Tag: joy

A Letter to Heaven

On By Anna EastlandIn motherhood, Stillbirth3 Comments

  
Dear Little Jo,

Tomorrow is a big day for Mummy. Your little brother is going to be born. We are going to coax him out into the world three weeks early, in hopes that he can be safe. In hopes that things will go differently than last time. He kicks and wiggles hello to you, his big sister in Heaven. 

Know, my dear one, that you are very much in my heart right now, as ever. Your little brother is, as a friend told me today, one of your many gifts to me. So I thank you for constantly making my life richer, deeper and more exquisitely beautiful. How much I love you!

After losing you in labour last time, I am afraid. When I think about how I couldn’t save you, I tremble. I want to cry. I want to hide my head in my blankets and not come out. But I know there is a greater, deeper plan than the one I can understand. I know you are safe and beautiful and loved. That you always will be. 

And I want you to know, my little sweetheart, that no matter how much time passes, you will always be my special baby, even when you have grown wise beyond your brief time on earth by so much time spent in Heaven, that timeless place of Love, where I hope to join you one day. 

Save me a huge hug and so many kisses, and tomorrow shower us with the grace of your perfect little prayers, as your brother makes his epic journey into this world. I know that we are wrapped in the wings of angels, and lifted up by the strength of so many heartfelt prayers. 

I pray that our new little one may, above all, become like his sister, a saint—a sweet beacon of love for the world. 

All my heart’s embraces,

Your Mummy

The Feast of All Saints

Paradox

On By Anna EastlandIn Poetry, Ponderings5 Comments

  

If you want to know true joy,

look to the one who has experienced deep sadness.

If you want to find strength,

look to the one who has been broken. 

If you want to know peace,

look to the one who has wrestled with despair. 

If you want to know laughter, 

look to the one who has wept. 

If you want to know loyalty,

look to the one who has been abandoned.

If you want to be truly human,

look to God.

Little Artist

On By Anna EastlandIn Arts and Entertainment, PhotosLeave a comment

  
How beautiful to see all the colours that emerge from the hearts and minds of our children—the blurs and smudges that are embraced as expressions of creativity rather than mistakes. If we could paint with the eager brush of children, how much more joyful and alive we would be!

Love Rebel: Reclaiming Motherhood

On By Anna EastlandIn Family Life, motherhood, Writing28 Comments

  
I am so excited to announce that my first book, with four other awesome women writers, is about to be published!

This beautiful labour of love (sorry for the birthing pun!) started with a spark of friendship that caught fire a few summers ago, when my friend Laura’s cousin Roberta Cottam, now a close friend of mine, first came to my mom’s group. We were discussing the importance of spending time on our artistic pursuits, even as busy moms…how spending time on things that make your soul happy and stimulate your mind is actually good for your whole family. A happy fulfilled woman is a happy fulfilled wife and mother. 

This was a huge point of connection for Roberta (artist, writer, designer) and me (writer and photographer) and began a series of great conversations about the topic. We both felt that our spiritual lives and our artistic output were very connected, and encouraged each other to deepen both. This book is one of the fruits!

It also came about because of another very good friend, Monique Leblanc, who had inspired me to start blogging about a year earlier. I found her blog so genuine, funny and refreshing that I decided to start blogging myself. I liked that her writing was so real…you felt like you were having tea with a dear friend…rather than remaining an aquaintence who is only shown all the pretty bits…it was the opposite of contrived. I connected with joyful Melanie Jean Juneau and fun-loving Bonnie Way online through blogging and mutual friends, and when we began the book project, Bonnie invited her good friend Monique Les to join in as well. 

So five moms, five bloggers, five friends, brought together through the passionate work of Roberta Cottam and designer Laura Wrubleski (http://www.visualaura.net/), have resulted in an anthology which I hope will encourage and inspire many mothers in the beautiful and worthwhile vocation of raising the future citizens of the world (yup, I mean being a mom!). Look for it soon on Amazon in print or as an e-book! 

