Ordinary Mindfulness

Something We Can Do

2012-03-09T09:11:00.001-08:00

What I mostly want to communicate in this ordinary mindfulness blog is that Presence, this something we need so deeply and benefit from so profoundly, is partly up to us.

Learning how to BE present is something we can DO.

Being present is a description of mindfulness. There's a simple method to mindfulness--show up, breathe, observe, embrace.

All these simple actions--the showing up, the breathing, the watching, the welcoming describe 'us' becoming 'present.' But it doesn't stop there.

In our ordinary practice we enter some place--some altered space--rather regularly. Often something else happens. Some ONE or some THING becomes...palpable. We work. We Watch. We Welcome. We wait (without expectation!) And then?

As Rumi wrote,

Keep knocking,

and the joy inside

will eventually

open a window

and look out

to see

WHO's there!

That THING, that ONE who's there, is the very Presence we prepare for and often experience...but never summon or control.

Mindful practices slow us down, center us, make us receptive. Practice cleans the windows. Maybe even opens them.

That's our part. It's something we can do. It's enough.

9 Breaths

2012-03-08T06:09:00.000-08:00

A wonderful way to re-boot and refresh is to take a minute here and there during the day to breathe purposefully. In other words, take time when you really need it to relax on purpose.

Before you start 'officially,' place your hands on your stomach and take a few deep breaths. Notice your stomach rise and fall. If the 'rise and fall' isn't easy to notice, breathe a little deeper.

---

9 Breaths

As you inhale during the first three breaths, imagine yourbreath traveling to any physical tension you are holding in your body, and thenimagine the exhalation carrying this tension away.

As you inhale with the next three breaths, imagine thebreath traveling to any place in your body where you feel you are holdingemotional tension, and then imagine the exhalation carrying this tension out ofyour body.

During the last three breaths, inhale into the part of yourbody where you are holding mental tension such as worries, thoughts about whatyou are doing, or fears that you can’t be successful. Breathe into the place inyour body where you are holding this mental tension and then release it withthe exhalation.

(If you're new to this kind of mindful breathing, for a week or two simply take the nine breaths with your hands on your stomach keeping as much attention as you can on what your breath feels like as it comes in your nose and as it moves your hands. When this begins to feel familiar, begin to work with the next three steps.)

--Tsultrim Allione (Joan Ewing). Feeding Your Demons: AncientWisdom for Resolving Inner Conflict

The Seventh Cathedral

2012-03-07T08:12:00.004-08:00

When I was a student at Furman I went on a pilgrimage without knowing it. Instead of a pilgrimage it was called a semester abroad. For us English majors this meant going to Britain. Our first three weeks, before settling into studies in London and Stratford, we zigzagged through Scotland, Ireland, Wales and England.

We zigged for a lot of cathedrals. By the time we were in Durham (Cathedral #7) I was pretty sure I never wanted to see another one. But it was cloudy and drizzly that day so I meandered rather aimlessly around a cathedral once more. I lit a candle. Looked up at arches and the vaulted ceiling a lot.

For awhile the organist was practicing--I paid some small attention to that. Watched little clots of people walking purposefully from one place to another. Stood before the altar rail. There was a sign that asked visitors not to go any farther.

All the while I'm mostly thinking, What's the big deal? Then I looked down.

There were grooves in the stones in front of the rail. Suddenly I got that kind of feeling that comes with goose bumps and catches your breath. It hit me that people's knees had made those grooves in the stones. How many knees over how many years does it take to make deep grooves in stone? Without thinking I sank down, put my knees in those groves.

I had 'lost' God 3 or so years before--and had been rather earnestly seeking a reasonable substitute ever since. It didn't seem to me that I was finding God in that moment. What was palpable was a sense of being in the presence of tides and tides of people who were was also seekers--seekers and finders, pilgrims and wanderers.

God, it was a rich experience. And a significant stepping (kneeling) stone in my own 'pilgrimage.'

I wasn't able to look up and get any clues about God, but looking down at those grooved stones, letting my knees rest in those hollowed-out marks, I entered Presence. Didn't understand it at all--but that didn't keep me from experiencing it.

Seeing those knee prints was like seeing signs of a trail after being lost, deeply lost, in a forest for a long time. Though I had been seeking Presence in a meandering way for 3 years, it's not accurate to say I found it. But it is accurate to say I entered it.

In the vocabulary of yesterday's prayer those knee prints gave me confidence--not a lot, but enough for doors to open. Generations and generations had been seeking and finding for centuries. For a powerful moment I came to trust that the same was possible for me.

"In cities that have outgrown their promise, people are becoming pilgrims again, if not to this place, then to the recreation of it in their own spirits."

That sign? The sign that said not to go any farther--on a certain level, I completely ignored it. Those kneeling stones became stepping stones, and I'm pretty sure that's all we ever need.

This blog is about paying attention to knee prints. Learning to trust that the grooves we and others make in bringing ourselves over and over again into the possibility of presence, keep us, all of us, right there, right here in the possibility of Presence.

Re-Thinking Pilgrimage

2012-03-06T07:47:00.000-08:00

There's a wonderful old prayer, formatted below as a poem:

OGod of peace, you

havetaught us

thatin returning

andrest

weshall be saved,

inquietness

andconfidence

shallbe our strength.

Bythe might

ofyour Spirit

liftus,

wepray,

intoyour presence,

wherewe may be still

andknow

thatyou are God.

If you haven't already, take an unhurried moment to read, to move with these words at a pace where you neither get ahead of them or fall behind.

If you find words like 'saved' or 'might' or even 'God' unhelpful do your best to find words that work within your own sense of spiritual aptness.

What else might you change to make this prayer a prayer that describes what takes you into Presence?

I can imagine God might want to make changes too (though we can never be sure what changes those might be)!

Still, as I wrote at the beginning, I experience this as a wonderful prayer. Almost every time I pray it, it functions for me like an incantation--like Gandalf chanting "Speak Friend And Open," at the Gates of Moria. If I slow down and move with these words, literally at the pace of comprehension, doors open, and I am present for Presence.

As I mentioned in yesterday's post, lots of people used to invest lots of time and effort in order to come into Presence (as well as to be 'saved;' but that's another matter). People made pilgrimages to holy places. 'Holy Place' is how'Sanctuary' translates. The 'thing' that 'sanctifies' a 'place' is 'Presence.'

Yesterday's quote from R. S. Thomas's poem was

Incities that
have outgrown their promise people
are becoming pilgrims
again, if not to this place,
then to the recreation of it
in their own spirits.

We live at a time when people are becoming pilgrims to holy places in their own spirits. This doesn't mean we don't also find Presence in traditional sacred places. It's a both/and thing for many of us. Though for some, for one reason and another, it's often necessary to make new paths.

Both the old and new pilgrim paths move people toward Presence. And both take people into community and adventure. And both require effort.

But neither guarantees Presence. Though it's very rare when Presence is not experienced on the way to and within the holy places of pilgrimage.

Just slowing down and 'entering' the prayer at the beginning of this post is a kind of pilgrimage. The 'returning' describes a path we take and take and take. No guarantee of Presence. And yet....

And yet...it is on journeys like this, short or long, where we find the quieting and the stilling and the knowing that something in us has always longed for.

More (God willing) on presence and Presence) tomorrow.

Sanctuary!

2012-03-05T08:03:00.001-08:00

I watched this scene with Ruth when she was a child more times than I can count. As melodramatic as it is, it often touched some place deep in me, invited a recognition of something longed for and valued.

We all have parts of our selves that need to be rescued. We all need to find a safe place where we, like Quasimodo, can claim "Sanctuary!" for ourselves and those we care about. Claim it and actually receive it.

I've blogged about R. S. Thomas's poem, The Moon In Lleyn, several times. We hear someone praying in a old stone church on the coast of Wales. Nobody comes to church that day. The person praying is discouraged--sees the demise of 'church' across the land.

Then another voice says...

Not so fast, mortal...

Incities that
have outgrown their promise people
are becoming pilgrims
again, if not to this place,
then to the recreation of it
in their own spirits.

For centuries people could claim Sanctuary in cathedrals and churches quite literally. They could receive 'due process' of law that otherwise would not have been granted. For many centuries after that a majority of people found spiritual sanctuary in cathedrals and churches.

Many churches and shrines and cathedrals had such promise, such presence, that people made time, invested great effort, to go there, to be there. Taking this kind of time and making this kind of effort was called pilgrimage.

Most people don't make pilgrimages to churches these days. Fewer and fewer people are finding sanctuary in churches these days.

I could write a lot about why this is--and I can say a lot about how many churches, including my own, aren't moaning about what we've lost but instead opening our heads and hearts to what new generations of seekers are longing for.

I find R. S. Thomas's words, 'people are becoming pilgrims again, if not to this place, then to the recreation of it in their own spirits,' healthy and wise and very functional.

I hope to follow this thread over the course of the week, exploring how contemplative practices are a new way for us to become pilgrims again, if not to the old places, then to the recreation of them in our own spirits.

That God

2012-03-03T04:57:00.000-08:00

It is usual for people

to think of God

as Supreme Being,

the Lord and Master

of all Creation,

the omnipotent Higher Power

who is in charge

of everything.

Such a God

is separate from us,

transcendent,

above and beyond us and

capable of giving us

good things

and bad things.

We naturally pray

for the good things we want

and for relief from the bad things

we don’t want. And usually

it doesn’t work.

We don’t get all

we want, and

we get too much

of what we don’t want.

That transcendent,

omnipotent,

separate God

seems arbitrary
at best.

And at worst?

At worst?

AT WORST?

That God?

Whose God

is that?

Ever have a crisis of faith? Recently? Now?

Or perhaps more of a slow erosion of its former landscape?

From what I can tell, the only way not to experience loss, erosion, queasiness of faith is ultimately to choose a more comfortable idea of relationship with God over actual relationship with God.

Recently I've posted how helpful Gerald May's book The Dark Night of the Soul is for coming to terms with how necessarily challenging and unsettling our experience of God must be. Challenging, unsettling, and ultimately deep, true, nurturing, and joyous.

The poem above is another bit of May's wisdom, slightly modified and formatted as a poem.

R.A.I.N--Helps Us Get Unstuck

2012-03-02T12:55:00.000-08:00

A helpful way of getting unstuck from Tar Baby--and an acronym for very earthy mindfulness work--is RAIN. It’s useful both as achallenging version of formal meditation and an on-the-hoof practice wheneverwe’re strongly hooked, stuck, frustrated, angry, melancholy, anxious, envious,puffed-up, etc., etc.

RAIN standsfor: Recognition, Acceptance, Investigation, and Non-Identification.

R We can practice RECOGNIZING wheneverwe’re hooked. The word RECOGNIZE means ‘to indentify somethingfrom having encountered it before.’ It’s a great word for the way we learn towork with unhelpful, habitual responses to life. It reminds us we have thecapacity to develop transforming habits of mindfulness right in the many placeswhere we’re working with unhelpful habits of our minds.

A We can practice ACCEPTING what’s going on with us every time we remember to. Welearn to look our own experience in the face. This practice is the opposite ofdenial. Accepting means we do our best to be aware of exactly what’s happeningwithout judging ourselves. ACCEPTANCE is more than gritting our teeth andbearing the unbearable. It suggests roominess, generosity, kindness, awelcoming spirit. Inhaling is a good a metaphor—the diaphragm making room forwhat keeps us alive.

I We practice INVESTIGATING the ‘stuff’ we’re noticing and welcoming. Are therebodily sensations? Where in the body do we sense it? Is it a pain? A numbness?More like cold or heat? Tightness? What about feelings? Are they pleasant (ornot)? Does this particular experience come with sadness, happiness, fear,frustration, etc.? What exactly do those feelings feel like? Where in the bodyare they lodged? (Don’t forgot ACCEPTANCE here—with every feeling we notice wedo our very best to hold it with kind attention.) And what about memories—domemories come up? What narratives surface with them? Is a story being told?What’s it about? Who seems to be telling it? Who’s listening? Is it possible tolisten objectively—and kindly?

N We practice NON-IDENTIFICATION. All spiritual traditions recommenddistinguishing between small self and big self, false self and true self,non-self and more-than-self, dying to self in order to be fully alive. NOTIDENTIFYING with our narratives, not mistaking the stories we tell aboutourselves for who we truly are is a powerful way of embodying the wisdom ofthese traditions. DON’T INDENTIFY may sound like a command, but it’s betterseen as wise, helpful, healthy practice. We DON’T CONFUSE the feelings,thoughts, memories, moods, stories or predictions about ourselves for who wemost truly are. RAIN work often exposes us to the very sticky feelingsand stories we do identify and suffer with, but all the while, as we slowlygrow in practical skill and gracious discernment, we’re seeing for ourselvesthe truer self—and the more-than-self knows and rejoices in the difference.

For a betterunderstanding of RAIN work, read Jack Kornfield’s, The Wise Heart,p. 101 ff

(Re-posted from September 26, 2011)

Tar Baby in the Brain

2012-03-01T12:49:00.000-08:00

Most of us know the old Georgia folktale about Br'er Rabbit and the Tar Baby. Br'er Fox sets an ego trap for Br'er Rabbit. He makes a tar dummy we know as Tar Baby. When BR meets TB on the road he gets so frustrated that TB won't be sociable, won't reply at all when spoken to, that he punches him and gets stuck. Punches TB again and again and gets stucker and stucker and stucker.

Mindfulness meditation is all about cultivating wisdom, humor and experience enough to recognize and avoid--or at least get unstuck from--Tar Baby the many times we meet him on the road.

Uncle Remus's Tar Baby catches Br'er Rabbit by being mute. Our ego/small-self catches us with constant chatter.

Contrary to what a lot of folks think, mindfulness meditation isn't about cultivating silence. It's about cultivating awareness. It's about learning to 'use' the part of our brains where 'awareness' comes from in order to witness what's up with other parts of our brains.

I love honey on toast or in tea. But I hate the sticky mess that invariably accumulates around the family honey pot. When I imagine what Br'er Rabbit must have felt like with his hands and feet--and ultimately his nose and chin and eyebrows--all glommed up with Tar Baby, it gives me the heebie jeebies.

Life often blesses us with frustration enough from being stuck that we're ready to learn how to get unstuck. In meditation, by keeping a little focus on the breath and the rest on kind attention to what's going on inside us, we begin to see and see and see how Tar Baby works in our lives.

I can describe what it feels like to me, but the only way to test how Tar Baby works in you is to begin to notice his sticky self in your own brain.

As you begin to take time to pay attention, you'll likely soon begin to observe a stream of back and forth chatter in your head. Lots of 'advice' coming from 'somewhere.' Advice and commentary--warnings, self-praise, self-criticism, praise and criticism of people you know or you're with at the time...etc., etc., etc., ad infinitum. It's a loop (noun) that loops and loops (verb). It's a pattern that catches us over and over.

But over time, as we practice noticing what's going on, we slowly wise up and get convinced not to engage Tar Baby on his own terms. Over time we also learn how to free ourselves from Tar Baby after we have engaged him on his own terms.

It's a very simply concept. We take time to pay kind attention to our patterns of thinking and feeling. Then we invariably see/hear incessant chatter. Then realize that much of the habitual 'guidance' we get is out of date and out of tune with are growing selves. Just by noticing this looping chatter, Tar Baby's stickiness decreases.

At some point we also realize that after tuning in to these voices we can choose to tune out. This is not repression. These voices and who and what they represent are welcome at the table--they're just not allowed to dominate the conversation.

Like I said, the only way to test this is to try it. Be curious. Give it time. Get support from a good book and a local meditation or centering prayer group if one is available.

Don't Stay Stuck. Stick With It.

2012-02-29T09:23:00.002-08:00

Yesterday's post was about getting stuck. Mindful practice helps us see where we're stuck. And it give us tools for getting un-stuck. Below is a little 'encouragement' from Jon Kabat-Zinn for those of us who sometimes wonder if we're suitable candidates for mindfulness meditation.

---

Can anybody meditate?

I get asked this question a lot. I suspect people askbecause they think that probably everybody else can meditate but they can’t.They want to be reassured that they are not alone, that there are at least someother people they can identify with, those hapless souls who were bornincapable of meditating. But it isn’t so simple.

Thinking you are unable to meditate is a little likethinking you are unable to breathe, or to concentrate or relax. Pretty mucheverybody can breathe easily. And under the right circumstances, pretty muchanybody can concentrate, anybody can relax.

People often confuse meditation with relaxation or someother special state that you have to get to or feel. When once or twice you tryand you don’t get anywhere or you didn’t feel anything special, then you thinkyou are one of those people who can’t do it.

But, meditation is not about feeling a certain way. It’sabout feeling the way you feel. It’s not about making the mind empty or still,although stillness does deepen in meditation and can be cultivatedsystematically. Above all, meditation is about letting the mind be as it is andknowing something about how it is in this moment. It’s not about gettingsomewhere else, but about allowing yourself to be where you already are. If youdon’t understand this, you will think you are constitutionally unable tomeditate. But that’s just more thinking, and in this case, incorrect thinkingat that.

True, meditation does require energy and a commitment tostick with it. But then, wouldn’t it be more accurate to say, “I won’t stickwith it,” rather than, “I can’t do it”? Anybody can sit down and watch theirbreath or watch their mind. And you don’t have to be sitting. You could do itwalking, standing, lying down, standing on one leg, running, or taking a bath.But to stay at it for even five minutes requires intentionality. To make itpart of your life requires some discipline. So when people say they can’tmeditate, what they really mean is that they won’t make time for it, or thatwhen they try, they don’t like what happens. It isn’t what they are looking foror hoping for. It doesn’t fulfill their expectations. So maybe they should tryagain, this time letting go of their expectations and just watching.

(From Wherever You Go, There You Are)

If you want to learn more about the basics of insight meditation, there's a good introduction here.

Stuck

2012-02-28T07:44:00.001-08:00

Just before moving to the NC mountains I talked to one of my new friends in Cullowhee, Newt Smith. I was planning on getting a pickup truck and was wondering what brand, what size, what options, etc.

"I really love exploring old logging roads," I said. "And I don't want to get stuck in the mud, so I'm thinking about getting 4 Wheel Drive."

"Well," Newt said, "Most folks around here have 4 Wheel Drive pickups. They have a saying about them, too: 'Four Wheel Drive allows to get way back into the woods...before you get stuck.'"

I wound up buying a nice used Nissan 2 Wheel Drive pickup that averaged 33 MPG. Never had to get it towed out of the wilderness. I had that little red Nissan for 16 years--it got me to the edge of wild places hundreds and hundreds of times. I always walked the rest of the way.

But I have, nevertheless, found hundreds and hundreds of others ways to get stuck.

Stuck is where you are when you stop moving toward where your deep self hoped to be. The way a lot of us deal with this kind of being stuck is to gradually stop hoping to be in that other, longed-for place. But it's not the deep wise hope we should be letting go of--it's the stuff that keeps us stuck.

Mindfulness practice is the best tool I've found to work with being stuck. Though, to be clear about it, sometimes meditation or contemplation is nearly as depressing as it is exhilarating.

That's because when we slow down and do the work of practice, we see just how very stuck we are. And that is wonderful medicine. And a bitter pill.

Einstein said, 'Problems cannot be solved at the level of conscious that created them.' Mindfulness takes us on a tour of the levels of consciousness that seeded, hatched, and raised the problems that populate our lives. What's the line in Monte Python's Holy Grail? ..."Run away, run away!"

Running away is one of our options. We have others.

The story of the Holy Grail is not a bad metaphor. What seems to be an insoluble problem turns out, almost miraculously, not to be. Over time, what is insoluble sometimes dissolves. What is un-find-able often gets found.

In meditation and contemplation new levels of consciousness are both cultivated and stumbled upon. By doing the grunt work of exploring the lands where we are stuck we are also always stumbling upon doors that open to new worlds.

Catholics & Protestants Getting It Wrong

2012-02-27T06:20:00.000-08:00

I experience Richard Rohr as a generous, wise priest. Also honest--sometimes painfully honest. What follows is a bit from a talk he recently gave about scripture--how neither Catholics nor Protestants handle it wisely.

---

Thomas Merton said it was actually dangerous to put the scriptures in the hands of people whose inner self is not yet sufficiently awakened to encounter the Spirit, because they will try to use God for their own egocentric purposes (This is why religion is so subject to corruption!). Now, if we are going to talk about Lent being a time of conversion and penance, let me apply that to the two major groups that have occupied Western Christianity—Catholics and Protestants. Neither one has really let the Word of God guide their lives.

Catholics need to be converted to giving the Scriptures some actual authority in their lives. Luther wasn’t wrong when he said that most Catholics did not read the Bible. Most Catholics are still not that interested in the Bible (historically they did not have the printing press, nor could most people read, so you can’t blame them entirely). I have been a priest for 42 years now, and I would sadly say that most Catholics would rather hear quotes from saints, Popes, and bishops, the current news, or funny stories, if they are to pay attention. If I quote strongly from the Sermon on the Mount, they are almost throwaway lines. I can see Catholics glaze over because they have never read the New Testament, much less studied it, or been guided by it. I am very sad to have to admit this. It is the Achilles heel of much of the Catholic world, priests included. (The only good thing about it is that they never fight you like Protestants do about Scripture. They are easily duped, and the hierarchy has been able to take advantage of this.)

If Catholics need to be converted, Protestants need to do penance. Their shout of “sola Scriptura” (only Scripture) has left them at the mercy of their own cultures, their own limited education, their own prejudices, and their own selective reading of some texts while avoiding others. It has become laughable, as slavery, racism, sexism, xenophobia, and homophobia have lasted authoritatively into our time—by people who claim to love Jesus! I think they need to do penance for what they have often done with the Bible! They largely interpreted the Bible in a very individualistic and otherworldly way. It was an evacuation plan for the next world—and just for their group. Most of Evangelical Protestantism has no cosmic message, no social message, and little sense of social justice or care for the outsider. Both Catholics and Protestants (Orthodox, too!) found a way to do our own thing while posturing friendship with Jesus.

Waiting For A Vanished April

2012-02-26T07:40:00.001-08:00

Today is the first Sunday in Lent. For us at St. David's, it also happens to be the day we mark our Patronal Feast Day. March 1 is St. David's Day across the world. David is the patron saint of Wales. Wherever Welsh people traveled, you'll usually find churches bearing that name.

R. S. Thomas was a Welsh priest in the Anglican Church (now the Church of Wales). He was also a a remarkable poet. His poem, The Coming, is a powerful reflection for the movement of God in Lent.

THE COMING

And God held in his hand

a small globe. Look, he said,

the son looked. Far off,

as through water, he saw

a scorched land of fierce

color. Thelight burned

there: crusted buildings

cast their shadows; a bright

serpent, a river

uncoiled itself, radiant

with slime.

On a bare

hill a bare tree saddened

the sky. Many people

held out their thin arms

to it, as though waiting

for a vanished April

to return to its crossed

boughs. Theson watched

them. Letme go there, he said.

Invictus Schimictus

2012-02-25T08:12:00.001-08:00

I remember hearing William Henley’s poem, Invictus, when I was ateenager. God, it sounded so right to me then. Exactly the kind of freedom thatour culture and certain bits of a boy’s DNA push toward.

It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll.
I am the master of my fate:
I am the captain of my soul.

But life itself, over time and through its continuous,evolving flow, shows us otherwise.

This sense of courage and responsibility that shoutsfrom the poem is something wonderful to be hungry for. But because we existall-together and not alone, not one of us--not then, not now, not ever—ismaster of our fate or captain of our soul. Sheesh, one butterfly flapping itswings in China participates in the causes of weather in Cullowhee!

