Category: Creativity

Return to the Heart Space

From Richard Rohr’s Immortal Diamond:

“Next time a resentment, negativity, or irritation comes to your mind, for example, and you want to play it out or attach to it, move the thought or person literally into your heart space because such commentaries are almost entirely lodged in your head.

There, surround it with silence (which is much easier to do in the heart).

There, it is surrounded with blood, which will often feel warm like coals.

In this place, it is almost impossible to comment, judge, create story lines or remain antagonistic. You are in a place that does not create or feed on contraries but is the natural organ of life, enbodiment, and love. Love lives and thrives in the heart space.“

These words are hidden in Appendix D (pages 204-205). By chance, I opened the book to these pages and “heart space” caught my attention. I was instantly reminded of where I needed to be. There is peace in the heart space.

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Rushing through life

“It’s as though we were rushing through our lives, and in our hearts, there is the flame of a candle. Because we are moving at such high speed, this essential interior flame is always on the point of going out. But when we sit down to meditate, when we become still, when we are not thinking in terms of our success or self-importance, of our own will, when we are just in the presence of the One who is, then the flame begins to burn brightly. We begin to understand ourselves and others in terms of light, warmth and love.” (John Main)

From the article, Advent’s Unanswered Questions by Teresa White FCJ.

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Entering Cote 304

Cote 304, Verdun France

May 3: Finding my way to Cote 304

I could see the approach of Cote 304 because a grove of Australian pines was nearing. The worst areas devastated by the war were reforested in the 1930s with Australian pines. It would take over three to four centuries for nature to fully recover the area. That evidence was clear wherever I went from Fort Vaux to Le Mort Homme where the artillery had broken the ground and shattered the subsoil.

The car turned onto a narrow lane that meandered through a forest of green conifers, which held back the sun and cast darkness onto the wood line floor. We approached the summit and circled around a tall monolith memorial. Marc and I got out of the car and I walked over to the woods at Cote 304. The ground was pocked and cratered by the bombs and ammunition that had blasted devastation into the ground. There was a dirt road cutting into the wood line. The stronger voice inside me whispered, “Go there.” I walked into the wood line aware of the magnitude of death that saturated the soil, knowing each step I took at Cote 304 was on the battleground where the living had fallen dead.

I stood there, feeling like a living sacrifice, with my hand up near my face. I could feel my breath on my hand. I could feel my face against my hand. I needed this sensory connection to life. As I stood there, the wind whispered through the pines. My eyes noticed the ground was blanketed in pine needles. Green moss grew in patches. Weeds grew in other places. There was life on the wood line floor. Although it looked dark from the road, I realized there were shafts of light streaming in the wood line. The wood line wasn’t filled with death. I stood on the ground of Cote 304. I wanted to remember and feared that my memory would forget. I took two pictures, and then regretted the noise from the shutter clicks. The woods deserved silence. I decided not to make any more noise on the ground where so many thousands of soldiers had died.

Continue reading “Entering Cote 304” →
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Starting Point: At the heart of the Star (Place d’Etoile)

April 30: I was walking clockwise from Avenue Kleber around Place Charles de Gaulle (also known as Place d’Etoile) in search of the tunnel that would lead me under the busy roundabout that surrounds the Arc de Triomphe. I found the tunnel at Avenue de la Grande Armee and descended into the corridor, which was surprisingly deserted of people. There was a nicely dressed Frenchman about twenty paces ahead of me. He paid no heed to the sign in French that was posted on the partially closed gate, but pushed it open and kept walking.

I followed him. As I walked deeper into the empty tunnel, I realized that following a man I didn’t know, through a deserted tunnel, in a foreign country was not exactly a smart move for an American woman traveling alone. And feeling confident that I would scream for help if something did go wrong was ridiculous. Who would hear my screams in an empty tunnel? I had arrived in Paris only a few hours earlier and now marveled at my lack of decision-making skills. I needed to wake up. I chalked up my actions to jet lag and promised myself to pay better attention to what was going on around me.