Boys are like puppies…

On By Anna EastlandIn Family Life, Photos2 Comments

Puppies need lots and lots of affection.

Puppies love to nap. 

Puppies like to play with other animals.

Puppies love treats and getting messy.

Puppies enjoy being taken for walks.

Puppies like to play on the floor.

Puppies delight in popping out of funny places like boxes. 

Puppies love big sticks.

If any of you are puppy owners, you’ll surely agree they are sweet, loyal and a little sticky, and make you feel very, very loved!

Pink Rose Blushing

On By Anna EastlandIn Photos, Ponderings4 Comments

This Sunday I saw a rose so lovely one could get lost in it’s petals, contemplating beauty while the blossom blushes sweetly. It had the rich scent of a real rose, the kind you want to just drink in again and again…the kind that makes you think of romantic English gardens and quaint little thatched cottages.

Thinking back, it was a funny little gift to see it growing there, just outside the church, where moments before I had been talking with my friend Sherri, and joking that all the pretty women were wearing roses that day. She had a beautiful white dress covered in red roses, and I had a rose pattern white t-shirt. She told me she wanted to dress up extra today, on the feast of Pentecost, for the Holy Spirit, with whom she has such a love affair. “He just always takes such good care of me,” she smiled.

“Today is my 10 year anniversary of baptism,” I told her, “10 years since I joined the church.” For her it had been almost 16. I remembered rubbing my belly with childlike excitement in the days leading up to my baptism…God Himself was coming to dwell in my soul! We marvelled at how lucky we felt, knowing God’s love, His desire to be close to each and every person, to bring depth and meaning to our lives.

So who is this person Sherri and I are enamoured with, who inflames and guides our hearts? Isn’t going to church just for stodgy old ladies…people who recite pious prayers but aren’t really spiritual? As a convert, I haven’t found this old stereotype to hold water, nor have I found the supposed opposition between being religious and being spiritual.

For me, finding the faith helped me begin a very intimate and interior journey, one of growing closer to God while at the same time becoming more free to truly be myself…learning to trust the still, small voice of the Holy Spirit, the one who nudges me to grow, to give, to respond to His creative impulses, to be optimistic and ready to dream aloud. To trust in something bigger than myself. To be willing to take creative risks.

Growing in my spiritual life has been essential to my growth as a writer. I find there is such a direct link between prayer and creativity, because prayer helps me be aware of the beauty around me, and to be still enough to let it enter my heart. Then it’s just a matter of sharing what’s inside. I once compared writing poetry to sitting still enough for a butterfly to land on you, a matter of receiving an inspiration and sharing it, a little gift…

So if I haven’t been blogging much at times, you can guess I’ve been letting myself get too busy, and you can write me a comment and say, “Anna, stop running around… sit still and pray more; we want some poetry! ”

When I don’t take time to pray, to be still, to talk to God about my life and especially to listen, my creative well runs dry. I run like a little hamster in a wheel, very busy but very superficial. It is exhausting and empty, and I think our souls need to love deeper…ha, that was a typo but still true: we need to live deeper and to love deeper. This is what helps us see the beauty in life, despite suffering; this is what helps us live for something bigger than ourselves, and in the process become more the people we are meant to be.

Maybe I’ll write more about this soon, but as we’re all busy people I’ll let you go for now. I hope you’ll find a little time to seek out that special stillness in which God whispers to our hearts and inspires us to help Him create a more wonderful world.

“The Wounded Healer” by Henri Nouwen 

On By Anna EastlandIn Ponderings18 Comments

  

Shortly after I lost my baby Josephine in labour nearly 6 months ago, a friend lent me this book by Henri Nouwen: “The Wounded Healer: In our woundedness, we can become a source of life for others.”  The idea expressed in the subtitle caught my attention, because it spoke a truth that I had recently discovered myself…that my pain and brokenness had become a means of connecting deeply with others, and of helping them release their own pain. 

