You know when you believe a truth to yourself and someone else’s words ground the truth you know? Those moments are great. I had one this morning. I heard a Joyful Mystery meditation and its fruit is poverty of Spirit. The meditation went: Appearances can deceive and God in a manger is a far greater wonder than angels in the sky; Faith puts us in contact with reality.
“Faith puts us in contact with reality” are the words I now know that grounded the truth I believe.
I’ve heard the question, “How can it be?”
In my opinion, “How can it be” is a question for a greater truth, a mystery.
I am still working at grasping the mystery of Faith. I’ll be working on that eternally. The only responsibility I have given myself in that work is to be a student and a teacher simultaneously - I am feeling by that, I will be a seeker.
In nursing school and in vet tech school is where I found a deeper respect for learning. That deeper knowing went something like: to teach others is to learn. There, I was a student myself- reading as best I could ahead of the lecture, taking attentive notes in lectures, recording lectures to transcribe later (my mom even got me a transcription machine for my lecture tapes), outlining the chapter with a highlighting system that made sense to me - all to create original notes connecting the lecture with supportive textbook details for myself first.
Before my one and only semester of nursing school I worked part time as a tutor in my college’s tutoring center while I was working on nursing school prerequisite classes. Betty East! I learned that fun name there. The fit between the person and that name was so tight, too. In my opinion, no other Betty East could do Betty East better than the Betty East I knew.
I would say tutoring both levels of human anatomy and physiology and microbiology simultaneously as its student and leading study sessions in my first semester of nursing school as its student made leading study groups in both levels of veterinary clinical pathology as its student, easier. #everythinghappensforareason
My favorite school subject of all time is Veterinary Clinical Pathology. I liked my instructor - she was a practicing veterinarian at the clinic she owned; she took her continuing education to the next level as a teacher to student veterinary technicians she hoped to hire in her practice upon graduation; and it sounded like she did pro bono work in her clinic part-time. I felt recognized by her, and I remember how she gave me her encouragement as her student - she didn’t hide her tone of disappointment when I performed the last task poorly on my final exam of our anesthesia and surgery semester. I took her criticism humbly, because I knew for myself, first, I wasn’t performing the final task of that final final exam’s final task optimally. I was running on fumes. Her tone of disappointment felt balanced so it wasn’t harsh, it was just true. I knew my joy in the moment - I wasn’t afraid to fail the task, and I showed up on my honesty. I felt like I had no control over that moment because I just was what I was - about “brain dead”. I had just enough brainfire power left to humble myself in her feedback’s presence.
Even in the weariness, remain aware - that’s what her feedback meant to me.
A moment in my internship drove that feedback deeper and encourages me still today - I always said “Yes” to filling in for someone who called in last minute on their shift, until I started holding myself even more accountable and stopped. I loaded a respiratory depressant into a syringe and without making the check, I confirmed “Yes” for the wrong patient - a patient who was just stabilized from a vaccine reaction. That’s the first of the seven rights of medication, wrong. My shift’s veterinarian reinforced my confidence before her shift change; I humbled myself in the oncoming veterinarian’s reaction - I knew the severity in my error first. Thankfully, the dapple dachshund puppy was discharged.
If there’s one class I have absolutely no recollection of the subject matter, it’s Veterinary Radiology; I just recollect I went through it. #somethingsgottogive I can recall one funny moment, though. It involves a dark room, an angry knock on the door accompanied by an unruly tone, and me and my group just developing our radiographs. I have to be reminded of the rest.
Veterinary Parasitology is my second favorite subject of all time! Let’s see…Trichuris vulpis! Hot damn! I still got it. My pneumonic device still works 11 years later for the scientific name of Whipworm. “Trichs have a vulva and might use whips.” :/ I might not remember where I put the jug of milk, but I can recall a parasite’s scientific name identified on a slide of centrifuged poop; its bipolar.
Making poop slides was easier than making blood smears; smearing blood onto a slide is a fine motor skill.
My intuition speaks to me, a good teacher is a teacher who is teaching themselves first.
When that kind of teacher is teaching, knowledge just seems to transmit seamlessly. What that feels like to me is: the teacher just delivers and the student is caught in wonder. How the teacher knew the student before the student even knew how to form the question into a thought.
