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A woman’s heart = experiencing God

Dec 9, 2015 | Hope & Encouragement, Spirituality, Women's Voice & Power, Women's Wisdom

From the beginning of time we have been asking questions about the Divine. The form, complexity, and context of the questions have changed as centuries have passed – influenced by our understanding (or lack thereof) of so many things: cosmology, philosophy, psychology, sociology, biology – but at the end of the day, year, generation, epoch, our inquiry remains essentially the same: Is there a God? And if so, how are we to understand
this God?

I hardly mean to make light of humanity’s quest – or even that of an individual – but what I know-that-I-know-that-I-know is that all it takes to solve any and all existential angst is to hang out with a woman.

I have the privilege of doing a lot of this – which, when I think of it, leaves me profoundly qualified to speak of God. (Bonus!!)

As I write this post, I am sitting in the airport awaiting my flight home after enjoying 5 days with one of the wisest, most beautiful, kind, and compassionate women on the planet. To call her friend takes my breath away. I stayed in her home, spent time with her family, ate her food, slept on her fold-out couch, kept her up way too late, and enjoyed a number of bottles of wine, spirits, and of course, champagne. It was fun, restful, encouraging, inspired, heart-overf;owing, grace-filled and above and beyond all else, just pure-and-endless love. It was, quite simply, divine. I did, quite clearly, experience the Divine.

So, want your own proof for the existence of God? Want to know how you are to understand this God? Yep. Hang out with a woman! The Divine will be revealed in and through her embrace, through the experience of being seen and heard and known by her, through the gift of time and conversation and hospitality and rest and most of all, her pure-and-endless-love.

And here’s even more definitive proof: When you show up and hang out with a woman, she becomes certain of God’s existence, as well – because of you. (Bonus!!!)

You can push me on this anyway to Sunday, as you please, but every bit of my experience, education, and expertise only validates what I know to be true:

It is only through our experience of love that we are certain of God’s existence. And love is experienced through a woman’s heart.

I know this is shocking, but it’s really that simple, that clear, that easy, that delightful.

Test this for yourself. Hang out with a woman. Pay attention to everything that is most true about your time together and apply these characteristics to the Divine. They won’t be wrong, I promise. Then take this one step further. Look in the mirror and revel in the fact that you reflect exactly the same!

All existential questions answered. All denominational strife solved. All religious wars settled. Every doubt soothed. Every hope realized. Every faith made real. God incarnate. In our midst. Relevant. Present. And right here. (Sounds a little reminiscent of the Christmas story, yes?) Yes.

‘Looking to experience God? Hang out with a woman. Yourself included. (Bonus!!)

When Darkness Threatens

Nov 16, 2015 | Hope & Encouragement, Spirituality

But a grave separateness has invaded the world… ~ Naomi Shihab Nye

It is said that in the beginning, darkness hovered over the face of the earth. God separated the dark from the light, the night from the day, created the moon and the sun, and decreed that all of this was good.

Oh, how we fight the separateness, the disconnectedness, the darkness, the aching spaciousness and silence that often seem to reign. We are loathe to call such “good.” Still, there is something about the darkness that connects us most profoundly to ourselves and to each other. And this is good. Not as reason or justification for the grief, the violence, the harm, the graves; but as evidence of light’s endless, undaunted, and determined presence, despite it all.

Clarissa Pinkola Estes tells an old, old story of when Mother Moon was stolen. At its end, these words:

On nights there was no light to guide, and so many people became lost, and so many children became orphaned, and so many people suffered, the villagers decided they must go and find what had become of the moon. Armed with torches and clubs, they trekked through the night into the bog, sinking down into the wet and slimy grass all the way up to their knees, and cold and wet they continued on. The evil things were about and surrounded them, scratching and clawing at them, but the flames from their torches kept them safe.

And they came to a great boulder, and they said they did not think this boulder was in this place before. There was a little lip of light all the way around it that shown whiter than white. With great excitement they lifted and they hauled and they tugged until the boulder rolled away. And then staring down into what seemed like the most beautiful face they had ever seen, they saw eyes filled with the love of humanity.

This is what we seek, and this is what we find when darkness threatens to overwhelm: “…eyes filled with the love of humanity.”

