every three years, i am supposed to have an EGD (esophagogastroduodenoscopy) because i have some nasty acid reflux and supposedly it’s wise to have doctors stick cameras down your throat. tomorrow’s the big day. it isn’t as terrible as it sounds…you get some really good drugs which put you in a “conscious sedated” state - meaning you’re awake, but really relaxed. on top of that, they give you a drug that makes you have short term memory loss, so you don’t remember what happened.

several years ago when i had my last one done, evidently i thought i saw squirrels in the corner of the recovery room. i asked chris several times what the results were. a nurse handed me some grape juice, and i kept saying, “where’d i get this juice from?” i don’t remember a bit of it.

i’d appreciate your prayers tomorrow morning. it’s totally routine and not a big deal, but i’m not a fan of hospitals or swallowing cameras.

sometimes, i see things that make me think,

“WHAT THE CRAP?!”

This is one of them.

The “Daddle.” The idea…potentially cool. But let’s make it a little less creepy, eh?

Daddle.com if you’re interested.

what brings 30,000 people a weekend to a spiritual center in india?

Mata Amritanandamayi is known as the “hugging guru.” Some days, she will sit for up to 20 hours straight as tens of thousands of devotees line up to feel her embrace and hear her whisper motherly advice.

Mata Amritanandamayi, aka the “hugging guru,” embraces everyone she meets in an effort to spread love and healing.

Followers come from all over the world to Amma’s ashram, or spiritual center, in Kerala, South India, to get a hug; many choose to stay.

“There are two types of poverty in the world, financial poverty and the poverty of love; the second is more important,” says Amritanandamayi, who goes by Amma, which means “mother.”

read more here at cnn.com…

we read so much about what’s being done in the world; how much money is being given here — or there — and that is not a bad thing.

but there is a poverty of love that is world-wide in its spread. even in our iPod loving, “TiVo LOST for me, I have to meet my coworkers for $12 martini-nite, but email me what happens-i’ll get it on my blackberry” kind of society…we are so emotionally and spiritually impoverished.

how can you show love this week? how can you serve?

more importantly,
will you?

perfectionism has always been a large part of my personality. in first grade, my teacher, mrs. nelson, busted me for throwing away my homework when my grade was below a 97. i was afraid to take anything lower than that home - not because my parents are psycho - but because i didn’t want to let them down.

a couple of years ago, my husband and i were watching old family videos from my third/fourth grade era. i played in a piano recital, received an award and was “interviewed” by my camera-weilding mother after we returned home.

[off camera] mom: you did so great, honey! first place! hold up your beethoven (i won a plaster bust of beethoven) so we can show your grandma and grandpa.

me: (looking flustered and with a gap in my front teeth) sigh. i didn’t hit all the notes on that one movement.

mom: but still, you did great!

me: it wasn’t perfect… (walks away upset)

chris pointed out that i beat out middle school kids…i was a 9 year old in a sea of teenagers. my mad mozart skills had trumped them all.

however i was reliving the fact i missed a note on one of my scales twenty years ago.

needless to say…always the perfectionist.

lately, i’ve been realizing how unhealthy this method of operation is. it stresses me out. eats away at my sanity, my sleep, my free time (what’s that?). some discussion on the swerve blog lately has been talking about it, and then today, i received a nugget of wisdom from someone i’ve respected for a long time and it really kind of kicked me square in the pants…he said (my paraphrase):

“Don’t always make things perfect. Perfectionism doesn’t leave room for imagination.”

wow?

well.

here we are.

evidently the issue of my choice to start capitalizing correctly was brought to the forefront.

and with this post, i will allow you to cast a vote…

whatever’s winning when i post next, will be the way i continue…

the future of this blog is in your hands…

(i’m not sure if the poll will show up in RSS feeds, so click here to cast your vote)

ok…the comments have slowed down (wow - thank you!) on me asking you what your greatest fear is. your honesty and transparency in sharing such powerful things with the public has just blown me away. now that it’s time for me to reveal mine, i can feel the hesitation many of you probably felt before pressing that “submit comment” button.

mine is death - more specifically, someone i love or myself dying tragically and unexpectedly. out of all the people i have ever known and loved who have passed, all but two have been unexpected. my close friend matt dying on his 31st birthday, my aunt who had ruptured a blood vessel in her head…or dying young…we had two funerals this week for a 20 year old and a 23 year old. a year and a half ago, my friend’s husband brandon passed away with NHL (read about it here and here). he was only 26.

so, all this fear…how can we combat it? fight it? how can we not let it rob us?

faith.

before writing this, i was reading a story on cnn about how a church collapsed in peru during a funeral. over 60 people are buried under the rubble.

the reporter notes the calm and peace shown by the nuns and the priest. he writes:

I couldn’t understand how this man and these women of the cloth could remain so calm, their faith so apparently unshaken while they contemplated the ruins of the church and the loss of people so dear to them. I asked them about that faith.

the priest replies:

“It’s difficult times like this that it [faith] exists,” the priest said.

wow. how frickin profound is that? without fear, doubt, question, turmoil…there would be no need for faith.

reflect on that a while…

“It’s difficult times like this that it [faith] exists,” the priest said.

have a good weekend…