I have found love, and I live to share it. I have lived through and spoken peace to many big storms, and life has been beautiful. I believe that our individual stories are important building blocks in the beautiful communities that life was meant to be. For it is only when we share our stories, with deep compassion first for ourselves and then for each other, that we recognize that we are not alone, we are not very different, we are and have always been very much the same at the core - souls seeking to shine and enjoy the light of all others as we move through this human experience: “We’re only human and we’re looking for love... Human by Her Brothers. “ I believe in love, in the pure love modelled by Divine I AM, which is expressed in myriad ways, and in all ways is always perfect. https://youtu.be/KxluyC3JdCQ
Atsuko shares the importance of knowing who you are—and who you’re not.
August 19, 2026
In the days leading up to my birthday, I continue sharing the feedback that has helped me to grow; today’s offering is the idea that:
You deserve love. You deserve consideration.
You are deeply valued here.
Today’s feedback is about one of the earliest ways we can teach that truth: how we guide children to meet what is unfamiliar. When a name, culture, ability, appearance, or tradition is new to us, love and consideration ask us to expand our understanding, not ask another person to shrink themselves into what we already know.
And if we are asked to shrink for the comfort of those around us may we lean into the tension and allow it to strengthen our resolve to give ourselves the love and consideration we need to remain fully who we are, because the world cannot experience its perfectly blended harmony without each of us.
Dear Teacher,
Your heart is for your kiddos. Thank you for that 🦋. And when students react with defensive teasing to an unfamiliar name the best path might be to help them past the discomfort of exploring the unfamiliar. Because students can learn to pronounce Atsuko just as they learn to pronounce the words “could”, “receive”, or “walk”.
Teaching new things is a wonderful part of the learning journey—and learning to pronounce new names, finding their meanings, and exploring their origins is a part of the beautiful harmony created when different subjects and their many branches of knowledge meet, blend together, and form the very melodious composition that the world is and can become.
It is so important to guide young learners toward appreciation for this process, because encouraging them to turn away from the unfamiliar unconsciously plants seeds of supremacy. It teaches them that what is familiar to the perceived or declared majority is the acceptable standard of being, while people who have different abilities, appearances, names, cultural norms and traditions must alter themselves to be considered acceptable.
In the days leading up to my birthday, I continue sharing the feedback that has helped me to grow; today’s offering is the idea that:
Peace, purpose, and process are already aligned to bring us joy. We can experience that by leaning into gratitude for each other—gratitude for our core innocence and our good intentions, gratitude for the courage and openness to move through all our conflicts to resolution and the progress that effective communication brings.
And so yesterday I went to the river and offered up a gift of gratitude in that place where land and water meet in celebration of being one with our Creator Family among the elements from which they prepared a home for us.
Did you ever realize that fire cannot exist without the connection of sparks and fuel? A spark on its own flashes and disappears. Fuel on its own remains full of unrealized possibility. And when they connect, they become warmth and light. Useful, productive, progressive, creative together.
Perhaps joy is like that too. Already present in what each of us carries, waiting to be kindled through gratitude, courage, and our willingness to remain open to one another through the process of creating thriving healthy relationships as we engage with effective communication to resolve all conflicts between us, as Yeshua M’shikha, the Incarnate Heir of Love, showed and taught us to do.
I believe that we desire to become less defensive, to listen more patiently, and distinguish context from rebuttal. I see it clearly and also see that sometimes our emotions and ingrained survival reactions overpower our intentions.
When someone raises a concern, our minds may quickly see everything that we think explains what happened. And if that context arrives before we listen well enough to affirm that the other person feels understood, our perception may function as a rebuttal regardless of our intention.
A powerful discipline for us to implement would be:
“What I hear you saying is… Have I understood you?”
Then ask questions until they say yes. Only afterward is it best to move to:
“May I share what was happening for me?”
Our capacity to explain may be highly developed. Our next growth may be tolerating the vulnerable pause, being patient in that uncomfortable place where we may feel misunderstood, before explanation because we have faith that we will be heard.
I believe in our arrival at joy, as peace, purpose, and process align for us all. And for that I expressed gratitude on our behalf.
What I do believe is that perfection can be incrementally attained with each level of new understanding and skill gained. Therefore perfection is built and constantly repaired, with no expectation that it must never need to be regained. Perfection is built through new understanding and skill, disrupted through ordinary humanity, and repaired or regained through practice. Needing to regain it does not mean that previous growth was false.
My school experience was AMAZING and challenging. Yup go ahead and roll your eyes because what experience isn’t. Well, dude this is my story.
Pucker up, buttercup (which as an old friend once told me are super strong and hardy plants). So ha! Buttercup is side-eying 👀 you too. Here we go.
I have never had a more amazing school experience. No hyperbole. Simply legend-ARY. The curriculum development team built the program with people of all abilities and skill-sets in mind. Assessments were initially done, which was a great place to start, because even before classes officially began people who were hopeful but who doubted their ability had the boost of confidence that doing well the first time brings—when doing well the first time has been the traditional marker of success. The scaffolding was highly effective. There was no need for anyone to worry about not knowing what was needed. Whatever one might need to know was taught, and learners had the opportunity to explore, dig in to the treasure field of existing knowledge and extract the elements that were most valuable to them.
We were guided by Leslie Fahr, a highly competent professional mentor, who skillfully trimmed the anxiety that was highly visible in the room as the old weeds of systemic trauma tangled themselves into the already-bountiful grove of diverse minds, a grove which was well-primed for new growth.
