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Great Moments Knocking, I Answer

Last year I received a call from an executive director of a treatment center in Fort Lauderdale. I thought the call was about a new center their company was opening in the Palm Beach area.

It wasn't.

I was asked to interview for Director of the Christian Program. 

"Christian what?" I responded.

Initially, I wasn't too keen on being back in an exclusively Christian world. I really enjoy engaging people from diverse religious and cultural backgrounds. I also have never had a huge desire to live and work in Fort Lauderdale.

But I felt a knocking on my heart and knew I needed to respond.  I went through some interviews and was offered the position.

I am Director of Three Strands, The Christian Program at The Recovery Place in Fort Lauderdale. The Recovery Place is owned by Elements Behavioral Health in California. I have been nothing but completely impressed with the professionalism and high calibre of individuals working for this company. I am so grateful to be a part.

I have been privileged to develop programming that integrates spiritual principles with solid clinical therapy for individuals who are battling addiction and other co-occurring mental health disorders. 

Three Strands believes that everyone is welcome at the table of the Lord. We create an atmosphere where people can move into the light and receive nurturing and healing for the soul. We also welcome people of other faiths and even no faith to enter the program. I still believe the Christian faith, when released in the paradigm of the teachings of Jesus, offers one of the greatest invitations to spiritual experience and transformation.

I recently received a huge compliment from a client who did about 40 days of treatment. He stated he entered somewhat agnostic, cynical and very mistrusting of religion. He said he left knowing that he can walk out his recovery following the teachings of Jesus and not having to be a dry, religious person. He said the days in therapy amounted to the greatest spiritual awakening in his life.

That made me smile real big. I feel blessed to be part of a healing center that honors both psychotherapy and spiritual renewal.

The Russian writer Boris Pasternak wrote, "When a great moment knocks on the door of your life, it is often no louder than the beating of your heart, and it is very easy to miss it."

Be attentive to the knocking on the door of your life today. It is probably quite soft and more a sensation than even a noise. If you follow it, it might have the potential to release you into a whole new phase of your life.

I know it has for me.

A Friendship Blessing for Anam Ċara

I've been reading the book Anam Ċara by John O'Donohue. Perhaps more than reading, I've been studying it. The book is full of quotes and insights that speak to my intellect as well as my soul.

O'Donohue was a priest, poet, and teacher of Celtic spirituality. He died a few years back. My Irish friends turned me on to him a couple of years ago, and I've posted his YouTube video here on this blog before. 

His approach to God and life really resonates with me. He writes and speaks with a rhthym that reminds me of Buddhist teacher Thich Nhat Hahn. I feel very connected when I meditate on his writings.

In Gaelic, anam means soul and ċara means friend. Literally translated it is "soul friend". In the Celtic tradition an anam ċara could be a teacher, friend, leader, or someone with whom you'd share the inner parts of your life. These are the people who see clearly into our souls and do not condemn but love, reflect, and embrace.

These are the people whom you meet on your journey and there is an instant spiritual connection when two souls meet and you know you are tasting something of the eternal beyond the confines of mere rational thought, time, or space. Eternal knowing invades the present moment.

I've been blessed to connect with several anam ċara on my journey. O'Donohue wrote the following poem which really expresses well for me, these who are part of my spiritual tribe:

A Friendship Blessing

May you be blessed with good friends.
May you learn to be a good friend to yourself.
May you be able to journey to that place in your soul where
there is great love, warmth, feeling, and forgiveness.
May this change you.
May it transfigure that which is negative, distant, or cold in you.
May you be brought in to the real passion, kinship, and affinity of belonging.
May you treasure your friends.
May you be good to them and may you be there for them;
may they bring you all the blessing, challenges, truth,
and light that you need for your journey.
May you never be isolated.
May you always be in the gentle nest of belonging with your anam ċara. 

O'Donohue wrote, "A friend is a loved one who awakens your life in order to free the wild possibilities within you." These are the ones I want to be surrounded by!

I pray the same blessing for you today. May you be surrounded by many good soul friends who "get" you and you "get" them. May you be so awakened that you are freed to fly with the wild possibilities within you!

 

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Propelled by Discomfort

Sometimes I feel extremely restless. I long for more. I find myself wondering if there indeed is more--whatever more is.

Existential angst fills my soul and sometimes gives way to dread. 

That might not be the most motivational or positive-thinking statement of the year. But it's true for me nonetheless. 

I've also learned to not fear restlessness, angst, or dread.

Here's why: I believe they play a valuable role in our lives. They compel us to move forward. They keep us from remaining stagnant. The resulting discomfort forces us to grow, if we allow it.