Continue reading “Starting Point: At the heart of the Star (Place d’Etoile)” →
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What grows in 25 years

25 years ago today, April 29, I was on a plane heading to Paris for five days in France, specifically to visit Cote 304 and Verdun.

Back then, I was writing what would become “Resurgam—Standing on the Ground of Remembrance.” On the surface, it looked like a war story but it was much more than that. The wood line I had envisioned in Alpha Company’s story seemed very similar to Cote 304. I wanted to know if Cote 304 was the ground I had imagined. I learned about Verdun on December 25 while looking through a tour book on France and by February 20 decided to go there. It made no sense why a place completely devastated by war intrigued me. The verdant land had been slaughtered by war. And yet poppies flourished on the war-torn ground in France. During my WWI research in February 1998, bits of the poem I read “In Flanders Fields” by John McCrae would drift into my thoughts.… we are the Dead. Short days ago we lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow. Loved and we loved, now we lie in Flanders Fields… 

I wondered what story I would discover when I remembered the unknown soldiers from WWI. The words of John McCrae’s poem continued to draw my attention:
Take up our quarrel with the foe: 
To you from failing hands we throw 
The torch; be yours to hold it high. 
If ye break faith with us who die 
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow 
In Flanders field

The words seemed to be speaking directly to me. The writer in me wanted to go to uncover the story in Verdun. Yet another side of me didn’t want to go face the darkness.

Deep within my gut I knew the step I had to take. And I did. No one else wanted to go, so I went alone. I prepared with great diligence for a trip to Verdun, the site of the longest and most devastating battle in WWI.

Continue reading “What grows in 25 years” →
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Rekindle

Schweitzer: “The tragedy of life is what dies inside a man while he lives… In every one’s life, at some time, our inner fire goes out.  It is then burst into flame by an encounter with another human being. We should be thankful for these people who rekindle the inner spirit… who or what will you connect with that will rekindle your inner flame?“

Continue reading “Rekindle” →
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Wordsworth: “Our senses drink in the secrets of nature…”

From Karen Armstrong’s new book, Sacred Nature: If we allow it to enter our lives, nature can inform our minds and become a formative influence.

We can begin by taking simple steps, perhaps sitting in a garden or a park for 10 minutes a day, without headphones or a mobile phone, simply registering the sights and sounds of nature. Instead of taking photographs of our surroundings, we should look at the birds, flowers, clouds and trees and let them impress themselves on our minds.

Continue reading →
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They lived. They loved. They have a story to tell

Remember
You are the hands of the present generation.
You hold the hands of a future generation.
You hold the hands of past generations, some now departed, and they in turn held the hands of older generations.
Hearts that once beat with life still beat in remembrance. 

It is All Souls’ Day, a day not recognized through the spring and early summer of my life.  Since writing the words above as the Foreword of Resurgam – Standing on the Ground of Remembrance in 2008, there have been the departures of older generations and the arrivals of younger generations.

Now it’s a day with meaning, a day to pause, to remember them and reflect on all those hands and hearts that once walked on this earth and cultivated the ground in so many loving ways. All the unseen actions that went unrecognized yet made a difference in the future, which has become the present. 

To honor them and remember them, I’m sharing “Stones Unknown,” about finding peace in the most unexpected place. The inspiration (not surprisingly) was a stone.  This is a chapter from the revised story—The Ground of Remembrance—the fruit received through cycles of seasons from the hearts and hands of older generations. As the early story of Resurgam goes, “They lived. They loved. They have a story to tell.” I have been listening and learning. This small, yet new chapter took 25 years of learning how to listen and trust my heart. It is the beginning.  My heart overflows with gratitude for a gift from past generations that continues to grow.

Read: Stones Unknown

Background: A photograph of a solitary soldier standing on a hill of ruins captured my attention in 2013. (Hill of Loss) Something was familiar. The caption revealed the location: “A solitary American soldier looks at a ruined church on the crest of Montfaucon, France, after the town was captured.” I had been to there! My guide took me to Montfaucon on my way to Cote 304. That discovery and the journey inspired a new chapter of fiction, Stones Unknown in 2022.

