December 24, 2020
Hello Everyone,
Who will you be on the other side? (The thoughts below are for those who did not receive this earlier through the Meaningful Life Center, and also to highlight the links at the end as a gift for the holiday season.)
As we move through this difficult time, it is hard to think of spring, of flowers, of the end of the pandemic. Covid has taken a heavy toll—in lives, as well as in our collective spirit. Now we have come to the depths of winter. The questions for each of us are: How can we use this time of darkness to move toward renewal and rebirth—which the solstice, Christmas, and a New Year all symbolize. How can we keep the flame of possibility for a better time alive? How do we nurture ourselves and others during this winter of our collective discontent?
The answers, of course, constitute the substance of what the great wisdom teachers through history have shared—that we must use the challenges of our lives as a stimulus for healing and growth; that we must cultivate a vision to which we give our energies, and we must use our intention and determination so that renewal and transformation spring forth from the ashes of our tribulations.
Ultimately, the only way to accomplish this is through metanoia. This word is used frequently in the original Greek of the New Testament by both Jesus and Paul, but is often translated into English as repentance. A much better translation, however, would be “to change the way we see things, to change our consciousness.” Metanoia points to the necessity that we must change our way of seeing, we must undergo a transformation in order to give birth to something greater within ourselves.
This is the challenge we each now face. But it is also the perennial challenge faced by everyone in every time and every place, no matter one’s age or circumstance. In all the initiatic traditions, one goes into the darkness, undergoes a trial or ordeal, and (hopefully) emerges renewed, reborn. Rebirth might be spoken of as awakening, as salvation, as letting go of ego attachments, becoming fully conscious, becoming free, or as becoming one with the all or the Tao or the Light. Or, as depicted in the classic Christmas story of Scrooge, as simply learning that the meaning of life involves becoming more loving, more concerned with the well-being of others than focusing so much on one’s own fears, losses, and ambitions.
Each of us gets to choose our image of what renewal or rebirth will mean, but all the great teachers suggest we must make a choice and commit to pursuing it with determination if we are to have a fulfilling life. If they are right, the questions before each of us are: How can we strengthen and deepen the movements already in motion within us toward a broader consciousness? How can we use this winter of collective trial to experience a personal metanoia, the birth of a new consciousness within ourselves? What image of ourselves will we support and encourage to come forth on the other side of this ordeal?
For those of us who embrace the importance of our connection to others and the communities within which we exist, there are additional questions: In this dark time, what can you and I do to lift the spirits of the people we know? How can we bring a little light into the collective darkness we are now enduring? How will we work together to heal our wounded collective spirit? How will we nurture the communities of which we are a part and help them heal and even prosper?
For myself, I will try to be more loving, more accepting of others and myself, more patient and kind. I will continue to work toward releasing myself from Thoreau’s “petty fears and petty pleasures” that interfere with peace within. I will do what I can to connect more deeply and fully to the larger currents flowing beyond my small ego self. I will seek to love more fully, help others more freely, and forgive myself and others more completely.
The great Christian mystic Meister Eckhart said: “What good is it to me if this eternal birth of the divine Son takes place unceasingly, but does not take place within myself?” Which leads to this final question: What will you attempt to bring forth during the remainder of this time of testing we have been given?
A few quotes to inspire
Here are some quotes that have inspired me as I have been traveling along on this journey:
“The greatest weapon against stress is our ability to choose one thought over another.” —William James
“Very little is needed to make a happy life; it is all within yourself, in your way of thinking. When you arise in the morning, think of what a precious privilege it is to be alive—to breathe, to think, to enjoy, to love.” —Marcus Aurelius
“Much suffering, much unhappiness arises when you take each thought that comes into your head for the truth. Situations don’t make you unhappy. They may cause you pain, but they don’t make you unhappy. Your thoughts make you unhappy. Your interpretations, the stories you tell yourself make you unhappy.” —Eckhart Tolle:
“To attain inner peace you must actually give your life, not just your possessions. When you at last give your life—bringing into alignment your beliefs and the way you live, then, only then, can you begin to find inner peace.” —Peace Pilgrim
One thing that is clear through the centuries is that many people have found great peace, love, and even joy in the most difficult of times.
