What Is Your Song?

Last week I read an article about a beautiful practice of the Himba people of Namibia.  Apparently, when a woman is thinking about having a baby, she goes off by herself.

When a Himba woman decides to have a child, she goes off and sits under a tree, alone, and she listens until she can hear the song of the child who wants to come.

And after she’s heard the song of this child, she comes back to the man who will be the child’s father, and teaches him the song. When they make love to physically conceive the child, they sing the song of the child as a way of inviting the child.

The Himba are not the only people who believe that each of us has a song that is unique to us and which, in some ways, contains or conveys the essence of who we are.

Try going to sit under a tree (literally or metaphorically) and listen for the sound of your song.  It might be a song you know and love.  It might be a tune you've never heard before.  Even if you're not able to hear a specific song, you can still think about what type of song it would be:

• is it something instrumental, or something with lyrics?
• is it jazz, classical, heavy metal, easy listening?
• does it have a traditional or avant-garde structure?
• have you heard this song before, or is it something new?

As I often suggest, if you journal take note of where this exploration takes you.  And again as always, you could talk about this with a spiritual director.  (You might even sing your song together!)


Pax tecum,

RevWik

"Music is What Feelings Sound Like ..."

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 Tradition and 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: