Category Archives: opening my mind

Welcoming Blessing!

15 Tuesday Oct 2019

Posted by in blessing, opening my mind, Uncategorized

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A Birthday Greeting!

The idea of blessing has been in the forefront of my thinking and pondering in these recent days. Blessing as a spiritual practice is offered in many of the sources from which I am learning, even though I don’t quite feel as if I have a competant handle on it yet; it hasn’t been part of my fundamental spiritual vocabulary to date.

Yet, in the birthday season of this year, that seems to continue on, I found myself being offered blessing from a wide swath of sources, some not even imagined or hoped for. Moreover, I was nudged to move my reflections from my being the one who offered a blessing, as so often pastors, even retired ones do, away from how the blessing came, to reflect on my heart’s capacity to welcome the blessings as they came.

I have been trying to activate my own blessing quotient daily, noticing, thanking and counting. Now, I am eager to see what opens my heart to receive them as they come. What “tunes my heart” to receive them?

  • my open spirit, one that regards each blessing, not only with gratitude but with wonder and amazement. Amazing, “the joy as it flies!”
  • my pace–too often because of speed, distraction and myopia, I don’t notice, let alone appreciate the blessings as they come. Moving with deliberation helps me sense much more!
  • my open imagination, unlimited by what has always been or what I have seen heretofore.
  • my spirit of prayer–traveling, perceiving and welcoming what comes with open eyes, hands and heart, a willingness to see what the blessing might mean.
  • my reflective review–taking the time and space to recall, relive, remember what has come to me with gentleness and wisdom, to pick up something I might have missed initially.
  • deep trust–grounding myself in my belief that “All will be well, and all will be well, and all manner of things will be well.” That wellness often appears in the the different shapes of blessing!

I encountered the woman in my photo on my birthday this year, in another town, on my way to meet friends, right in front of the place we parked the car. I was drawn to the open tray she was holding, amid a cluster of surroundings–an old hollowed out tree, from which new branches were sprouting at the bottom, a bright green succulent with buds that promised blossom, some unlit twinkle lights strung through the old and new growth, a little rust on the sculptured hair. Right in the middle of all that diversity and contrast, she stood with open hands and capacity to receive what the day brought her. I was blessed, and I was reminded how blessings often come as a surprise, and I received the blessing she bestowed as a gift from the One from Whom all blessing flow! A blessed birthday indeed!

Coming Into A Clearing

21 Thursday Jan 2016

Posted by in listening, Mindfulness, Mystery, opening my mind, paying attention, Spirit, wisdom

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HuntingtonDogBeach

The big pressures of the Season are over, and even though there continues to be much to do, I feel as if I can pause to take a breath. I have been doing a great deal of reading about “mindfulness,” and listening to a multitude of voices who speak from their experiences about what this practice does for, in and through them. In attempting to participate in the practices about which I read, however, I find that they are not intuitive to me, or easy to get the hang of.

This break in the liturgical year between Epiphany and Lent does give me space to try to practice some ways of mindfulness. The calendar is not quite so event-filled, the deadlines have been met for the time being, and the sales forces are losing a little of their steam. I can be a little less in a hurry, a little gentler in my intention, and more expansive in my gaze.  Susan Phillips in her book, The Cultivated Life, (IVP,2014), when speaking of mindfulness for someone on a faith quest, says this: The praying person enters the silence, pays attention to what’s on her heart, and then directs attention to God, aided by the text and the community.” (116)

I am attempting to take that pause, to allow this change of pace to be more mindful and attentive. On a trip to the section of beach where dogs can roam free, accompanied by my grandson, husband and wild dog Max, in the crispness and quiet, I sit shivering, but still, captured by the juxtaposition of motion and stasis: rolling waves, calm ocean farther out; dark mass of clouds softening into promising light; intrepid surfers and quiet watchers. How do I attend to Holy Presence in this moment?

I begin with gratefulness–for being here in this moment to behold the beauty of the Creator in wave, sky and sand; to delight in the weaving of grand-boy, grandfather and dog, up and down the strand; for living in proximity to ocean and mountain both; for ample time to take a day to celebrate the birthday of this unique grandchild, with a love for creatures and a longing to wander untethered in as much wilderness as he can inhabit.

Then with the prayer, Loving God, here I am, I turn my heart to questions for clarity: what do you want me to know? where do you want me to be? how shall I do the next right thing? I experience these prayers as seeds being sown in the garden of my heart, to be brought to fruition when the time in right. For the moment I need only to offer them, and sit with the panorama of Light and Dark before me, and wait. Like the roses in my garden behind and as the irises in my garden in front, the flowering of answers will appear in due season.

