Attending to What Matters

June 19th, 2021 | 2 Comments

A strong thunderstorm blew through the neighborhood a few days ago. It felled a massive maple tree that had offered shade on my regular walking route for years. But I’m just a newcomer. That maple had been part of the landscape for generations.

The huge tree seemed solid and enduring. The strength and stability amassed during all its years of growth appeared unassailable. But the power of the storm revealed otherwise. Its heartwood was rotten, and the appearance of strength belied the tree’s ill health.

The house beneath the tree was spared, fortunately, because of the direction of the wind. When the trunk splintered several feet above ground, it fell toward the street. Had it toppled in the other direction it would have crashed through the roof.

Now that the broken remains of the trunk are exposed to the light, it’s easy to see that the tree should have been removed years ago. But it would have been difficult to muster the will to remove such a magnificent presence. The branches offered welcome shade in the summer and glorious foliage in the fall. There must have been signs that the tree was unhealthy, though I certainly didn’t notice. It’s easy to let such things go for another week, another season, another year. Surely it will be ok a little longer. Until it isn’t.

Was it unimaginable that such a tree would violently break? Certainly not, though apparently the owner of the property didn’t see this coming. Or didn’t want to.

One of our most powerful resources is our attention. Where we direct our attention influences how we use our energy. “Where attention goes, energy flows.” What we pay attention to, and what we ignore, shapes our lives. We can choose what we will attend to, or allow our attention to be directed by longtime habits of thought, emotion, and behavior, along with the urgencies of daily life.

Internally, the things we habitually focus on (and ignore) compel us to keep repeating the same old patterns. Externally, all kinds of voices clamor for a foothold in our minds. Our wiser self knows what we need to pay attention to, but it takes real effort to hold on to that awareness. We need some kind of daily practice to stay connected to what our best self knows.  

When we’re not paying attention to our lives, we miss what’s really going on. We overlook the new growth asking to be cultivated, and ignore the danger of familiar but rotten practices whose time is finished.  

In order to be present to our lives we must be present to ourselves. There is no clarity about what’s happening in our interactions with others or in the events of our days unless we’re also aware of what’s going on within. Attending to our inner self allows us to see more clearly and respond more effectively to what’s happening in the world. It makes us less susceptible to manipulation, and frees us from the patterns that confine us.

Life is all about change. It’s easy to miss those changes unless we can be fully present, receptive to what’s really going on. Bringing our attention to what’s happening in this moment, rather than getting caught in our familiar thoughts and emotions, allows us to see what’s in front of us more clearly.

Maybe there’s something we need to do differently. Maybe there are aspects of how we live that were once solid but now need to be removed. Showing up fully, with the courage to pay attention, is an act of love. It’s when we’re truly present that we can perceive accurately, respond appropriately, and do what needs to be done.

Susan Christerson Brown

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Finals Week

October 26th, 2020 | Click to Comment

Many years ago when I was an undergrad, I learned that the week of final exams was a time of great anxiety. The dorm’s common rooms filled with study groups, and solitary students hunched over their desks late into the night. Across long tables in dining halls we commiserated about upcoming tests and unwritten papers. (We scarcely noticed the cafeteria dishes clattering in the background as other people prepared our food and cleaned up afterwards.) It was the crucible of the semester’s end. Fashionable girls abandoned blow-dry styles for ponytails, and went about bare-faced, attired in sweatshirts. The library tables were full, and everyone looked stressed.

My senior year I lived off campus, in a neighborhood where no one else was in college. The strangest thing happened. During finals week I had some exams. I studied. I wrote papers. I worked hard and I finished. The drama I believed was part of finals was entirely missing. No pervasive anxiety anywhere, except when I showed up to take a test. For the first time I understood that the concentration of worried students on campus created its own separate atmosphere, a storm cloud looming over the dorms and classrooms.

The time we’re in feels something like being caught under that storm cloud. Certainly, there’s more at stake than a student GPA, and the expanse of unease is far beyond the reach of a college campus. But the principle is the same. On a national scale, we’re creating this atmosphere as we amplify each other’s anxiety.

