In Search of All Things Beautiful

I wanted to start this post with apologies for absenses, for reasons for time away, for all of those things you feel you have to say when you stopped doing a thing and hid for a good long while. But...I am not going to! Because that's not what I am here for. I'm here to be a compassionate joyful being, so let's do that instead. 

One of the compliments I get a lot is how open I am, how I am really good at small joy and delight and making people feel cozy and comfortable. I've been thinking about that a lot lately, and what that means and how it works and how I make it happen...and my brain just stops. Like...I don't know! There's no secret sauce, it's just...I think about all the times in my life I felt like I didn't fit, that I was unhappy and lonely and how much that hurt. So I seek joy, first and foremost, and I make sure I can make room for people to also feel that joy. Can it be that simple?

I have been praying with some friends lately, just because. I kinda forgot how to pray for a while, which sounds silly because as a Baha'i, we have all these amazing prayers that Baha'u'llah and Abdu'l-Baha and The Bab revealed for us, but there's a difference, I think, between "I can read these words out loud like a parrot repeating stuff they've heard but don't understand" and "My heart is using this to talk to God". But slowly, I am figuring out how to open that part of me again. It feels good to sprinkle those drops of joy into the world, slowly, on my own terms.

This quote has been on my mind a lot, too. It feels like a HUGE ask, to be a centre of attraction, just by...being. How does that even work?
 

At first I decided I couldn't ever do this, that I wouldn't ever be enough of the right things. I think of all the ways Baha'is talk about Abdu'l-Baha as like our best and brightest example of how to do all of the Baha'i everything, and my brain just stalls out. I might like cats and I might be good at sharing cake, but I can't ever do all of these things! I can't! It's impossible! I'm never going to get all of these things right enough to ever have the people of a city unquestionably say I'm a Baha'i....can I? 

One of the things I'm re-learning lately, though, is that it doesn't have to be an all or nothing proposition. Sure, I might be SUPER bad at things some days, but God made me and wanted a me just like me in the world, so I might not be perfect, but I'm here for something. 

So I will keep loving on people, I will keep dancing to my music when I walk, I'll keep sharing cake and helping neighbours figure out Zoom, I'll keep being all of my authentic self, because I think that's how we do this. We exist, we breathe, we love, we admit we don't have it all together, but that we're going to keep trying. And we say prayers, we cry, we laugh, we dance, we tell people how awesome we think they are. If we keep showing love, compassion, and honestly share of ourselves, then that's how people will see how Baha'is are. 

We're not perfect. And that's okay! We don't have to be. In fact, some of my best conversations about Baha'i life have come from me admitting how often I feel like I am secretly three trash pandas in a trench coat desperately pretending that we're a whole and functioning adult. Because it takes off some of that weird expectation that faith needs perfection. It doesn't! We're all messy. 

Love yourselves, friends, even when you're messy. You're always worth that love. I'll remind you of that, endlessly and always. 

Deeper Than the Holler

Been thinking about love a lot lately. Mostly been thinking about how tired I am that love is just supposed to be between two partnered humans or direct family. Like it's apparently weird that I love my friends, and that I tell them, to their faces (well maybe to text boxes or to their ears if they're farther away friends that I only voice chat or text with mainly) how much I love them, why I love them, and I mean it with the same seriousness as when I say I love my spouse or my family.

Life's too damn short not to love people. Love them. Love them, love them, love them, and tell them. Tell them loud, tell them quiet, tell them in the unexpected moments. Show them in a million ways.

Right now, me and some of my friends are watching She-Ra and the Princesses of Power (the new one) which I have never seen before. I *love* it. I love the range of body types and personalities and designs the princesses have, I love how everyone, good or bad is messy and imperfect, I love that there's character growth, I love all of it. (I love Scorpia and Entrapta and Mermista best so far, but that's like saying I love chocolate ice cream better than butterscotch - I love ice cream so much, the difference in preferences is slight.)

But you know what I love best? I love that the whole reason we are watching it is because I said "I have so much trouble watching new cartoons, there is so much going on and so much story to keep in my head and I keep forgetting about things, it's frustrating" and a pile of my friends went "what if we watched it with you? You could pause to ask questions, or to excitedly yell and handflap about stuff, or to say that you need a moment because a scary thing, or for us to remind you who is who, anything like that, and it would just be really fun to watch it again with you. Plus, we can turn the captions on so it's easier to follow what's going on." (For the most part, they've already seen it, I'm the only one who is completely new to it.)

