Book Review--The Parable of the Golden Pathway by Jenny Phillips

I admit it.  I'm a page surfer.  That's what I call a person who curiously opens up a book and reads the first few pages to test out the water and then skims a few in the middle, before sneaking a peek at the ending to see how it all works out.  (Weird, I know.  Am I the only one who doesn't mind reading a book even though she knows how it's going to end?  Do I need therapy or what?!)

So, yesterday, I purchased Jenny Philllips NEW book, The Parable of the Golden Pathway. And, yes, I was in my "surfing" mode.  Cramming in a quick "surf" while watching my son at the skate park and taking my daughter to a band concert, I perused the 20-something page storybook with unanticipated expectations.  Big mistake! 

Later on, when life quieted down, I immersed myself in the 20-something pages and realized all the beautiful analogies I had missed in that quick surf at the beginning of my day. 
The Parable of the Golden Pathway is a powerful little parable.  "The story recounts the travels of three young siblings, Sarah, Ori, and Tabitha, along the golden pathway to the kingdom of the Light Maker."  It illustrates the temptations, trials, consequences, and rewards that youth—and others—face in their daily journey to obey God’s laws.  The book promises that you will see yourself in the three main characters as they struggle to remain on the path and reach the Ligh Maker's kingdom.   

I see a Family Home Evening Lesson in sight.  (I'll let you know how it turns out.) 

YOUNG WOMEN IDEAS:  By the way, Jenny Phillips offers some suggestions for Young Womens activities at Resources at jennyphillips.com.  You'll want to check those out.

For Jenny Phillips' The Parable of the Golden Pathway, I give it my GOLD STAR. 

Take time to sit down and read this inspiring parable to your children. It's worth it!

A Life-Lesson on Trust: To be trusted you have to be willing to trust

My kids and I tried to rescue some stray kittens hiding behind the bushes near the Arctic Circle. Catch them so we could help them. That's all we wanted to do. Sadly, even opened cans of cat food failed to lure the kittens to a quick capture and rescue. Time and time again, these darling fur balls would timidly creep out from behind the bushes, swallow a chunk of cat food, and, before we could snatch them up, they would dart behind the thick bushes hopelessly out of sight. After an hour of trying, we left empty handed feeling horribly defeated because those kittens would remain orphans. All because they didn't trust us.


Trust is a tricky thing. One definition I found says: "Trust means making an exchange with someone when you do not have full knowledge about them, their intent and things they are offering to you." Think about it. God sends a baby to a twenty-something mom and dad who have never been parents, who know nothing about late night feedings, 102 degree fevers, and sharp corners on coffee tables. Now that's trust. Talk to me about trust in two years, when my daughter asks me to take the car for the first time all by herself. Yikes!


Ten years ago, when I showed up to teach my first class at a substance abuse treatment center, I learned how important trust was. I knew nothing, absolutely nothing about addiction. Just like those timid kittens, the women in my first class didn't trust me. They had no reason to. If they could have, they would have run behind the bushes. Instead of cans of cat food, I could have lured them in with Hershey bars. But that wouldn't have lasted long. With my son on my hip and my two little girls following close behind me, I entered the room. Forty pair of eyes can make a girl feel intimated. And I was.


"Hi, ladies. My name is, Jodi. How is everyone today?" Then without thinking I handed off my 6 month-old son to a woman sitting to my left.


"Hold him just a moment would ya? I need to get my notes." I shuffled through my diaper bag and found what I needed to start my class.


Looking back I'm sure a few of those women were thinking, "Who is this chick with her craft buckets and kids in color coordinated outfits?"


Throughout my class, I glanced at the young twenty-something woman bouncing my baby boy up and down on her lap. She did a fine job of keeping him occupied. At some point, I asked her if she had kids. She gave a longing look. Come to find out she didn't have custody of her son. He lived with his grandparents. She missed him.


"Oh, I'm sorry." Pause. "I hope you'll see him soon."


I'd never met this woman before but I wanted to hug her, console her and tell her to be strong. I couldn't imagine not being with my baby. It was after I'd been teaching at House of Hope for a few weeks that I realized what a welcome site my kids were to many of the women in treatment. Some had lost custody of their children permanently. Others were waiting to regain custody. Some women had scheduled supervised visits on weekends. These women missed their kids and being with my children consoled their aching arms.

That was ten years ago. Last month, I sat at the House of Hope Alumni Tea, an honorary celebration for women still in recovery. Wendy, a woman who graduated from treatment nine years previous sat at my table. We talked about that first class. And you know what she said?