The poem below was not written as a poem--it’s adapted fromone paragraph in Gerald May’s, TheDark Night of the Soul. It’s about freedom too.

To my ear and mind and heart, Gerald May nails it—whatfreedom is and isn’t.

Whatever form it takes,

the movement

of the soul and God

is always finding

its way toward freedom.

In prayer
as in life,

it is a movement

toward freedom

from willfulness,

from the compulsion

to be in charge

and the fear of loss

of control.

It is a movement toward
freedom from

functional atheism:

the conviction that

effortful

autonomous

accomplishment

is the only hope!

A movement toward
freedom for

simple

loving

presence.

And appreciation--
a willingness

to respond

and participate

in the divine
Spirit

in the world.

A trusting confidence

that allows

radical
loving

action.

Praying

2012-02-24T07:50:00.002-08:00

Praying

Mary Oliver

It doesn't have tobe
the blue iris, it could be
weeds in a vacant lot, or a few
small stones; just
pay attention, then patch

a few words together and don't try
to make them elaborate, this isn't
a contest but the doorway

into thanks, and a silence in which
another voice may speak.

(Thanks to June & Newt for growing stunning Irises)

The Incredible Shrinking Man

2012-02-23T05:58:00.000-08:00

On Saturday afternoons when I was a kid, one channel alwaysoffered some kind of horror or Sci-Fi movie. There were lots of repeats.

I remember watching ‘The Incredible Shrinking Man’ a bunchof times. The main character was a scientist who’d invented something that madeanimals grow smaller. At some point (like in all this kind of movie!) he tooksome of his own ‘medicine.’ The rest of the film followed his diminishment. Unlike ‘Honey, I Shrunkthe Kids,’ it wasn’t a comedy.

Life gets harder and harder, stranger and stranger for our ‘hero.’His problems grow as he shrinks. In the next to the last scene he’s fallen intohis cellar. There’s a spider in the cellar. A ‘relatively’ huge spider. There’salso a sewing needle. It’s pretty big too. An epic duel follows. The scientistprevails (barely). Without any words spoken (there’s nobody to talk to) we seehis desperation to get out of that basement.

He searches, intensely, noticing a louvered vent. Hesqueezes through. It’s night, moonless night. The stars are clear, bright,infinite, and huge. The soundtrack swells—the music is not comforting.

Neither is the feeling in a young watcher’s psyche.

At some point in my future education I realized ‘TheIncredible Shrinking Man’ was about Existentialism in the mid-20^thcentury. Our trying to reconcile a diminishing sense of self with an expandingknowledge of the vastness of our universe. The dominant kind of existentialpractice seemed to me to be an attempt to overcome depression with stoicism—arealization that, so, the spiders are huge—but, then again, our weapons arebigger.

This is a perspective we continue to grapple with. In theundeniable vastness of creation will we experience devastating insignificance or profoundconnectedness?

Probably a little of both—and there’s integrity there. It isa big universe. And we humans are not as significant in relation to it as itonce seemed.

Wise spirituality shows us how to be small and big at thesame time. Those who lose ‘self’ find ‘Self.’ It’s not so much the ‘ME’ that’sbig but the ‘ME-IN-RELATIONSHIP’ that’s big. It’s the ‘WE.’

Demeter seeks Persephone from the big love of a mother’sconnectedness to her child. Jesus goes to Jerusalem and Buddha declines nirvanabecause of an even larger sense of connectedness and love.

Katabasis, Lent, The Dark Night of the Soul, falling intothe cellar all are a Going-Down. We areless significant than our egos natter on about.

But not devastatingly so.

We are profoundly connected.

The word profound comes from the Latin ‘fundis’ which means ‘bottom’and ‘pro’ which means ‘before.’ There’s nothing more profound than wise,intentional, Going-Down in order to explore and confirm our deep connectednessto one another and to God ‘before’ we hit ‘bottom.’

Discovering, mending, cultivating this connectedness is the cure for the incredible shrinking man.

Katabasis

2012-02-22T07:26:00.000-08:00

A rich story for Ash Wednesday--and Lent--and winter moving toward spring--is the Greek tale of Persephone (per-sef-uh-nee) and Demeter (dih-mih-ter).

Persephone, young and beautiful, is abducted by Hades, Lord of the Underworld. Demeter, her mother, leaves the heavens to search for her.

It's a powerful force--what a mother feels for a lost child. A wonderful icon of the potential energy we humans have for life's most important adventures.

Demeter searches and learns about Persephone's capture--that Hades has taken her beautiful daughter as his bride. The one she longs to help is imprisoned in the underworld. And Demeter cannot go there herself. BUT she doesn't give up. She finds...a way.

It's a long and eventful story! I plan to refer to it over the next few days.

One word for this kind journey Demeter takes is Katabasis (kuh-tab-uh-sis)--a Greek word that means 'a going down.' The story of Demeter and Persephone shows us what the 'going down' is about: Looking for what we love--never giving up on what we've lost--insisting that whatever is imprisoned be set free.

Prayer can be very like katabasis. Prayer is sometimes described as the mind descending into the heart. Meditation also sinks us to that deep still point.

Katabasis can also be about justice--taking risks so that what we love and who we love can be set free.

Why does Jesus 'go down to Jerusalem?' Why does Gautama, awakened under the Bodhi tree, even though he's offered the chance to enter Nirvana now, choose instead to stay here for the rest of his life?

There are many crucial journeys life calls us to take that we can't manage on our own.

What have we lost? What do we love? What takes us to the place where we are empowered to take risks for what we love?

How do we get there? How do we see in the dark?

How do we trust the Frodo in each of us that says, "I will take the ring--though I do not know the way?"

What is the Wisdom and the Way of Katabasis?

Big Ways To Have Small Fun?

2012-02-21T08:52:00.000-08:00

On the Enneagram, I'm a type 7 (The Epicure). One of a 7's greatest fears is being deprived. So, here on the cusp of Lent, on Fat Tuesday, my type's tendency is to gorge and hoard. I recognize that pattern!

But after a few decades of going with my pattern, I discovered there's more joy in moderation. And ultimately, it's tastier! And we 7s are born connoisseurs.

There's surely more joy on Wednesday morning when we party, shall we say, shrewdly on Fat Tuesday.

I tried marijuana in my late teens. Food tasted great! Thoughts were dreamier--and more colorful. But I hated not being able to have real conversations with my friends. It didn't take long to just 'know' that when I was stoned life itself just wasn't as tasty.

This kind of stuff is a hint of that strange irony Jesus talks about--that to find ourselves it's best to lose ourselves. Small self has lots of big ways to have small fun. Big self has lots of small ways to have BIG fun.

Going from Fat Tuesday into Lent can seem like a downer. Except that Big self understands (like all seeds understand) that a little down usually leads to a lot of up.

PS: if you'd like to discover your enneagram type, you can find do it here.

The God Who Knows Only 4 Words

2012-02-20T06:44:00.000-08:00

We’realmost to the end of Epiphany as a season. Two more days—tomorrow is Fat Tuesday,our last chance to revel in delight (or in the Light).

The liturgical season isa calendar of sacred times which rarely line up neatly with the times our soulsgo through. Instead, liturgical seasons cycle us through practice times, over and over and over, sothat when our souls do enter their seasons of discovery and loss, longing and learning, waiting and finding, we know something of their landscape.

Thereare 46 days in Lent, the darkest, hardest ‘practice’ season.

But we’re not thereyet. We’ve still got time to party like it’s 1999. Iquoted Richard Rohr last week; he was talking about the transformation of ourexperience of God as we grow into our relationship with God:

“Godbecomes more a verb than a noun, more a process than a conclusion, more anexperience than a dogma, more a personal relationship than an idea. There isSomeone dancing with you, and you are not afraid of making mistakes.”

Someone is dancing with us--and it's a really lousy time to miss the opportunity to do it wholeheartedly.

Everychild has known God,

Notthe God of names,

Notthe God of don’ts,

Notthe God who never
does anything weird.

Butthe God who knows
only 4 words, and...
keeps repeating them:

“ComeDance with Me.
Come. Dance!”

-Hafiz

Leaving Words Behind

2012-02-19T07:41:00.000-08:00

It’s hard to teach without using words. Words point the wayto so many wonderful places. Yet to get where we’re going at some point wehave to leave words behind. Even 'God' words get in the way of life in God.

I remember watching four or five people each carrying hang gliders up the lastbit of a mountain. They’d gotten near the top with cars and trucks, but thelast eighth of a mile was an obvious struggle. Then they got to the edge of amassive rock face and, waiting till the wind was right, they just leanedforward and pushed off. The wind—and significant, learned skill, trust andchutzpah—did the rest.

It's the last Sunday in Epiphany. Another process, another kind of journey waits in Lent. Not so much 'Come and see' as 'Come with me.'

Following, stepping out, stepping off the cliff sometimes doesn't require words at all.

I Seem To Have Misplaced My Faith

2012-02-18T06:58:00.000-08:00

Faith grows. Which means faith does not stay the same. Whichmeans sometimes when we look to those familiar places in our minds and hearts forour accustomed faith, it’s not there. Something unfamiliar has taken its place.

Usually, when we come to these moments in our spiritual lives, we’re so struckby the absence of familiar faith weforget to remember that this is how growth works. New wineskins for new wine!New shells for growing crabs! New experiences of evolving faith!

The longer we live, the more chances we have to remember toremember.

Following is another passage from Gerald May’s book,The Dark Night of the Soul. He describes aspects of this experience of growth lovinglyand perceptively.

---

The deeper, more penetrating—and usually morepainful—dimensions of the passive night of the spirit (an aspect of the darknight of the soul) have to do with changes in people’s habitual sense ofrelationship with God.

A common experience, often confusing but not too painful, isthat the word “God” loses its meaning. That word, which used to bring forthfamiliar images and feelings, now seems inadequate and somehow even wrong. Andthere seems to be no satisfactory substitute. One learns experientially whatJohn and Teresa continually affirm: no words, not even the divine names, canever adequately portray the Reality.

A much more unsettling experience is the loss of the senseof God’s presence, which can often feel like being abandoned by God. Manypeople are used to a consistent and long-lasting feeling of the presence of Godin their lives. It may be a distinct sense of presence, of companionshipeverywhere. It may happen more in relationship with children, spouse, or otherbeloved people. It may occur in special places, as in church or outdoors innature. Even more often it is just too subtle to describe at all. Whatever formit takes, however, it is sensible, palpable, and deeply meaningful. Then,sometimes, it disappears.

Though we don’t realize it at the time, when habitual sensesof God do disappear in the process of the dark night, it is surely because itis time for us to relinquish our attachment to them. We have made an idol ourimages and feelings of God, giving them more importance than the true God theyrepresent. This can happen with any image or sense of the Divine. For example,some people have a long-lasting sense of God as distant, harsh, and judgmental.Others feel that God absolutely controls their destiny; they have nothing tosay about it. Others feel much the opposite: that if there is any God at all,it is a God who leaves them alone to fend for themselves. Still others carrywith them a steady sense of God’s loving presence, comfortable and reassuringbut static, never inviting challenges or risks. No matter what specific formthey may take, all such rigidly held feelings about God restrict our opennessto the incomprehensible divine reality.

The passive night of the spirit serves to loosen our hold onsuch expectations, to leave us more willing to accept God’s being as God will.As with other changes occurring in the dark night, this process can sometimesfeel delightfully liberating; bright new vistas of possibility open as we letgo of old habits. More often, though, it feels as though the foundations offaith are being shaken. It is easy to understand how devastating such anexperience might be. For people who are deeply in love with God, the loss of ahabitual sense of God’s presence can seem like a greater abandonment than theloss of human love. Here again, people are likely to feel it is somehow theirfault; they wonder where they went so wrong to cause the divine Lover to disappear.And when this loss is accompanied by lassitude and emptiness in prayer andother spiritual practices and lack of motivation for them, a person may easilywonder, “Do I even believe in anything anymore? Do I even care?”

When the spiritual life feels so uprooted, it can be almostimpossible to believe—or even to consider—that what’s really going on is agraceful process of liberation, a letting go of old, limiting habits to makeroom for fresh openness to love.

Therein lies the wisdom. Teresa and John both say that weeasily become so attached to feelings of and about God that we equate them withGod. We forget that these sensations are only speaking to us of the divine One.They are only messengers. Instead, we take them for the whole of God’s self,and thus we wind up worshiping our own feelings. This is perhaps the mostcommon idolatry of the spiritual life.

I remember having an almost continual sense of God’spresence as a very small child. The feeling receded as I grew older and otherthings occupied my attention. Later in life, when I embarked on my intentional“spiritual journey,” I realized how much I had missed that feeling of continualcompanionship. I sought to recover it in prayer and meditation, and I prayedfor it to return. I experienced the Holy through other people, through nature,and in many other mediated ways. But what I longed for was that old non-mediated,immediate sense of direct, palpable relationship. I searched and prayed for itfor nearly twenty-five years. Then, when I was very sick as a result of cancerchemotherapy, it came back to me. And since then, that sense of presence hasnever left me. I can feel it anywhere, anytime. All I have to do is turn myattention toward it. I love it and surely would hate to lose it. It’s theanswer to a very long prayer. But I know it is not God. It is only a sense ofGod. I don’t think I make an idol of it, so I don’t imagine it will need to betaken away. If at some point I do lose it again, I hope I will be given thewisdom to continue to trust God in the absence of any sense of God.

God is always working obscurely within us. And, even moremysteriously, some part of us is saying yes to God’s invitations to go where wedo not want to go.

---

Another hymn we sing at St. David’s is below. It’sabout this freedom we have to grow in faith--how it’s possible to find our way in our growing experience of God. If you want to sing it, the tune is Sursum Corda.

There are no fences in the fields of God,

an open country greets an endless sky;

but there are landmarks to direct a step

and vivid features to engage the eye.

We find good pasture on the highest hills

and streams between alive with water sound

and groves of trees to shade a sun-scorched back,

the rich ecology of holy ground.

No staff is raised to snatch a wandering sheep;

we are not branded, hobbled, bound or belled.

But when we stumble over rock or ledge

we have a certain sense of being held.

There are no fences in the fields of God,

to come and go is an abiding choice;

but like the flock before we’ve come to trust

the supple tether of a shepherd’s voice.

Practice Makes Perfect (and Weary)

2012-02-17T08:42:00.000-08:00

The mostcommon theme in this blog is PRACTICE—how taking an active role in our ownspiritual formation is crucial if we want to grow. I write about this so oftenbecause I continue to be amazed and grateful that such a thing is possible atall--as I continue to be amazed at how often it’s not taught, embodied, andtransmitted.

On the otherhand, habitual focus on practice can get to be a kind of haranguing. I often feel like I’m haranguing myself, pushing toohard, expecting too much, flogging a weary horse.

I feel this way because it’strue. There’s a decisive difference between haranguing and encouraging, and I’msometimes oblivious to it.

Thank God for the gifts of frustration and wearinessand misery—signs that get our attention, turn our heads around, get us to lookdown at our compasses long enough to notice we’re turned the wrong damn way!

What follows is another wise bit of Gerald Mays book, The Dark Night of the Soul. I'm sooooo grateful we have many wise teachers to help us along the Way.

---

John and Teresa pay relatively littleattention to the active aspect of the spiritual life because they know fromexperience that our own autonomous efforts can accomplish very little. They aremuch more interested in the passive dimension, the work God does within us,seemingly beyond our own will and intention. John says quite bluntly that allthis effort does not work…grace is needed to find “the courage to be in thedarkness of everything.”

It is easy to understand that wecannot free ourselves on our own; life itself teaches us that. But it’s alesson many of us seem determined to forget. Even now, with a lifetime ofself-improvement failures behind me, I still keep trying.

As soon as I become aware of some badhabit or personality defect in myself, I try to take it into my own hands andfix it on my own. It’s possible that I have been successful at some of theseattempts, but for the life of me I can’t think of an example. I usually have tofail several times before I admit that I cannot do it alone.

Giving up the striving isn’t easy. Wehuman beings naturally try to achieve satisfaction in all things through ourown autonomous effort and control. This is just as true in our search forspiritual fulfillment as it is in the rest of life. We may yearn to “let go andlet God,” but it usually doesn’t happen until we have exhausted our ownefforts. There is a relentless willfulness in us that seldom ceases until wehave been brought to our knees by incapacity and failure.

In John’s vision, it is during the 'passive nights' that God’s grace flows through the ruins of our failed attempts,softens our willfulness, and takes us where we could not go on our own.

Sometimes we may experience it as aninner relaxation and letting go. At other times it may feel like something wecling to is being ripped away from us. Either way, the freedom comes onlythrough relinquishment. The actual experience may feel like delightfulliberation or tragic bereavement, or it may happen so deeply that we are notaware of it at all. But one thing is certain: the process of freedom is one ofsubtraction—we are left more empty than when we began.

Prayer is never really separate fromthe rest of life, so the passive nightof the senses brings a similar change in one’s spiritual activities. Prayerthat used to be full of consolation and peace may now seem empty and dry.Worship and other church activities are not as rewarding as they used to be. Itis increasingly difficult to maintain daily “active” practices like prayer,meditation, journaling, or spiritual reading.

In general, one finds oneself losinginterest in the spiritual things that used to offer so much gratification. Eventhe images of God one has depended upon may gradually lose their significance.

All the while, as we have seen, theprocess happens in obscurity. We do not understand that the changes we areexperiencing are opening us to more free and complete love. Instead, our mostcommon reaction is self-doubt. Because we assume we should be in charge of ourspiritual lives, our first reaction is usually, “What am I doing wrong?”

This self-doubt, combined with lossand confusion, explains why the passive night of the senses is oftenunpleasant, why it involves territory we would not choose to traverse on ourown. I want to reiterate, though, that the experience can in some ways bepleasurable. A lessening of dependence on one’s work or relationships cansometimes feel freeing. Even the loss of one’s habitual spiritualactivities—especially if one has been doing them out of habit or obligation—canfeel like a burden lifted.

Pleasant or unpleasant, however, allsuch experiences do involve loss, and there is always a certain emptiness leftbehind. The passive night of the spirit, as John sees it, is the process ofemptying and freeing the spiritual faculties: intellect, memory, and will. Itliberates them from attachment to rigidly held beliefs, understandings, dreams,expectations, and habitual, compulsive ways of loving and behaving righteously.

In my experience, the most universalchange accomplished by the passive night of the spirit is the blurring of one’sbelief in being separate from God, from other people, and from the rest ofcreation. Increasingly, one feels a part of all things instead of apart fromthem. Such softenings can happen with any rigidly held habitual beliefs andconcepts.

What Prayer Is Not

2012-02-16T06:26:00.000-08:00

Prayeris not technique

forgetting things, pious

exerciseto make God

happy.

Prayeris not a ticket

toheaven. It’s more

likepracticing heaven

now.

Prayeris a way of seeing

thattakes away anxiety

forfiguring it all out

here.

Needingto be right about

everything.Here, now God

becomes more verb than

noun.

God--more process than conclusion,

moreexperience than dogma,

moreintimacy than

idea.

Someoneis dancing with you,

andyou are not afraid

ofgetting it

wrong.

*This poem is a very close paraphrase, almost a quote of the following Richard Rohr passage from The Naked Now: Learning to see as the mystics see.

Inprayer, we merely keep returning the divine gaze and we become its reflection,almost in spite of ourselves (2 Corinthians 3:18). The word “prayer” has often beentrivialized by making it into a way of getting what we want. But I use “prayer”as the umbrella word for any interior journeys or practices that allow you toexperience faith, hope, and love within yourself. It is not a techniquefor getting things, a pious exercise that somehow makes God happy, or arequirement for entry into heaven. It is much more like practicing heaven now.

Suchprayer, such seeing, takes away your anxiety for figuring it all out fully foryourself, or needing to be right about your formulations. At this point, Godbecomes more a verb than a noun, more a process than a conclusion, more anexperience than a dogma, more a personal relationship than an idea. There isSomeone dancing with you, and you are not afraid of making mistakes.

La Noche Oscura--The Dark Night

2012-02-15T05:52:00.000-08:00

A hymn we sing in Advent, which in the northern hemisphere is always the season of the longest nights, is about possibility--a counter-intuitive possibility of learning to trust darkness.

In the winter's early darkness,

through the days of failing light,

travelers may delay a journey

or may learn to read the night.

Turning on a steady axis,

cold and burning, black and bright,

heaven tells a faithful story

of the coming of the Light.

As we recognize the patterns

and we turn a certain way,

even when the path is darkest,

we are faced to greet the day.

Advent isn't the only season of long nights--it's just the one on the calendar. We all enter a long darkness at certain points in our lives. Gerald May writes about the long darkness in his book, The Dark Night of the Soul--part biography and part exploration of the theology of Teresa of Avila and John of the Cross.

What follows is one of his many helpful descriptions of what is possible in this Dark Night.

---

Brother Lawrence of the Resurrection, a Carmelitemystic, lived in seventeenth-century France. At one point in his famoustreatise, The Practice of the Presence of God, he says, “People would besurprised if they knew what their souls said to God sometimes.”

Centuriesbefore Freud “discovered” the unconscious, contemplatives such as BrotherLawrence, Teresa of Avila, and John of the Cross had a profound appreciation that there is an activelife of the soul that goes on beneath our awareness. It is to this unconsciousdimension of the spiritual life that Teresa and John refer when they use theterm “dark.”

When we speak of darkness today, we are often referring tosomething sinister, as in “powers of darkness” or the “dark side.” ...This is not what Teresa and John mean when they used the Spanish wordfor dark, oscura. For them, it simply means “obscure.” In the same way thatthings are difficult to see at night, the deepest relationship between God andperson is hidden from our conscious awareness.

In speaking of la noche oscura, the dark night of the soul,John is addressing something mysterious and unknown, but by no means sinisteror evil. It is instead profoundly sacred and precious beyond all imagining.John says the dark night of the soul is “happy,” “glad,” “guiding,” and full of“absolute grace.” It is the secret way in which God not only liberates us fromour attachments and idolatries, but also brings us to the realization of ourtrue nature. The night is the means by which we find our heart’s desire, ourfreedom for love.

This is not to say that all darkness is good. Teresa andJohn use another word, tinieblas, to describe the more sinister kind ofdarkness. There is no doubt about the difference. Teresa uses oscura in sayingthat the spiritual life is so dark she needs much patience “in order to writeabout what I don’t know.” But she uses tinieblas when she says, “The devil isdarkness itself.” Similarly, John says it is one thing to be in oscuras andquite another to be in tinieblas. In oscuras things are hidden; in tinieblasone is blind. In fact, it is the very blindness of tinieblas, our slavery toattachment and delusion, that the dark night of the soul is working to heal.

For Teresa and John, the dark night of the soul is a totallyloving, healing, and liberating process. Whether it feels that way is anotherquestion entirely! Nowadays most people think of the dark night of the soul asa time of suffering and tribulation—redemptive perhaps, but entirelyunpleasant. This is not always the case.

The only characteristic of the experience of the dark nightthat is certain is its obscurity. One simply does not comprehend clearly whatis happening. Some dark-night experiences may be quitepleasant. One friend of mine, driven by unrelenting perfectionism, haddedicated his adult life to doing everything right. He had a sense of humor,and we had good times together, but it hurt to see the pain his self-judgmentwas causing him. Then, gradually and inexplicably, he felt himself relaxing. Hewas delightfully liberated from his burdensome sense of responsibility; he was“free just to be,” as he put it. Although he wasn’t sure what was going on andat times wondered if he might just be getting lazy, his overall experience ofthe change was joyful.