Leslie was one part of a vibrant ecosystem, which is the image that comes to mind when I reflect on the plethora of people and organizations who together created the SCSW-CHWK project: the Sqwá First Nation Education Team— Dianne, Penny, Jade, Elder Aunty Violet; the Discovery Community College team—James, Candice, Lisa, Heather, Benita, Shelley, Isaac, and myriad others across both those organizations; and others such as my WorkBC employment consultant Deepmala, and other employees of broader provincial federal, civic, and social organizations that help nourish and sustain the ecosystem which supports our community’s healthy existence.
The experience was amazing. I am repeating myself. I know. The emphasis is intentional. It was that good.
And there were challenges. Big ones. Life-altering ones. Together, we faced them. In order for that to happen we spoke up repeatedly, persistently. I had to strengthen my lagging communication skills. I had to use all the tools available to amplify the accessibility message that I needed to be heard. It took Herculean effort to consistently practice a better way of showing up through conflict intertwined with excellence for every day of eight consecutive months. Conflict is not usually a part of interpersonal relationships because of bad intentions; conflict is that part of the relational growth curve where asymmetrical and varied lived experiences can become tangled as we move through life together.
I was able to use the opportunity to continue the lifelong practice of regulating my sensitive nervous system. I was able to continue to name the need that none of us recognized would arise prior to entering into the experience, and I was able to continue to hold space for collaborative progress until we were able to sit around the table and figure out what needed to be done.
Practicing mastery of self-regulation and moving through accountability without blame or shame is important because everyone has the right to choose what they will do. We’d like to hope that everyone will always access agency in ways that are mutually profitable to all, and the reality is that in some way or another we all at times become tangled in the weeds of supremacy and refuse to connect to the ecosystem so that we can function optimally together. Self-regulation helps us to honour choice and wait for collaboration and reconnection without doing harm.
That walk across the stage was a walk of triumph for everyone there, and for all of us all across this world wherever or whomever we may be. That walk celebrated our power to show up, celebrated the increasing wellbeing of our ecosystem—as we live free, at home in ourselves nowhere, and everywhere, as Maya Angelou says, and always — right now, experiencing harmony on Earth as it is in heaven.
PS. This was for me the half-graduation though the program is officially completed. The second will be in the fall which I am excitedly looking forward to celebrating 🙌🏿 in a good way.
I love you, and… I know it’s hard to hear this. And it’s really important that we listen because we are all being harmed by this virus of supremacy. Or rather it’s really important to me to speak, and I hope that at some point we can listen and discuss together.
There has been a much publicized photo which shows a lone Afro-descended young woman seated on a train surrounded by White Supremacists. This is not courage. This is reality. This is not her choice. And this is not just an American problem this is the world.
In response to concern about the dynamics displayed in this photo the response has repeatedly been: did they kill her? No? Then all is well.
Is that truly how we measure our own experience of safety? Is the question did you survive? Or would it more correctly be: did you feel no threat, no fear, no concern that you might not survive?
In the American Civil War, it is estimated that hundreds of thousands of people died fighting for the right to own Afro-descended people and use them as free labour.
The timeline of the nation indicates that it has been longer immersed in this ideology than it has not been.
People were freed, and then they were segregated so that there would still clearly be those who belonged above and those who belonged below. Dominance and subordination. Caste. Class.
In this era, racial supremacy still sits unexamined in the minds of most Americans. And not just Americans, but in most of us.
Unexamined in most. Present in all.
It is important that we do not exclude any of us from this examination of unconscious supremacy, because all of us sit in that position of dominance in some area in our lives:
In this era, supremacy still sits largely unexamined within our collective consciousness because there has never been a peaceful national reckoning with racial supremacy or any other kind of supremacy. There has never been a conscious collective choice to restore and rebuild the nation on a foundation of equality.
Instead the nation has used war and then laws to criminalize supremacist behaviour without creating open forums to discuss and bear responsibility for, and work through the imbalance that maintains supremacy unconsciously.
We’ve swept supremacy under the rug instead of getting rid of it completely.
Supremacy continues to unconsciously exist because we do not become magically transformed from any state of being to another.
Transformation involves restorative action. It involves deliberate active growth from unconscious incompetence to awareness of incompetence to learning and practicing new skills which facilitates the transformation to skilled application of knowledge (unconscious competence).
If one finds themselves unable to even consider the idea that supremacy is still unconsciously harming those with whom they are in relationship, it means that supremacy is still present and attached to shame in the shadows of the mind. Bringing it to the light is where it will begin to become visible so that the process of weeding and pruning can begin.
Awareness is not the same as growth in competence. Knowing that supremacy is wrong does not mean we have learned how to recognize it within ourselves, receive correction when it is revealed, repair the harm it causes, or build relationships in which equality is actually practiced.
Prohibitive laws are intended to be guardrails, and if we depend on laws to suppress behaviour, we lean into Jung’s assertion that what we resist will persist and will come forth later in uglier ways. Until we create spaces for safe growth through accountability, apology, and new meetings of the mind, supremacy will continue to burn like a fire which is controlled but not extinguished.
We then over-burden our emergency response and public health services with cases that would never have existed if we had the skill to care for ourselves—if we had developed the ability to accept the discomfort that is a part of the process of settling disputes and creating ways to meet needs without devolving into oppression, suppression, and violence.