The news is intense right now. I listen to NPR on the radio while I’m cooking, read online newspapers over coffee, watch news on tv in the evening, and try to keep up with The Atlantic magazine here and there. The routine of all this news-gathering has a soothing regularity, despite the distressing content. The state of our nation is a topic of urgent conversation over Zoom or in person. But all of this takes a toll.

Our collective emotional pitch is creating the reality we’re living, and it’s not good for us. It keeps us on edge, affects our relationships and our health, and creates a climate where disinformation can easily take hold.

I’ve had to learn to recognize when I’ve hit my limit for news, and more importantly, how to step away from that anxious mindset. Though at this point I can’t walk a few blocks to reach a different climate, I’m finding that walking a few blocks helps anyway.

Different things help different people. In this final week before the election, it’s a good time to be intentional about cultivating some peace of mind. How can you allow yourself at least a few minutes a day to rest from the rising anxiety? Is there a place where you can be in nature? Is there a project you enjoy working on? Is there a friend with whom you enjoy spending time? Is there something new you’d like to learn? Can you revive your mindfulness practice?

In that last, quiet undergraduate year, I missed the excitement of finals week on campus, just a little. What I actually missed was being caught up in the shared experience with my classmates. For all the distress, we were going through something important that bound us together.

I know now that I could have helped myself and others if I had been less overtaken by the hive mind. I could have made more of a contribution if I had more perspective on the hive’s anxiety. I could have offered the genuine assurance that we simply had to do the work in front of us, and the reminder that a few deep breaths would make it easier.

That’s true now, as well. We can’t control events, but we have a great deal of choice in how we respond to them. We can choose where to put our energy and attention. We can recall how we’ve been carried through other difficult times in our lives, and allow that to give us a better perspective. If each of us can keep our balance individually, it will help bring peace when we need it most.

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Lining the Shelves

July 27th, 2018 | Click to Comment

The timing of a move this summer gave me a few days to ready the space before I moved into my new home. It was a chance to get to know the house itself, uncluttered with furniture or boxes, seeing how the light filled the rooms and changed throughout the day. I played a radio that echoed through the empty spaces while I prepared for my things to arrive.

One task was to put down clean shelf paper in the kitchen cabinets and drawers. Even before the boxes were moved in I was eager to get them unpacked and organized into a working kitchen, so I wanted all of the shelves ready to hold the things I needed.

It took forever, or at least it seemed to. Cutting the liner to the right dimensions made me aware of every inch of storage behind cabinet doors and drawer fronts. I allocated an evening for the job, but at the end of the evening I was so far from finished that I questioned the value of the whole enterprise. What had seemed like a good idea turned out to be more of an investment than I realized. But the shelves I had lined were clean and inviting, and I wanted all of them to feel that way. So I kept going.

The payoff showed up when I was unpacking boxes and working to put things in order. With that basic, foundational work done, the shelves were ready to hold what was needed.

Foundational work of any kind takes longer than we think. We underestimate what’s required to do it properly because in daily life the foundations aren’t obvious. Once the dishes are put away the shelf paper is practically invisible—unless it’s done badly, in which case it’s a continual vexation.

In spiritual life, the foundation is laid by cultivating the ability to be fully present and fully aware. It’s not until we’re able to notice what’s happening inside ourselves—our mental habits, our emotional patterns, our places of physical tension—that we become able to see clearly what’s going on in the world around us.

That practice of being present, of being awake and aware, is how we become receptive to the divine force that holds and guides us through life. Being present is how we become more loving; we can only love when we actually show up in this moment.

It’s easy to convince myself that I’m truly here because my body is. But my mind and heart go off on their own, wandering the same old paths, and lose connection with the body. If I’m not settled enough to feel my feet on the floor and the breath expanding my chest and belly, then I’m probably running my habitual patterns inside instead of truly showing up here and now. Not being in the body is a good clue that I’m not receptive to what life is offering right now.

Cultivating this practice takes even longer than putting down shelf liner. Preparing ourselves to receive the contents of whatever new box the day unpacks is the work of a lifetime. Yet when we are prepared to receive what comes, we’re better able to respond in freedom instead of from reflex. We’re more able to act from a place of love. The practice of mindfulness and meditation is something like laying down a clean lining for the shelving in our minds and hearts, and being conscious of what we will store there.