This process is not one of having all the right consoling things to say, or of having found a magic solution to blot out pain. Emotional healing is not about making pain disappear, but about learning how to live with it while maintaining a sense of hope and joy. 

There is a huge difference here, because one involves living in the reality of our broken world, with a hope that transcends it, while the other involves hoping in a world that doesn’t exist in the present…one without any suffering. 

Acceptance or denial, peace or rebellion. Choices we make every day when we live in pain. 

The world may tell us that life is not worth living when there is deep pain, and that the supposed nothingness of death would be better. But I can honestly say that there are things pain does which are very beautiful: 

Pain breaks down barriers between people and connects hearts. 

Pain makes beauty stand out in sharp relief, and helps one appreciate what was previously taken for granted. 

Pain burns away the fear of being authentically yourself, because the petty concern of what others might think ceases to matter as much. 

Pain rips open your heart to let the world in; no longer do you judge those who are struggling. 

Pain makes you rely on God, because your spirit needs support to bear this weight gracefully. Meaning with God’s grace. With prayer. 

Connection. Gratitude. Authenticity. Compassion. Interior growth. These are all pretty big gifts. They make life more beautiful and worth living. 

When you truly suffer, your heart hurts deeply, but loves more deeply as well. And this love, coming from a humble place of pain mingled with hope, can be a source of life for others. 

  

How I attended a conference while cleaning my bathroom…

On By Anna EastlandIn motherhood1 Comment

 

I’ve been having a great time today listening to talks on my iPad from the free online Catholic conference for moms…while folding laundry, cooking dinner, and yes, even cleaning the bathroom..my evening office! 😉 It’s like having awesome, interesting friends over for coffee to keep you company while you go about your work.

I highly recommend this encouraging conference for moms, which still has three days left. The theme is “Beyond Survival, Into Revival.” Once you register with your email, you’ll be sent the link and password to the talks for that day. Then you just watch whichever ones you like, when you like that day.

So here are few quick notes I jotted down after I finished scrubbing the bathtub…while speakers on my iPad cheered me on from the bathroom stool! 😉  Just to give you an idea of a few of the talks..these aren’t comprehensive.

“Nothing steals a mom’s joy more than comparison.” Stephanie Wood Weinart.

I loved Stephanie’s talk about the three things that rob mothers of joy: comparing ourselves to other moms, isolating ourselves, and getting addicted to the internet as a form of escape.

She stressed the importance of accepting ourselves as we are, as the ones God chose to raise our kids, without beating ourselves up with self-doubt.  She also encouraged us to pray for close, supportive friendships from a few fellow moms who can be our kindred spirits, the ones we lean on. And finally she reminded us of the joyful freedom that comes from putting away our smartphones and really playing with our children, looking into their eyes and rejoicing in them.

Sherry Antonetti spoke on the question “What is a mom?” She said the essence is loving people. Yes, there’s endless work but it’s not a sacrifice to be surrounded by people who love you. Don’t be burdened by the minutiae or the isolation, or become a taskmaster.

Reach out, spend time with your kids, ‘waste time’ with them ‘waste time’ with God. Put those things on your to do list. Waste time taking kids to the park, reading them books or painting your daughters’ toenails…it means the world to them because you are spending time with them. At the end of the day, those “wasted” moments are the real measure of success.

Mary Stanford spoke on the theology of the body, and the importance of being truly present to each other. She said the body is a gift which represents the presence of our person. It’s a bit like the way the bringing cookies to someone represents our friendship, being a physical embodiment of a spiritual reality.

We come to truly know ourselves only in relationship to others. When we reveal our inner selves to those we love, we come to know who we truly are. This kind of deep self-revelation can only really be done in person, and helps prevent objectifying others.

Don’t let electronic deceives remove your presence from those you’re actually physically with, the ones God has placed by your side. Be an example to your kids of being present, looking in their eyes, truly listening with your whole body, and not while half scrolling the latest Facebook feed.

