Making Peace with What You Can Do

March 13th, 2010 | 2 Comments

Walking in the early spring air this morning, I got by with a light cotton jacket. Yet the weather remains cool and damp. Green fronds push up from the ground, but the skies are grey. Trees are full of birdsong, though the bare branches appear unchanged since winter.

This almost-spring feels nothing like winter, yet there is no blossoming. As if the earth is saying: This, today, is what I can do. I can bring forth this much, but for now I can go no farther.

And the slow warming is enough. The turning of the seasons is exactly this; nothing more is needed. There is no hurry, no catching up to do. All is sufficient.

***

It’s tempting to discount those efforts we are able to make. How do you make peace with the limits of what you can do?

Comments (2) | Inspiration in the Everyday,Seasons Tags: , , , ,

The View Through Old Glass

March 11th, 2010 | 3 Comments

Looking through old glass feels a little like standing outside of time. The wavery, watery pane distorts the view just enough to hold it in perspective, as a fleeting moment in the long passage of years. It holds the scene at a distance, even as it offers a reminder of life’s fragility. An old window softens the world.

The old glass reveals motion I cannot perceive otherwise: the imperceptible turn of the earth with its accrual of days into seasons, a year, a lifetime; the pull of gravity over time, drawing down the pane into ripples and waves, pulling at my body in the same way. All the moments count, no one of them more or less than another, which is hard to take because that’s not how we see our lives.

Time passes without our noticing, yet it leaves its mark. The view through old glass notes the brevity of a moment, even as it attests to the lasting change a moment’s passing leaves. It’s an image of the weight of the past, and of the vitality that sets this moment apart.

It shows our days to be part of a long unfolding, part of something larger. At the same time, it invites an appreciation of the moment as all we have.

If I could see the view through the other side of the glass, look through the curving lines of light at myself, would I understand something more about my life?

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Opening to the Sacred

March 8th, 2010 | 2 Comments

In The Case for God, Karen Armstrong talks about “this hinterland between rationality and the transcendent.” It’s the place where our thought, ideas, and intellectual life have taken us as far as they can, and we need a different kind of knowing in order to experience God.

The intellect is part of our spiritual path. It carries us past the limited notions of God that constrict our assumption of what religious life entails. It brings the fresh breeze of new ideas, which prepare us to see what we have missed. It shows the limitations we have put on God, and the experience of God, of which we were unaware.

But we can’t live into a new faith, or any faith, by intellect alone. An expanded idea of God doesn’t have much impact on who we are or how we live unless we develop a connection to God—asking, seeking, waiting, inviting, listening. In Armstrong’s words, “Religious insight requires not only a dedicated intellectual endeavor to get beyond the ‘idols of thought’ but also a compassionate lifestyle that enables us to break out of the prism of selfhood. . . . It require[s] kenosis, ‘negative capability,’ ‘wise passiveness,’ and a heart that ‘watches and receives.’”

Armstrong’s book mirrors this process. It summarizes and analyzes a long and complex history of how people have understood God. She places our current theological thinking in the context of history, the better to see how we arrived in this place and how best to move forward. Yet her work points to an understanding of God beyond definition or certainty, experienced in mystery, expressed in poetry and in love. It’s a book about what cannot be expressed in books.

Ideas are important; I thrive on them. Yet at a certain point ideas no longer satisfy. It’s like driving to the mountains to go hiking. At some point, you have to get out of the car.

I experience another kind of truth in the light turning gold as the sun rises, the purr of a cat under my hand, the voice of a loved one. These are openings to the sacred, to the sense of being deeply and truly alive.

I’m asking myself whether I’ve spent too much time reading theology and not enough reading poetry. Where is the balance between intellect and experience? Do you see one as more credible, or trustworthy, than the other?

Comments (2) | Books I'm Reading,Inspiration in the Everyday Tags: , , , ,

The Taste of Chartreuse

March 3rd, 2010 | 3 Comments

In this season of almost spring (a time described beautifully by Amy Oscar at her blog: Story, Spirit, Seed), I find myself thinking about the taste of Chartreuse. The flavor suggests the greening of the earth, the scent of mown grass and fresh herbs, the return of the sun in spring. Even its luminous yellow-green color speaks of new life.

It’s still a bit early to retrieve the bottle from the dark recesses of the kitchen cabinet. But for the first time in months I remember it’s there, waiting. Its distillation of past growing seasons holds the memory and anticipation of spring.

Chartreuse and its secret recipe have a fascinating history, which lends a delicious mystique to the experience of drinking it. I first tasted the liqueur in the company of dear friends after we watched Into Great Silence together. The film shows the passing of a year in the Carthusian monastery of La Grande Chartreuse, where Chartreuse has been made for centuries.

To watch the film is to experience something of the monastic life, with its beauty and tradition, as well as its constriction and mundaneity. The film evokes both yearning for the spare beauty of the monastery and claustrophobia at its repeated routines. It has no speaking, no soundtrack, only a few frames containing a word or two of French. Sounds such as the creak of a monk’s kneeling bench are heightened, enveloped in profound silence. It’s a beautiful film of changing light and unchanging ritual. I was glad to share its silence with friends, and also glad to speak with them about it afterwards.

The elixir made by the monks is lovely to sip on its own. Mixing it with the clear, cold effervescence of club soda makes a wonderful drink as well, something like the taste of winter giving way to spring.

That transition is a process happening now, at least for those of us in the Northern hemisphere. But how do we know when to celebrate?

Comments (3) | Inspiration in the Everyday,Seasons Tags: , , , ,

Learning to See

February 20th, 2010 | 3 Comments

I enjoy taking pictures. It’s a pleasure to look at the world with an eye toward framing a photograph, and in that state of mind I tend to see more. Someday I might take a class or invest in a better camera, but in the meantime I just snap photos of what looks interesting.

So during a recent stay in an eighth floor hotel room I was glad for its view of the city, especially at nightfall. But when I pulled back the curtain with camera in hand, I found the scene obscured by water droplets and condensation. No good. With the window sealed so that it couldn’t be wiped clean, I would have to find another vantage point.

As I gathered my things for a trek down the hall, it seemed a lot of trouble to traipse around in search of a clearer window. But the light at evening had drawn me to look outside, the color and pattern of towers and skies held my attention, and I couldn’t resist trying to capture the image.

In looking for a better view, however, I was rejecting what I had already found beautiful. Photography helps me notice what’s in front of me, but it’s still easy to miss things. In this case I had only seen the foggy window as an obstacle and not part of the scene. I want to open my eyes and pay attention to the world I’m walking through. But that’s hard to accomplish with preconceived ideas about what’s worth looking at.

So I returned to the window and observed how the water on the glass reshaped the light from outside. I considered how the pane of moisture softened my perspective on the city. And I realized that for one evening, in that particular place, I didn’t have to resist the uniquely filtered view.

Is there something in front of you that you might cease resisting?

Comments (3) | Inspiration in the Everyday,Paying Attention Tags: , , ,
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