Soul Words

So what kind of "soul words" have we shared lately with those we love?

Not words about events, news, other people, or even what we believe.

But soul words.

Words expressing how we feel.

Words expressing emotions. 

I found a gem of a book last week at Focus on the Family called How We Love: Discover Your Love Style, Enhance Your Marriage.

It talked about how many people tend to avoid expressing themselves with "soul words," 

because it didn't happen much in their family of origin. 

 

We often grow up unable to share our hearts and feelings because when we did so we were either ignored, scorned, blamed or otherwise treated badly for it.

So we end up with one of four or five styles of relating that impair how we love:

1) the Avoider Love Style

2)The Pleaser Love Style

3) The Vacillator Love Style

4) The Chaotic (Controller and Victim) Love Style

The Avoider has learned to shut down his emotions till he doesn't know he has any, and to avoid emotions, deeply felt hugs, vulnerability and closeness to others. 

The Pleaser spends his life trying to please others in order to get the love and closeness he or she craves. They don't know how to say no and they often end up being used. They also end up building up resentment against the people they are struggling so hard to please because they don't have healthy boundaries.

The Vaccillator has suffered so much that in his efforts to find the love and closeness he craves, he ends up with such idealistic expectations that no one can ever meet them, and he ends up constantly disappointed and unhappy with those around him. He thinks his spouse will satisfy all the longings of his heart, and when the spouse doesn't, the vacillator ends up disillusioned and may start looking elsewhere.

The Chaotic relational style comes from a home situation where there was abuse or parents or other figures who were either extremely controlling or negligent. Such people end up being either weak victims or selfish controllers themselves to try to make sure they aren't hurt again. 

Then the book talked about examples of what happens when people with certain styles of relating

marry each other!

You sort of wish you could swat each other sometimes!

And then the book shows how each style can start learning to understand themselves and each other, especially regarding your styles of unhealthy relating, and begin to take steps toward healthy change.

One of those steps was to start communicating using what the book calls "soul words."

 

These are words that express our feelings and emotions--giving people a peek into the window of our soul.

How often do we express ourselves using such words as

happy, relieved, secure, thrilled, loving, tender, responsive, appreciative, enthusiastic, playful, determined,

or anxious, uneasy, restless, burdened, afraid, apprehensive, confused, betrayed, ashamed?

The book said that a key question to ask ourselves is can you remember a time in your family of origin when you were comforted?

How did your family of origin respond when you were sad or angry or hurt?

How were your feelings treated?

Were they ignored, brushed off, made fun of, punished?

And now, how are we treating the next generation?

Are our children free to express their feelings in healthy ways?

 

This does not mean we allow temper tantrums or selfish or wrong or subtly manipulative behavior.
Neither does it mean we cater to every whim and let our children control and manipulate us.
(We had a small child who was crying last night and acting mad and whimpering because she said she didn't know if her daddy loved her now or not, when he had to get tough with her about obedience. We realized that when this happened the second time in a matter of days, she was trying out a new manipulation tactic, and we made sure it did not work for her.)
 But do we teach them how to express themselves with soul words so that they can communicate effectively, deal with problems in a healthy way, and learn to deal with root issues instead of surface things?

Do we seek a balance of tenderness and toughness?

Often parents who have never or rarely felt a deep love or felt soul comfort themselves have no idea how to deeply love and tenderly comfort a child.
They might feed, clothe, and educate them, and they may feel guilty for not loving their little bratty child and respond by giving him or her everything they want to try to take the place of true nurture--
which takes time and emotional energy.
Do we enjoy and nurture our children? 

 Jonathan and I worked through a number of pages of this book together, taking time here and there over several days, and are finding our understanding of each other deepened and our marriage relationship richer, closer, and more fulfilling. 

And because these thoughts were such a blessing to us personally, I spent a while one night when I couldn't sleep putting these thoughts into this post.

We are also working at relating more patiently and lovingly to our children. 

Nurture is what is it about.

Bringing them up in the "nurture and admonition of the Lord."

Who doesn't need more hugs, more understanding, and more kind words along with the admonition, instruction, correction and discipline?

More "soul words"?

I recommend this book to every married couple and family!

Bishop's Castle

On our way home from our 2-day camping trip, we stopped for an hour or so at Bishop's Castle.

Here Sam has climbed to one of the high points.

And the girls are climbing the stairs.

A castle can be a refuge--or just a scary high place.

Sam and Carrie went everywhere there was to go, and Jonathan took Danny and Hannah almost everywhere there was to go.