For another person in another situation, the same kind ofliberation might be very painful. When I was practicing psychiatry, a womancame to see me for depression. She had spent her life taking care of herfamily, frequently neglecting her own interests in the process. She felt guiltyabout anything she did for herself. She struggled with a sense of emptinessafter her children had grown up and was later devastated to discover that herhusband was having an affair. The experience was beginning to ease hercaretaking compulsion, but it certainly did not feel like liberation. All shefelt was pain, loss, and abandonment. Glimpses of her growing freedom made hereven more depressed at first, because in relinquishing her total dedication toher marriage and family, she felt she was losing her only source of worth.Gradually, however, she began to enjoy time for herself. And in ways so subtleas to be almost unnoticeable amidst her pain, she began to feel a sense ofmeaning and value not for things she did, but just for who she was.

Liberation, whether experienced pleasurably or painfully,always involves relinquishment, some kind of loss. It may be a loss ofsomething we’re glad to be rid of, like a bad habit, or something we cling tofor dear life, like a love relationship. Either way it’s still a loss. Thuseven when a dark-night experience is pleasant, there is still likely to be anaccompanying sense of emptiness and perhaps even grief. Conversely, when adark-night experience leaves us feeling tragically bereft, there still may be asense of openness and fresh possibility. The point is, no matter how hard wetry, we cannot see the process clearly. We only know what we’re feeling at agiven time, and that determines whether our experience is pleasurable orpainful. As one of my friends often says, “God only knows what’s really goingon—literally!”

The obscurity of the dark night is so constant that Isometimes say, “If you’re certain you’re going through a dark night of thesoul, you probably aren’t!” The statement is flippant, but in my experience peoplehaving an experience of the dark night almost always think it is somethingelse. If it’s a pleasant experience, they may call it a mysteriousbreakthrough, a moment of unexplainable grace. If it is unpleasant, they tendto see it as a failure on their part: laziness, lassitude, resistance, or someother inadequacy.

If, as John maintains, the night is such a gift, why must theprocess remain so obscure?

Since the night involves relinquishing attachments,it takes us beneath our denial into territory we are in the habit of avoiding.We might feel willing to relinquish compulsions we acknowledge as destructive,but anyone who has made a New Year’s resolution knows how self-defeating suchattempts can be. And what about the attachments we love, the ones we honor andvalue? Would we willingly cooperate in being freed from drivenness to do goodworks or to care for our family, even though we know it comes from compulsionrather than love? Would we willingly join God’s grace in relinquishingattachments to the beliefs and images of God that give us comfort, security,and meaning, even if we recognize how they restrict and restrain us?

If we arehonest, I think we have to admit that we will likely try to sabotage anymovement toward true freedom. If we really knew what we called to relinquish onthis journey, our defenses would never allow us to take the first step.Sometimes the only way we can enter the deeper dimensions of the journey is bybeing unable to see where we’re going.

Pay No Attention To That Man!

2012-02-14T04:17:00.000-08:00

I wonder what percentage of you recognize this quote in the post's title today? I'd guess maybe 80 or 90%. Just in case you don't, here it is above, captured in all it's glory.

"Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain!" These are words of the small self, the false self, the ego, or persona protecting their turf. Our evolutionary process has found it important for us to have a big enough self to defend our territory and survive--like a blowfish puffing itself up.

But as we discover over and over, the basic gifts of evolution that have empowered us to stay alive are not the ones we need to become FULLY alive.

The huffing and puffing of the Projected Oz is forceful and compelling. A marvelous example of Ego in full bloom. The pilgrims to Oz are suitably cowed!

But even more compelling in this short scene is the gratitude in the tone of the human voice of Oz. Dorothy says to him, 'You're a very BAD MAN!" And then from that part of Self that is not ego or persona, the man, stepping away from the machinery of inflation replies, "No, no, I'm a very good man. I'm just a very bad wizard."

A moment before he'd been cranking the projector, pushing buttons, amplifying everything. Then a faithful, curious little dog draws back the veil.

Contemplate prayer, insight meditation, mindfulness of all kinds are like Toto, tugging the curtain aside. It can be a scary process, unveiling the false self. And evolution has built in strong resistance to it.

But something in us knows we make very bad wizards. And something in us longs for the energy misspent on ego to get invested in the real deal. And something in us is very grateful to get to be who we most truly are.

(I can imagine this movie clip and description may speak more to male ego than female--so, women friends, any iconic movie scenes come to mind that shed light on your experience of small self? If so, I'd love for you to say something about it below or on my FB page.)

Waterloo Was a Near-Run Thing

2012-02-12T07:27:00.000-08:00

The account below from second book of Kings reminds us how lucky we are that our Jewish brothers and sisters wrote down what they thought would be helpful for future generations. The story reads as much like a parable as a history--it 'pops' with archetypes, irony, and wisdom.

You might want to read the story itself, thoughtfully, 2 or 3 times before reading my comments below it.

You can skip these immediate prompts too if you want! But it might be helpful to work with these few questions as you read.

If this were a short play, which character could you play most easily?
Are any of these people really hard to understand or identify with?
Have you ever had any kind of experience as challenging as Naaman's leprosy?
Have you ever been challenged to do something simple, like Naaman's wading into the Jordan, that for some reason seemed unthinkable?

2 Kings 5:1-14

Naaman, commander of the army of the king of Aram, was agreat man and in high favor with his master, because by him the LORD had givenvictory to Aram. The man, though a mighty warrior, suffered from leprosy. Nowthe Arameans on one of their raids had taken a young girl captive from the landof Israel, and she served Naaman's wife. She said to her mistress, "Ifonly my lord were with the prophet who is in Samaria! He would cure him of hisleprosy." So Naaman went in and told his lord just what the girl from theland of Israel had said. And the king of Aram said, "Go then, and I willsend along a letter to the king of Israel."

He went, taking with him ten talents of silver, six thousandshekels of gold, and ten sets of garments. He brought the letter to the king ofIsrael, which read, "When this letter reaches you, know that I have sentto you my servant Naaman, that you may cure him of his leprosy." When theking of Israel read the letter, he tore his clothes and said, "Am I God,to give death or life, that this man sends word to me to cure a man of hisleprosy? Just look and see how he is trying to pick a quarrel with me."

But when Elisha the man of God heard that the king of Israelhad torn his clothes, he sent a message to the king, "Why have you tornyour clothes? Let him come to me, that he may learn that there is a prophet inIsrael." So Naaman came with his horses and chariots, and halted at theentrance of Elisha's house.

Elisha sent a messenger to him, saying, "Go, wash inthe Jordan seven times, and your flesh shall be restored and you shall beclean." But Naaman became angry and went away, saying, "I thoughtthat for me he would surely come out, and stand and call on the name of theLORD his God, and would wave his hand over the spot, and cure the leprosy! Arenot Abana and Pharpar, the rivers of Damascus, better than all the waters ofIsrael? Could I not wash in them, and be clean?" He turned and went awayin a rage.

But his servants approached and said to him, "Father,if the prophet had commanded you to do something difficult, would you not havedone it? How much more, when all he said to you was, `Wash, and beclean'?" So he went down and immersed himself seven times in the Jordan,according to the word of the man of God; his flesh was restored like the fleshof a young boy, and he was clean.

---

One of the things that jumps out to me in entering into this story is how easy it is to miss our blessings. Like Wellington said upon his victory at Waterloo, "It was near-run thing." Right from the get go I'm amazed at the touch-and-go moments along Naaman's path.

How unusual is it that a recently captured, recently enslaved girl steps up to be a link of compassion for her captor?

How unusual is it that a man as powerful and prominent as Naaman takes the advice of a slave?

The next bit isn't so surprising. How usual is it for us insecure humans to freak out like the King of Israel when we think it's all about us? The paranoid King might have stopped the process right there.

Elisha isn't one of my favorite characters in the Hebrew scriptures. He seems haughty sometimes. But he is nevertheless willing to be a link in conveying the grace and power of God. Is Elisha being the shrewd sage by refusing to meet with Naaman? Testing him by pricking his pride? Or...is he just haughty--or territorial--or scared of getting leprosy? Hard to be sure. Naaman's healing continues to be a near-run thing.

Namaan, the famous commander, feels the slap of the prophet's refusal to meet him, heal him, or even give him a worthy, proper task. And suddenly we've arrived at the story's most tenuous moment. Scorched by the insult and hooked by his own arrogance, Naaman, enraged, turns toward home.

But..Ah!...Other servants (what is it about servants!) intercede with the very wisdom that can reach Naaman. They get him to enlist his familiar strengths--honor and courage--to overcome his habitual weaknesses--anger and pride. "How many times, Master, have you turned and met hard challenges without hesitation!"

Something in Naaman softens--a decisive moment! He turns back to the Jordan. Wades in. Sinks down. Seven times. Then he rises up--healed!

Being healed can be a near-run thing--for those of us on the cusp of healing and for those of us who happen to be links of God's grace along the way.

Looking back, where are we in this story?

Looking forward, how will the story unfold for us and for others in new and unexpected ways tomorrow and tomorrow?

What will help us recognize and re-recognize the parts we might play as the story unfolds?

God and My Chiropractor

2012-02-10T09:08:00.000-08:00

I have astiff neck. Some days metaphorically, most days literally. Stiff and achy. Istarted seeing a chiropractor a couple of weeks ago.

Earlier thismorning as I was lying flat on my face she was asking me, while her palms weretouching the bottoms of my feet, to look toward different things—the corner ofthe room, straight ahead, my right shoulder, my left shoulder. Then she’d docertain ‘adjustments’ based on what she noticed with her hands.

As she didthis we were also talking about prayer—about how it feels right sometimes totalk to God out loud. How she often talked to God out load before sleeping orjust after waking up--how I do the same thing while walking.

Talking toGod out loud can be a lot like journaling. Engaging parts of ourselves otherthan just the thinking part can be insightful. When we’re journaling or prayingout loud we’re not just creating thoughts we’re also hearing or reading whatwe’ve created. By using more of our natural capacity for ‘speaking’ we’re alsodeveloping more of our natural capacity for ‘hearing.’ Any of you who journal(or pray out loud!) probably already know this.

The current‘blog’ thread is about this kind of thing. Richard Rohr has been reminding usthat Eckhart Tolle is a friend of many different traditions because he’s nottelling anybody what to see or believe but is instead invitingand skillfully training anybody who's interested to learn how tosee better.

I know verylittle about Eckhart Tolle, but I’m grateful for anybody who is able to help ushumans better see what's most important to us. Seeing is one of the Forms ofSpiritual Formation. Sadly, very few Christians value spiritualformation.

We do valuespiritual transformation, yet we don’t understand how it works. We tend tothink that being moderately faithful day by day will somehow, in God’s time andby God’s grace, transform us. It won’t. It doesn’t.

Mychiropractor has spent years learning how to ‘see’ with her hands. I asked herabout the process. She told me about her years of training--and how shewas still learning. She said some older, seasoned chiropractors no longer hadto ask patients to turn their heads different ways. They could just lay theirhands on certain places and ‘know.’ She said she still needed to follow a morebasic protocol. Me too.

As Imentioned, journaling and talking to God out loud can be really helpful. But,as we say in the South, there’s a whole ‘nother way of prayer that doesn’tinvolve talking at all. Listening to God is as important, probably moreimportant, than talking to God. Yet how many of us have been skillfully trained inlistening?

Wouldn’t itbe nice if we could daily, hourly, moment by moment open our minds and heartsand hands to God to better hear what the Spirit is saying to us?

Well…we can.We have centuries of wisdom to explore, wise teachers to help—and best ofall—no shortcuts.

As we learnto understand the active and living process of transformation, our longingto be transformed is a great and sacred force. Learning how to hear what theSpirit is saying to God's people is a huge part of spiritual formation and transformation. The process begins and continues as we come to trust that cultivating receptive silence takes work.

How much work?

How longdoes it take a chiropractor to 'know' with her hands? When is the trainingover?

Thank Godthere are schools of chiropractice. Thank God there are schools ofcontemplative practice.

How To See

2012-02-09T05:55:00.000-08:00

I remember as a little boy watching the Dick Van Dyke show with my parents. Dick and Mary Tyler Moore were at supper and Dick was going on and on about something that had happened at work that day. Finally, he let out a long sigh and asked, 'What's for dessert?'

Mary said, 'We already had dessert--you had three servings!'

'What was it?' Dick asked.

'Chocolate cream pie.'

'Oh darn,' he moaned. 'That's my favorite!'

My favorite quote from Richard Rohr's article on Eckhart Tolle from yesterday's post is

"He (Tolle) is teaching process not doctrine or dogma. He is teaching how to see and be present, not what you should see when you are present."

The Christianity that most of us Christians have been shaped by has long been stunted by too much emphasis on doctrine and not enough emphasis on process. For too many centuries we've been told what to see instead of being shown how to see.

We have almost two weeks left to celebrity the great invitation shot through the season of Epiphany: "Come and see!"

I'm drawn to mindful practice because through it I am being trained 'to see and be present.' Whatever it is we see when we're more present is simply a truer, richer, more complete version of what we might have seen when we aren't present.

See & Be!

It's a gift. It's a process. It's a training. As rudimentary as practicing scales on the piano and as breath-taking as playing Fur Elise. Grace is equally in the grunt work of practice and the epiphanies of presence.

Life's too short to ever, ever eat three pieces of chocolate cream pie without tasting even one bite.

Eckhart Tolle and the Christian Tradition

2012-02-08T04:39:00.000-08:00

What follows is a reposting of a Richard Rohr article. I find it helpful in two ways. It helps me better understand what Tolle is about. And it models a spirit of Christian curiosity and generosity that I, as a Christian, want to grow in.

Richard Rohr is the chicken crossing the road, showing those who sense how important it is to get to the other side that it can be done!

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Although Eckhart Tolle is arousing great interest today,many think he is a novelty, New Age, or even non-religious. The process—andthat is what it is—that he is teaching, can be traced through the Greek andLatin traditions of contemplation, the apophatic tradition in particular, andthe long history of what was sometimes called "The Sacrament of thePresent Moment" (Brother Lawrence, OCD, Francisco de Osuna, OFM, JeanPierre de Caussade, S.J.).

The mystical tradition inside of Orthodoxy and Catholicismoften divided contemplation into two types: infused or natural contemplation,and acquired contemplation. Evelyn Underhill, the brilliant historian ofmysticism sees three forms of contemplation: 1) Mystical Contemplation of theNatural World, 2) Metaphysical Contemplation of the World of Being andConsciousness, 3) Theological Contemplation of the World of God.

After the oppositional mind that set in place during andafter the Reformation of the 16th century, and after the Enlightenment of the17th-18th centuries, this ancient tradition was largely lost, except amongindividuals. We lost the older Tradition of "praying beyond words" asthe entire Western and Eastern Churches became quite preoccupied with words andproving words to be true or false. This is the only period that Protestantismand Evangelicals have ever known. So for at least 400 years, we have hadneither an understanding of infused nor acquired contemplation! It is suchforeign terrain to almost all Protestants, and most Catholics and Orthodox thatthey immediately think it is heresy or even pagan, when in fact, it is thesolid tradition of the first 1400 years of Christianity! (Which I will try todocument in my next book, The Third Eye).

Tolle is, in fact, rather brilliantly bringing to ourawareness the older tradition of both "infused" or "naturalcontemplation," and the two first types in Underhill's listing. These areboth the ground and the process for breaking through to theologicalcontemplation of God, and acquired contemplation of Jesus, the Gospels, and allspiritual things. He is teaching process not doctrine or dogma. He is teachinghow to see and be present, not what you should see when you are present. Tolleis our friend, and not an enemy of the Gospel. There should be no conflict fora mature Christian. "Anyone who is not against us, is for us," asJesus said, and he also said, "Fear profits nothing."

What Tolle Is Not:

Eckhart Tolle is not a Christian theologian or teacher.
He is not teaching Christian contemplative prayer or Christian prayer at all.
He is not teaching any dogmas or doctrines as such.
He is not presuming or teaching that there is a personal/relational God (but neither is he denying it).
He is not a proponent of the social, communitarian nature of religion.

What Tolle is Doing:

Eckhart Tolle is teaching a form of natural mysticism or contemplative practice.
He is teaching a morality and asceticism of recognizing and letting go of "the self that has to die" (Matthew 16:25), which he calls ego and Jesus calls the "grain of wheat" (John 12:24) ; so that another self can be born, which he would call "consciousness" and we would call the person born again in Christ, or something similar.
He is giving us some practices (Similar to how John Wesley gave "methods" or Ignatius gave "exercises") whereby we can be present to the grace of the moment and stop the "passions," the "egocentric mind," or the "prideful self" which keeps us from true goodness (or God, as we would call it). Each tradition uses different language for what is to be overcome, but it is always some form of "un-love" and selfishness (which he calls ego). TOLLE IS NOT ASKING YOU TO BELIEVE ANYTHING. HE IS ASKING YOU TO TRY SOMETHING! You will know if it is true, if you try it, and you will not know if it is true or false, if you don't try it. No point in arguing it theoretically or in the abstract.
He does assume and imply a worldview that is foreign to many, if not most Christians. For Tolle, Being, Consciousness, God, Reality are all the same thing, which is not all bad, when you come to think of it. Of course, his very point is that you cannot think of it at all, you can only realize it. I would not call him pantheistic (all things are God) as much as panentheistic (God is IN all things).
His brilliant understanding of the "pain body," as he calls it, is actually very close to the Catholic notion of Original Sin, and does give a corporate, communitarian, mystical understanding to religion. We are all in this together, and share one another's pain. I'm not sure he makes clear how we share one another' joy, except that he tends to create very "low maintenance" people who can relax and enjoy life.

In Tolle's world, Jesus is not central. However, he is abeloved teacher, who does it perfectly right himself. "Redemption,"as we understand it, is not necessary beyond letting go of our own fears,negativity, and oppositional energy. He might understand reality itself asgracious. We would localize that grace in and through Jesus, as the"Sacrament" of all of Creation.

Although Tolle is not a Christian teacher, we must notassume that makes him an anti-Christian teacher. Today we need whatever methodsor help we can receive to allow the Christian message to take us to a deeperlevel of transformation. Our history, and our guidance of Western history,shows this has clearly not been happening on any broad scale. This is anopportunity for us to understand our own message at deeper levels. It would bea shame if we required him to speak our language and vocabulary before we couldcritically hear what he is saying—that is true and helpful to our own message.

What if John's Gospel had refused to use the word"Logos" which was a term directly taken from Platonist philosophy?What if Paul had kept the limited vocabulary and categories of Judaism when hepreached in Rome and Athens? What if Thomas Aquinas had not written his Summabecause it was a dialogue with Aristotelian philosophy? Would they have had anysuccess as evangelists?

Admittedly, this will be much harder for those Christianswho emerged after the 16th century when the older contemplative tradition wasno longer taught, or understood even by the older Tradition. Catholics andOrthodox simply have the trustful advantage of apophatic saints like Clement ofAlexandria, Gregory of Nyssa, Gregory Palamas, Dionysius the Areopogite,Bonaventure, Francisco de Osuna, Meister Eckhart (whose name Mr. Tolle chosewhen he recognized his gift as a spiritual teacher!), the Cloud of Unknowing,John of the Cross, and Jean Pierre de Caussade.

Unfortunately, most of Western Christianity has understoodJesus apart from the eternal Trinitarian life and the Pre-Existent CosmicChrist that is presented in Colossians 1:15-20 or Ephesians 1:8-11. Here"The Son" is at work in the universe from the very beginning andeverywhere, and not just during and after Calvary (which Protestantism hastended to exclusively concentrate on). Remember, both Thomas Aquinas andBonaventure said "Deus est Ens," God is Being Itself. This is not newor dangerous teaching, but if ones denominational tradition has no tradition ofphilosophical theology, or no tradition of the pre-existent Christ as theSecond Person of the Trinity inherent in the very pattern of creation, then Iadmit that Eckhart Tolle will be quite foreign terrain. That does not make himwrong.

I have learned to join with Peter, who said after muchresistance, "God has made it clear to me that I must not call anyoneprofane or unclean" (Acts 10:28), and I am willing to hear truth todaywherever it comes from, as long as it does not compromise the Gospel. As St.Thomas Aquinas said, "If it is true, then it is from the HolySpirit."

I must join with Paul who in preaching to the secularAthenians, said "God is not far from any of us, since it is in himthat we live, and move, and have our very being" (Acts 17:28). That isan excellent foundation for trusting Tolle's natural mysticism. We are alsopreaching to a largely secular world, and must find a language that they canunderstand and draw from, as Paul did, and not insist that they learn our vocabularybefore we can even talk to them or hear them. How else can we ever be "allthings to all people" (1 Corinthians 9:22) or dare to think that we can"preach the Gospel to all creation" (Mark 16:16)?

Overcome. Resisted. Ignored. Repressed.

2012-02-07T08:17:00.000-08:00

The first day of first grade was a big deal. My oldest brother was in the eighth grade. Middle brother was in fifth. A family in the neighborhood was my carpool. They came in a green 1954 Dodge. "Time to go to school, Buddy," my brothers said.

I realized my mother was still in her pajamas, and it suddenly swept over me like wildfire, "Momma--you're not going with me?"

My mom ran the preschool program at our YWCA. I'd been a pre-schooler forever. Loved it. Had bunches of kids and endless toys to play with five days a week. AND...my own wonderful mom was always there.

The ground fell out beneath me. I was stricken. Terrified.

"I'm not going!" I screamed.

"Of course you are. You'll be fine."

"I won't. I'm NOT going."

I remember my brothers saying, "Don't be such a sissy!" The oldest came to pick me up and carry me out to the green Dodge.

I grabbed the banister. Held on with all my strength. Cried, "No, don't, please let me stay with Momma!"

As you can imagine, I didn't when that argument. My fingers were pried free. I was carried to the car. I went to the first day of first grade with a cavernous sense of terror and betrayal whose roots still, after all these year, sometimes clutch at my heart.

For decades I've 'overcome' 'resisted' 'ignored' 'repressed' and 'walled off' the strong sensations that often pulse from the part of my brain where that experience is stored.

I posted yesterday a snippet of brain science that I find helpful--about how our limbic and other lower brain processes naturally pulse with unpleasant feelings associated with the experience of fear, anger, anxiety etc. How that's just the way our bodies work. I find science about the way we're wired helpful and potentially freeing, and I work at remembering and remembering about this hard-wiring when my limbic system, etc., fire their warnings.

On the other hand, deep down in the neurons where memories are stored and carried, a terrified little boy is still clutching a banister.

So I also find it very helpful to be gentle with the memory. To be a wiser big brother to my fears than my brothers, at that time in their lives, we able to be with me. To be a better parent to my young terrified self than my mother was able, at that time in her life, to be at that moment in my life.

See clearly. Love dearly.

This is a wonderful and healing process--holding 'stuff' in compassionate awareness.

We can work with our neurons and with our stories both with clear attention and unshakable kindness.

"What's Wrong With Me?"

2012-02-06T12:34:00.000-08:00

Do you ever think to yourself when you're having strong, persistent, unpleasant feelings, "What's wrong with me?"

You're in good company if you do.

What's wrong with us is being human.Our brains have evolved over millions of years and the 'wisdom of the ages' is carried there--from the base of our brain stems to the top of our prefrontal cortices--from the slyness of our lizard selves right up to the fullness of our better angels.

Neuro-scientists are discovering more and more about how our brains work. I only retain (in my older brain) little bits of the details they report, though I regularly read what they write. And though I can't seem to master the facts, I do usually come away encouraged and even chuckling, because I do 'get' a 'something' that seems important and wise and full of grace.

What follows are a few snippets from Rick Hansons's book, The Buddha's Brain. Just enough to keep us curious about why we experience such insistent impulses--and how mindfulness helps us understand and work more wisely with how our brains actually work.

