Sunday Post - Right Where You Needed To Be
A Story, Question, Practice, Touring & One Inch Photos
Hey Folks, Just an little heads up! Next week I’ll be sending out my usual Sunday Post on Monday, which is the day I’ll be releasing a new single and video for the song “Potluck” from A Great Wild Mercy. The video was created with lots of film and photos from the “Potluck” recording sessions. Here’s a link to my first Spotify Single.
Kitties & Doggies - Right Where We Needed To Be
This week a friend told me a story that happened while walking her sweet little dog. While they were wandering the neighborhood she encountered a young father and his little boy. The boy was quite young and was just learning how to speak the names of things. The toddler looked at my friends dog and with great awe and wonder breathed the word “kitty”. Is father gently corrected, “Yes, it looks a bit like a kitty, but this is a doggie.” The toddler looked at his father then to my friend and then with great earnestness said “nooooo, kitty”. The father started to correct his son again and thought better of it. Then the toddler got down on the ground right next to my friends very gentle dog, he felt her soft ears and looked into her sweet brown eyes, and then he laid his cheek on top of the dogs fuzzy head and with great joy and relief breathed again the word, “kitty.”
I loved hearing about this story, the sureness of the child, the gentle tolerance of the dog, the kindness of the father. There was so much generosity and grace in this story. I mean, who knows what “kitty” meant or represented to that little boy. Kitty was one of the only words he knew. It could have meant “soft” or “beautiful” or “I love you” or it could have been that he just wasn’t ready to see the difference between one soft fuzzy thing and another.
The father was patient enough to allow for his son to be exactly who he was and to meet him exactly at the threshold of his understanding. The father wasn’t sure (with so few words in his vocabulary) what the word “kitty” represented to his little boy and so he trusted what is child was saying to him was as true as he knew how to express. In the same way that a plant cannot be stretched or shamed or berated in to growing taller, each plant has to reach and stretch toward the sun for itself, according to its own internal clock. To force the word “doggie” right at that moment might have been like pulling on a plant shoot, damaging the beautiful and tender cells that were reaching as far and as sincerely as they could at that moment.
That doesn’t mean we don’t speak our truth at times or call something for what it is. There have been times when I’ve had to stand up and say, “What you are saying hurts my heart, I care deeply about this issue and understand it very differently.” I’ve had to stand up for those who might not be in the room at that moment. “What you just said diminishes or dismisses people I care about and love, people who deserve dignity and deserve better.” I’ve also had to walk away from encounters when I know I’m just too close to the story to be effective in the conversation. So I’m not saying that we never correct or confront or give a different understanding of the issue at hand. What I’m talking about finding within myself the wisdom to know when its time to step back, listen and ask good questions, when it is time to speak the truth as clearly as I know how, and when it is time to walk away. But I’m also talking about is developing the compassion and grace it takes to meet a person right where they are whenever possible.
It made me think about how I would like to be as patient as that young father. I would like to meet people where they are with tenderness and grace. To step back when my first impulse is to jump in and correct, dissuade, argue, refraining from the belief that I might know all about that person’s story without actually listening or asking open hearted questions.
In turn, on a personal level, I would like to view my own history with that a similar measure of generosity, knowing that I was doing the best I could with what I knew at the time. continuing to be grateful to the Wise Teacher that moves through the world and moves within me as I live into another day of stretching toward the light. The Great Luminous Mercy that keeps sending me messages and clues that I may or may not be able to see or hear just yet—and when I call a doggie a kitty, it meets me right where I am.
Question
If you were to write a short letter to your younger self, what kind of encouragement would you give?
Practice
Write that short letter. As you write it think of the patient father in the doggie & kitty story. Express love for who you were at that moment, encouragement for what you were learning, and compassion that you were right where you needed to be.
A Great Wild Mercy Fall Tour Calendar w/Solo, Duo, Trio & With String Quartet
For More Info & Tickets For All Public Shows Visit www.carrienewcomer.com/tour
September 2023vShows
Two Very Special String Quartet Show in September 2023
One Inch Photos
Great sentiment. Patience and perspective are so important. As a middle school teacher (while being a Substack writer and singer-songwriter) I find it so important that kids and parents hear that. There is no one singular path and no time limit for growth, which remains true at every age.
Younger self, There are people and experiences in your life that you want to believe are absolutely right for you (or that you can make right for you.) Then things change. Sometimes impermanence feels hard and sad. You will sometimes question yourself and your judgement harshly. The truth is you were doing the best you could then. Making the choices you did and could in that moment. Moments of learning and growing. Some day you may notice those experiences brought you here today. Blow a kiss to your sweet learning growing self.