From the book “RESURGAM – Standing on the Ground of Remembrance” – the discovery of Montfaucon, France (and the Center for Peace):

(c) 2022 Jean Niedert, an excerpt from “The Ground of Remembrance”

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John ‘O’Donohue writes: “…the life within us calls out for expression. This is what creativity serves. It endeavors to bring some of our hidden life to expression in order than we might come to see who we are. When we are creative, we help the unknown to become known, the invisible to be seen and the rich darkness within us to become illuminated. “

From the book: Beauty: The Invisible Embrace by John O’Donohue

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The spirit of a tree

St. Simons Island is known for its tree spirits. I was determined to visit all eleven listed in the Tree Spirit Scavenger Hunt. Finding some are challenging.

Most interesting, the “tree spirit” with the most presence was not on the list. The featured photograph is a majestic live oak at Fort Frederica on St. Simons Island. As I walked the Broad Street path to the fort, the presence of the tree drew my attention. It’s not an original tree from colonial times but it’s an old tree that’s weathered many storms. All I know is the tree had a presence and spirit not carved by human hands.

Creativity calls out to me, “Pick up a soft pencil or charcoal and draw it.”

Continue reading “The spirit of a tree” →
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The rill garden: a place of enchantment

If you’re not familiar with the rill garden created by Geoffrey Jellicoe, here’s a lovely introduction that provides sight and sound.

Watch: Shute Garden (4:16 mins) This is a BBC video clip from episode 4 of “The Secret History of the British Garden” by Monty Don.

The moment Monty Don and Suzy Lewis passed through the gate of Shute House Garden, I was instantly transported to a place of enchantment. The water is channeled from the River Nadder into a series of canals, pools and waterfalls. It pours down a series of copper chambers in the rill which create different notes on the musical scale.

Continue reading “The rill garden: a place of enchantment” →
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Sound: Warm as sunlight… a calming, centering glow

David George Haskell writes: “A tone clear and warm as sunlight sounds from the giant bronze bell. The ring contains no hint of clang or jangle, just a single frequency, sweetened and fattened by overtones, pitched a few notes below middle C, exactly at the midpoint range of human speech. 

His words create a sound.  I imagine listening to this bronze bell while wondering where it might be. 

Haskell continues: Although I stand two meters away from the bell, the sound seems to emerge from within me, a calming, centering glow that spreads from chest to extremities, then flows outward into my perception of the park which I stand. 

Haskell reveals he’s standing in Hiroshima Peace Park listening to the Peace Bell, which visitors can ring. The resonate sound of the peace bell arrived in my imagination and awareness. I heard it. Here’s a different version of place making and peace making—of cultivating sound and a sense of peace.

“A child stands on tiptoe and reaches up to haul on a rope dangling from the beam. She pulls back, then releases, and the wooden striker swings onto the bell. The sound rings again. Pure and steady toned, with a slight pulsation, a swelling of amplitude that comes at a pace just slower than a calm heartbeat.” 

David George Haskell writes about the Peace Bell, it’s maker, Masahiko Katori and introduces the 100 Soundcapes of Japan in his book, Sounds Wild and Broken—Sonic Marvels, Evolutions Creativity and the Crisis of Sensory Extinction.” He notes the ringing of the Peace Bell is Soundscape 76.  

The 100 Soudscapes of Japan is a government program launched in 1996 to combat noise pollution, to honor significant soundscapes and to prompt people to rediscover the natural sounds around them and encourage deeper listening.

Haskell reminds us, “The wonders of human culture and the living world come to us through many senses. To only honor material objects and spaces is to exclude much of what gives life joy and meaning.”

I pause to recognize how much sound gets cast into the background, and yet, it’s often the sounds of nature that give life joy and spark a sense of wonder.

