UnBoxing “God”

After a full week or protests, reading ‘White Fragility’, watching the news, and looking up the nose of Juneteenth, I have chosen to amplify the voices of black men and women for this week’s Bonus Episode.

Isolation vs Community, Connection, and Belonging - THIS EPISODE IS BROUGHT TO YOU BY BRITTANY C & KRISTIN C, thank you for your support!

Introduction

What is “church”?  In this episode of Unboxing God, we delve into the true meaning of the word and why we feel we need it.

Join us as we explore what “church” means for a few of our friends: Kyle details the experience of skating top speed on the roller derby track, completely focused and in the moment, as his “church”;  Anthony finds his “church” out on the open road; and Scott chronicles a sailor’s lifelong “church” out on the open water.

Summary

Why church? Where is church? What’s in a church anyway?

“Yes, but…” is a dead-end; “yes, and…” is the path forward.

Churches universally provide: a place of safety and support, belonging and community, and inspiration and growth.

Belonging is a universal human need, just like the need for food and shelter

Quotables

“It doesn’t have to be in a building for me; it doesn’t even have to be inside at all.  For me, the feel of that road just running underneath me, and the breeze in my face, and the sun beating down on my shoulders… That’s where I find my church.  That’s where I’m closest to my God.” -- Anthony

“...I use a sailboat analogy in my 12-Step recovery to picture the Serenity Prayer… I think of the Serenity Prayer, asking for the “courage to change the things I can” being the courage to change my sails because I can’t change the waves and the wind.  …[I]nstead of fighting it ... so that I can experience the serenity that it provides.” -- McCall

“More and more as I get older [in the sport of sailing] I find that I do my best when I just let go.  I ground myself firmly in the present, I don’t look back, I strictly breathe deeply, and try to figure out how to make the most out of the moment that I’m in."  -- Uncle Scott

“When you’re thinking about it, you don’t sail well.  When you just let go and experience it, you do very well.”  -- Uncle Scott

Recommended Resources

Support Unboxing God here

The Quorum: A Place of Belonging by Elder Carl B. Cook, from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints

Create a Sense of Belonging by Karyn Hall, from Psychology Today, 2014

Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs

Cleveland Sailing Charters, Lake Erie Cruises with Captain Scott Sanders

From poetry to lyrics and music, there are all sorts of ways to experience communion with the God of your understanding through prayer. Gratitude lists, music, and meditation are all different ways to praise The Divine. Similarly, “worship” can be done through art, singing, dance, even just sitting in intentional wonder as we gaze upon nature’s splendors. This week on Unboxing "God," McCall and fellow travelers explore PRAISE, At the same time, tune in to learn the related three ideas that can help you too unbox God through music.  

Summary

When the podcast starts, McCall delves right into the concept of prayer by sharing the definition and expanding on the notion, what it means for us and how it is related to praise and worship.

Guests then share their concepts of prayer. For some, prayer means praising the nature for blessing the human beings with a beautiful world. Others view it as a gratitude for things that happened in their lives. However, everyone agrees that prayer is an act of thanksgiving

In the second half of the podcast, McCall talks about music as prayer. To show how music affects the mood by changing different brain chemicals, she takes the listeners through the research of Kiminobu Sugaya and Ayako Yonetani – two world-renowned professors and experts in their field.

Next, McCall elucidates the three ideas to help you unbox God through music. These are:

Music connects us to God.

Lyrics are prayer

Harmony is worship

In the end, McCall briefly talks about prayer as a form of therapy. 

Timestamps

[00:39] The definition of prayer

[01:25] Different forms of prayer

[02:19] Micaela shares how she connects with God

[03:15] Johanna from St. Petersburg talks about how she prays

[03:58] Prayer as an act of thanksgiving

[04:39] How Ryan from New Zealand shows his gratitude to God

[06:03] The philosophy of prayer by June, from Los Angeles, California

[06:39] McCall shares an excerpt from the first chapter of Change Me Prayers by Tosha Silver

[07:52] Honesty as a form of worship by Kass, from Florida

[08:42] – [09:59] Advertisement

[10:02] Music as prayer

[11:35] How music affects the mood

[11:56] Music and the Brain by neuroscientist Kiminobu Sugaya and world-renowned violinist Ayako Yonetani

[13:12] The three ideas to help you unbox God through music

[13:38] Music connects us to God

[18:05] Kristin C., from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, shares her two prayers

[19:22] How to pray if you don’t believe in the idea of God

Quotes

Awareness + action for me is how I practice gratitude.

It’s hard to be fearful and grateful at the same time.

“The memories associated with music are emotional memories, which never fade out — even in Alzheimer's patients.” - Kiminobu Sugaya

"He who sings prays twice.”

Any song, lyric or piece of music that helps you focus on how great the Divine, Universe... God... is, well, that, my dear friend, is praise music.

Prayer is not about talking to God, it’s about changing your heart.

Useful Links

Unboxing God

Unboxing God on Spotify

Unboxing God Official Facebook

Change Me Prayers by Tosha Silver

The Mozart Affect

In Episode 1, 'Sensing God", I discovered a favorite quote of Hellen Keller's from a poem called "Grieve Not For Beauty" by Witter Bynner:        "Therefore, O spirit, as a runner strips Upon a windy afternoon, Be unencumbered of what troubles you - Arise with grace And greatly go! - the wind upon your face! " I have continually gone back to read a much larger chunk of the piece, seeing new angles each time and I'd like to share it with you.

See, I love using poetry, or even song lyrics, as a sort of prayer. Unwrapping the words deliberately and dancing in the ideas that come to me. I believe this is a form of Higher Power "worship" even, where we speak to each other, Waldo and me.

I invite you to try it out for yourself. Get lost in the words and allow something Greater to lead your thoughts. I will also share my own... in this BONUS episode.

How a 10-day experiment in calling God “Waldo” helped me begin a love affair with the God of MY understanding. Other people’s “takes” of their own Alt. Higher Power. Where’s Waldo, and how did I find God in him? In a relentless effort to fill my personal God-Shaped-Hole, I’ve journeyed through a variety of faiths and soul seeking - from Synagogue to Catholic school to an Ashram, Wicca, shamanism, all the way to good ole JC. It wasn’t until I began my journey to a PERSONAL relationship with the unique God of MY understanding (a sort of Ms. Potatohead deity, whom I lovingly call Waldo) that my vision of what is possible really began to expand and my access to uninhibited conversations about “The Divine” began. The interpersonal connections that my playful experiments of “God” have fostered are some of the most real, raw, and magical relationships I’ve ever known... and an unfiltered connection to myself is at the very top of that list!

Today we will explore ways we might SENSE GOD. 

Think about it for a moment... have you ever seen fingerprints of a power greater than yourself in Nature and the landscapes? Do you notice repeating numbers around you and wonder if it might not be a God WInk? 

How about HEARING God? Is there music or poetry that sets your soul on fire? Is their a voice in your life that cuts through the outside chatter and reaches into your heat? Can you TASTE God, What about those with sensory impairments... might they have some secret "key" to a shared space with a Higher Power? Today. I ask that very question of an old friend, who happens to be deaf.

Just a brief musing on what the idea of “Recovery” means to me, McCall, personally. Take what you like... and leave the rest. But please share YOUR “take” on the word/idea by email: [email protected] or phone +1-WALDO-LOVE-3 If we get some usable clips (wav, mp3 or types shares) you could be featured in a future episode. As always, send ideas, thoughts, questions too! Let’s make this a conversation!!