If our systems had not been driven by prohibitive laws which focused on punitive measures to ensure success we would not have shamefully hidden our supremacy, we would have moved through the struggle that it takes to become true friends.
I wrestled to understand what Aunty Maya Angelou meant when she said only equals can be friends. I wrestled to understand what my great-grandmother, Sarah-Ann, meant when she said that only equals should marry. I understand now that only equals can build effectively together, because only among equals can we tolerate examining faults. If we bristle and become defensive when someone suggests that our actions are causing them pain this is an indication that unconsciously we may not consider this person our equal.
This is deeply important therefore I repeat:
Only people who recognize each other as equals can truly be friends. Only among equals can we safely examine our faults. If we become defensive when someone tells us that we are causing them pain, we may need to ask whether, somewhere within us, we believe that our beliefs about their experience matters more than the pain associated with their experience.
Does our defensiveness matter more than their pain?
Do we matter more than they do? If we cannot listen, we cannot learn, and if we cannot learn how can we progress?
What have we lost to supremacy? I experience supremacy as the proverbial host of locusts which decimate crops in which the grower has invested much. The good thing is that our Creator has promised to restore what the locusts have stolen. This is a fully trustworthy promise. Recovery, restoration, reconciliation, and resplendent abundance become possible when the peace and safety of equality allows us to access all of our yet untapped and undiscovered regenerative resources.
I am grateful that these people were masked, because we cannot be distracted or derailed by using any one as a scapegoat. We have the opportunity to see ourselves. They are a mirror calling us to look at ourselves.
When we can face the discomfort of confronting these questions, we will know that we have begun the journey to transformation.
I am grateful to my grandmother, Dora, who reminded Daddy that people can only walk as quickly as they can walk. As much as supremacy hurts it is not all that we are. There is so much that is wonderful about us individually and collectively.
Our world—we—together—have begun the journey from supremacy to equality—which is the journey to true freedom and the ever-flowing stream of wealth and significance which is found therein.
Dudes, how much longer are we going to let money, scarcity, and fear keep us from experiencing the bliss of being with each other??
I know that this is a really simplistic question that completely ignores the factors which tear us apart. So let me explain what I mean. But first let me share that the big idea is that we can release our stranglehold on money as the lifeline that gives us worth and keeps us alive. We have chosen money as one of the tools with which we build our lives. Therefore when we let go of money as a lifeline it will move freely and profitably between us, and we will have the opportunity to then connect to the true source of life — the circle which includes all of us, everything that lives, and our Creator.
When I look at all of human relationship breakdowns to identify what caused the structure to begin to topple, I see money in the background as the ground zero source of infection. And it’s not the physical money that we hold in our hands. It’s money as a representation of worth and power and as the source of survival.
What if we remembered that we were here before money? What if we remembered that money is something that we made to organize our transactions?
What if we remembered that we always have what we really need?
What if we remembered that we are already very clearly seen?
What if we remembered that we do not need to be afraid? Aware? Yes. Wise? Yes. Afraid? Not needed.
If we took money out of the equation and organized our world by exchanging skills to help each other build the ideas that come to our minds, what would emerge as the most valuable and powerful thing?
Drum roll? 🥁
We would. We would be the most powerful and valuable thing.
And what are we? We are:
•Our minds.
•Our ability to communicate.
•Our respect for each other.
•The patience that allowed us to wait for an idea to fully come alive.
•The gentleness that held us safe as we waited, and comforted us when waiting became difficult.
•The self-control that harnessed anxiety and reminded us that we just need to wait our turn.
. The faith that believed that we would figure it all out.
•The joy that helped us to laugh and have fun while we build and while we wait.
•The love that is like a cozy blanket which keeps us perfectly warm and perfectly cool and perfectly grounded. Can you feel that blanket? Can you visualize it?
•The hope that knows that all of these things will always be replenished.
•The experiences that helped us to strengthen all of these parts of ourselves.
•The goodness that helped us to share with certainty that we would have what we need when we need it.
And we’d see that goodness is the peaceful state that allows us to connect to patience, gentleness, faith, self-control, respect, communication, love, hope, and each other.
What if we remembered that before there was money there was a Creator who equipped us with everything that we needed, and enjoyed watching us explore the world, and enjoyed watching us come up with new ways to put things together?
What if we remembered that we invented money as a part of our exploration? What if we remembered that money does not preserve our lives?
What if instead of loving money we loved us?
What would change for us then?
Would we able to rest?
Happy Sabbath. I say happy Sabbath because I am writing this on the seventh day. A day which I receive as the Creator’s original built in weekly holiday designed to fully embrace rest. Not because it’s Saturday but because I see the value in the cycle of six days of work followed by a full day of rest. Rest is the gift that allows us to slow down and remember. We are not poor. We have and will have everything that we need. Sabbath is not a religious idea. The Creator attached no punishments and restrictions to the day. It is a gift which we are invited to accept. Let me pause here to clarify this thought.
Rest is not owned by religion.
To be clear, I am not speaking from a Christian worldview or from any other religious perspective. I am speaking from what I think is the perspective of our sustaining spirit’s heart: from a spiritual perspective.
As I observe the world I see that people co-opted relational virtues and placed them into a container called religion, then distilled this idea further to create a hierarchy which elevates religion as the only space where people can become virtuous.
