STRONG AND KIND.

Mark and Eric friend talk about a poem called Strong and Kind, and explore the opportunity for growth that discomfort affords those with eyes to see and ears to hear. But it is important to grow intentionally: strong and kind. This poem is why. We hope you love this episode! (We felt we owed you some studio time! haha) 

Heart, 

Mark and Eric

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Welcome to the Text and Rock Show. Ancient story. Better tomorrow. Let's begin.

SPEAKER_01 0:17

Yeah, at least he's still moving and grooving. Well, this one's fun. Yeah. I thought we'd do a newer one. I've got like a couple hundred from this year that I haven't published at all. And then this was an old book I started to edit and it didn't finish. I'm going to. Like I've got a couple hundred poems to filter down to like the top 100, 120 pop in here. Okay. But this is when I started it, and I like this one. Yeah. But it's newer, it's been written more recently. Yeah. It goes it goes like this. When you are thrust into the desert wild, there is an opportunity for growth that comfort could never afford.

unknown 1:01

I like that.

SPEAKER_01 1:02

But you could grow in many directions. Some towards goodness and virtue, some towards bitterness and vice. Even in the myth bar, you can choose your direction. Choose strength and kindness. Grow strong, grow kind. For without strength, you may be swallowed up by the harsh terrain and disappear into the sands again before your time. Without kindness, you might grow strong, but wield your strength with anger and cynicism and hatred. And so grow strong and kind, so that nothing can break you and let your compassion go before you. As a smoke cloud by day and a fire by night that lets others know someone strong is on their side. Okay, this one's hot actually. Oh man, there's a lot going on there. It's one of those poems where I try to use the simplest language possible, no vocabulary words that anyone has never heard before. Except for Mithbar, I guess, which is wilderness in Hebrew. Like it's the desert where Israel wanders around for 40 years, or the desert where Jesus goes for 40 days in the stories, right? So here's kind of the big push of it. Alright. It first says when you're thrust into the wilderness, like liminal space in your life, okay? So think of those seasons in your life, Eric, where you're not where you want to be and where you know you're headed, but you're also not in the past and you can't go back there. You know what I'm saying? Yeah. Like there's no way back, and you don't know the way forward yet. You're literally in the wild. In uh the Hebrew Bible, Divraim or Numbers, is the book that catalogs Israel camping in the wild with Yahweh. And the idea is I had a good Bible professor say numbers is about getting used to life with God. And so again and again, there's these cycles that move through of obedience, things are going well, disobedience, God sends like this crazy ass plague or pestilence, or like the punishment seems, well, ungodly terrible. And then they're like, Oh, we're sorry, you know, and Moses or Aaron, who represents basically the prophet and the priesthood, will mitigate between the people and God, which is a very like you know, priestly way of writing. We're supposed to be in charge, right? And putting it back in the story. Um but the the big picture of the stories is reconnecting and relying on God, spirit, source, creator, and not yourself. Embracing just enough. That is, sometimes you don't you don't need to know what's gonna happen five years from now, you don't need your bank account to have a budget for five months from now. Sometimes it's about the day-to-day wilderness that shapes you because it's hard and because it's uncertain. Okay? Okay. So I say it actually is an opportunity for growth that comfort never could afford. The wilderness is where Israel grows up, Jesus gets his mission, Elijah works as miracles. To be an Israelite in the Hebrew scriptures, the wilderness is where you go to meet God, and in doing so, develop into your mission, right? That uh uh rubs up against uh the Gilgamesh thing a little bit, right? Yeah, it's the hero's journey. You have to leave you have to go get good and lost. Yeah, good and lost. Which by the way, which by the way, one of my favorite authors, Richard Rohr, wrote a book called Falling Upward. And he basically says that actually, if the first life you've built for yourself doesn't go to shit and fall apart, you'll never grow into who you're supposed to be in the second half of life. You'll miss it. So if actually all the work you did to build up comfort in the first half of life doesn't get put to the fire and destroyed, you'll actually never hit a second wave of growth, and a lot of adults don't. But the lucky ones whose life falls apart, well, they can rise like a phoenix. Right. Or a dragon. Yes, you're right. Yeah, so this second part I've seen true many, many times. You can grow in many directions, but primarily, when people go through something really difficult, they either grow inside and become an amazing person, even more so, or it's like there's a second and third death and they cling on to bitterness. And to be honest, I think I've gone through seasons of of both in the last three years. I don't I don't think it's been like up into the right, you know? It's been a perpetual asking of which way do I want to grow? And for me, the conviction is you should grow strong from the difficulty you went through and you should grow kind. And then the next two paragraphs are about what happens if you have one and not the other. Yeah. So if you grow strong, right? Or if you if you grow without strength, so you give up the strength, you get swallowed up by the wilderness and the divine monsters that lurk out there, and you can't stand up to what you need to stand up to that would promote your growth. You can't scale the mountain that you need to scale in the wilderness to reach new heights. You instead just stall out. But without kindness, you could grow really strong and you could basically become an angry, cynical person. And we've all met someone who carries bitterness and anger. No. And if you could really get underneath it, it would be that they voted for Trump. No, just kidding. It would be that if you could if you could really get underneath it, it would be that they incurred a wound and did not grow in the right direction. They were bitter and angry. And now they view every single person they encounter as a threat or a potential threat. So grow strong and kind so nothing can break you, but your compassion goes before you. And then I love this final image. It's the image in Shemot, Exodus, where Israel is escaping from their Egyptian oppressors, and it says that Yahweh appeared as a smoke cloud by day, so they could follow this giant pillar of smoke to go to the right place to evade their people. And the smoke cloud stood in the way of the Egyptian armies and Israel, and a fire by night. That is, at night there was this giant pillar of fire. Now it's all it's all mythology placed over the story, right? But it's a really cool image because this is what an Egyptian commander would use to guide their own troops. They would pull a pan of smoke at the front of the lines, and their troops would follow the smoke for miles, or they would light up fire if they were like trekking through the night to get to a battle and they would follow their commander's fire. So the idea is that Yahweh is like the Egyptian commander guiding the people that the Egyptians had slaved through the wilderness. It's a really, really peculiar way to name God. Yeah. Like he picks the slave people and then he overturns the very devices of the military and uses it against them for the people they had oppressed. Pretty cool. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. Yeah. Wanna try this one out? Sure! Alright, alright. I'm gonna try. You do you, man. I never give you any direction.