Wikipedia: 100 Soundscapes of Japan

Read an excerpt from David George Haskel’s book that’s repurposed as an article in Spirituality and Health:  100 Sounds and a Culture of Listening

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“What will happen to our hearts if there is no place to find the beauty of emptiness in an overstuffed world? “ – Joan Chittister

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Learning about restorative gardens

Taking the Introduction to Therapeutic Horticulture course (online) during May-July enabled me to see the “hidden” structures in gardens. Of course, the structure is always in clear view, but I haven’t attended to those details until now. 

My interest has landed on restorative gardens, the characteristics in healing gardens and the therapeutic power of beauty.  Here’s what holding my attention this month:

Four phases of interaction in nature (addressed in Johan Ottosson’s doctoral thesis, The Importance of Nature in Coping):

  • Phase I – Inert objects
  • Phase II – Plants and greenery 
  • Phase I + II – Nature 
  • Phase III – Animals 
  • Phase IV – People 

Eight characteristics of a restorative garden (Grahn, 1991) (Stigsdotter 2015):

  1. Serene
  2. Wild
  3. Rich in species
  4. Space
  5. The common
  6. The pleasure garden
  7. Festive 
  8. Culture
Continue reading “Learning about restorative gardens” →
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Placemaking inspires reinvention

porch swings in a park

From the Project for Public Spaces: Placemaking inspires people to collectively reimagine and reinvent public spaces as the heart of every community. Strengthening the connection between people and the places they share, placemaking refers to a collaborative process by which we can shape our public realm in order to maximize shared value. More than just promoting better urban design, placemaking facilitates creative patterns of use, paying particular attention to the physical, cultural, and social identities that define a place and support its ongoing evolution.

When you focus on place, you do everything differently

Read more from Project for Public Spaces: What is Placemaking?

You’ll find a Placemaking booklet on the PPS page that you can download.

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Discovering “place maker” and contemplating “peace maker”

“I feel called to be a ‘place maker’ to set down roots in a society that is constantly on the move.” – H.D.

My introduction to “place maker” arrived when I read H.D.’s forum post regarding her interest in therapeutic horticulture as the course ends.  My mind kept playing with “l” and “e”: place maker | peace maker.  I could see the interconnectedness in the interplay of place and peace.

What else could I find?

Continue reading “Discovering “place maker” and contemplating “peace maker”” →
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The plant would still be distinguished… and that in itself is its own reward

“Struggling over steep hills covered with hedgerows, trees, and generally impenetrable jungle, one of my men turned to me and pointed a hand, filled with cuts and scratches, at a rather distinguished-looking plant with soft red flowers… – Sandy Kempner

I received an email on Friday and learned an acquaintance was reading Resurgam. Although he was on page 39, he offered feedback, which included:  “Phil, we learn, is a poet, but there is also Sandy’s beautiful and profound letter.  The reader is led not simply to hear such voices respectfully but to think along with their spirit.  His cherished plant among the blasted warscape provoked in me this remembrance of Whitehead’s words….“

With the mention of Sandy Kempner’s letter, the plant with red flowers waving gaily in the downpour and the tired Marine who wrote the letter arrived in my memory.  What timing.

Beauty as a form of emotional nourishment

This letter records beauty as a form of emotional nourishment. Originally, I found Sandy’s letter in the early months of my search for Alpha Company way back in my late twenties. For me, so much was unknown and there were many battles with doubt at that time. The unexpected beauty described in Sandy’s letter offered a completely different perspective. 

Continue reading “The plant would still be distinguished… and that in itself is its own reward” →
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Beauty as seen by Sandy Kempner

“It makes a sound, and the plant was beautiful, and the thought was kind, and the person was humane, and distinguished and brave, not merely because other people recognized it as such, but because it is, and it is, and it is.“

Dear Aunt Fannie,
This morning, my platoon and I were finishing up a three-day patrol. Struggling over steep hills covered with hedgerows, trees, and generally impenetrable jungle, one of my men turned to me and pointed a hand, filled with cuts and scratches, at a rather distinguished-looking plant with soft red flowers waving gaily in the downpour (which had been going on ever since the patrol began) and said, “That is the first plant I have seen today which didn’t have thorns on it.” I immediately thought of you. 

