Jesus says so often, something like, "Your faith has made you well." I got to thinking about the usage of the word "faith" in the scriptures. Did Jesus mean the same thing I think of when I read that word? Did he mean your faith in God? Your faith in himself, Jesus? 'Cause that's what I have grown up thinking about when I hear, "Your faith has made you well."
But nothing I read about Jesus would suggest he wanted people to have faith in him. WE believe WE should have faith in him but I don't believe he thought that. I believe he wanted to point the finger away from himself, actually. I believe that he wanted his followers to believe in the same faith that he had - not in himself specifically but in the God he loved and the Love of that God and the Power of that God. I don't believe Jesus thought HE was doing the healing. If he had, he would have said, "Your faith in ME has made you well."
But he didn't even say, "Your faith in God has made you well." This blows my mind now that I really think about this. Your "faith". Faith the size of a mustard seed sometimes apparently from what scripture says. Faith the size so as to move mountains, it says elsewhere. But just FAITH. Not FAITH IN, but just FAITH.
This suggests to me an attitude that what I want to have happen actually will. Just that. Is that enough to be made well? To acquire your hearts desire?
Why not? The scriptures say so. Jesus says so. It must have worked for him. Why not you and me?
Wednesday, March 23, 2011
Friday, March 18, 2011
Impotency
My spiritual director held a very open and loving space for me today as I dumped my load of issues into the room. She said not a word...well, I didn't exactly give her space to...but when I was done, she said, "Let's just sit awhile and see what comes." A very, very wise choice.
I find myself close to tears this morning. I tell my spiritual director so. This brings the tears to overflowing. What is this? Is it the frustration of my impotency? No. I tell her that I can feel something very powerful trying to emerge. What is it?
She asks that we sit in holy silence.
Rising out of the "nothingness", as potent as love itself, is the word "grief". And the image of Christ hanging from his assassination posts. He is looking down at those with a future. "Forgive them...", he says. For the first time, I realized that he was in deep grief for them, for us all. Could he do anything from his fixed position? In one sense, no.
In another sense, he did all that he could. And it was enough. He loved us enough to grieve for us.
There is power in grief. Grief is not impotent. Grief is a visceral measure of the love we have invested. Love invested is anything but impotent.
My issue was that I came this morning feeling impotent. Powerless. On the one hand, the number of people found dead from the tsunami in Japan is rising by the thousands. Years ago, Mom would have found a way to tangibly help over there. Me? I pray. That doesn't seem like enough. I feel impotent.
On the other hand, my relationship to my mother is different now and I struggle to be enough for her. She is dying. What can I do for one whose only spark of life now is to enjoy being in the presence of those whom she loves and who love her back...what can I do when I am not able to be in her presence? I feel powerless.
I find myself close to tears this morning. I tell my spiritual director so. This brings the tears to overflowing. What is this? Is it the frustration of my impotency? No. I tell her that I can feel something very powerful trying to emerge. What is it?
She asks that we sit in holy silence.
Rising out of the "nothingness", as potent as love itself, is the word "grief". And the image of Christ hanging from his assassination posts. He is looking down at those with a future. "Forgive them...", he says. For the first time, I realized that he was in deep grief for them, for us all. Could he do anything from his fixed position? In one sense, no.
In another sense, he did all that he could. And it was enough. He loved us enough to grieve for us.
There is power in grief. Grief is not impotent. Grief is a visceral measure of the love we have invested. Love invested is anything but impotent.
Thursday, March 10, 2011
And yet...
And yet, without any conscious help from me, things have happened that I could not have planned or contrived but which I might have worked very hard to do had I known they were coming. Such as the flight/bus schedule dovetailing despite delay due to weather. And the fact that I "happened" to be close by when Mom had a heart episode last night. And the people I "happened" to see at the grocery store...people I am so grateful to have seen but whom I would not have tried to work in to my already anxiety-driven schedule.
It isn't like this is the first time I have seen God handle things without my help....you'd think I'd get it by now.
It isn't like this is the first time I have seen God handle things without my help....you'd think I'd get it by now.
