Revolution Reality 01 Tomatoes

A fun little video we made for Tommy and Krissi's Revolution Reality. There will be more of these fosho.

The Five Love Languages

Love Languages

For a significant amount of time since we'd broken it off, I've spent countless hours resenting my ex boyfriend (unnamed here) for being neglectful and unloving. I've cried out because I felt I was the victim of two years of emotional abuse. At times, I was even more angry at myself for allowing the emotional wounding to happen.

Recently, two happily married friends invited me to a seminar where, among other things, I learned about the concept of the "5 Love Languages" and how they help us understand our personal emotional wounding. Apparently this Christian marriage counselor named Dr. Gary Chapman put this all into writing HERE in his books(s) with the same title "The Five Love Languages". Many aspects of my past relationship started to make a lot more sense to me after understanding these concepts. Although not everything in the relationship could be explained through the love languages concept, understanding the love languages really helped me understand myself more. It really hit head on when it comes to my current relationship and the little times in that relationship that I feel might be repeating themselves from the last one gone sour. Thanks to my understanding I know that I'm not crazy and that it's ok to need love the way I'm wired to need it. Before, I though I was just being irrational and "too needy" where, instead, I should have sacrificed my own understanding of love, lived with a huge hole in my heart, and be ok in relationship with someone who just doesn't know or maybe doesn't care what language they should use to make me feel loved. WRONG!

The following are the five love languages taken directly from the website thefivelovelanguages.com as written by Dr. Gary Chapman. (remember, you can check out his books at that same website) Remember, these don't really apply to ALL of the friendships and relationships we have- just people we are in relationship with like family or boyfriend/girlfriend, etc.

Words of Affirmation

Mark Twain once said “I can live for two months on a good compliment.”  Verbal appreciation speaks powerfully to persons whose primary Love Language is “Words of Affirmation.”  Simple statements, such as, “You look great in that suit,” or “You must be the best baker in the world! I love your oatmeal cookies,” are sometimes all a person needs to hear to feel loved. Aside from verbal compliments, another way to communicate through “Words of Affirmation” is to offer encouragement. 
Here are some examples: reinforcing a difficult decision; calling attention to progress made on a current project; acknowledging a person’s unique perspective on an important topic. If a loved one listens for “Words of Affirmation,” offering encouragement will help him or her to overcome insecurities and develop greater confidence.

Quality Time

Quality time is more than mere proximity. It’s about focusing all your energy on your mate. A husband watching sports while talking to his wife is NOT quality time. Unless all of your attention is focused on your mate, even an intimate dinner for two can come and go without a minute of quality time being shared.
Quality conversation is very important in a healthy relationship. It involves sharing experiences, thoughts, feelings and desires in a friendly, uninterrupted context. A good mate will not only listen, but offer advice and respond to assure their mate they are truly listening. Many mates don’t expect you to solve their problems. They need a sympathetic listener.
An important aspect of quality conversation is self-revelation. In order for you to communicate with your mate, you must also be in tune with your inner emotions. It is only when you understand your emotions and inner feelings will you then be able to share quality conversation, and quality time with your mate.
Quality activities are a very important part of quality time. Many mates feel most loved when they spend physical time together, doing activities that they love to do. Spending time together will bring a couple closer, and, in the years to come, will fill up a memory bank that you can reminisce about in the future.
Whether it’s sitting on the couch and having a brief conversation or playing together in a tennis league, quality time is a love language that is shared by many. Setting aside focused time with your mate will ensure a happy marriage.

Receiving Gifts

Some mates respond well to visual symbols of love. If you speak this love language, you are more likely to treasure any gift as an expression of love and devotion. People who speak this love language often feel that a lack of gifts represents a lack of love from their mate. Luckily, this love language is one of the easiest to learn.
If you want to become an effective gift giver, many mates will have to learn to change their attitude about money. If you are naturally a spender, you will have no trouble buying gifts for your mate. However, a person who is used to investing and saving their money may have a tough time adjusting to the concept of spending money as an expression of love. These people must understand that you are investing the money not in gifts, but in deepening your relationship with your mate.
The gift of self is an important symbol of love. Sometimes all your mate desires is for someone to be there for them, going through the same trials and experiencing the same things. Your body can become a very powerful physical symbol of love.
These gifts need not to come every day, or even every week. They don’t even need to cost a lot of money. Free, frequent, expensive, or rare, if your mate relates to the language of receiving gifts, any visible sign of your love will leave them feeling happy and secure in your relationship.

