If on the one side of the spectrum we find that Fallen Eve becomes hard, rigid, and controlling, then on the other side you find women who are desolate, needy, far too vulnerable. Women like Ruth Jamison in Fried Green tomatoes. She is naive, lost, bereft of any sense of self. She falls under the abuse of a bad man and hasn't the will to get herself out. Take out the abusive situations and you have a women like Marianne in Sense and Sensibility, who is far too willing to give herself over to an untrustworthy man. She is desperate to be loved. And she ends up heart broken.

Desolate women are ruled by the aching abyss within them. These are the women who buy books like Men who ate Women and the women who love them and Women who Love too much and Co-dependent no more. They are consumed by a hunger for relationship. A friend of ours, a young man his twenties, was lamenting how much his mum calls him. "How often does she call?" I asked, thinking he might be exaggerating. "Every Day." Whoa. Every day is too often for a mother to call her adult son who has left home.

Sadly, desolate women also tend to hide their true selves. We are certain that if others knew us, they wouldn't like us, - and we can't risk the loss of a relationship. They might be women like Tulah in My Big Fat Greek Wedding, who literally hides behind the counter when an attractive man walks in her cafe. She hides her beauty behind Big glasses (in a day of contacts?), baggy outfits, frumpy hair - all chosen because they do not draw attention. Because she does not believe she is worth paying attention to. Desolate Women might be busy women who hide behind, "There's so much work to do." That's how the women in my (Stasi's) family learned to handle life.

My mother grew up in rural North Dakota. Her parents spent all the long years of their lives in the same house that she was born in. Her father was a cold, detached man. He never spoke the words that little girls long - no, need - to hear. She never heard from her father that she was precious and pretty. He never even told her that he loved her. Not once. After one terrible day at school, she ran home with tears streaming down her face. Deeply hurt, sobbing, with her little girl's heart broken, she risked running to her father for comfort. He pushed her away.

Her mother, she knew loved her. Yet she was not expressive, either. But she was clean... and incredibly controlling. My mom was not allowed to have friends over to her house to play because they would mess it up. The living room was not for living in but for looking at. All objects in the house belonged to her mother, and it was not okay to touch them or, heaven forbid, move them. You can imagine, there was no romping in that house. There was no fort building or game playing or dashing about. It was orderly neat... and soul killing.

One day, while her mother was entertaining guests, my own mother was upstairs using the bathroom. A very good girl, she washed her hands in the sink after first closing the drain as she was taught. Then a very bad thing happened. She could not get that water to turn off, or the plug to open. Both were stuck. In a house of rigid rules, one did not interupt one's parents while they spoke with adults. My mom didn't know what to do. The water ran on, something was broken. My mom was responsible. She was going to get into trouble. The water was rising. So mom did what we all do when we are afraid that we have failed and are going to be found out. She hid.

She left the bathroom, went into her bedroom, crawled under her bed, and there she stayed - hiding, cowering, afraid. The water in the sink finally overflowed, spilling onto the floor, soaking through the ceiling, and dripping onto her mother's guests. Oops. Her hiding, like our hiding, only made matters worse.

I was afraid because i was naked; so i hid. (Gen 3:10)

One of my college roommates was a very pretty young women, but she didn't know it. She was kind and funny, intelligent and bright. She was also timid and afraid. She spent her evenings camped out in front of her personal television. DECLINING invitations to go out, night after night, the weeks turning into months. Wounded, heartbroken in ways I could only guess at, she found solace in sitcoms and snacks. Too insecure to enter into the world, she hid fom it instead, wenturing out only to attend classes and restock her food supply.

Hiding women are those of us who never speak up at a Bible study or PTA council or any kind of meeting. Who, when we pass a beautiful dress in a window, say to ourselves, I could neverwear that. We stay busy at family gatherings and parties we can't avoid. We rather go to a movie than out to dinner with a friend. We don't initiate sex with our husbands ever. We dismiss every compliment. We relinquish major decisions to others.

Like Eve after she tasted the forbidden fruit, we women hide. We hide behind our make up. We hide behind our humour. We hide with angry silences and punishing withdrawals. We hide our truest selves and offer only what we believe is wanted, what is safe. We act in self-protective ways and refuse to offer what we truly see, believe, and know. We will not risk rejection or looking like a fool. We have spoken in the past and been met with blank stares and mocking guffaws. We will not do it again. We hide because we are afraid. We have been wounded and wounded deeply. People have sinned against us and we have sinned as well. To hide means to remain safe, to hurt less. Atleast that is what we think. And so by hiding, we take matters into our own hands. We don't return to our God with our broken and desperate hearts. And it has never occured to us that in all our desperate hiding, something precious is also lost - something the World needs from us so very, very much.

