If you are here to explore working with a Spiritual Director, you may well be in the right place. Explore the site -- go to the GETTING STARTED (FAQ) page where many of your questions may already be answered; read the blog and listen to how you feel; follow some of the links to learn more; find out a little something about my background. If you'd like to contact me -- either to set up an appointment or ask a questions, there's a contact form on the right side of each page that you can use to MAKE A CONNECTION.
Most simply, though, the spirit of my practice can be summed up in these words (adapted from Robert Mabry Doss): For those who come here seeking God ... may God go with you. For those who come embracing life ... may life return your affection. And for those who come to seek a path ... may a way be found, and the courage to take it step by step.
Isn't that a great quote? I haven't been able to find out (definitively) who said it, but whoever it was really kind of nailed it, didn't they? Music can get our bodies moving; it can inspire us to dig deep and pull out our courage. A song can help us to really feel our sorrow, or can perfectly express our joyful exhalation.
On her blog Notes from the Far Fringe, my friend, the Rev. Kimberly Debus, has a section called "Hymn by Hymn," in which she posted a daily reflection on the hymns in the Unitarian Universalist hymnals Singing the Living Traditionand Singing the Journey, one hymn each day. I know several people who always seem to wake up with a song stuck in their head use it as a kind of journal prompt, reflecting a little each day on why that particular song might be on their mind.
I had a musical practice for a few years, when I was living on Cape Cod and working in Boston. The commute by bus was about an hour and a half each way, and I took to listening to one piece of music, repeated, for the entire trip. By the time I arrived at South Station it had become a part of me, like my in-breaths and out-breaths.
What's your relationship with music? Is it part of your spiritual practice? Might it be (without your even being aware of it)?
Pax tecum,
RevWik
This was one of my favorite song-prayers during those bus ride commutes:
Meditation. It's one of those spiritual things we're supposed to like to do. It's important. Everyone tells us that it's important. Yet a lot of us don't do it. (Like flossing -- we know it's supposed to be good for us, but, well ...)
The other night I led a class at the congregation I serve which had the same title as this post -- "Meditation for People Who Don't Like to Meditate." I began by asking people to introduce themselves, including a little something about what had brought them to the class. I suggested that people seem to fall into one of three groups:
People who've tried meditation in the past who've just found it too hard for one reason or another;
People who've thought about trying to meditate, yet haven't, because they assume that they are going to find it too hard for one reason or another; and,
People who've got a great meditation practice going, and who come to things like this class because they just really love talking about meditation.
Virtually no one identified as belonging in that third group.
When I asked people what the reasons were that people'd found meditation challenging (or figured that they would), there were some common responses:
My mind wanders too much;
I don't have time for it;
My body hurts if I sit still for too long;
Nothing happens.
In the next two posts this week I'm going to look at the wandering mind and the lack of "results." Today I want to address the concerns about how to make room for a meditation practice, and what to do about a complaining body.
The Vietnamese poet, peace activist, and Buddhist monk the Ven. Thich Nhat Hanh says in one of his books that if you want to engage with a meditation practice you should set aside 30 minutes morning and night. Unless you can't. If you just can't manage to carve out that much time from your day, then try 15 minutes morning and night. Unless you can't do that, either. If not, do 10 minutes in the morning. You guessed it -- unless you can't. He keeps reducing the mandatory time needed for meditation to simply smiling a real, true smile when you wake up in the morning. If that's all you can do, he says, then do that.
Other teachers would disagree, of course. Yet Nhat Hanh's point is that if the purpose of meditation is to train us to be mindful of the reality in which we're living in at this very moment, then shouldn't one true, fully aware, fully present smile each day also accomplish that? After all, being present is being present, whether it's for an hour or a moment. As he says in one of his breath prayers (or gathas), "Breathing in, relax body and mind; breathing out, I smile. Dwelling in the present moment, I realize this is the only moment." This is the only moment and, so, being present to this moment -- that moment during which you smile a deep, real smile -- is the only moment you can be present.
The longer times are recommended because, as I've noted elsewhere, spiritual practices are just that -- practices. I like the analogy to playing a musical instrument: if you only pick it up once in a while, or only for a few minutes, you can make sound, but you won't make real music. And that's true. So 30 minutes in the morning and 30 minutes at night -- with periodic times of even longer periods, such as during a retreat -- gives you more of a chance to practice. Still, one of the most exciting sax solos I've ever heard is in the Miles Davis classic, In a Silent Way, when the incomparable Wayne Shorter plays just two notes. But they are the perfect notes, in the perfect place. You don't need to play an entire symphony -- a note or two can be music. You don't need decades of dedicated meditation practice -- a moment or two of clear mindfulness is not to be sneezed at.
Now, what about that persnickety body? After 10 minutes of sitting your lower back starts to ache, or your legs fall asleep. Almost immediately after you start your meditation your nose starts to itch. What can you do about that? The first Zen retreat I attended at Zen Mountain Monastery in New York, I was a zazen rockstar. I sat strong and still ... and I paid for it. On the last day we each went to sit knee-to-knee with the Abbot, John Daido Loori. We had the opportunity to ask him any question, but when I kneeled, I was flooded with white hot pain, so all I could say was, "I'm in too much pain to think." "Well," the Abbot responded, "why didn't you sit in a chair?" He went on to say that you should not let aches and pains distract your during your practice, yet neither should you intentionally set yourself up for pain.
It's true, there are all sorts of teachings about how one should sit, perhaps especially within the Zen tradition. And sometimes these instruction include esoteric meanings in the postures -- this represents the teaching of non-duality; this other thing represents holding the cosmos; etc. Fundamentally, though, there are some pragmatic explanations for why you do what you do.
