Say it out loud?

"The most common response I have received from readers of 'The Road Less Traveled' has been gratitude for my courage, not for saying anything new, but for writing about what they had been thinking and feeling all along, but were afraid to say."

~ M Scott Peck MD

A friend of mine just posted this quote on facebook. These past two weeks have been filled with wrestling with how and when and where to say what I'm thinking and feeling. As I have spoken my truth - truth that, as another new connection of mine said tonight in an email, is both dangerous and liberating - I've wondered whether what I thought and felt resonated with anyone else.

I've also puzzled over the appropriate ways and the best places to speak my truth. Am I effecting change, edifying others, emanating love? Can I do all of those things at the same time? Sometimes the truth - as I see it - seems hard. Sometimes confronting injustice doesn't feel loving at all. Often, I wonder if change is even possible.

I think I'm in a bit of an identity crisis. I'm in a lull in my professional journey, with nothing to do but wait. And the next steps are not defined. What do I want to be about? Where do I want to invest my energy? Can I do what I want to do effectively from where I now stand - or do I have to shift? What costs come with the choices?

I haven't really articulated my dreams. There is a lot of energy around the blogosphere right now about dreaming big. Putting it out there. Letting action follow intention. Taking risk. Speaking truth. I want to be able to throw caution to the wind... but then fear rears its head and the voices of the gremlins get louder.

So - my goal for this downtime is to get clearer about my intentions. To face the fear and put the dreams into words. To be purposeful about what I say and what I do instead of letting the fear and the old voices drive me to reaction.

So stay tuned - I'm going to see what I can say - out loud....

Last Night as I Lay Sleeping by Antonio Machado

My friend Elissa posted this in the comment section of my last post. It was too good not to share with everyone - so here it is. Enjoy!

Last Night as I Lay Sleeping

Last night as I was sleeping I dreamt a marvelous illusion
that there was a spring breaking out in my heart.
I said, "Along what secret aqueduct are you coming to me
Oh water, water of a new life that I have never drunk."

Last night as I was sleeping I dreamt a marvelous illusion
that there was a beehive here in my heart.
And the golden bees were making white combs
and sweet honey from my old failures.

Last night as I was sleeping I dreamt a marvelous illusion
that there was a fiery sun here in my heart.
It was fiery because it gave warmth as if from a hearth
And it was sun because it gave light and brought tears to my eyes.

Last night as I was sleeping I dreamt a marvelous illusion
that there was God here in my heart.

God, is my soul asleep?
Have those beehives who labor by night stopped, and
the water wheel of thought, is it dry?
The cup's empty, wheeling out carrying only shadows?
No! My soul is not asleep! My soul is not asleep!
It neither sleeps nor dreams, but watches, its clear eyes open,
far off things, and listens, and listens
at the shores of the great silence.
It listens at the shores of the great silence.

by Antonio Machado

Time

Time, you move so strangely through my life. Tomorrow seems to never come and yesterday seems miles away, so that all we have ever is today.

But then I look at the scar on my firstborn's cheek, cut open by a surgeon's scalpel after they wheeled her away and find it impossible to believe the scab has already healed some ten years later.

Arranging pictures, I see my younger with her short curly golden hair and dimples -- contrast with the now toothless grin and flowing dark tresses and wonder where my baby went.

How can it be that I make preparations to walk across the stage marking the ?end? of a journey I only started weeks ago (or months, or wait, really - three whole years?)

Celebrating 15 years in this house, foundation laid before we said "I do", I realize I've lived in this spot longer than I've lived anywhere else in my life. And moved more.

Not the same person as when I marked any of these events, but changed how? In the blink of an eye? For that is how it seems, although in the moments of growth and the pains of labor - time stretches out eternal.

Time, a strange friend and subtle enemy -- but always my constant companion - can you stand still for just a moment? No? Well, then I'll journey with you I guess, wherever you take me next.