"You know how I knew you were the real thing, Jodi? When you let me hold your son."
I had forgotten. Tears welled up in my eyes. Wendy was the girl with the dark streaks in her golden blonde hair who bounced my son up and down on her lap in my first class. It was one of those flash moments, when you get it. Really get it. It was all about trust and someone had to go first. And that someone was me.


Over the last ten years, all four of my kids have been hugged, high-fived, and patted on the back by hundreds of women fighting for their sobriety. They have allowed me and my family to be a small part of their lives during their stay at House of Hope. And it has been life-changing.


It's been almost a decade since Wendy and I decided to trust each other. And today, we have a beautiful friendship. Our children have attended the same school for the past five years. We've been on a fieldtrip together, sat next to each other at the Christmas concerts, and ate lunch together. Wendy's even taught classes with me at House of Hope. She's a successful business woman and a loving mother to her two sons. And she's sober. Her life is good. Wendy is one of my heroes.

So back to that definition of trust. "Trust means making an exchange with someone when you do not have full knowledge about them, their intent and things they are offering to you." When I handed my son to Wendy, I showed her I could be trusted to love, not judge. Silly me, I thought that gaining trust was going to come from something marvelously inspiring I had to say. Turns out that it wasn't what I said that was important. It was what I did. If you want to be trusted, you have to show what that looks like. We don't always do it the right way the first time. Sometimes it takes a few do-overs. But being trustworthy is worth any amount of do-overs.


As for the kittens, well, I'm looking for resources on-line for teaching felines how to trust. I just can't stop thinking about how hungry and thirsty they are. I hate to leave those little fur balls out in the cold when I know they need some love and tender care.


Matthew 25:26 "Naked, and ye clothed me: I was sick, and ye visited me: I was in prison, and ye came unto me."

House of Hope women, you are my heroes. You're my teachers. You're my inspiration. I never knew the fullness of God's power until I met a drug addict and saw the miracles in the lives of the women who live to have hope! Ladies, thanks for trusting me with who you are and allowing me to believe in who you can become.

How was Your Mother's Day?

Meet Lila...Holy cow just doesn’t seem appropriate.

Don't eat your friends … or you'll be lonely.

My friend Kris and I took our kids to Wheeler Farm and met Lila the Pig.  (Her name's not really Lila.  We just felt that she needed a feminine name, well, because you know.)  Lila spent the entire afternoon trying to get some relief by sitting her bottom-half in the water barrel.  She did the best she could under the circumstances. 

Hillarious!   Kris and I kept coming up with one liners and we laughed so hard we cried.  Here are just a few...

"That's SOOOMMMMEEE pig."

"I've heard of pigs in a blanket, but a pig in a bucket?"

"Here's a new way of looking at bringing home the bacon."

"Lila, thanks for making me feel so good in my workout clothes.  Bless you darlin'!"

"We're on a roll...yea...a sausage roll."

And, Kris, thanks for the laugh.  And Lila, you've got it goin' on!

A Diamond in the Rough--Author Jewel Adams Visits House of Hope

A few months ago, author Jewel Adams came to House of Hope to share her personal story of recovery.  I was so impressed with her.  Her honesty.  Her candor.  Her genuine ability to say, "I've been where you've been.  I've made it and so can you."  Her story inspired me and all of the women there.  Her name, Jewel, fits her perfectly.  She is truly a gem of a human being.  This is not the forum to share her story, but perhaps some time she will choose to do so.  She is a wife, mother of ten children, grandmother, and successful author.  The women loved receiving a free copy of her book, The Journey. 

Today, I'd love to introduce you to her latest Novella entitled, Tears of Heaven. It's an ebook on her website:  http://jewelsbestgems.blogspot.com/ 

I love when I meet people whose personal life stories inspire me to be a better human being.  I can honestly say, "Jewel, I knew the moment I met you I liked you!"

I've always said to the women in my classes, "When you get the chance to tell your story to help others, do it. There is healing-power in every story of recovery." I believe that.  We all have a story.  We've all overcome something or are in the process of doing so.  We are all diamonds in the rough. 

Who we are is not as important as who we are becoming.

I love meeting strong women who have already become something wonderful.  Women like Jewel!  Thank you, Jewel, for sharing your experience and your wisdom.  I look forward to working with you again. 

Diamond in the ROUGH--Someone who has exceptional future potential, but currently lacks the final touches that would make it truly stand out from the crowd.

A Tribute to Invisible Women Everywhere--Happy Mother's Day

To all of the Invisible Women in my life...Happy Mothers Day! To those women I know and those I haven't met yet.

