Daily Dose (November 18 – 21)
TUESDAY NOVEMBER 18 — “Sanctuary is wherever I find safe space to regain my bearings,
reclaim my soul,
heal my wounds,
and return to the world as a wounded healer.
It’s not merely about finding shelter from the storm: it’s about spiritual survival. Today, seeking sanctuary is no more optional for me than church attendance was as a child.” Thank you, Parker Palmer.
This I know. Regaining and reclaiming are not easy when my mind is elsewhere and otherwise. When my energy (my umph, my focus) is spent on fret and disquiet—giving the better part of my attention (energy and time) to non-essential matters. Easily elevated to anxiety or fear (and yes, sometimes to the level of urgent consternation.)
“Martha, Martha!” Jesus said (I’m guessing with empathy and concern) in Luke’s Gospel, “You worry and fuss about a lot of things.” As in, Martha, if you’re not careful, this’ll eat you alive.
With worry, we lose heart. And as a preacher, it’s tempting to now deliver a sermon about worry.
I prefer this story: when worry and anxiety happened to Jesus’ friends, (“because so many people were coming and going that they did not even have a chance to eat,” The Gospel of Mark), Jesus—mercifully—didn’t preach or lecture or lead a prayer or offer a gadget. The story says, immediately Jesus made the disciples get into the boat and go ahead of him to the other side, while he sent the crowds away. “Come with me by yourselves,” Jesus told them, “To a quiet place and get some rest.”
Ahhh, regaining my bearings and reclaiming my soul.
So. It’s not about creating a life absent of stress.
It’s about being present, even in the hectic and the crazy.
In other words, it is in the rest, the refueling, the “be-ing,” the sanctuary to refocus on essential matters, which allows us to let go, to be present, even in the busy, the noise, the demands, the lists.
Gabrielle Roth reminds us, “In many shamanic societies, if you came to a shaman or medicine person complaining of being disheartened, dispirited, or depressed, they would ask one of four questions.
When did you stop dancing?
When did you stop singing?
When did you stop being enchanted by stories?
When did you stop finding comfort in the sweet territory of silence?
Where we have stopped dancing, singing, being enchanted by stories, or finding comfort in silence is where we have experience the loss of soul. Dancing, singing, storytelling, and silence are the four universal healing salves.”
I love that the shaman didn’t ask, “When are you going to quit worrying?”
Let’s think of regaining and reclaiming as Sankofa Time. Sankofa (in the Akan language of Ghana), associated with the proverb, “Se wo were fi na wosankofa a yenkyi,” which translates “It is not wrong to go back for that which you have forgotten.”
I am writing this in Matosinhos, Portugal. On our first very sunny day. And yes, I’m smiling real big.
Spending the day walking the coastline—the Camino path—toward Porto.
The ocean is speckled with surfers. All waiting for the opportune wave, while practicing the gift of patience—hopefully, giving up worry.
And on a sunny day, the pathway is chock-a-block with people, some strolling, some jogging, some walking and talking with a friend. We passed a half dozen or so Camino pilgrims, replete with the backpack, and good walking shoes. This would be day one of their Camino. We smile and nod.
“Buen Camino” indeed.
WEDNESDAY NOVEMBER 19 — “Sanctuary is wherever I find safe space to regain my bearings,
reclaim my soul,
heal my wounds,
and return to the world as a wounded healer.
It’s not merely about finding shelter from the storm: it’s about spiritual survival. Today, seeking sanctuary is no more optional for me than church attendance was as a child.” Thank you, Parker Palmer.
Do you have any relatives that make you wonder about the gene pool in your family tree? Well, Uncle George was exasperating and difficult. Looking after him was stressful, taxing and thankless. Driving to the funeral of Uncle George, the young man let loose with pent-up emotion.
“Thank God,” he blurts to his wife. “I suppose I’m sorry he died, but I’ve got to tell you, I don’t think I could have stood one more day with that annoying and dizzying man. I’ve had enough. And I’m telling you that the only reason I gave so much time and energy to your Uncle George was because of my love for you!”