Your brain evolved from the bottom up and the insideout, along what is called the neuroaxis (Lewis and Todd 2007; Tucker,Derryberry, and Luv 2000), which is one way to conceptualize the organizationof the brain.

With equanimity, you see into the transient and imperfect nature ofexperience, and your aim is to remain disenchanted—free of the spells cast bypleasure and pain. In this—rather Buddhist—sense of the word, disenchanted, youare not disappointed or dissatisfied with life; you simply see through itsapparent charms and alarms and are not knocked off center by either.Understanding and intention are both grounded in the prefrontal cortex. Theintention to remain equanimous relies in particular on the anterior cingulatecortex (ACC) hub in the neuroaxis.

Equanimity also involves remaining aware of the passing stream withoutletting any bit of it hook you. This entails anterior cingulate oversight,especially in the beginning stages of equanimity. As equanimity deepens,meditators report an effortless continuity of mindfulness, which presumablycorrelates with reduced ACC activity and self-organizing stability in theneural substrates of awareness.

The limbic, HPAA, and sympathetic nervous systems react to each other incircular ways. For example, if something frightening occurs, your body willtend to become activated (e.g., increased heart rate, sweaty palms) and thosebodily changes will be interpreted by the limbic system as evidence of athreat, which will trigger more fear reactions in a vicious cycle. Throughactivating the parasympathetic nervous system (PNS), you prevent thestress-response system from reacting to its own reactions. This is one reasonwhy the training for equanimity in contemplative settings involves considerablerelaxation and tranquility.

Over time, equanimity deepens into a profound inner stillness that is adefining characteristic of contemplative absorption (Brahm 2006). It alsobecomes increasingly woven into daily life, bringing great benefit. If you canbreak the link between feeling tones and craving—if you can be with thepleasant without chasing after it, with the unpleasant without resisting it,and with the neutral without ignoring it—then you have cut the chain ofsuffering, at least for a time. And that is an incredible blessing and freedom.

Waiting: First...Then...Next...

2012-02-05T07:43:00.000-08:00

The lesson from the Hebrew scriptures today in the Revised Common Lectionary is familiar and much loved:

Those who wait for the LORD shall renew theirstrength,

they shall mount up with wings like eagles,

they shall run and not be weary,

they shall walk and not faint.

The possibility of being worn out and worn down and being renewed is a wonderful thought to work with. And the image of that eagle, riding an updraft, is iconic.

We're told in this Isaiah passage that those who wait soar.

Wait, as it's used here, is a verb. It's a perfect yin yang kind of verb. Patient and Active.

The Gospel for today tells about Jesus going home with Peter and Andrew. Healing their sick mother. Meeting the needs of all the neighbors who come seeking help.

Then it shows how Jesus waits on God and is renewed.

First...he sleeps.

Then he gets up early.

Next he walks out to a deserted place.

Then he converses with God.

Out of this sacred time of 'waiting on God' comes discernment. Peter and Andrew, James and John find Jesus--tell him how many other of the town's people are already gathering, needing his wisdom, his prayers, his healing.

Jesus says, "We need to move on. Other people have needs, too. It's crucial that the experience of God's love and concern gets spread widely."

When we wait on the Lord, we can get clear guidance. The discernment Jesus sought was gut-wrenching. And clear. And renewing.

If we just wait for God passively, we can wait a very long time without discernment or renewing. But if we do it something like Jesus did, we might, in one way in another, catch an updraft every morning.

Small Self Big Self False Self True Self

2012-02-04T06:09:00.000-08:00

If any ofyou wants to go where I go, you must stop romancing your small self, face your greatest challenge, and follow me. If you try to hang on to your life, you will lose it. Butif you let it go for my sake and for the sake of what the world needs to see and here, youwill find your truest self. --Jesus

Theemptiness of self shows itself first in our lack of control over our supposedlyfixed 'self.' Anyone who turns inward to meditation or prayer immediatelyencounters the ever-changing thought stream of mind, the endless ripples ofmoods and emotions that color each moment. These thought streams and emotionshave a life of their own. Inmeditation we can shift our attention from the sense of everything beingconsciously tied together as 'my experience' to a more silent, less possessiveobservation. This silent observation allows us to see the first aspect ofemptiness, called selflessness or egolessness. --Jack Kornfield

‘It iseasiest for God to find us when we are not there.' --AngelusSilesius

Up Close. From a Distance

2012-02-02T09:40:00.000-08:00

This image of the Mona Lisa is an installation at the North Carolina Museum of Art in Raleigh. The background image is big--something like 7ft x 7ft. The image in the foreground is created within a 2 inch diameter clear globe (with an 8 inch handle). When you look into the globe, Mona Lisa turns 'right-side-up.'

But what's really interesting is the medium of the background image. It's made of hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of ordinary spools of thread laid side by side and stacked one upon another.

From a distance, as you approach the area, you just see a big picture of an up-side-down Mona Lisa and wonder why somebody wanted to stand her on her head.

But as you get closer you see how pixelated she is. Closer still you discover that the pixels are nothing but spools of thread--the kind you could buy at Walmart. And you think, Good Lord, how did the artist manage to do this? Then, Why did the artist want to do this--what inspired him or her?

Then you start playing with the crystal globe-on-a-handle. You can lift it out of its base and move it around. The image moves around as you do; shows up in different surfaces of the glass. It seems a little like you're holding a magic wand.

Without knowing what the intent of the artist was, I began, perhaps, to experience what the artist intended. Wow--isn't this cool! A bunch of thread-spools taking on such a familiar and lovely shape. What a work of love--figuring out all those shades of thread and stacking all those spools!

We never see people as they are. And try as we do to create better images of ourselves, other people neither see us as we hope or as we truly are. We see through a glass, if not always darkly, at least incompletely.

We experience our selves incompletely, too. Our ideas of our selves and others around us is refracted through many different lenses.

Slowing down and taking an honest look at how we see before we jump to conclusions about what we see is a game changer.

Seeing how much trouble I go to to stack my spools in order for people to see the 'me' I want to project--makes me want to laugh and makes me want to cry.

It's like when Martha Stewart was fussing over the marzipan animals she was making to decorate her Thanksgiving turkey platter said, "Oh, it's no trouble at all." And her guest (Julia Child no less!) said, "Looks like a lot of trouble to me!"

Meditating, simply welcoming whatever is going on in the mind and body with honesty and kindness, tends to teach us to agree more with Julia than with Martha.

On the other hand, as we do begin to see how much trouble we've gone to most of our lives, putting our best foot forward, it's easier to smile along with everybody else--stacking all those spools, upside down, specially crafting the right kind of globe to turn us right-side-up again.

To look through the globe and appreciate the image! And then to move closer--and appreciate all the work!

And then to find a place nearer the middle where we're able to see both the image and the reality with honesty and compassion. It's still amazing--and from the right perspective, even beautiful.

What Feels Better Than Being Right?

2012-02-01T08:26:00.000-08:00

Monday I wrote about what it was like for me to be vehemently challenged by an old friend from my Evangelical days about my present support for LBGT couples being able to have the same legal rights as straight folks.

In the blog I mentioned some of my initial feelings--anger, pride, self-righteousness--a quick desire to put this person in his place!

I also mentioned what can happen when we're willing to slow down, to very mindfully pause and notice all the ingredients of what's stewing in us--pause to let things settle so we can follow our deeper desires.

A wise person was asked--'What are the teachings of a lifetime?' The wise person answered, 'An appropriate response.'

Whether we're Muslim or Sufi or Jewish or Hindu or Buddhist or Christian, we have a commitment in common to embody love wisely and courageously. Embodying kindness and compassion wisely is an appropriate response.

Sometimes it's embodied forcefully. Most times our best response is more even.

Anyway, after 'sleeping on it' I wrote this back to my Evangelical friend:

Sean (not the real name),

The reason I'm in favor of gay couples being able to marry is a long, long story. Took me a long time to study and pray and listen my way to it.

My middle brother was gay. Having somebody you love and know really well gives you a steady reason to talk to God about something like this.

What I noticed over the years with my brother was how hard he tried to be straight. He was never openly gay. He married. Loved God and his family. But was also miserable deep down in his experience of hiding his true self. I knew he was not a 'deviant' in any way. No more sinful than me--in any way. He was just wired differently.

But (and you know well how this works) I also loved God and the scriptures. I could no more set scripture aside than I could set my love of my brother aside.

I remember reading a book in seminary, a collection of essays by Evangelical scholars about God, gays, and the Bible. I was struck that not one of the writers didn't agonize as he/she wrestled with the issue. I think all of them had friends or family that were gay or lesbian and so their writing wasn't just detached study but was also a real work of the soul.

I went about my search in a similar way. I've read, referenced wise commentary, and pondered every thing the Bible says about homosexuality...too much to put in a Facebook message!

But since I need to to pick a few bible passages that have been decisive for me...

The first is from Genesis: "The LORD God said, "It is not good for the man to be alone." Amen. What a wonderful blessing it is to have a life partner.

The second is from Galatians: "There is no longer Jew or Gentile, slave or free, male and female. For you are all one in Christ Jesus." I don't think this is an exhaustive list, Sean. I think this is the pattern of how God works--continually opening our hearts and actions where they've been closed.

The next is from Mark: "Jesus said, 'Come, follow me...'" The longer I live the more I realize how much faith it takes to follow Jesus. He's the living Covenant, you know? We can't follow scripture the same way we follow Jesus. When scripture gets carved into stone, it becomes Law not Gospel.

Faith has 2 'opposites.' One, as everybody knows, is doubt. The other is trickier...it's certainty.

For myself, Sean, faithfulness and trust keep moving me on to where, to the best of my ability to discern, Jesus is leading me to love in bigger and ever more generous ways.

I've come to know and love a lot of gay and lesbian Christian couples over the years. I see God working in them just like God works in you and me. Faithful, loving, worshiping, praying, vital, growing people.

The main thing that's different is how much they suffer from judgment, discrimination, even demonization. I believe God wants this to change.

This is really ironic if it's true, you know? That what needs to change is not homosexual orientation but heterosexual orientation. We heteros may need to get better oriented to following a living Gospel.

Anyway, this is a long story made short about why I'm in favor of LGBT couples having the same rights as straight folks.

Letting go means just what it says

2012-01-31T07:50:00.000-08:00

Whenever we practice the Sacred Pause, we also bump right into the possibility of practicing Letting Go.

A lot of us know how helpful (and advisable) it is to let go. Nobody that I know is all that good at it. It's what some folks would call a 'growing edge' for us. I practice letting go enough to realize that I don't practice letting go enough! But I think it gets easier to practice as we get better at recognizing its potential and experimenting with the many, many opportunities we get to let go.

Jon Kabat-Zinn has a wise perspective on it--a wise perspective sometimes obscured by overlong sentences and complex syntax!

But it's easy enough to forgive Brother Jon when we stay with him long enough to discover what very insightful things he knows and is committed to passing on. I'm very grateful to him.

What follows is one short chapter from his book, Wherever You Go There You Are.

---

The phrase “letting go” has to be high in therunning for New Age cliché of the century. It is overused, abused daily. Yet itis such a powerful inward maneuver that it merits looking into, cliché or no.There is something vitally important to be learned from the practice of lettinggo.

Letting go means just what it says. It’s an invitation tocease clinging to anything—whether it be an idea, a thing, an event, aparticular time, or view, or desire. It is a conscious decision to release withfull acceptance into the stream of present moments as they are unfolding. Tolet go means to give up coercing, resisting, or struggling, in exchange forsomething more powerful and wholesome which comes out of allowing things to beas they are without getting caught up in your attraction to or rejection ofthem, in the intrinsic stickiness of wanting, of liking and disliking. It’sakin to letting your palm open to unhand something you have been holding on to.

But it’s not only the stickiness of our desires concerningouter events which catches us. Nor is it only a holding on with our hands. Wehold on with our minds. We catch ourselves, get stuck ourselves, by holding,often desperately, to narrow views, to self-serving hopes and wishes. Lettinggo really refers to choosing to become transparent to the strong pull of ourown likes and dislikes, and of the unawareness that draws us to cling to them.To be transparent requires that we allow fears and insecurities to playthemselves out in the field of full awareness.

Letting go is only possible if we can bring awareness andacceptance to the nitty-gritty of just how stuck we can get, if we allowourselves to recognize the lenses we slip so unconsciously between observer andthat then filter and color, bend and shape our view. We can open in thosesticky moments, especially if we are able to capture them in awareness andrecognize it when we get caught up in either pursuing and clinging orcondemning and rejecting in seeking our own gain.

Stillness, insight, and wisdom arise only when we can settleinto being complete in this moment, without having to seek or hold on to orreject anything. This is a testable proposition. Try it out just for fun. Seefor yourself whether letting go when a part of you really wants to hold ondoesn’t bring a deeper satisfaction than clinging.

I really hate being told I'm wrong

2012-01-30T07:36:00.000-08:00

Yesterday I posted a video on Facebook of a youngwoman interviewing people on the Western Carolina University Campus about a controversial amendment we have coming up in NC this May. What we'llbe saying Yes or No to in North Carolina is this:

“Marriage between one man and one woman is theonly domestic legal union that shall be valid or recognized in this State.”

The young woman doing the interviewing at Westernis part of a group trying to raise consciousness about what a huge impact thisvote will have.

She's also very passionately opposed to theammendment and hopes to get lots of folks to vote against it. I'llcertainly be voting against it.

Later in the day a Christian friendI haven't seen in 3 decades, somebody I've recently become Facebook friendswith, sent me a very strongly worded, rebuking kind of message. One of thescripture quotes in it was, "Woe to those who call good evil and evilgood."

Funny, the sermon I preached yesterday was abouthow hard it is to let go of BEING RIGHT.

I really like to be right.

I really don't like not being right.

I really hate being told I'm wrong.

So...getting this message from an old friend gaveme a wonderful opportunity to practice, yet again, what I preach.

And I don't mean I think this means I'm wrong inwhat I believe. It's just that mature spirituality offers wiser ways to relateto the whole concept of RIGHT & WRONG.

I quoted Yehuda Amichai's poem in yesterday'ssermon:

From the place where we are right
Flowers will never grow
In the spring.

The place where we are right
Is hard and trampled
Like a yard.

But doubts and loves
Dig up the world
Like a mole, a plow.
And a whisper will be heard in the place
Where the ruined
House once stood.

Great wisdom in this poem. Especially for those of us withstrong attachments to being right.

Reading the Facebook message frommy old friend was a great time to practice The Sacred Pause.

I was so riled up. Three or four possibleresponses popped into to my head. Fueling every one of them was that potent mix of anger and pride and self-righteousness that drives so manyunhelpful 'discussions.'

Sensing those strong feelings--anger and pride andself-righteousness in myself--reminded me to simply pause. To just be with whatI was thinking and feeling. To try to view it all and feel it all withoutacting on any of it...YET.

To tell the truth it was kind of a messy process.The phrase "stewing in his own juices" comes to mind.

Eventually, however, the heat under us and in us always gets turned down. Noteven a simmer left.

And we find two really good results have come. One is that we've been able to see and smell and taste almost everything that's been stewing (nothing much edible or edifying!). The other is we haven't jumped to a hasty action.

A seeker once asked a sage, "What is thewisdom of a lifetime?" The teacher answered, "An appropriateresponse."

Pausing is the practice that allows space for anAppropriate Response to be sought, awaited, recognized, considered,and embodied.

Life's too short to cook up and serveself-righteousness. Especially when your deepest desire is to cook up and servesomething so much richer.

The Mutant Possum

2012-01-28T07:53:00.000-08:00

I heard about a farmer in the Midwest who was really good at cross-breeding corn. He paid a lot of attention to which varieties had the best qualities and patiently mingled them in ways that naturally 'incarnated' the best qualities of each into his experimental crops.

When he was satisfied that the new seeds were really good, and when he'd got enough, he'd share them with neighboring farmers.

Somebody asked him, "Wouldn't it be better for your business if you kept the best seed for yourself--wouldn't it give you an edge with your buyers?"

The farmer said, "No. When my neighbors grow inferior corn, it'll cross-breed with my corn and take me backwards. Sharing is better for all of us."

Cultivating and sharing goodness is a wise thing.

The agro-conglomerate Monsanto entices farmers to switch to Monsanto's genetically modified seed and then SUES those farmers if, after a successful harvest, they save some of the harvested seed from their own crops to plant the following year.

Monsanto also sues farmers whose neighboring non-GMO crops cross-pollinate with Monsanto's GMO crops making them 'inferior.' They even sue farmers whose own organic fields get cross-pollinated by Monsanto's GMO crops and the GMO corn 'naturally' springs up here and there in the organic farmers' fields. They sue the organic farmers for patent infringement!

Cultivating and enforcing small-mindedness is not a wise thing.

Monsanto is more like the possum than the chicken.

Except Monsanto is a GMO possum.

On steroids. A mutant possum bullying traffic. Buying up roads. Suing drivers. Refusing to evolve naturally. Forcing growth unnaturally and unwisely.

The Monsantos of the world are a reality. Thank God for those who know how to take wise action in opposition to them. May the rest of us be mindful of what products to support and which to avoid.

The world is always in need of people who know how to grow and cross-pollinate wisely in the evolution of the human spirit.

Problems cannot be solved at the level of consciousness that creates them.

Creator of us all, help us grow.

Incarnating the Possible

2012-01-27T08:48:00.000-08:00

Junior year in high school, I think it was April, my friend George invited some of us guys to his parents' cottage in the North Carolina mountains. He said he had some really great places to show us.

We got to the cottage at night, figured out who was sleeping where, woke up, had a hurried breakfast. George said, "Lets go!"

Took us maybe twenty five minutes to drive east on 64 then south on 281 and come to a pull-off alongside the Horse Pasture River.

As soon as we opened the doors we could hear a waterfall. Always something exciting about that.

We followed George down a little path that led to the top of the falls. George said, "Take off your shoes." Then he began to wade across about twenty feet upriver of the falls. We followed.

The water was really, really cold.

There was another path on the far side. It led down beside the falls. "Drift Falls," George told us.

The path was steep, rocky, kind of washed out, weaving around rhododendron through which we had a broken but continuing view of the falls. About half way down George turned off the trail and took us out to rocky edge of the waterfall itself.

Drift Falls isn't a 90 degree straight down waterfall. More like 45 degrees--like a sliding board beside a swing-set. A really huge, bumpy, roaring, flooded kind of sliding board.

George took off his shirt.

"What are you doing, George!?" somebody asked. I don't remember which of us spoke, but it was the question on everybody's mind.

"I'm gonna slide down," George said.

None of believed him. We were a band of scoffers. The water was so fast, so cold, the prospect was so scary.

About 40 feet and directly below where George was standing a big plume of water, a rooster tail, shot up and out treacherously. Impossible.

"No way!" we said.

George smiled at us, a little disdainfully, turned his head downstream and sat down.

Immediately the river took him. His legs were straight ahead. He kept his hands flat against the falls for balance and, it seemed to me, for navigation. In a blink of an eye he was going as fast as the water, shooting forward, his back ramrod straight, his eyes fixed ahead.

He managed, just barely, to miss the rooster tail. But the contour of that great slab of granite beneath the falls has a certain kind of launching effect about 10 feet below the bottom. It lifted George, impressively, off his butt, into the air and then into the big pool of water at the falls' base.

He disappeared under the white wavy water and popped right back up with the kind of great and happy scream a boy has when he's done something big and brave and fun.

The four of us back up on the rock beside the falls looked at each other with a very different kind of feeling, though still a big one. George had shown us, like the chicken showed the possum, that sliding down Drift Falls could be done.

What George did was a very, very powerful kind of showing. We boys, standing up there, still on the dry side of adventure, knew we had to decide if we were men enough to do it.

---

I hope to continue this thread tomorrow. Friday's my day off and right now it's time to turn my head toward chores, remembering how many times and how many ways I've been shown by friends and family that chores, too, can lift us off our butts and into life's stream.

(Though most Fridays I'd just as soon slide down a cold waterfall.)

A Sense of the Possible

2012-01-26T05:51:00.000-08:00

One morning at breakfast in the church I served in Norfolk, a little boy about five years old came up and tugged on my sleeve. He was smiling--a big, mischievous smile. "Wanna hear a great joke?"

"Sure," I said.

He said, "Why did the chicken cross the road?"

Somehow I couldn't imagine how a Why did the chicken joke could be great. But his smile was great, so I gamely replied, "I don't know. Why did the chicken cross the road?"

With a voice and affect of a teacher passing on the coolest insight in the world he declared, "To show the possum it Can Be Done!"

All of us at the table laughed and laughed. This was 20 years ago. I still think this really is one of the coolest insights in the world.

In 15 words he'd given me as good a definition of Incarnation as I've ever heard.

When Jesus invited people to "Come and see!" what was he inviting them to come and see?

When Einstein said, "Problems can't be solved at the level of consciousness that created them," what was he trying to tell us?

As we all discover, there are a million ways to be wrong, to be hurt, to get tired of being hurt. In one way it's really wise to stop trying to cross the road. Better to stay where we are than to be road-kill.

But then here comes that chicken, crossing the un-crossable. And if we're open and honest, we won't keep telling ourselves it can't be done.

If we're open and honest we'll say to ourselves, "Holy crap--it can be done!"

And then maybe, "It's possible--I just don't know how to do it."

Living in the tension of the not yet possible can be very unpleasant. We often beat ourselves up for not doing what we 'should be able to do.'

On the other hand, living in the tension of the not yet possible can be energizing, stimulating--it can connect us to the very positive sense of curiosity and hopefulness.

One of the great gifts of life is to witness other people crossing roads we haven't yet been able to navigate. This is one of the ways God gets into the world.

Jesus says, Come and see! Einstein nudges us to another level of consciousness. A little kid, five years old, gives his assistant rector some of the most helpful assistance he's ever had.

There are a lot of roads we don't know how to cross...yet.

"Oh, Lord," let us pray, "keep sending us evolved chickens."

A Hundred Years of Rain

2012-01-25T08:39:00.000-08:00

I remember so well hearing James Taylor for the first time. I was a freshman at UT, Knoxville, driving home to my apartment. I heard a guitar played in a way I'd never heard before. An extraordinary voice came through that so-so radio. Then, O my God, such harmony. I actually had to pull my old Ford Galaxy over to the side of the road--I was so lost in the song it wasn't safe to keep driving.

James Taylor has written so many wonderful songs over the years. I love listening to him.

Yet like almost all song writers, way too many of his songs are about eros love. Our culture puts way to much hope and weight on finding fulfillment in romantic relationships.

A wonderful partner is a wonderful thing, but nobody can make anybody else whole. We must tend to our wholeness ourselves and cultivate love in many, many other ways.

There's a wonderful line near the end of Shakespeare's Much Ado About Nothing. Benedick, who has been sparring with Beatrice the whole play (and we've been hoping all along they'll figure out they love other) finally realizes the moment is right and, recognizing that Beatrice is feeling sad and tired a little lost, he offers her (very tenderly!) this advice:

"Serve God. Love me. And mend!"

It's such a lovely moment in the play. And pretty close to good advice.

Except that to serve God and truly mend, we have to widen and deepen and focus our love beyond one lover. And I don't mean that we should be serially monogamous or poly-amorous!

I mean we have a reservoir of love that's big enough to spill over, at least potentially, everywhere we are and onto everyone we're with. Springs of living water--enough and more to sustain complete and complex gardens.

Something marvelous, of priceless beauty, can grow in flower pot. It takes something bigger to grow a garden.

I love JT's songs. Mean Old Man is a great example of his great writing.