I preferred to stay on the ground. 

I had been in this castle several years back, maybe ten years ago, and didn't see the need in climbing the heights again. 

I didn't feel like I had anything to prove. 

I thought these chipmunks had the right idea--scampering around with their feet firmly on the ground.

 Chipmunks don't need to prove anything like we people seem to need to. 

I've had to realize that there have been areas in my life where I felt the need to prove something--

a need which has been stripped away from me lately

inside the school of hard knocks. 

You don't have to climb to the highest pinnacle, or down to the lowest mine to prove that you aren't afraid.

You don't have to go across bridges that have next to nothing under them

just to prove that you can connect with people who don't want to connect with you. 

You don't have to climb into scary places and wave at the people down below 

just to prove you are somehow braver and better or wiser or stronger or smarter than they are.

You don't have to climb up into scary heights just to prove that you care about the world around you.

And you don't have to climb down the wire bridge till you are looking down at the fire-breathing

dragon to prove that you can get that close to him without getting zapped.

 You don't have to climb into scary places and do things you don't feel comfortable doing

just to please people. 

Not even if everybody is doing it.

Because if you aren't doing it, not everybody is doing it. 

It's okay to do something different. 

It's okay to enjoy the chipmunks down on the solid ground and make supper for your family in the motor home and be glad when everyone makes it back safe and sound.

We don't have to prove anything.

And we don't have to please everybody. 

 We just have to be ourselves, and please God.

And let others make fun if they must, and scorn if they want to. 

God is a castle for us, but He is a refuge and not a frightening experience.

Frozen Calipers and Stuck Spots

On our way home from camping, our brakes were heating up, so we had to pull over in the parking lot of a church where this wooden cross was on the far side of the parking lot.

So while Jonathan showed Sam how to pull the tire and check to see how the caliper was frozen up, and how to spray some penetrating oil,
Hannah was taking pictures of me by that cross.

It was a sacred place, it seemed to me,

quiet and pretty and holy.

I didn't care that it was a Baptist church.

It was still holy, and as I admired the trees and flowering bushes in front of it, I thanked God for this little humble spot in southern Colorado where a broken down motor home could stop for repairs. 

And I stood by the doors and prayed for all the precious people who attend this little place--

and for those in our own church, and others.

Because so many times there are more things than brake calipers that get frozen up in lives,

causing things to heat up and smoke to rise and 

yes, a big stink. 

And that is why we need to just stop sometimes. 

Just stop by the old rugged cross.

It's there we can ask for the penetrating oil of the sweet Holy Spirit
to be applied to that frozen caliper,
to that fear, that anxiety, that wound, that stuck spot,
and to free it up with the truth that sets free.
A cross is an amazing thing. It's not made from a tree full of branches.
It's made from lumber that has been stripped and sawed into pieces, like this lumber we watched being stripped on our way down the mountain.

 And God knows that there are a whole lot of branches on each of us that

are mostly just that--branches that aren't all that useful 

when it comes to His plan for our lives.
It was amazing watching this big machine grab these trunks of trees and strip it bare of branches,
then saw it to the correct length.

This machine grabbed several trees at a time and hauled them where they needed to be.

And yes, sometimes life does seem to kind of treat us this way, 

just kind of grab us and haul us around,

leaving us sort of swinging and off balance

and feeling kind of awkward.

But then we get set down, and the dust settles, 

and the dizziness lets up, and the storm calms,

and we realize God wanted to do something more, different, and better with us than He'd done before.

All in the middle of the terrifying stripping of branches, we realize He has a plan.

He wants something besides a needled pine growing on the mountainside in the middle of a bunch of other pines.

He wants lumber for a house or a bridge or a barn or a trellis--

or a cross.

And so He marks our tree for the lumbering project.

 It would be easy to turn away from God's plan--

the pruning of unnecessary branches,

the carrying of the cross.

No, Lord, not that!

 But in His tender love, He keeps stripping away the things that don't honor Him,

the things in our lives that hinder His plan.

 We may think we need those branches for robins to perch on,

for chipmunks to scuttle on. 

Branches are necessary, and beautiful, aren't they?

 Sometimes God has a different plan.

 What we see as beauty, He sees as unfruitful.

What we see as just a part of us, just a part of our personality we were born with

or raised with,

or formed by habit,

He sees as ugly and disgraceful.

 Are we willing to be stripped of things that are part of us,

and even dear to us,

so that the glory of His power may be seen in our earthen vessels?

So that we can truly cherish the "Old Rugged Cross...
And exchange it someday for a crown"?