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The Better Part

January 29th, 2016 | Click to Comment

I have long wrestled with the story of Mary and Martha* in the gospel of Luke. In my reading, Martha is a worker; Mary is a listener. Martha is active; Mary is contemplative. As the two sisters host Jesus in their home, Martha is busy with the tasks of running a household while Mary sits at Jesus’ feet absorbing his teaching. Martha is angry about doing all the work herself, and insists that Jesus have Mary help out with the chores.

Mary and Martha with Jesus, St. Patrick's Cathedral, Dublin

I understand Martha. It takes work to keep a household or anything else running smoothly. Martha wants to offer the finest hospitality to this amazing teacher. Perhaps she would have liked to sit and listen, but it takes work to provide a clean bed and a good meal.

Jesus responds by speaking kindly to her, noticing that she is worried by many things, and offering a different perspective. He points out that the work she thinks is necessary is actually distracting her from what is most important. Whatever standard Martha is trying to meet, it isn’t set by Jesus. He wants her to know that she is made for more than the treadmill she has put herself on. Jesus didn’t show up just to add to her chores.

I understand Mary. She is drawn to the wisdom of this new teacher and the power of his presence. She sets aside her normal activities, recognizing that this is no ordinary guest, and gives him her full attention. Yet following her heart means not living up to others’ expectations for what she should be doing. It’s not easy to disappoint Martha, who doesn’t share Mary’s priorities, and lets Mary know that she’s not doing her part.

Mary and Martha in stained glass, St. Patrick's, Dublin

I have long wished the story would show Jesus inviting Martha to sit down and listen, then have everyone pitch in with the chores.

We all have mundane tasks to do. But it’s important to recognize what merits setting them aside. Jesus refuses to send Mary back to her usual tasks just as she is beginning to hear his life-changing teaching. Mary has chosen the better part, he tells Martha. Jesus doesn’t want us doing more chores, he wants us to be transformed.

Mary and Martha both live inside me. There’s nothing wrong with Martha wanting to get the job done. The world is in need of a great deal of work. But the world needs Martha to lend her strength and skill to the most important tasks. In a world of “shoulds,” how to discern what truly is the better part is a question always before us. We need Mary and her ability to recognize what is genuinely life-giving.

Carl Jung offers an insight regarding his patients’ growth that applies to the tension between Mary and Martha:

All the greatest and most important problems of life are fundamentally insoluble . . . They can never be solved, but only outgrown. This “outgrowing” proved on further investigation to require a new level of consciousness. Some higher or wider interest appeared on the patient’s horizon, and through this broadening of his or her outlook the insoluble problem lost its urgency. It was not solved logically in its own terms but faded when confronted with a new and stronger life urge. (as quoted by Matthew Fox in Original Blessing)

We need both Mary and Martha, not in opposition but in a complementary partnership. We need a higher level of awareness that incorporates them both. I like to think of Martha spinning a cocoon, Mary yielding to the transformation that happens within it, and through the work of the Spirit, a new creation emerging into the world.

 

*The text of the story is brief, found in Luke 10:38-42. Here it is, in its entirety:

Now as they went on their way, [Jesus] entered a certain village, where a woman named Martha welcomed him into her home. She had a sister named Mary, who sat at the Lord’s feet and listened to what he was saying. But Martha was distracted by her many tasks; so she came to him and asked, “Lord, do you not care that my sister has left me to do all the work by myself? Tell her then to help me.” But the Lord answered her, “Martha, Martha, you are worried and distracted by many things; there is need of only one thing. Mary has chosen the better part, which will not be taken away from her.”

 

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Compassion and Ourselves

January 27th, 2015 | 1 Comment

I keep thinking about an article I read from the Atlantic recently, “Alcohol as Escape from Perfectionism” by Ann Dowsett Johnston. Its poignancy comes from Johnston’s ability to put her finger exactly on the place where the determination to live up to an impossible ideal leaves us vulnerable.  Intellectually, I know that unreasonable expectations are unhealthy, but I didn’t expect to be so deeply touched by the place in life she describes.