I love that my friends didn't dismiss my accessibility needs. I love that they were like "yep we know you forget and get distracted and stuff, but that's okay!" So we watch it using Netflix Party, we take turns pausing for questions or "OMG DID YOU SEE THAT" or "whoa, need a second, that was a lot"  sorts of moments, and it's just...nice. Plus, the show is SO much fun, and it gives us a thing we can do together when we don't have a lot of spoons for our usual cozy gaming or whatever.

That to me, that's love. That's people seeing me in my all together true, loving me as I am, and working with me so I can experience a thing.

There are so many ways to show love. Especially right now, when the world feels so dang short on love, and so big on fear. Let's tip the scales a little, together. Find ways to show love, tell love, breathe love, live love - and let's teach each other that it's okay to tell each other how much we love each other. Because trust me, we all want to feel that.

In Midnights, In Cups of Coffee

This post is horribly overdue - I should have posted it about three weeks ago. But...life is what it is, right now and time and space feel weird and strange, so here we are.

I have been a Baha'i for an entire year, now. I formally declared in a friend's living room three days before Naw Ruz in 2019, and here we are, in a brand new year. This year looks a whole lot different than the last one, but not all for the negative. So...I figured, in light of all the hard things in the world right now, I'd talk about some of the awesome good that has come out of life in the last year.

Being part of the Baha'i community here has...exploded my life in a lot of really neat ways. I know a lot more people locally than I ever did, and they have showed me such amazing love. A friend recently said something about all the Baha'is they knew being amazingly kind humans, and...oh, they are not wrong. The ways these people have accepted me, in my altogether true, and have helped me find ways to serve and grow alongside them has been astonishing. These are the people of my heart, and I am so glad Baha'u'llah has helped me find them.

My husband is here now! We did the immigration dance, and he came here in June last year, on our second wedding anniversary. I am so incredibly grateful he's here - especially now. Having someone to talk to, to snuggle up to, to play video games with, to cook with...it's still magical in a million ways. I know a lot of people prayed for us and hoped for us and helped us along the way, and I still am sometimes startled and delighted that we got here.

I've found a lot of strengths inside myself I didn't know I had. I'm willingly going out and being social and attending lots of devotionals and other community events now - because my community has made me feel safe and welcome. And sure, it helps that right now they're video chats so I can do it from the comfort of my computer chair at home, but still - I love that there is a place for me to be a part of such an awesome community who is trying really hard to be a force for such good in the world.

I've been making our Baha'i community newsletter every nineteen days for a while now - I've learned so much about design and accessibility and how to make sure that people get the news and information they need in a way that's easy, aesthetically pleasing, and not too intimidating. I've really enjoyed learning the programs I'm using, and seeing how happy this connection to each other has made others in my community. It doesn't feel like I am doing something all that big, but here we are.

I've started recording myself reading various books from my childhood, as a way to spread some joy in the world. I'm posting them on Facebook and Twitter, and it's just been fun to share these happy things in the world, to give people a moment to breathe, to forget the world outside, and just enjoy a fun thing.

This year has been a lot of change. A lot of new things, a lot of hard things, and the world feels like it's a whole lot of struggle right now. So I thought focusing on some bright moments might help. We're going to get through this together, friends. As the Universal House of Justice reminded the Baha'is of the world in a Naw Ruz letter they sent us a short time ago, "However difficult matters are at present...humanity will ultimately pass through this ordeal, and it will emerge on the other side with greater insight and with a deeper appreciation of its inherent oneness and interdependence." We're in this together, my lovelies. We've got each other, and we're gonna make it through. The world will not be quite the same, but there are still flowers that are gonna bloom and birds that are gonna sing and somehow, we'll find a way. Take care of each other, love each other..

I hope to hear about the things that made your heart bubble up with joy over this past year, and maybe even what you're looking forward to in the months to come. We've got this. Today might be hard, but tomorrow will come. It might be hard too, but that's okay. We'll face it together.

