Keren Dibbens-Wyatt's Blog, page 19

96. Passive Aggressive (Empathy, Lent 37)

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I remember a counsellor during my divorce mentioning almost casually that I was passive aggressive. I was stunned and really hurt. This is one trait that people seem to really loathe in others, was I really doing that? Well, maybe. But looking at this with self-compassion I can see that for me (and maybe for many people) when it did occur, it was a self-defence mechanism. I couldn’t come out and say what I actually wanted to, for fear of confrontation or of being emotionally or physically hurt. So the comeback came indirectly. And then this becomes a habit, especially when we are living with fear, that is hard to break.

I have worked really hard with God over many years to try to be far more honest with those around me about my hurts and grievances. It has been very tough for me, as I was trampled emotionally for many years. I didn’t even realise that my pain was seeping out of the cracks in this way. So now when I twig that other people are doing this, my first instinct is to have compassion, and try to help them say what they really want to about what they really want to, when they do, rather than feeling they need to go all around the houses and back again. Because another thing that self-compassion has taught me on this one, is that it is an exhausting way to go about things!

text © Keren Dibbens-Wyatt 2017 photo from Pixabay

95. Analytical (Empathy, Lent 36)

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I am terribly logical and analytical. One of my best subjects at uni was key criticism. I can pick a hole in an argument from a hundred yards away. I played Mr Spock in our sixth form review. But I know that it can seem annoyingly pedantic to others. I sometimes catch myself correcting people (this often annoys me more than it annoys them – I cringe). Or I explain why what they are saying is based on a false premise, and get that look, or that Facebook response. You know. I can be the class boffin. And yes, this is related to the intelligence I bared my soul to you about yesterday. But maybe my self-compassion here is warranted too, because there is a lot of ragged, lazy thinking out there, and so I hope these skills are useful, especially in Christian circles, where proof-texting and shoddy logic is rife. Fortunately, my logic is not cold, and sits very happily with my figurative, story-telling side. I love using both in my reading of Scripture. Realising how well those two parts of myself team up, I’m really pleased I decided to have empathy with myself on this character trait now. I had started to wonder, in this opinion-driven age, if it were an anachronism. I feel better now. Thanks.

text © Keren Dibbens-Wyatt 2017

94. Intelligence (Empathy, Lent 35)

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I’ve always been very bright. It has, at times, been a quality that has made me feel very visible, or even odd, and certainly frustrated. I struggled to understand why other people couldn’t grasp what I was saying, was horribly bored at school, and found myself trying to think of shorter words for things (especially with boyfriends, who did not seem to like my brains very much).

Although it is a wonderful thing to have, it also made me seem older than I was and people would assume I was emotionally mature as well as intellectually clever, when actually this was not the case. And just because I was clever didn’t mean I was practical. I could write a great essay on physics, but fail to get the back off a plug.* Perhaps the worst thing of all was that cleverness became the one thing I could rely on, my one gift, the source of any and all pride. So when after university I got terribly ill and succumbed to brain fog, barely able to put two words together, unable to read or decipher signs, I struggled with my identity. Who was this daft, slow, mixed up aphasic? Well, she was me too.

And when I began to recover my clarity for short periods, and then God presented me with the task of writing, what should I begin to lean on again but my intelligence? It was bound to happen, and having had to live without it for so long I wasn’t going to give it up very easily. And yet, that is exactly what God asked me to do. I had to give him my one specialty. He didn’t want, it seemed, for me to write plots with more smarts than Billy, or to dream of the Booker Prize. He wanted me to write from the heart. I remember a prayer time vividly, where I had to hand my brains over. I metaphorically watched them crack off from me, the way ice falls from a glacier, and saw them drift off on a flow of water.

And because I did that, because I gave them up and let them go like he’d asked me too, he returned them to me. But just as it is when we give him our hearts, and they return renewed, so my intelligence seemed changed. It had an entirely new focus and character. It was like my cleverness was not about me anymore. Not about making me look good, or feel superior, or special, nor any of the things it had, perhaps understandably, meant to me before. Now it was like my mind was living for God as well as my heart. I feel much happier, more integrated about this. When I use my intelligence now, it is to aid my readers understand my meaning. If I use a big word, it’s because (and only because) it is the right word to use.