My cousin told me: to teach yourself is to learn
I come back to that often. Just like I think I came back again to Betty East today. For awhile there, things were coming back to cotton candy often. Good times!
This is just my observation that makes sense to me: good teachers sound like they’re teaching themselves first. It’s a nonverbal sound, but it is noticeable to me. Kind of like in my head - good singers sound like they’re singing to themselves first. And the audience is simply enjoying the intimacy of the moment being shared between the singer and the singer.
Matt told me Drake is on his way to having more number one hits than any other musical artist. Whatever else I was thinking about at that moment just came to a halt. I was in disbelief. I can follow Peyton Manning to Drew Brees to Tom Brady just fine. I am not qualified, but I am opinionated. I am in disbelief. I asked Matt if he could pick Drake out on a radio. In terms of Drake, I can pick out music belonging to Timberlake better than I can Kendrick Lamar. I had to recall who Drake even is to help my disbelief. The only way I distinguish Drake on the radio is if I recognize a song that belongs to him, and the only way I recognize Drake’s song is if I am curious- enough to know- who’s voice was on that beat. I am trying to recall on my own even one title belonging to Drake, and I need Google’s help. And “Tuesday” wasn’t Drake; he was just a feature. I don’t think the song would have had the same sticking power with me if it was titled “Saturday”. Then I asked Matt rhetorically if he can distinguish Michael Jackson on the radio. Matt asked me what felt like the control question, “If I could distinguish a Beatles song.” We cannot. . https://youtu.be/hggOR1HMx9M
We both said, “Yes” to Michael Jackson. Just like we’d both say “Yes” to Elvis and Dolly Parton. What does “hold the con” even mean? Google doesn’t even know- when I asked, Google assumed I meant holding cones, ice cream ones. I was happy with Google’s response. Now I’m thinking about frozen custard. They shut Shake’s down. Their Concretes were smooth - like a heterogenous mixture that had a homogenous texture. Blizzards and Flurries are convenient Concretes! Not McFlurries. Sonic’s Flurries - the ice cream/slush mixture. I was disappointed when Sonic stopped calling them Flurries, they were more Flurry-like than McFlurries. When I’d visit Matt in college, he’d take me to Shake’s and to get a Quesadailla Explosion salad; I was so pleased. I tried Culver’s but it’s hard to be satisfied when you already know Shake’s. I haven’t made it to Andy’s yet, but I’ll get there. I am holding out because Arctic Ape didn’t shape up, and Andy’s is my backup plan.
Christy Turlington is my favorite supermodel.
“Faith puts us in contact with reality” caught my attention like to catch my attention to pay attention now. I had an anticipation for something’s coming next, and then I heard the 4th Joyful Mystery meditation follow. For me, this meditation grounded a mystery, “Faith puts us in contact with reality,” in the mystery of Faith even harder like WOAH:
“Mary began with few truths but she had immense faith. We have every truth and much less faith. To pray for stronger faith is to obtain stronger faith.”
Fighting fire with fire just made its first true sense to me, here…
“Mary’s Faith is Satan’s greatest enemy.” - Emily Speer
Faith is not a fire as much as it's a glow
A quiet, lovely burning underneath the snow
And it's not too much
It's just enough to get me home
'Cause love moves slow
Love moves slow
My favorite song that helped me connect Faith with a feeling is Audrey Assad’s “Slow” https://youtu.be/ITryMlL1cA8 I love how tightly Audrey’s lyrics hold on to her melodies. I once wrote to her it’s like the melody is singing along to her voice, and she acknowledged my thought within the moment. That was a neat night. My mom was gladdened by the moment, too.
And then I wondered:
I read once Faith is a dark knowledge. I am glad I listened to my intuition and saved that book to read when I read it because it made its deep spiritual sense to me at that moment with what I was encountering physically that was impacting me mentally. My grasp of the mystery of Faith just got a little tighter today.
(5/9/23 I met Ephesians 2:8-9 today, and how I had written Faith works, before, made a clearer sense to me. Faith is a gift of God, not even from God, of God, Faith is not earned by works, Faith is received. I think a great example of this is The Annunciation.)
The fruit of that bolded 4th Joyful Mystery meditation is obedience.
I am grateful for Mary’s work in Faith and for choosing to follow God’s will which would be good for her life - first. To me, God is that great in His will. Psalm 62:7
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