With winter comes cave time; time to surround myself with darkness; an invitation to reflect and go deep. The light is out there and known, but not necessarily seen. In the cave I feel sheltered and protected, as I do the work of reflection. I welcome cave time, and only rarely do I wonder how many more days of cold and dark will there be. Cave time with its qualities of hiddenness and hibernation is a time of restoration and regeneration, along with a time to rest, if that is what is needed. Burrow in and allow the heart to find its own rhythm.
I needed cave time, but somehow in these summer months, which most Wisconsinites yearn for all the rest of the year, that doesn't seem like the right image. I should be out in the sunshine, playing and bursting forth with relief we made it through another winter. What to do since I felt in my soul I need time to rest, restore, and release. And then I received a word. Don't you love when that happens? Cloister.
I am reading The Dancing Animal Woman, A Celebration of Life by Anne Hillman. Another example of the right book at the right time. I participated in a retreat she led over a year ago, and this book has been waiting for me on my shelf since then. Early in the book she finds herself in a quiet garden she describes as a "green cloister." What I needed was Cloister Time. I don't mean entering a monastery, hidden away from the world. Instead my personal cloister was slightly set apart from the world, where I could see the delicious greens and the ongoing growth as the days progressed from its first days of summer wonder to the expected days of summer's lushness and fullness. I could observe and enter in as I chose to and when I needed to. I could come and go as desired, knowing the cloister would remain in place.
In my cloister located on the front porch of our home, private unless I choose to greet passersby, I read and doze and write in my journal and pray and meditate and find my bearings. Another word from Anne Hillman. Hillman describes getting her bearings not in terms of getting back on top of things, not finding a direction or a destination, but experiencing the center. "Center was still. Empty. Yet filled with the present. Alive."
One of my favorite books about spirituality is The Cloister Walk by Kathleen Norris in which she writes about her experiences as a resident in a Benedictine monastery. This morning I realized I, too, have a "cloister walk" right here at our home.
This past weekend my husband extended a side garden, adding more stepping stones and bordering it with lavender plants, my favorite herb. While the path is short and in view of the neighbors, it still feels like a place set apart. I walked this cloister walk several times this morning, pausing on each stone, offering a blessing. "This stone is for my father." This stone is for the loving gardener of this cloister walk." "This stone is for the as yet unknown buyer of this home who will inherit this cloister walk." I named family members and friends. I named myself. With each step on this cloister walk I felt more restored, more at ease and at rest, more centered. As I returned to the porch, I prayed that I may be able to carry this cloistered center or is it centered cloister with me wherever I am.
What does the word cloister mean to you? Where is your cloister and what does cloister time offer you?
One never knows whom one will meet on a retreat. I met a Willow Tree. Recently, I attended a retreat at Holy Wisdom Monastery here in Middleton led by Anne Hillman who wrote the book Awakening the Energies of Love, Discovering Fire for the Second Time, a book that has become a touchstone in my life. What a privilege to have three days for intentional reflection. I loved meeting Anne and the other participants on the retreat, but who knew I would make a new friend and develop a new relationship? Who knew I would open to a new spiritual guide, a new teacher?
I met a Willow Tree.
At Sweetwater Farm a willow tree was the resident sage in the wetland on our land, and such a presence that tree was. The last tree to lose its leaves as the season moved from fall to winter. The most distinctive citrus yellow green in the springtime, standing out from all other greens. The welcome greetings of branches swaying in the breeze and sweeping the earth gently, lightly. And often, quite often, a resting place for a red-tail hawk. I can feel my heart lift as I recall the beauty of that sight.
Perhaps this willow tree is a distant relative of the one I loved at Sweetwater Farm. My intention is to get to know this tree better, but initially, I kept my distance, preferring to observe and to listen before introducing myself. The days of the retreat were the epitome of June days: warm, but not too; the sun hiding occasionally behind playful clouds, and a breeze dancing through prairie grasses and trees dressed for summer days. This willow tree (Do I dare call it "my" willow tree?) swayed, swirled, swooped, swept, sashayed--did everything but swagger down the trail closer to the pond. I sat on a deck nearby and spent time with my new acquaintance.