People made religion the only container in which perfect harmony is held. As if that is even remotely possible. It’s like building an aquarium and then insisting that the aquarium is the ocean.
I’m not looking at religion I’m looking at what causes fragmentation in a community and looking at what qualities create a thriving, vibrant, hopeful and healthy community.
So returning to the framework of healthy community:
Accountability is the part of relationship that calls us back to remember what wholeness and thriving looks like.
Forgiveness is the part that understands that we forgot.
Power is knowing that this is all true and possible.
Peace is understanding that we cannot force anyone to remember. We all remember when we can. And so we embrace all that we are, and do no harm.
Sin is forgetting. Forgiveness understands. Grace creates space for repair of the wound that forgetting caused.
This is what I mean when I say that God freed my fucks, and became my best friend on my journey through the Bible with Jesus.
Because the Bible is a record of the story of humanity’s beginning, which pivots to the experience of one community from its inception through its journey in relationship to other communities, and then it ends with the promise of complete relational restoration.
And through that story I found peace in the consistency of God’s well regulated presence which continued to be with humanity through much misunderstanding and confusion mixed with some understanding. I saw that humanity consistently legitimized its adulterated harmony by claiming that its interpretations and practices are fully congruent with God’s pattern of being. And Jesus came to remind us what was truly legitimate. But we killed him. He let us do that because he knew that his survival did not depend on our actions. He chilled for a bit, and then got back to business having been restored to life by the giver of life.
God accepts my rage, allows me to pour it all out instead of imploding with suppression, and is completely unoffended throughout the process. They’re the ultimate well regulated parent. Their one request is that I learn to slow down and bring my rage to them, instead of unleashing it on to others.
They don’t punish me for my rage or for the things that I do and say when my mind is flooded and overwhelmed and I get stuck in flight, freeze, fawn, flock, or faint.
They help me to repair. They help me to restore. They help me to figure it out. And they help me to rebuild when I’m ready.
This is us.
We keep wrecking the home which was designed to be the space in which we have this experience, so God keeps showing up to patch it up and heal the wounds that we got when things broke. And when we get to the place where we mess with the chemical balance and burn the house down They’ll come back to rescue us, and take us to the new home that They’ve had waiting for us.
It would be super foolish to fight being rescued and stay in the burning house to try and save our money and the things that we got with money. But some of us will do that.
I know that gratitude belongs, and it always does. If we live with gratitude and connection to whom we are, everything, even when we have been deeply wounded, can begin to be profitable. We discover possibilities for growth. Growth is profit. Therefore when we are hurt and need to move into survival mode to remain alive may we remember to return to gratitude and connection so that we can begin to heal and grow optimally again. This is the message of my heart every year on Canada Day because this day is a representation of the complexity of suffering mixed with gratitude which allows us to thrive as we move through the world. As the descendant of formerly enslaved people who struggle to find a way to be free and resilient in a world which is still wrestling with hierarchy and oppression—I see you. I see us. I see possibility.
Life is complex. When we experience pain our attention moves to what causes pain so that we can survive. Depending on the severity of the injury we forget about everything else to focus either on saving our lives or fighting for our ability to function well. Our vision narrows to focus on the thing that we must survive. Our system pauses all functions that are not essential to survival.
Focused on survival we forget joy. We forget gratitude. We even forget the need for nourishment. That is natural. That is right. Without this we would not continue to exist so that we could have the opportunity to heal and grow later.
Today is Canada Day. For many generations we have been focused on survival as a nation of settlers and Indigenous People, whom settlers attempted to dominate and force to assimilate to settler ideology after The People welcomed settlers to this land. Settlers may have forgotten, as it seems we typically tend to forget, that when we harm others we harm ourselves, because at the core we are one. So we all hurt.
Therefore what was done did not only hurt those who were oppressed. They struggled to survive with the excruciating pain of attempted erasure. And all who witnessed the pain, caused it, or lived in a nation affected by that pain suffered the loss of innocence which ruptured the connection that would have made this nation stronger as people working as equals together.
What we may not realize is that everyone who witnesses injustice lives with ruptured innocence, for life will never return to what it would have been without the experience of the resulting pain. Shattered, it cannot be what it once was. And yet with accountability for injustice, we make the space to create something restored. Something stronger can be constructed which will stand as a monument to the recognition that justice and integrity are pillars of a nation’s fullest prosperity—where optimum profitability hinges on the lived experience of each person’s autonomy and agency.
As a nation, Canada has moved past pretending that our complex history is not real. We began to face this truth together. Yes, some still pretend that there was no harm or that we are fully healed. And as a nation we cannot allow ourselves to be pulled back into pretence. We will be stuck in survival or inability mode if we do that.
With the vision of possibility in mind, I encourage us to keep moving forward, Canada. And while we move forward may we remember to go back to gratitude for everything that is wonderful about us. May we together grieve what was lost, and may we return to joy. Together.
So much is possible if we can do this. Living in Chilliwack for the last two years has given me the opportunity to experience the nation moving forward together with the joy and the struggle that is a part of the process. This community lives with extraordinary hope and intention towards the profit to be gained from togetherness when we embrace belonging and freedom as the birthright of everyone who calls this place home. I don’t take that lightly because I am keenly aware that whether we are Indigenous Peoples, settlers, or newcomers we had to choose to wrestle with the past to arrive in the present with hope for a prosperous future together.