Third Street Stuff Wall Ishiguro 2013-11-19

My children are young adults now, and I have grown since they were children. But as if it were a coat hanging in my closet, I can still wear the sense of responsibility from those years, and I can easily wrap myself once again in a state of mind that said I was never doing enough, or doing it well enough.

I thought there was a right answer for how life should be lived, and my job was to reach that answer, claim it, and make it work. That applied to having a family, making a home, serving the community, and somehow finding my own work. There were standards for living a good life, a worthwhile life. They had to be met. I couldn’t have told you that’s what I believed, but it was the water I was swimming in. There were things I was supposed to do. Whatever it took, I had to find a way to accomplish them all. Except, of course, it wasn’t possible.

Measured by the distance from where I thought I should be, my life fell short.  I fell short. All I could see was the gap, what wasn’t done, what I hadn’t achieved, where I hadn’t reached.

Where did that come from, that certainty about what I was not? The dismissiveness about what I was? Who pointed to that place out of reach and said that was where I should be? Who insisted that nothing else mattered as much? I don’t know why I was so unkind to myself.

As a young mother, Johnston would sip wine to ease her transition from the day at work to the evening and its responsibilities at home. It was a pleasant ritual, then it became a necessary one. She wouldn’t give herself a break on what she expected of herself, but she would pour herself some wine. Genuine self-care wasn’t part of her world, but she kept wine in the fridge. Until little by little, the wine took over.

I didn’t rely on wine, but I nonetheless recognize the state of the soul that Johnston describes—the refusal of compassion for oneself. I turned my back on myself and accepted what the world said: Just get it done. All of it.

I wish I could have told my younger self that I was good enough, that my needs mattered, that kindness to myself was not the same as self-indulgence. But perhaps I can pass that message along to someone else who needs to hear it.

It doesn’t always come naturally to show ourselves the kindness we would offer to a good friend, but there are good resources that help. My thanks to Lisa Gammel Maas for pointing out the work of Kristin Neff on self-compassion.

May you be well.

* The wonderful artwork above is by the inimitable Pat Gerhard, and is found on the wall of the warm and welcoming Third Street Stuff and Cafe in Lexington.

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Room for the Spirit

September 27th, 2014 | Click to Comment

Last week, workmen installed a new hardwood floor at our house. Preparing for that work looked a lot like moving—books packed away into boxes and furniture carried out. When the room was empty the old carpet looked even worse; this project was long overdue.

Two and a half days of noisy work followed: an electric saw wailing on the front walk, hammers pounding the planks into place, sporadic shots of a nail gun driven by a compressor that reverberated through the entire house. But in the midst of it all was the encouraging scent of fresh lumber and the satisfaction of seeing good work in progress.

Bare Wood Floor

After the oak was stained, the guys brushed the finishing coat over the wood, working their way toward the front door. They stepped backwards onto the porch, leaned in to close the door, and wished us well.

It was quiet. And beautiful.

An empty room with a glowing oak floor has a Zen-like tranquility. Waiting for the finish to dry meant it had to remain bare, and I enjoyed seeing this kind of space in the house. Later, even as I missed the comfort of the room’s furnishings, I was reluctant to move everything back in. The openness invites a sense of expansiveness, of possibility, that I didn’t want to give up.

Not allowing everything to return means making some decisions. It means sorting through shelves and baskets deciding on what’s worth keeping. And it means not letting things pile up once that paring down is done.

But I’ve been here before. And before that. It’s a cycle that continues. But in this case the change started at the foundation, and the decision is not what to carry out but what to bring in. Maybe that will make a difference. I keep having to learn over and over again that changing your space and changing your life seem to go together.

That expanse of uncluttered space, anchored by the warmth of natural wood, made me think of meditation. Maybe it seemed a perfect room for meditation because the open space, both restful and expansive, is like the mental and spiritual uncluttering that happens through meditation and prayer.