The body is like a moral thermometer…while not the source of shame, it is the place shame is expressed, for example by blushing. It is where we feel if something is right or wrong. When people communicate primarily on social media, they can’t read the cues on other people’s body’s, and trample through delicate matters without realizing.  That’s why young people share intimate things online, or bully others as they wouldn’t in person. It’s as if their moral sensor is turned off.  To mature and develop ourselves, we need to have friendships where we see people face to face.

Overall I was very happy with these great talks and with my day, and felt encouraged that besides some cleaning and homeschooling, I also “wasted” time in laughing with my kids, playing outside with them and reading lots of Narnia before bed. Hope you’ll join the conference tomorrow (and until Monday) and be encouraged that you, too, despite all your struggles, are a great mom. 🙂

The Catholic Conference for Moms

If you miss some talks, or want to later share them with friends or a mom’s group, you have the option of buying the conference package after, and using the code “Crazyland” will get you $10 off. I’m definitely planning to get it myself, because I think these short talks will be perfect for discussion at my parish mom’s group.

Choosing Happiness

On By Anna EastlandIn Ponderings7 Comments

Recently my dear friend Natalie from Chicago came for a quick visit, as she was back home for her grandmother’s funeral. Her presence was like a sweet breeze from the Windy City. She brought a little pot of cheerful daffodils to brighten my table. I got florally spoiled! It was a gift to be able to see her, and have a heart-to-heart talk while the kids played at the park. A moment of happiness I will cherish for a long time.

I’ve been thinking a lot about happiness lately, and how necessary it is to choose it. Not just as a lifetime hope, but moment to moment. Choosing to embrace each good moment that comes, choosing to smile, to dance with the kids, to laugh when they tell me funny little things, to savour each time they hug or play together well. Tonight we had homemade pizza. “We’re having a nice lifetime,” said my four year old,”This is the best pizza ever!”

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I have to see each of these moments as gifts, despite the underlying ache for my little lost daughter, who is busy painting Heaven’s clouds pink with her rosy cheeks. She would want me to be a happy mother who is present to her children, who is affectionate and fun, who is able to enjoy her children and to apologize when she loses her cool.

We can choose to see life as meaningful gift, painful but precious, or as a terrible burden, fraught with danger. But how would the latter help us? To be paralyzed by fear is to refuse to live. And we must live and love, even as the sun must rise, because that’s what we’re meant to do.

Who among us is without pain? We have all suffered in one way or another…
Yet we still have the ability to choose happiness. The longing in our hearts for truth, goodness and beauty is there because those things exist, and we are meant to possess them.

“The essence of greatness is having the heart of a child,” quoted James Stenson in a parenting talk. I think this is also a choice: to let sadness wither you up and go grey inside, letting yourself become even internally old, or to choose youth—hope, joy, simplicity, trust, laughter—for to embrace life is to be young.

This is not a choice we make only once, for we are so changeable, like the shadows of leaves dancing on a windy day…it is a choice we have to make again and again, every time an opportunity comes to enjoy life, to be silly, to dance, to relish a conversation with a dear friend, to bask in the sunlight that pours down on us.

If we refuse the joy of those moments, because the pain of deep old scars that still throb, we are being like the child who refuses to get over her tantrum because one toy broke, even when she is offered many others. It’s really easy to be that kind of child, but we have to remember the resilience of children who seek joy in each new day, who get excited about little things, who are easily pleased by small shows of affection.

All the daily blessings we receive, all of those good moments, are caresses from God’s hands, and a sign that He is with us, despite life’s struggles. Say yes to them. Say yes to Him. Say thank you. We are in bigger, better hands than our own, and only in them can we truly live as children who know how to trust and rejoice, despite the tears that also come.

As I’m trying to take my own advice, here’s some photo’s of me being a kid on my retreat at Loon Lake, climbing about in the woods and getting wet pulling a raft across the lake. Felt like I was 12 again. Was great!

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