“Out of suffering have emerged the strongest souls. The most massive characters are seared with scars.” —Kahlil Gibran
“When you make peace with yourself, you make peace with the world.” —Maha Ghosananda, the Buddhist monk who served as leader of Cambodian Buddhism during the terrible Khmer Rouge period of collective suffering. (His name means “great joyful proclaimer,” which he seems to have lived up to during a terrible time.)
Anne Morrow Lindbergh teaches us how to do this:
“Go with the pain, let it take you. Open your palms and your body to the pain. It comes in waves like a tide, and you must be open like a vessel lying on the beach, letting it fill you up, and then, retreating, leaving you empty and clear. With a deep breath (it has to be as deep as the pain) one reaches a kind of inner freedom from pain, as though the pain were not yours, but your body’s. The spirit lays the body on the altar.”
Viktor Frankl provides another clue:
“When a man finds that it is his destiny to suffer, he will accept his suffering as his single and unique task. His unique opportunity lies in the way in which he bears his burden. Suffering ceases to be suffering at the moment it finds a meaning.”
Or as Nietzsche succinctly put it: “He who has a why to live can bear almost any how.”
And Helen Keller makes vivid the choice as she came to see it through her own incredible trials: “Life is either a daring adventure, or nothing.”
Ken Wilber offers a valuable insight:
“Concealed within unhappiness is the embryo of a special intelligence usually buried under the immense weight of social roles. A person who is beginning to sense the suffering of life is beginning to awaken to deeper realities, truer realities. Suffering smashes to pieces the complacency of our normal fictions about reality, and forces us to become alive in a special sense—to see carefully, to feel deeply, to touch ourselves and our worlds in ways we have heretofore avoided.
“I normally do not perceive my true identity because my awareness is clouded and obstructed by focusing my awareness on my individual self, my personal ego. My awareness is not open, relaxed, and Spirit-centered, it is closed, contracted, and self-centered. And precisely because I am identified with the self-contraction, to the exclusion of everything else, I can’t discover my true identity with the All.”
Annie Dillard, in Teaching a Stone to Talk, gives a vivid image of how a time of trial can break us from the shell that is restricting our full experience of life:
“In the deeps are the violence and terror of which psychology has warned us. But if you ride these monsters deeper down, if you drop with them farther over the world’s rim, you find what our sciences cannot locate or name, the substrate, the ocean or matrix or ether which buoys the rest, which gives goodness its power for good, and evil its power for evil, the unified field: (Here we find) our complex and inexplicable caring for each other, and for our life together here.”
But all of that is so very serious. Here are a few videos just for fun:
A bit of humor
Why can’t we all enjoy our jobs lke this?
And the best medicine out there right now is …
And this one is especially for those who can smile at the absurdities of life:
For a little energy boost
Give yourself over to these marvelous performers:
Of course, I know you can’t rush out and do that yourself, but maybe, with a few plastic cans, you can get close:
(and notice the number of people who have viewed this young man’s improvised performance!)
And here are three favorite musical videos of the season
Pentatonix – Little Drummer Boy
Again, note the number of views this has recieved.
The most unusual performance of White Christmas you will ever see:
And a flash mob at a food court with the Hallelujah Chorus
(Do you remember back in the Stone Age when people actually went to a mall and ate at a food court, all crowded together?)
Finally, a list of books, many of which I am sure you have read, but revisiting some of them might inspire you on the journey at this particular time:
Meditations by Marcus Aurelius (I like the translation in The Emperor’s Handbook by Scot and David Hicks)
The Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle
Open Mind, Open Heart by Thomas Keating
Tao Te Ching by Lao Tzu (Stephen Mitchell version)
Peace Pilgrim: Her Life and Work in Her Own Words by Peace Pilgrim
Peace Is Every Step by Thich Nhat Hanh
When Things Fall Apart: Heart Advice For Difficult Times by Pema Chodron
Enduring Grace: Living Portraits of Seven Women Mystics by Carol Flinders
Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff . . . and It’s All Small Stuff by Richard Carlson
Siddhartha by Hermann Hesse (I like the Hilda Rosner translation)
The Way of the Pilgrim by Anonymous
Jonathan Livingston Seagull by Richard Bach
The Gifts of Imperfection by Brené Brown
The Trial and the Death of Socrates by Plato
May you be well,
May you have much peace and joy
during this season of renewal,
David