“My Uncle George,” she says flabbergasted. “My Uncle George? I thought he was your Uncle George!”
It seems to be our bait these days, to collect Uncle Georges.
It is the perfect metaphor for any fret, disquiet, apprehension, anxiety or fear—you know, that is too often elevated to the level of urgent consternation.
Bottom line; “Uncle George” consumes us.
And we wonder why, especially given that he’s not even our uncle.
“Worry is the interest you pay on a debt you may not even owe.” Not sure who coined this, but I say, “Amen.”
And when worry takes root: I am now distressing about stuff I can do nothing about. And I give the better part of my attention, energy and time, to non-essential matters.
And yet. I’m smiling, because I know that for all our objections to the contrary, we collect worries like we collect all our stuff… there’s always room for one more.
It seems to take care of something. I know I like to use Uncle George to let you know how important, or busy, or indispensable I am. It’s still about control.
We do know this; this blend of worry and fuss is a pickle, because it gums up the system. Stops the flow. Worry, from an Anglo-Saxon word “to strangle” or “to choke.” As if literally cutting off the air supply that allows us to breathe emotionally and spiritually.
It’s not just the accumulation of Uncle George(s), it is that we have become untethered and susceptible. So, we feel at the mercy of—whether it be exhaustion, public opinion, the need to pacify or please, the need to impress, fear or embarrassment.
Well, here’s the bottom line: preoccupied with Uncle George, I am quite literally, not myself. Pulled in many directions, I am of two minds (at least).
Numb, I am not really available for the people I love.
Numb, I have no bandwidth for things that matter to the heart; gladness, desire, intention, compassion and wholehearted fire.
This is not to say that we can’t engage in activities, or service, or work. However, work that is fueled by a need to be needed, or need to prove value is too consuming, leaving no time for rejuvenation (sanctuary),
Or regaining our bearings,
or prayer, or delight, or the quiet work of the Spirit.
Let us be gentle with ourselves my friends.
I’m writing this from a train. Heading from Porto to Lisbon. I’ve walked the coastal Portuguese Camino (Portuguese: Caminho Português). But I’ve had friends who’ve walked the Camino beginning in Lisbon, which is quite the hike. Starting in Porto, The Portuguese Way is 260 km (160 miles), and starting in Lisbon, you walk for 610 km (380 miles). You know, enough miles to let go of some bits of worry. Just sayin’.
THURSDAY NOVEMBER 20 — This week we’ve been taking to heart Parker Palmer’s invitation, that “sanctuary is wherever I find safe space to regain my bearings, reclaim my soul, heal my wounds,
and return to the world as a wounded healer.”
One of the gifts of any Camino pilgrimage, are the nudges (or yes, the “signs”). Ahhh, the unexpected moments, when a new awareness (attentiveness and mindfulness) takes root.
Of course, let’s be honest. Not every one of these moments is “welcomed” with open arms. Because we see, and discover, the parts of our self that are vulnerable. And fragile. And broken.
You know, the parts we’ve often worked to hide for many years. Along with the fear.
And here’s the deal: this happens to me (the need to hide) when I put a moral price tag on my wounded (or fragile or broken) places. Because, now, these are places to be run from, or concealed, or suppressed, or fixed.
And I miss the power that these are places where grace lives.
Let’s pause and hear that again: These are the places where grace lives.
I miss the permission (and the gift) to let the wound be a place of healing (for myself and for others).
I miss the exquisite beauty (strength and power and life) in what is fragile—and the light that shines from broken places—love, tenderness, kindness, generosity, gentleness and empathy.
We forget (or maybe don’t see) that it is from our soft and broken places that light (and healing) can and does spill.
There is an old legend in the Jewish Talmud in which a certain Rabbi encounters the prophet Elijah, and he asks him: “When will the Messiah come?”
The prophet answers him: “Go and ask him yourself.”
The Rabbi replies: “Where is he, and how will I know him?”