It’s also a physical embodiment of what the Sabbath is meant to be—an opening of time for what we value most, a space that allows some perspective on what’s most important. Sacred space and sacred time seem to be two sides of the same coin, and both help make room for the Spirit.

There’s a sense of renewal in transforming this room, just as meditation and prayer renew mind and spirit, as Sabbath renews the week. Creating it gives rise to the question of what is worth allowing into our space, and offers a reminder of how much choice we have in making that decision. It’s a practice worth repeating every week, or even every day.

 

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A Different Way to Fight

February 20th, 2014 | 1 Comment

“Everyone talks about fighting cancer,” a dear friend in the midst of that struggle tells me. “They talk about it as a battle. The doctors say you have to fight.” But she goes on to say that “battle” isn’t the best way to describe what she has to do.

Labyrinth Covered in Leaves

 

A battle implies a clash in which the enemy can be vanquished. It suggests a singular foe. But my friend understands that her challenge is to continue living her life with the people she loves, even as she endures treatment and manages its details. The cancer she contends with is a chronic condition that will, in some way, remain present in her life. The hope is less for a victory than a truce.

For someone who does not want the disease to define her, making it the primary focus of her life would be a kind of giving in. To cultivate the discipline of mind and strength of heart to live and love, even through the ongoing demands of cancer treatment, is an entirely different mindset.

My friend is required to spend a great deal of time caught up in the medical machine that is our health care system. Even with the support of family and friends, she has a difficult task in trying to bridge the gaps between the realms of the different physicians involved in her care, and in navigating the labyrinth of the way our doctors and hospitals practice medicine. All of that is on top of the myriad details in keeping everyday life on track. It would be easy to allow those challenges to take over.

But she continues to be involved in the lives of her family and friends. She spends time with her grandchildren, works on her poetry, has coffee with her writing group. She maintains her interest in politics as well as her walks around the park, and lends a sympathetic ear to others. She remains grounded in her life even as she undertakes the requirements of her treatment.

Her battle is for her life, at least as much as it’s against cancer. She tries to avoid being consumed by the fight, so she can enjoy what is precious to her. She resists being focused only on treatment, not wanting to put off her life until later. Her fierceness is in her determination to live, even now.

She is like a birch tree, rooted in her life, bending with the force of the strong winds blowing and straightening when they subside. I respect her strength and courage, and I appreciate her wisdom. I am blessed to have her as a friend.

 

 

 

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Feeding the Dark Hole

March 11th, 2013 | 4 Comments

Recently I had a lesson in paying attention, something that turns up for all of us from time to time–without too much pain, if we’re lucky.

I had taken the time to fill my thermos before leaving home, planning to have an organized, have-it-all-together kind of day. Unfortunately, I didn’t take time to be sure it was sealed.

The good news was that my laptop in the same bag was unharmed, but that was because my papers soaked up the spilled coffee. Handwritten pages bled through most of the notebooks, leaving an ever more ghostly imprint on each leaf. It was a stupid mess, made by no one but me, and there was nothing to do but pull everything out and clean it up.

I wiped the cover of my computer and set out the waterlogged paper to dry. I used a paper towel to soak up the liquid remaining in the bottom, all the while appreciating the excellent design decision to make the lining black.

But as I dried the interior I felt something beneath the lining—actually several somethings crowded together under there. I checked the inside pocket and sure enough, found a hole. It was an opening in the bottom corner, hardly noticeable but plenty big enough for a pen to work through. I made the opening a little bigger until I could get my fingers around a pen that had fallen behind the lining, then another one, and another. Suddenly I knew why a whole package of my Pilot fine-point gels had disappeared.

 

 

But there was more—a bottle of lotion from the Hampton Inn, a package of Kleenex, two tubes of lip balm, and a card from Laudanum Printing that I kept as a reminder to check their Etsy site. There were several paper clips, Riccola cough drops, plus a Hall’s, a couple of Dove dark chocolates, a Luna bar, a shoe shine mitt from the Inter-Continental in Seoul, and a sealed bag of Bigelow’s English Teatime.

All these important items I had squirreled away, thinking they might be necessary, only to have them disappear into a black hole in my bag. Who knows how long I hauled this stuff around, completely inaccessible but crowding my space and weighing me down. If these things were so important, how could they disappear without my noticing?