Ours. Other’s. Always.

May it be so.

*******

(This post acknowledges and grieves darkness’ aftermath in Beirut, Baghdad, Kenya, Syria, and Paris. In endless hope that light will dawn…)

Messy is Preferable

Aug 12, 2015 | Spirituality

Sunday morning was a known and predictable entity for me while growing up; a thing in and of itself. No question ever considered, we would be in church. All five of us. Everyone in the car. Everyone in the pew. Everyone paying attention. Everyone being respectful. Everyone singing the songs. Everyone following the rules. At a certain point in the service, I would be excused to Sunday School. I have few memories of these rooms: small chairs, big tables, flannelgraphs, bible stories, right answers, wrong ones, a craft project, songs sung, maybe a snack. Afterward, the Fellowship Hall. Finding my parents. Waiting for obligatory conversations to end. Getting back in the car. Heading home.

As I reflect, I see that weekly ritual as a mirage: Sunday morning became the façade we maintained the rest of the week: all of us in our right places, paying attention, being respectful, following the rules. A command performance – though we didn’t realize it. We would be – come hell or highwater – a family that worshipped together, prayed together, and yes, stayed together. Only we didn’t.

*****

Years later, while in seminary and studying aspects of “church” of all things, I would ask my (now ex-) husband, the pastor, what he thought about making Sunday morning a space and experience that invited honest, vulnerable, and real conversation; a place in which the mirage and façade could be broken; a place in which authenticity was welcomed, invited, and above all else, safe. (That conversation never went anywhere. I think he believed that was happening.)

I’d dress my daughters in their darling outfits. The three of us would sit on the very front pew. Perfect. Pretty. Well behaved. At the expected cue, the two of them would leave my side, walk down the center aisle, and head off to Sunday School – toddlers with shiny shoes and bouncy curls. And in expected required fashion – smiling, stoic, and barely sane – I stayed. Until I didn’t.

*****

I left that pew – the one of the distant past and more recent – thinking that in so doing, I left behind the veneer. But the smell of it still lingers: the plasticky desire for a perfect Sunday morning, a perfect family, perfect relationships, a perfect life. And I can feel my highly-honed proclivity to pretend that it is. Except it isn’t.

My life is messy. My relationships are messy. My family is messy. My Sunday’s are too (thankfully): sleeping in, drinking coffee, reading Brain Pickings Weekly, braving Costco and Target and the grocery store, doing laundry, and sometimes – if my daughters’ schedules permit (and the stars align) a movie together.

And my soul is messy. The days of a Bible verse to satisfy every doubt or disappointment, definitive solutions to life’s most difficult questions, a pre-determined god, a 3-point sermon, and less-than-fresh cookies after the service are long gone.

In their place are questions and wonderings and looking within and finding my own answers and long conversations with amazing women over wine – not to mention writing (and writing and writing).

I’m learning to allow for this ongoing, twisty, often-directionless-but-incredible and did I mention (?) messy journey; this life that’s mine.

That hardly means it’s easy. The mess (though completely understood and even chosen) remains hard for me to tolerate and allow. The tendency is high to nail everything down, to find some system that works, to hammer away at my flaws, to sublimate my intuition, to think that if I just try harder… I’ve learned to color in the lines, to never get angry or be moody or say how I really feel, to bury my emotions, to keep a stiff upper lip, to be disciplined, to be the responsible one, to hold it all together, to smile politely, to sit, to stay. Except I can’t.

*****

These days, the problems inherent in my Sunday morning reality overwhelm and sadden me. The least disruption is huge. One crayon mark on the wall is fatal. One unmet expectation is seen as a betrayal.  There’s little bandwidth for ambivalence or confusion or, god forbid, grief. Desire and naming and truth-telling feel dangerous.

Because they are.

*****

So I’m experimenting (metaphorically) with scribbling on walls in permanent marker. I’m choosing to scream and yell and rage and weep (mostly on the pages of my journal or multiple documents on my Mac). I’m wondering what it would feel like to actually be connected to my body, to the earth, and consequently-really passionately, to the Feminine.

