Yesterday I posted something on Facebook about my Christmas resolution.
Such an unexpected thing, now that I think about it. Usually, resolutions are made at New Year's.
But the phrase -- and the reality of it in my heart, was out there before I had time to stop and re-think it. It seemed deeply natural to be making a Christmas resolution.
Maybe it's from all those repeated annual viewings of "A Christmas Carol" and "It's a Wonderful Life" -- two stories about Christmas Eve as a time of life-changing reflection and life-saving resolve. Maybe it's from reading and hearing about the new film, "The Man Who Invented Christmas," and the suggestion the Dickens, in the story of Scrooge, created for us the image of Christmas as a time for self-examination, repentance and conversion of life.
And why shouldn't Christmas Eve -- as much as New Year' Eve, be a time for life-changing reflection and resolution?
As far as New Year's Eve is concerned, of course we measure and mark our lives by calendar years, and January 1 is a nicely identifiable time of beginning and then tracking a new resolve. There's a sense of beginning afresh that seems to invite a moment of intentional self-improvement or correction. The
calendar has a nice, clean look to it -- beckoning like a field of
new-fallen snow graciously covering up the old ways, giving us the freedom to start carving new paths in their place.
But is not the day we celebrate the birth of the Christ not also a good time to take stock of our own life journey, and of where at this moment we feel called to a truer way of life? For he is the one we regard as the true human, God's Word of life and for life made flesh among us. And each time we come to celebrate and see his birth, and see him so weak and vulnerable in the manger and in our care, is there not some change, some different path, some new commitment or re-commitment to true living ourselves that we feel called to?
For me, I woke up Christmas Day knowing a desire to read daily something I have so far read only randomly -- Fr. Richard Rohr's daily online meditation. It seems a little thing. But Rohr in particular writes so lovingly and gently about the eternal Gospel invitation to grow up into our truest Self, that at this stage in my life-journey I know that daily reading of his experience, strength and hope in this direction cannot help but have good and growing effect on my own life and spirit.
And isn't that what resolutions -- at either New Years' or Christmas Eve, are about?
Maybe the difference for me right now and at this stage of my journey, is that a clean, blank field covered in fresh, fallen snow doesn't quite give me the direction I think I need to necessarily begin carving out the new paths I really need.
But coming to the stable, seeing what life is given to all of us there, and feeling what new directions it evokes and what next steps it inspires within me, does.
Recently I was chatting with a friend. About what, I don't remember.
At one point in the conversation, though, I changed whatever the subject was, and asked, "About gifts," referring to Christmas gifts, since Christmas Day is less than a week away, "did we decide not to exchange any?"
To me the question made sense when I asked it. I have a few relationships in which over the past few years we have decided not to exchange gifts. I thought maybe this may have been one of them, but I wasn't sure. I just wanted to clarify the expectations.
My friend, though, seemed taken aback by the question. "Well ...," she began, and I don't remember exactly how she phrased it, but it was instantly clear she had prepared a gift for me and for Japhia. Separate gifts, in fact. Simple, not expensive, thought-out, and hand-made. She explained that whatever I did or didn't do was fine, but she just likes to give gifts.
I wonder when I started to think of gifts as something we exchange. Instead of simply give.
It's not like I haven't received gifts from people to whom I did not give one.
Nor that I haven't also over my life simply and freely given something to others just for the pleasure of giving. With the question of receiving something in return being irrelevant.
So I wonder about this concept of "gift exchange."
And I marvel at the ability and willingness of the human heart just to give.
Fifteen seconds can be a long time. Especially to be doing something counter-intuitive.
I was told recently that the human brain is naturally like teflon and like velcro. Like teflon in the way it handles positive, complimentary, affirming things we receive; and like velcro in the way it handles negative, critical, judgemental things that come our way.
And it's not just our psycho-social history that predisposes us in this way. This predisposition to remember and hang on deeply to the negative -- the things that threaten our sense of self, is hard-wired into our brain chemistry through evolutionary eons. It's how we survive.
But it's not how we thrive.
We thrive when we grow into a settled, grateful awareness of ourselves as good and blessed children of a good and loving God -- lovable, loved, and able to love.
But how do we undo or fight our way through the natural chemistry of our brain?
The other thing I was told is that it is possible to rewire our brain, and that this is what spiritual -- rather than natural, evolution is about.
One simple way of rewiring our naturally defensive brain, of growing beyond natural evolution to matured spiritual humanity, is a practice of 15 seconds of gratitude. At different times of the day -- when something happens, when someone crosses your path, when you see something that catches your attention, when you do something as simple as lift a cup of coffee to your lips ... instead of just noticing and moving on in good teflon fashion (or even not noticing at all!), take 15 seconds to become aware of the ways you feel gratitude for whatever it is.
A cup of coffee? Take 15 seconds to be aware of the gratitude you feel for its smell, its taste, its warmth -- including the warmth of the cup in your hand, the comfort it brings you, perhaps the kindness of the person who poured it for you, the memory maybe of a special time you shared a coffee with a friend, and who knows what else.
I've practiced a full 15 seconds only two or three times since I was told about it two days ago. And already I notice a new awareness of even momentary (2 or 3-second) gratitude for things that I would normally just slide by.
Like the mist I saw from the Skyway Bridge this morning on the lake in the winter cold, and my gratitude for its gentle and haunting beauty, for being able to be there at that moment, for the wonder of the world all around me, for the memory of mist just like it on Lake Superior that I saw years ago on a mid-winter train trip from Winnipeg to Toronto, for the family I had visited there and still am part of, for different relationships I have been blessed with in my life, for the fact that no part of my life is lost, that in spite of everything my whole life is still one blessed and graced journey.
