{"id":1563,"date":"2011-09-03T11:13:15","date_gmt":"2011-09-03T15:13:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/simplelife\/?p=1563"},"modified":"2011-09-05T10:11:17","modified_gmt":"2011-09-05T14:11:17","slug":"look-at-me","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/simplelife\/2011\/09\/look-at-me.html","title":{"rendered":"Look at me"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>With the stir of the new movie, The Help, <\/em>I’ve been reminded that the hardest part\u00a0about\u00a0directing a choir of mentally challenged people is teaching them to look at me.\u00a0 In the twenty years that I have been a choir director for persons who are developmentally delayed for The Special Gathering, this has been a constant and consistent\u00a0problem.\u00a0<\/p>\n

In the 1960\u2032s when the Jesus Movement was sweeping across America, my husband and I were swept into the miraculous wonder of the Holy Spirit\u2019s healing touch.\u00a0 Though I was very young, almost daily,\u00a0I had the privilege of praying for people.\u00a0\u00a0Occasionally,\u00a0these were African-American women who were visiting our home.\u00a0\u00a0With\u00a0this wonderful\u00a0population of women, I was always faced with the same problem.\u00a0 They refused to look at me.\u00a0<\/p>\n

No matter how bold they had been in conversation, when it came time to pray, they all took the same posture.\u00a0 They would sit with their heads pressed to their chests and their\u00a0hands clasped in their laps, too timid to move or speak.\u00a0<\/p>\n

I felt that the Lord told me that part of what was needed for them was to insist that they raise their heads and look at me, eye to eye.\u00a0 At times, I had to physically force their heads upward.\u00a0 Amazingly, once these women\u00a0began to look up, there was a visual transformation that happened every time.\u00a0 They seemed to come alive with joy and acceptance.\u00a0 Laughing and crying at the same time, they would say, usually in a reverent whisper, \u201cI\u2019m free!\u201d<\/p>\n

I wasn\u2019t totally surprised to also\u00a0have this problem in the mentally challenged community.\u00a0 This cloistered, sub-culture is made up of individuals who are told all their lives,\u00a0\u00a0\u201dSit down.\u00a0 Be\u00a0quiet\u00a0and don\u2019t draw attention to yourself.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n

Even if those words are not spoken, they are told that a million times in their lives in a multitude of different ways.\u00a0 I remember a funeral that I attended.\u00a0 The father of one our members had died.\u00a0\u00a0At that time, Nora was\u00a0in her mid-thirties.\u00a0 She is a high functioning, well-spoken, sophisticated woman.\u00a0 Several times before and after the funeral service,\u00a0her mother, brother and two sisters gathered in a circle.\u00a0\u00a0Comforting each other,\u00a0\u00a0they joined in a large group hug.\u00a0 Nora was never a part of the hug.\u00a0 She\u00a0stood on the outside\u00a0grasping her arms close to her chest, weeping alone.\u00a0<\/p>\n

I don\u2019t care how tonally correct the members of the choir sing but I do care whether they\u00a0look at me or not.\u00a0 For some of the members, this is\u00a0especially difficult. For it is not only part of\u00a0the mentally challenged community\u00a0culture to not look people in the eye; but it is also part of their disability.\u00a0 Yet, I have never had one person\u00a0who has not learned to overcome\u00a0his training and disability.\u00a0 They have all learned to look at me.\"\"<\/a>\u00a0<\/p>\n

Each new member thinks I\u2019m incredibly horrible when I harp on them, not allowing\u00a0them to look away for a second.\u00a0\u00a0Usually by the time they have trained themselves to look at me, another person will join the choir. Then she sees that I have to go through the same thing with the new, fledgling\u00a0performer.\u00a0 Almost, without exception,\u00a0she will say in a patient, mentoring voice, \u201cYou can do it.\u00a0 I had to learn and\u00a0you can too.\u201d<\/p>\n

There is an element of self-worth that is essential in\u00a0maturing in the\u00a0Christian faith.\u00a0 Through Christ\u2019s sacrifice, God makes us his children, not his\u00a0slaves or lackeys.\u00a0\u00a0Perhaps the greatest joy I have when the choir performs is not the musical quality or the correct enunciation of all the words but 12 sets of eyes that meet mine and look at me, eye to eye.\u00a0 Equal partners in ministry, holding our heads and hearts high.\u00a0<\/p>\n

It makes me want to have a large, group hug with no one left outside grasping their arms.<\/p>\n

Have you found that making eye contact is important to self-worth?\u00a0 What are some other signs of a good self-worth?<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

With the stir of the new movie, The Help, I’ve been reminded that the hardest part\u00a0about\u00a0directing a choir of mentally challenged people is teaching them to look at me.\u00a0 In the twenty years that I have been a choir director for persons who are developmentally delayed for The Special Gathering, this has been a constant…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":387,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,20,3,182,40,186,49,16,8,12,4,41],"tags":[690,21,696,7,18,699,715,694,689,57,6,700,265],"class_list":["post-1563","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-christianity","category-church","category-developmental-disabilities","category-disability","category-faith","category-hope","category-inspiration","category-intellectual-disability","category-mentally-challenged-community","category-religion","category-simple-truths","category-spirituality","tag-autism-spectrum","tag-christian","tag-church","tag-developmental-disabilities-2","tag-discipleship","tag-faith","tag-hope","tag-intellectual-disability","tag-mentally-challenged-community","tag-prayer","tag-simple-scriptural-truths","tag-spirituality","tag-the-help"],"yoast_head":"\nLook at me - A Simple Life, a Childlike Faith<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/simplelife\/2011\/09\/look-at-me.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Look at me - A Simple Life, a Childlike Faith\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"With the stir of the new movie, The Help, I’ve been reminded that the hardest part\u00a0about\u00a0directing a choir of mentally challenged people is teaching them to look at me.\u00a0 In the twenty years that I have been a choir director for persons who are developmentally delayed for The Special Gathering, this has been a constant…\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/simplelife\/2011\/09\/look-at-me.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"A Simple Life, a Childlike Faith\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2011-09-03T15:13:15+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2011-09-05T14:11:17+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/simplelife\/files\/2011\/09\/Special-Gathering-Choir-08-12-07-300x198.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Linda G. 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