I’m learning (again and again and again) to tell the truth – first and foremost to myself. I’m throwing stuff away. I got my nose pierced. I’m toying with the idea of a tattoo. And I constantly fantasize about buying a TinyHouse and moving to Costa Rica or Southern Italy or Carmel or Vashon Island or anywhere, really.

I’ve given up nearly all of my Sunday morning beliefs. New ones, graciously and gratefully, have taken their place, including this:

Messy is preferable – to pretending, to dogmatism, to being disingenuous, to denial.

And this:

The Sacred shows up in undeniable and impossible-to-ignore ways when we acknowledge just how far we are from perfection, when we trust that know-that-we-know-that-we-know voice within, when we actually invite the mess to coexist with the miracles.

Not just on Sunday morning, but every day, all day, and in all ways.

May it be so.

Permission Granted: the God YOU choose

Aug 1, 2015 | My sort-of Sermons, Spirituality

It used to be, when lost in places of confusion, hurt, or pain, I would turn to the God of whom I’d been told and taught – completely certain that if I just looked hard enough, had faith enough, believed enough, everything would make sense. There had to be an answer, a template, a rubric, a principle to apply.

It never occurred to me that there were no answers. It never occurred to me that perhaps my plight was not because I was doing something wrong (not being good enough, devoted enough, disciplined enough, obedient enough). It never occurred to me that sometimes, oftentimes, things have no rhyme or reason to them at all.

There came a time, not all at once, but over many years, in which I stopped looking to God (at least the one of whom I’d been told and taught). I began to allow questions instead of seeking pat answers. Graciously, maybe even miraculously, I began to look within.

What do I know? What do I feel. What do I desire? What do I believe? What if the God of whom I’d been told and taught isn’t the only one, the only way? What if there is something more? What if I am something more? (Wouldn’t that be something?!?)

As my questions rose, so did my voice. I rejected (at least for a time) an entire interpretive, exegetical history. I articulated my rage at the patriarchy. I swirled and screamed and shouted to whoever would listen and even those who would not. I asked more questions: What of the women? Where is her voice, her perspective, her lens? And if Hers is silenced, missing, ignored, what about mine? These questions did have answers. And I knew them – inherently and intuitively within.

These days, I find and treasure places of rest, overlap, and even healing in which the God(s) of my past and present merge, where the tension is soothed, where I can breathe, where I can imagine, where I can be.

I continue to listen and question and wonder – certain of and comforted by this:

There is no static God, no singular understanding, no immutable truth. This is grace and gift.

Every (attempt at) comprehension throughout the centuries has arisen from someone’s questions, musings, and imagination – their particular culture, philosophy, and way of being – which is ever-changing, ever-evolving. I’m a “someone.” So are you.

If there is an immutable truth, it is this: we have complete and unfettered permission to understand and experience God/the Sacred in ways that speak to, inform, and transform us – uniquely, individually, perfectly.

  • Who might the God/Sacred be that invites us to hear and trust our own brilliance, our own power, our own heart with complete confidence?
  • Who might the God/Sacred be that reminds us of our strength and worth?
  • Who might the God/Sacred be that already dwells within us – waiting, watching, loving, and longing for us to step up, speak out, say yes, say no, say “now”?
  • Who might we be if this was the God/Sacred in whom we believed, trusted, dwelled?

With so much hope that it may be so for you and me both . . .

Letting Go is NOT Falling Apart

Jul 13, 2015 | My sort-of Sermons, Sacred Stories, Spirituality, Women's Voice & Power, Women's Wisdom