I can’t help wondering what other long-forgotten necessities are crowding my life, or what else I’m lugging around in my metaphorical baggage. What’s really essential, right now? What would happen if I could pay attention, fix the hole, and stop feeding the bag?

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Seeing the Picture

February 11th, 2011 | 1 Comment

I’m remembering a dear uncle this week. Tall, gentle, and soft-spoken, his careful tamping of tobacco and patient lighting of his pipe fascinated me at family gatherings when I was a girl. Back then he was the only adult I knew who painted pictures, and I was confused when he said he didn’t think of himself as an artist.

One of his paintings was of a tree, which I remember him saying was out back of some building, in the parking lot. That was even more bewildering. How could something as special as a painting be made of something that sounded so ordinary? I would have learned an important lesson much earlier if I had been able to articulate that question, but I was a child with a thousand things I didn’t understand and no way to determine which I needed most to learn about.

Fortunately, I was able to know him long past childhood. He gave up his pipe in later years, and eventually failing eyesight took painting from him as well. But his sensibilities remained, and he appreciated the goodness of life. To talk with him was to share in a beautiful perspective on the world.

I took a break in the middle of the morning yesterday, from both the household chores I was taking care of and the writing I’ve been obsessing about for the past few days. Weary of all of it, I decided to just have a cup of coffee. Not to read or write, not to think or analyze or plan, but just to sit and look out the window and drink my coffee.

It was a beautiful day. The bright snow on the ground, the white-trimmed branches against a bright blue sky—“pretty as a picture” was the phrase that came to mind. It’s an old-fashioned idiom from a time when pictures were rare, special in a way utterly foreign to our image-flooded culture. But the phrase still evokes that sense of attention and value that comes with placing a frame around a scene. Making a picture is a way of saying this is worth noticing.

That’s what an artist can do. It’s what my uncle did when he saw something beautiful in an ordinary scene. Appreciating beauty doesn’t require a literal frame, but it helps to have some kind of reminder to pay attention. The frame could be the time it takes to drink a cup of coffee. It could be a particular place to be at a regular time of day. It might take the form of a ritual, like lighting a pipe.

It might even be a conversation with someone who can help you pay attention. Talking with Uncle Guyles often helped to frame something worth noticing. I’ll miss him.

What helps you frame the things you want to notice?

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When Searching Doesn’t Work: Being Prepared to Find

January 17th, 2011 | 6 Comments

For the past few weeks I’ve had a single silver earring hanging from the stand on my dresser. The forlorn half of a pair, it hasn’t been worn since the day I lost its mate.

I looked everywhere I could for the missing dangle—in the weave of my sweater, the folds of my scarf, the lining of my coat; behind the seat cushion of the car, in the carpet on the floorboards, among the detritus of a day of errands; on floors and countertops and inside grocery bags. I could only conclude that it lay somewhere among the miles of parking lots and store aisles I had crossed that day.

The earrings were a pair I wore often. They were simple and well-formed, bought years ago from a local artist. Back then I stretched a bit to afford them, though given their price per wearing they were a bargain. I was sad to lose something that fit so well into my life.

Today an easing of winter’s onslaught inspired me to sweep the garage, motivated mostly by the prospect of less dead leaves, dirt, and crud to track into the house. Pushing a mound of debris in front of the broom, I noticed a glint of light. When I stopped to look, yes, there was the earring missing for these many weeks.

I had examined the garage floor in my search, and since then had crossed and re-crossed the path where that familiar silver form must have fallen. But somehow I missed it.

Not until I swept things clean, tumbling the leaves and dirt and trash together, re-ordering that small part of the world, could I find what I had searched for so diligently and nonetheless overlooked. There’s a lot to be said for a cleaning binge. In sweeping out and putting things in order, there’s no telling what you’ll find.

It pays to do the chores with eyes open, to notice what gleams among the debris. It helps to have some idea of what we’re looking for as well. Remarkable things, even the things we search for, sometimes show up in unexpected places.

What are you looking for?

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