I was captivated by one branch that arched over open space, forming a portal, a passageway, a natural arbor, a threshold. Lately, I have realized that these years in Madison are transition years for me -- preparation years for the next stage of life. I am making myself ready. For exactly what, I am not sure, but it is time to prepare my body, mind, and spirit. I am on a threshold, but this is not yet the time to walk through, to cross over, to look back at where I have just been. Being on this retreat and spending time with the willow tree, I realize, however, now is the time to live with deeper attention, to move from thought to awareness, to listen to my deepest yearnings, to be present.
Later during the retreat Anne led us in T'ai Chi, and I became the willow tree: grounded and yet supple and flexible, lifting my arms to the sky and letting them softly drift back to my side. I danced as the willow tree dances. The willow tree has more to teach me, and I will return to its sacred space. Someday I will accept its invitation to cross the threshold and stroll underneath its supple branches, and to feel the touch of its feathery leaves.
Matthew Fox says, "Everything is a word of God."
Even willow trees.
Selected Resources from my Bookshelves
Sacred Trees, Spirituality, Wisdom and Well-Being by Nathaniel Altman
The Healing Energies of Trees by Patrice Bouchardon
I attend a class that focuses on the contemplative practice of centering prayer, and the other night one of the facilitators mentioned the concept of kenosis or self-emptying. I remembered first learning about kenosis when I was in training to be a spiritual director. We were encouraged to develop a spiritual practice that would help us renew and be open to what we were created to be.
Relying on God has to begin all over again every day, as if nothing had yet been done.
C. S. Lewis
Get thy heart as clear from the world as thou canst. Wholly lay by the thoughts of thy business, troubles, enjoyments, and everything that may take up any room in thy heart. Get it as empty as thou possibly canst, that it may be more capable of being filled with God.
Richard Baxter
One of the practices I have used to empty myself and therefore, be more open to God is T'ai Chi. As I move through the T'ai Chi choreography, I clear the space, I become present, I smooth the rough edges. I find calm. When I taught T'ai Chi, I always mentioned kenosis, and students seemed to appreciate the connection between body, mind and spirit. But not always.
Once upon a time I was asked to offer an introduction to T'ai Chi at a woman's retreat. I didn't know the retreat leader well, but she had attended an earlier event where I taught T'ai Chi. I also didn't know the retreat participants, and I knew very little about the content of the retreat itself. I just did what I always did, confident they would love it, too. When I introduced the move called Clearing the Space, I mentioned kenosis as an act of self-emptying. I talked about having a pitcher of water and if it is filled to the brim, there is room for no more. It is only by emptying that we can refill. Almost immediately I felt a shift in energy. Not everywhere in the room, but still, I sensed some discomfort. I continued with my instruction, leading the group through the moves, trying to be alert to what might be happening, and soon I saw one woman stride quickly from the room. The retreat leader followed her. I finished my teaching, and all seemed to go well. Many, as I packed up my things to leave as had been planned, indicated how much they enjoyed the session.
Days later the retreat leader called to tell me what had happened. The woman who left the room felt if we emptied ourselves, we left room for the devil to enter our hearts and take up residence. We needed to be ever on the alert and not leave any open space for the devil. I was stunned. Naively, that had never occurred to me. Knowing this perspective has not changed the way I feel about kenosis, but it furthered my awareness of how everything has shadow and light. I was saddened by the woman's fears that seemed to dominate her faith, but I respected her ability to act upon what was real for her.
I have continued to incorporate spiritual practices into my life that help me empty in order to know the movement of God in my life, and kenosis as I first understood it has been a staple in my spiritual life. Until this morning when I encountered this passage in the very challenging Awakening the Energies of Love, Discovering Fire for the Second Time by Anne Hillman. http://annehillman.net/
This silence--'the mind's empty room'--is not the emptiness our intellects define. This emptiness is full. Emptiful. To me the word I coin is resonant with the word beautiful.