A wise woman tells me she gets this strong sense that I am unable to really let go; like I’m afraid of letting my hair down. I hear her words, feel the lump in my throat (a marker that truth has been spoken), and in
my mind’s eye can already see the story, her story, the one I need to hear.

~~~~~

The town harlot. Marginalized, unseen, shamed, and scorned. And not one bit of that matters. Not to her. She leaves the margins and enters the fray – walking into a room full of men – the insiders, the censors, the judges, the jury. They look up from their feast, reclining interrupted by the shock of her presence. Head held high, she ignores every incredulous face, sidelong glance, and whisper of contempt. There’s only one goal, one guest, one man that matters. No amount of shame or scorn will stop her. She will be seen.

And she will not bow or scrape. Not today. She will stand. Eye-to-eye, face-to-face, toe-to- toe with this God-man, this healer, this miracle worker, this Love enfleshed. Jesus.

So she did. Time slowed. Din silenced. Shame dissipated. Scorn dissolved. Only the two of them existed. And maybe this is what enabled her next move: the visceral and complete awareness that this moment and this man were all that mattered, that she mattered.

She let go.

She wept. So much that she rained down tears on his feet. Then, in front of all her accusers – those leaders, law enforcers, and rule-followers – she let down her hair. Literally. She opened an expensive perfume, an aromatic oil, the fragrance of which filled the room and confused the senses. She poured it on his feet, mixed it with her tears, and dried them with
her hair – her let-down hair.

She let go. Of ramifications, risk, (broken) rules, created ruckus.

She let go. Of their responses: unheard of! disallowed! scandalous! extravagant!

She let go. Of everything.

Because she knew she could. Because she knew she was safe. Because she knew she was seen. Because she knew she could not be stopped. Because she knew her own heart would not lead her astray. Because she knew…

And in letting go, she was received, held, caught up, embraced – every bit of her. Expressed emotion, embodied offering, exposed heart – all allowed, welcomed, and honored.

He spoke of her with such fierce love – condemning those who had not offered him even the smallest portion of what she had; who had stingily gripped their pride, their power, their position; who refused to let her anywhere near them (at least in daylight), let alone into these inner chambers; men who refused to let go.

“Truly, I say to you, wherever this gospel is proclaimed in the whole world, what she has done will also be told in memory of her.”

~~~~~

But that has not happened. Not really.

Why would I think my story (or my telling of hers) would be any different?

~~~~~

I am not like her. I sit tight and hold back. I clench my teeth, my fists, the muscles in my neck. I won’t enter the room. I won’t take the risk. I won’t bear the ramifications. I brace myself for the scorn and shame. Because I’m convinced it’s coming.

I refuse to let go.

Letting go has meant being wanton, irresponsible, and foolish. Letting go has gotten me into trouble. Letting go has been what I’ve done when I have not held onto myself, and ultimately compromised myself. Letting go isn’t prudent. Letting go isn’t smart. Letting go might get me hurt.

Letting go has gotten me hurt.

~~~~~

What does this mean: “I can’t let go.” What am I holding on to? What am I unwilling to release? What do I fear will happen if I do? What do I grip so tightly? Why do I feel like I balance on tip-toes while a noose chafes my neck? What room won’t I enter? What faces will I not face? What old-tapes play?  What taboos am I unwilling to break? What tears do I refuse to shed? What expense do I spare? And all the while, what words and stories am I unable/unwilling to speak, to write, to live?

All these questions exhaust me. I dwell on the margins instead of entering the fray. The wise woman says to me, “It feels like oppression. Sacrificing words because someone made you feel like you’re not good enough or you don’t fit in or you’re too different. You’ve got to let go. Reflect on where those messages of perfectionism and being outside the norm come from. Then you can contain that energy and get out of your own way. The floodgates will open.”

Even this exhausts me (though it rings true). So much time spent trying to figure everything out, to understand my own psyche, to analyze my own stories, to endlessly push against the obstacles that refuse to let me pass.

~~~~~

She sings to me. She seduces. “You know my story is yours. You know the rooms that are yours to enter. You know the courage required. You know the focus, the intent, the determination with which you must move. You know of the whispered contempt, the shouted scorn (or at least your fear of such). You know who waits for you at the head of the table. You know of the tears you’d shed, the emotion you’d express, the offering you’d give, if your heart was exposed – and received. You know what’s true: this God allows, welcomes, and honors you. You know…”

I see her outstretched hand, her dazzling smile, her yet-glistening tears. “Here’s what I know,” she says. “You are extravagant. You are safe. You cannot be stopped. You know this. And you’re not alone. I am with you.”

~~~~~

Letting go is not falling apart.