They Linger in Closets and Under My Bed

It's almost the end of the year! Well, almost the end of the Baha'i year. Right now it's the last few days of Ayyam-i-Ha, then just 19 more days after that is Naw Ruz, the new year. Year 177 in the Baha'i calendar! And so I find myself in a very reflective mood.

So much has changed this year. Heck, so much has changed in my life in the past few months. I have more stability in some ways, less in others. Things I thought were going to be wonderful things that brought good to my family haven't, and things I didn't think would work out have worked out in ways I'd never expected. 

Right now, though, I have to be patient. I have to wait for a lot of things that are completely out of my control to come to fruition, and the world being dark and full of cold and snow isn't helping much. I know spring's gonna come someday, because it's never not come, but right now, things feel...more impossible and hard to sit with than I wanted them to be. I've talked before about the power of sitting with someone in the quiet spaces, and how it's okay to not have all the answers, but this time, it's a little different.

You see, we're heading into the Baha'i Fast. The last month of the Baha'i calendar is a time of fasting (abstaining from food or drink from sunrise to sunset, if you are able - no putting yourself in danger if medical stuff prevents you, or if you are elderly or very young or travelling), and also a time of prayer and comtemplation - reflecting on the year that's past, disconnecting from our material self and focusing on our spiritual selves. So...sitting in the quiet spaces is almost expected to happen during the Fast, as we sit with ourselves and with each other. 

It's not about punishment, it's not about atonement or absolution, it's about letting go of the world and sinking deeper into our relationship with God. As Abdu'l-Baha wrote, "this material fast is an outer token of the spiritual fast; it is a symbol of self-restraint, the withholding of oneself from all appetites of the self, taking on the characteristics of the spirit, being carried away by the breathings of heaven and catching fire from the love of God". 

For 19 days, it's not about us, our meat-selves and our "idle fancies and vain imaginings". We pause, we reflect, we pray. It's not easy, but its an act of love that requires a lot of patience. So, there's patience layered on patience layered on patience, right now. Patience for the upcoming Fast, patience for my life stuff that's going on in the background, and most of all, patience for myself. I'm not perfect at any of this. In fact...I'm awful at a lot of it. But this year, I'm going to try to sit with myself, in my perfectly imperfectness. I will sit with my joy, with my heartache, with my ardent love for Baha'u'llah,with the things that aren't where I want them to be and the things I don't know yet where they're going.  As Baha'u'llah reminds me in one of my favourite Hidden Words, O SON OF MAN! For everything there is a sign. The sign of love is fortitude under My decree and patience under My trials." (The video below is a sung version of this passage by Rosanna Lea, which is what helped me memorize it a while back.)

We Can Burn Brighter Than The Sun

I keep waiting for the day I feel like a grown up, it feels like. I'm 32, and I keep thinking that at some point, I will wake up and actually feel adult. So far, that hasn't happened. Sure, I make sure the bills are paid, I go to work, all of that, but I also have a lunch bag that can double as a cat puppet, my room is full of plushies of various kinds, and juiceboxes and Goldfish crackers are my go-to comfort foods.

So...what makes you a grownup? Do you have to be grownup all the time? Can we learn anything from the not-grownups in our lives?

I've been working through some of the Junior Youth Empowerment Program books with a friend. They're aimed at people much younger than me, intended to help teach various moral and spiritual values and a general idea of empowerment. They avoid being overtly religious, because that's not really the point - it's not a conversion tool. They're inspired by various Baha'i concepts, but that's really as far as it goes. And yes, they're not *technically* aimed at older youth or adults, but that hasn't stopped me from getting a LOT out of them.

Right now, we're going through one called "Thinking About Numbers". As the title states...it's about math. Like counting and arithmetic math. Math is...not my strong suit, so it's been fun because it has honestly been changing how I, well, think about numbers. We're not very far in, but I can't wait to see what sorts of things I get out of it. But it's not just about the math concepts - all of those concepts are good, and do need to be taught, but the book also frames them in their wider context. It's not just "learn about math because...you have to because school says so", it's "learn these things and how to think about numbers and math concepts as part of also learning how to grow and be a part of your local reality, your community, your world". 

I never liked math in school because after a bit, you stop learning why it's useful, and how it can help you, and it's just "learn these complicated things because someone else decided that this is summarily important for everyone even though you're likely going to forget them and never use them." (I'm looking at you, quadratic equation.) But this...this is different. It reminds me about how so much of my faith is centered around looking at the world and it's problems, refusing to accept that things are just how they are, and working to change it where we can. 