Continue reading “Beauty as seen by Sandy Kempner” →
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Discovering the Oratory of the Heart

Joan Chittister writes: “… you have to make an oratory for yourself somehow. Take a long walk alone, perhaps, where the whipping wind or the bursting of trees can bring you back to the essentials, the basics of life. The point is that your “oratory” is whatever invites you, lifts your soul beyond the daily and the mundane. The oratories of the heart are any place that recalls you to your spiritual self.”

I have continued to return to Joan Chittister’s words in the chapter “The Oratory – On Holy Space” from her book The Monastic Heart.

I landed in the oratory during February and continued to return to the pages due to its resonance. Why do these words speak to me? Initially, I thought it was the discovery of the word, “oratory” for chapel. I remembered the Chapel of the Palms. This small, simple oratory sits by the Edisto River, which flows—within eyesight—into the Atlantic Ocean.   To be there—even on the ground of remembrance—is to notice hidden transitions.

And still, the oratory resonated, so I wanted to share this chapter with others. It was the timing of my decision to share that finally illuminated a deeper understanding and meaning. 

March 13, 2022, the two-year mark

It is March 13, 2022, the two-year mark since all organized activities were cancelled for two weeks in March 2020 due to the unknowns of COVID virus. Those two weeks transformed into a stay at home mandate in April 2020. Routines were swept away and life upended.

As I reflected on those early months, I realized the oratory speaks to my heart and spirit because I created an oratory but wasn’t aware of the creation until I read about the oratory. 

Now I understand that COVID restrictions didn’t block access to this space. Visiting hours remained open. There wasn’t any mask mandate.  The only requirement was to find time to visit—to pause, to settle, to rest, to find peace—and finally, to be at peace.  

I entered a variety of oratories during these two years.  There was a back yard deck, the detailed memory of the Chapel of the Palms by the water, the neighbor’s backyard garden with the koi pond, a friend’s covered dock with unexpected sightings of dolphins, walks on the beach, a porch swing on a river walk, a bench at a church’s columbarium, a yoga mat, but most importantly, the space within the heart. In these past two years, I have visited the oratory in my heart more than I have ever visited it before. Maybe that’s the truth I needed to discover this week as the world faces another challenge.  And this I know with great certainty in this uncertain world: There is an expansive network of hidden oratories. The community of prayer has grown stronger during these two years.  Where is your oratory? How many have you created and visited during these past two years? 

Excerpts from “The Oratory – On Holy Space” from Joan Chittister’s book The Monastic Heart:

… Now, in these times, we are at the very same kind of moment: Churches are closing as congregations move or disappear. Massive cathedrals stand alone in the cities, still cavernous, too often empty. Now, perhaps more than ever, we need to “let the oratory be what it is called.” We must let it call us beyond our present overwhelmed selves. What will happen to our hearts if there is no place for us to find the beauty of emptiness in an overstuffed world? We live in an overnoisy, overcrowded, overstimulating round of events, with hardly a break to think through the important questions of life: What is life about? What is the purpose of our lives? How can we possibly make things better, more whole, for our families, for our world, for ourselves?

… The oratory tells you that you yourself must reach out, stop, sink down inside yourself, and let the weariness, the pain, the fear of abandonment evaporate and go to dust in the presence of the soothing warmth of faith and the promises of security, beauty, joy, and happiness that come with the presence of God in your life. 

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“It is a time when all the old clarities break down and everything is in flux. Things are up in the air. Nothing is a given anymore, and anything could happen. No one knows the answers: one person says one thing and someone else says something completely different.” (William Bridges)

That description seems to fit the world in the present day. I know I’m in the middle phase of the transition process due to the global pandemic and the changes it has sparked and catalyzed. William Bridges calls this time the Neutral Zone, because “it is a nowhere between two somewheres, and because while you are in it, forward motion seems to stop while you hang suspended between was and will be.” 

As I study transitions, I recognize the Not Knowing Place is part of my transition process. In the past I placed too much emphasis on getting out of the Not Knowing Place. Bridges writes, “when change is deep and far-reaching, this time between the old identity and the new can stretch for months, even years.”