Acts of Service

Sometimes simple chores around the house can be an undeniable expression of love. Even simple things like laundry and taking out the trash require some form of planning, time, effort, and energy. Just as Jesus demonstrated when he washed the feet of his disciples, doing humble chores can be a very powerful expression of love and devotion to your mate.
Very often, both pairs in a couple will speak to the Acts of Service Language. However, it is very important to understand what acts of service your mate most appreciates. Even though couples are helping each other around the house, couples will still fight because the are unknowingly communicating with each other in two different dialects. For example, a wife may spend her day washing the cars and walking the dog, but if her husband feels that laundry and dishes are a superior necessity, he may feel unloved, despite the fact that his wife did many other chores throughout the day. It is important to learn your mate’s dialect and work hard to understand what acts of service will show your love.
It is important to do these acts of service out of love and not obligation. A mate who does chores and helps out around the house out of guilt or fear will inevitably not be speaking a language of love, but a language of resentment. It’s important to perform these acts out of the kindness of your heart.
Demonstrating the acts of service can mean stepping out of the stereotypes. Acts of service require both mates to humble themselves into doing some chores and services that aren’t usually expected from their gender. However, these little sacrifices will mean the world to your mate, and will ensure a happy relationship.

Physical Touch

Many mates feel the most loved when they receive physical contact from their partner. For a mate who speaks this love language loudly, physical touch can make or break the relationship.
Sexual intercourse makes many mates feel secure and loved in a marriage. However, it is only one dialect of physical touch. Many parts of the body are extremely sensitive to stimulation. It is important to discover how your partner not only physically responds but also psychologically responds to these touches.
It is important to learn how your mate speaks the physical touch language. Some touches are irritating and uncomfortable for your mate. Take the time to learn the touches your mate likes. They can be big acts, such as back massages or lovemaking, or little acts such as touches on the cheek or a hand on the shoulder. It’s important to learn how your mate responds to touch. That is how you will make the most of this love language.
All marriages will experience crisis. In these cases, physical touch is very important. In a crisis situation, a hug can communicate an immense amount of love for that person. A person whose primary love language is physical touch would much rather have you hold them and be silent than offer any advice.
It is important to remember that this love language is different for everyone. What type of touch makes you feel secure is not necessarily what will make your partner happy. It is important to learn each other’s dialects. That way you can make the most of your hugging, kissing, and other physical contacts.


Love Languages applied:
Honestly, when the women at the seminar were explaining the love languages in short... I just couldn't believe what I was hearing. It made so much sense. I'll recap it here: People feel and express love in 5 common ways. Often times, if a family member or lover expresses their love for you in a way that isn't your personal love language, it's hard to understand their love for you. For example, my mom might love me a ton but if I understand love through words of affirmation and she understands and expresses love through physical touch, it doesn't matter how much she hugs me and rubs my back, I'll still have a hole in my heart because I'm waiting for her to tell me that she loves me or compliment me or encourage me. If words of affirmation just aren't the way she expresses love we could misunderstand each other resulting in my not feeling loved and her not understanding why I think she never loves me. Understand? Spending a significant amount of time in a relationship like that can cause significant emotional wounding that carries over into other aspects of your life. If mom never told me she loved me (but she DID love me... she just didn't speak my language), then I might start freaking out if I have a boyfriend who doesn't tell me he loves me every hour that I'm with him. That unrealistic expectation of him would have been caused by being in relationship with someone who never told me that they loved me so now I need someone ELSE to tell me that they love me enough for the mom who didn't and for themselves or else it's going to be the end of the world because NOBODY LOVES ME! Sound familiar?


