I’ve begun to think that everything can be a symbol from which I can learn if I am paying attention. Call me crazy but I’m convinced that there are lessons to be learned each day and life is more easily engaged in a positive manner if we pay attention. Let me explain.
Yesterday I finally accepted the fact that I needed to get a new phone. (Mine has been on a charger now for days with no sign of life.) Being one of the least technologically savvy persons I know, I resisted a trip to the Verizon store but finally gave in to the inevitability and went. Having been alerted to the fact that there is an alternative to the large store near the university where all the employees are like 15-year-old barracudas who meet you at the door and talk faster than anyone I have ever met, I was grateful for the information that led me to that small, quiet alternative where there were only two employees, one a middle-aged man and one a 22-year-old woman. She became my guardian angel within the first five minutes. The bad news was that my phone was irrevocably dead and because I had resisted adding “cloud space” for the last many months, she would not be able to transfer such things as contacts and photos. The good news was that I would be able to purchase a new phone for about 60% of the price that I was expecting.
I did not buy the phone. I needed time to consider the options. Grace got in my car with me for the trip home, however, because in that half-hour drive two things happened. First, in realizing that I would need to let go of much that was contained in the phone’s memory, I would be starting over. A new season would be born for me which suddenly seemed like a good thing – like when the first shoots of spring plants begin to appear. Of course it will demand some work to build a new set of contacts but those will be recent rather than long-ago entries that are no longer operative. And if my photos are gone, I still have the memories they contained. The recognition was swift and filled me with peace.
As I neared my exit from the highway the most vivid and spacious rainbow suddenly appeared, stretching from ground to sky in a blaze of seven colors that took my breath away. Because I had left the sun in the city and was driving into a dark gray backdrop of sky, conditions were perfect for such a show: no rain, just glorious color. It stayed with me for over five minutes of gratitude and glory.
Today I will buy and begin life with my new phone and call it Grace.
There’s hope for all of us! I was just reading a synopsis of St. Vincent de Paul’s life (1580 – 1660), one of the most well known saints of Christianity for his care for the poor. Vincent, the account says, “had become a priest with little more ambition than to have a comfortable life,” but had been changed by the deathbed confession of a dying servant that “opened his eyes to the crying spiritual needs of the peasantry in France.” There’s lots of evidence of his good works, commonly known, but it was a small paragraph toward the end of the account that gave me pause – and actually made me smile.
I’ve been engaged in a number of conversations lately where the topic has been the need to let go of what we can’t control – like the weather and the march of time (specifically our aging process). This morning I opened Meg Wheatley’s little book, Perseverance, to a page called “Life Is Life” and found there some words worth my time and reflection. Perhaps we can all benefit from her wisdom.
When I was in elementary school at Our Lady Help of Christians parish, it was the custom on our tests (and probably other written work) to place a small cross at the top of the page and underneath to print JMJ (Jesus, Mary, Joseph). I don’t remember being instructed each time to do what was most likely supposed to become a habit of dedicating our work to the Holy Family but I suspect for many of us it was either a desperate prayer for help or a desire to be seen as pious. Later on, as we grew into the upper grades and got more sophisticated, the letters changed to AMDG (Ad majorem Dei gloriam = for the greater glory of God). Knowing the meaning in English was easier than remembering the Latin words, at least until we got to high school. It wasn’t until much later that I learned how famous that phrase was.
Sometimes it can be very comforting to read the letters of Paul in the Scriptures, like today when he speaks about his ego getting the best of him. When that happens, he notes that there’s always something that reminds him of his fallible nature. When he begs God to make him better (Sound familiar??) God’s response is amazingly reassuring and loving. We would do well to believe God says the same to us. Listen and see if you can rest in both parts of the answer.
The weekend just ended brought both old friends and new faces to our tiny “island of grace” (the way I see our small retreat center these days). The privilege of preparing meals for them allowed me observation time of their interactions with one another and the alternation of their movements to and from the conference room – so often peppered with “thank you” or smiles of appreciation for every little thing. I cannot help feeling judgments about people melt from me as I observe the gifts that diversity brings to a retreat where everyone is desirous of spiritual growth. The ways that people dress or speak or choose their food are all overshadowed by the blinding light of their intention toward unity with the Divine (however they perceive the One I call God).
Today is a day that calls for living in the moment…but is also prompting me to remember the consistent goodness of God: past, present and future. The grass couldn’t be greener, the sun is full up and drying the dew, the promise of the meteorologists is for a perfect late spring day. The psalmist sings: Each day I bless you, God of all; never will I forget the good that you have meant to me. (PS 103:2) I think of the graced conversations of yesterday – each one giving me something to think about or thank God for, so that the feelings and sensations of such a blessed day remain. While holding it all lightly, willing for the encounters to be like deposits in my spiritual bank account, I look toward today with a willingness to accept whatever befalls me. It is my hope to remember all day long that wonderful reality – also called to mind by Psalm 103 – that we swim in mercy as in an endless sea.