In less than 5 or 6 seconds, I felt my self so graciously held and supported in such a deep matrix of love and beauty far greater than myself, that I continued my journey into the rest of my day with more faith, hope and love within me than is often the case. I felt alive and free.
And ... it's not just "the good stuff" that this practice can be used with. I notice in the past two days a new willingness in my mind to seek out reasons for gratitude in things that disturb, interrupt or annoy me as well. That I will leave for another time, though.
For now, enough for me to know that 15 seconds can be a long time to be doing something counter-intuitive, but that 15 seconds can change my life.
The headline caught my attention: "Sikh Temple donates $10,000: Money for stem cell transplants follows religion's philosophy of helping those in need."
It was a page 3 story in The Hamilton Spectator about a local Sikh temple giving $10,000 to the Juravinski Hospital and Cancer Centre Foundation's campaign to expand and purchase equipment for a dedicated and specialized clinical unit for stem cell transplant recipients.
One line in the story has stayed with me, and made me happy I read past the headline. It's the line that describes Guru Tegh Bahadur Ji as being known for urging three things -- prayer, honesty and charity.
Good religion and real saints make it sound so simple. Maybe because when you find the meaning of life, it really is quite simple.
Prayer.
Honesty.
Charity.
A living daily relationship with, and openness to God. Living each day with integrity in all you do and all your relations. Practicing an active concern for the well-being and dignity of others, especially those in need and the disadvantaged.
Prayer, honesty and charity are attitudes. They are also actions. They are commitments and disciplines.
Three attitudes and actions, three commitments and disciplines that when faithfully attended to, probably make being a truly human being a surprisingly simple joy.
Nearing the end of the day.
In maybe half an hour we'll be into that wonderful late November twilight that makes the drive home so deep and rich.
And for the first time today I am aware of being at rest.
Woke up feeling already squeezed into a shape of anxiety I didn't like by the pressure of Christmas deadlines and obligations. In my case, mostly having to do with liturgies, special services, and end-of-year loose-ends-to-be-tied-up at church.
But the pressures come in all kinds of guises, and maybe you are feeling some of your own.
The temptation (and my usual way of "coping") was to simply forge on all the harder. To take a moment to prioritize and organize, and then to launch into doing and doing and doing some more to whittle the list down bit by bit.
And there is some value, and sometimes necessity as well, in handling life that way.
But today I chose a different path. I chose to honour one commitment I had -- a mid-morning visit with a couple of our church members who struggle these days with a variety of health concerns. And after that I cancelled two other appointments (sorry Brynna and Bill!) around and in between which I was planning to do as much of my prioritized work as I could ...
... and instead drove down to a lakeshore park, left my briefcase and laptop and daytimer in the back seat of the car, zipped up my jacket, and went and sat by the lake -- to take in the day, to breathe, and to practice as much of the mindful contemplation as I remember from my days in treatment and from a little book by Pema Chodron, called The Wisdom of No Escape, that I've been reading and trying to practice in fits and starts.
And it made all the difference in the world ... or at least in me and in the world of my own heart and soul. By mid-afternoon I was settled, grounded and open enough to come to my favourite coffee shop, get the liturgies for the season completed far more easily than I imagined would be the case, and now to write these thoughts.
But the productivity is not the point nor the reason. The simple experience of resting in the moment and breathing the goodness of life is what it's all about -- what all our life (work included) is at its best all about.
Greetings!
How do we greet one another? Maybe, to paraphrase Jesus and other spiritual teachers, as we like to be greeted?
On my walk this morning I was welcomed by the most wonderful sunrise (more about that later), and it so lifted me from the shadows of a disturbed night and a troubled dream, that I intentionally offered an honest "Good morning" to the three persons I met along my way.
One
person replied with a quick "Hi" before passing on. The second looked me
quickly in the eye and said, "Good morning" in return. The third,
caught by surprise while scraping frost from the back window of her car,
offered just a smile -- but a warm and open one.
The person by whom I felt most honestly greeted was the one who said, "Good morning." Second best was the smiler. Last of all was the one who said just "Hi."
This particular reflection is prompted by a memory of being admonished a few years ago by a Roman
Catholic sister who was a fellow participant in a residential program.
Her most recent posting had been for a good number of years in Rome, and she was accustomed to a
certain level of culture and grace. So one morning when I uttered my
usual "hi" as we passed in the hallway, thinking that was sufficient for politeness, this time she took
the time to stop and wonder aloud why on earth North Americans think a guttural
grunt of one syllable is really adequate to acknowledge the presence of another
human being.
Ouch! Good morning.
The best greeting of all this morning, though, was of course the sunrise that I had the good fortune to walk into as I walked out the front door of our house, down our sidewalk, and then as usual for my morning walk turned left to walk along the public sidewalk. Which happens to lead me east. Which faced me suddenly and without expectation, square and open-eyed and leaping-hearted towards the most gently glorious sky of dawning gold, orange, and crimson, tinging all the earth below -- trees, street, cars, lawns, houses -- with hues of the same.
It has been some time, I think, since my gaze has been raised in quite that gracious and wondrous a way to feel greeted by a new day. Some time since I have felt that drawn beyond the shadow of disturbed nights and troubled dreams, into the gift of a perfect new morning and the dawning of a new day.
And I wonder ... am I able to offer at least some reflection of that grace, in the way I choose to greet others? To greet, as I have been greeted?
