As my blog has long been the space I use to share my random rambling thoughts, it seems to make sense to share the answers, or bits of them, or bits of some of them,here too.
1) What's the one thing that people always misunderstand about you?
I guess I think I'm fairly transparent, what you see is more-or-less what you get so I don't think there is that much to misunderstand! I wonder whether, when people first meet me, they might believe me to be more organised than I actually am ... I am quite good, I think, at getting a lot done, and I think that gets mistaken for organisation when in reality the energy, enthusiasm and hard work are genuine, but there's a fair amount of chaos and disorganisation en route to the results!
2) What do you think about when you are alone?
Well, at the moment, these questions, so I'm now thinking about what I think about! But generally, work, a lot, possibly more than is healthy. I think that's always / often been true: it was true when I was a teacher, and it's definitely true now. About activities and ideas, a little; but mostly about people and their stories and experiences; and about my part in sharing in and shaping those realities, and my own story being effected by its interaction with them. I guess, ultimately, its not so much that I think about work, but that I think about people I care about, it just seems that a lot of the people I care about happen to be people at work, but there are certainly others too, perhaps including you.
3) If you had the ability to get rid of something you did in the past, what would it be?
The reality is that many of the things I can think of which haven't entirely worked out as planned, or which have brought with them struggles or challenges, are also the things that have brought me to the place I am today and helped make me the person I am, and as such I have very few regrets. Obviously there are things I might have done differently with the benefit of the hindsight and experience I now have, but that's just not how life works! I guess the thing in my past I am least proud of is probably how I behaved as a teenager (I was very difficult, but the good news is I think I turned out ok!). It came from a place of being deeply unhappy, something I am able to recognise and articulate now in a way that my fourteen yourself never could have done, but I guess maybe I could / should have handled life a little differently.
4) What are the main principles of your life?
It's become somewhat cliched, but if that old chestnut, that "these three things remain,faith,hope and love, and the greatest of these is love" doesn't sum up what guides my life, I at least hope it sums up what I aspire to live by as my guiding principles. That my trust in a loving God, and the rhythm of prayer which allows me to experience it is the firm foundation on which I am trying to build my life; that drawing on that source I am able to remain hopeful,not with some sort of naive and empty optimism, but with a deep sense of hope which inspired me to fight on for the change I believe necessary and keep smiling in the midst of the mess along the way. And that the experience of unconditional love, a love which forgives all my failings (and there are many!) might help me take baby steps towards offering that same love to those around me, those I encounter and those I don't, love expressed through a passion for justice and peace,love expressed in caring, compassionate relationships. This is the life I want to try and live, but I acknowledge it is aspirational as opposed to accurate, but I guess that's often what principles are ... the place to come back to all those times when I'm not measuring up to my own standards!
5) What is your greatest fear?
I've written a lot about fear, recently, and about trying not to be afraid, so it's tricky to now stop and reflect on what I am afraid of... but I think my deepest fear, at least at the moment, is to feel like I do not have a purpose; to feel like I am not, or that I cannot make a difference to the world around me. I would be the first to say that I do not believe our value is found in what we do or achieve, that we have inherent value irrespective of our achievements because we are beloved children of God ... that our first vocation is to be not to do; despite that, in my heart of hearts I know that the idea of not having a purpose, not being able to contribute, fills me with dread!
More to follow ...
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