Some of the books (like the first one we looked at, called Breezes of Confirmation), focus more directly on moral/spiritual matters - and I think that's also important too. All of the books are so focused on giving young people agency and learning about self-direction and letting them be an active participant not just in the books and what they're learning from them, but also in their local communities.

I really like this chance to look at these books, because, well, they weren't a part of my youth. I like seeing what sort of things we're trying to help children and teens learn to be fully able to take an active role in their world, and they're also good for me - I am learning so much, just because I am taking time to think about these concepts. I imagine anyone who works through them with junior youth also leans a lot, because you'd see these things through their eyes.

So maybe it's okay I'm not a grownup all the time, and that I still haven't figured out what that looks like. Maybe it means knowing I don't have all the answers, and that I won't, and that it's okay. Maybe it means not dismissing things just because they're aimed at kids, and remembering that learning never really stops.

The Wisest Amongst Us and Fair

The world is bound by a lot of rules. The rules of the road, the rules of the classroom, the rules of common etiquette, there are rules everywhere. Sometimes the rules are easy and they make a lot of sense - they're there for our safety, to protect us and keep us from injury, harm, sickness, or death. Sometimes, they're less obvious, but we're still expected to follow them. We're told so often that rules are there for our own good, even if we don't understand them. There will always be rules you like, and rules you don't; rules you are willing to follow and rules that are dealbreakers for you.

When I mention to people that I'm a Baha'i, if they know anything about the Faith, they usually ask about the rules. (And even if they don't, people generally realize that religion = rules). They ask what they are, or they mention ones they know and ask me how I cope with obeying. (For me, a lot of the time the "no alcohol or other intoxicating things" is the one that people tend to get stuck on.) Why would I choose to be a part of something with rules like that? There's rules about prayers, about how to live, there's whole books on it. The world is full of enough people telling you what to do , why would you willingly listen to one more?

I stumble over this a lot. The no intoxicants one is easy - I've struggled with that sort of thing in the past, so this, to me, is a convenient way to take the temptation out of my own hands. I never made what people might consider "huge mistakes" with anything, but I know I've made some pretty ungood choices in my past when influenced by those substances. So now, it's nice. I can just go "I don't drink because I choose to trust that Baha'u'llah asked me not to for some very good reasons", and it's done. It doesn't matter if you agree with the decision, but I feel better and more okay with sitting with it. It's not about me trying to keep myself away from something that I struggle with (although that's a nice bonus), it's about me trusting that He asked me to do this, so I can keep a clear head and help the world be a better place.

Some of them are trickier. I'm not always great at remembering my prayers, backbiting and gossip are often very, very tempting, but I try. I try because I want to - because when I was seeking, the rules felt manageable, like I could try to do it, and as I've continued to try my very best, I have seen so many ways following Baha'u'llah's rules have helped me be a happier, kinder, safer person. I've been able to do more, and be more, and I've been able to serve my community in ways I'd never ever ever thought I could.

The rules give me structure, and structure makes my brain happy. My brain *likes* knowing what's next. It keeps my anxiety dinosaur from roaring quite so loud, it keeps my brain spiders from skittering around making messes of things. So now, I can go to Feast even though it means more people than I'm technically happy with in terms of crowds and social stuff and small talk. I can make the newsletter, I can speak up during consultation, I can make friends in my community, I can live and breathe and sleep a little easier, because I get to give so much of the hard decisions to someone else. Baha'u'llah's already told me what to do, so I don't have to stress about it. Baha'u'llah said to "Let each morn be better than its eve and each morrow richer than its yesterday", and to me, that just means that hey, every day is a new day where we can do a little more, try a little harder, and make the world a little happier. And His rules help me do that.

Last night I was talking with a dear friend about some stuff in my life, and he reminded me of another quote I like a lot: "Bring thyself to account each day ere thou art summoned to a reckoning" - in context, it's talking about the fact that we are all going to die someday, and will be accountable for the choices we make, but to me, it also is a nice reminder to think about the day I've had. What did I do well? What was good? What did I learn? What would I change the next day? It helps me refocus myself, and to think about how I am using the rules and guidance that Baha'u'llah has given us, for myself, and for the world around me.