Trying Too Hard
Am I trying too hard? I have been trying to stay, at a very minimum, two steps ahead of myself, getting everything exactly right. I have needled people with questions designed to keep me in "the know". I have a back-up plan for my back-up plans. What drives me? Fear, of course. Fear of being out of control. Fear that I will be run over by life. Fear that I will be caught unaware.
Unaware. Interesting. I have made some amazing strides in becoming more and more aware and living more and more consciously these days, and yet here it is, larger and more consuming than ever it seems, this fear of being unaware. So am I really unaware or am I just aware of being unaware?
At home I have been living differently, facing the dark shadows within me, the places of my deepest unawarenesses. I turn toward my hunger, my anxiety, my blatant fear. In turning toward, rather than running from, I have been learning to befriend these long-carried shadows of mine.
Yet, here I am, in Maine, doing things foreign to my usual schedule and I have fallen back into old habits. I am overrun with anxiety which turns on the need to take back exorbitant control tactics, trying so hard not to drown.
But in trying so hard, I have tripped myself up. I passed out the night meds this morning. While this may not be the end of the world...I certainly hope it isn't the end of her world!...it does awaken me to what I am doing to myself.
Breathe. Meditate. Sigh loudly. For all is well. All manner of thing is well.
Unaware. Interesting. I have made some amazing strides in becoming more and more aware and living more and more consciously these days, and yet here it is, larger and more consuming than ever it seems, this fear of being unaware. So am I really unaware or am I just aware of being unaware?
At home I have been living differently, facing the dark shadows within me, the places of my deepest unawarenesses. I turn toward my hunger, my anxiety, my blatant fear. In turning toward, rather than running from, I have been learning to befriend these long-carried shadows of mine.
Yet, here I am, in Maine, doing things foreign to my usual schedule and I have fallen back into old habits. I am overrun with anxiety which turns on the need to take back exorbitant control tactics, trying so hard not to drown.
But in trying so hard, I have tripped myself up. I passed out the night meds this morning. While this may not be the end of the world...I certainly hope it isn't the end of her world!...it does awaken me to what I am doing to myself.
Breathe. Meditate. Sigh loudly. For all is well. All manner of thing is well.
Tuesday, March 8, 2011
Completion
Until this moment, I can say that I have never really been this consciously aware of the energy of a person who is no longer interested in living.
She struggled just to pee on the pot. Struggled with her pants, struggled to sit, to wipe, to decide if she really was done, to stand, to sit again, to stand and sit one more time and finally to get herself "hitched" back up, as she would say. As I stood there, trying to be helpful, I said, "It's a lot of hard work to live, isn't it?" "Oh, you BET it is," she said, matter-of-factly, salted with a bit of ruefulness. "If I could, I'd just..well, I don't want to say die, like suicide, but...." "You just wish you could be done living?" "Yes. How old am I, after all?" "90," I answered, "but I don't think it's as much about age as completion." "Yes, that's a good way to think about that."
"Well," I said, as I continued to watch her laboriously deliberate movements, "I don't want you to die, but I also don't want to see you suffer." "Oh, you won't miss me." "You don't think so?" I returned, mind racing about her statement and what it really meant. "Well, you won't feel sorry for me, I hope. I'll be better off," she stated, not looking at me, but attending to her bathroom tasking. "Well, no, I won't feel sorry for you, but I will still have to adjust to being without my mother, you know." "Oh, well, yes, that makes sense."
She was finished...both with her bathroom needs and her conversation. She shuffled into bed and was asleep almost instantly.
I watched her, realizing that in every way, she is not about living any more. She no longer hungers over her paper, no longer looks forward to checking her email, no longer even seems to connect with the infinite tidbits of "normal" information coming to her. She seems to have one task...to get through the day doing only the things she absolutely must do.
What good are commercials to one who is no longer interested in living? What good are the many amazing videos depicting wonderful things people are doing, places to see in the world, amusing anecdotes, poignant life moments when these things are strictly for the one who needs this information to live a better, fuller, more meaningful life? What if you feel your life is complete as is? What if you really, truly, have no more living to accomplish?
This is where my mother is.