Living on the Edge

Today is Earth Day. Apparently the day has been a topic of conversation for my daughters at school this week. This morning in the bathroom, my younger chided her older sister for leaving the water running too long saying "you are not being a good Earth Day person!" So we had a little chat about leading by example rather than criticism and as my husband kissed me before he walked out the door, he whispered that he blamed me for their liberal agenda.

He was teasing me, mostly. But my slide to the left in all things social, political and religious has provided more than one tense moment in our relationship. We've finally reached a balance point and don't seem to be on the verge of tipping into chaos quite so often, but it has not been easy.

I am many things. I am a feminist in a patriarchal world. I am a democratic in the most republican county in the United states. I support a woman's right to control her own body while surrounded by people who picket Planned Parenthood. I think there is more than one way to God in a community that preaches hellfire and damnation for non-believers. I am drawn to Jungian theory in a evidence-based medical model world. I support GLBT rights and marriage while the AG of my state refuses to grant a gay couple a legal divorce and in a city where churches are called on the carpet by their denominational boards for being inclusive. I am inclusive in an extended family where jokes about the President's race and calling for his demise are applauded as funny. I think helping others holds value, even if it means sacrificing some of my own wealth and privilege. I think real sex education and open communication beats "True Love Waits" pants down! The list goes on and on.

And I'm constantly afraid. Afraid of offending someone with my beliefs. Afraid of losing relationship because my friends cannot understand. Afraid of emotional abandonment by the people I love. I rarely feel like I fit in anywhere. And when I speak up and speak out, and meet resistance, disagreement, hostility and fear from others, it hurts. It makes me want to hide, to run away, to be silent and good and agreeable so that I won't have to experience the pain of rejection.

But I'm finding more and more I CANNOT be silent. I MUST speak up. I must stand up for those who do not and cannot have a voice. I have to live my life true to who I really am, not who others think I am or want me to be.

If that means my husband chides me for being a liberal - so be it. If that means my mother refuses to come to my daughter's weddings because of her prejudice (a threat she made recently) - so be it. If that means I am constantly at odds with my community of faith - that's just the way it is. But here is the rub.... all of this stuff doesn't just affect me - it affects my husband, and my children. And that pill is hard to swallow. I have to be who I am. But I don't want them to have to pay for that by loss of their friends and their communities. And I'm always afraid they will have to pay. And that too works to keep me silent - or at least very muted. I don't have a good answer to that tension of the opposites just yet. I'm not sure I ever will.

So I feel like I am living on the margins. Out on the edge, but not quite able to break free - and not always convinced I want to, but compelled to keep moving just the same, even if it puts me in danger of falling off the cliff.

Angry

This article makes me angry, as does the idea that Roman Catholic parishioners must do penance to pay for the ongoing exposure of the truth.

I have a lot of things to say. And I have a forum to say them, whether many are listening or not. Others have things to say too, some with a forum and some without. But position and power rule with threat and violence and fear and too often our voices stay silent.

This is not a Roman Catholic problem. I am not a Roman Catholic. In fact, I grew up in a denomination that preached that ALL Roman Catholics were going to hell and indeed stories like this served only to fuel the flame, while our leaders walked around with self-righteous pomp because they were indeed washed in the blood.

Abuse of power and position, sexual abuse of the body, and spiritual abuse of the soul leave wounds that never really heal. Survivors do just that - they survive. Some of us thrive. But nobody ever completely recovers. And blaming and silencing victims through shame, threats, and isolation only pulls open the wounds over and over and over again.

Are these leaders really SO powerful that we cannot stand up and speak? Potentially. Jesus found that out the hard way I think. Fear and silence or finding a voice and punishment - not a very good set of choices I think.

Wishes and Graces

I wish:

We never had to say goodbye.

People we loved, and strangers we don't know, never had to suffer.

Time and money never prevented anyone from following their dreams.

Good intentions always culminated in productive action.

