​For lots of people, dirty, off-color, vulgar, crude or inappropriate humor has no place in entertainment, social interactions or any part of day to day life. The only trouble is that humor and laughter play almost as important a role in human life as sex and sexuality, which tend to be the subject of such “lowbrow” humor.

Swedenborg explains why laughter is important based on its correspondential meaning. In the context of the biblical story of Sarah laughing at the announcement that she would have a child in her old age, Swedenborg explains that laughter represents affection for truth or inversely falsity (Gen. 18:12, Arcana Coelestia 2072). Within the context of that story, Sarah’s laughter is a response to the contradiction between the truth of her old age and the promise that she would bare a child. Humor often comes from a place of trying to rationalize the information we take in from the world around us. Laughter can spring up whether we see an inconsistency or when we see something that perfectly represents our experience. Humor is funny that way. Continue reading What A Dirty Joke →

I attended Kainon School, a New Church Primary School in Westville, Durban, South Africa between 1996 and 2002. The values that were formed during those years have been foundational throughout my life. One of the things that has recently taken on more meaning for me is Kainon School’s motto: “Happiness in a Useful Life” or “In Usibus Felicitas.”

A few months ago, I wrote an article about my personal growth journey and taking steps to fulfil my purpose. Over the past few months, I have experienced so much joy, challenge and fulfilment in my work. One of the most rewarding parts of my work is having the privilege to help others find their purpose. This part of my work involves guiding teens and adults on a journey of self-awareness and personal development to help them to figure out the unique value they can offer the world. I love nothing more than seeing a person’s face light up when they suddenly “click” and the pieces of the puzzle finally fall into place.

When I am working with people in this way, I feel like I am fulfilling my own purpose. Having the opportunity to hear a beautiful, unique personal story and helping someone to understand their “essence” is what motivates me. My passion lies in helping a person to identify their strengths, understand their gifts and harness their talents in order to empower them to live a useful and fulfilling life.

“From them they also knew what charity was, namely the affection for serving others without any thought of reward…” – Emanuel Swedenborg (Arcana Coelestia 3419(3))

Continue reading In Usibus Felicitas →

My kids like to listen to a song called “Busybusybusy”. The kids find the rapid delivery funny, but their mother finds the whole thing a little dark. It’s worth a couple minutes of your life.

For those of us in charge of a house and maybe a kid or three, life sometimes seems to boil down to busily shuffling stuff around. I dress the kids, put the kids in the car, buy the groceries, shuttle them home, assemble a meal, wash the dishes and car, then wash and dress the kids for bed. Lather, rinse, repeat.

It’s easy to get stuck on the treadmill of this material world and to forget the Lord’s eternal purpose.

After a spiritually foggy year, I stopped making excuses for why I wasn’t raising my mind up to the Lord and His Word regularly. (I’m too tired, I need to sweep the floor, I can’t decide where to begin, and so on.) I joined an online study group.

Last week, I was dutifully trudging through the Arcana, and as often happens when I dutifully trudge through the Arcana, the Lord had a gem of a passage waiting there for me. I was reading a section explaining Genesis 35. Continue reading Busy Busy →

I’m a fairly anxious person. I over think and over analyse most things. From the moral, environmental, and health implications of every snack I choose for my kids each day, to how to spend my money (with many of the same worrying implications), or how to prioritise my life.

Often even as the over thinking is stressful and building I am able to manage. But it regularly builds and becomes overwhelming. I am learning that this happens most often if there is a bigger underlying stress. In recent months and years that underlying stress has been changing and I have made progress. But there are many large life questions I have been wrestling with that are still there even as they have shifted.

These big background stresses are complicated and interconnected and are hard to keep ahold of mentally. As I talked about that with a friend recently she suggested that I draw. No rules, no limits, no specific guidelines, just draw something of my mental worries. I am terrible at drawing without judging my skills (I can’t draw stick figures usually without just feeling so ridiculous), so I chose rather to paint abstractly. Continue reading Painting to Calm My Anxious Brain →