Aging

Not too long ago I was walking down an aisle at Costco looking for something on my list. An employee in the same aisle looked at me, smiled, and in an all-too-perky-slightly-patronizing voice said, Well, hello there young lady. How are you today?

First of all, I’m 65 years old, and while I may look pretty good for my age, and tend to dress in a rather hip-but-appropriate-for-my-age kind of way, I am most certainly not a “young” lady by anyone’s standard.

Second of all, I don’t want to be young again. While I wish I had started wearing sun screen earlier, every wrinkle and line tells the story of the life I’ve lived, and the wisdom I’ve gained has been hard won.

For those of us in the third-third of life, it could be, should be, our vision to show what it means to age well. To stay active and strong, and to continue to offer our strengths and gifts to the world around us. To lead the charge in modeling the courage to continue to show up and do the work of becoming authentic and wholehearted human beings.

From the moment we arrive on the planet we are on a one way trip off of it again. Every year is ours to make of it what we can in order to, in some way, leave the world better than we found it. My 66th year is just around my corner, and in case anyone is wondering, this 65 year old woman is doing just fine, thank you.

(Sometimes I just need to rant a little.)

Delores's Delight

…I have learned things in the dark that I could never have learned in the light, things that have saved my life over and over again, so there is really only one logical conclusion. I need darkness as much as I need light.

~ Barbara Brown Taylor - Learning To Walk In The Dark

It’s called Delores’s Delight.

The favorite dessert of my childhood, I dusted off the recipe card today and made a big batch of it for the first time in years. If I had to choose a final meal before leaving the planet, this dessert would be on the menu. While others in my family wanted cake for their birthday, I only wanted this, and if you decide to make a batch, you’ll probably know why.

Growing up, the best part about it wasn’t the first piece after dinner, delicious as it was. It was waking up in the middle of the night, sneaking into the kitchen and finding my dad there too. In the dark we would cut two more pieces and savor every bite before heading back to bed. Somehow it tasted even better in the shadow filled kitchen than the light filled dining room.

When it comes to this delectable dessert, it is the crushed dark chocolate cookies layered on the bottom and sprinkled over the top that help hold it all together and set off the flavor of the sweet, rich center. In our lives, the dark, the shadow parts of ourselves that we have been courageous enough to explore and come to know as intimately as the rest, are layered with the light, and are key ingredients in what it means to be a whole human being.

Delore’s Delight is a combination of the dark and the light, just like my relationship with my dad. And a lot like real life when it comes right down to it. In order for our lives to be authentic, wholehearted and real, we must incorporate the dark with the light in order to cook up a whole life. One without the other just doesn’t cut it.

Solitary Solidarity

On the home page for Life In The Trinity Ministry there is a phrase that rings as so true and so important.

A place for solitary work that cannot be done alone.

There is work that is ours to do, and no one else can do it for us.

However.

There is a need for us to have a safe place to do that work in relationship with others. A place where we can say what is true for us and be heard. A place where we can bring our questions and not get ready answers, our fears and not have them shushed away, and our messy emotions and not have someone try to clean them up. We need people who will keep us from getting burned, and, will hold our feet to the fire. People who see for us what we can’t see for ourselves, and, who accept us as we are.

While the work may be ours alone to do, there is safety in numbers. Going it together reminds us that we are not alone in our desire to make sense of things, and to become as fully ourselves as we are meant to be.

I am grateful to those who walk with me on my journey to becoming whole, and for those who invite me to walk with them.

Onward.

Together.

Photo by Matt Hatchett from Pexels

Everything

“We do not think ourselves into new ways of living.

We live ourselves into new ways of thinking.”

― Richard Rohr

Our lives are made up of so many bits and pieces that it is easy to lose sight of the wholeness of it all. Not the perfection of it all, but the wholeness that is our life. Like a 1000 piece jigsaw puzzle, each little piece contains a small fragment of the image that when put together will make the whole picture.

We, or at least I, get sidetracked by the small bits, forgetting that they are necessary to the whole. And in forgetting that they are necessary to the whole I let myself get swept up in frustration at what I’m not getting to, seeing things as interruptions to my day rather than integral to my day.

I forget that it all matters. I forget that the task at hand, the person on the other end of the phone, and the unexpected occurrence are all parts of the larger picture. They are all opportunities to show up fully and bring the best of myself to what, in that moment, is mine to do.

I forget that every emotion matters. I forget that there is as much to learn from the visitation of the hard emotions, the dark and painful ones, as there is from the gentle, shimmering, and delightful ones. That every one that comes knocking at my door has, as Rumi writes in The Guesthouse, been sent as a guide from beyond.

I forget that as Franciscan priest, author, and spiritual teacher Richard Rohr believes, everything belongs. Think about that for a moment. Everything belongs. Everything belongs. Everything belongs.

Everything.

What if we began to see everything that shows up at our doorstep as an invitation to become more of who we are meant to be?

What if we began to actually live into the truth that everything belongs.

It might just change everything.

Photo: pexels.com

With gratitude to Dane Anthony

Soaking It All In

On a whim last Sunday we took a detour on our way home from a weekend of hiking and camping. The potential of a long soak in hot mineral waters and a 30 minute linen wrap in the historic bathhouse at the Carson Hot Springs Resort sounded simply too good to pass up. Taking a chance that they would have tubs available for us we turned off the highway, and within a half an hour I was submerged in steaming hot water with a cold wash cloth on my head.

Not always one to be present to the moment, I made the choice, over and over again, to return to the sensation of the hot water on my skin, the cool touch of the wash cloth on my forehead, and the heat soaking into muscles that had worked hard to carry me safely up to the edge of the Mount St. Helens crater and back again. By the time my soak was done, I found myself squarely situated in the present moment. Thoughts about the past and any concerns about the coming week seemed to have drained away along with the water in the tub.