SPEAKER_02 8:49

Sometimes play around. Play a jazz.

SPEAKER_01 8:52

Do whatever you want.

unknown 8:54

Oh, come on.

SPEAKER_01 8:54

Really? Does that just rattle like that? No.

unknown 8:57

Well, I have to set up. You're good. Okay. Alright, alright. If you are thrust into the desert wild, there's an opportunity for growth. That comfort can never ever afford.

SPEAKER_01 9:13

But you could grow in many directions, some towards goodness and virtue, some towards bitterness and ice. And in the middle bar, you can choose your direction.

unknown 9:31

Grow strong and grow kindness. For your own protection. Or without strength, you may be swallowed up by the harsh domain and disappear into the stand before your time. Without kindness, you might grow strong, field your strength with anger and skepticism and hatred. And so growth strong and kind.

SPEAKER_01 9:58

So that nothing can break you and let your compassion go before you as a smoke cloud by day and a fire by night that lets others know that someone's wrong is others. I love that last line. Yeah. It lets like like if you can achieve this, if you can go through difficult things and let it grow you into a person who's strong and compassionate, the upshot is it serves everyone around you. They feel like someone is strong on their side, just like you feel when yeah, you're stuck in the wilderness, but God camps out with you and is developing you. Yeah. It's like the upshot is you become a great developer or leader of others. Wow. Even if you're just leading in joy. Right, right, yeah. Yeah, man.

SPEAKER_02 10:59

Very cool, man.

SPEAKER_01 11:00

That's awesome. Yeah. Cool, cool, cool. Yeah. Are we gonna do another? I don't know. What time is it? It is 1046. Uh no, I think we're gonna eat Mexican food. Okay. That's what I think. I think we should go do that. Let's break burrito. Let's break burrito. All right later. Be good to each other.

SPEAKER_00 11:45

This has been the Text and Rock Show. The Text and Rock Show is the creative work of Mark Schaefer and Eric Madison. Don't forget to subscribe so you know when new episodes drop. If the show adds value to your life, please consider leaving them a review or sharing Textandrock with a friend. You can explore other Textandrock digital productions or contact Mark and Eric by simply clicking the link in the show notes.

SPEAKER_02 12:33

You wouldn't snatch it.

SPEAKER_01 12:34

Wait, so you're telling me from the top, you're telling me that you would steal a baseball out of the hand of like a four-year-old.

SPEAKER_02 12:45

Out of the hand.

SPEAKER_01 12:47

What's the difference?

SPEAKER_02 12:50

If I caught it.

SPEAKER_01 12:53

Say like a kid catches it and you really want it. Would you snatch it like those adults in the videos? Like it's literally grown adults snatching stuff from the kids.

SPEAKER_02 13:05

It was on the sign yes.

SPEAKER_01 13:08

Oh man.

SPEAKER_02 13:10

What what about I'm a kid too?

SPEAKER_01 13:14

Yeah. That's true. Well you're you're 13. Would you steal the ball from Ivy?

SPEAKER_02 13:24

You totally would, wouldn't you? If she wasn't a family member. That's almost worse.

SPEAKER_01 13:35

Yeah. Okay, so like, what if it's a minor league game, like a criminals game? What if it's like I'm junior? You're diving in the pit for that.

SPEAKER_03 13:49

Yes, Ivy. What's up?

SPEAKER_01 13:52

Yes. When we get to the ice cream place? What are you gonna get today? Can we get something you can drink out of a straw so we can run our other errands? Well, what is it? You want something you can eat with a spoon? Okay. Alright, fair enough. It's a little chilly today. Well, it's not too bad. Yeah. Probably not. Yeah. Ivy, how would you feel if a professional athlete gave you a ball and someone like brother took it away from you really quick? You might be able to do it. Yeah. I think you would have cry. Yeah.