It seems that we have recognized that a journey towards freedom and togetherness must hold space for both restoration and transformation. And these processes take time. Observe anything healing and that truth becomes clear. Observe a butterfly in each stage of its development and it becomes clear that each stage of development plays a role in the final emergence of the butterfly. I believe in us. I believe that we can move through both restoration and transformation to become a nation united and profitable together. However, as my parents reminded us in our family pledge we must all choose to do this with intention, determination, and practice.
Mommy and Daddy brought this idea to us: Effective family life does not just happen. It is the result of deliberate intention, determination and practice. And I pledge with God’s help to do my part to make this family life effective.
That was neither a short-term goal nor an easy process. But they had faith in our ability to make their vision of our wholeness a reality. I still believe in that possibility for myself, for our family, for our nation, for the world.
I love you neighbours, and I also know that to reach the goal of wholeness we need to keep acceptance, accountability, forgiveness and openness as essential pillars of the process.
What the f*ck are we waiting for, man? Forgive each other already and let’s do this. 🫣I’m eager 🤩 and I’m also determined to continue to learn to be patient. 🥰
Oh Canada, the home in which we stand, moving courageously through pain and fear to belonging and wholeness. Happy Canada Day. I’m grateful that we moved from Dominion Day to Canada Day. That showed intention. Let’s keep building forward together.
When communities teach children that they are the holders of ultimate truth, those children will unintentionally inherit pressure, anxiety, and unconscious superiority.
That is because we have placed on the children a burden that is far above their pay grade. We place on them the same burden that was placed on us—a burden that many of us carry to the third and fourth generation. What is that burden?
We tell them that we, and only we, are the bearers of divine truth.
We tell them that no one else has truth like we do.
And we tell them that we are tasked with guarding that truth for a Master who will punish us if we deviate from it.
This creates a traumatic inheritance of anxiety and arrogance.
It robs us—and it robs the children—of the opportunity to live as loved, learning humans.
We are human, and I think that matters more than we sometimes allow it to matter.
Because when we forget that we are human, we begin to imagine that our thoughts are pure, linear, and perfect simply because these thoughts originate in us—guardians of truth.
We begin to imagine that our intentions are undefiled simply because we meant well.
We begin to imagine that the harm in the world is mostly caused by other people—people who are ignorant, cruel, lost, defensive, incompetent, blameworthy, shameful, and less perfect than we are.
And that is a big part of the problem.
The live video below may seem chaotic, unclear, or disrupted. But what it reflects is something real about being alive.
It is a living reflection of the awe and wonder we can experience together—alive and in relationship with the natural world, with the things we have created, and with the mystery of being created beings ourselves, without perfect clarity.
It is the experience of living in connection with our Creator and with each other. And that kind of connection is profoundly profitable.
Not profitable in the narrow transactional sense that we often associate with economics, but profitable in the deeper sense of mutual flourishing. When relationships are rooted in humility, truth, and love, the result is shared wellbeing—spiritually, sexually, emotionally, socially, and materially.
This kind of prosperity is transformational rather than transactional. It is the kind of prosperity that healthy communities were always meant to cultivate together.
The video begins with a moment of shared wonder as we observe a magnificent eagle perched—and then soaring—from the highest point of a majestic tree at my very favourite place: Crescent Beach.
From there, we begin to explore the truths of our stories, and the danger of believing that the part of the truth we hold is the whole truth that exists.
And we turn to Jesus’ invitation to live with humility and respect for the many stories that shape our human experience.
I invite us to recognize the value that each of our stories brings to the world. I invite us to learn from our stories, and I invite us to recognize that there are as many stories as there are living things—and all bring a part of truth to the world.
And I also invite us to recognize something even more important.
Our Divine Creation Team does the heavy lifting in the work of revelation and healing.
They ask us to cast that burden onto Them.
That is not our job.
We cannot carry that weight.
We thrive when we accept their invitation to become partners—when they fulfill their role in the Big Picture, and we faithfully fulfill ours.
In Romans chapter 3, Paul speaks of the Jews having the revelation of God.
But is Paul correct?
What impact did the idea of having the revelation of God have on Israel?
And what impact does the belief that our revelation is the truth have on individuals and communities today?
When Jesus asked, “Should we take the children’s bread and throw it to the dogs?”was he affirming Israel as “the children” and defining all others as “the dogs”? Or was he challenging the nation’s supremacist assumptions—and inviting everyone present to recognize themselves as children?
These are important questions.
And they bring us back to something that matters deeply.
We must be very careful about the stories we tell the children.
And we must be equally careful about the way we live our stories in front of them.
Because the way we tell and live our stories shapes how children experience the world.
When we present our story as the only truth, we unintentionally place a heavy burden on them—the burden of believing that they must carry truth for the world.
That burden easily grows into superiority.
And superiority, even when it grows out of sincere belief, leads to contempt.
When contempt enters our hearts, it robs us—and it robs our children—of the joy of living in peace and shared progress with all the children of God.
So I invite us to witness this moment of shared awe and wonder with the community as I share my testimony, my questions, and my reflections on this big idea.
The moment began simply.
For several months I had been trying to get to my favourite place: Crescent Beach. Two Saturdays ago, on March 14th, I finally made it.
As I arrived, I saw a man who is Sikh standing beside where I parked, his head tilted upward, his phone raised and focused on the top of a magnificent tree.
He had noticed the eagle first.