Elijah says to him: “He is at the gates of the city, sitting among the poor, covered in wounds. The others unbind all their wounds at the same time and then bind them up again. But he unbinds one at a time and binds it up again, saying to himself: ‘Perhaps I shall be needed: if so I must always be ready so as not to delay for a moment.’” (Story often used by Henri Nouwen)
And quotes to carry with me today.
“The older I get, the clearer it becomes to me that no one is cheated in this world, unless it’s by himself, but some of us are so wounded that we must return to the scene of the crime, must play with the fire that burned us, must live the scene out as many times as necessary until it comes out differently. We are not prisoners, no traps or snares are set about us, but many of us imprison ourselves or at least are helplessly stalled.” (Thank you, Merle Shain.)
“There are no privileged locations. If you stay put, your place may become a holy center, not because it gives you special access to the divine, but because in your stillness you hear what might be heard anywhere. All there is to see can be seen from anywhere in the universe, if you know how to look.” (Scott Russell Sanders)
FRIDAY NOVEMBER 21 — My friend tells the story about a Nativity play at his parish. Mary and Joseph show up at the inn, hoping for lodging. The little girl, playing the innkeeper, has only one line, “No room.” But she apparently isn’t beholden to the script.
She opens the door (of the inn), looks at Mary and Joseph, and then looks out at the priest. She looks back at Mary and Joseph, and then looks out at her parents. She looks at Mary and Joseph and says, “Oh well, you might as well come on in for a drink.”
Now we’re talking. We need the freedom (wisdom) of that little girl. The spontaneity and joy, and compassion and gladness, a freedom that comes from not being beholden to worry.
This I love, and it makes me smile real big. Knowing that this freedom and spontaneity of compassion and joy (and profound healing) spills from a grateful heart.
On my Camino revisit walk, I’ve found respite in Meister Eckert’s advice, “If you can only learn one prayer, make it this one: Thank you.”
Not a bad place to start when you put your backpack on. And, when you take it off.
This walk (yes, a pilgrimage, for me meaning re-discovery) has been about uncovering the ways gratitude has been concealed in parts of my life. And the healing and sustaining power it brings to the way I can now walk through my world.
Here’s the deal: Gratitude does not take away any of the difficult decisions or conundrums of our week. But it sure keeps us from looking in the rear-view mirror or around the next corner. Yes, one step at a time.
Gratitude allows us to live this life, and not the one we always figured that we’d trade this one in for.
Gratitude allows us to invest in what we can see, hear, taste, touch and smell in the moment. The sacrament of the present moment.
Gratitude allows us to partake in the joys of the everyday, to see the sacred in the very, very ordinary.
And gratitude helps us see that the sufficiency is not self-sufficiency, but that gratitude sees the connection, Ram Dass’ affirmation that we do indeed walk one another home.
I write this in Lisbon (in our final few days before returning back to Washington state). And enjoying a visit to the Church of Santiago (Igreja de Santiago), a quaint, very historical church dating back to the 1100s. Because it is not the Cathedral, it is lesser known to Lisbon tourists, but special for pilgrims, as it marks the official starting point of the Cathedral pilgrimage from Lisbon to Santiago.
Camino Prayer for our week…
Blessing
We are all great rivers flowing to their end.
Swirling inside us is the silt of ages and creatures and lands
and rain that has fallen for millions of years.
All this makes us cloudy with mud,
unable to see God.
As we struggle for clarity and the open sky,
the Lord keeps saying the same thing:
Come to me now and be blessed,
Come.
Hafiz (1320 – 1389)
Photo… “Terry, I just read your Sunday email. Thank you for adding something new for your sustaining members. But, much more importantly, thank you for spilling light into my life. It’s so nice to have an email in my inbox that I’m actually excited to receive regularly! As promised, here are a couple of pics in my part of the PNW. I will never tire of the fall leaves. And we were blessed with a surprise dahlia plant in our garden that has been prolific and a huge benefit to the bees. It’s gifted us over 125 flowers and is still going strong in the cooler temperatures! With appreciation,” Charlene Wall… Thank you Charlene… Thank you for your photos, please send them to tdh@terryhershey.com
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