M. Scott Peck said it this way:

The truth is that our finest moments are most likely to occur when we are feeling deeply uncomfortable, unhappy, or unfulfilled. For it is only in such moments, propelled by our discomfort, that we are likely to step out of our ruts and start searching for different ways or truer answers.

I wish this weren't true. But it is. We human beings are designed in such a way that it sometimes takes a level of psycho-emotional-spiritual suffering to get us to make necessary moves.

I think this kind of inner darkness also serves another important purpose: It gives us empathy for others.

Carl Jung wrote, "Knowing your own darkness is the best method for dealing with the darknesses of other people."

Until we experience the dark night of the soul or fully embrace our inner restlessness, we really can't connect with the depth of human experience in ourselves or in other people. Refusing to journey through the valley of the shadow of death will keep us shallow, immature, and isolated from our full potential as human beings.

It's only when we tell the story of the darkness of our intense discontent that light can then break through.  Telling our story enables us to let go of the angst, despair, dread, and discomfort.

Richard Rohr described letting go in this way:

Letting go is different than denying or repressing. To let go of something is to admit it. You have to own it. Letting go is different than turning it against yourself; different than projecting it onto others. Letting go means that the denied, repressed, rejected parts of yourself, which are nonetheless true, are seen for what they are; but you refuse to turn them against yourself or against others. This is not denial or pretend, but actual transformation.

The religious word for this letting go is forgiveness. You see the imperfect moment for what it is, and you hand it over to God. You refuse to let any negative storyline or self-serving agenda define your life. This is a very, very different way of living; it implies that you see your mistakes, your dark side, but you do not identify with either your superiority or your inferiority.

Don't fear the darkness of your soul. It serves a greater purpose.

Call it what it is.

Know that it does not singularily define you.

Receive it as a gift to move you forward.

Take it as the change agent to transform your life.

The Rest of the Serenity Prayer

Most of us are familiar with the Serenity Prayer: 

God, grant me

The Serenity to Accept the things I cannot change

The Courage to change the things I can,

And the Wisdom to know the difference.

But did you know that there's a second part to it? The prayer is traditionally attributed to the 20th Century theologian, Reinhold Niebuhr: 

Living one day at a time,

Enjoying one moment at a time,

Accepting hardship as a pathway to peace,

Taking, as Jesus did,

This sinful world as it is,

Not as I would have it,

Trusting that You will make all things right,

If I surrender to Your will,

So that I may be reasonably happy in this life,

And supremely happy with You forever in the next.

Amen.

Use this prayer. Adapt it and make it work for you. It's a great way to let go, keep your focus, and trust that everything thing will indeed work out okay.

Living Awake

For the most part, I try to live life spiritually awake, eyes wide open, ready, alert.

There are also times when being awake seems like too much, when it's easier to pull the covers over my head and shut out the noise, the drama, the chaos.

That's the rub of waking up: taking in the amazing can also be very emotionally overwhelming. But hey, you're awake and that's the point!

The poet Rilke wrote:

Again and again some people in the crowd wake up.
The have no ground in the crowd
and they emerge according to much broader laws.
They carry strange customs with them
and demand room for bold gestures. 
The future speaks ruthlessly through them.

Living awake may be lonely when those around you are not awake to "the much broader laws" you are living by. It can feel equally empowering and isolating. That's why I think it's important to connect to those who are awake to similar kinds of revelation.

Living awake may make you a spectacle, especially when you stop practicing former customs and ways of thinking. Those who were with you in the previous season may think you're in error, misled, or on a dangerous path. 

Living awake may make others think you have a sharp edge or that you've something to prove. But they fail to recognize the edge you live by is only sharp when it grates against the prevailing mindsets you don't live by.

Until those prevailing mindsets change, living awake makes you a type of prophet, living according to ways that are coming, but that have not quite fully arrived.

Living awake may appear to be costly, but you know it would be costlier to turn back. Indeed, the future does speak ruthlessly through you and call you forward. Once you open your spirit to that voice, you can never really go back to sleep.

The best way out is always through.

“When one door closes, another opens. But we often look so long and so regretfully upon the closed door that we do not see the one which has opened for us."

~ Helen Keller

I've been thinking about closed doors and looking at the new ones as they open up.

What does it mean when the open ones are not necessarily the ones you were looking for?

How do you embrace the new opportunities in a way that honors your primary purpose and/or passion?

I do know it's helpful not looking back at the closed ones for too long. You gotta let go and then let life be.

Accepting life on life's terms is not always easy, but it's probably the surest way to get through your current predicament or overcome your presenting challenge.

As Robert Frost wrote, "The best way out is always through."

So keep moving forward. Don't look back for too long. It's the best, perhaps the only way, to get through. 

