Life Victorious!

“Joyful Freedom”, A Poetic Summary

14 Jan 2012 2 Comments

by shalimamma in "From Cult-like Thinking to Freedom in Friendship": My Story, Humor: the Antidote for Suffering

There once was a couple sublime

Who had trouble being on time

Messes they left

Prayers were unsaid

And they quickly were sentenced with crime.

So they bought brand-new clothes that were modest

Put fancy new suits in kids’ closets

They set out to please

Fell down on their knees

And if children made noise they did pause it.

But one fateful day in the basement

They mistakenly left crumbs a’layin’…

And out came the glares

The critical stares

And a movement was formed of betray-ment.

So the next week with smiles and forgiveness

They cleaned others’ mess and skipped breakfast

But the coup had been formed

And they hadn’t been warned

That a ‘leader’ had just been enlisted.

They welcomed her joyfully then

And although she was one pecking hen

They were happy to find

That indeed she was blind

And was actually still their dear friend.

Upon further investigation

The couple discovered a nation

Of warriors true

Who hated them, (oooh!)

But ‘they’ were not even a human!

It wasn’t the lady in black!

Or the one with the auction-bought hat!

It certainly wasn’t

The two married cousins

Or the woman whose perm had grown flat!

With relief, and with giggling first,

The couple with great laughter burst!

All of this time

That Serpent unkind

Had made them think THEY had been cursed!

And joyfully waltzing away

They left that unfortunate Snake

To find someone else

(Oh, he found SomeOne Else)

Who cast him to hell!

And the music continued to play…

And looking back briefly that day

The couple saw SomeOne unphased…

He stood at the door

And He laughed with a roar

And with Mighty Hand chuckled and waved!

“Joyful Freedom” by Shalimar Masters

Copyright 2012

It’s Only Fair…

13 Jan 2012 2 Comments

by shalimamma in "From Cult-like Thinking to Freedom in Friendship": My Story, Humor: the Antidote for Suffering

There once was a mother of many

Who took a few kicks in her shinnies

She kicked and she screamed

She cried and she cleaned

Then she laughed and she beamed

As she finally seemed

To discover the secret of winning…

Find friends who are GLAD!

(why would you want ‘sad’?)

Find friends full of LIFE!

(why would you want pride?)

With our glasses half-full

Of wine or Red Bull,

Of joy and beer brews

We sit and we muse

Of our lives full of laughter and plenty!

To the Woman with a (Sad) Servant’s Heart, A Poem for Your Enjoyment

12 Jan 2012 2 Comments

by shalimamma in "From Cult-like Thinking to Freedom in Friendship": My Story, Humor: the Antidote for Suffering

There once was a woman of class
With impeccable standards unpassed
But try as we strained
To love her by name
Still, just the same
We just couldn’t aim
For examples she showed
And the way that she glowed
As she sat upon us with her… tasks.

It’s Time I Tell You the Whole Truth… A Humorous Response to Cult-like Treatment

12 Jan 2012 13 Comments

by shalimamma in "From Cult-like Thinking to Freedom in Friendship": My Story, Humor: the Antidote for Suffering

My dear fellow fabulous faithful friends,

I believe, as we begin the New Year, it is time for me to come clean and reveal the truth about myself, as well as my family.  There has been a lot of hearsay, and much of it has come back to us.  In fairness, you do have reason to worry, as I have not been completely honest with you.  In fact, the rumors you hear are much more tame than the real, cold, hard truth.

The truth is, my friends, that I have been admitting to fake sins.  I am not and have never been impatient with my children.  I have much graver sins.  And I believe I should make a public confession.  As some of you have noted, I am a liar and a betrayer.  Yes, my friends, it is true.  I will outline the ways that I have lied, so that we can clear up all those rumors which are so much tamer than the real truth.  And I will also humbly apologize, as per the proper rules of etiquette.  I implore you to please forward this letter to anyone you deem important, but only after you have had it notarized and properly filed with the Secretary of State and all three credit bureaus.

1.  My last name is not really Masters.  It is Bachelors.  I apologize that I tried to make myself appear more educated.

2.  My children are actually well-behaved.  Yes, my friends, we PRETENDED to have unruly (a.k.a. ‘wild’) children so that we could blend in with the rest of you.  We didn’t want to embarrass anyone just because we have much more culture than everyone else.  We were trying to be charitable, and sometimes would even pinch our children to make them cry, and make them appear “not-from-the-dirty-boon-docks” and “normal.”  I apologize for this deception.

3.  The prayer book I carried around actually contained only pictures.  No, my friends, I am afraid that I don’t know the full extent of the prayers like the rest of you and cannot measure up (please see #1 about my education.)

4.  We only pretended to milk 9 goats in the morning.  We don’t even have goats.  We hate goats.  We don’t even have a farm.  We were just making an excuse for showing up late at gatherings.

5.  Ah, the rumors about reporting to a “superior”…  Yes… you see, I lied there, too.   In fact, the tattling has only been done TO me, as I do not know how to tattle, nor do I have time to tattle, and the last time I tattled was when I was 13.  But all the rumors and reporting about our family has made our otherwise boring life rather exciting.  Plus, I rather enjoyed being in a junior highschool clique of cheerleaders, and it has been wonderful getting to relive this experience.  (Does my hair look OK?)

