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- Each Hour a Miracle
Some thirty years ago I participated in a ritual where a person could present her/himself for a blessing. If you chose this you named the blessing you were desiring often concluded with oil on you forehead or hands or …. My experience is that of living water welling up from some where deep within. Slowly I integrated this ritual at the end of a spiritual direction session or a 5th-step. I have been especially touched by these anonymous higher power moments, where we drink silently together. Thomas Keating mentions in “pooling our silence drinking from that well of living water”, And I add, washing over me loosening those hardened scales of my egoic happiness program. These three much over-used wells have experienced the gentle soothing blessing, cleansing, softening of the waters from this living well.
That place between the intellect and the heart is that “look twice” place of “listen to the one I love”. Sitting quietly following a huge evacuation time I am becoming more aware of the vast number I am invited to embrace and listen to in my day to day life, those I am being pointed to on the periphery where I am most at home and I quietly receive as the living Eucharist, and here I dwell…. in a prolonged A–M—E——N
The image is speaking into my life this Lent , two bird like winged creatures, rather like the Hindu Kundelini (feminine awakening figure). Facing the image, the deep brown bird-like creature seems dominant facing the white creature where there is splash of yellow light ensconced in red burning embers. I turn the image 180 degrees. The white bird-like creature is dominant, yellow flame illumines the beak, the ember have burst into intensity burning the beak of the dark brown bird. splashes of yellow light wash this white creature, lower left a woosh of light like the thrust of an airplane. A significant encounter Thursday where the interplay of yellow light ( the kind I have been seeking all my life) and the deep crucible of fiery intensity( the kind I have always avoided) came together. Wordless except for: ” the flame that burns the ego and enables to pass from fearful fragmentation to fearless fullness….) Both flame and fire encircled the discernment. We know in the marrow of our bones, we are on the path and the flame of courage in our bellies. I bow in humble gratitude for the fasting of my heart. I give over ownership to the ONE to whom it belongs.
Oh, Susan, how very sad! I join all of you in your parish in prayer. May hearts be softened and bless those unjustly treated with patience and courage.
Wrapping you Jason abd those you cared about/for in my praying.
A shiver of powerlessness, and a hint of despair when a first glance, upon opening this week’s WOW : “love your enemies, pray for those who persecute you; the invitation of centering prayer as the table of the Lord’. I avoided both, when a couple of days passed, I listened to the thought “what have I got to lose?”, now living into my 89th Lent! Something very liberating is happening. Instead of despair I fell into the abyss of God’s work of love as primal, my part is to show up, be open, be curious, declare my intent, gently return to my word. So much is changing as I engage in email follow-up with a 5th-step person, another person in a transition situation; my spiritual direction coordination ministry on the threshold of a new approach that I am called to initiate and let go….. I close this week in humble gratitude for “powerlessness”, in humble acceptance of letting go of other people’s “laundry list” and God’s plans in their unfolding state.
I am living in a strange liminal kind of space; no longer on the threshold; the beyond is not visible, the next step has been taken, dying lingers, but it is not me focusing on correcting a behavior, the correction is happening. an empowerment not of my doing, the empowerment of waiting. I have left behind “figuring it out” and I am okay; more okay than I have ever been. I am accepting the cost to the self that is not me.
This morning I joined some one hundred fifty persons gathered around on Becoming a Trauma Reformed Church.
Wrapping all with love and prayer.
A key phrase springs out from my lectio: when we take a clean look at what we see – stop being strangers to ourselves, we increase the number of ways we can respond to what arises”. Though this has been one of the most difficult years of my life, it’s also been an energizing experience of detachment from myself to give my all. “That clean look” has been possible by my consenting to the work of the Indwelling Spirit. Tuesday I celebrated my birthday. So much for which to be grateful. I simmer in non-dual gratitude.
Blessed those who experience the painful cracks in the house of the self, for you are blessed with the gift of humiliation that allows the grace-filled LIGHT in.
This week it seems I catch glimpses of of the power of my powerlessness. During centering prayer a constant of ever so gently returning to my word many times during my “sit” I catch glimpses of this time as God’s work. During my day I sense God, the Great Untangler of my net, with my role as accepting , responding with mercy, with forgiveness; accepting the harm I have done intentionally and unintentionally; accepting the consequences of my actions that have created barriers; humbly allowing the Untangler to do the work only the Untangler can do.
that my self centeredness
The image this week brings me into a sense of being drawn into…..that inner space of no words, a simple resting. This image for Centering prayer Wednesday was slightly askew. To the left a log boom…. an image of much of my life, keeping the logs moving slowly downstream. This Wednesday I disappeared underneath, navigating the strong current in the thickest kind of dark; image of my life these last years; suddenly I pop in the center part and I know I am in the presence of the one I have been seeking. Looking in the central part of the image, orangish brown I see the hint of a face, eyes, nose, mouth, chin and a sense of being held… a transcendent kind of awe
This has been a week where I felt held in the depths of my being. The image captured my attention. I got out a magnifying lens to peer in the depths only to find myself. Eighty nine years ago at 8 months I didn’t question the star within I was content to be loved into being, first daughter, first grand daughter. Today 89 years later the luminous figure on the donkey is me enveloped and guided by the light of the star. Surprisingly I am, too, the donkey, the being that carries a lot of other people’s stuff, often taken for granted, at the beck and call of others. Reminds me of the role of Joseph in the Incarnational unfolding. The tall figures are all my invisible support, such as this centering prayer community. Thanks for helping me recognize the star.
I am just checking to see if I can post now
Into my awareness from some hidden place within, pops up a disappointment of here we go another Advent, I “welcome prayer” this disappointment. All my security buttons on red alert , one little consenting nudge followed by another, then another, on the way to embracing this now-Advent-moment. I consent to being guided into this sacred plunge, not into the dark abyss of my ego-self, but into that inner well where love and mercy reside. My first glimpse at Geard’s image drawing me…..
Be vigilant this Advent is a new awareness of living life open ended, the kind that is not controlling the future. Pope Francis recently said:” Our future has a name and that is hope.” My emotional programming is in high gear this Advent as I embrace, rather bubblingly, trusting in the infinite mercy of God.
