Grace

this girl wrote:

"Why is it so much harder to be gracious then it is to spew anger and venom?
Perhaps it's the person involved
Perhaps it's my frustration at a vanilla life situation
Perhaps it's dealing with old feelings of rejection brought on by the night before He left.
Perhaps it's PMS
Perhaps it's that i just need more sleep
Perhaps it's the person involved
Perhaps it's me! (what? me? pfft! perish the thought!)

i WANT to 'spew' grace - or spread grace or exude grace or share grace"


This whole area is an important one for Me, and I've written on this more than once.

All those possible reasons that this girl listed could very well be factors -- they usually are. I find that most people's orientation is to the right thing, unless other stuff gets in the way. And yeah, that other stuff can be lack of sleep or PMS or not fitting into your jeans or stupid girl stuff or stupid boy stuff or stupid job stuff or (insert any one of 6,594 other things here). It happens to us all.

Grace, in this context, can really be defined as "being less under the influence of 'stuff' than the other person currently is." And being less under the influence of stuff is the result of being able to take that little pause I've harped on written about before.

Grace is breathing. Stop. Walk around the block. Twice. Run in place a minute or two. Watch three minutes of Sanford and Son on TV Land. Realize that whatever you're momentarily angry about is much less important than what you're about to give away by giving in to that anger.

Grace is creating that tiny little bit of clear space inside. And almost magically, once opened up, a realization pops into that space. The realization that anger is its own punishment, that the anger and bitterness of the other person diminishes that person, not you. The realization that expressing that anger and bitterness, while it might feel momentarily liberating, is slowly but inexorably imprisoning us in a way of thinking and feeling that is self-limiting and ultimately destructive.

Grace, this sought after, golden thing that differentiates adult from adolescent, Master or Mistress from control freak, submissive from brat, is achieved by the consistent application of the most prosaic, almost silly things. Grace is stopping one pattern and starting another. And once started that pattern is joyfully hard to stop. And gradually one, in this girl's words, spews grace.