Learning New Tricks

You will learn a lot from yourself if you stretch in the direction of goodness, of bigness, of kindness, of forgiveness, of emotional bravery. Be a warrior for love. Cheryl Strayed

I appreciate this idea that our actions should be guided by our intentions. Most people I know want to stretch in the direction of goodness. They do. I’m lucky that way. But that does not mean that we all agree on how that should look. This is not a problem UNLESS we unconsciously shift away from our intentions and forget who we want to grow up to be - good, kind, forgiving, brave, a warrior of love. ALL of these characteristics are easier to manifest if we start and end all conversations with asking and answering the following question, “Where do we agree? Where is our common ground?”

What would happen if we stopped judging and calling names and instead got serious about listening to one another? What would happen if we stopped thinking, “What a bunch of _______ !” (Insert what bad names you use when you judge another.) INSTEAD, what if we said, “Man, I understand. I feel disenfranchised and marginalized too. How can we fix this?”

My kids have led our family in finding the art of loving, gentle, reasonable, heartfelt conversations about topics that we all land in various places on. My son Michael in particular is a passionate guy and I know he has strong, strong feelings about any topic that he is invested in understanding. But he rarely condescends and if on occasion a little hot sauce is sprinkled over his words, he immediately apologizes and explains why he feels so passionately that his words come out fast and intense. He is one of the safest people I know to be curious with on a hot topic. I do not know how he became this man. We did not teach this because we did not know how to practice this skill. But I think it serves as an encouragement - we can learn new tricks, even us old dogs. Sometimes the mentor is the youngest member of the family. Sometimes it is the oldest. If we as families could learn how to do this, maybe that would spread out into our communities and ultimately our country as well? Don’t you think it is worth a try?

In Christ’s family there can be no division into Jew and non-Jew, slave and free, male and female. Among us you are all equal. This is, we are all in the common relationship with Jesus Christ. Also, since you are Christ’s family, then you are Abraham’s famous “descendant,” heirs according to the covenant promises. Galatians 3:28-29 The Message

Responsibility to Others...

Be about ten times more magnanimous than you believe yourself capable of being. Your life will be a hundred times better for it.

Cheryl Strayed

I do not know if you are up on the news, but we are about to transition from one political party in the White House from the other. It has not been an easy transition. I need to talk about this. I hope you will be kind and gracious to me. First off, I am struck by how winners and losers say the exact same thing but from the opposite perspective. I remember when the BLM protests and riots were going on last summer and many folks said that many of the protesters were peaceful and some were not. On Wednesday January 6th, when the protests and riots were going on over the election of Joe Biden, many folks said that many of the protesters were peaceful and some were not. When we feel passionately FOR something, we tend to think that “our side” behaves righteously and the “other side” are violent thugs. Theories are posited so that we can hold onto our certainty of our righteousness. Both sides. Both sides doing the exact same thing, just from an opposite perspective. Both sides. (Just to be clear, I do not think there is a moral equivalency between protests and insurrection, I’m just saying that both sides have a tendency to demonize the other. In situations like this, there is always more diversity in those who attend than we are able to acknowledge in our certainty.)

It is at times like this that I wish for a magic wand so that I can sprinkle it over us all. I wish everyone practiced the 12-steps so rigorously that it would no longer be in our DNA or behavior to point fingers at others BUT instead we would have a deeply ingrained propensity to reflect deeply about our own self-righteousness and certainty. When my wand arrives from Amazon, I am going to sprinkle the s*&* out of that thing, but alas, it is lost in transit. Friends, this is not right. I know I am only responsible FOR myself, but I am also responsible TO others. I do not want to talk about such things, but I feel that I need to be clear about my perspective. Here is what I want us to do, with our ordinary, daily life:

1. Love one another, especially those who differ from us.

2. It would be so amazingly cool if we stopped sharing our opinions and instead spent our time curious about the places where our opinions, perception of fact, etc., might be off base. This is not a rejection of our freedom, it is a repudiation of license to share our certainty in favor of exercising the liberty and responsibility to love one another. Humility should always question our sense of righteous indignation.

3. If we share our opinion, for God’s sake, can we please stop using social media and ONLY do it one-to-one where dialogue can be part of the conversation? PLEASE?!?

I so wish we as a community would consider this.