Listen to it again or scan the lyrics below. Think about how all of us need saving from time to time--and how wonderful it is to be cared about and cherished--to have our hearts buoyed up--to feel delivered from 'a hundred years of rain.'

Care deeply about yourself. Tend to your own wholeness. Cultivate your deepest places. Fill up with living water. Allow that water to flow on to wider places.

Serve God. Love many. Mend.
Tend the world.

---

Mean Old Man
by James Taylor

On my own
How could I have known?
Imagine my surprise
Just a fool
From a tree full of fools
Who can't believe his eyes
Imagine my surprise

I was a mean old man
I was an ornery cuss
I was a dismal Dan
I made an awful fuss
Ever since my life began
Man, it was ever thus
I was a nasty tyke who was hard to like

I had to misbehave
I did things in reverse
Refused to wash or shave
I was horrid to my nurse
I got back what I gave
Which only made me worse
I had to have my way
Which was bleak and gray, oh dear

Living in here
One hundred years of rain
Such a drag
This riches to rags
With just myself to blame
A dirty low-down shame

Silly me
Silly old me
Somewhere outside my mind
Clever you
Walking me through
Willing to lead the blind
Just in the nick of time

Who gets a second chance?
Who gets to have some fun?
Who gets to learn to dance
Before his race is run?
Who gets to shed his skin?
Who comes up born again?
Who was a mean old man
'Til you turned him into a golden retriever
Puppy dog
Who's a good boy?

Damming and Undamming Life

2012-01-24T07:38:00.000-08:00

A nice little creek ran behind the houses on the block where I grew up. We neighborhood kids loved to play in and around it. One of the things we liked to do was build dams. It wasn't easy to build a good dam--especially when the only tools we used were hands and feet and sticks.

We had good materials, though--lots of rocks, almost limitless sand, sticky clay--sometimes red, sometimes almost white.

The first part of the dam was never a problem. Line up a row of big stones, put little ones in the holes, great handfuls of sand behind on the upstream side.

But as soon as we'd got the first two thirds working okay, that meant all the water started flowing through the one third of the stream bed that was not yet dammed. The flow was three times stronger there. It was harder to get rocks to stay put!

We figured out that we had to use bigger rocks on the last third. And we had to work faster.

But then, once we finally got our rocks and sand and clay to hold, the water would start flowing over the top somewhere and start eroding those spill-over places from the top down.

Oh, well. In the meantime we had fun splashing around in the little reservoirs we'd created behind our dams.

At some point somebody brought a piece of an old pipe and 'installed' it at one end near the top of our newest dam. Worked pretty well. The water could collect behind the dam and then could flow out without washing big chunks of the dam away. At least for a while.

In the end, our lovely dams always collapsed. But as kids we were just about as happy to jump over to the downstream side and feel the rush of let-go water as we'd been to play in the pent-up water the moment before.

About three decades later, I remembered those dams, and the memories were sacramental. I had developed a strange intolerance for tight clothes. Couldn't bear tight collars, tight waist bands, tight shoes.

Long story told short--I saw a good therapist, got wise and gentle counsel, and this strange irritation from tight places began to ease. Too much had been dammed up in me. My psyche had gotten too good at bottling stuff up.

I've had a lot of good therapy since, learned to recognize better what damming the flow feels like--and what it does to my life, inside and out.

One of the reasons I like mindfulness practice so much is because it can be such good therapy.

Mindfulness is simply the practice of paying kind attention to our lives, inside and out. Noticing how our lives flow, noticing what's dammed, what's eroding, what's leaking, and what's working.

In many ways mindful people, over time and with practice and good teaching, become their own therapists. We bring honest, nonjudgmental Presence to our woundedness, our confusion, and our wholeness.

As a God person, I think of this process as incarnational: welcoming God's wise and loving Presence so regularly that it begins to be palpably embodied.

One more thing about mindfulness--sometimes it helps us experience our lives like kids again. As we keep bringing curiosity to more and more moments, something in us remembers what it once was like to be really good at being curious, adventurous, experimental, and playful.

Dangers in the Deep End

2012-01-23T07:48:00.000-08:00

Almost all of us need encouragement to risk going deeper in our lives. The ego likes it better when we don't contradict its opinion of itself.

Frank Leahy, football coach at Notre Dame, famously said, "Egotism is the anestheticthat dulls the pain of stupidity.” Our egos are made to protect 'us' from full disclosure of our 'usual selves'--until we're mature enough to protect and nurture our full and becoming selves in wiser ways.

But if we don't want to stay ignorant of who we are and what we're made of--if we don't want to continue to stunt our growth--we have to risk going deeper, getting to know better both the what and the how of our thinking and feeling. On the way we will meet uncomfortable stuff. Sometimes scary stuff.

Ann Lamott famously writes, "My mind's like a bad neighborhood--I try not to go there alone." That's not just true of Ann Lamott. We all have bad neighborhoods somewhere in us.

Encouragement to go deeper is helpful. Cautioning about going deeper is helpful.

Most of what this blog is about is encouragement. I've been helped so much by intentional spiritual formation, by meditation, by mindful practice, that I can't not want to pass it on.

I keep saying, one way and another, try this! Take time for mindful practice! Don't just read about it--do it!

I say this because it's only in the do-ing that we actually go deeper and have our lives continually being transformed, slowly and surely.

Some time in the process, however, we come upon memories, feelings, traumas, woundedness that's just more than we can handle. More than we can 'say grace over.'

It's helpful at times like these to consult a therapist, a spiritual director, a wise pastor, rabbi, meditation teacher, etc.

And it's also helpful to know that scary stuff is stored in all of us. When you meet dark stuff in yourself it won't just be 'your' stuff. Dark matter and black holes are apparently universal.

Sometimes by going deeper I trigger feelings in myself--black moods that are both deeply troubling and persistent.

Don't be surprised when it happens to you. Don't be horrified or despondent, either.

The good news is that the honest seeing we practice in meditation coupled with the compassionate holding of all we experience in meditation combine to bring healing and integration of all the 'stuff' we uncover in meditation.

Speaking of practice--when we get triggered by scary stuff, it's really helpful to know how to do simple focused breathing. Purposeful, deep, strong, loud breathing. Following the breath as it comes in through the nose, down into the throat and chest--noting the way our chests expand, our diaphragms move. Then following the breath out again. No thinking! Just simple and complete attention on the breath over and over and over.

Doing this for 5 or 10 minutes can be remarkably centering, soothing, restoring.

If you intend to continue going deeper into mindful practice, you might want to practice this every now and then--so that when you need it you'll have it.

Diving Lessons

2012-01-22T07:00:00.000-08:00

The Revised Common Lectionary gives us a reading from Jonah today. The story of Jonah fits right in with our continuing DIVING, and DEEP END OF THE POOL theme.

It's hard to read Jonah and not think about all the time that's been wasted on arguing about whether or not it's possible for a person to survive the digestive processes of a big fish or a whale.

Most people haven't heard that the book of Jonah is a Wisdom text, not a book of prophesy like Isaiah and Jeremiah and Ezekiel, etc., etc.

Jonah is a wise and wonderful PARABLE.

God asks Jonah to carry a message of redemption to Nineveh--Israel's historic and bitter enemy. Jonah books passage on a boat going the other direction. When it comes to finding room in his heart for an enemy, Jonah is completely out of his depth.

So what does God do to nurture a bigger love in Jonah?

God sends a storm. God sends a storm that begins to sink Jonah's ship. The storm is a gift to get Jonah in deeper water. The sailors, against their will, toss the runaway prophet into the waves.

Jonah sinks.

God sends a big fish.

The fish transports Jonah in the direction opposite Jonah's heart: The Big Fish swims toward Nineveh, toward the deep end of life.

One of the great myths of our culture is that we love love--that we love love's depths--that we love to fall in love and experience love's depths.

We do love to fall in love. But even then, we resist love's depths. Love's depths are scary and painful. We rarely want to go there. It often takes storms and metaphorical big fish to move us to places where our hearts are challenged to grow, to deepen, to stretch.

An interesting thing about Jonah is that it ends with a question. Jonah, very begrudgingly, has carried God's message to Nineveh. He walks somewhere near the center of town and in a one-off 8 word speech warns the town folk of impending judgment and then walks on through town to find a vantage point to watch Nineveh be destroyed.

It's summer in Nineveh. Hot as hell. Jonah is miserable. God sends a vine to shade Jonah's hard head. Jonah is filled with joy!

God sends a worm to eat the vine. Then God sends a fiery desert wind. Jonah is miserable again and turns as peevish as 4 year old who didn't get his nap. "I'm so uncomfortable I could just die!"

Then God tries one more time to widen and deepen Jonah's heart--with wisdom that ends in a question:

‘Is it right for you to be angryabout the bush?’ And Jonah said, ‘Yes, angry enough to die.’ Then the Lord said,‘You are concerned about the vine, for which you did not labor and which youdid not grow; it came into being in a night and perished in a night. Andshould I not be concerned about Nineveh, that great city, in which there aremore than a hundred and twenty thousand people who do not know their right handfrom their left, and also many animals?’

The book ends with this question.

Jonah is a parable about God's big love. God sends us lots of wonderful things--storms, creatures of the deep, shade, worms, hot dry winds--all as a heart-deepening gift.

God sends us these little gifts so God can send other people bigger gifts. The bigger gifts God is always preparing to send is us--our own deepened and stretched by big love selves.

Should God not send us these little gifts?

The Gift of the Sacred Pause

2012-01-21T06:49:00.000-08:00

Another way of taking refuge, similar to the trout resting behind a rock in calmer water, is the Sacred Pause. It's a remarkably simply practice--a remarkably simple practice that leads over and over into consternation and then on to insight and possibility and peace.

Here's the simplicity of it: Any time you're in the middle of something and you feel pressured or tense, frustrated or confused, angry or afraid...Pause. Don't go with the flow--step out of it. Whatever you're about to do...don't. Just don't. Simply...Pause.

Remembering to Pause is like the trout remembering where the river's best rocks are.

Actually Pausing is our movement to the still place behind the rock.

The current around us is still just as strong as it was--only we're not exactly in it anymore. We sense the rush and the roar, we sense some of the old tug too, often very strongly.

But here's thing--the current is not taking us where it usually does because we're pausing and resting in a stiller place.

And then?

Then something else, something fresh becomes possible.

One of the first times I gave pausing a real try was in the middle of one those habitual arguments couples get into. One of those 30 year kind of arguments where you each dig in to the same old position you've always had and lob rocks (or grenades) over the other's wall.

A few minutes into the escalating battle, I remembered the possibility of pausing. And tried it.

I stopped arguing. At least out-loud. There were still lots of heaving and seething in part of me--but there was also this other thing, this other thing I was trying to embody, this Pause thing.

I settled into breathing, in and out, in and out, trying to listen both to what my wife was saying and to my own aggravated thoughts and feelings. It wasn't easy but it was doable.

At first I thought maybe that without actually participating in the argument out loud myself, she'd stop too. But finally having a chance to say what she wanted to say without smart-ass interruptions and attacks from me was apparently too sweet an opportunity to miss--she let me have for about 10 or 15 more minutes--which gave me an extended opportunity to explore Sacred Pausing in depth!

It was painful. It was promising. It was obvious that Pausing was full of fresh possibilities.

Why...I could use this time to find the perfect stone to throw--and wait till just the right moment to sling it--like a major league pitcher picking a runner off first base!

Or...I could use the time and space of this pausing, this resting behind a rock and out of the strongest currents to actually try to embody my deepest self's intentions.

My deepest self's intentions are a lot more loving than my habitual self's intentions.

So much is possible when instead of doing the usual thing we open our minds and hearts to deeper, fresher possibilities.

But I was new at this and had no clue how to make it work. This is the consternation part--to recognize the presence of such possibility and not yet know how to use it well.

On the other hand, I was at least learning how to stop the war. The best I could do at the time was to listen, and listen, and pray for wisdom. And keep my mouth shut.

Over time we slowly make better use of our possibilities--of God's possibilities. Though I don't think the consternation ever goes away or needs to. God's possibilities will always stretch and challenge us beyond our comfort zone and current ability.

This mix of deeper intention, and consternation, and peace, and possibility and Presence is why the practice of Pausing is called Sacred. It's not a stretch at all to discover that practicing the Sacred Pause in one of the best ways we experience for ourselves, over and over, right here in the middle of our human mess that the Kingdom of God is always at hand.

The Wonderful Paradox of Non-Doing

2012-01-20T08:25:00.000-08:00

So...how can we rest in life's turbulence like a trout behind a rock? Got time for wise counsel?

What follows is a helpful bit from Jon Kabat-Zinn in his book, Wherever You Go There You Are.

---

Certainattitudes or mental qualities support meditation practice and provide a richsoil in which the seeds of mindfulness can flourish. By purposefullycultivating these qualities, we are actually tilling the soil of our own mindand ensuring that it can serve as a source of clarity, compassion, and rightaction in our lives. These inner qualities which support meditation practicecannot be imposed, legislated, or decreed. They can only be cultivated, andthis only when you have reached the point where your inner motivation is strongenough to want to cease contributing to your own suffering and confusion andperhaps to that of others.

If youcultivate patience, you almost can’t help cultivating mindfulness, and yourmeditation practice will gradually become richer and more mature. After all, ifyou really aren’t trying to get anywhere else in this moment, patience takescare of itself. It is a remembering that things unfold in their own time. Theseasons cannot be hurried. Spring comes, the grass grows by itself. Being in ahurry usually doesn’t help, and it can create a great deal ofsuffering—sometimes in us, sometimes in those who have to be around us.

Patience isan ever present alternative to the mind’s endemic restlessness and impatience.Scratch the surface of impatience and what you will find lying beneath it,subtly or not so subtly, is anger. It’s the strong energy of not wanting thingsto be the way they are and blaming someone (often yourself) or something forit. This doesn’t mean you can’t hurry when you have to. It is possible even tohurry patiently, mindfully, moving fast because you have chosen to.

Do you havethe patience to wait

till yourmud settles and the water is clear?

Can youremain unmoving

till the right action arises by itself?

--Lao Tzu

The flavor and the sheer joy of non-doing are difficult forAmericans to grasp because our culture places so much value on doing and onprogress. Even our leisure tends to be busy and mindless. The joy of non-doingis that nothing else needs to happen for this moment to be complete. The wisdomin it, and the equanimity that comes out of it, lie in knowing that somethingelse surely will.

It reeks of paradox. The only way you can do anything ofvalue is to have the effort come out of non-doing and to let go of caringwhether it will be of use or not. Otherwise, self-involvement and greedinesscan sneak in and distort your relationship to the work, or the work itself, sothat it is off in some way, biased, impure, and ultimately not completely satisfying,even if it is good. Good scientists know this mind state and guard against itbecause it inhibits the creative process and distorts one’s ability to seeconnections clearly.

Non-doing has nothing to do with being indolent or passive.Quite the contrary. It takes great courage and energy to cultivate non-doing,both in stillness and in activity. Nor is it easy to make a special time fornon-doing and to keep at it in the face of everything in our lives which needsto be done.

But non-doing doesn’t have to be threatening to people whofeel they always have to get things done. They might find they get even more“done,” and done better, by practicing non-doing. Non-doing simply meansletting things be and allowing them to unfold in their own way. Enormous effortcan be involved, but it is a graceful, knowledgeable, effortless effort, a“doerless doing,” cultivated over a lifetime.

Meditation is synonymous with the practice of non-doing. Wearen’t practicing to make things perfect or to do things perfectly. Rather, wepractice to grasp and realize (make real for ourselves) the fact that thingsalready are perfect--perfectly what they are. This has everything to do withholding the present moment in its fullness without imposing anything extra onit, perceiving its purity and the freshness of its potential to give rise tothe next moment.

Then, knowing what is what, seeing as clearly as possible, andconscious of not knowing more than we actually do, we act, make a move, take astand, take a chance.

Some people speak of this as flow, one moment flowingseamlessly, effortlessly into the next, cradled in the streambed ofmindfulness.

---

TRY: During the day, see if you can detect the bloom of thepresent moment in every moment, the ordinary ones, the “in-between” ones, eventhe hard ones. Work at allowing more things to unfold in your life withoutforcing them to happen and without rejecting the ones that don’t fit your ideaof what “should” be happening. See if you can sense the “spaces” through whichyou might move with no effort.

Notice how ifyou can make some time early in the day for being, with no agenda, it canchange the quality of the rest of your day. By affirming first what is primaryin your own being, see if you don’t get a mindful jump on the whole day andwind up more capable

Taking Rufuge

2012-01-19T06:54:00.000-08:00

Sometimes when I'm hiking along a stream and the sun is just right I see trout making their way in the world.

Some are scanning the surface looking for their next meal.

Some are deeper, moving in and out of shadows.

Some are taking refuge behind rocks nearer the surface, resting, almost completely still except for the gentlest undulation of their bodies, a slowly animated S, a gentle wag of a fishtail that allows them to stay right where they are.

I've felt envious of resting trout sometimes. Imagine--resting so easily in a moving stream.

'I love you, O Lord,
my God, my Rock
in whom I take refuge....'

These are words of a psalm many of us have seen, taken to heart, and prayed in one way and another many, many times. Times when we've felt afraid, wounded, baffled or swept away.

For decades I recalled and prayed this kind of prayer as if all the work was God's. Contemplative practice has been an epiphany. We have essential work to do in 'refuging' too. We have 'to take' it--take refuge.

These days I'm practicing that gentle-undulating-fishtale movement that keeps us poised in the still water where we are able to

Be still
and KNOW

that God is God. When it becomes obvious that strong currents are wearing me down or sweeping me places I don't need to be, I don't just pray to the Rock, I swim to It.

And when the currents are strong (in other words when we most need refuge) swimming can be arduous. But then, alleluia, we reach the Rock, we find the Still-Place. We rest.

Of course, even when we rest in the still waters like a trout, we also drift. Woosh--we're caught again in the current--all at once 10 feet downstream!

It takes another burst of effort to get back to a place of the undulating, slowing moving S that keeps us in the still-place. And then another sweeping-away and another burst of effort. And then another. And another. This is a basic rhythm of mindful practice.

Is Taking Refuge grace or work?

YES!

Look at the words. One is active. One is not.

It's really a kind of koan for contemplative prayer.

One
is active!
One
is not!

---

"People are not free when they are doing just whatthey like. People are only free when they are doing what the deepest selflikes. And there is getting down to the deepest self! It takes somediving." --D. H. Lawrence

Playing in the Waves

2012-01-18T05:38:00.000-08:00

I'm continuing to work with D. H. Lawrence's wise words this week:

"People* are not free when they are doing just what they like.People are only free when they are doing what the deepest self likes. And there isgetting down to the deepest self! It takes some diving."

---

For all of you who've had the joy of being a child at the beach, wading out, having your hand held, feeling the little waves slap against your legs, the tug of retreating waves, the sand being sucked from under your feet, you already have a wonderful context to imagine what it is to go deeper in our interior lives.

Shallow water is wonderful, just as wonderful as deep water. It's just that, over time, we want both.

Remember going farther out into the ocean--the water rising every few steps--the waves slapping higher up--a strong force--3 steps out, 2 steps back?

At each point, growing up, you find your appropriate depth. Until you're ready, a big person stayed with you. You held hands. Your big person was an anchor--the waves that knocked you back didn't knock her or him back.

You grew. You became a big kid. Imagine that! You could go out by yourself or with other kids about your size. You learned to jump up high when the waves came.

And then you learned to duck under them--or dive right through them.

You ventured out a little farther. Some of the waves were too big to dive over or through--and if you just stood there they'd slap you really hard, maybe knock you down and tumble you along the bottom. You learned which waves do what. You learned to go under the big ones if you wanted to stay where you were. Or to ride them all the way in if that's what you wanted.

Now you're grown up. Imagine that! You probably don't play in the water as much as you used to. But life is still full of waves. Your memory of beach and ocean is a wonderful gift.

Pay attention to each day's waves. Some you can stride right through. Some you can rise over or ride back to shallow water. But now that you're so often in deeper water, most waves invite getting under, one way and another--ducking or diving or just gracefully dropping below.

And now that we're all grown up, it's kind of ironic to spend so much time bitching out loud or to ourselves about all the damn waves when some part of us understands that once upon a time we knew exactly how to play in them.

*I changed 'men' to 'people'

The Deep End of the Pool

2012-01-17T07:47:00.001-08:00

One summer day when I was 4 or 5 my two bigbrothers told our mother they were taking me to the Furman pool to teach me howto swim.

"You boys be really careful,"Mom said.

"Don't worry," they promised."We'll take good care of the little tadpole."

It was an indoor pool. The sliding doors wereopen, but many other windows were fogged up. A lifeguard kept watch perched onhis tall chair at the edge of the pool.

One brother took me by the hands, the other by thefeet, swinging me back and forth, "one and two and three...."

Then, without further ceremony or advice, theyflung me into the deep end.

As I posted last week, D. H. Lawrence wrote,"Men are not free when they are doing just what they like. Men are onlyfree when they are doing what the deepest self likes. And there is getting downto the deepest self! It takes some diving."

Religions are in deep trouble when their peoplestay in the shallows.

How is it possible to know, to go with God, if wedon't get out of our depth?

Becoming free and fully alive takes getting to thedeep end of the pool--but the way I got there is not the best way.

I only really know one religion, Christianity.Christianity certainly recommends getting to the deep end, but for centuries wehave effectively failed at training people how to swim in the deep end.

Perhaps it's because we have such a high regardfor grace--and such a low regard for works--a high regard for God--and a lowregard of our own capacity to meet God, even to incarnate God in the depths ofour own lives and in the deep places of life.

To swim takes training and practice. I flailed myway to the side of the pool after my brothers threw me in. The most I could dothe rest of that summer was dog-paddle. The next summer, by watching otherswimmers, I developed a passable stroke. It wasn't till I was in my 30s that Iactually got lessons, practiced, and actually experienced thejoy of smooth, efficient movement through water.

Love the deep places.

When we don't love the deep places it's almostalways because we haven't been there or haven't been lovingly, skillfully,practically prepared to be there.

I hope to follow this thread over the next fewdays. In the meantime, I'd like for as many of you as possible to post here oron my Facebook page the names of people, books, and practices that have helpedyou come into, to trust, and to navigate the deep end or your religion, soul,spiritual tradition or practice.

I ask you to do this because it can be sowonderfully helpful for us to check out what inspires, trains and sustainsothers. If somebody names a person or book--Google the name, go to Amazon andread the book reviews, explore similar books that Amazon's algorithmsuggests--then order what looks good from your local book store!

Follow the threads that seem hopeful andhelpful.

Cultivate and share what works.

Love the Frustrations

2012-01-16T07:29:00.000-08:00

We often come across Rilke's quote, "Love the questions."

I've usually enjoyed exploring the kinds of questions Rilke seemed to have in mind--questions of the heart and of the soul. At least I've enjoyed them when I've been able to glimpse the answers, or at least glimpse the regions up ahead where the answers might be found--like hiking and seeing the next ridge or two on the path you're on.

It's a different thing to love questions when you can't glimpse answers, when you're not sure there are answers, when you're not sure you have the ability to find some answers even if they do exist.

Rilke's advice then becomes more like, "Love the frustrations."

Raise your hand if this could be one of your favorite quotes.

Frustration is the feeling of being upset or annoyed as a result of not being able to change or achieve something. Frustration is also the prevention of our progress, success, or fulfillment of something.

Alas, frustration is also the thing that convinces us, by its persistent uncomfortableness, to stop trying to get to where it's so damn hard to go--even when it's the place deep down we want most to go.

What would happen if we actually could grow to "Love the frustrations?" What would that be like?

What would a moment in life be like if Frustration was scratching at our door and we opened the door laughing and invited it in--treating it honorably, trusting (at least a little) that even Frustration is sent as a guide from beyond?