High above us, perched at the very top of the tall, majestic tree, the bird sat with quiet authority—still, watchful, completely at ease in its place in the world.
I grabbed my phone, exclaimed in delight, and clambered out of the car to find a spot where I could witness and share the moment.
And as we stood there together—strangers, friends, passersby—the conversation stopped. We were largely quiet. Heads tilted upward.
For a moment, we were simply human beings sharing wonder.
We were standing together at Crescent Beach—one of my favourite places in the world—watching the tide breathe in and out along the shore. The air carried that familiar mix of salt and wind that seems to open something inside the human spirit.
Then the eagle moved.
With sudden and effortless grace, it spread its wings and lifted into the air, leaving the tree behind and rising into the open sky.
And in that moment, something beautiful happened among us.
People laughed in delight. Someone gasped. Others pointed as the bird caught the wind and began to soar.
We were different people, carrying different stories, different beliefs, different questions about life and God and truth.
And yet, in that moment, we were simply a small community of humans standing together in awe.
That moment inspired and encouraged me, because it reminded me of something important. Human beings were not meant to live as isolated holders of ultimate truth, defending our small pieces of certainty against one another.
We were meant to stand together in wonder.
We were meant to learn from one another’s stories.
And we were meant to soar together.
It was the perfect moment to share the thoughts of my heart that continue to emerge as I live in relationship with God and with all of us, as we seek to become a truly inclusive community that embodies belonging.
My Crescent Beach experience became so much more than I could ever have asked, dreamed, or imagined, and I hold faith that our communities will similarly become more unified in the love of God, and we will soar together, finally embodying belonging more than we had ever asked, dreamed, or imagined.
Today is March 13, 2026. A week ago I was at a meeting with Anjali, and the day had been so full of everything good — including conflict resolution that ended with acceptance. I asked her to take a picture of me. And then as I looked at this picture of little me which is on my phone screen to remind to me to be as gentle with myself as I would have been gentle with her…
I felt so at peace. I felt as if every version of me, at every stage, was safely comforted and accepted by the me I am today.
I recognized that I have always been assertive and unafraid to engage with people because I have always seen us all as beautiful little people who belong here.
For a while I struggled with fear about whether or not we all really belong. I struggled to believe that I belonged. And one day several years ago as I was meditating, I saw a vision of my little self lying terrified in the dark. As I looked at baby me, the Spirit said: “You know exactly what to do with that baby.” All of me smiled as I recognized that I absolutely knew. I picked her up and hugged her.
That is how I see us. I see the terrified little one in all of us, and in my heart I do pick us up and hug us.
And as I continue to observe the world I realize that we have been immersed in some ideas that have affected our ability to be together in real love.
I have heard it said that the enemy of one’s enemy is one’s friend.
This idea has shaped many of our alliances, our politics, and even our relationships. We often bond through shared opposition rather than through shared love.
But Jesus said something very different.
Love your enemies.
Bless those that hurt you.
Pray for those who despitefully use you.
At first this teaching seemed almost impossible. How could anyone genuinely love those who cause harm?
Over time, however, I began to notice something difficult and humbling.
I have learned that I hurt myself and despitefully use myself more than anyone else ever has—and God keeps guiding me through accountability with myself for this.
And it was on that gentle journey of accountability that I began to learn to love.
This growing me forgave and gave grace and comfort to all the younger versions of myself—from birth to this present day.
I learned that more than anything else I needed to forgive myself for the ways that I had harmed the younger versions of myself.
I needed to give myself the grace to continue to belong, because now I know that I did not know then what I know now.
It was on that gentle journey that I began to see that defensive-loyalty had been very often misrepresented as love.
I learned that love does not pretend that harm did not happen.
Love protects with wisdom.
I learned that love does not turn away from injustice.
Love gently and boldly speaks the truth.
I learned that love is the willingness to look honestly at oneself without feeling shame.
I learned that love knows, embraces, and welcomes the opportunity to emerge as a new creation with truth learned and justice installed as often as is needed — seventy times seven.
Because on that journey the Holy Spirit taught me two primary skills:
1. To accept being wrong.
2. To accept being perceived as wrong.
Learning both of these skills was difficult, because accepting that I might be wrong required courage and openness. I had to consent to allowing God to prune aggression from assertiveness.
Accepting that I might be perceived as wrong required something even deeper. I had to learn to remain open and peaceful even when misunderstood.
Then the Spirit taught me something even more freeing.
They taught me how to listen.
To listen I had to choose to stay in — rather than run away from uncomfortable conversations and processes.
Through listening, I began to learn what was right—not through shame, but through curiosity and grace.
For much of my life I had believed that accountability would lead to condemnation. Instead, it led to something completely different.
As I experienced God’s grace and forgiveness through the process of accountability, God gained my trust, and became my best friend.
And that is where I began to understand what it means to love the Lord my God with all my heart, soul, mind, and strength.
There I learned to love myself.
And from there I began to learn to love my neighbour as myself.
Because when shame, defensiveness, anxiety, fear and similar emotions and states of being are filtered out of our lived experiences and replaced with awareness, clarity, hope, discernment and similar emotions and states of being we become open to learning. And when we become open to learning the growth of love in and between us becomes possible.
And it was there that I began to understand the difference between being a co-shepherd and being a hireling who is unconsciously focused on personal glory and reward instead of on the good way of mutual profit and care.
A hireling protects reputation.
A co-shepherd protects people.
A hireling invests in being right.
