In Pursuit Of Self

"From the rising of the sun to its setting The name of the Lord is to be praised." ~ psalm 113:3

When I was a little girl, I was the center of my small universe. I have the distinct memory of riding home from  lake Sherando- I guess I was about four years old or so- looking out the window of the unusually quiet car, staring at the moon. Every time we turned, the moon seemed to follow us. The faster we went, the moon kept the pace.

"Mommy!," I remember excitedly whispering," The moon is following me..."
Now that I have my own children, and I know a little about the so-called psychological development of children, I realize that this "egocentric" view of the world is a "normal" stage of development in a child's life.

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And, of course, we hope to pass through this self-centered phase, as remaining the center of one's own existence is certainly not the foundation of maturity. Have you ever met an adult who still thinks that life should center around him or her? We all have moments of self-god, but hopefully it's not the norm.

There is one area of our lives, however, where it would be good to see ourselves in the center, in focus. As I took my walk yesterday, the sun seemed to follow me. I was once again that child in the car, small and stilled...to think that the sun follows me. It was not the arrogance of self being glorified. It was the humility, the awe of a child, that such grandeur would pursue nothingness. That though I am not worthy, He gifts me every day in innumerable abundance.

That it doesn't matter  how good I am, or what I do, or how I look. That it doesn't matter what my house looks like, or how my kids turn out, or what a mess my life is. That perfection is not the prerequisite. He pursues me because he loves me. He Loves me. Is there really anything more than this?

Every day God pours his very life out for us. Every morning we must commit ourselves to sharing in his love. Loving God isn't about being good; loving God is about becoming a receptacle of his grace by choosing Him above all else.

"Choose you this day whom ye will serve."~ Joshua 24:15

Every morning, every moment, I make that choice. Loving God isn't about me; I am only able to respond to Him, to be filled with love, because He first calls me. And when I respond to that call, when I choose to serve Him above all, I love Him in a way that completes self: self in the center, self radiating out, self widening circles that unleash His love to others.

Invitation To Love
by Paul Laurence Dunbar

Come when the nights are bright with stars
Or when the moon is mellow;
Come when the sun his golden bars
Drops on the hay-field yellow.

Come in the twilight soft and gray,
Come in the night or come in the day,
Come, O love, whene'er you may,
And you are welcome, welcome.

You are sweet, O Love, dear Love,
You are soft as the nesting dove.
Come to my heart and bring it rest
As the bird flies home to its welcome nest.

Come when my heart is full of grief
Or when my heart is merry;
Come with the falling of the leaf
Or with the redd'ning cherry.
Come when the year's first blossom blows,
Come when the summer gleams and glows,
Come with the winter's drifting snows,
And you are welcome, welcome.

His Will Be Done

The wind, in its shapeless form, hollows sky and parts seas, and I, restless and unmade, find form in His breathing of life, his imparting of soul manna.

Tossed. Feverish. Unsettled. The storm raged over roof and vexed sleep last night. I awoke feeling restless and agitated.

I pray with the psalmist, "Whither shall I go from thy Spirit? Or whither shall I flee from thy presence?" (psalm 139:7), and I know that God is surely present in the tempest; He does not depart. I cannot flee. But sometimes the greatest cross to bear is staying. Not running. Not hiding. I stand before God in all disfigurement, unashamed of my naked soul.

I settle in my chair this morning with one of my best friends in hand. De Caussade never fails to move me with his words of wisdom. He speaks on the restlessness of the human heart, of how to really do God's will, and how the waiting and being open to divine promptings is the deepest form of prayer. Remaining detached, emptied, open...this is the surest disposition, the most holy posture of prayer:

Leave everything else to God, except for your love and obedience to the duties of the moment...
We possess and enjoy God by union with His will, and we deceive ourselves if we imagine we can have this delight by any other means.

God unites His will to ours in a thousand different ways, and the one he employs in our case is always the best for us. We should honor and love them all, for they are all arranged by God to suit each individual soul to bring about this union.

We must keep ourselves detached from all we feel or do if we are to travel along His path and live only for God and the duties of the present moment. We must stop all imaginings of the future, keep our attention on what is happening now and not bother about anything that has gone before or what may follow.