6.  I did invent the internet, and I also contributed to Global Warming.  Yes, it is true.   But I have made up my mind to use less aerosol hairspray and try to stop throwing out so many disposable diapers.  I apologize for this harm I have done to the Earth.  In fact, my mistake had made even our small group feel stuffy and a bit too hot at times.

7.  Did you hear the one about how we ‘breed like rabbits’?  Yes, that one was announced at a public gathering, I believe… Well, we started that rumor.  I am so sorry, but we lied there, too.  You see, we do not and have never bred like rabbits.  We breed like a bored, in-love married couple out in the secluded country during a blizzard whilst listening to Theology of the Body tapes.    Sorry, I didn’t mean to scandalize you with the word… “blizzard.”

8.  I lied in my appearance.  Yes, my friends, I am afraid I do have fake implants.  These are not my real eyes.  The real truth?  Oh, it is so hard to admit this… but… these are human eyes.  Tragically, I was born, by some freak of nature, with red snake eyes.  My parents quickly had the implant surgery done, because they didn’t want anyone to see the true motives of my heart.  Interestingly, though, it seems that some of you have had an uncanny ability to still be able to tell exactly what is going ON my heart… oh my, this is intimidating and kind of blew the lid off my whole ‘green eye’ thing.  Well, I suppose that is why I am coming clean here… I am so sorry…

9.  I am not that innocent.  That’s right, I have pretended all along that I didn’t know I was being watched.  I taped that little circle thingie on my computer out of paranoia.  And took apart all my smoke alarms.  My biggest tip off was when I discovered that everywhere we drove, there was a little red dot on my chest.  To be sure, this gave me the goosebumps.  But I enjoyed your company so much that I didn’t let on that I noticed.  I am sorry I wasn’t more… uh… transparent.

10.  I believe that there is more than one way to skin a cat.  Yes, I am sorry, but I have been pretending that there is only ONE way, in ONE place, with ONE group, with ONE leader telling you how to do it.   But the truth is, I was in nursing school (another secret I kept from you) and we all disected cats, a huge class of us, and each of us did it a different way.  Boy, it feels good to get that off my chest and admit it…

11.   And the last lie that you may have heard, is that ”I am an evil transformer trying to destroy the whole entire church by writing letters and turning friends against friends”…. Ahhhh… I am so sorry, but I made that one up too.  You see, someone else is trying to destroy the church from within (his name is Satan, have you heard of him?  Well, now you know!), but I didn’t want to let on that it wasn’t us, that we are free, and that we are happy.   We felt that letting on these things might inspire envy and the over-selling of natural gluten-free anti-depressants on eBay.

12.  If you find you are unable to smile at this writing without express permission from “your leader friend”, you are exactly who I wrote my series for!   Congratulations!  I love you, forgive you, and I can see you through your computer camera. 

My Freedom from Cult-like Thinking, Part 8 3/4: Y’all Ready for This?

12 Jan 2012 Leave a Comment

by shalimamma in "From Cult-like Thinking to Freedom in Friendship": My Story, Humor: the Antidote for Suffering

(For the beginning of this series, My Freedom from Cult-like Thinking, please click here.)

There is only one cult-like factor I would add to the brilliant assessment written on FreedomofMind.com: the absence of humor in people who practice cult-like thinking and behaviors.

In fact, I have found that although they may joke amongst themselves, especially against ‘outsiders,’ there are certain untouchable subjects that are taken way too seriously, especially anything that has to do with the actual group that they are fearful of having ‘infiltrated’ or worse, poked fun at… even if it is all in good,  charitable humor.   Those who are healthy in a good organization such as the one I have been referring to have not lost their humor in the least.  In fact, I would say that a good sense of humor and the ability to laugh at oneself is a sign of health.  I know some people that go to the church in my story who could be stand-up comedians.  And, you, guessed it, they are healthy, balanced, successful, and just plain enjoyable to be around.  Humor is the natural anti-dote to sadness, depression, scrupulosity, bitterness, grief, betrayal, misery, financial woes, wild kids… (oops, I said wild again , toxic people who try to hurt you (humor builds up a wonderful shield), and even: sin.

Before I get to my insights on how I have grown and the freedom I have experienced, I do need to get a little humor off my chest.  Things were so intense for a few months, that I found humor to lift me out of the pit and help me find joy and healing again.  In fact, as the days go on, I find that I am laughing more and more, and the more I experience attacks, the more I feel like joking.  It has reached a place where people’s accusations have become so ludicrous and over-the-top that I find them hysterical, even though there is a twinge of sadness for those who ‘know not what they do.’

Keep in mind: God invented joy and laughter.  Satan invented the opposite.

And so without further ado, I give to you my next post, An Open Letter to Our Former Friends:  It’s Time I Tell You the Whole Truth, To Be Read With an Ice Cold Foreign Beer in Your Hand…

A Special Poem for the Lady Who Is My Biggest Fan and Keeps Reporting My Writings to Friends and Important People ;)

05 Jan 2012 2 Comments

by shalimamma in "From Cult-like Thinking to Freedom in Friendship": My Story, Humor: the Antidote for Suffering

There once was a woman of worry

Who couldn’t believe there were stories

Of people who laughed

At reportings, in fact,

Of blogs that were honest and boring.

It seems a little humor is in order… A lady appears to be worried about my blog.  I am so flattered to even be noticed!   More humor to come as we work through the series!