A co-shepherd invests in healing.
And in that realization I finally understood something that had once confused me.
I understood how deeply damaging it is for us as fallible human beings, as individuals, as countries, systems, or organizations—to claim to be the truth or claim to know all truth.
Truth is something we grow toward together through humility, listening, correction, and grace.
Anyone who claims ownership of truth will eventually begin protecting their authority instead of protecting people.
But when we approach truth as learners—when we allow ourselves to be corrected without shame—we become something else entirely.
We become neighbours.
We become friends.
We become co-shepherds who hold space for others to join us on the journey to the green pastures of love.
And along that journey may we begin to see what we may have forgotten before. Inside of each of us is still a small child who only needs someone to pick them up and assure them that they belong here.
We’ve got this. We know exactly what those little ones need.
We need to allow the One who is all love to pick us up and welcome us with a hug.
There was once a great house on a hill, built by a Master who loved every person who entered it.
The house had many doors, each one leading to a room prepared for someone to grow, rest, and learn to love.
But long before the current residents arrived, a whispering voice wandered through the halls.
It told the first occupants:
“The Master is holding something back from you because he wants to control you.
You are not safe here.
You must protect yourselves.”
And so the people began to close their doors.
The whisperer created a coalition of other whisperers, and they spent their time wandering through the house, whispering stories of discord and fear.
And so the people locked their doors.
As they repeated the whisperer’s stories about the Master, the room-owners began to be more afraid.
Then they pushed furniture against the doors and told their children that although the Master had made them a house, and made for each of them a special room, he was not to be trusted, because he withheld good things from them so that he could control them .
Soon each person lived in a private war, afraid of the Master and also afraid of each other, convinced that the others were aligned with the Master, and so were to be feared as enemies, not trusted as friends.
The whisperer never touched a single door.
He only told stories.
The people did the rest.
The Steward
One day the Master appointed a Steward—not to rule, but to serve.
She was given no keys, no authority to force doors open, and no power to punish.
Only this instruction:
“Keep the lamps lit.
Keep the hallways warm.
And when someone opens their door—even a crack—meet them with a love lamp.”
So the Steward did as instructed.
She cared for the lamps.
She repaired the hallways.
She filled the pantry.
She kept the house running even in the times when she believed the story that others had left her alone.
Sometimes the residents blamed her for things she had not done.
Sometimes they accused her of motives she did not have.
Sometimes she felt like they took without giving.
Sometimes she certainly got things wrong.
Sometimes she did not know what to do.
And each time, the whisperer smirked in the shadows.
The people behind the doors believed that she was aligned with the controller too.
The Steward’s Own Messy Room
What the residents did not know was that the Steward herself had once lived behind a locked door.
Her room had been cluttered with old fears, unhealed wounds, and the debris of stories she had believed about herself and others.
The Master’s Friend had come to her door many times—not with force, but with a gentle knock.
When she finally opened it, even a little, she expected anger.
She expected disappointment.
She expected judgment.
Instead, the Friend stepped inside with a lamp and said,
“You can be loved and messy at the same time.
You can be joyful and still learning.
You can be free and still growing.”
He helped her clean one corner of the room at a time.
He never rushed her.
He never shamed her.
He never compared her to others.
He simply stayed—gentle, kind, and clear—until she understood something she had never known before:
Love was not a reward for perfection.
Love was the environment in which transformation becomes possible.
And that is why she could lead with grace.
She had first been led with grace herself.
And she had learned to bring the stories to the light so that she could see what was true.
The Resident
One day a resident who had long kept her door shut felt a strain in her heart.
She remembered the Steward’s patience.
Her invitations.
Her quiet care.
And she opened her door—just a little.
The Steward was there, lamp in hand.
“I’m sorry for the places I hurt you,” the Steward said gently.
For the Steward had learned something important from the Master’s Friend.
During the period of time when her own heart had been locked in fear, she had blamed the Master for hurting her. Yet the Master had received her anger without abandoning her.
The Friend had told her about the Master’s Son who had once lived in the house.
The Son had tried to love the residents openly and clearly.
But the whisperer convinced them that the Son had come to steal their freedom.
So they turned on him and drove him away.
As the Steward listened to the story, she realized how wrong she had been about the Master.
And she understood something else.
If the Master could love her while she blamed him, then she could offer grace even when she was misunderstood. And she could take responsibility for those times when she had been wrong too.
The resident’s eyes filled with tears.
The Steward’s apology made room for her healing.
From that day forward the resident began to grow.
She learned to lead her own household.
She learned to love her children with wisdom.
She learned to build traditions.
And slowly she opened her door wider.
The Steward rejoiced—not because she had been proven right, but because love had done its work in the Resident just as it had done its work in her.
The Master’s Return
When the Master returned to the house, he found the hallways warm, the lamps burning, and many doors open.
He smiled at the Steward.
“You have understood my heart,” he said.
“For I did not condemn the world; I only wanted to save it through love.”
When the residents heard this, they opened their doors and peeked shyly into the hallway, wondering if the Master would truly welcome them.
The Master’s light filled the whole house. And as he was joined by the Son and the Friend, light danced throughout the entire house.
And as the light spread through every hallway, the whisperer fled—for everyone could finally see that his stories were not true.
Oh, how beautiful it would have been if the whisperer had accepted love too.
The Lesson
Freedom did not come from locked doors.
Freedom did not come from blame.