She struggled just to pee on the pot. Struggled with her pants, struggled to sit, to wipe, to decide if she really was done, to stand, to sit again, to stand and sit one more time and finally to get herself "hitched" back up, as she would say. As I stood there, trying to be helpful, I said, "It's a lot of hard work to live, isn't it?" "Oh, you BET it is," she said, matter-of-factly, salted with a bit of ruefulness. "If I could, I'd just..well, I don't want to say die, like suicide, but...." "You just wish you could be done living?" "Yes. How old am I, after all?" "90," I answered, "but I don't think it's as much about age as completion." "Yes, that's a good way to think about that."
"Well," I said, as I continued to watch her laboriously deliberate movements, "I don't want you to die, but I also don't want to see you suffer." "Oh, you won't miss me." "You don't think so?" I returned, mind racing about her statement and what it really meant. "Well, you won't feel sorry for me, I hope. I'll be better off," she stated, not looking at me, but attending to her bathroom tasking. "Well, no, I won't feel sorry for you, but I will still have to adjust to being without my mother, you know." "Oh, well, yes, that makes sense."
She was finished...both with her bathroom needs and her conversation. She shuffled into bed and was asleep almost instantly.
I watched her, realizing that in every way, she is not about living any more. She no longer hungers over her paper, no longer looks forward to checking her email, no longer even seems to connect with the infinite tidbits of "normal" information coming to her. She seems to have one task...to get through the day doing only the things she absolutely must do.
What good are commercials to one who is no longer interested in living? What good are the many amazing videos depicting wonderful things people are doing, places to see in the world, amusing anecdotes, poignant life moments when these things are strictly for the one who needs this information to live a better, fuller, more meaningful life? What if you feel your life is complete as is? What if you really, truly, have no more living to accomplish?
This is where my mother is.
Thursday, March 3, 2011
Hungry for Healthy Co-Existence
Who among us doesn't scratch an itch automatically? Who among us, in civilized Western culture, doesn't reach for an analgesic when in pain, a person with whom to share our sadness or fears or something to eat when hungry? It is natural to seek a homeostatic, peaceful, happy, pain free existence. In this country we not only have the means, generally speaking, to be pain free but we consider it our right.
Awhile ago, while I sat meditating and enjoying a peaceful place in my mind, I experienced an itch. I scratched it and two simultaneous things happened: I was both physically relieved and yet emotionally disappointed that in scratching my itch, I lost the meditative bubble I was in. Right then and there I decided that the next time I felt an itch or pain or cramp I would not seek to relieve it but instead seek to befriend it. And the next time it happened, I did just that. I acted counterintuitively and experienced myself in a whole new, very conscious way.
It was sort of like staring down a friend, this befriending my itch. I "stared" at it, smiled at it, thought about how it felt, thanked it and eventually it went away, satisfied and maybe bored with me. A week ago, I took the opportunity to similarly befriend hunger. When my pants felt tight to me the night before, I wrestled with depression at gaining back some of pounds that eight years ago I had lost and kept off. My initial thought was to "go on a diet", a common knee-jerk reaction to unwanted weight. My next thought was, "But how? I am already on the diet that has kept me from gaining back the entire 60 pounds I'd lost." The answer that came to me wasn't entirely new: it wasn't so much about what I was eating as how much and when. Creeping into my day were snacks that I would grab at the slightest hint of hunger and often times when no hunger at all was present. I just wanted food.
I have known that I am in a relationship with food that serves as a friend when I am sad, a comfort when I am depressed, a comrad when I am angry. But something seemed different this time. The word "hunger" kept coming to the forefront of my mind. And I wondered, "What is my relationship to hunger?"
I had to admit to myself that I see hunger as the grim reaper of daily existence. I am in dread of the feeling of hunger. I will avoid it at all cost, including using diabetes as an excuse to "have to eat". I have labeled hunger as a very bad thing, a thing I have the right never to feel. In fact, hunger has been so forbidden to me, that I have rarely felt it at all in the past few years...maybe rarely throughout my entire life. And for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. With hunger labeled as "bad", food then was labeled as "good", the white stallion, the knight in shining armor coming to rescue me from the clutches of evil.