Sometimes these emotional wounds also carry over into our relationship with God (as the trinity- father, son, holy spirit). If we understand the Father through our relationship with our dad (dad's supposed to give us identity, security, and protection), the Holy Spirit through our relationship with our mother (comfort nurture and teaching) and Jesus through our relationships with our siblings and friends (communication and companionship) than think of how our unsatisfactory or broken relationships with those people affect how we understand the corresponding Godhead. Sometimes, it seems like we start to believe lies about God based on how those family members or friends have treated us. If Mom misses my love language I might believe that the holy spirit doesn't want to encourage me or will never get excited about me or what I do. That is a LIE! Understanding the love languages can help me understand what lies I believe about God and then ERASE them so that God, (holy spirit, jesus, and holy father) and I can get closer. way cool. Forgiving Mom for just not understanding the love languages, releasing her to God and blessing her and then forgiving yourself for thinking that the Holy Spirit wasn't your biggest fan and then starting to let the Spirit Shine through and show you how much of a fan he really is will not only help you partner with God in love but allow God to HEAL your wound so that you can move on with your relationships in a more healthy and affirming way.

I've tried this and it's TRUE! Tried and true... you would not believe how awesome forgiveness is. I'll talk about that in my next post.
We could be closer than you know,
Chelsea

A movement everyone should know

This is the most beautiful poem I have ever read. It is the poem that inspired my favorite song (of the same title): the third movement of Suite bergamasque by Claude Debussy. Appreciating beauty is worship in itself. I think God listens to this song as much as I do and digs the poem that inspired it. How some people can write music to so perfectly match someone else's words is a marvelous mystery of art and intelligence.. in it's own sense, empathy.

Claire de Lune
by Paul Verlaine (1844 – 1896)

Votre âme est un paysage choisi
Que vont charmant masques et bergamasques
Jouant du luth et dansant et quasi
Tristes sous leurs déguisements fantasques.

Tout en chantant sur le mode mineur
L'amour vainqueur et la vie opportune
Ils n'ont pas l'air de croire à leur bonheur
Et leur chanson se mêle au clair de lune,

Au calme clair de lune triste et beau,
Qui fait rêver les oiseaux dans les arbres
Et sangloter d'extase les jets d'eau,
Les grands jets d'eau sveltes parmi les marbres.

Click to read it in English

Self Denial 101

Yesterday I had a breakthrough.
My whole life I have misunderstood the whole "die to self" thing that Jesus teaches. My blood sugar was low, which causes some strange things to happen sometimes, and, after totally embarrassing myself in front of some friends while trying to get it under control, I just sat for hours alone thinking. What occupied my mind: how on earth was I going to make it up to them, the fact that they have to be my friend. Yes, folks, I've gotten to that point in my life. I have become a self-loathing loser who thinks nobody would ever forgive her for anything. Awesome. The realization of it made me want to vanish even more. What have I become?

Once I could finally talk again, in my sorrow, I asked for some advice from my boyfriend. He lovingly pointed out, again, that I need to start thinking differently. "You need to change your attitude." Whenever it comes to this I can't, in my life, figure out what he's talking about. I have tried everything and a half to battle this illness that I've had for about two years now. I've been terribly resilient. I've come a seriously long way but it's not gone and the symptoms of it still plague my life. I often feel like I am a disease. A disease to other people's lives and to my own. It's painful and scary and bad. Anyway, I think constantly bouncing back from episodes and being persistent and energetic in my treatment for it would count as having a positive attitude. Never mind the fact that I constantly feel spent and hopeless... defeated. Point being, I can never understand him when he tells me i need an attitude adjustment. I was still around wasn't I? I hadn't given up and, to me, that was about as good as it got. I hadn't given up yet even though I had to fight and give it EVERYTHING i have to keep from failing, giving up, admittedly loosing the battle... but to him that isn't good enough.


After our conversation and more tears on my part I started my two mile walk home in the 100 degree weather. More pitty party for me. I didn't have a job. I didn't have money. I didn't have a car. I didn't even have my bike because something was broken on it and I had to buy a part to fix it. boo hoo. It didn't last long, though, because something he had said a few minutes before got me thinking about self-denial.

As a Christian we are taught that self-denial is an essential part of our faith. No I'm not referencing Romeo and Juliet: "O Romeo, Romeo! wherefore art thou Romeo? Deny thy father and refuse thy name".. I think the most famous verse from the bible abou this is as follows:

Matthew 16:24-25 "Then said Jesus unto his disciples, If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me. For whosoever will save his life shall lose it: and whosoever will lose his life for my sake shall find it."