From the soak I headed into the quiet room lined with cots and covered with fresh linen sheets, found the one that was mine, and lay down. The sweet attendant asked what kind of wrap I preferred: tight, medium, or loose? I went with medium, opted for another cool cloth on my forehead, and a towel wrap over my head. For thirty minutes I didn’t even have to work at being present. There was no where else I wanted, or needed to be.

Almost asleep when my time was up I stood and slowly made my way toward the showers and couldn’t help but notice one of the other women in the room. Like me, she had come from a soak and was laying on her cot wrapped in a linen sheet. She didn’t however seem to be in the room at all, mesmerized as she was by her cell-phone. Watching as she clicked and scrolled and swiped, I couldn’t help but think about all of the times that I am anywhere but where I am. If not glued to my phone, then following the rabbit trails of thoughts, diving into one hole after another.

Granted, not every moment is a linen wrap after a hot soak, but the present moment is where we are meant to be. It is the place we are called to show up as fully and whole-heartedly as we can, over and over again. It takes practice, and some days it comes easier than others, but I hope to remember the contrast between those minutes in the tub and on that table, and all the times I find myself lost in the past or projecting myself into the future.

The only way to be squarely where we are is to choose, over and over again, to submerge ourselves in the present moment, soak it in and get completely wrapped up in it.

Here Comes The Sun

Sunflowers know that light matters. They turn their face to the East to greet the dawn every morning. They don’t wonder if the sun will rise tomorrow, but eagerly seek the sunlight that is offered today.

We too are in need of the light. Of turning our face to greet the day. Tomorrow is only a possibility, but for now, the light is shining on this day, and it is ours to decide what we will do with the day we’ve been given. The world needs us to choose well.

This And That

“What we focus on determines what we miss.”

Brian McLaren

Life is a mixture of this and that, all at the same time.

Good and bad, scary and brave, sacred and profane, grief and grace, hope and despair, difficult and easy, heartache and happiness, disappointment and surprise, independence and partnership, alone and together, rising and falling, strength and weakness, fierce and fragile, love and loss, life and death, constancy and change, faith and doubt.

It’s all happening all around us all of the time, and if we don’t widen our gaze, we’ll miss out, because when we only focus on this, we can’t see that.

Photo by Kush Kaushik from Pexels

This Not That

Some mornings we start our days with steel cut oats topped with fruit, almond milk, some nuts, and a little butter and brown sugar for good measure. Each ingredient adds to the whole, but can stand alone on its own. Even the butter. It’s delicious and we both love it. Tom however, chooses to ruin his by stirring it all up together into something I call “glop”. I love oatmeal. I hate glop. It is hard to distinguish one flavor from the other, and it’s not much to look at either.

Stick with me here, but a bowl of glop is a lot like how we can handle interpersonal challenges, especially in our long term relationships. We stir everything up together until it is almost impossible to tell one situation or issue from other ones.

Stirring everything together sounds something like this: You always… You never… This is just like when you… All the ingredients of the current issue get glopped together with a bunch of other ones, until every bite tastes the same, and it is nearly impossible to tell this from that.

Not stirring everything together sounds like this:This morning when you___ I felt… When you didn’t follow through on your commitment, this is how it impacted me. I want to talk to you about something that happened recently. Each issue or situation stands on its own.

Learning to take our issues one at a time and separate one from the other is one of the ways we grow up into the people we are meant to be (a lifelong process). It’s hard work. It means we have to take things as they come, deal with them as they come, and stay in the conversation about them. Some conversations are a one-and-done deal. Others come around again, and again, and again, each time an opportunity to show up more fully and with more personal accountability and ownership for our part of the bargain. And there is always a part of the bargain that is ours.

In my unhealthier moments, I can take a current issue, conflict, or challenging situation, and stir it up with a whole bunch of other ones from the past. Or take one thing and make it about everything. But as I choose to stop, sift through the emotions and particulars of the situation, I am learning to separate this from that, and bring this to the conversation, and leave that out.

Take it from me. It tastes really good.

Photo by Daria Shevtsova from Pexels

Equipped

We want to be equipped for whatever comes our way.

Sometimes we are.

Sometimes we aren’t.

Whenever we come to the edge of our capacity, we have the choice to retreat back into our safe arenas, or step out into the risky territory that spans the gap between who we are now and who we want to become. It is there, and only there, that we are challenged to show up more fully, and bring more of who we are to our relationships, conversations, and the world around us.

It isn’t easy and it’s scary as hell to risk new ways of being in the world, but it is the only way I know of to become more well equipped for the life I am here to live.

Photo by eberhard grossgasteiger from Pexels

The Chase

Chasing squirrels is high on Gracie’s to-do list any day of the week. Because she can’t safely be off-leash out in our neck of the woods, that makes actually chasing one a moot point. If she tries, as she did yesterday, forgetting that she is tethered to an old stump, she will get caught up short in very short order.

The thing is, the squirrels don’t know she is on a leash.

This morning a tree squirrel who calls our property home was afraid to make a run for the woods, never realizing that freedom was his for the taking. Flitting from branch to branch he chattered constantly, trying to scold and scare her away. She circled the tree, jumped up on the trunk of the tree, and sat by the tree, but no matter how much Gracie wanted to chase that squirrel down, her leash wouldn’t let her do it.

Sometimes I want to put my thoughts on a leash. You know the ones. The ones that chatter and scold and scare us and just won’t shut up. What if we put them on a leash and tethered them to an old stump? And when those thought show up chattering and scolding and scaring, we remember that no matter how much those thoughts want to chase us down, the leash on which we’ve put them won’t allow it.

Pick a thought, put it on a leash, tether it to a stump, and head out into the woods where freedom is ours for the taking.