Before proceeding on to the next essay, the next shift in thinking, let's stop, truly pause, and breathe in this idea if it's new to you. See and feel how stepping aside when a friend or family member is trying to engage you in a drama you want no part of relieves you of anxiety. In fact, recall when you have tried this most recently, if you have an example. Journal about how that felt.
If you don't have an example, take a moment here to recall a situation during which it would have been perfect for you to step aside, but you got right in there instead. What was that outcome? Journal about that situation. Make a plan for what you might do next time and write it down. Now close your eyes and envision yourself having a successful experience of stepping aside.
Job well done. Go forth now and spread peace.
2
Hear the Silence, Rest the Mind, Let God Speak
Being at one with the quiet spaces within gently clears the mind, allows the solution to a nagging problem to surface, and draws us close to God and one another. In that closeness, our healing lies. All our answers reside there too. We simply need do nothing to initiate the healing we seek. The healing everyone seeks. It waits for us. It waits for all of us. And when we are ready, it will come. It will come freely.
When I first learned that we need do nothing, that most of what ailed me—ailed all of us, in fact—was rooted in the insatiable ego, I breathed easier. I still didn't understand how things would change, but I did breathe easier. I had always assumed I needed to be busy acquiring information, money, lovers, degrees, friends, accolades. To be at rest, to trust that what I needed to do would present itself to me when the time was right, was unfathomable. I know I'm not alone in this assumption. I believe that what's true for me is true for all of us. Quit chasing. Sit a while. Hear the silence. It will speak to us. Maybe not the first time you and I sit quietly, but as we cultivate the joy of silence, that which we seek will come.
One of the marvelous prizes that comes with aging is that we do have more time, time that seems even more precious now that we are on the “backside of life,” to sit quietly in our favorite comfy chair, or on the deck overlooking a garden or a lake, or in a nearby park. We have time to contemplate the stillness. No one can rush us anymore, unless we allow it. We choose the activities we want to experience. Sitting quietly is one of the sweetest ones to call to us.
Wherever you are sitting right now reading this, let's try a tiny experiment. Lay the book aside. Put your feet flat on the floor. If it's comfortable, close your eyes, but not until your hands are resting in your lap. Listen to the quiet all around you. Feel your chest rising with each breath. Notice the images that pass through your mind. With very quiet lips, blow the images away. Absorb the emptiness. When another image comes, blow it away too. Because you can, sit still for the next few minutes. Voice a quiet request to God: “How can I be of help before this day ends?” Sit a spell longer, then open your eyes slowly. Now, trust that what moves your way is your opportunity to offer help. Don't judge it. Simply do what feels right and natural.
Perhaps it seems that life can't be this simple. But it can. No one is watching over your shoulder. We are free to simply be. The years of spinning our wheels are over. Many would say we didn't ever have to spin them even when we did, but we did that which we saw others do. Now we can be the trendsetters. Now we can show others a new way to be. A quiet way to be. A way that promises the rich reward of experiencing the present moment. Only in the present moment can we be healed from the wounds of old. Only in the present moment can we sense God. Only in the present moment can we know our next “suggestion,” the assignment that will invite another soul into the experience of healing that we have found. In the stillness that we cultivated are the only suggestions we need to follow.
Amen. Amen.
If a man would travel far along the mystic road, he must learn to desire God intensely but in stillness, passively and yet with all his heart and mind and strength.
—Aldous Huxley
Let's consider some truths before moving ahead:
1. The desire to know God is required to experience God.
2. The wish to experience stillness requires that we let our mind step away from chaos for a spell.
3. Our woundedness is a pathway to seeking connection with others.
4. Our woundedness is our opportunity to experience forgiveness.
5. Breathing freely is our birthright.
6. Experiencing peace is a decision.
7. Teaching others is the number one fact of our life. It's happening every moment.
8. Teach only love.
What next?
Listen. Love. Pray. Forgive. And then forgive again.
Go forth today with this thought: I will act from the place of love in my heart. Again and again.
At day's end, make a note in your journal describing your interactions.
What pleased you?
What will you change before going forth tomorrow?
3
A Faith-Filled Life
Faith is not about everything turning out okay. It's about being okay, no matter how everything turns out.
—Anonymous
I didn't grow up in a faith-filled home. I never observed anyone at 827 being quietly peaceful, trusting that the experiences we were sharing would work out okay. The days and nights were generally very tense, undergirded with the expectation that an outburst over something, large or small, imagined even, might occur at any moment. And usually did. Night after night, the feeling present at the supper table mimicked the feeling at lunch. Tension was served and felt with each bite. Our family doctor, Dr. Cole, told my mother that I had a nervous stomach. What I really had was extreme anxiety that made eating nearly impossible some nights. Living in my home was hard. Peace was something I could never have defined. Tension was all I knew. Tension defined all six of us.
I did have a place I loved to be, though, and that was in Logansport with my grandparents. My grandmother had a quiet presence about her. No wonder I loved to visit them. Her comforting words and arms and smiles would temporarily convince me that everything was okay. When I thought about home when I was with her, my stomach would twist and turn. I hated to feel, even from afar, the tension at home. I feared it would never change. And as a matter of fact, it never did. Not even with the passage of time. Tension was as fresh in my parents' old age as when they were young. How tragic, really.
Tension is hard on all of us. No matter our age. But we choose the feeling, as strange as that may seem. Unfortunately, we seldom understand how and when we made that choice. Certainly I didn't know I had chosen it. We do imitate that which we observe, however. And my times with my grandmother were simply too short for me to adapt to her way of living and seeing the world.
For many who grew up in environments like mine, leaving home, choosing to be surrounded by new philosophies, new people, new opportunities, became necessary in order to catch a glimpse of a life free from tension. And that glimpse didn't come very quickly for me. It took a few years, a few bad relationships, one painful marriage, and multiple suicide considerations