The rules are there because I am loved, because He knew what I'd need to be able to be my best self, what humanity would need as it grows and changes. They're not there to put me down, to subjugate us, but to give us hope, and life, and the tools we need to make the world more awesome. They're an audacious ask, a act of care and compassion. They're an act of trust - trust that we will follow His guidance, that we will trust that He knows what we need, even if we don't understand it yet.

So yes, there are rules. Not nearly as many as you think, and it's surprising how many are just natural extensions of trying to be a good person. But they're rules I can sit with, and that's all that matters.

The Old Voice Warning Me

When I like a thing, I tend to...really like it. Almost to the exclusion of everything else. When I was in my Hamilton (the musical, not the city) phase, I read Chernow's book about Hamilton (that was SO LONG), I memorized the whole soundtrack, I followed every Twitter thread and video and anything I could find that was remotely related. I listened to literally almost nothing else for months.

Then...at some point, I stopped. I was done. My brain wandered off to something else, and I haven't really listened to the soundtrack since. I still like it, I want to see the play eventually, but when I had the chance to join people in the random lottery style lineup for tickets for the eventual Toronto debut of it....I didn't really bother. (Saved me a bunch of money, I suppose, I heard tickets weren't cheap.) It's no longer a hyperfocus.

This is how I like things. I get into them, with my whole self for a while, then I'm done. I've done it with numerous craft projects (cross-stitch, crochet, among others), languages (Russian, mostly), I do it with stage plays (Hamilton, RENT, In the Heights (that one's still an active focus)).

When I found the Baha'i Faith...I kinda fell in with both feet. There are a few days around when I declared where I didn't sleep a lot, I was just kinda floating in a lot of reading and a lot of wondering and some very patient friends who let me ask them a lot of questions. I have read (and continue to read) as many books about the Faith I can get my hands on. (Yes, I did read Lights of Guidance cover to cover. It was actually pretty interesting. I learned a lot.)

I hyperfocused, hard. I wanted to know everything all at once. I still do, although I've kinda realized there's more than I'll ever know, or fully understand and that's okay. I read a lot and I tried to be everywhere and do everything and I reached a point right after the Bicentenary in October where my body was like "okay, enough, breathe a little".

So...I've been breathing a little. I still love Baha'u'llah and His message with my whole heart, I still go to Feast when I can and I usually have at least one Baha'i adjacent book in my book rotation (right now, it's Creating a New Mind, by Paul Lample). But maybe I don't go to every single devotional that's within reasonable transit distance, maybe I let myself read a few more romance novels before tackling more Adib Taherzadeh.

It's hard not to feel guilty. I keep hearing the voice in the back of my head that tells me that maybe this is just another hyperfocus. Every time I forget my obligatory prayer, or I can't make it to Feast, or I don't go to someone's devotional because I have something else I'm doing, I worry. I worry I'm just going to some day just...drift out of this.

It's kinda scary to admit that, out loud. I talk about how the Faith has changed my life (and oh my gosh, it really has, but that's another story for another day), how I love my community, how I like that I have a way to participate within my own capacity for service with the newsletter and the social media bits. But I don't talk so much about how I am scared my brain is just going to decide I'm done, someday.

I know people will tell me that if it's important, it will stay. The way I've kept friendships alive and my marriage alive and my cat alive - they're important, beyond hyperfocus. The things that are part of the very core of me, those don't go away. I'd love to believe that my Faith is in there too, in the core of me. But I don't know yet. In the grand scheme of my life, I've been doing this Baha'i stuff for....maybe 3 percent of my entire existence?

I know the answer is to just keep on keeping on, the way I do. To keep finding ways to serve the Cause, to keep connecting with my local reality and my friends and my life, and to keep integrating the Baha'i concepts into my everything, as I've been doing. But I thought it might be good to also talk about being scared. I don't think we do that enough, admit we're scared sometimes. We all want to be good people doing good things in good ways that don't let people down.

So hi. I'm Ash, I'm not always good at this, and sometimes I get scared. Sit with me, if you're scared. We don't gotta even talk about it, we can just be scared together, and then we can maybe keep walking, lanterns held high, pushing back the dark.