Creating Sanctuary in Your Everyday Life

“Sanctuary is finding a place to regain our bearings, reclaim our soul, heal our wounds and return to the world as a wounded healer. It’s not merely about finding shelter from the story - it’s about spiritual survival and the capacity to carry on.”

Parker Palmer

When Pete and I head to the lake at summer’s end for a break in our action-packed life, we are seeking shelter. We shelter from our routine and our tendency to work more than we play. I start thinking about returning to our shelter as we pack up to leave the lake. After loading the kayaks and floats, the workout equipment and leftover food, we back the car out of the garage and begin the steep climb up the driveway towards home. I do not look back. I look ahead. I think about the next time we will return to this wonderful place of leisure, quiet, wildlife, a comfortable dock to perch on and launch ourselves into the glassy lake.

This is not a sanctuary - it’s shelter.

If I waited until I was on our lake vacation to experience sanctuary, I would be in big trouble mentally, emotionally and spiritually. Sanctuary is finding a place moment-by-moment, hour-by-hour, day-by-day...on and on marching across the timeline of our lives.

This is new information for me. I consider our vacations the ideal time to experience sanctuary, and it is true enough that we do find that during those weeks of solitude, stillness and silence. But we bring it with us. It isn’t the environment, it is the essence of our lives that allow or resist finding sanctuary.

One way I find sanctuary is using the practice of The Welcoming Prayer. I go slow with it. I talk back to it. There are more formal, codified ways to practice the welcoming prayer and if you want more details contact me and I will send you some lovely details about such things. But this is how I personally find myself using it.

When I pray The Welcoming Prayer, I am practicing faith even when filled with doubt, courage even when overcome with fear. I dare to pray this prayer as a way of intending to believe that God is for me, not against me; that his hand is upon me as support and encouragement, not as punishment or manipulation. It is a short but specific way I admit to God and myself that my assessment may feel certain in the moment but have often proven unreliable. I commit my intention to let go of those false strategies that honestly, never worked that great anyway. I let go of my desire to control ife, rather than surrender to God’s presence in my life.

It begins like this: Welcome, welcome, welcome.

Today, I invite you to sit quietly and welcome God into your sanctuary. Invite yourself to participate in God’s work - equipping you for spiritual survival and giving you the capacity to carry on.

Let’s pray...The Welcoming Prayer by Mary Mrozowski

Welcome, welcome, welcome.

Spiritual sanctuary is not about retreats and the perfect candle. Although, both are lovely. But if we only think about sanctuary and our idealized view of its necessary accoutrements, we are missing out. To welcome God into our life requires that we acknowledge that what God does once he gets there is really none of our business.

I welcome everything that comes to me in this moment because I know it is for my healing.

In the welcoming prayer, we are - welcoming. We trust that the world is a healing place, a place of hope, a creation of God intended to bless us and others. Sometimes this is an act of fierce will, often it feels like crazy talk to believe this about our germy world. But this is the work of faith.

I welcome all thoughts, feelings, emotions, persons, situations and conditions.

We trust ourselves. We trust that we can handle all that is real and true about ourselves. We get curious and stop all the self-judgment and self-doubt.

I let go of my desire for security, approval and control.

Some days my desires are so long I have to take a break for lunch before I complete the list of things I am holding onto for security, the people I am looking to for approval and ALL the ways I am trying to exert control. It is what it is.

I let go of my desire to change any situation, condition, person or myself.

We let go of the desire, and then ask God to show us how to apply it to our daily decisions. This prayer is a commitment!

I open to the love and presence of God and the healing action and grace within.

Oh blessed relief. And, dare I say it? Perhaps the toughest part of this prayer. To trust God. To admit that his work in me is none of my business. I open up, and after that - it’s up to God to decide what happens next. Or doesn’t feel like it is happening at all. We open. We rise and take on the day.

Amen

The Hard Work of Self-Confrontation

So far this blog has just been a bundle of optimism! Rethink loneliness I suggested! Don’t run from suffering! What pain are you avoiding? I inquired. These are the words people seeking maturity and wisdom need to hear. They are not easy words. But they are necessary words.

We will not heal as a nation, we will not unify as a people, we will not deny our baser instincts, unless a few of us are willing to do the hard work of self-confrontation. So. In order to do this work, we need to find a sanctuary.