We could spare our children pain.

Love didn't come at a price.

But I'm grateful for:

A warm and wonderful place for my children to learn, with teachers who have sparked their imaginations.

Friends who chase their dreams.

Sunshine on a beautiful Spring day.

Abundance and choices.

A family who grounds me, sometimes creating the tension between physical and spiritual and sometimes transcending it.

The threads of gold woven into the tapestry of my life (thanks Jeanie for that image)

Practice Makes Perfect?

Somebody asked me today if I had a spiritual practice. I immediately answered no. I do not have a set place, a set time, a particular ritual or routine. At various times in my life, I have tried. I've bought devotional books and books on prayer, I've set the alarm 30 minutes earlier to find solitude, I've been on retreats, I've listened to the admonishment of experts in the field. I've tried reading scripture. I've committed to journaling every day. I've co-opted tips and tricks to remind me and motivate me. Discipline comes easy for me in some areas of my life, but not so easy in others. The area of spiritual discipline seems to continually elude me. I lose focus and attention, I get bored easily, I feel silly and unconnected to anything remotely spiritual, just going through the motions. And I give up.

But as I thought more deeply about the question and about the statements of somebody else that we find our practice in our laundry basket and our kitchen sink, I began to reframe my answer. I do have a spiritual practice of sorts - although you wouldn't find it described in any book on spiritual practices, Christian or otherwise.

I practice:
--by reading half a dozen blogs about life, living and spirituality each morning (you can find most of them on my blogroll)
--by staying in almost daily communication with a unique and deep support system that has miraculously materialized over the past couple of years
--when I slow down as I round the corner of my alley after delivering my children to school and notice the twigs turning into green sprouts, the trees budding and blooming and unfurling fresh green leaves, the azaleas beginning to blush pink
--when I stop to watch and listen as the mockingbirds and bluejays chatter to welcome the day
--each time I look deeply into one of my daughter's eyes and see the singular grace that lights her from the inside
--when I snuggle with my husband before drifting to sleep each evening
--by spending an hour almost every week laying out, looking at, and trying to re-arrange the deepest parts of myself in the presence of someone who holds out unfailing faith, hope and love
--by reading books from varied and deep thinkers who write about faith and practice, psyche and soul
--every time I tap into my creativity by writing, on this blog and elsewhere
--when I decide to listen to my body and rejuvenate myself with a short afternoon nap
--every night when I immerse myself in a hot bath and soak while I let my mind drift into a deep level of thought and relaxation
--by joining with my imperfect and flawed community in songs of joy and recognition of the divine
--by making time to linger over a meal with good friends, sharing our ideas and our hearts
--and most of all, by simply paying attention

I do all of these things on a regular if not routine basis. I do not always do them with the focus and attention needed to make them a spiritual practice, but much of the time I do. I've worked to discipline my mind and my heart to really focus on the moment I am in when I am in that moment, to observe my internal reactions and notice the reactions of others. To simply acknowledge my feelings as they come and not immediately judge and censor them. And I think I've made progress, although there is always farther to go.

I also am almost constantly aware of myself and the world on a spiritual level. I acknowledge the presence of the divine in and around me in almost everything I do. I think part of my problem with tradition Christian spiritual practice is the outward focus of much of it. God is out there somewhere, I have to go find Him. And then I have to appease Him with my worshipful presence. My concept of God has shifted a lot over the past 20 years - from a "HE" up there somewhere that I have to figure out how to make happy and then push off on someone else to a more universal presence manifest in creativity, individuality, beauty and synchronicity - a life force within me and within every person I encounter, a directional flow that I can participate with to make a difference in people's lives if I will pay attention. That sounds sort of "new-age" even to me. But it isn't. It's old and deep and real - it just doesn't fit well into the words I grew up using, so I have to choose others, because those old words hold tainted images for me. My faith today is stronger than it has ever been. I see God everywhere - including inside my own soul.