But I asked myself, "What if hunger is neither good nor bad, but just a neutral indication of the body's need for sustenance? And what if food is neither good nor bad but just the neutral substance that chemically sustains a chemically-based human body?" This thought changed everything for me. Suddenly I wasn't the middle guy between two warring factions. I realized that I could stare down hunger in much the same way as I stared down the itch. The difference, of course, is that I will not let hunger just go away as the itch does, since it serves the purpose of keeping me alive. But certainly I can have a different relationship with it, one in which hunger is not the dictator of my eating, just a messenger. The relationship I want to have with hunger is a reciprocal one, a co-creative one, a balanced one, a respectful one. I want to cease being co-dependent to hunger as I have been to so many other things in my life where I have been unconsciously living, unaware of my actions and the reasons for them.
This new relationship to hunger is only one week old. Patterns 57-years-familiar to me will be hard to break. These things take time. But if hunger is no longer something to fear, that is the beginning to a much healthier co-existence with eating. I am excited and now realize I can work similarly with sadness, grief, anger and fear.
Awhile ago, while I sat meditating and enjoying a peaceful place in my mind, I experienced an itch. I scratched it and two simultaneous things happened: I was both physically relieved and yet emotionally disappointed that in scratching my itch, I lost the meditative bubble I was in. Right then and there I decided that the next time I felt an itch or pain or cramp I would not seek to relieve it but instead seek to befriend it. And the next time it happened, I did just that. I acted counterintuitively and experienced myself in a whole new, very conscious way.
It was sort of like staring down a friend, this befriending my itch. I "stared" at it, smiled at it, thought about how it felt, thanked it and eventually it went away, satisfied and maybe bored with me. A week ago, I took the opportunity to similarly befriend hunger. When my pants felt tight to me the night before, I wrestled with depression at gaining back some of pounds that eight years ago I had lost and kept off. My initial thought was to "go on a diet", a common knee-jerk reaction to unwanted weight. My next thought was, "But how? I am already on the diet that has kept me from gaining back the entire 60 pounds I'd lost." The answer that came to me wasn't entirely new: it wasn't so much about what I was eating as how much and when. Creeping into my day were snacks that I would grab at the slightest hint of hunger and often times when no hunger at all was present. I just wanted food.
I have known that I am in a relationship with food that serves as a friend when I am sad, a comfort when I am depressed, a comrad when I am angry. But something seemed different this time. The word "hunger" kept coming to the forefront of my mind. And I wondered, "What is my relationship to hunger?"
I had to admit to myself that I see hunger as the grim reaper of daily existence. I am in dread of the feeling of hunger. I will avoid it at all cost, including using diabetes as an excuse to "have to eat". I have labeled hunger as a very bad thing, a thing I have the right never to feel. In fact, hunger has been so forbidden to me, that I have rarely felt it at all in the past few years...maybe rarely throughout my entire life. And for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. With hunger labeled as "bad", food then was labeled as "good", the white stallion, the knight in shining armor coming to rescue me from the clutches of evil.
But I asked myself, "What if hunger is neither good nor bad, but just a neutral indication of the body's need for sustenance? And what if food is neither good nor bad but just the neutral substance that chemically sustains a chemically-based human body?" This thought changed everything for me. Suddenly I wasn't the middle guy between two warring factions. I realized that I could stare down hunger in much the same way as I stared down the itch. The difference, of course, is that I will not let hunger just go away as the itch does, since it serves the purpose of keeping me alive. But certainly I can have a different relationship with it, one in which hunger is not the dictator of my eating, just a messenger. The relationship I want to have with hunger is a reciprocal one, a co-creative one, a balanced one, a respectful one. I want to cease being co-dependent to hunger as I have been to so many other things in my life where I have been unconsciously living, unaware of my actions and the reasons for them.
This new relationship to hunger is only one week old. Patterns 57-years-familiar to me will be hard to break. These things take time. But if hunger is no longer something to fear, that is the beginning to a much healthier co-existence with eating. I am excited and now realize I can work similarly with sadness, grief, anger and fear.
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