Vulnerability, Shame, Fear, etc.

Crucial to my daily work is showing compassion to those sitting in front of me, freeing them from shame and judgmental moralisms, often self-inflicted and pernicious in their impact on the human soul.

I know, because I struggle with that myself. That's when a good therapist comes in handy. Every helper needs a good helper too.

I came across this author/sociologist/researcher recently and thoroughly enjoyed her talk on TED that I've re-posted below.

There are some profound tips here on embracing the human condition of vulnerability, shame, fear...thereby being born into newness of joy, peace, and life.

I recommend watching the whole 20 minute clip when you have a little time.

 

 

The Power of Vulnerability

by Brene Brown 

To be vulnerable is to see all of me 

And to be open to 

The possibility of 

Authenticity 

The courage to love me 

And ask for what I need 

With no certainty 

And holding my own 

Hand with accountability 

Of boundaries that 

I Set to let go of 

Who I think you need me to be 

And the ingredients include 

Courage, compassion, connection 

And the nest is acceptance 

Of all of me Shame and guilt 

Must be looked at 

With severe honesty in 

Owning my story 

Trusting my spirit solely 

Letting go of shoulds and pushing 

Practicing gratitude into a 

Shifting of joy that 

Doesn't exclude fear or sadness 

But delivers the need for 

Certainty turned into faith 

And in the calm and still place 

Don't forget to play 

God brought us each here 

With a gift to create today  

Dikes of Courage

We must constantly build dikes of courage to hold back the flood of fear.

--Martin Luther King, Jr.

I've been meditating on this quote for a couple of weeks, asking myself, "How can I be more courageous?"

Here are some "dikes of courage" that I find helpful:

1. Surround yourself with people who love and support you unconditionally.

2. Remove people from your life (both in person and virtually) who who do not support you or your purpose in life. 

3. Fear and worry put you in a very disconnected and negative spiritual space. The only way to move out of it is to confront it. Do so by, reminding yourself that the emotion is temporary and will pass. I do this by viewing my life or situation objectively. I close my eyes and visualize me outside of my body, looking down on me. I then ask myself, "What counsel would you give someone who is in your situation?"

4. Respond in the opposite. When doubting, respond in faith. When in fear, respond in love. Fear cannot reside where love is. They are antithetical to one another.

5.   If you are going to do something gutsy, sleep on it first. Nothing gives clarity like a good night's rest.  

6. Once you've stepped out, don't look back. Regret or fearing you've made a mistake can trip up your next critical step.

7. Ask yourself, "What's the worse that could happen?" Built a respond plan that could implement if the worse did occur. But remember, most things we fear don't actually ever happen. 

It's been said, "Feel the fear and do it anyway." I think that's exactly right. Courage is when we respond confidently in spite of the fear. Don't let negative emotion hinder you. Listen to the inner voice within your spirit and do it.

Patrick and Spiritual Experience

I found my copy of The Confession of St. Patrick this morning.

I was struck again by this man's story. He was taken into slavery out of Roman Britain (probably modern day Wales) around the age of 15. He was held captive in Ireland and during his literal captivity he found spiritual liberation through prayer and meditation.

It was there that he connected to his spirit and found the Spirit speaking to him which would then lead him away from his slave master, onto a ship to his voyage of freedom to Gaul and back to Britain.

Yet once again through spiritual experience and great faith, he would return to Ireland to minister to others the spiritual freedom he had found while in captivity in that land.

I love how he framed the voice of Spirit to himself through dreams and visions:

And on another night, I do not know, only God knows, whether in me or outside of myself, I heard the most wise words which as yet I could not comprehend...And once again, I saw him praying within my soul; it seemed as if I was still inside my body, and then I heard him above me, that is, over my inner man. So that there he was praying with many a groan, and as all this was happening, I was stunned and kept marveling and wondering who he might be, who was praying in this wise within me. But as this prayer was ending, he declared that it was the Spirit.

His description resonates with me for often I don't know if it is within me or outside of me that I hear what I believe to be the voice of the Spirit. Sometimes, the Spirit sounds similair to my human spirit, indistinguishable as it were.

The point for me is not to quibble over which it is but to discern good, clear direction when these kinds of experiences happen and answer "yes" to the call. 

Sixteen hundred years later, Patrick's Confession is a primer for spiritual experience that reflects the 21st Century human condition as we struggle in a time of conflict to follow faithfully the heart's call in spite of great turmoil or opposition. He wrestled with his culture, his religion, and his God to follow his heart and live authentically.

As the poet e.e. cummings wrote: "It takes courage to grow up and become who you really are."

Patrick did just that.  His story inspires me to do the same today.