Shhh…The Soul of Snow

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Brian Johnson, fresh, Optimize, Peace, pristine, stillness, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

Everything is silent…there are two feet of snow outside blanketing everything. The only sound is the tiny click of my keyboard as I type. The word that comes to me as a definition of “what is” today as I look out my window is pristine. The whiteness is everywhere and (as the dictionary explains) it is “in perfect condition: fresh and clean as or as if new.” I breathe it in wishing to feel a sense of “pristine-ness” in myself. In Brian Johnson’s column, Optimize, this morning there was a quote from William James that seems apropos.

“Buy room for peace and stillness,” he says, “and thus make good work and good thoughts accessible and inevitable.” Today seems a perfect day for that impetus to all good things. May it be so for you!

Determination

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Brian Johnson, challenge, determination, keep going, Optimize, pandemic, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

When I was younger (much younger!) I used to be able and willing to run two miles with a colleague after school. When I moved to the country, I delighted in walking two miles down our road to breathe in the good air and watch the changes in the landscape in every season. That lasted a very long time. Lately, I have been disappointed to experience a diminishment that I am blaming at least partially on the pandemic. I find my capacity for foot travel woefully less than I ever expected. My goal is to strengthen my legs by exercising but that is not working very well in this long season of distress…

This morning I read something that may be a solution for me. I plan to try it anyway. It was in Brian Johnson’s daily post, “Optimize” where he wrote the following:

The next time life presents you with a challenge, don’t simply assume everything will work out. Don’t tell yourself you can’t do it. Just evaluate the situation. Figure out what you can accomplish right now. Then draw your line. When you cross that line, draw another one. And keep going.

In this difficult season, it seems important to me to remember that “small is beautiful” or “one step at a time” is the way to go. The determination not to take on too much is key. Wish me luck – or better yet – pray me along and join me!

Optimizing the Story

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awakening, Brian Johnson, George Floyd, hope, new birth, optimism, Peace, reparation, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

Today there seems to be a whisper of promise in the world. The sun has returned after the torrential rain and thunder of yesterday and the birds are conversing in quiet tones outside. Fog is lifting – inside and out. There is a sense of possibility, a hope for return to civility on the heels of charges brought against the four policemen involved in the death of George Floyd. We are, perhaps, at the beginning of a new moment of what will be a long awakening. Our task now is to recognize and acknowledge the situation in which we stand.

I am often taken by the messages of Brian Johnson on his daily website offering: optimize.me and today I found his words and those he quoted from President John F. Kennedy particularly appropriate. The occasion was the graduation ceremony at the University of California at Berkeley in 1962. I offer it in gratitude for Brian Johnson, for the hope that is in me and perhaps for the stirring again in many of us, allowing a desire for reparation and a new birth.

Kennedy speaks: “‘Knowledge is the great sun of the firmament,’ said Senator Daniel Webster. ‘Life and power are scattered with all its beams.”‘ “In its light we must think and act not only for the moment but for our time. I am reminded of the story of the great French Marshal Lyautey, who once asked his gardener to plant a tree. The gardener objected that the tree was slow-growing and would not reach maturity for a hundred years. The Marshal replied, ‘In that case there is no time to lose; plant it this afternoon.‘”

Kennedy wrapped up his speech by saying: “Today a world of knowledge – a world of cooperation – just and lasting peace – may be years away. But we have no time to lose. Let us plant our trees this afternoon.”

Waking Up

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adversity, awake, Brian Johnson, COVID19, growth, living in the moment, Optimize, The Practicing Stoic, The Sophia Center for Spirituality, Ward Farnsworth

I feel as if I have been in this state of “suspended animation” long enough. If you are floating along (as I have been), waiting for the pandemic to be over, you have perhaps reached the same point as I have. Some would call it like the adage “sink or swim.” The shift began yesterday when quotes from what I was reading in the morning—tidbits from the internet—came crashing through my brain one after another. I resisted because of Mother’s Day but hurriedly wrote some of what I read in a little notebook, in hopes that the energy of the words would keep until today. Some of it is still legible and comprehensible. It began with Brian Johnson’s Optimize.com. He was talking about stoicism. Listen: (from The Practicing Stoic by Ward Farnsworth).

Some adversity is NECESSARY for our growth. Indeed, the aim of the Stoic is something more: to accept reversal without shock and to make it grist for the creation of greater things. Nobody wants hardship in any particular case, but it is a necessary element in the formation of worthy people and worthy achievements that, in the long run, we do want. Stoics seek the value in whatever happens.

I have been hearing similar sentiments expressed in many conversations lately and can point to historical and present events that illustrate it. (Consider the rush to find a vaccine—or several—to match and conquer COVID 19.) It seems that necessity is often truly the mother of invention.

I’m going to spend some time today considering this concept and reality. I hope to shape the beginnings of a plan for living in this “moment” regardless of how long it lasts. Whether the plan is ever activated is not important; the planning itself is a worthy enterprise for now, I trust.

Are you already awake? What are you doing today?

Real and Imperfect

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A Deep Breath of Life, Alan Cohen, Brian Johnson, divine nature, forgive, imperfection, perfect, perspective, real world, Richard Rohr, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

At this moment we’re closing in on what looks to me personally at some moments like an entire month of wasted time. I wake up each morning and gradually a plan for the day emerges in my mind. As I ready for sleep each night, looking back on the day, I ask myself what I have accomplished and can rarely come up with anything more than a zoom call or two in which I have participated. It’s hard not to be disappointed in myself.