I look compassionately on my school girl self, desperate for praise and trying to scramble to stay at the top of the heap in something (Lord knows it was never going to be P.E.) with her big brains that didn’t know what to do with her or where to take her. She was only doing what the world told her she should. And the me of now can have compassion on my current self as well, especially when I am misunderstood, or folk think I am being wordy or precious. It’s okay to use my God-given brain, and it’s especially okay to use that God-given, given-back-to-God, God-re-given brain, for the things he had planned all along.

* This endearing (to others) and infuriating (to me) trait continues. I just had to ask my (also very bright) husband to help me take a new camera case off its cardboard mount. Failure took me ten minutes, success for him, five seconds.

text © Keren Dibbens-Wyatt 2017 temporary photo copyright Oliver Postgate/BBC

92. Apologetic (Empathy, Lent 34)

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For this last week of Lent I want to take a slightly different tack and explore how to have a little more empathy with myself. I’m going to look with kindness at qualities I have that I’m not that comfortable with, or that get in the way of compassion and growth.

I’m always saying sorry. I am one of those people who, if you bump into me, will apologise profusely. Or at least, I used to be. Recently, I think because of the support of my very loving husband, I’ve started to stick up for myself a bit more. But constantly apologising is a rather English habit, and even more ingrained in those of us who grew up dreading being told off.

Sometimes it is easier to take the blame for something than to run the risk of causing any kind of conflict. It can be a placatory gesture too, and those of us who do it imagine that other people find us more agreeable and pleasant because of it, whereas in actual fact, they are more likely to think us foolish, or to gauge us as easy to take advantage of.

I used to think it was Christian to be like this, but now I think that there is a big difference between being conciliatory and being a doormat. We are all learning new things, and perhaps it is good to be patient with ourselves as well as with others, as we round those curves.

text © Keren Dibbens-Wyatt 2017 (photo from Amazon)

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Exciting News!

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Dear friends, my new book, “Garden of God’s Heart” which is a beautiful set of 365 spiritual contemplations inspired by English gardens accompanied by black and white photos, is now available to buy from Amazon, Lulu or Barnes & Noble, along with my three other offerings, paperbacks: Positive Sisterhood; Whale Song: Choosing Life with Jonah; and FREE e-book, Christian Prayers for the World.

Jennifer Rees Larcombe, acclaimed author and speaker, has this to say in her Foreword to “Garden of God’s Heart,” by Keren Dibbens-Wyatt:

“There are books that are beautifully written, books that tell great stories, books that contain deep spiritual truths and books which speak grace to the heart. Rarely is there is a book that does all these.   This is such a book… I hope you will love it as much as I do.”

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Enjoy! Thanks for reading!

If you would like to watch a short trailer for the book which includes my reading a line or two, then click this link…  https://youtu.be/aAzz-XGo-ks

91. Banker (Empathy, Lent 32)

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I am one of those left-wing liberals that like to rail about justice and equality. But as you know I feel challenged to look at the world with different eyes for a while. Let’s take a topical example. Supposing, as I stand and shout on social media with the No DAPL protestors, vehement in my beliefs that clean water and safeguarding the environment is more important than rich shareholders taking home yet more cash, that I turn the tables in that outrage, and am placed in the shoes of the CEO of a bank who are deeply invested in that pipeline. How might I feel?

I’ve been employed to run a profitable business. My priority is to keep the stockholders happy and keep my job. I cannot allow myself to ponder the rights and wrongs of the actual investment. If I did that with every dollar I’d never be able to get anywhere! I’ve been trained to see that as my emotions interfering with my work. I am good at making tough decisions and holding on through difficulties. This is how I earned both my place and the respect of my peers. I want to stay at the top. If I resigned over it, or lost my job taking a stand, someone else would be put in my place who would do the right thing by the investors anyway. I’d have lost my position and endangered the security of my co-workers and family for nothing.