The way to hear what Frustration (as a Guide from Beyond) has to tell us is to find time to be still. To consciously slow down, take a few deep breaths, and listen to and feel what Frustration is bringing to the party.

First, simply feel what frustration is doing in your body. Maybe it's sitting on your chest!

But that's okay. Frustration is never really as heavy as advertised.

Just keep some attention on your breathing, in and out, and a little attention on Frustration's great big butt on your chest--or tightness in your throat--or droopiness in your posture. Wherever Frustration is, just breathe into that place for a few minutes with no other intention but to treat it honorably.

Then keep doing the same thing with a little wider awareness. Listen to whatever is speaking. Try not to argue or be defensive. Breathe. Feel. Listen. Treat each thought and feeling honorably.

Welcoming whoever comes, as Rumi recommends, is always just as simple as this and at the same time almost never just as simple as this. As with everything else in life, the only way to explore this kind of welcoming is to give it a try yourself.

Love the frustrations. Opening our doors to them in a playful, welcoming way sometimes is the same thing as having a door opened for us along those very ways that have seemed, so far, so very closed.

The Wonder and Work of Epiphany

2012-01-15T06:21:00.000-08:00

The wonder and work of Epiphany is captured in three words--Come And See.

When people began to notice the curious smile, words, and actions of Jesus--and found themselves curious--curious enough to ask, Where do you stay, what is your Source?" Jesus, no doubt with that curious smile, replied, "Come and see."

Curiosity about the important things in life leads to our salvation--leads to wonder, to openness, to wholeness, to fullness of life.

Everyone who responds to the invitation to Come and See, everybody who actually comes with eyes and mind and heart open, has a really good chance of seeing--of seeing a wider, deeper, richer, more malleable world than we've yet seen.

In the season of Christmas we celebrate Incarnation. We travel with the magi and see that God is in the world! We're so grateful that God is in the world our natural response is Adoration. We fall on our knees.

Epiphany is about responding in the next way.

We see that God is in the world and we get up, we get off our knees and onto our feet so we can follow, explore what Incarnation does in the world. And when we come and see, we see, we witness what Incarnation does in the world. And that leads to the next response, which is Inspiration--we're so stoked by and filled with energy and purpose and a fresh sense of the possible.

And then--if we hang in there--if we stay curious and keep our hearts and minds open, our next response is Imitation. Though we're not sure exactly how it works, we're sure that we too want to help, to share, to love, to make a difference in the world--in the world where we touch it.

In Chapel Hill last week, just before breakfast, my friend Newt Smith and I were in the living room reading and he said--"You wanna hear a good poem?"

I did.

He read.

What he read is a wonderful story of what it is to Come And See--what it is to come with an open mind and heart--what it's like to try to do our best to make a difference in the world.

Here's the poem:

Wandering Around an Albuquerque AirportTerminal

Naomi Shihab Nye, Apr 26, 2007

After learning my flight was detained 4 hours,

I heard the announcement:

If anyone in the vicinity of gate 4-A understandsany Arabic,

Please come to the gate immediately.

Well --one pausesthese days.

Gate 4-A was my own gate. I went there.

An older woman in full traditional Palestiniandress,

Just like my grandma wore, was crumpled tothe floor, wailing loudly.

Help, said the flight service person. Talk to her.

What is her Problem?

We told herthe flight was going to be four hours late and she Did this.

I put my arm around her and spoke to herhaltingly.

Shu dow-a, shu- biduck habibti, stani stanischway, min fadlick, Sho bit se-wee?

The minute she heard any words she knew – however poorlyused

- She stopped crying.

She thought our flight had been cancelledentirely.

She needed to be in El Paso for some major medicaltreatment the Following day.

I said no, no, we're fine, you'll get there, justlate,

Who is picking you up? Let's call him andtell him.

We called her son and I spoke with him inEnglish.

I told him I would stay with his mother till wegot on the plane and

Would ride next to her -- southwest.

She talked to him. Then we called her other sonsjust

for the fun of it.

Then we called my dad and he and she spoke for awhile in Arabic and

Found out of course they had ten shared friends.

Then I thought just for the heck of it why notcall some Palestinian Poets I know

and let them chat with her. This all took up about2 hours.

She was laughing a lot by then. Telling about her life.Answering Questions.

She had pulled a sack of homemade mamool cookies--little powdered

Sugar crumbly mounds stuffed with dates and nuts--out of her bag --

And was offering them to all the women at thegate.

To my amazement, not a single woman declined one.It was like a Sacrament.

The traveler from Argentina, the traveler fromCalifornia,

The lovely woman from Laredo -- we were allcovered

with the same Powdered sugar. And smiling.There is no better Cookie.

And then the airline broke out the free beveragesfrom

huge coolers -- Non-alcoholic -- and the twolittle girls for our flight,

one African American, one Mexican American -- ranaround serving us all apple juice

And lemonade and they were covered with powderedsugar too.

And I noticed my new best friend -- by now wewere holding hands --

Had a potted plant poking out of her bag, some medicinalthing,

With green furry leaves. Such an old countrytraveling tradition.

Always Carry a plant. Always stay rooted tosomewhere.

And I looked around that gate of late and wearyones and thought,

This is the world I want to live in. Theshared world.

Not a single person in this gate -- once thecrying of confusion stopped

-- has seemed apprehensive about any otherperson.

They took the cookies. I wanted to hug allthose other women too.

This can still happen anywhere.

Time Will Tell

2012-01-14T06:58:00.000-08:00

My daughter has been working hard for a couple months on getting financial aid and a loan in order to continue her education. But...bureaucracies can be a very sticky wicket. It's been one frustration after another.

However, this past week she'd got it all done and was waiting as patiently as possible for a final decision.

Thursday night we had supper together and watched an episode of The Forsyte Saga. Afterwards she checked her email and learned that she had not gotten the loan--apparently they would only approve me for the loan, not her. She already knew that I wasn't going to take out a loan.

She's was devastated. She is soooooo ready to go back and finish her degree.

But as she read over the email again and again, she realized the language wasn't all that clear. We talked about the possibility of suspending judgment (and devastation) until the next day when she could go once again to Financial Aid and find out what was what.

Friday morning she told me she hadn't been able to sleep. She'd anguished all night long. She was so worried and so miserable.

There's a Zen parable that speaks to this very dynamic.

---

Once upon the time there was an old farmer who had workedhis crops for many years. One day his horse ran away. Upon hearing the news,his neighbors came to visit. “Such bad luck,” they said sympathetically.

“Maybe,” the farmer replied.

The next morning the horse returned, bringing with it threeother wild horses. “How wonderful,” the neighbors exclaimed.

“You never can tell,” replied the old man.

The following day, his son tried to ride one of the untamedhorses, was thrown, and broke his leg. The neighbors again came to offer theirsympathy on his misfortune saying, "This is such a tragedy!"

“Who can say?” answered the farmer.

The day after, military officials came to the village todraft young men into the army. Seeing that the son’s leg was broken, theypassed him by. The neighbors congratulated the farmer on how well things hadturned out.

“Time will tell,” said the farmer.

---

Evolutionary necessity has given us minds that size up situations quickly, make judgments quickly, set a course of action quickly. But nothing has given us the ability to know the future. None of us is a prophet.

One of the great treasures of 'diving' (see yesterday's blog) is that diving down below the waves of our fast reactions shows us both how much we prophecy and how unhelpful it is to believe our prophecies.

I've punished myself enough by borrowing tomorrow's trouble. At this stage of life, instead of borrowing I'm working hard to invest in tomorrow by doing my best to sow wise responses today.

Friday morning Ruth went one more time to the Financial Aid office. It was just another mistake. Everything was fine. She got the loan. She gets to go to back to school. She's over the moon. I'm so happy for her.

"How wonderful!"

“Time will tell,” says the farmer, the wise old sower of seeds.

What Our Deepest Selves Like

2012-01-13T07:35:00.000-08:00

Are we having fun yet?

Where are we in our life's progression? Are we pleased with where we are? Is our trajectory taking us where we want to go?

Actually, I shouldn't be wondering about such things or sitting at the computer messing about with blogging right now. I should be outside scraping the ice and snow off my car.

To tell the truth, as I'm looking out at the car, maybe what I should really be doing is cleaning the living room windows--they're grimed from the propane heater and smudged by dog noses.

And you? What should you be doing?

You probably shouldn't be reading this blog. You slacker.

Because...because what we really like is getting stuff done, right?

What's the balance between getting stuff done (and recovering from getting stuff done) and moving toward where we really want to be?

D. H. Lawrence wrote, "Men are not free when they are doing just what they like. Men are only free when they are doing what the deepest self likes. And there is getting down to the deepest self! It takes some diving."

Yes, I know, DIVING, another damned thing to get done. Except...

Except--in another way DIVING can be a profound way of not-doing.

Take 2 minutes--for not-doing.

Really, right now--take 2 minutes.

Let your mind ease down into your heart. Rest there.

Just be.

For a brief time--Just Be.

Allow your mind to be active enough to Just Rest.

This is a wonderful way to remember and remember, to discover and discover, what our deepest selves like.

3 Day Pilgrimage

2012-01-10T05:53:00.000-08:00

"Darkness cannot drive out darkness--
only light can do that." MLK

I'm off on a pilgrimage over the next 3 days.

Been a UNC basketball fan most of my life. I've seen 100s of games--but never in person. Tonight, God willing, I'll see my first in the Dean Dome.

Tomorrow we (Newt & June Smith & I) make our way to the Rembrandt Exhibition at the NC Museum of Art in Raleigh.

Thursday, we pay homage to the Civil Rights Center & Museum in Greensboro. The museum is in the old Woolworth building where the historic 1960 non-violent lunch counter sit-ins happened.

The call of Epiphany is to Come and See. "Darkness cannot drive out darkness--only light can do that." MLK

Crossing the Thames

2012-01-09T07:19:00.000-08:00

The first time I remember ever paying attention to the word epiphany was in a remarkably apt place to do it. My mother had paid substantially more for my fall senior semester at Furman so that I, an English major, could study in London and Stratford.

The professor who led these trips was Willard Pate, a great mentor. We'd come across the word epiphany in something we were reading early in our six week stay in London. She said, "The next time you cross the Thames' footbridge, remember to stop. Turn around. Look back. Maybe you'll have your own epiphany."

That very night a few of us were going to a piano concert across the Thames at the Royal Festival Hall. We took the footbridge. We remembered. We paused. Turned around to see Whitehall and Westminster lit up at night, the iconic images sparkling, floating on the big river below.

It made my breath catch. Just seeing the beauty, being at least a little aware of how much water had flowed under this bridge, along these banks, metaphorically, across the centuries. My soul seemed to grow--it had to grow in order to make room for the shear wonder of it all.

Then I caught an image of Mom in my mind's eye. I remembered the conversation we'd had about the trip. It was only a year after my dad died of a heart attack. I had said something about the England trip being a big deal for some of the students--but that I knew it cost too much. I was also thinking she might not relish living by herself quite yet. She'd said simply, "Don't be silly. Go. It's a once in a lifetime opportunity. I'll be fine"

This memory came with a surge of gratitude--I was suddenly experiencing my mom's willingness to bless me. Up till then I hadn't exactly perceived what a rich blessing it was. Then suddenly I was as rich in gratitude as she had been in generosity.

Dr. Pate was right. I was getting a taste of epiphany.

We are in the season of Epiphany now and for the next 6 weeks. The great invitation to the season is Jesus's profound invitation, "Come and See!"

How many ways are there to say yes?

How To Be A Magus

2012-01-08T04:24:00.000-08:00

There’s astar you follow. It goes among

things that change. But it doesn’t change.
People wonder about what you are pursuing.
You have to explain about the star.
But it's sometimes hard for others to see.
While you follow it you can’t get lost.
Tragedies happen; people get hurt
or die; and you suffer and get old.
Nothing we do can stop time’s unfolding.
Don't ever lose sight of the star.

(This is a riff on William Stafford's poem, The Way It Is.)

Cultivating a Path

2012-01-07T05:07:00.001-08:00

A path is a way. The original name for Christianity was simply the Way. Buddhism is called the Middle Way. Tao (which can't be literally translated) is often called the Path or Way or Road.

We're always on a path. Looking backward we can see that our past experience is the path we've been on so far. At some point, many of us, looking back, come to a place where we want to choose the way forward more wisely than we chose in the past. We want to cultivate a saner, wiser, richer path.

One of the sweetest realizations in life is that this can be done.

What follows is a string of insights into what it is to value and cultivate a mindful path, a spiritual path. It's from Stephen Batchelor's, Living With The Devil.

A foot path is a space because it offers no resistance to placing one foot in front of the other. Its space allows one to move without hindrance. Space is thus a metaphor of freedom. Instead of seeing a path as a thing on which one walks, imagine it as the space between things that allows one the freedom to walk. If the English language did not condemn us to separate the path from the act of walking, we could speak of such free movement as "pathing."

A compulsion is any mental or emotional state that, on breaking into consciousness, disturbs and captivates us.

Compulsions obstruct the path by monopolizing consciousness.... To escape their grip does not entail suppressing them but creating a space in which we are freed to let them go and they are freed to disappear.

Thus emptiness is a path. It is that open and unfettered space that frees us to respond from a liberating perspective rather than react from a fixed position.

A path is created by clarifying one's aims and removing what gets in the way of their realization. It is carved from commitment and opened up by letting go. It entails both doing something and allowing something to happen. A path is both a task and a gift.

(Creating a path) is guided by an intuitive yearning for what we value most deeply; its space is the openness we are able to tolerate within our own hearts and minds; it is sustained by the network of friendships that inspire us to keep going.

The survival of a path is achieved not by preserving it but by walking it--even when you have not clear idea where it will lead.

Navigating a Closed Path

2012-01-06T07:35:00.000-08:00

Life will always confront us with plenty of closed paths--fallenbranches, knotted catbrier, etc. And we also have plenty of these withinourselves. We don't need to create any more closed and scratchy paths.

One of the great gifts of contemplative practices is the trainingthey give us in a GROWING ABILITY TO NAVIGATE CLOSED PATHS.

Sitting down to meditate is often like entering a thicket--atangled thicket of thoughts and feelings. Ideas and memories. Compulsions,ego-stroking, ego-damning. Pressures, fears, hopes, dreams.

Mindfulness doesn't teach us to push through these in order to getsomeplace else--it trains us instead to be still as these things come tous.

In an interesting way, mindful practice is nevertheless very muchlike a path--a path that is traveled best by keeping still.

To me this does very often feel like Mary Oliver describes it:

Where the path closed

down and over,

through the scumbled leaves,

fallen branches,

through the knotted catbrier,

I kept going.

By keeping going with the practice of being still, we do seem toget somewhere. And coming to the edge of a pond seems as good an image as anyfor where we get. Open space. A bigger perspective. Light.Air.

And doesn't the edge of a pond feel good in contrast to knottedcatbrier!

Spiritual formation often feels like PUSHING THROUGH.

Learning to recognize the special kind of balance where our soulscan rest often feels like really hard work. And it is. It's the hard work ittakes to become familiar with how to rest--anywhere.

Coming to the edge of the pond doesn't mean we'll often see 'a shower ofwhite fire,' it doesn't mean we'll be always be able to 'step over every dark thing.' Butit does mean, learning to be stiller does always mean, wewill see better.

We will see WHATEVER.

We will we better see whatever might present itself. Whatevercomes into the open space in front of us, around us, behind, we will see.

And we're so much better navigating life when we see it.

Today is Epiphany. When a couple of curious disciple-wannabees sawJesus passing by, they asked him, Where do you stay?

He answered, Come and see.

The Path To the Edge of The Pond

2012-01-05T05:20:00.000-08:00

Mindfulness is like being at the edge of the pond. It's also like the path that takes us there.

Be Mary Oliver for a moment. Walk in her shoes, live in her skin, feel what she's feeling, think was she's thinking:

Where the path closed
down and over,
through the scumbled leaves,
fallen branches,
through the knotted catbrier,
I kept going. Finally
I could not
save my arms
from thorns; soon
the mosquitoes
smelled me, hot
and wounded, and came
wheeling and whining.
And that's how I came
to the edge of the pond:

After being hemmed in and frustrated by tight, ensnaring conditions, what a wonderful experience it can be to come to an open place.

Light. Air. Room to see.

And even though she's come to the end of this path and can't go any farther (at least with her feet), she keeps going--by another way.

By stopping, pausing, watching, she's able to go even farther.

And that's how I came
to the edge of the pond:
black and empty
except for a spindle
of bleached reeds
at the far shore
which, as I looked,
wrinkled suddenly
into three egrets - - -
a shower
of white fire!
Even half-asleep they had
such faith in the world
that had made them - - -
tilting through the water,
unruffled, sure,
by the laws
of their faith not logic,
they opened their wings
softly and stepped
over every dark thing.

I have my own recognitions reading this, my own 'white fire.' But, if you have a few minutes, linger at the edge of the pond and see what you see.

I think it's wise not to prejudice you with my epiphanies before you've had time--sacred time in this sacred space at the edge of the pond--for your own.

You know, quite amazingly, today is Epiphany Eve.

Curiosity Killed the Cat

2012-01-04T05:10:00.000-08:00

--I kept going...

This is we're we paused yesterday.

Where the path closed
down and over,
through the scumbled leaves,
fallen branches,
through the knotted catbrier,
I kept going....

This 'manway' my friends and I were hiking on Saturday was a delight to discover. And the place it finally would take us is spectacular. But the finding of this particular path had been a long and sometimes frustrating process. When I was first exploring the area years ago, I got lost a lot.

Of course, getting lost a lot teaches us a lot about where the path does not go. One time I persisted in a direction that put me in a laurel hell. A laurel hell is the name locals use for massive thickets of laurel and rhododendron.

Very often, at the edge of a laurel hell, you see something that looks like an arch, a path, a kind of tunnel through their tangled trunks and branches. The reason it's called a 'hell' is because these tunnels usually lead deeper into the thicket--and then close in again. And since you've already invested effort in getting where you are, and since you're headed in the general direction you want to go, you keep going--either crawling under the tangled branches or slowly snaking over and through them like a contortionist.

Then you find something else that seems to be a way through, another arching tunnel. Ah, thank God, you think--I can stop crawling and contorting. Then that tunnel peters out too--now deeper into the 'hell.'

I'm grateful for these experiences. I've learned a lot about my stubbornness, which is often unhelpful to myself and others. And I've learned a lot about curiosity--which, though it sometimes fuels stubbornness, is of itself a lovely form of energy. I'm glad to repent of stubbornness. I don't repent of curiosity.

I can remember my mom, every time somebody said, 'Curiosity killed the cat,' replying, 'And satisfaction brought him back!'

Mary Oliver's poem continues,

I kept going. Finally
I could not
save my arms
from thorns; soon
the mosquitoes
smelled me, hot
and wounded, and came
wheeling and whining.
And that's how I came
to the edge of the pond...

Curiosity keeps us moving forward, exploring life. And when we're curious about the deep places of life, when we're curious about what really matters, when we keep exploring even as the mosquitoes come 'wheeling and whining,' eventually we often come 'to the edge of the pond.'

A Closed Path

2012-01-03T08:09:00.000-08:00

My friend Jeanne Finan opened up my Sunday morning for me with a Facebook post and link to a guy who decided several years ago to read a poem every day. I followed the link and was transported--literally and otherwise. The link eventually led to Mary Oliver's poem, 'Egrets'.

I don't know exactly what it is that happens when we're reading a wonderful poem and suddenly we're seeing something new--or seeing something familiar in a new way and life just lights up.

Here's the poem...

Egrets

Where the path closed
down and over,
through the scumbled leaves,
fallen branches,
through the knotted catbrier,
I kept going. Finally
I could not
save my arms
from thorns; soon
the mosquitoes
smelled me, hot
and wounded, and came
wheeling and whining.
And that's how I came
to the edge of the pond:
black and empty
except for a spindle
of bleached reeds
at the far shore
which, as I looked,
wrinkled suddenly
into three egrets - - -
a shower
of white fire!
Even half-asleep they had
such faith in the world
that had made them - - -
tilting through the water,
unruffled, sure,
by the laws
of their faith not logic,
they opened their wings
softly and stepped
over every dark thing.

Last Saturday I took a hike off the Blue Ridge Parkway with six newish friends, none of whom know this area well. The Parkway was closed because of icy patches--we couldn't get to the 'best' trails.

For 18 years I've hiked around here by myself nearly every Thursday. It's a wonderful way to work on a sermon.

Over these years I've stumbled across what some people call manways. These are ad hoc trails, usually short, often connector trails. I suspect many of these are made by hunters.

I asked my new friends if they were game to take a manway in order to get to a 'real' trail. They were.

But manways are not exactly maintained. They are faint paths to begin with. Limbs and trees are often blown down across them. Bushes and brambles grow into them.

I often move fallen stuff off manways. Knock down a few briars along the way. I suspect most folks who take these little trails do a little maintenance.

Animals do maintenance too. The parts they walk on are better worn. But animals have their own destinations. And their trails always take off in another direction at some point, and it's often hard to tell the difference between their trails and ours.

Often I've taken the wrong trail without knowing it and then realized it's bending in the wrong direction or just petering out all together. I know I'm close to where I want to be. But I'm not there. Is it best to back up--or press on through forest and underbrush?

I love this poem's first 5 lines for their immediacy and vividness,

Where the path closed
down and over,
through the scumbled leaves,
fallen branches,
through the knotted catbrier--

I love the next line for its chutzpah and inspiration,

--I kept going.

This first bit of 'Egrets' is something worth being mindful about--a least for a day!

What Is Insight Meditation?

2012-01-02T07:05:00.000-08:00

Vipassana means 'insight.' Or 'to see clearly.' It's the kind of meditation a lot of people do the world over. The Buddhists developed it--and give it away freely. Meditation is not inherently religious. But it's a marvelous tool for spiritual people.

Vipassana is also translated as 'to see clearly.' Before I knew this translation, I already 'knew it' from meditating. Early on, doing vispassana meditation as part of my morning quiet time, I found myself singing "to see Thee more clearly, love Thee more nearly, follow Thee more nearly--day by day."

I knew that meditating would help me see, and love, and follow Jesus in a much richer way. For me this is pretty much the same thing as following my life path--living into Irenaeus's words: "The glory of God is a human being fully alive."

Spirituality gets moldy, vapid, feeble without day to day spiritual formation.

What follows is a clear, helpful description of how to 'DO' vipassana meditation. It's from Tara Brach, (the book is Radical Acceptance).

-------------

Find a sitting position that allows you to be alert—spineerect but not rigid—and also relaxed. Close your eyes and rest your hands in aneasy, effortless way. Allow your awareness to scan through your body and,wherever possible, soften and release obvious areas of physical tension.

Because we so easily get lost in thoughts, vipassana beginswith attention to the breath. Using the breath as a primary anchor ofmindfulness helps quiet the mind so that you can be awake to the changingstream of life that moves through you.

Take a few very full breaths, and then allow your breath tobe natural. Notice where you most easily detect the breath. You might feel itas it flows in and out of your nose; you might feel the touch of the breatharound your nostrils or on your upper lip; or perhaps you feel the movement ofyour chest or the rising and falling of your abdomen. Bring your attention tothe sensations of breathing in one of these areas, perhaps wherever you feelthem most distinctly.

There is no need to control the breath, to grasp or fixateon it. There is no “right” way of breathing. With a relaxed awareness, discoverwhat the breath is really like as a changing experience of sensations.