I imagine that God's will always governs you. You will then have some inner prompting which makes you say: "I feel drawn to this person or this book; I would like to give another person some advice or ask for some myself; I wish to complain about something, to open my heart to someone and in turn receive confidence, to give something away or to perform a certain action..."

We must give ourselves to whatever God wishes and for as long as He wishes and yet never get personally involved in them...There is never a moment when there is not some virtue to be practiced.

But whatever we do, we do it because we are drawn to this particular action without knowing why. All we can say can be reduced to this: "  I feel drawn to write, to read, to question and examine. I obey this feeling, and God who is responsible for it, thus builds up within me a kind of spiritual store which, in the future, will develop into a core of usefulness for myself and others."

(excerpt from: Abandonment To Divine Providence pgs 80-81)


Yes...what it all comes down to is one simple line, a creed, a daring manifesto:  Thy Will be done. In all, through all, amidst all...His Will be done. When we fall in love with God, when we seek to exist as a tool in the master's hands, He can do wondrous things. He can give shape to the formless, He can make something from nothing.

Breathe

A late March snow empties from the sky,  gentle benediction on stilled earth. Benediction breathes beauty, and beauty breathes life into my soul.

And as I walk, I'm struck by how hushed the earth is in its delicate fullness~ flower budding, waters surging, snow falling, animals birthing ~ all life coming to, never questioning, never resisting. As I inhale each breath of  life-swell, I am conscious only of that, only of breathing. And somehow in all this "living" I do, I forget to breathe; I'm feverish with trying to figure it all out. Is that even living? Is living about getting it all straight, putting all the pieces together- every day cramming and flattening life into conformity?

I do this crazy thing when I exercise sometimes: I forget to breathe. It must not be too uncommon, as I have been in many fitness classes where the instructor has to remind everyone to "Keep breathing!" And I know I do that in life sometimes; when obstacles mount, when oppression suffocates, I forget to breathe. Instead of breathing deeper and more fully, I lose my breath.

So I just stand there in all that beauty and breathe deep. Breathe deep the stillness, breathe deep the hush, breathe deep the benediction.

I birthed nine babies into this world, panting hard and anxiously awaiting first life breaths- that sucking in of air, inflating lungs and coursing blood ...and they breathed, and they cried. They Cried! No longer were they in that watery sanctuary where all was done for them, all was effortless. They had to be on their own. They had to learn to breathe, and breathing can hurt.

Breathing hurts. Letting go of control and giving to God, being still in the center of the storm, waiting...just breathing... can throb. Like the runner, cramped with an air bubble, I so desperately need that breath that will cause me to double in pain.

Every moment of our lives we must give birth and be reborn; we birth surrender and are born continuously into God's grace and love, the eternal breath. And with each breath we may have to pant, with each rebirth we may cry out, helpless newborns squalling.

I come to the steep part of my walk, and I am full of breath. I begin to run, just run crazy up that hill so I can get breathless. I want the need to breathe, to empty out so I can let it all in. Because sometimes we actually live life fullest when we're out of breath and breathing hardest.

It is beginning to snow, and I lie on the ground and look up. "You're a nut, Mom," John Paul said when he saw the pictures. Maybe I just don't care what anyone thinks anymore, and maybe I found a way to let go and live deeper and more fully- a way that truly sustains my soul. I look up at those trees all stately gracing, and snowflakes land gently on my face. I open my camera and attempt to get a picture of the snowflakes landing on my pants and jacket. The lens cannot capture the intricacies of the snowflakes, but I see something else.

Each snowflake, every single one, explodes before it melts. Looking through the camera lens,  I am captivated by these miniature explosions, happening over and over! And I'm thinking that that's how I have to be; before I can run free, before I can melt before God in surrender, I must get rid of self. I must explode all preconceived notions of who I am or what I need and just be. Be in His presence, be in His grace, inhaling and exhaling, respiring life. Breathing.

Letting Him Find You

Roy walks beside me on the first warm day and he knows delight. He runs through the pond, mouth open, drinking up, tossing head, wallowing joyous.