Another popular reference is to the story of the least shal be first dinner table fable thing.

But then it hit me... the breakthrough. My whole life I have misunderstood the whole "die to thyself" thing. I've had it totally backward and that's what Ty was talking about when he told me I needed to change my attitude. He was talking specifically about how I dealt with my illness, however, what he said applied to my whole life- overall.

What I used to think:
Denying oneself meant putting yourself in the worst positions possible and/or always approaching bad situations in your life with acceptance and tolerance. Making sure that you acknowledge your unworthiness in every situation and always taking the last share or none at all depending on the situation. Not complaining and certainly not changing a bad situation that you are in. The more suffering you must endure, the more loving you are being. Suffering is just a way you are building character so living with it and not dealing properly with people who abuse you or mistreat you is just building your faith and your character. Your enduring makes you more worthy. You are worth less than everyone else and placing yourself in that position is a way to get closer to God and be more holy.

Yesterday morning that was seriously how I lived my life!!!!! It was how I felt and how I thought I was living humbly and correctly. I thought THAT was humble. It was the reason I've stayed in abusive relationships with boyfriends and plain old friends. It's why I haven't taken initiative in so many places that I should have until it built up so much that i exploded and then just made the situation worse, why I let a non profit screw me out of hundreds of hours of time and about 9 thousand dollars so many years ago, why I let room mates walk all over me, why I let jobs pay me almost nothing, why I let people at church take advantage of my charity and hard work, why it seems like I resent more people than I respect, and why I'm currently a self-loathing looser.
Consider the light bulb on!

I'm proud to say (thanks to God!) that today I have a totally different outlook. Never mind how I got here in the first place. I'm learning learning and one of the first things I'm learning that the past is the past and now is now. WOO! yay God.

What I understand now:
When Christ asked us to deny ourselves He didn't mean for us to deny our worth. He meant we should Deny our privilege and then allow God to place us accordingly. Luke explains starting at 14:7:

When he noticed how the guests picked the places of honor at the table, he told them this parable: “When someone invites you to a wedding feast, do not take the place of honor, for a person more distinguished than you may have been invited. If so, the host who invited both of you will come and say to you, ‘Give this man your seat.’ Then, humiliated, you will have to take the least important place. But when you are invited, take the lowest place, so that when your host comes, he will say to you, ‘Friend, move up to a better place.’ Then you will be honored in the presence of all your fellow guests. For everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and he who humbles himself will be exalted.”

Denying your own worth could be considered a SIN on it's own! Denying your worth and accepting less than your worth in life on the basis that you are not worth anything or you aren't worth better is like denying that the Lord made you in his image. Denying your own worth causes resentment, misfortune, and unhappiness. It doesn't help serve the world and it certainly doesn't help serve you. I honestly never realized I was doing this until yesterday afternoon.

PRAISE GOD for giving me this breakthrough.

Denying one's privilege is humility and, although I think sometimes there can be some grey area and a fine line, really most of it is clean cut and clear. The man at the table didn't deny his worth and sit on the floor for crying out loud. He didn't place himself with the dogs- he sat at the table to get food and join the celebration! He just chose what place to sit in... he still got to sit at the table and then, when the host promoted him, he didn't say "nonono promote someone else" he allowed himself to get promoted.

Point being, stand up for yourself Chelsea. Don't accept crap from people because you certainly don't deserve it. Stand up for yourself and realize your own self worth. We are all children of the Lord and we are worth more money than is conceivable. We are more precious than any object or any other person in the world. We don't have to be martyers or put ourselves in bad situations and when bad situations come it is ok to try to get out of them! If it's impossible to escape THEN and only THEN is it time to be resilient and push through but not because you have to suffer to be close to God, no, because you value the life he gave you so much that you WILL suffer if it means protecting it the way the Lord gave it to us.

I was like becoming a modern version of one of those misguided Catholics who thought they had to harm themselves to make up for their sins. One of the monks who wore a hair shirt or whipped themselves. That's like how I was living!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Wasn't Christ's death enough for me.

It is now. Praise God.

I have value and today is day number one. I will accept no less than I am worth. Today I end resent. Today I start fresh. Today I begin to heal.