I "see" you.

With love & friendship,
Jodi

Quotes on Virtue

FREE downloads.  Right click and save the above images.  If you need a higher resolution, email me at jodirobinson2182@hotmail.com and I'll email you the files.  These are great for decoupage' tiles for Young Womens handouts.  The girls can make them for an activity.  Thanks to http://www.shabbyblogs.com/ and Michelle Underwood for designing such an adorable pink frame!   The pink frame can be found on http://www.shabbyblogsblog.blogspot.com/.

Twelve Steps to Recovery--A Mighty Miracle that Changes Lives

"I believe that people are good if you give them half a chance and that good is more powerful than evil."  Lois Wilson—birth mother of AL-ANON

Sitting on the window ledge in my kitchen is a geode. It was given to me by my friends at House of Hope, a drug recovery treatment center in downtown Salt Lake. For ten years, I've spent most of my Friday's teaching motivational and life skills classes to women trying to overcome substance abuse.  When someone new shows up in my class, her insecurities, despair, and hopelessness are not hard to miss.  Her countenance is dark.  She is clearly unsure of House of Hope and most certainly is unsure of me.  She questions if she's even going to make it.

Some women come in fighting, full of anger at the "world" for doing "this" to them that, at first, they are hard to reach. But then something miraculous happens.  They spend time in the program and they begin to soften. They begin to, as their counselors call it, "trust the process." In group and in one-on-ones, these women begin to learn tools and coping skills that help them deal with life's stresses.  They slowly uncover the reasons for using drugs and drinking alcohol and then a new acceptance emergers as they admit they need help and surrender to their higher power. I've seen it happen over and over and over. Women who have been to jail. Women who have lost custody of their kids. Women who have experienced domestic violence, done drug deals, prostituted themselves.  Anything and everything that comes with drug life, they've seen and done it; and I've watched them shed their skin and transform into beautiful, confident, radiant souls anxious to tackle the world clean and sober.  It happens. And it happens every day at House of Hope.

So, back to my geode. Lisa presented it to me at the Alumni Tea, a yearly celebration for all those women in recovery. Almost two hundred were in attendeance this year.  Lisa placed the broken rock full of crystals in my hands.  She said, "Jodi, this is how you see the women of House of Hope. When the world sees the rough, rock exterior. You see the crystals inside." And I do.  Thank you, Lisa.  I will treasure that rock and every time I look at it sitting on my kitchen ledge I'll say a quick prayer for a woman still living in her addiction.

"I never thought I was good enough," one woman told me. "I didn't deserve to be happy," another shared. Oh, the tragedies of living at a time when the Adversary wreaks havoc on the self-esteems of young women and women.  As we journey towards becoming better people, let us understand as C.S. Lewis did:

"(The Christian) does not think God will love us because we are good, but that God will make us good because He loves us." — C.S. Lewis

 Beautifully said.

If any of you watched the Hallmark Hall of Fame TV Movie on April 25th, Sunday night, it was fabulous.  The Lois Wilson Story reveals the dedication and devotion one woman had in her quest to help her husband overcome addiction, a courageous journey that gave birth to Al-ANON.  So, in honor of AA founder Bill Wilson...and his angel wife, Lois Wilson, who stood by her husband to witness the making of a new man, today I post the Twelve Steps.  

Thank you, Bill Wilson. Because you chose to turn your addiction into a miracle of change, millions upon millions live free of their addictions. And thank you, Lois, for bringing millions of women support and help through your brainchild, AL-ANON. 

You don't need to be a recovering-anything to recognize we are all in need of reaching out to our higher power and surrendering our will. Let the steps inspire you as they have me.  And to my friends at House of Hope...NEVER give up! 

THE TWELVE STEPS OF ALCOHOLICS ANONYMOUS

 1. We admitted we were powerless...that our lives had become unmanageable.
2. Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves could restore us to sanity.
3. Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of God as we understood Him.
4. Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of ourselves.
5. Admitted to God, to ourselves, and to another human being the exact nature of our wrongs.
6. Were entirely ready to have God remove all these defects of character.
7. Humbly asked Him to remove our shortcomings.
8. Made a list of all persons we had harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all.
9. Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others.
10. Continued to take personal inventory and when we were wrong promptly admitted it.
11. Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God, as we understood Him, praying only for knowledge of His will for us and the power to carry that out.
12. Having had a spiritual awakening as the result of these Steps, we tried to carry this message to [others], and to practice these principles in all our affairs.

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