All these treasures strewn under leaf and studding sky await discovery. They fill me with such happiness. But why? How can moth delight and flower startle to the point of overflowing? And wouldn't you think I should get tired of blogging about this day after day, week after week?

But how can the freshness of God ever be exhausted? His creation made new every moment speaks a language that rivets soul and does not weary.

There are places so deep, so tremulous within -that beauty speaks what words can't. It's why eyes and heart flood when sky unfolds at dawn, pouring out His glory. My eyes well with joy tears and the recesses of my soul are made bare before God. He has probed the depths in creation all spilled out and raw.

I stand so small before God, so painfully aware of the lack and depravity....and yet, yet..

He doesn't hold back. He gives all.

And the longing for wholeness, needing Him, being loved by Him and all made good in His grace and
Why?!! Why does he love me? Why does He love us? What would make a God, infinitely good and merciful choose to love such wretched creatures who can do so little for Him?

But that's the beauty. He in his greatness, wants our smallness. We can do nothing for Him, but he longs for us, seeks for every soul like the shepherd looking for His lost sheep. And won't I let Him find me?

Will you allow God to find you today?  Will you bask in His presence and be awed by His grandeur...you being empty and Him filling up,  you being still and not trying to figure it all out, you trusting and letting your weakness being perfected in Him?

He is waiting...He is waiting for You.


God's Grandeur  by Gerard Manley Hopkins

The world is charged with the grandeur of God.
It will flame out, like shining from shook foil;
It gathers to a greatness, like the ooze of oil
Crushed. Why do men then now not reck his rod?
Generations have trod, have trod, have trod; 
And all is seared with trade; bleared, smeared with toil;
And wears man’s smudge and shares man’s smell: the soil
Is bare now, nor can foot feel, being shod.

And for all this, nature is never spent;
There lives the dearest freshness deep down things; 
And though the last lights off the black West went
Oh, morning, at the brown brink eastward, springs—
Because the Holy Ghost over the bent
World broods with warm breast and with ah! bright wings.

Just As I Am

I have washed this floor hundreds of times, but the sunlight spilled in that day, exalting the ordinary. Dirt still layers corners, grime plasters nooks in the door, and they'll never come showroom clean...but somehow light lifts this patch of 'everydayness' to the sublime.

But isn't that what we're supposed to do every day, each moment? Take the ordinary and remold with love and tenderness so that even the smallest gestures become noble?

"Love begins at home, and it is not how much we do...but how much love we put into that action."
~ Mother Teresa

But what about those days that seem so...so...ordinary? The light isn't bathing the floor; it's raining outside and the dog tracked mud everywhere, children are crying in the next room, and the floor is just another obligation- just another mess to deal with.

And honestly, many days are like that. I want to find the beauty in the mundane, the grace of the ordinary.I want to savor moments and rejoice in the rain...but I feel paralyzed. I can't see beyond the mess, the demands, the obligations, and sometimes just my own frame of mind. Some days, too, are just harder.

Writers get writer's cramp, and they can't think of anything to write. Runners get runner's cramp, and they can't run without getting sharp, stabbing pains in their sides. Sometimes I get what I call "life cramp,"  and I forget how to live. I know what needs to be done, and I just can't do it. I'm unmotivated and sluggish, sometimes sad and overwhelemd.

So what to do? When the zest for life gets trapped somewhere inside, and it is painful to breathe, do I try harder? I always thought that was the answer. Refocus, try something different, breathe deeper, pray, walk, think positive thoughts...shift the mindset. All of those things are good and necessary to living a life well, but sometimes the best cure for life cramp is the holy prayer of acceptance.

I accept that I feel tired and unmotivated right now. I accept that I can't find the joy or beauty of this moment. Lord, I accept that I don't always feel your grace, even when I know it's there. Is it a sacrilege to accept the unacceptable? A sacrifice sometimes, but not always a sacrilege.

The only reason I am ever able to know the countless joys and gratitude, the treasures of any moment is a gift, not a right. The fact that God often graces me with a spiritual vision that consecrates the ordinary says nothing of my own merit. It is all gift. And sometimes the gift doesn't come wrapped in joy and gratitude; it comes wrapped in the acceptance of just being able to BE, and know that "this too shall pass."