Freedom did not come from hierarchy or control.
Freedom came from the heart of the One who taught the Steward
to love herself in her mess,
to clean her room without shame,
to lead without superiority,
to submit without fear,
to love without condition.
And so it became clear to all who lived in the house:
The Son had come to set the residents free.
And whom the Son sets free is free indeed.
This is not just my story. This is our story.
And it is such a precious thing to see the whisperer’s stories unravelling as more and more of us hold the stories up to the light, and experience love through grace, forgiveness, and accountability.
So yesterday I was processing some realizations about love, and when I’m processing what feels like a moment of clarity, my whole being vibrates with joy and I get so excited about sharing. But then usually there will pop up this little monster that asks, “Who do you think you are to speak like this?” And fear creeps in. Who do I think I am to ask questions, see patterns and perspectives, see what seems like light?
And as I said yesterday, fear turns into wondering if sharing is inviting pain and possibly death to my door.
Because I still believe that in some realm that we don’t understand there is warfare. And I believe that the enemy of love attacks people who are committed to growing in love. Not because we’re perfect, but because the light of love is transformative. That light shows that there is infinite space for all living things, infinite value in all living things. It banishes scarcity and its partner, greed. It eliminates the need for war. It invites peace. It uncovers the power that was being hidden by the shadow of fear.
And without fear, the enemy of love loses control of the slaves that they have been hoarding, as people recognize that they have long been declared free.
And yet I can’t hide the moments of clarity because that is neither integrity nor love. Leaving us in the dark because I am afraid is selfish. And I love you, all of us, too much to be constrained by fear.
I believe that even though I may experience pain, God will take my pain away. And from my pain more love seems to grow. I don’t enjoy the pain, but I have come to accept that it will be. And so I am sharing this summary of my recent thoughts and observations about why I value love and its role in our lives.
And more importantly who am I not to share?
My heart and mind are transformed from fear to openness in relationship. Everything that I have ever learned has been because of us, and this is no different.
It is so consistent across all relationships.
The characters in the stories may change, but the elements that lead to peace and reconciliation are always the same.
We only experience love when we allow grace and forgiveness to come together.
It seems that these two states are made up of similar parts with distinct differences, meant to relate interdependently to create love as a regenerative, creative, expansive, resilient, diverse state.
Grace can stand alone without forgiveness.
And forgiveness can stand alone without grace.
And it seems that the equation that produces love is something like this:
grace + forgiveness = love
It feels like supernatural math.
Like 1 + 1 = 3.
Grace opens the space.
Forgiveness releases what was held.
Grace says we still belong together, and no punishment is needed for that to be true.
Forgiveness says we don’t have to carry the pain or fear of being harmed anymore.
And when those two states meet and are joined together, something new appears.
Love.
Love isn’t only grace.
Love isn’t only forgiveness.
Love carries both of them and becomes more.
It is as if grace and forgiveness recognize and accept each other.
And when they come together, they create something larger than either one alone.
Love.
And love does something else.
It multiplies.
Grace makes space for forgiveness.
Forgiveness welcomes grace.
Together they create love.
And love begins to create a resilient, diverse community of belonging.
Belonging plus love creates peace.
Peace plus love and belonging creates freedom.
Freedom creates patience, kindness, gentleness, self-control, and more.
And suddenly the equation keeps expanding as more states that support resilience emerge.
Love creates a unified community. Love creates unity.
And unity does not erase difference.
Unity protects freedom.
Unity holds everyone inside belonging.
And when I look at that pattern, it starts to look familiar.
It starts to look like the mystery we see in God.
Father.
Son.
Spirit.
Different.
And yet the same.
Three.
And yet one.
Not competing.
Not controlling.
Not excluding.
Just existing in perfect relationship.
And when relationship is whole like that, something beautiful happens.
Love keeps multiplying.
Maybe this is what it means that humans are created in the image of God.
Beings unique and so similar.
Not to control each other.
Not to rank each other.
But to learn how to live inside that same kind of relationship.
Grace making space.
Forgiveness releasing harm.
Love multiplying belonging.
Peace holding it all together.
And because peace sits at the foundation of it all, it has remained very good.
Even when we forget.
Even when we fall back into the old patterns.
Grace is still there.
Forgiveness is still possible.
Love is still multiplying.
So perhaps the most important thing we can do is the simplest thing.
Trust the process.
Grace makes space.
Forgiveness releases what was held.
And when grace and forgiveness meet, love appears.
Grace + forgiveness = love.
And love keeps expanding.
Love creates belonging.
Belonging creates peace.
Peace creates freedom.
And freedom allows something beautiful to happen.
Difference no longer needs to compete or dominate to survive.
Difference becomes part of a resilient, living community.
Maybe this is part of what it means that humanity reflects the image of God, life that is generative, relational, and creative beyond anything we could fully imagine.
Perhaps every new life, every new person, every new expression of humanity is another glimpse of that mystery unfolding.
And maybe the point is not to compare forms of generativity at all.
The point is simply to recognize the wonder of it.
To recognize that life keeps creating new expressions of itself.
That diversity is not a threat to unity. It is part of its beauty.
Comparison is truly the thief of joy, and a waste of good energy.
Appreciating the diversity of all things, and being grateful that everything serves a purpose and has a place in the ecosystem of life, is what really matters.
Value the diversity. Our ecosystem would not be so wonderfully complex and beautiful without it all.