To enter this kind of Kingdom, we shift our attention from the mind's knowing and drop into what seems like emptiness inside. Then, we begin to dance with Life. We ask, What now? and are amazed to discover that the emptiness is full! New possibilities, all kinds of new responses to the situation at hand, arise out of the stillness within us--another way that spiritual practice 'breaks the mind.'
The difference is subtle. Instead of thinking about how emptiness leads to change, including fullness, I contemplate emptiness AS fullness itself. I am not sure yet what that looks like or even feels like, but I am challenged to update, to deepen what I have up till now accepted. And to live it. Hillman continues,
When, instead of reacting from our gut, we drop in to the silence and ask, we are offered spiritual gifts just waiting to be received: courage, reverence, awe, patience, restraint, gratitude, and more...
Sometimes this is how I experience it: In the middle of a spat. I 'step back' from wanting to be right, then ask from some place deep in my body. What now? What rises is usually a response that is exactly right for the occasion! I don't think up this response; it is offered. In this situation, what might rise in awareness is forgiveness. If I am feeling stubborn or afraid, the suggestion might be willingness or courage. When I am trapped in judgment, what occurs to me is compassion. All of these responses from the "empty room" are nonviolent; all of them, a softening. And any one of them--if I receive and act on it--returns me to the present moment.
How much I have yet to incorporate kenosis, the emptying and the fullness, into my life was clear to me this week when I realized how overbearing I had been in a specific situation. I did not pause and and enter the empty room. Instead of softening, I hardened, judged, and got stuck in my own ego. I am grateful my apology was accepted, but a real apology means greater devotion to contemplative practices, including centering prayer. A greater exploration of emptiful.
For the last couple months I have not consistently taken time for morning meditation and devotional time, even though I know how life-enhancing that time is. With the new year, however, I re-instated my intention to set-aside time for morning centering prayer, study and journal writing time.
All was well till Friday morning when my normal routine was up for grabs--a first thing in the morning electrician appointment, a date to celebrate a friend's birthday, and the usual list of To Do tasks. About 20 minutes before I knew the doorbell would ring, I was dressed and ready for the day and I wondered what I should do now. Empty the dishwasher? Answer some emails? Pay bills? Fold towels? When several possibilities float effortlessly to my awareness OR when no ideas are present, I know it is time to clear the space. Close my eyes and take a deep breath. Find my rhythm and allow the whisper of my inner voice to be heard. "Sit with your journal and your devotional materials." Of course.
My current study book, a book I am sure will be on my "favorites" list for 2012 is Awakening the Energies of Love, Discovering the Fire for the Second Time by Anne Hillman and what do I read? Referring to legends passed throughout the generations, Hillman says ".... they intended our lives--propelled us and set us on our Way.
Intended! How I love the way language flowered in the minds of my ancestors! How the ancient Latin, tendere--to stretch, to grow, to strive--exploded into bloom! It brought us intent...intention.....and tendency...And although we may discover that 'stretching' and 'growing' is not without intensity or tension--it is also not without tenderness and our yearning to tend--whether a fire or a child to another person." (Note: the italics are the writer's.)
Wow! How's that for synchronicity? The day before I had written my first blog post about "intention" in my new blog and here it shows up in my morning study material --material I almost didn't read in favor of doing other things. I wonder how often I miss these kinds of gifts because I haven't cleared the space.
Intention is a key word for me and Hillman has given me much more to consider. I so often use the word "tend," especially "home tend," and yet had not connected it to "intention" nor had I thought specifically about how intention is related to stretching and growing. I could feel little ah-ha sparks of energy as I read those words. My intention is to stretch, to grow, but I do understand growth and stretching is not without tension and intensity. Shadow and light. Ah, this journey of intentions promises to offer unanticipated adventures and unknown depths. I will need to remember to be tender with myself and those around me as well.
Where are your intentions leading you?