I noticed that time became fluid during the pandemic/Stay at Home order and the boundaries of time (such as self-imposed deadlines and schedules) washed away. Continue reading →

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Finding the Neutral Zone of Transition

“It isn’t the changes that do you in, its the transitions. They aren’t the same thing. Change is situational: the move to a new site, the new boss, the revisions to plans. Transition is psychological; it is a three-phase process that people go through as they internalize and come to terms with the details of the new situation that the change brings”. –William Bridges from the book “Managing Transitions”.

What Happens When Your World Changes?

The lifting of the Stay at Home order only intensified change. The new reality was evident in every outside interaction. Continue reading “Finding the Neutral Zone of Transition” →

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Standing in Paradox and the Tension of Opposites

As I continued to investigate the Not Knowing Place during the Stay at Home months, I remembered reading about standing in paradox and the tension of opposites in the book, “The Great Work of Your Life” by Stephen Cope:

“Marion Woodman writes, “We learn to live in paradox, in a world where two apparently exclusive views are held at the same time. In this world, rhythms of paradox are circuitous, slow, born of feeling rising from the thinking heart. Many sense such a place exists. Few talk or walk from it.”

Carl Jung’s developmental strategy for standing in paradox: One must hold both sides of a paradox at the same time without choosing one or the other. Exiling neither. Privileging neither. In this way, we can gradually learn to tolerate living in the tension of opposites.

Marion states the technique with stunning clarity: “Holding an inner or outer conflict quietly instead of attempting to resolve it quickly is a difficult idea to entertain. It is even more challenging to experience. However, as Carl Jung believed, if we held tension between the two opposing forces, there would emerge a third way, which would unite and transcend the two. Indeed, he believed that this transcendent force was crucial to individuation. Whatever the third way is, it usually comes as a surprise, because it had not penetrated our defenses until now. A hasty move to resolve tension can abort growth of the new. If we can hold conflict in psychic utero long enough we can give birth to something new in ourselves.”

Hold conflict in psychic utero. This is a skill that can be learned. But it requires a host of collateral skills that most of us in the west has not nurtured: the capacity to stand in the mystery; the capacity to tolerate the unknown; the courage to live in the wilderness for a while; the love of the dark and the night and the moon; the wisdom of the circle, not the line.”

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The Intimate Familiarity of a Place Known is the Not Knowing Place

“The perfection is in the repetition, the sheer ordinariness, the intimate familiarity of a place known because we have visited it again and again in so many different moments.”

As I reread the words by Wayne Muller on April 8 while under a Staying at Home order, I recognized the intimate familiarity of “a place known,”  was the unknown.  I have spent a lot time writing about the unknown, but rarely valued its true worth. Throughout life, it served as a catalyst. I always wanted to know, to find the answer and take a step into knowing. Time spent not knowing was viewed as wasted time. The receptivity of “the gift of time” during March enabled me to recognize the Not Knowing Place. And as Muller suggested, I have visited it again and again in so many different moments. Through all the seasons, through all the years, through all the days, and even in the moments, I have found myself in the Not Knowing Place.  I actually “knew” this place! Continue reading “The Intimate Familiarity of a Place Known is the Not Knowing Place” →

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Paying Attention to the Known and Unknown of Life

Cote 304, Verdun France

 

My creative meander in March that started with Receiving the Precious Gift of Time led me back to familiar ground in June. During the uncertainty and upheavals between March and June, I revisited chapters from “A Year to Live” by Stephen Levine. Noticing, Gratitude and A Commitment to Life helped me befriend the unknown. His book provided hope and structure during the months of change out of my control. Here’s the first paragraph from the Introduction:

This is a book of renewal. It is not simply about dying but about the restoration of the heart, which occurs when we confront our life and death with mercy and awareness. It is an opportunity to resolve our denial of death as well as our denial of life in a year-long experiment in healing, joy, and revitalization.

When my calendar was cleared in March, I felt the loss of routine and social interaction. I was naively hopeful, expecting that we would return to something new in April. There was no return in April but there was something new: Stay At Home orders.

With nowhere to go, few distractions, I kept writing about what I encountered during the global pandemic. Changes out of my control and transitions experienced during long-distance caregiving and end of life care (2010-2017) helped me in many ways during the Stay at Home months. I had experienced a micro of this unexpected macro that started in March.

Ten years ago, an orange leaf on the front cover of a book caught my attention while browsing in a bookstore. I saw the title “Parting” and then “A Handbook for Spiritual Care Near the End of Life.”
My initial thought, “It’s too late for that book.” My dad had passed away in April 2010 and my grief was raw in June 2010. I had believed he would live into his nineties due to his love of life and learning. Everyone was blindsided when he was diagnosed in March and offered a hopeful prognosis.

Instead of dismissing the book, I picked it up and read the Foreword, which included: …Spiritual care for the purpose of this handbook is soul care, helping the human spirit in its search for peace. It is the attempt to help those near the end of life feel whole, fulfilled, and in harmony with their world and higher power. Religious experience may or may not be spiritual, and spiritual experience may or may not be religious. Regardless of the dying person’s religion or persuasion or faith tradition, spiritual care near the end of life supplies a deep human need.

I bought the book that day in 2010 and read it during Father’s Day weekend. An odd thing to do—dive into the dying, but my motivation was to dissect the misery and what had transpired in forty days. I needed to understand and “helping the human spirit in its search for peace” offered a light of peace in the unfamiliar darkness that descends with death. I accepted the light. It was as gentle as a single candle flame.

Found of page 3 in Parting:

One physician says that the best way to improve spiritual care for the dying is to improve it for the living. All too often, the day-to-day business of life gets in the way of the inner life. Death clears the calendar; it uncrowds life so that spiritual needs come to the forefront.

I asked myself, “Why wait? Why wait until end of life to pay attention to our spiritual needs? Why not now?” These questions have stuck with me since 2010. Time and time again, I cycled through change and transition due to a loss or a death. I would find peace and then lose it. Some “thing,” or connection, seemed to be missing.  The physician touched upon it in “Parting”, the day-to-day business of life gets in the way of the inner life. In March 2020 there was suddenly time to pay attention to the inner life. The two-week “hold” that transformed into a Stay at Home order was lifted on May 22. Plans for 2020 died. The death of the familiar day-to-day routines cleared the calendar.  Ways of doing changed. Ordinary events were no longer ordinary (or no longer existed). There have been many endings and each ending carried varying degrees of loss and grief. There was familiarity but disconnection, and a lot of unknown. The outside world looked the same, but there was an unseen hill of loss.

I had been here before.

And so Levine’s words return, replacing book with journey, and dying with what has died:

This is a journey of renewal. It is not simply about (what has died) but about the restoration of the heart, which occurs when we confront our life and death with mercy and awareness. It is an opportunity to resolve our denial of death as well as our denial of life in a year-long experiment in healing, joy, and revitalization.

Next: The Intimate Familiarity of a Place Known is the Not Knowing Place

 

 

 

 

 

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“Sabbath honors this quality of not knowing, an open receptivity of mind essential for allowing things to speak to us from where they are. If we take a day and rest, we cultivate Sabbath Mind. We let go of knowing what will happen next, and find the courage to wait for the teaching that has not yet emerged. The presumption of the Sabbath is that it is good, and that the wisdom, courage, and clarity we need are already embedded in creation. The solution is already alive in the problem. Our work is not always to push and strive and struggle. Sometimes we only have to be still, says the Psalmist, and we will know.”
From the conclusion of the chapter Beginner’s Mind in the book, “Sabbath – Finding Rest, Renewal, and Delight in Our Busy Lives” by Wayne Muller.

And so, I allow these words to speak to me. I remember last week how the days started to melt together. It seemed like Wednesday but it was only Tuesday! There was a spike of panic, the worry of memory loss but then I turned away from that worry. Continue reading →

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