You will find that the mind naturally drifts off inthoughts. Thoughts are not the enemy, and you do not need to clear your mind ofthoughts. Rather, you are developing the capacity to recognize when thoughtsare happening without getting lost in the story line. When you become aware ofthinking, you might use a soft and friendly mental note: “Thinking, thinking.”Then, without any judgment, gently return to the immediacy of the breath. Letthe breath be home base, a place of full presence. While you might notice otherexperiences—the sounds of passing cars, feelings of being warm or cool,sensations of hunger—they can be in the background without drawing you away.

If any particular sensations become strong and call yourattention, allow those sensations, instead of the breath, to become the primarysubject of mindfulness. You might feel heat or chills, tingling, aching,twisting, stabbing, vibrating. With a soft, open awareness just feel thesensations as they are. Are they pleasant or unpleasant? As you fully attend tothem, do they become more intense or dissipate? Notice how they change. Whenthe sensations are no longer a strong experience, return to mindfulness ofbreathing. Or if the sensations are so unpleasant that you are unable to regardthem with any balance or equanimity, feel free to rest your attention again inthe breath.

In a similar way, you can bring mindfulness to strongemotions—fear, sadness, happiness, excitement, grief. Meet each experience witha kind and clear presence, neither clinging to nor resisting what is happening.What does this emotion feel like as sensations in your body? Where do you feelit most strongly? Is it static or moving? How big is it? Are your thoughtsagitated and vivid? Are they repetitive and dull? Does your mind feelcontracted or open? As you pay attention, notice how the emotion changes. Doesit become more intense or weaken? Does it change into a different state? Angerto grief? Happiness to peace? When the emotion is no longer compelling, turnyour attention back to the breath. If the emotion feels overwhelming for you,or if you are confused about where to place your attention, relax and come hometo your breath.

The particular sensations, emotions or thoughts that arisewhen we practice mindfulness are not so important. It is our willingness tobecome still and pay attention to our experience, whatever it may be, thatplants the seeds of Radical Acceptance. With time we develop the capacity torelate to our passing experience, whether in meditation or daily life, withdeep clarity and kindness.

Working with the Life's Pressures

2012-01-01T04:53:00.000-08:00

Jon Kabat-Zinn tells us in the following 6 paragraphs what meditation is and isn't. It's a helpful read.

It is acommonly held view that meditation is a way to shut off the pressures of theworld or of your own mind, but this is not an accurate impression. Meditationis neither shutting things out nor off. It is seeing things clearly, anddeliberately positioning yourself differently in relationship to them.

People whocome to our clinic quickly learn that stress is an inevitable part of life. Whileit is true that we can learn, by making intelligent choices, not to make thingsworse for ourselves in certain ways, there are many things in life over whichwe have little or no control. Stress is part of life, part of being human,intrinsic to the human condition itself.

But thatdoes not mean that we have to be victims in the face of large forces in ourlives. We can learn to work with them, understand them, find meaning in them,make critical choices, and use their energies to grow in strength, wisdom, andcompassion. A willingness to embrace and work with what is lies at the core ofall meditation practice.

One way toenvision how mindfulness works is to think of your mind as the surface of a lake orof the ocean. There are always waves on the water. Sometimes they are big,sometimes they are small, and sometimes they are almost imperceptible. Thewater’s waves are churned up by winds, which come and go and vary in directionand intensity, just as do the winds of stress and change in our lives, whichstir up waves in our minds.

People whodon’t understand meditation think that it is some kind of special innermanipulation which will magically shut off these waves so that the mind’ssurface will be flat, peaceful, and tranquil. But just as you can’t put a glassplate on the water to calm the waves, so you can’t artificially suppress thewaves of your mind, and it is not too smart to try. It will only create moretension and inner struggle, not calmness.

That doesn’tmean that calmness is unattainable. It’s just that it cannot be attained bymisguided attempts to suppress the mind’s natural activity. It is possiblethrough meditation to find shelter from much of the wind that agitates themind. Over time, a good deal of the turbulence may die down from lack ofcontinuous feeding. But ultimately the winds of life and of the mind will blow,do what we may. Meditation is about knowing something about this and how towork with it.

--John Kabat-Zinn, Wherever You Go, There You Are

A Lot Happens On a Mountain

2011-12-30T14:01:00.001-08:00

One of the first things I remember about bringing 'spaciousness' into mindful practice came from Pema Chodron. It was simple: "A lot happens on a mountain."

The way I remember it, she was advising new meditators to picture ourselves as a mountain--solid, big, imperturbable.

I took this picture on a hike a week ago. On one side of the mountain, a whole valley was under low cloud. The other side was completely sunny. I was about a mile high--high enough to see that even above the cloudy side, the sky was a brilliant blue (though the folks in Waynesville were still having a gray day).

What often perturbs us are our strong feelings and insistent, sticky thoughts.

And here's the thing--the reason we're perturbed is because we're identifying with these thoughts and feelings, wrapped up in them. We're feeling somehow defined, named, circumscribed, fogged in.

But a lot happens on a mountain.

Clouds on one side, sun on another. Icicles growing long at a creek's headwaters, the same creek flowing freely a couple of miles down.

A lot happens on a mountain. A lot happens in us. Practicing spaciousness invites us to see beyond the in-your-face perspective of strong feelings and sticky thoughts. Not to ignore or repress sticky thoughts and feelings, just to hold them in a roomier way.

When we don't identify with these thoughts and feelings, when we can see them for what they are and what they're not, then there's somebody home to hear their messages.

"Meet them at the door, laughing," says Rumi. "Invite them in. Each has been sent as a guide from beyond."

When we regularly meditate with this in mind, even for a few minutes a day, we discover we have more capacity to hold stuff, to keep tricky thoughts and feelings in perspective than we've realized. We begin to learn that becoming familiar with the things that make us small is part of a natural process of becoming bigger.

Basic Training for the Great-Hearted

2011-12-30T07:58:00.000-08:00

There are lots of ways our hearts grow. Loving as a partner or parent. Stepping up for work that makes a difference. Taking God's love into us and trying to embody love in our particular neighborhoods.

There are ways to train in heart growth too. For years I never imagined meditation could be such a powerful way of growing the heart.

One of the qualities that insight meditation recognizes and cultivates is something called spaciousness. Just by slowing down and allowing our thoughts and feelings to come and go, noticing them without judgment, cultivates spaciousness--room enough to hold whatever comes.

Several years ago I was driving to a very important meeting. The car's check engine light came on. Then the low oil light came on. I figured it wouldn't hurt to go another 25 miles. I was wrong.

After 20 miles the engine began to 'knock'. To go clunk, clunk, clunk.

After the meeting I drove to the dealer. A mechanic told me it didn't sound good. 20 minutes later he came back to tell me I'd pretty much ruined the engine, melted the rods--or something like that.

Sitting there, waiting for my wife to pick me up, I was so angry at myself. Worried about the $5-6,000 butcher's bill, too.

I'd been practicing mindfulness for 3 or 4 years. A 'check engine' light was flashing somewhere in my head--but I didn't want to go there, didn't really think effective mindfulness practice was possible for me in a circumstance like this. Yet after stewing a bit more, I at was least willing to try.

I began to breathe. Doing nothing at first but following the breath and trying to not listen to all those overheated judgmental thoughts slamming around in my head.

I began to recall what spaciousness was all about--making room for our thoughts and feelings. It was an ironic moment. No ****ing way to make room for this mob of tyrants.

But I kept trying.

"Just let it ventilate," I remembered. "Where do you feel this in the body? Breathe right into this very place. Breathe into it and through it and all around it. Sense the space this creates."

I did. Lots of clanging around still going on. But I kept breathing. Kept imagining. Continued to sense wild feelings & thoughts, breath & space.

After awhile my mind and heart seemed nearly able to hold all that hot, difficult energy. To hold it--not repress it or resist it--and be reasonably at peace at the same time. What a lesson.

Welcome and entertain them all! (says Rumi)
Even if they're a crowd of sorrows,
who violently sweep your house
empty of its furniture,
still, treat each guest honorably.
He may be clearing you out
for some new delight.

Having our hearts swept empty is very underrated. This being cleared out for new delights is an amazing gift. Practicing spaciousness is good training for those who want bigger hearts.

Making room in our hearts to deal with our own crap also reveals that we have more room than we knew for other people's crap. For life's crap. More room for life's delights, too.

Cultivating spaciousness is a wonderful kind of spiritual formation.

Be grateful for whoever (or whatever!) comes,
because each has been sent
as a guide from beyond.

Opening the Door--a Key

2011-12-29T09:49:00.000-08:00

We've been following the thread of an inscription carved in stone over a church door in Iran. It reads

Where Jesus is, the Great-Hearted Gather.
We are a door that's never locked.
If you are suffering any kind of pain, stay near this door.
Open it.

Though the door is never locked, opening it is not exactly something we control. Perhaps, remembering what Jesus said is a key:

Knock and the door will be opened.

And there are other doors, related doors, practice doors, that we do control--or at least doors that we might learn to open (and open, and open).

The author of those 4 lines above the church door in Iran is the poet Rumi. His poem, The Guest House, offers some of the best door-opening wisdom a person can get.

Many of us know this poem--we see it quoted a lot. I hope its familiarity won't dull another reading. It's a poem of the Great-Hearted. And a perfect poem for us Great-Hearted folks in-traning too.

This beinghuman is a guest house.
Every morning a new arrival.

A joy, a depression, a meanness,
some momentary awareness comes
as an unexpected visitor.

Welcome and entertain them all!
Even if they're a crowd of sorrows,
who violently sweep your house
empty of its furniture,
still, treat each guest honorably.
He may be clearing you out
for some new delight.

The dark thought, the shame, the malice,
meet them at the door laughing,
and invite them in.

Be grateful for whoever comes,
because each has been sent
as a guide from beyond.

If we take this to heart, if we welcome and entertain and meet and laugh and are grateful for whoever comes, pretty soon we'll know what it's like to be a door that's never locked. Our hearts will grow. We won't really notice who's on which side of the door anymore.

This 'welcoming and entertaining them all' is at the heart of mindfulness practice and centering prayer and spiritual formation of all kinds. Learning how it works, practicing this non-judgmental kind of welcome, is one of the things that makes a heart literally greater--bigger, more stretchable.

We practice on our own, sitting or walking quietly, welcoming whatever comes. Seeing thoughts and feelings clearly for what they are without judging or shooing them away. Welcoming whatever comes with honesty and warmth.

We practice with others, watching how our minds resist or ignore people we interact with, noticing--and then letting go of--our own clutter in order to make room for another person's clutter! And beneath that their unique and precious self.

We are a door that's never locked.

Welcome and entertain them all.

Come to me all you who are weary and burdened.

Who says this? Who practices this?

Who opens the door that's never locked?

On the Fourth Day of Christmas

2011-12-28T05:44:00.000-08:00

On the fourth day of Christmas my true love gave to me--the last line of an amazing bit of wisdom carved into the stone above a door of an ancient church in Iran. So now we have the whole quote:

Where Jesus Is, the Great-Hearted Gather.
We are a door that's never locked.
If you are suffering any kind of pain, stay near this door.
Open it.

Is it that simple--Open it?

Remember in the Lord of the Rings when the nine companions get to the door of the Mines of Moria? Where's the entrance? They can't find the entrance.

Then the moon peeks out from behind a cloud and the intricate mithril silver design etched in the door is revealed on the great cliff face. Written in elfin are the words, "Speak Friend and Enter."

Gandalf is thinking, 'Piece of cake.' So, knowing that he is a friend of both elves and dwarves, he confidently begins to speak every arcane incantation for 'Openings' he knows. All of them.

The mountain is unmoved.

Tired, baffled he sits down, exasperated.

Then...he laughs.

Ah! He's realized the door will open of itself when he simply says the word 'friend.' He says, Friend. The door opens.

Following the advice carved above the church door in Iran is like that. It's so simple. Yet it's never something to take for granted. It's a process that we can absolutely trust, but it's never a process we control or command.

Not that we don't try to open the door.

How long can we sustain being baffled? How long can we sustain deep trust? How long can we hold trust and bafflement in our hearts? How long will we stay near a door we can't seem to open?

Well, maybe not that long--at first. Yet holding frustration and trust in the same heart enlarges that heart. And it is the Great Hearted who are gathering here. It is in the company of the Great-Hearted we want to be.

How do we open the door?

The inscription doesn't tell us 'how.' It tells us 'to.' Nobody can tell us how.

Yet I think we can trust that the inscription is telling us everything we need to know.

The Third Day of Christmas

2011-12-27T09:05:00.000-08:00

On the third day of Christmas my true love gave to me--the next line of an amazing bit of wisdom carved into the stone above a door of an ancient church in Iran. So now we have three lines:

Where Jesus Is, the Great-Hearted Gather.
We are a door that's never locked.
If you are suffering any kind of pain, stay near this door.

This is the third day of Christmas--are you still here near this door?

If you are, something better than 3 hens seems to be promised (even if they are French hens).

If you are suffering....

If?

Hah!

Who is not suffering in one way or another? And if we're not suffering surely it's impossible to be among the Great-Hearted. Anybody whose door is never locked suffers.

The old King James Version of Jesus' quip to those who would shield him from the annoyance of children comes to mind: "Suffer the little children to come unto me." Modern version: "What? You think I can't tolerate the chaos of kids? Kids are a window into the realm of God!"

Jesus can tolerate a lot--even us: "Come to me all you who are weary and weighed down and I'll give you rest." This invitation can only come from a heart that has been stretched a lot.

I'm pretty sure the only way hearts grow is by being stretched. And being stretched always causes suffering. New wine bursts old wine-skins.

And (this may be the greatest most ironic majestic heart enlarging laughing out loud truth of this life) not being stretched causes the most profound suffering of all.

So, here we are, reading these three lines, pondering what they may have to do with us. And then we realize the reading and the pondering have actually allowed us to fulfill the first bit of advice the inscription has:

Stay near this door.

On the Second Day of Christmas...

2011-12-26T04:39:00.001-08:00

On the second day of Christmas my true love gave to me--the next line of an amazing bit of wisdom carved into the stone above a door of an ancient church in Iran. So now we have two lines:

Where Jesus Is, the Great-Hearted Gather.
We are a door that's never locked.

The immediate thing I want to know about this second line is, who is the WE?

Who do you suppose is the WE?

Is it the congregation of the church that bears the inscription?

Is it the Great-Hearted?

Is it potentially anybody who happens to stumble into places where Jesus Is--Jesus, God, Buddha, Sophia, Creator, Mystery, Ground of Being?

As I imagine myself wandering through an unfamiliar town and winding up standing in front of this inscription, I recognize how I've always wanted to be among the Great-Hearted. And I recognize how very often I have not felt I belonged.

So I see myself reading these words and feeling two things--smallness and longing.

In the smallness part, I recognize the many ways my heart has been locked, protecting itself from what it fears.

In the longing part, I recall people I've recognized as great-hearted and realize there's nothing I want more than to be among them, welcomed, recognized myself, un-locked myself.

I can imagine other things, too. Other people coming up to the door, a small throng standing in front of these words, curious, intrigued, having their own experience of the inscription.

I can imagine conversations springing up--and an eagerness both to speak and to listen.

On the First Day of Christmas...

2011-12-25T06:25:00.000-08:00

On the first day of Christmas my true love gave to me--the first line of an amazing bit of wisdom carved into the stone above a door of an ancient church in Iran:

Where Jesus Is, the Great-Hearted Gather.

I've noticed over the years that people who gather in Christian churches, myself included, are often not particularly great-hearted.

Maybe the first line carved in stone above this church door is a prophecy, something about our potential?

What does it mean to be great-hearted? Or maybe it's better to ask, what does it take to be great-hearted?

Perhaps it's about having hearts that continue to keep pace with our lives. To grow so that there's room in us to hold life's circumstances wisely--maybe even with a sense of humor.

And with more kindness--both for ourselves and everybody else who wanders in and out of our hearts' neighborhoods.

Any chance you'll eat more than you can hold today? There's something in that feeling that's parallel to not being great-hearted, for not having room for what we're taking in.

But then the metaphor breaks down. We don't need bigger stomachs.

But having hearts that grow to hold what life brings--that's another thing.

New Moon On Christmas Eve

2011-12-24T05:54:00.000-08:00

It's not often Christmas Eve and the new moon coincide. Tonight they do.

Much of my life I'd supposed the new moon was the first little bit of visible crescent. But a new moon is a 'no' moon. The new moon is the moon we cannot see. Or at least can't see in our electric world. On a clear night in the ancient world earth-shine faintly illuminated the 'no' moon.

The new moon is when the moon is between earth and sun. The 'new' moon is when what we call the 'dark side of the moon' is completely bright, completely lit up--in the half we never see from Earth.

The Welsh priest and poet R. S. Thomas writes about new-moon-darkness in 'The Moon in Lleyn'.

Thomas was vicar of several small parishes in Wales just at the time when churches were 'dying' all across his country.

It was a dark time. It is a wonderful poem.

The Moon in Lleyn

The last quarter of the moon
of Jesus gives way
to the dark; the serpent
digests the egg. Here
on my knees in this stone
church, that is full only
of the silent congregation
of shadows and the sea's
sound, it is easy to believe
Yeats was right. Just as though
choirs had not sung, shells
have swallowed them; the tide laps
at the Bible; the bell fetches
no people to the brittle miracle
of bread. The sand is waiting
for the running back of the grains
in the wall into its blond
glass. Religion is over, and
what will emerge from the body
of the new moon, no one
can say.

But a voice sounds
in my ear. Why so fast,
mortal? These very seas
are baptized. The parish
has a saint's name time cannot
unfrock. In cities that
have outgrown their promise people
are becoming pilgrims
again, if not to this place,
then to the recreation of it
in their own spirits. You must remain
kneeling. Even as this moon
making its way through the earth's
cumbersome shadow, prayer, too,
has its phases.

Our churches face dark-of-the-moon challenges too. Christmas Eve is a wonderfully pregnant time to explore these challenges.

Hopes and fears of all the years are met tonight. On dark streets we'll get a chance to contemplate everlasting light.

People are always becoming pilgrims again. Always and always. The great star that lights up our path tonight leads to something.

And from tonight forward over the next 28 days, the moon will only grow brighter. Prayer has its phases--as does life.

Christmas Triggers

2011-12-23T07:17:00.000-08:00

The ‘hopesand fears of all the years are met…’ every time we have extended family visits!

As much aswe love and value our closest family, there’s just nothing like holidaygatherings to set us off, light our fuses, show us where we’re stuck, make uscrazy—and to remind us in wonderfully obvious ways just how wired we still areto old family patterns.

Thefollowing is copied from Rick Hanson’s book, The Buddha’s Brain: The Practical Neuroscience of Happiness, Love, andWisdom. It’s a great holiday read!

It may ormay not make us feel better, but it’s almostguaranteed to make us chuckle at the ironies of our lives—and perhaps even tosmile at the possibility of learning how to say grace over and within the wacky minefieldsof the season.

Taking fiveminutes to read this might at least make it easier for you to appreciate why youfeel the way you do.

---

Suffering isnot abstract or conceptual. It’s embodied: you feel it in your body, and itproceeds through bodily mechanisms. Understanding the physical machinery ofsuffering will help you see it increasingly as an impersonalcondition—unpleasant to be sure, but not worth getting upset about, which wouldjust bring more second darts.

Sufferingcascades through your body via the sympathetic nervous system (SNS) and thehypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal axis (HPAA) of the endocrine (hormonal) system.Let’s unscramble this alphabet soup to see how it all works. While the SNS andHPAA are anatomically distinct, they are so intertwined that they’re bestdescribed together, as an integrated system. And we’ll focus on reactionsdominated by an aversion to sticks (e.g., fear, anger) rather than a graspingfor carrots, since aversive reactions usually have a bigger impact due to thenegativity bias of the brain.

Somethinghappens. It might be a car suddenly cutting you off, a put-down from acoworker, or even just a worrisome thought. (It might be conversation around the family table*! [MH])

Social and emotional conditions canpack a wallop like physical ones sincepsychological pain draws on many of thesame neural networks as physical pain (Eisenberger and Lieberman 2004); this iswhy getting rejected can feel as bad as a root canal. Even just anticipating achallenging event—such as giving a talk next week—can have as much impact asliving through it for real. Whatever the source of the threat, the amygdalasounds the alarm, setting off several reactions:

Thethalamus—the relay station in the middle of your head—sends a “Wake up!” signalto your brain stem, which in turn releases stimulating norepinephrinethroughout your brain.
The SNSsends signals to the major organs and muscle groups in your body, readying themfor fighting or fleeing.
Thehypothalamus—the brain’s primary regulator of the endocrine system—prompts thepituitary gland to signal the adrenal glands to release the “stresshormones”epinephrine (adrenaline) and cortisol.

Within asecond or two of the initial alarm, your brain is on red alert, your SNS is litup like a Christmas tree, and stress hormones are washing through your blood.In other words, you’re at least a little upset. What’s going on in your body?

Epinephrineincreases your heart rate (so your heart can move more blood) and dilates yourpupils (so your eyes gather more light). Norepinephrine shunts blood to largemuscle groups. Meanwhile, the bronchioles of your lungs dilate for increasedgas exchange—enabling you to hit harder or run faster.

Cortisolsuppresses the immune system to reduce inflammation from wounds. It also revsup stress reactions in two circular ways: First, it causes the brain stem tostimulate the amygdala further, which increases amygdala activation of theSNS/HPAA system—which produces more cortisol. Second, cortisol suppresseshippocampal activity (which normally inhibits the amygdala); this takes thebrakes off the amygdala, leading to yet more cortisol.

Reproductionis sidelined—no time for sex when you’re running for cover. The same fordigestion: decreases and peristalsis slows down, so your mouth feels dry andyou become constipated.

Youremotions intensify, organizing and mobilizing the whole brain for action.SNS/HPAA arousal stimulates the amygdala, which is hardwired to focus onnegative information and react intensely to it. Consequently, feeling stressedsets you up for fear and anger.

As limbicand endocrine activation increases, the relative strength of executive controlfrom the PFC declines. It’s like being in a car with a runaway accelerator: thedriver has less control over her vehicle. Further, the PFC is also affected bySNS/HPAA arousal, which pushes appraisals, attributions of others’ intentions,and priorities in a negative direction: now the driver of the careening carthinks everybody else is an idiot. For example, consider the difference betweenyour take on a situation when you’re upset and your thoughts about it laterwhen you’re calmer.

In the harshphysical and social environments in which we evolved, this activation ofmultiple bodily systems helped our ancestors survive. But what’s the cost ofthis today, with the chronic low-grade stresses of modern life?

---

Becomingaware of all this stuff that goes on in us can make us a little crazy. But notnearly as crazy as not becoming aware of it. Happy Holidays.

Longest Night of the Year

2011-12-22T06:18:00.000-08:00

It's the shortest day of the year. Least light. Longest night.

The flip side is that this is the very day and night that light begins to increase.

As we recognize the patterns--and we turn a certain way,
even when the path is darkest we are faced to greet the day.

Thomas Aquinas, who many take to be the most important Christian theologian in the West, was also someone who took religion with a grain of salt. He knew that religion, theology, cover up as much as they reveal. But also that they have the capacity to reveal so much.

Many folks who love to mark the solstice don't have much use for religion. Many religious folks don't have much use for solstices.

Ain't that a shame.

Aquinas, who wrote volumes and volumes and volumes of theology, also tried getting to the heart of spirituality in simpler ways--like the two lines below:

I once asked a plant, "What does light talk about."
"I'm not sure," said the plant, "but it makes me grow."

A blessed Solstice to you!

Recipes for Wassail and Frustration

2011-12-21T04:52:00.000-08:00

Ah, the Christmas season! What joy...what frustration!