I cannot tell you what your sanctuary looks like or where to find it. But I can tell you my understanding of the concept.

“Sanctuary is finding a place to regain our bearings, reclaim our soul, heal our wounds and return to the world as a wounded healer. It’s not merely about finding shelter from the story - it’s about spiritual survival and the capacity to carry on.”

Parker Palmer

My sanctuary is mostly solitary, but when necessary, I have trusted mentors who I ask to join me. I do this by inviting them to hear my story. I share my pain. I tell them the things I hope no one ever knows about me, because these truths embarrass me. I’ve made some whopper mistakes when it comes to trusting people but for the most part, as I age, I get a bit better at finding trustworthy mentors.

May we find sanctuary, one and all!

Loneliness is an Essential Part of Growth - Whether We Like It or Not

Loneliness improves concentration and cognitive functions and is actually conducive to self-development, identity consolidation and heightened creativity. Love the poetry of Mary Oliver? She was not exactly a social butterfly but I swear her time spent in the fields with the butterflies and God’s creatures sparked her creativity and has healed my heart with her beautiful writings on many a day when her words were the thing that got me up and going.

The Handbook of Solitude emphasizes that loneliness can help us gain insight into ourselves, have therapeutic benefits and can help us deal with political and social pressures. They report that those who experience loneliness are able to form better and more lasting relationships than those who have not. AND...loneliness can immunize us against future social isolation.

Maybe we are not experiencing an epidemic of loneliness so much as we are experiencing monophobia - a fear of loneliness. Maybe we are incompetently treating what ails us with increasing and intensifying contact with others. Maybe our problem is less about loneliness and more about our inability to cope with alone time.

Consider this: If you are not your own best company, what do you want/need to change about you? If you chase after everyone, how are you nurturing the small cadre of people who have demonstrated how much they want to be in your company?

If we can let go of fear of loneliness, we can perhaps pay more attention. Are there people in our life who we need to let go of? Maybe the relationship has run its course. Or maybe, upon reflection, the mutual relationship was perhaps not as solid as you thought? Remember that some folks have more to take and less to give. Sometimes that person is us. But we absolutely do not have to feel obligated to live in one-sided relationships. And each of us gets to decide what that means to us, depending on our own temperament, maturity, and capacity for wisdom.

Now, the exception clause. Sometimes people you love are suffering and unable to pick up the phone and call or respond to your reach outs. This is not personal and no offense or judgment needs to be expressed. Our work is to decide, after long and hard consideration, prayer and soul searching, if this is the end of a relationship or a time to hang in with your friend. It can go either way. But if this friend has been a good friend in the past, maybe this is the time when we extend them the grace they have so often extended us. After all, no one has a friend for a while without having to extend grace. In situations like this, we try not to be a stalker and we work hard to manage our own feelings of loss. We find ways to reach out that are not too burdensome to our friend. We do the best we can. They do the best they can.

Just remember: there are worse things than loneliness.

Love one another.

A new year offers us the opportunity to reflect and consider our future selves. Inevitably, we all have different perspectives on resolutions and such. After the year our world has just experienced, it might be hard to muster unbridled enthusiasm and optimism for 2021. Good.

We don’t need it. The endless possibilities; the big dreams; these are not the things that build character and resilience. In the future, it is far more likely that the suffering of 2020 will stimulate creativity and spiritual awakenings the likes of which art camp and retreats could never accomplish.

Suffering is an essential part of growth - whether we like it or not. I am not suggesting we seek out suffering - that’s masochism. But I do hope this allows us to think of our suffering as something we walk through, not run from.

Do you have regrets? A boatload of remorse? Ok. Tempted to blame others? That’s normal. Trying to pretend that you DON’T feel these painful things? Sounds about right.

If 2021 is going to provide us with growth and maturity and wisdom, there is one crucial question we must ask ourselves: What pain are we avoiding? T. S. Eliot said, “Humankind cannot bear very much reality.”

But some humans learn that bearing reality is actually a super power.

Believe in the integrity and value of the jagged path. We don’t always do the right thing on our way to rightness. Cheryl Strayed

Let’s pray….

Jesus said this one time to a group of people. Read these verses and imagine him saying this exact same thing to you:

“Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”

Matthew 11:28-30 NIV