We could be closer than you know,
Chelsea

A series on modern morality 2

So as soon as I blogged my last post and started writing I stumbled upon this book:

The Irresistible Revolution: Living as an Ordinary Radical by Shane Claiborne

My review

rating: 5 of 5 stars
This is by far the best book I have ever read... ever.

Dive in and dare to dream!!!


Now that I've read this I am not about to even start to compete by writing my own. So scratch that whole last post. Holr!!!
We could be closer than you know,
Chelsea

A Series on Modern Morality

I have decided that I'll go about getting my recent education out of my brain and "down on paper", err... "blogged" by setting it up like I was going to write a book. haha. Well why not?

Anyway, I'm going to keep the title: "A Series on Modern Morality", but i'll add something afterwards for each.. uh.. chapter. For example: "A Series on Modern Morality: Food" or... "A Series on Modern Morality: Conscious Consuming". These titles will hopefully give you an idea of what is to come. Chances are there will be different sections to each basic chapter so their numbers will be added accordingly: "A Series on Modern Morality: Conscious Consuming; Section 01"

I can pretty much guarantee that I won't be posting these entries in any specific order so that's why I'm so meticulously categorizing them. This way anyone can follow along even if I post them grossly out of order and out of wack. Ya'll can just look them up in my history and continue through.

I can also guarantee that these aren't going to be a weekly thing. I am going to spend a ton of time on them and research them as thoroughly as I can before slappin' em on the old blog. I'll try to get some kind of a rhythm going (and i'll set deadlines for myself because the good Lord knows I need deadlines in order to function) but I'm not going to make any promises here about that :)

EEsh this is going to be a big project. I'm glad, though, becasue getting this stuff out of my head will really help me understand it myself. Seriously.
Maybe I'll post the letter I wrote to some of my spiratual confidents that explains how my brain has been in a bit of a twist since my understanding of morality has greatly expanded. It's really a rant but might give the blogging world some perspective as to where the inspiration is coming from for this huge project.

We could be closer than you know,
Chelsea

BICYCLEs and Faith

How Cycling helps me learn balance :

Psalms 18:36 - "You broaden the path beneath me, so that my ankles do not turn."

Yes, that's right. My bicycle has been a key asset to learning balance in my life!

Balance is a term that can mean many things. What I mean by balance here is simple. We have a few main needs in our lives, some of these include things as simple as food and shelter, another is, for example, the need to be in relationship with people- friends and family. We need good nutrition, regular exercise, enough sleep, and a place to work. With all of these human needs we also need relaxation, God, and a spiritual element to our lives. The trick, though, is finding a balance of all of these basic human needs. Often time, in my own life, I end up spending much more time focusing on one need and, subsequently, end up neglecting another need. The problem with this is that each need is still a need and when I spend more time with one than with the other my life starts to become unbalanced and I start to feel that unbalance. Unbalance in a personal life can be a very negative thing that can ultimately hurt a person in many different ways. For example, if you neglect your body and choose to, instead, only relax and are not actively exercising often then you open yourself up to heart disease, a higher risk of cancer, high blood pressure, higher chance of heart attack, and many other health problems that come with being over-weight. If you devote all your time to your need to work and make money and neglect relaxation and the relationships you have with friends and family you can hurt the important relationships in your life and even become exhausted to the point of mental breakdown.

Did you know that any form of extreme unbalance in a person's life, when it comes to these basic needs, can cause permanent damage to that person? An unbalance in any of the basic categories of need can damage a person's body, mind, soul, relationships, quality of life, etc.


This is a little candle my boyfriend and I made for my good friend HAWK who is a bicycle security guard... I love stuff like this.

