Tag: presence

Sacred Courage

by Davin Franklin-Hicks

I greeted the morning by taking our beloved pit-bull Lu out for a walk. We encountered a wounded owl in distress, flailing, unable to fly, but still trying.

Lu didn’t really react. I wasn’t sure she noticed as I didn’t approach the owl, just observed, and then brought Lu back inside as I worked with some neighbors to get the owl some help.

When animal rescue workers got there, I went inside and got Lu, intending to take her on a walk again, since we had to cut the first walk short. I was nervous Lu would react so I started walking the other way, trying to distract her as they helped the owl. She definitely noticed this time. She was transfixed, but not making any sound. I kept trying to have her walk with me but she was not having it. We stayed far enough away to not interfere and I just let Lu be. She stared. And then laid down. She was calmly and silently watching. It took about ten minutes and she remained.

When the owl was removed I expected her to want to walk. She continued to just lay there in this restful, peace-filled way. It took my breath away. There was something happening and it really felt sacred to see, but I wasn’t sure why I was having that response.

During my prayer and meditation time I sat with this some.

Why did that matter so much?
Why was I moved by her complete and full presence in that moment?
Why is there a need for bearing witness?
Why do we sit endlessly with loved ones as they die?
Why is this sacred?

Empathy.

Our mirror neurons in our brain make us able to climb into the lived experience we are watching. As we witness the lived experience of others we see ourselves.

That scares the ever living stuffing out of us at times.

If we acknowledge suffering exists, we cannot deny that suffering is a part of all of this living. We cannot deny suffering will happen to us. And we hate that.

It takes courage to admit our fragility, our limitations, and our mortality. It’s hard to live a life that we know will one day end. It feels impossible to live while also accepting that we will one day flail where we used to fly.

What was the invitation for the sacred moment I experienced? Was it in the watching? We have all kinds of motivations to watch all kinds of things. In and of itself I don’t think the sacredness was in the watching.

I think the sacredness was invited the moment we realized we were seeing suffering. The sacredness was that we stayed.

Roll Call

by Amos Smith

There is something subtle and profound that makes us uniquely human. There is something illusive, yet extraordinarily powerful, that animates human genius. In its pure form it “hovered over the surface of the deep” (Genesis 1:2). At the world’s genesis it separated the day and the night by name (Genesis 1:5). It is a power that arrives with the age of reason (about twelve or thirteen years of age). It is what some refer to as “full reflective self-consciousness”. This is a more technical phrase for the familiar term, “awareness”.

It is amazing how many times we can hear the word “awareness” without fully recognizing its penetrating primal meaning. For a long time, I thought I knew what awareness was. I thought I was aware. Yet only recently have I discovered how little I can claim hold of this illusive powerhouse of a term.

I like so many people, slip into unconsciousness on a regular basis. On some level I tune out, space out, check out. “Out” is the key word here. I am no longer present.  If there was a roll call, an astute observer would record “absent” after my name.

If I am honest, there are many intervals throughout the day when I check out. When I make my breakfast I am most often absent. I have made breakfast so many times in the same way that I now do it in my sleep. When I talk with loved ones, the people I most want to be present to and to listen to, I sometimes fade out. I stare out the window and lull my awareness to sleep. When I sit down to eat after a long day I sometimes pull my chair out without thinking—it is unconscious—I am not aware of what I am doing. Then I chew my food while thinking about something else, without really tasting it. And when I sit in front of the television, like so many Americans, I check out. I just take in the sound bites and CNN’s glossing of the news. I do not reflect and think about what is coming into my senses. I allow mental laziness to creep over me like a fog. I then just accept what is being said wholesale, even when it insults my intelligence.

It is always easier to tune out. It is always easier not to question – to just accept what we are fed through mass media. It is always easier not to look beneath the surface, not to listen when it stretches or hurts, not to be present when pulling up a chair after a long day. It is also easier not to check in on our familiar destructive habits. It is easier just to let things slide. It is effortless to pop the tranquilizer that shuts off awareness – to simply go on autopilot. It is always easier to cut class. But when we get older we can no longer obtain the permission slip to be absent. We no longer have an excuse to check out. To be an adult in the best sense is to be present. It is to be attentive to our children, to the written and spoken word, to dinner, to brushing our teeth, and to our world.

It is when people check out and appeal to instinct that our world turns to indifference, apathy, and violence. It is when people check in and appeal to reason that our world turns to compassionate understanding, beauty, and poise.

Even when we read, we are distracted and check out for a paragraph or two. This is normal. But, do we know that we have checked out and do we know which paragraphs were missed and why. Or are we so absent, we don’t even know that we are absent.  

Roll Call! Are you in or out?

The Gift of Listening

by Karen Richter

We’re all about listening when it’s children doing the listening and we wise grownups are doing all the yappin’.

We tell them they have two ears and one mouth for a reason.

“Listen” and “pay attention” are just behind the word no in their frequency in young humans’ lives.

It seems we teach our children all about listening because

  1. We teach the things we need most to learn ourselves.
  2. We are so desperate to be heard that we ask children to play the role of listener in our families and communities.
  3. We don’t think that we need to be listening to children.

I came home from my first two weeks at Hesychia School of Spiritual Direction with the overwhelming insight that, in every setting of my life, I talk too much. With friends, over coffee. At work, in the staff meeting. In the car, with my kids. Over dinner, with my spouse. At church, teaching and leading.  Too. Much. Talking.

So Hesychia was something of a remedial crash course in the art of listening to another human (of course it’s more than that too, but that’s where I needed to start). It’s a gift when we focus our attention on another’s story, not to fix or respond or correct but just to be present. We know this… I’ve read some variation on this theme on this very blog before. But it’s hard work and little valued in our culture.

I’m taking little baby steps. The other week in our Lenten study, one of our small groups asked if I had anything to add to their discussion. “No, I’m just listening,” I replied. They were a tiny bit surprised, but continued their exploration.

Another baby step is watching and expecting surprising examples. I was at Wal-Mart the other day and the customer in front of me was telling her life story to the cashier. I don’t know what prompted her sharing, but she spoke very vulnerably about the end of her marriage, her struggles to find her equilibrium on her own, and her sadness that her life was different from how she always imagined it would be.

I smiled, nodded, listened; the cashier did much the same – adding a small ‘hmmm’ at appropriate times. After the customer finished her transaction and left, I asked the cashier about this experience.

“I guess you’re a little like a bartender… People tell you their stories,” I asked.

“Happens all the time,” she said with a smile.

“Maybe people need someone to listen,” I prompted.

“I guess. Folks need to know that they’re going to be okay, that what’s going on with them is normal… I just try to listen, not jump in with advice or get them more upset. I just listen.”

I started to tell her that she was a spiritual director, or perhaps a retail chaplain, but I didn’t want to add to her stress. But what a gift she gave that morning – a compassionate voice, a nonjudgmental presence. It was certainly a gift to me, just observing and now sharing with you.

On Transfiguration Sunday a few weeks ago, the children at Shadow Rock talked about the command from the voice of God: Listen! We discussed how often adults in their lives are like Peter in that story, bumbling about, making ridiculous plans, and missing the point of what’s happening right in front of him. I asked them how often they wanted adults to stop and listen. Their answers were sad and unsurprising.

So in the spirit of teaching/blogging about what you most need to practice, I suggest a Holy Week discipline:

More listening, less pontificating.
More presence, less judgment.
More gentle nodding, less interrupting.
More compassionate silence, less thinking about your own response.

There are holy stories all around us.