Shopping. Crowds. Traffic. Family. Lists. Lines. Canned carols. Wassail steeped at Christmas has nothing on simmering holiday frustration.

Long, long ago, Plato published a recipe that tops both:

"Be kind. For everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle."

And this is a recipe that has to steep, too. On Facebook and Twitter and through email we read inspiring quotes all the time. How long do they keep us inspired? How deeply does the wisdom that briefly opens our hearts spread? It's got to steep to spread. It's a recipe that calls for steeping.

Then serving.

While shopping in crowded stores, bogged down in traffic or long checkout lines--or on the third day with family--pause, breathe, come back to your truest self.

Then practice Plato's mantra: Be kind--everybody here is fighting a hard battle.

As you repeat the phrases, breathe, and locate kindness in yourself.

Where is it? What is it's source in you? Rejoice when you find it. Savor it in yourself for a moment or two. Let it steep.

And after you've tasted it in yourself and it tastes good, then serve it up to others in whatever way is consistent with who you are.

High Places, Low Places, Forks in the Road

2011-12-20T09:01:00.000-08:00

Yesterday's post ends with "Who knew?"

Who knew how somebody can go from seasons of searching to a moment a finding so immediately? I didn't know. Not then. But since 'then' I've been paying more attention to what that's about.

I love this bit in Proverbs 8--

Listenas Wisdom calls out!
      Hear as understanding raises her voice!
On the hilltop along the road,
      she takes her stand at the crossroads.
By the gates at the entrance to the town,
      on the road leading in, she cries aloud,
“I call to you, to all of you!
      I raise my voice to all people."

The word Wisdom is quite a word. Wisdom is all the wise words ever uttered and passed on. Our scriptures and philosophies, novels and plays and folk tales, songs, family legacies, and on and on and on.

Wisdom is also the ability to recognize what's wise and what's not.

Wisdom is what's been known and the knowing and The One Who Knows all together.

Is The One Who Knows 'you?' I think so. It's the sum of the rich process of discernment.

Is The One Who Knows 'God?' I think so.

A very long time ago receptive people begin to experience this. They blogged about it. They wrote songs and shared them. "Be Still and Know I Am God" is one of those lyrics.

Not everybody who Knows calls the Knowing "God." I don't doubt their Knowing--at least no more than I doubt mine or anybody else's. We all see through a glass darkly. We all know only in part.

Yet we see. We know.

Try that. Trust asking and seeking, knocking and exploring.

Wisdom calls aloud from high places and low places, forks in the road--Wisdom actually meets you in all the way-points of your everyday life.

Try slowing down. Listening. Being still and knowing.

The Door at the Back of Beyond

2011-12-19T07:22:00.000-08:00

The thread so far is just at the point of sitting with both Absence and thePossibility of Presence at the same time. It's not the easiest ofthings to do. But like so much else in life, learning to recognize our moments,to read the signs, to follow the star becomes more familiar in the doing.

But after a long plod sometimes things happen all at once.

Lucy was just playing hide and seek when she climbed into thewardrobe, edging back behind its old coats so she wouldn't be found. Back andback and back until she discovered there was no back--and something wascrunching under her feet--it was snowing! She was in Narnia.

Moses, having run away from Egypt to save his life, was tendinghis father-in-law's goats so far from the familiar that it was called TheBack of Beyond. This is where Moses saw the great sight--a bush that burnedbut didn't burn up.

Four years after my friend gave me the gift of being lost,I was again sitting and reading one morning (I had become so curious and opento where the thread I was following might take me that I was actually readingthe Bible--pretty much the last place I thought wisdom might be found.) One ofthe 'wise people' I'd been reading quoted Jesus here and there. He obviouslyhad been experiencing Jesus as a particularly richsource of wisdom. Go figure.

So I had plodded through the first 10 chapters of Luke. Same oldsame old.

Then in chapter 11, I saw it, I got there--the back of thewardrobe, the back of beyond. Here's what I was reading, Jesus was saying:

Ask, and it will be given to you; search, and you will find;knock, and the door will be opened for you. For everyone who asksreceives, and everyone who searches finds, and for everyone who knocks, thedoor will be opened. Is there anyone among you who, if your child asksfor a fish, will give a snake instead of a fish? Or if the child asksfor an egg, will give a scorpion?

I wasn't 19 anymore. I was 23. Some things I was beginning to seefrom both sides, at least a little. I had come to that point in time where achild can begin to see his/her parents in a fresh way. How hard most parentstry. How hard it is to be a parent. How much most parents really care abouttheir children. How much my parents cared about me.

Here's what I read next, Jesus is still talking--

So, make the connection. You humans, being as fallible as you are(one thing my 4 years had taught me was how very fallible I was), know how togive good gifts to your children. Consider what God wants to give you.

Then, just like that, in a flash--Narnia, a flaming bush.

I jumped out of the chair. My heart was on fire. My brain wasnearly exploding with wonder. I kept looking back at the chair. And the Bible.Who knew!

All I had done was to consider what God might want to give me. Itcame faster than Next Day Air.

Who knew?

The Glorious Impossible

2011-12-18T04:52:00.000-08:00

It's the last Sunday in Advent. Advent is a yearly pilgrimage to what Madeleine L'Engle calls "The Glorious Impossible." Mary, Mother of God, is the image, the icon, the poster-teenager of the glorious impossible.

Einstein had his version of the glorious impossible, too:

"Problems cannot be solved at the level of consciousness that created them."

You know that queasy feeling we get when we have a problem that looms over and in us that really needs to be solved, fixed, dealt with--and yet we can't figure out how to do it?

Einstein suggests those kinds of problems are only solved by growth. By fertile consciousness that knows how to gestate.

Mary, as she hears the angel say, "you will give birth to God," says two things:

First, "How is this possible--I'm a virgin?"

Last, "Let it be with me according to your word."

Our minds and other people often say of working with tough problems, "This just isn't possible!"

Sometimes they're wrong. Gestating with the glorious impossible is the only way to know which is which.

Life always turns out to be more than we can currently envision if we can just remember to modify our 'impossibles' by keeping 'glorious' in front of them

Why We Wake Early

2011-12-17T05:03:00.000-08:00

It isvirtually impossible, and senseless anyway, to commit yourself to a dailymeditation practice without some view of why you are doing it, what its valuemight be in your life, a sense of why this might be your way and not justanother tilting at imaginary windmills.

In traditional societies, this visionwas supplied and continually reinforced by the culture. If you were a Buddhist,you might practice because the whole culture valued meditation as the path toclarity, compassion, and Buddhahood, a path of wisdom leading to theeradication of suffering.

But in the Western cultural mainstream, you will findprecious little support for choosing such a personal path of discipline andconstancy, especially such an unusual one involving effort but non-doing,energy but no tangible “product.” What is more, any superficial or romanticnotions we might harbor of becoming a better person—more calm or more clear ormore compassionate—don’t endure for long when we face the turbulence of ourlives, our minds and bodies, or even the prospect of getting up early in themorning when it is cold and dark to sit by yourself and be in the presentmoment.

It’s too easily put off or seen as trivial or of secondary importance,so it can always wait while you catch a little more sleep or at least stay warmin bed.

--Jon Kabbat-Zinn, Wherever You Go, There You Are

Guides Along the Way

2011-12-17T04:54:00.000-08:00

It’stempting, writing this, to just jump to the place where faith takes hold again.This tale of being upended by a friend, being shaken to the core and feelinglost, is really a sidetrack to the exploration of mindfulness practice. It’s a ‘forinstance.’

Forinstance, the next time you’re upended and shaken, you might consider takingheart. Having our ‘familiar self,’ our ‘comfortable self’ shaken can be a dooropening, a wormhole to a parallel reality. A way of ‘being’ where what weexperience is more real than the way of ‘being’ we know now.

One of theblessings of mindful practice is, overtime, learning how to slow down andwitness our own lives. We’re more able to see what’s true, what’s not. What’shelpful, what’s harmful. We get better at recognizing when the compass ispointing true north and when it’s not.

For fouryears I wanted so badly to learn what true north was. And in some of thosebooks I checked out from the library, I got the sense that it was possible. Forfour years, I never knew what true north was for me, but I could tell that someother people’s compasses were working for them. And even though it was frustratingas hell not to know my own way, hope stayed kindled by witnessing other people’swisdom and integrity and confidence.

Alan Watts,Teilhard de Chardin, G. I. Gurdjieff. I understood very little of what theseguys wrote, next to nothing, really. But I got a clear sense that they wereguided by that which they found trustworthy, by that which deepened their livesand opened their hearts. Witnessing their steadiness kept me going.

Most everymorning for those four years I got up an hour early and read. Sometimes I triedto pray or meditate, but nothing clicked for me those days with prayer ormeditation. But the practice of sitting in the morning with a hot cup of teaand a book of wise words--witnessing otherpeople finding their way--fed my spirit just enough to keep me trusting thatthere was such a thing as spiritualfood.

At the sametime (alleluia, alleluia, alleluia) how that quiet, solitary, consistent timein the morning whetted my appetite. How sitting with both absence and the possibilityof presence kept alive a sometimes-sense that one day spiritual food mightrain down like manna even for me.

Faith As a Noun Is It's Own Worst Enemy

2011-12-16T06:43:00.000-08:00

When I waswalking up and back surveying all those religious books in the Greenvillelibrary as a 20-year-old, I had lost faith in Christianity. I’d tried tobelieve in what many well-meaning people had tried to pass down, but it justdidn’t connect.

Looking backnow, it seems to me that faith had been misrepresented. It had been presentedas a noun. Stuff to believe.

Faith is its own worst enemy when it’spresented as a noun.

It’s ironic,makes me laugh now to realize, that right there in the library, by beingconfused and miserable and desperately curious all at the same time I had alreadycrossed over into the realm of faith as a verb.

Much laterthere would come a time when I laughed out loud about it reading what Jesus,that Jewish guy I’d quit believing in, had said.

Ask and youget. Seek and you find. Knock and a door opens.

These are real faith words. They’re active, effective.

Ask.

Seek.

Knock.

Help is a faithverb too. Unless we misunderstand, confusing it with a passive process.

Follow is thecentral faith-word in Christianity. But I was still a long way from following.

Evolution on Purpose: Threat Signals

2011-12-15T05:51:00.001-08:00

Foryou to stay healthy, each system in your body and mind must balance twoconflicting needs. On the one hand, it must remain open to inputs duringongoing transactions with its local environment (Thompson 2007); closed systemsare dead systems. On the other hand, each system must also preserve afundamental stability, staying centered around a good set-point and withincertain ranges—not too hot, nor too cold.

Forexample, inhibition from the prefrontal cortex (PFC) and arousal from thelimbic system must balance each other: too much inhibition and you feel numbinside, too much arousal and you feel overwhelmed. Signals of Threat To keepeach of your systems in balance, sensors register its state (as the thermometerdoes inside a thermostat) and send signals to regulators to restore equilibriumif the system gets out of range (i.e., turn the furnace on or off).

Mostof this regulation stays out of your awareness. But some signals for correctiveaction are so important that they bubble up into consciousness. For example, ifyour body gets too cold, you feel chilled; if it gets too hot, you feel likeyou’re baking.

Theseconsciously experienced signals are unpleasant, in part because they carry asense of threat—a call to restore equilibrium before things slide too far toofast down the slippery slope. The call may come softly, with a sense of unease,or loudly, with alarm, even panic.

Howeverit comes, it mobilizes your brain to do whatever it takes to get you back inbalance. This mobilization usually comes with feelings of craving; these rangefrom quiet longings to a desperate sense of compulsion. It is interesting thatthe word for craving in Pali—the language of early Buddhism—is tanha, the rootof which means thirst. The word “thirst” conveys the visceral power of threatsignals, even when they have nothing to do with life or limb, such as thepossibility of being rejected.

Threatsignals are effective precisely because they’re unpleasant—because they makeyou suffer, sometimes a little, sometimes a lot. You want them to stop.

--RickHanson, Buddha's Brain: The Practical Neuroscience of Happiness, Love, andWisdom

Where Does a Person Start?

2011-12-15T05:44:00.000-08:00

College life as I had been living it just didn't seem worth it. I dropped out of my fraternity. Stopped dating. Trudged through finals. Drove home to South Carolina. Over Christmas decided to take a break from school.

Two days after Christmas I left on a road trip--a hitchhikers road trip. I aimed at Vermont where another friend was living. He was a rock-solid kind of guy who was also dissatisfied with the way he'd been living his life. Together, I'd supposed, we might hitchhike to California where it would be warm and full of other kids our age hungry for insight.

Mom and Dad, resigned to my determination, drove me to the interstate--though the whole way suggesting alternatives to hitchhiking north at the end of December--it was already snowing as far south as Georgia.

You hear people say that there's no fool like an old fool. But a young fool is often not far behind.

Getting rides was slow. By the time I got to the North Carolina-Virginia border it was about midnight. Six inches of snow on the ground, though the sky had cleared. I kept my thumb out for a couple of hours but nobody stopped.

I went into some tall grass a hundred or so feet from the road. Fished around in my dufflebag for the tarp and sleeping bag. Laid them out, slithered in, and as my breath formed tiny ice crystals around the edges of the mummy bag, I contemplated the wisdom of my expectations.

That beam of light that had filled my head--where was it now? In those distant stars sparkling overhead in the December sky? What was it all those wise men had said?

It dawned on me that I didn't have a clue what wise people had said. I'd never really paid attention. And though I didn't understand it, this realization was the beginning of wise receptivity to the wisdom I didn't yet have! It was the thread.

I fell asleep.

My shivering body woke me up a couple of hours later. I've never been so cold. Good Lord, I thought, I might die here.

I stuffed my gear back in the bag and jogged across the crusty snow to the interstate, thumb out.

Thank God somebody stopped. Took me all the way to Washington, where I realized I had cousins. My ride let me out at a gas station. I called them. Got directions. Called a cab, arrived, got fed and took a hot shower. Next morning I spent all my money on a plane ticket back home.

The very next morning my path took a new tack. I went to the library and found the Religion section. Walked through it, up and down, back and forth, wide-eyed and thinking, Here's where a person encounters Wisdom.

But...where does that person start?

Down the Rabbit Hole

2011-12-14T05:09:00.000-08:00

In the monthsafter my friend ‘helped’ me become conscious of my shallowness, I tried tocarry on life as it had been. It worked sometimes. More times than not there was a gnawingin the heart—something that had been mostly repressed before--but no longer could be.

After aboutthree months my college roommate at the time asked me if I wanted to try something ‘absolutelymind-bending’–in pill form--that might help me. I didn’t want to.

But over a few weeks hepersisted. Told me it was ‘pure stuff.’ That it would help me ‘see inside my soul.’ That it was like 'those magic mushrooms Native Americans use for insight.'

I was stillskeptical, so he suggested maybe I could just take ‘half a tab.’ And though not convinced, I was intrigued.

I took half a pill. And in about 45 minutes it wasdown the rabbit hole. It was down the rabbit hole for the rest of thenight.

Ashe promised, it was mind-bending. At first mostly just a sluggish ‘WOW’ state. Before long there was a kind ofecstasy. Thinking in vivid colors and in 3D with surroundsound.

At one point my roommate put headphones on me and played a song by the MoodyBlues. The bit of lyric I remember is

A beam of light will fill your head
andyou’ll remember what’s been said
by all the wise men this world’s ever known.

That's how the experience was unfolding. At first aperfectly marvelous sense of being led through landscapes of insight, wisdom, epiphany.

But as the night wore on the landscapes were more about comparisons,inadequacies, judgment, self-loathing, condemnation, and fear.

Well intothe night it was all I could do to just hold on. It was like being caught in agreat whirlpool, going down, down, down. Something told me I must not go downany further. That people who went down further never came back.

For the restof the night I swam with all my might against that powerful, threatening current,at some point finally drifting off to sleep.

When I finallywoke up it was with the absolute certainty that I had to understand what this 'thing,' this powerful experience of the mind, was about. Not just because I was curious. Mainly it was because I had a deep sense that this 'beam of light' would either light my way forward or burn me up. And that 'lighting my way' or 'burning me up' would depend on whether I stepped willingly into spiritual exploration or ran away hoping to return to where I'd been.

There's a thread we follow. While we hold it, we can't get lost. Though for me it would feel mostly like being lost for the next 4 years.

Mostly. But not always.

What if we don't want to know the truth?

2011-12-13T04:23:00.000-08:00

When I was nineteen, one of my best friends, a guy who I really liked and admired, said to me, "You know, for somebody as perceptive as you are, you sure can be shallow." Hearing him say this felt like a snakebite to the heart.

It hurt so bad because something in me knew it was so true. I was just cruising, trying to squeeze as much fun out of life as I could. Didn't care that much about using people along the way. Just wanted to keep the fun coming.

Whatever that something was, the something that knew, it was profound and persistent and somehow undeniable.

Overnight I became lost, disoriented, unsure, tentative.

And miserable.

Looking back, William Stafford's poem, The Way It Is, comes to mind:

There’s a thread you follow. It goes among
things that change. But it doesn’t change.
People wonder about what you are pursuing.
You have to explain about the thread.
But it is hard for others to see.
While you hold it you can’t get lost.
Tragedies happen; people get hurt
or die; and you suffer and get old.
Nothing you do can stop time’s unfolding.
You don’t ever let go of the thread.

Only at that time, this thread-following William Stafford wrote about was something I didn't understand at all--even though this was the moment I began to consciously follow the thread.

I don't think there's any one name for the thread. But it has something to do with recognizing and owning what's true. And at that time, what the truth did for me was hurt.

Why follow that?

Who can say?

Maybe it's a certain grace that comes with pain--that pain somehow marks the place where healing is not only necessary but possible.

Maybe what Jesus said about truth is carried somewhere in our DNA, maybe even in our reptile brains: "You will know the truth and the truth will set you free." Maybe it's just dirt level basic--recognizing how and working with the way things are.

Bottom Up Thinking

2011-12-12T03:28:00.000-08:00

"The Glory of God is a human being fully alive!" -St. Irenaus

Our brains are a little kludgy, like somebody didn't want to throw their old Atari computer away and over the decades cobbled together new hardware and software.

Neuroscientists say that we humans have three brains--the reptilian, the paleomammalian, and the neomammalian. Or more colorfully, we have a lizard, a squirrel, and a human brain all wired together. These three brains evolved one at a time, growing one on top of the other and wiring together. Our three brains, working together, are are how we process life.

I find this wonderfully encouraging. It explains why our thinking and feeling can be all over the map.

The reptile brain is simple. And fast. And what it 'wants' comes into our awareness as very strong urges, intense 'motivation.'

Our top brain (neomammalian/human) is slow and 'motivationally diffuse.' Our most sophisticated brain communicates with subtler 'urges.'

Mark Twain said that a lie can travel halfway around the world while the truth is still putting on its shoes.

Our lizard impulses can spread from our ears to our toes while our top brain is still processing what's happening--what's happening both outside us and what our lizard and squirrel brains want us to do about it.

This all happens while we're 'still putting on our shoes,' so to speak.

Mindfulness, by slowing us down and training us to notice what we think and feel, enables us to watch this. To understand it better. To work with our selves (and our three brains) as we are.

And it gives us a reason to smile, chortle even, in the process. Ah! No wonder it's tricky--this growing into being fully human.

I wish I'd known how this stuff works when I was a teenager.

Learning to Read the Night

2011-12-11T04:08:00.001-08:00

It's Sunday, so this is a Sunday thread.

We're in Advent, a season of longing and preparation for the coming of light. Also, as it happens this year on this day, we have a full moon. It rises in the east and sets in the west.

When the moon is full its rising always means the sun is setting. Its setting always means the sun is rising. Two completely round orbs balanced at either end of our world. Together they mark one full day and orient us in both time and direction.

Here's a hymn about longing and preparation and paying attention. About blessings we experience practicing celestial navigation.

In the winter's early darkness,
through the days of failing light,
travelers may delay a journey
or may learn to read the night.

Turning on a steady axis,
cold and burning, black and bright,
heaven tells a faithful story
of the coming of the Light.

As we recognize the patterns
and we turn a certain way,
even when the path is darkest,
we are faced to greet the day.

(you can sing this to the same tune as Come Thou Long Expected Jesus)

Evolution & Spiritual Formation

2011-12-10T08:41:00.001-08:00

These are Trilobite fossils on our living room mantel. Trilobites flourished in our oceans 250-500 million years ago. They headline this post simply because they're ancient, beautiful, and part of the evolution of life on Earth.

I plan to follow an Evolution Thread for awhile here at Ordinary Mindfulness. I think spiritual formation is a kind of evolution, a very intentional kind of evolution.

Everything that lives lives because life has evolved to this point. We humans have passed on a reasonably sophisticated DNA. We learned how to farm and were able to support larger families and communities. We learned to make weapons in order to hunt and protect ourselves.

In some places we grew prosperous and powerful. Built great cities and eventually great armies. We evolved so dramatically that we have become dangerous critters.

Dangerous to every form of life on the planet including ourselves.

If we don't learn to evolve purposefully from here on out...we might really mess up God's gift of life forever, at least on this planet.

I saw a poster once that said, None of us is as dumb as all of us. A cartoon that read, We have met the enemy...and it's us!

I get really stoked about spiritual formation because it is a key ingredient in the wise evolution of our race. It's something we can participate in that cultivates a wisdom and an ability to grow toward LIFE--full, enjoyable, sustainable life.

Nothing Memorable Accomplished

2011-12-09T06:28:00.001-08:00

There weretimes when I could not afford to sacrifice the bloom of the present moment toany work, whether of the head or hand. I love a broad margin to my life.

Sometimes,in a summer morning, having taken my accustomed bath, I sat in my sunny doorwayfrom sunrise till noon, rapt in a reverie, amidst the pines and hickories andsumachs, in undisturbed solitude and stillness, while the birds sang around orflitted noiseless though the house, until by the sun falling in at my westwindow, or the noise of some traveller’s wagon on the distant highway, I wasreminded of the lapse of time.

I grew inthose seasons like corn in the night, and they were far better than any work ofthe hands would have been. They were not time subtracted from my life, but somuch over and above my usual allowance. I realized what the Orientals mean bycontemplation and the forsaking of works.

For the mostpart, I minded not how the hours went. The day advanced as if to light somework of mine; it was morning, and lo, now it is evening, and nothing memorableis accomplished. Instead of singing, like the birds, I silently smiled at myincessant good fortune.

As thesparrow had its trill, sitting on the hickory before my door, so I had mychuckle or suppressed warble which he might hear out of my nest.

-Thoreau, Walden

Gloomy Day, Bright Day

2011-12-08T05:48:00.001-08:00

Yesterday I was reflecting on gloomy weather and gloomy feelings. But early this morning, walking the dog before dawn, I saw lots of stars vivid in the December sky.

Later, in the time I do 'sacred reading' and just as I came across a quote from Thoreau, the sun sprang up over the mountains.

My chair faces north, so the sun rises directly to my right. It was so bright that as it struck my cornea and lit up the right side my nose, I was a little bit blinded.

With wonderful irony, this is the quote I was reading at this precise moment: "Only that day dawns to which we are awake." I had to laugh out loud.

I was reading Jon Kabat-Zinn's, Wherever You Go There You Are. This is what preceeded the quote:

"Taking up a formal meditation practice by making some time for it each day doesn't mean that you won't be able to think any more, or that you can't run around and get things done. It means that you are more likely to know what you are doing because you have stopped for a while and watched, listened, and understood."

This has a lot to do with why I meditate. I really appreciate the encouragement and instruction to stop and watch and listen.

The payoff is to understand, at least to understand a bit better and better over time. And sometimes light dawns in a surprisingly vivid way.