This morning I had the good fortune to read two things that assuaged my conscience and shifted my perspective. Speaking of life and how we live it, Brian Johnson (optimize.me) quoted Richard Rohr – one of his new heroes. Father Richard says the following: “A ‘perfect’ person ends up being one who can consciously forgive and include imperfection rather than one who thinks he or she is totally above and beyond imperfection.” Great insight! My favorite line is elsewhere in the text, however, where he writes: “What a clever place for God to hide holiness.”

Alan Cohen, in his book, A Deep Breath of Life, was talking about “the real world” and our participation in it. Although he didn’t speak of perfection directly, he wrote a lovely paragraph that I saw as related. As he sees it: “The real world is a world of kindness, caring, vision, and service. All these qualities are attributes of our divine nature. As children of God, we can only be what God is, and that is everything that is good. We are born of light, and we return to the light. To live in light is to live in the real world.”

So here’s the message that has been renewed in my consciousness once again: Who we are is much more important than what we do. So regardless of how many or how few tasks are crossed off on my ever-present lists, I can be satisfied in this time-out-of-time to be living an imperfect real life!

The Wisdom Jesus

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Brian Johnson, Cynthia Bourgeault, mindfulness, The Sophia Center for Spirituality, The Wisdom Jesus, words matter

One of the websites that shows up daily in my email is Brian Johnson’s “Optimize.” I don’t know how it first came to me but I used to systematically delete it each day along with all the ads that appear. Now I scan it because sometimes I find clues to good reflection topics and notes from a person I have come to see as a very energetic cheerleader. Today there was one line that caught my eye as I prepared for the events of the day. The topic was “Science Says Words Matter.” The advice at the end of his presentation was as follows.

“See if you can bring a little more mindfulness to the words you use today.”

Nothing wildly creative or vastly different. Just a reminder that is valuable no matter what day it is. For me today it will be my companion during two sessions of a book study. They’re our last meetings where we will discuss The Wisdom Jesus by Cynthia Bourgeault. I am having hard time letting go of this one because of the level of deep sharing that we have experienced during our exploration. Of course it is due to Cynthia’s extraordinary insight and writing skill but the grace with which participants have responded brings the book (and Jesus, I might add) to life in a wonderful way.

So I offer two things this morning. 1. Take Brian Johnson’s advice for the day, and 2. Give The Wisdom Jesus a try. Cynthia’s work is not for those unwilling to dig deep and re-read sometimes, but this is one that may respond to your need for a deeper understanding of (as Cynthia would say) “just what Jesus was up to” here on earth.

A Pearl of Wisdom

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Brian Johnson, irritation, pearl, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

Brian Johnson (optimize.me) spoke this morning of how pearls are formed. And what a good reminder it was! Here’s his quick summary.

An irritant gets inside an oyster’s shell. The oyster creates something called “nacre” that coats the irritant. Repeat THOUSANDS and THOUSANDS and THOUSANDS of times over an extended period and…Voila! Behold the iridescently beautiful pearl.

When is the last time you were irritated by something or someone – especially if the irritation was an often-repeated experience? Did you even consider that the irritant was there to challenge you to grow? What about those people who “drove you crazy” who later became good friends? Brian Johnson carries a little pearl in his pocket and touches it when he is irritated by “life’s rubs.” Not a bad idea, I’d say.

Stretching the Point

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Brian Johnson, diamonds, Doctor of the Church, irritation, perseverance, St. Catherine of Siena, The Sophia Center for Spirituality, trouble

For me, Mondays are always days of new beginnings. Looking back to what has been completed, I take pleasure in crossing items off my “to do” list. Rarely, however, do I “start from scratch” on a Monday but in recognizing what has been accomplished rather than what still remains, I avoid the frustration of the incomplete.

Brian Johnson offered me a smile this morning on his website (Optimize) in speaking of the way that precious gems are produced from pressure and challenge or irritation. Diamonds from pressure and pearls from what we might call being rubbed the wrong way but then find to have been just the right way are both worth the trouble as they often teach us lessons along the way.

It may be a stretch to see a connection here to Catherine of Siena, one of the saintliest women (and finally celebrated as such) in the history of Christianity. Her feast day is today and I see her as a great example of one who was pressured and challenged throughout her short life (33 years) without ever giving up. For her perseverance through constant irritation in her home life and serious roadblocks in her efforts to save the Church from itself, she was finally “crowned” with the title “Doctor of the Church,” one of the few women to be so named even to today. Just a quick read from the “Saint of the Day” section on http://www.franciscanmedia.org seems to me enough to prove my point.

I will take Catherine with me today as I go about my daily tasks and try to follow her example of tenacity, regardless of any jewels that may or may not accrue as a result of what happens as we go.

Try This!

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Brian Johnson, mantra, Optimize, success, Teddy Roosevelt, The Sophia Center for Spirituality

Sometimes on Fridays I like to take stock of what the week has held of events and accomplishments (or lack thereof). This week I feel as if all I’ve done is answer emails and telephone messages, trying to catch up with myself and hoping each day for more “success.”

This morning I smiled as I read one of the various websites that just appears on my screen each day without any invitation from me. I have just begun to read it occasionally rather than automatically deleting it. It is written by Brian Johnson and is called “Optimize.” Today I didn’t even have to click on his topic to get the message, which he says comes from Teddy Roosevelt, because it appears in big, bold letters – all CAPS and says: DO WHAT YOU CAN WITH WHAT YOU HAVE WHERE YOU ARE. 

Sounds like a mantra for the day to me! Thanks, Brian, wherever you are!