“I like projects!” declares my granddaughter. But in this past season for me, I had no compelling projects ahead–no big birthdays or anniversaries coming up, no peak events for which I was responsible, no anticipated shifts in my universe for which to get ready. And August, a time in my personal calendar, it was a time to lie fallow.
What happens in the fallow times? The earth rests. My spirit wander without destination. I can observe what is going by, what is coming in, without needing to leap up and engage it. I have learned, however, that the appearance of inactivity in the earth, and in me, does not mean that there is nothing going on. Underneath all kinds of things are being absorbed, processed, re-imagined and integrated. And so it is with me! In lying fallow I have been aware of the changes in the world that keep swirling, some affecting me directly, others seemingly far away, yet in the web of life still touching me. While I felt stuck in amber some days, there still have been words, music, images, sensations that have dropped down into my being, beyond consciousness even, that have continued to shape and nourish me.
The fallow season for me is over–all grand-kids are back in school, the church has its homecoming, the scorching heat has abated somewhat, and the regular gathering of my soul friends resumes. It’s time to assess “projects,” to plan holidays. to reconsider commitments for the year ahead. What I am discovering is that from the fallowness, things are popping up, like the mushroom, unexpected, unplanned, unimagined. New perspectives, new energies, new visions are latent or explicit as the projects of this next season unfold.
I rely on two things from my spiritual journey that sustain me and help me understand this season I have just lived through. One is that in the Providence of the Holy, nothing is wasted. When it looked to me like nothing was going on, the Heart-knower was at work in a subterranean way, creating me energy, imagination and love. Beyond that is my trust that the Holy One never slumbers or sleeps, even in my states of amber or my seasons of lying fallow. For these truth, I am deeply grateful! I am ready to begin my “projects” again!
The gospel of Luke tells us that after all the profound and intense events of the days of Holy Week, those who loved and followed Jesus, “On the sabbath…rested according to the commandments.” I am entering into that rest today, Holy Saturday. I am taking sabbath in my spirit. It’s not as if I don’t know that there are things that need to be done. But I am intending to let my spirit be at rest. Marva Dawn in her important book, Keeping the Sabbath Wholly, identifies four movements of Sabbath that I am observing inwardly today.
A Musing Amma 