NEXT POST WOULD BE "INDULGUNG" Hope you guys are starting to get into it^^ and also i apologize for the long wait on this post hahaha been quiet busy during the holz....

thought you guys myt have had enuf reading for nowz so today you can have a laugh at this pic^^

continue #4... Captivating by John and Stasi Eldredge

Dominating Women

Think about it for a moment about the characters of women you dislike - even despise - in movies. (That seems a more charitable place to start - they are, after all, fictional characters.) In The horse whisperer, Annie MacLean (played by Kristin Scott Thomas) is a sharp sophisticated New York professional, the editor of a leading women's magazine. She's also an incredibly controlling woman. Annie's daughter is hospitalized in critical condition following a riding accident that takes the life of her best friend, claims her leg and terribly injures her horse. Understandably, Annie is shaken to the core. The way she handles her crisis is to dominate - the Doctors the Nurses, her husband, even her maimed daughter. At one point she notices her daughter's IV bag is running low.

"You can't leave it to these people."

(She steps into the hall, apprehends the first nurse coming by.)

"Excuse me - my daughter needs a new IV."

"Yes, I know - we have her down..."

"Well I'd like you to take care of it now please."

("Please" is a bearly veiled threat, more like, "or else." Annie walks back into the room and explains to her embarrassed husband.)

"You have to stay on top of these people constantly"

She needs no one. She is in Charge - "On top oof things constantly." She is a woman who knows how to get what she wants. (Some of us might even admire that!) But consider this - there is nothing merciful about her, nothing tender, and certainly nothing vulnerable. She has forsaken essential aspects of her femininity.

Think of Tom Cruise's fiancee at the opening of Jerry Maguire (the one who decks him). "I'm not going to let you do this to me, Jerry." Or Rose's mother in Titanic. "We have to survive." That line is also said by the horrid mother in Strictly Ballroom. And all those villains like Cruella De Ville and Esmeralda ("mirror, mirror on the wall"). Notice that most of the wicked witches are women. Or stepmothers. Have you ever wondered why it was that for years - until the feminist movement, it might be noted with irony - hurricanes were named after women? Now, sure, a calculating, heartless man makes a frightening villain. But somehow it's even worse when she's a woman.

Fallen Eve controls her relationships. She refuses to be vulnerable. And if she cannot secure her relationships, then she kills her heart's longing for intimacy so that she will be safe and in control. She becomes a women who "doesn't need anyone - especially a man." How this plays out over the course of her life, and how the wounds of her childhood shape her heart's convictions are often a complex story, one worth knowing. But beneath it all, behind it all, is a simple truth: women dominate and control because they fear their vulnerability. Far from God and far from Eden, it seems a perfectly reasonable way to live. But consider also this: "Whatever is not from faith is sin" (Rom 14:23 NKJV). That self-protective way of relating to others has nothing to with deeply trusting God. It is our gut-level response to a dangerous World.

Now this is not to say a women can't be strong. What we are saying is that far too many women forfeit their femininity in order to feel safe and in control. Their strength feels more masculine than feminine. There is nothing inviting or alluring, nothing tender or merciful about them. The archetype would be the infamous Lady Macbeth, who ask the Gods to "unsex her," remove her femininity, so that she can control the face of the man in her life, and thus secure her own fate.

Controlling women are those of us who don't trust anyone else to drive our cars. Or help in our kitchens. Or speak at our retreats or our meetings. Or carry something for us. Make a decision that is "ours" to make. Suggest a different dress, agenda, restaurant, route. We room alone when we travel. We plan perfect birthday parties for our children. It might look as though we're simply "trying to be a good mom," or a good friend, but what we often do is arrange other people's lives. Controlling women are "the sort of women," as C.S. Lewis said, "who live for others.' You can tell the others by their hunted expression."

Controlling women tend to be very well rewarded in this fallen World of ours. We are the ones to recieve coprate promotions. We are the ones put in charge of our women's ministries. Can-Do , Bottom-Line, Get-In-Done kinds of women. Women who have never even considered that our Martha Stewart perfectionism might not be a virtue. We have never considered that by living a controlling and domineering life, we are really refusing to trust our God. And it is never dawned on us that something presiouc in us is lost. Something the World needs very much from us.

I guess... after reading this... i can really see alot of that reflected upon my mum... alot of my relatives and my gosh alot of women i know around me... and i use to be one myself... i have experienced an extremely controlling mum... and thus nearly made me turn out the same... but i always know that people turn out either one way or the orther... you either follow your mother's footsteps or u follow a totally opposite path... i chose the more loving, caring, "vulnerable" way of living my life because yes, i get so much more out of it.. of coz i still think a bit of control should still be there.... women also need strength but should be expressed differently... VERY differently to men... The next post would be "Desolate Women" hope you guys will stay and continue reading and unfolding this journey with me...

continue #3... Captivating by John and Stasi Eldredge

The Curse

To the women he said, "I will greatly increase your pains in childbearing; with pain you will give birth to children. Youir desire will be for your husband, and he will rule over you."

