Be Still

Stand still.  The
trees ahead and bushes beside you 
Are not lost, 
Wherever you are is called Here
And you must treat it as a powerful stranger
                                         David
Wagoner
 
There are the places you wish to go, there are the places
you desperately wish you never left, there are the places you imagine you
should be, and there is the place called here
                                         Padraig
O’ Tauma
________________________________________________
 
in this virus time
when we are Covid tired
Covid-dry
 
Sheltering here
Wherever here is
In a cabin in the woods
In an apartment in the concrete
 
Alone or with loved ones, alienated ones 
Happy one’s, sad ones
 
We think
we think of place
of this place
of places we have been
of places we wish to go
 
________
 
my head and heart are full of places
of snapshots in time
of moments of brilliant joy
of moments of deep violet, red, black shame
 
and I am all over the place 
but not in this place
this sheltering place
 
I can escape the virus, perhaps
but I struggle to escape
myself
or my fears
hand to the plow I keep looking back
and the jagged ragged furrow of my life
 
heart in my throat I look forward
into the bleakness of a new world
of shortened time 
 
all of this roils
as I find myself 
in this place
 
but I am here
and this is the place
and this place does shelter and hold me
and if I can just be here
 
for a moment
for this moment
breathe in, breathe out
 
if I can just be here
then in this place Jesus can find me
locked in my room for fear
(as Jesus found this disciples, locked away for fear)
 
Jesus can find me
And I know just what he will say
 
“Hello
 Hello beloved
child
 Hello least of
these
 Hello impetuous,
impulsive, tortured one
 Hello
 
 Peace be with you”

Permeable

I've been reading an interesting book by a psychologist named Laurel Mellin.  Called "The Pathway" it is a book that tries to help people find what they want the most, what she calls "life's sweetest awards."  What I have loved about this book is the author's insistence that we don't find those rewards by looking outside ourselves to external solutions.  Those external things that we try to use to make ourselves happy generally don't work.  Sometimes because they are inherently destructive, and sometimes because in our desperation, we simply can't limit our use of them.  So no matter what they are they end up as "bad news."  

So we are out of balance, feeling sad, angry, guilty, or fearful, and we reach outside to things that might be good, serving others, working, but  we go to excess and we stay a mess.  Or we reach outside to things that numb but don't help, such as alcohol or food, and we stay a mess.

Mellin believes that the way we get back in balance, and find what we need, is to go inside, to look of internal solutions.  Often the reason we don't go inside is because we have neglected the inner life, so that when we do go inside, there is nothing there.  Or it is a space so full of emotional junk that we cannot find nurture and comfort in that place.  

Mellin suggests that we take time to nurture that inner place, which she calls, fittingly, the sanctuary.  She says that we need to do some house cleaning.  Take out the emotional trash,  "clean he cobwebs off a nurturing inner voice," repair the disconnects between ourselves and, well, ourselves.  In short, we need to be lovingly connected to our self, intimate with our self.  

But not just our self, also "spirituality."  Being connected with the spiritual, with God, being "intimate" with God.  Becoming intimate with the sacred, is something else that happens when we go within to the core of who we are. There we find God, and as we are open to that presence we learn to love the sacred, and be loved by the sacred.

I have been using many of Mellin's ideas in my own life.  But what I realized the other day is that this concept has been around a long time.  This idea, that we go inside, to the heart, that we connect there with God and our true self, and thus find joy, and intimacy with others, has been around - well at least since Jesus said "Love God, with all your heart soul mind and strength, and love your neighbor AS YOURSELF".

I like the idea of being what Mellin calls "an intimacy catcher"  -  being so in touch with my God and my self that I can allow others in, that I can catch those opportunities for intimacy, for love, as they come along  --  in the smile of a child, in the laughter of a friend.  I'm still working on it!  But hopeful.