difference lies in understanding that you were actually in the wrong and letting the person on the receiving end of that apology know that you admit it and realize why you were wrong. The former is dismissive while the latter is heartfelt.
While we are at it, let me say this about gratitude. When someone tells me, “You shouldn’t have,” right after I’ve gone to the trouble to do something nice for them, I wonder why I did it in the first place? This is not a thank you but a self-absolution that borders on the ungrateful. There’s no better thanks that you can give anyone than a simple, and again a heartfelt, “Thank you.”
All of which leads us to a discussion on being helpful. When you know that someone needs help just go ahead and help them. Don’t ask, “Do you need help?” because oftentimes pride will get in the way and they will say, “No,” despite the fact that they obviously do. Rarely will anyone tell you to stop helping after you have started, and they therefore do indeed get helped. Even if they utter the dreaded, “You shouldn’t have,” it doesn’t negate the fact that you have extended an act of human kindness and the world sure can use a lot more of that.”
Your words "urgency", "extinction" and " before it is too late" are resounding across our home planet right now. The Rice whales, our water, our air, our playing loose with our "new fire" of AI agents-- all existentially on the brink. Joining this moment of teshuvah, calling us to turn and repair, will hopefully shake us into a new way of being, before our very web of being is broken beyond repair. Choosing life means our grandchildren may live!
Thank you for this. It's so hard for me to read about the terrible things we continue to do to our planet - and especially to animals. Unfortunately, I think that the powers that be DO mean to do these cruelties - because they are motivated by greed and their greed justifies all their actions.
I read today’s meditation and felt a big lose. Trump and his Reich/Administration do not care about LIFE!!! They are driven by greed and power alone and are willingly destroying America and by their same actions, the world. The scariest thing about all this is that America is allowing it by its inaction.
The rest of the free world is scrambling to work around America and by the time change happens in America, the world will have moved on and America will be left alone.
Trump and his people are already threatening its closest friend and ally and we are trying to get out from under America and are basically being called traitors.
When a bully becomes unbearable, you have to find friends who want to walk with you, not over you!!!