So, I find myself considering how to articulate and define my spiritual practice. And I wonder if I need to add something more concrete and recognizable, or if what I have is enough. I'm not sure I have the answers to those things right now. But all I know to do to find them is to keep practicing, because I know I'm far from perfect.

Sharkarosa - was it heaven?

I spent the day on a field trip with 60 first graders, ecstatic to have escaped the confines of the classroom, especially on a day where expectations ran high for older students engaged in the Texas version of child torture, a high stakes test called the TAKS. I've been on testing day field trips before. The normal destinations around town burst at the seams with seas of swarming children outfitted in rainbows of matching t-shirts. Invariably, the end result for the chaperones, after a long loud bus ride and a hot day herding cats, turns out to be tired feet and a pounding head. But the smiles on our darlings' faces because mom or dad came along on an adventure outweigh any sacrifice on our part.

But today turned out differently. We traveled about an hour outside of the city limits, into the rolling hills of the horse country just to our north. And we didn't have to ride the bus! All our little darlings and their teachers fit on one bus, but taking parents on the bus would have necessitated another bus, charged at $4 a mile! So we parents suffered our fate and carpooled with our coffee in hand. The kids seemed to survive the trip just fine without us. And to my complete surprise, when we arrived at our destination - we were the ONLY ones there. We had 128 acres, scores of fascinating animals, and the attention of the highly qualified staff all to ourselves.

We interacted with baby kangaroos and watched a queen lemur (who knew King Julian only existed in Disney fantasy?) climb and jump with her twin babies clinging to her body. We learned about noctural animals, marveled as a bearcat hung by its tail, and discovered the super-long tongue and pollinating function of the kinkajou. We watched zebras and deer and the ancestors of the llama eat just paces from our safari car, and got to pet some beautiful draft horses and less beautiful but very interesting camels. Sharkarosa is a wildlife sanctuary, taking rescued animals, nursing zoo animals that need extra attention, and working to preserve some endangered species. I know there are mixed opinions about the merit and virtue of these places. I have no political statement to make. But the staff at Sharkarosa obviously loves each and every animal there and loves sharing their knowledge with the kids.

But what I took out of the day came from the laughter and the wonder on the face of my kid and the kids in my charge for the day. The experiential learning, being outside, seeing, touching, experiencing just lit each of them from the inside. So often they are told to look and not touch, to stand at a distance, to listen and learn - and they follow the rules but don't learn a thing. Today, they touched and smelled and observed up close instead of from far away, and they loved every minute of the learning they didn't even realize they were doing.

The blogosphere seems to pick up a theme and run with it for a while... right now, the theme that resonates is BE PRESENT. I watched six and seven year-olds do just that today. They could not have been less concerned with what came before or what was next, they reveled in the moment. They engaged their senses to live and to learn about their world. And for a few hours, I found myself able to do the same.

This story of mine, this journey I'm on, sometimes causes me to wallow around stuck in the past or worry about the future. Re-visioning my faith sometimes makes me feel as if the ground under my feet shifts constantly. But I think I saw today, in the faces of first-graders absorbed in life, what Jesus meant when he said we need to become like little children before we can experience heaven, even if he's never chaperoned a first grade fieldtrip to a little place called Sharkarosa.

Knowing Our Story

From Here All Dwell Free by Gertrud Mueller Nelson:

Our responsibility, then is to find and know the story that is our own. We then reach out to grapple with it, choosing to suffer the conflicts that pull us back into our fate and forward to our true selves. As we become healed and autonomous, we reenter our community and our history, offering our gifts to benefit all, and taking our place as cocreators of our personal and communal destinies. All three of these tasks, though developmental in nature, are not necessarily done in stair-step order, but cycle around and around, deeper and deeper, as we grow in consciousness and responsibility.... Only where we allow ourselves to be fully human can God meet us, and here we encounter our true selves, as if for the first time. Here all dwell free.