"To Adam he said, "Because you listened to your wife and ate from the tree about which i commanded you, 'you must not eat of it,' Cursed is the groud because of you; through painful toil you will eat of it all the days of your life. It will produce thorns and thistles for you."(Gen. 3:16-18)

Now, it would be good for us to give careful attention to all that has unfolded here - especially the curses God pronounced - for the story explains our lives today, east of Eden. For one thing, the curse on Adam cannot be limited only to actual thorns and thistles. If that were so, then every man who chooses not to be a farmer gets to escape the curse. Man is cursed with futility and failure. Life is going to be hard for a man now in the place he will feel it most. Failure is man's worst fear.

In just the same way, the curse for Eve and all her daughters cannot be limited only to babies and marriage, for if that were true then every single women without children gets to escape the curse. Not so. The meaning is deeper and the implications are for every daughter of Eve. Women is cursed with loneliness (relational heartache), with the urge to control (especially her man), and with the dominance of men (which is not how things were meant to be, and we are not saying it's a good thing - it is the fruit of the Fall and a sad fact of history). [I am also indebted to Dan Allender who first pointed out these insights to me.]

Isn't it true? Aren't your deepest worries and heartaches relational - aren't they connected to someone? Even when things are good, is your vast capacity for intimacy ever filled in a lasting way? There is an emptiness in us that we continually try to feed. And can't you see how much you need to have things under your control - whether it's a project or a ministry or a marriage? Are you comfortable trusting your well-being to someone else? And haven't you felt "this is a man's World," felt your vulnerability as a women to be a liability? Most women hate their vulnerability. We are not inviting - we are guarded. Most of our energy is spent trying to hide our true selves, and control our worlds to have some sense of security.

When a man goes bad, as every man has in some way gone bad after the fall, what is most deeply marred is his strength. He either becomes a passive, weak man - strength surrendered - or he becomes a violent, driven man - strength unglued. When a women falls from grace, what is most deeply marred is her tender vulnerability, beauty that invites to life. She becomes a dominating, controlling women - or a desolate, needy, mousy women. Or some Odd combination of both, depending on her circumstances.

Next entry would be "DOMINATING WOMEN" hope you guys can wait hehehehe you know i guess for me alot of this is true dunno about you guys but hope you guys get something out of it^^

The Fall of Eve

When the World was young and we were innocent - both man and women - were naked and unshamed(Gen. 2:25). Nothing to hide Simply... glorious. And while that World was young, and we, too, were young and beautiful and full of life, a corner was turned. Something happened, which we have heard about, but never fully understood, or we would see it playing itself out every day of our lives, and more important, we would also see the chances given to us everyday to reverse what happened.

Now the serpant was the shrewdest of all the creatures the LORD God had made. "Really?" he asked the women. "Did God really say you must not eat any of the fruit in the garden?"

"Of course we may eat it." the women told him. "It's only the fruit from the tree at the centre of the garden that we are not allowed to eat. God says we must not eat it or even touch it, or we will die."

"You won't die!" the serpant hissed. "God knows that your eyes will be opened when you eat it.You will become just like God, knowing everything both good and evil."

The women was convinced. The fruit looked so fresh and delicious, and it would make her so wise! So she ate some of the fruit. She also gave some to her husband, who was with her. Then he ate it, too. (Gen., 3:1-6 NLT)

Alas.

There are no words.

Wail; beat your chest; fall to your knees; let out a long lonesome howl of bitter remorse.

The women was convinced. That's it? Just like that? In a matter of moments? Convinced of what? Look in your own heart - you'll see. Convinced that God was holding out on her. Convinced that she could not trust his heart toward her. Convinced that in order to have the best possible life, she must take matter into her own hands. And so she did. She is the first to fall. In disobeying God she also violated her very essence. Eve is meant to be Adam's ezer kenegdo, like one who comes to save. She is to bring life, invite him to life. Instead , she invited him to his death.

Now to be fair, Adam doesn't exactly ride to her rescue.

Let me ask you a question: Where is Adam, while the serpant is tempting eve? He's standing right there: "She also gave some to her husband, who was with her, and he ate it"(3:6). The Hebrew for "with her" means right there, elbow to elbow. Adam isn't away in another part of the forest; he was no alibi. He is standing right there, watching the whole thing unravel. What does he do? Nothing. Absolutely nothing. He says not a word, doesn't lift a finger. [I am indebted to Crabb, Hudson, and Andrewsd for pointing this out in The silence of Adam.] He won't risk, he won't fight, and he won't rescue Eve. Our first father - the first real man - gave in to paralysis. He denied his very nature and went passive. And every man after him, every son of Adam, carries in his heart now the same failure. Everyman repeats the sin of Adam, everyday. We won't risk, we won't fight, and we won't rescue Eve. We surely are a chip off the old block. (Wild at Heart)

You can see this play itself out every day. Men, just when we need them to come through for us... check out. They disappear, go silent and passive. "He won't talk to me," is many of women's lament. They won't fight for us.

And women? We tend to be grasping, reaching, controlling. We are often ench anted, like Eve, so easily falling prey to the lies of our enemy. Having forfeited our confidence in God, we believe that in order to have the life we want, we must take matters into our own hands. And we ache with an emptiness nothing seems able to fill.