Flexibility is a great virtue.
My inboxes are a mix of faith reflections, pop psych, business, quilt shop newsletters and other quilt related stuff. Not to mention friends who long to catch up. *Oh bother! I have a letter to write to a couple of friends – grabs pen – see you later.*
Okay I’m back now.
This Catholic chic loves Henri Nouwen, Archbishop Sheen, Ignatian Spirituality, Lectio Divina (holy reading/reflection) among others. I’ve recently added Blessed is She, Mary de Turris Poust, and one of the publishing companies. Good golly this is a wide variety of things isn’t it. Like a quilt, I like a lot o’things and make ’em work. Or it seems a bit unfocused, eh whatever.
As a result of a recent “bomb cyclone” aka a Nor’easter one of the trees in the neighborhood went down. Thankfully it fell parallel to the house and didn’t do any damage to the building. I fully expected the root ball to be huge but it was kind of flat. Hmmm. I know that with trees for everything we see – trunk, branches – have at least that much, if not double what is above ground. Meaning that the root system is huge. When looking at the tree, the root system showing out of the ground was kind of flat so the tree was in the process of dying. And the winds of the Nor’easter blew the tree over.
I was also reminded, and am so grateful that the wind in these events blows parallel to the house.
When the reflection from Henri Nouwen came through this morning speaking about reeds, flexibility – that the flexibility provides strength to ride out the storms. What provides that flexibility? Prayer, reading Scripture and other books that speak about faith, blogs, radio shows, and the like. Things that offer opportunities to connect more deeply with God. Then there is the more practical, human connection – connecting with people, with a community for prayer, worship, and work. Think Corporal Works of Mercy.
As a quilter I’ve learned to embrace design decisions, “imperfections” in the quilting stitches, not the straightest of lines, the curviest of curves, the hexagonist of hexagons, the nonagonist of nonagons. This flexibility frees me to simply quilt.
It’s taken a lot of time to learn to be flexible in the quilting. There’s learning the rules, learning to take exacting stitches, learning to enjoy precision, learning to know how to break the rules with to stitch out the things in my head. The images, inspiration given me by our dear Creator. A Creator who loves with reckless abandon, who calls us to love Him – to be loved by him. Sometimes love is painful, it hurts deeply.
And sometimes Love bares its soul revealing much more love than one would expect.
Flexibility shows itself in growth, growth in faith, trust, security in God, in His timing. Flexibility shows itself in growth as a quilter, a defining of character, and style, an ability to adapt, change direction. Flexibility in faith, and in quilting allows the opportunity to grow actively, and passively.
Oh Lord, may I become like a reed – well rooted, and flexible.
God bless,
Teri
A Quilter's Heart 