So it seems like, to me, of all of these needs, I tend to become most obsessed with one of them: the need to make money in order to sustain myself financially. Very often I let this need overtake much of my life. It quickly and effectively snuffs out the time that I dedicate to other needs like exercise, building relationships, and even adequate rest. The funny thing is that I just can't seem to concur this over-dedication to working and I've been trying to figure out why. One of the things that I've discovered is that I am absolutely not alone in this particular type of unbalance. In-fact it seems like an unbalance when it comes to putting work over all other needs has become part of the typical progressive American lifestyle. This is not a unique trait to just the Americas, it's here and there all over the world. I can't say that I'm surprised though. Our culture puts such an emphasis on what job you have, how much money you make, where you live, what you own, what you drive, and so on. People have disputed this with me. I've had people say "oh i don't care about what someone does or where they live" when we hit the topic of needs in our conversation. Take these people to a party, though, and introduce them to someone new. 10 bucks says that they, at at least once point in the conversation, ask their new friend "what do you do?" or "that's cool what kind of car is it?". They don't ask that to judge... it's just our custom. It's what we deem important in life. Usually "What do you do?" is the FIRST question in a new conversation when we are getting to know someone. I'm guilty of the same thing.

How does one remedy an unbalance when it comes to work? I can't answer that question for somebody else because every person's needs and the action and lack-there-of that fit our lives are different. People have balance and unbalance all over the place and it really doesn't make sense that there would be one formula that works for everyone, one course of action to balance everyone out. After looking at my own life and trying to understand the reasons why I was always rushing around and never seemed to have "time" to do anything but work I started to discover the areas in my life that I had surrendered control and choice to the working world. For example I would start allowing my boss to call me anytime of day or night to demand my time. When I was called I would always respond and focus on working. As this went on and got worse and worse my work became the center of my life instead of just part of the balance. I would drive my car all over the place rushing to do all of the other things that are parts of my life during the small time that I wasn't working. Often times I'd get to the point where I felt as though I was not in control of anything in my life and that I didn't have enough time to do anything that i wanted. I felt like I wasn't accomplishing ANYTHING yet for some reason I wasn't doing anything but working. It was a spiral..

And then I got a bicycle.

I decided to start riding to work, my appointments, and everywhere that I could. Sometime it was because I couldn't afford gas, sometimes it was because I really needed the exercise, sometimes it was because I thought I owed it to the environment to give my car a rest. As I began to make cycling one of my main modes of transportation I started slowing down. I found a gateway to learning balance. I had no idea how to start and, being forced to slow down a little because I was cycling instead of driving, provided the first step to understanding what balance in my life I needed. When my boss would call and say I need you at work I went from saying "ok right away" and rushing in my car over to the office to saying "ok I'll be there in 30 minutes", packing and planning to ride, and then jumping on my bicycle and having an enjoyable journey to the office.

It taught me to slow down, plan ahead, and enjoy the ride.

I started taking less things with me and started running chores one at a time instead of trying to do everything gat once. I started buying less in order to fit things in my backpack. I started feeling less tired and more in shape. I started eating better and drinking more water because I had to make sure I had enough energy to ride the 25 minutes to work and 25 minutes back every day. I started thinking about ways to make time to SLOW DOWN instead of make time to speed up like I'd been accustomed t for so many years. Often I ride with friends to work or on chores and it gives me a chance to spend time with them and catch up. Best of all, riding bicycles is FUN! Every time I ride to work it reminds me of when I rode to school every day in middle school having a blast all the way. You start noticing things that you don't notice in a car like the smell of the bagel shop down the street, the sunflowers that grow in the street gutter, the decorations in people's lawns and the smiling faces of your neighbors. Now that my boss is accustomed to me riding my bicycle to work he understands that it takes time and doesn't expect me to act on the drop of a pin every day.

Even better, so many of my friends have begun to pick up on my excitement about slowing down in life and achieving balance through starting to ride my bicycle everywhere that they are also trying it out. To their pleasure bicycle riding has been helping them as well! (not to mention saving them a lot of gas money!)

Riding bicycles is a fun pastime and a friendly way of transportation as well as a great way to slow life down and achieve a little balance. It's funny what types of things can help us in life, even spiritually. God made the world so that we can enjoy it.. how interesting that enjoying a bicycle ride has helped me so much to achieve balance for all of the other needs in my life. Funny how these things work, right? I thought that working all the time and rushing around and making money was what would make me happy when in-fact the opposite was true. Cycling more, working less, and experiencing a little more time off, friends, neighbors, exercise, nutrition, energy, and sunshine was the key ;)


Keep riding!
-Chelsea

(For more information about cycling in Utah check these web-pages out: http://www.slcbikecollective.org and http://www.slccriticalmass.org/)