There is no point, in any case, worrying about the environment, because everyone around me tells me that the scientists are wrong, that the protestors are just whining, that there is no real cause for alarm, that the earth can look after itself, and I am also, knowing myself to be canny, investing in renewable energy as well as fossil fuels, though perhaps with less enthusiasm. If that starts to get anywhere, my bank and I will be right behind that too. These things have a way of working out. Necessity is the mother of invention and all that.

text © Keren Dibbens-Wyatt 2017 photo from Pixabay

(This piece contains part of an article published on Godspace. You can read it here.)

90. Beater (Empathy, Lent 31)

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I’m totally anti-hunting. I hate all blood sports with a passion. I don’t think enjoying killing things is a healthy way to be. But even on this, are there two sides? Is there another way of looking at it through different eyes to mine? As a vegetarian of course, the argument changes, but how might meat eaters who help with the shooting of grouse, pheasant and other game birds justify what they do?

It is better to kill and eat birds this way than to rear them in a barn all squashed in so tight they can’t even move. I guess the shooters and the dogs certainly enjoy themselves, and the birds don’t really suffer, not like those supermarket chickens. People who criticise are happy to point the finger but don’t think it through. This is an old and noble profession, people have always hunted and nothing goes to waste. This is how the land works, how the countryside makes its way. Such is life.

text © Keren Dibbens-Wyatt 2017 photo from Pixabay

89. Foul Mouth (Empathy, Lent 30)

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I’m not a big swearer. It’s not something I usually do unless I’m on hold to a call centre, my computer is playing up, or I’ve stubbed a toe. It is a rarity in terms of communicating feelings. I get uncomfortable around people who swear continuously, especially when they are using words for female anatomy to call someone stupid or obnoxious. That seems unfair to the female anatomy involved I think, which deserves more respect. I wonder how it feels to be trapped inside that kind of vocabulary.

Look it is really hard to express myself in words that mean things. It is easier to use words that are less specific, and put my feelings into them. That’s more my idea of expression. I am very passionate and I get angry a lot, and that flows into my speech. Sometimes I just get so angry with not being able to say what I mean that I swear, and sometimes I get angry with the system and the people running it that I swear, and sometimes I enjoy seeing that I’ve shocked them. That gives me a feeling of power that I wouldn’t otherwise get to experience. I don’t read books, so words, especially long words, mostly feel like they belong to other people. I know the words that me and my friends understand and I stick to those.

text © Keren Dibbens-Wyatt 2017 photo from Pixabay

88. Hippie (Empathy, Lent 29)

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I’m rather a hippie myself up to point. I am a socialist, a pacifist and I feel a strong connection with nature. As a Christian, love is my watchword. But I am also fairly pragmatic, and try to follow a moral code which involves being faithful to my partner, and not taking drugs. So my kind of free love is a little different. But like many stereotypes, the hippy is so much more than the obvious things that spring to mind.

I truly want to be one with the earth and the trees. I express that in my paganism and my tree-hugging, my protesting against roads and my love of greenery of all kinds. Yes, I tie die my own tee shirts made from organic cotton. You may laugh at how well I fit the hippy mould, but for me it is a no brainer. Marijuana relaxes me and my friends, it is better than being uptight and obsessed with property markets and dress codes. Really for me, being a hippy is about community, and it is about wanting world peace. And that both these things start right where we are. That’s a better beginning than in a lot of churches I’ve seen.

text © Keren Dibbens-Wyatt 2017

87. Show Off (Empathy, Lent 28)

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I hate being the centre of attention. If I ever actually became successful at what I do, I’d have to continue to hide away. No after-dinner speeches for me (not likely due to my ill health anyhow)! I can understand that all of us feed on attention, but it’s hard for me to get those who actively seek out that centre place by acting up or playing the clown, revelling in being the centre of things. What might that look like from the other side?

I get so bored listening to other people, it’s so much more fun to be the one talking, and even if I say so myself, more interesting. I have a lot to say, talents to share, I’m the life and soul of the party. What’s wrong with that? Someone has to be the loud and lary one, and I love it. All eyes fixed on me and I can keep control of the situation. I can feel loved and popular, and my low self-esteem rockets. Attention was in short supply at home, so if I can heal that wound and entertain people I like at the same time, why not?

Photo from Pixabay, text © Keren Dibbens-Wyatt 2017