The next morning I am in a sanctuary preparing for worship. I am sitting with my husband, there is powerful music, stained glass, and a welcoming liturgy. But first to get quiet. I find that  I routinely need to do things: rest in the truth that I am now a “person in the pew” not a worship leader, and that I need to recycle all the Grace that was extended to me by letting go of any bits and bobs of critique I might carry forward from my years of experience as pastor; then, I need to remind myself that I am gathered here with the people of God in worship of the Mystery we call God, even though I don’t have deep friendships or feel connected. I am ready now to pray, Loving God, here I am, and to see what how the Spirit will catch my attention and nourish my thirsty soul. Will it be words of a new hymn? will it be the reading of the Word by a sweet and adept 10 year old? will it be a line from the Word preached, a cadence sung by the alto soloist, an invitation to participate in the healing of the world close by? I tune my hearts to listen.

The next challenge will be to bring my practice of mindfulness to a committee meeting. Will I be able to lay aside my resistances, my anxieties, my critical spirit long enough to be quiet, pray again Loving God, here I am, and then listen for what prompts the Spirit brings to me: is this a time to speak, to refer to my past experience, to jump into the fray or this is a time to call of the Spirit ot “set a seal on my mouth,” to listen to the deliberations with an open heart, while praying for the common good for all of us gathered?

“Thou will keep her in perfect peace, whose mind is stayed on Thee…”  Isaiah 26:3

Loving God, here I am, make me mindful.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Opening my Mind-Lent IV

23 Monday Mar 2015

Posted by in changing my mind, Lent, opening my mind

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ChristthetheDesertIn this week of Lent I have mused on how opening my mind to the Presence of the Holy in me and around me could allow angels to feed me. I began reflecting on all the ideas I had once held firmly, and how I now have come to understand and to believe something different.

The angels who have fed me over the decades of my life are many–pastors, teachers, seminary professors, therapists, exemplars, writers–each one that was a game changer taking me to places where I never imagined I would go. Some have taken me deeper in the Mystery we call God. Some have widened my understanding of the complexity of being human. Some have taken scales off of my eyes or lifted my vision up to see that there are “more things than I have dreamed of” in this world that God has made–more diversity, more variety and ways of seeing. “What no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the human heart conceived, what God has prepared for those who love him”–these things God has revealed to us through the Spirit,” says Paul quoting the prophet Isaiah.

The editors of Christian Century asked a collection on theologians and spiritual writers to reflect on “How I Changed Mind,” now published in a book. Each essay chronicles a combination of an opening of mind along with an opening of heart and intention. As I look over my own mind shifts, the opening of my mind to the Spirit of God has been as important as my circumstances and my feelings. As one who was raised in a tradition that held “right” belief in higher honor than “right” feeling or “right” doing even, I had reservations about being too open minded. Yet in my journey I have found that each time I was willing to open my mind to what the Spirit was prompting, i encountered Holy Presence on the other side.

As a very young person, I would have been so surprised to see where the Spirit was opening my mind. I could not have imagined that a life of faithful following would lead me to a ministry of Word and Sacrament, a calling that I had been taught belonged only to men. I didn’t imagine that a closer reading of sacred text would demonstrate that all Christians are to be mutually submissive to one another, even in a marriage. I had not understood the radical inclusiveness of the company of Jesus that opened life and love to all who had been “othered” in my community–people with racial-ethnic provenance different from mine, those with a different sexual orientation, those whose faith practices looked very different from the practices I held dear. And I had missed nearly completely that global dimensions of the Christian mandate to love the world that God created and loves, including the creation itself. I would have been startled to know that I could have soul friends from many traditions–Judaism, Roman Catholic, “spiritual but no religious,” even self-proclaimed “nones.”

During Lent I have been reading The Rebirthing of God by John Philip Newell. He speaks about what we know what what we think we know, yet he also is aware than there is much within us and in the outer world that is still unclear. He says, “We long for what we do not yet know to emerge from hidden and unawakened depths within us into the light of the day, into the realm of consciousness.” (91). My prayer for this practice is that in my longing to know more about the Mystery, I will be willing to open my mind to the ways that the Holy One is being revealed, and that i will honor the angels who bring that awareness to me.

Personal phono at Christ in the Desert Monastery, Mew Mexico.