Sitting on the front ends of a cushion, with the legs folded in full lotus, it was explained to me, is an extremely stable position. You are grounded, unlikely to move. (One monk said that it was really so that monks wouldn't fall over and knock each other down if they fell asleep during those early morning sittings!) So, whether you sit on the ground, or in a chair, do so in a way that's sold and stable. The same is true for just about every other traditional teaching about meditation posture -- taken as a whole their purpose is to help the body to remain as still as possible, since Buddhists new thousands of years ago that a restless body and a restless mind generally go together.
So when you sit, sit comfortably, yet solidly. Don't let yourself be so comfortable that you'll slouch (which is actually an uncomfortable position to hold for too long), and so that your body can remain still yet alert in the same way you'd like your mind to be. Thich Nhat Hanh even speaks to the proscription against moving while meditating with his profound gentleness. He says that if your nose itches, why not go ahead and scratch it? Just do so with intention and awareness. And if your leg falls asleep and you'd like to move it, go ahead -- just be as aware of that decision and its concomitant movement as you are of your breath.
So ... there you go. Time and body aches need no longer be a hurdle. On Wednesday let's look at that wandering mind.
For the past few weeks I've been posting videos that I find deeply spiritually filling. (I hope you have as well.) While in many ways quite different from one another, there are four things which all the videos have in common that I think make them "spiritual."
First -- and these really aren't in any specific hierarchical order of importance -- they are all highly visual. Whether the lush imagery on John Boswell's Symphony of Science videos, the often breathtaking scenery in Matt Harding's Where The Hell Is Matt?, or the sight of musicians from a wide variety of human cultures all working together to create something beautiful, all of these videos offer us images. Imagery can touch us in very deep ways. It's no wonder that all of the great religions we humans have ever developed make use of imagery -- whether Greek Orthodox Christian's icons or Tibetan Buddhism's ephemeral sand paintings.
Next, these videos also are not just visual, they are also musical. Music, too, can take us to really deep places. It has been said that, "Music is what feelings sound like out loud." (The quote is attributed to a number of people.) Saint Francis of Assisi is remembered as telling his companions, "Preach always. When necessary, use words." Music is a way of "preaching" spiritual truths in a way which bypasses our more literal, linear thinking.
Of course, words aren't all bad, and all but Matt Harding's video include words. John Boswell's Symphony of Science videos use words to convey meaning more heavily than does Playing For Change's "Stand By Me," yet the song's lyrics certainly support the message (implicit in the images) that we are one human family and need to stand by one another. I think I could make a case that even in Matt Harding's dace video, the decision to include the place name of each scene constitutes a use of words to convey meaning.
Finally -- again, not because it's least or most important -- there is the fact that when watching and listening to the videos we are having an experience, yet an experience we from which we have a little distance. We do not have to be invested in the work of creation/production. We do not have to be hampered by any kind of "performance anxiety." Nothing is demanded of us but that we engage with these works and allow them to "enter" our hearts and our minds.
These four things are not the only things that define a source of spiritual inspiration and nurture, yet one of more is very often involved.
To round out this series of posts I offer these questions for your consideration:
Where do you find inspiration and nurture for your spirit?
What qualities do the sources share with one another? What do the share with the four qualities I've writes about here?
In what ways do the things that speak to your spirit differ from these videos and/or from each other?
Many years ago now I stumbled across the work of a musician, remix artist, and video maker that has inspired me ever since. He goes by the name Melodysheep, but his real name is John D. Boswell. While he's done a great deal more than this, what has touched me so powerfully is his "Symphony of Science" series.
In his Symphony of Science videos, Melodysheep (Boswell) takes ordinary science lectures and documentaries, and mixes them with original music (and using technology to make the scientists "sing"). These visual and musical creations are sermons, as far as I'm concerned. (I'm mindful that Saint Francis is remembered as saying, "Preach always. When necessary use words.")
In the next few posts I'm going to share some of my personal favorites from this series, and I encourage you watch and listen meditatively. Afterward you might want to think about how you felt during the video, as well as what you might have been thinking about. (From the point of view of spiritual direction, how we feel -- physically and emotionally -- can be much more revealing that what our intellects think.) Some questions that might guide you meditation include:
How do I feel while watching this video?
Which effected me more -- the words, the visuals, or the music?
Did the video in any way change the way I look at myself or the world?
Am I continuing to reflect on the video for some time after watching it?
What might this video -- and the act of engaging with it -- have to do with my spiritual life?
You also might to share these videos with friends and family members -- encouraging them to also watch the meditations, or perhaps watching them together. You could then talk with each other about your experience(s).
The first one I'll share is the first one I discovered, "Our Place in the Cosmos." It includes clips fro m Carl Sagan's Cosmos, Richard Dawkins' Genius of Charles Darwin series as well as his TED Talk, Stephen Hawing's Universe, Michio Kaku's interview on physics and aliens, along with added visuals from the films Baraka, Koyaanisqatsi History Channel's Universe series, and IMAX Cosmic Voyage.
* * * * *
This second video, "We Are All Connected," includes clips from Carl Sagan's Cosmos, The History Channel's Universe series, Richard Feynman's 1983 interviews, Neil deGrasse Tyson's "Cosmic Sermon," and Bill Nye's Eyes of Nye series. It also includes visuals from NOVA's The Elegant Universe, Stephen Hawking's Universe, Cosmos, and Powers of 10 (plus others).