It’s not falling, at all. Rappel, free-fall, skydive, stop worrying about the net beneath, leap, spread your Phoenix wings, fly. Of course.

~~~~~

Of course. I’ve written of her before. I know this! It was in letting go that she was received, held, caught up, embraced – every bit of her. Expressed emotion, embodied offering, exposed heart – all allowed, welcomed, and honored.

Her story and mine (and yours, as well) is about being a woman who risks and believes and has faith – in herself; who stands eye-to-eye, face-to-face, toe-to-toe with the Divine and then makes the extravagant choice to pour out everything she has – because she can do no less.

Letting go is not less. It is more – the most – the best – and all I can ever hope to do; it is the fullest expression of who I am.

(And you, as well.)

May it be so.

A freewrite on faith

Jun 7, 2015 | Hope & Encouragement, My sort-of Sermons, Spirituality, Writing

There have been times in which my own writing has taken me to places of surprise, insight, and even tears. Some alchemy occurs, my brain works for instead of against, me, and I have the unexpected ability to express something that changes and transforms me. When that happens, it is the Sacred – with a capital S.

But it happens so rarely! Which causes my faith to wane. In myself, my capacity, my ability, to be sure; even more, in the Sacred – with a capital S.

It seems to me that the Sacred – with a capital S – would want to be experienced, want to show up, want to amaze and awe and impact. And so, when days and weeks and months and seasons slip by without noticeable Presence – with a capital P – it never occurs to me to wonder about those upper case realities. I figure it must be me.

I do not have enough faith. I am at fault. I am to blame. Yep. That’s it. So I get to work. I write more. I critique myself more. I think more – and nothing surfacy, thank you very much – only thoughts that are deep, profound, and significant. I sweat drops of blood – or at least try.

Still, to no avail. And the accompanying belief (which is really a lie) is this: Yet again, I am not enough, do not want it enough, do not believe enough. Because, really: “If you have faith the size of a mustard seed you can say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it will move. Nothing will be impossible for you.”

I remember countless nights as a teenager, lying in bed, eyes red-rimmed from tears, thinking about that verse. A mustard seed?!? That’s nothing! I would close my eyes and picture that tiny seed – the one that rattled within the charm hanging from the silver bracelet my grandmother gave me (alongside the State of Washington, the Empire State Building, a grand piano, and countless other then-meaningful symbols). I’d pour all my faith into it – every positive thought, learned belief, and endless hope – in order to move the mountain du jour: clear skin, a boyfriend, a date to the dance, being pretty, being noticed, mattering.

Truth-be-told, these nights hardly ceased with my teens. There have been more nights as an adult in which I’ve done the same – just new mountains to move: a man, infertility’s end, a miracle in my marriage, a relationship’s healing, money, and yes, my writing. Nothing moves. Nothing changes. Nada. And I am left with the defeating awareness that my faith remains (or does it?) smaller than that seed; apparently almost nonexistent.

I grew up hearing and learning that “faith without works was dead.“ As though, in order for faith to be real or worthy or even remotely worthwhile, to keep it present and even functional, my actions (only the good, worthy, and important ones, of course) were required.

Imagine faith as a body and works as exercise and food choices. To let one’s body fall apart; to not take the necessary steps, do the necessary work, be  responsible? Well, all kinds of internal and external shame shows up around that. Likewise, to let one’s faith merely ‘be’ without working at it, working, period? Yes, shameful.

These days, all of this sounds and feels wrong to me (both the eating/exercise and the working at faith).

I believe that faith is something lovely and light and whimsical and intuitive and transparent and un-capturable and liminal. What is John O’Donohue’s word? Penumbral. (I’ll have to look that up). Faith just is, period. I don’t have to work at it, or work to prove that I am worthy of it, or work on it to make it grow and even exist, in the first place. Faith is like hope and joy and peace and love. It is a state, a reality, a truth, a gift. Yes, that’s it.

As I write this, I feel the surprise, the insight, and yes, the tears. Alchemy and change. The Sacred – with a capital S. Which has nothing to do with me, my less-than-a-mustard-seed faith, my effort, my striving. Nada. Thank God! This is mountainous. And I am the one who is moved.

Guess I’ll keep believing…and holding on to hope…and pondering mustard seeds…and yes, writing.

*****

Penumbral: A fringe region of half-shadow resulting from partial obstruction of light by an opaque object; the lighter and outer region of a sunspot; the point or area in which light and shade blend.