Do what matters

woke up with my head buzzing

a cacophony of thoughts

whirling through my brain

 

what day is it?

what do I have to do?

what have I forgotten to do?

 

I had the most profound sense of dis-ease

as if my soul were being assaulted

 

I did not notice happy dog, nuzzling my hand

or the misty beauty of a snow morning

I did not feel at home in my body

I did not greet the new day

with joy

 

what have we done to ourselves?

we people who delve in the book of faces

and tweet on twitter

and jump to our inboxes the moment we awake

 

this is, as Thomas Merton suggests

“innate violence”  (Conjectures of a Guilty Bystander)

 

we allow our schedules

our jobs

we allow the shoulds, oughts, and musts

we allow our brains to bully us

 

this is spiritual violence

as we allow ourselves to

be carried away by a multitude of conflicting concerns,

to surrender to too many demands,

to commit [ourselves] to too many projects

to want to help everyone in everything…”  (Merton)

 

as we over connect with the world

we lose our connection to the world

 

we no longer see the sky

hear the birds

smell the roses

feel the warmth of the sun,

or the crisp coldness of the snow

 

we rush, and rush, and rush

leaving our souls neglected

 

“Ah” we cry, “but there is so much to be done!”

 

indeed

 

but flailing away blindly at the problems of the world

is no way to live a life

and no way to truly change anything

 

paradoxically we must start our striving

by stopping our striving

 

we must go inside, to where the energy of God lives

and sit in Sacred space

 

that is when things start to happen

that is when the Sacred suddenly appears

 

and that is when we are moved by Sacred Energy

to the places we need to god

 

and that is when we understand, finally

the things we need to do

 

and can set the frantic busyness of this world

and our need to perform (in order to have value)

aside

 

and become human beings

and find ease (instead of dis-ease)

 

and do what matters