* split personality *

the past few weeks have been interesting to say the least, considering some of the things that have been in the news of late.

i originally wanted to write about meeting jane goodall on oct.24 for my next post, but i wanted to wait for the photo i took with her. unfortunately, it never came. i had stupidly forgot my camera at home, and while waiting in line for her to sign my book, i was thinking maybe i could ask someone else to take a photo for me, and then email it to me. just as i thought that, the girl in front of me turned around with her camera and asked me to take a picture for her. so i made the deal with her, except she never sent me my photo.

jane's talk was called "reason for hope", which is the same as her new book. she talked about the seperation of the head and the heart, a split personality of sorts. some people may look at this world we have and say that it is doomed for destruction. look at what people are doing to the earth and to each other, most of the time for the pursuit of power and money. the thing is, most people, if given the chance, would say that love and compassion and selflessness and a perspective of interdependence are all great things - things more valuable than the price of gold or crude oil, more valuable than our net worth. but i think people say this with their head more than with their heart most of the time. if only we could find a connection between the brilliant capacity of our minds (look at all the incredible advancements in technology, all because of the human mind) and the inner invisible stuff that is our hearts (the part of us that feels, needs, aches, fears, and truly connects with others).

if only people could find a way to live & work with their hearts rather than their minds...

and what is it to work with love? it is to weave the cloth with the threads drawn from your heart, even as if your beloved were to wear that cloth. ~ the prophet

the problem is that people are so far removed from each other, even when they're standing right in front of each other. i think this is what jesus must have been trying to get at when he talked about leaving the 99 for the 1. we must learn to see that one, that anyone, as our one and only beloved. this is something we've been trying to grow in one_eighty, but it's hard. it's inconvenient. it's much easier to go about life thinking that it's all about ME, that the entire world revolves around ME, and everyone else are just extras or the supporting cast. but what if we could see the OTHER as the main character, whoever that 'other' might be? i think we would have a very different sort of world.

i know it's not easy. we are all humans afterall. and humans are fragile beings, especially our egos. we don't like it when we give and are rejected. we enjoy comfort and fame and money far too often. and we don't like to admit that we have faults, that we are fallible, that we are sinners.

but the thing i've learned is that it much easier to be real, to admit my faults, and to be transparent than it is to have to hide some deep dark secret. eventually, the weight of the secret will crush us. eventually, what is in the dark will have to be revealed in the light, as we saw with ted haggard this past week.

thank God there is hope. thank God He IS our hope.