Category Archives: gratitude

Orienting

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[ Photo by Jared Fredrickson] 

The weeds in the garden were well on their way to taking over the bed, so I spent an hour pulling them away from the tomatoes, chives, snow peas, and sunflowers. When I began, the sun was just peeking over the roof line; when I finished up, it was well on its way to the middle of the sky.

I don’t usually pay much attention to this daily arc through the sky – unless it’s to seek shade or because the sun’s heat is doing its best to turn my skin pink. But today, I began my weeding at the base of the sunflowers. In the hour I spent in the garden, the sunflowers changed their orientation: all of them began facing one direction and turned their faces to another by the time I stopped pulling weeds. The sun had moved, and they changed their orientation to continue facing it, following the life-giving light.

When I water the garden this evening, the sunflowers will be facing in the opposite direction to their morning orientation. It’s why they are called sunflowers, I suppose: though grounded in one particular place, they turn with the sun’s movement. If that isn’t an every day miracle, I don’t know what is.

It struck me that I can do the same thing. I cannot move from the particular time and circumstance that set the parameters of my life’s span, but I can choose my orientation. I can choose to be moved by something life-giving beyond myself. And within this very small, brief, and specific life span I call my own, I can choose to act accordingly.

Lord, keep my eyes and heart open. Only with your help can I look beyond myself and act with compassion for all the life you’ve created. Amen.

 

Forgive, not Forget

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Years back, someone dear to me lost the path of peace and joy, and ended up in the spiritual wilderness of physical exhaustion and emotional darkness. Hurtful things were said and done, and our friendship was damaged. Eventually, after many years, the friendship was repaired and trust came back. But it wasn’t something that came quickly or easily for either of us. It took a lot of work to restore what had been such an easily formed friendship so many years ago.

What kept me in the friendship when it would have been easier to let it go? The certainty that my friend was a good person going through a bad time, not a fundamentally bad person.

Desmond Tutu and the Dalai Lama both practice forgiveness – releasing self and other from continued harm and hatred. They do not advocate forgetting: actions have consequences, and avoiding or denying them gets us nowhere but in more trouble. I doubt either one would have inspired so many people to live in love and peace had they not learned to forgive, remember, and move forward.

It takes a lot of strength to forgive, but it opens us up to joy again. Isn’t such a life worth the effort? If the Dalai Lama and Desmond Tutu are able to forgive the many destructive things that have happened in their lives, I’m willing to try to forgive the few in mine. What have I got to lose but suffering?

 

Pillar One: Perspective

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Perspective: There Are Many Different Angles

It’s the chapter title for Desmond Tutu’s, the Dalai Lama’s, and Douglas Abram’s first chapter on the Eight Pillars of Joy [Book of Joy, New York: Avery, 2016, p. 193]. In a nutshell, the main point is that how we experience something is a matter of how we look at it as well as a matter of what we are looking at:

A healthy perspective really is the foundation of joy and happiness, because the way we see the world is the way we experience the world. Changing the way we see the world in turn changes the way we feel and the way we act, which changes the world itself. Or, as the Buddha says in Dhammapada, “With our mind we create our own world.” (p.194)

Taking a broader perspective, thinking long-term rather than immediate, and including the wants and needs of others in our deliberations can get us out of our small box reality and into something larger and more life-giving.  That’s true, but there’s more…

Sometimes a narrower focus brings to light beauty and joy that often goes unnoticed. This is especially true when life isn’t difficult. The value of a single tree can get lost in the forest.

Zooming in or stepping back, a change of perspective can open hearts and minds to the joy that each day holds, and sustain the soul in all circumstances.

What a marvelous thing that is.

Eight Pillars of Joy

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I’ve been reading The Book of Joy: Lasting Happiness in a Changing World these past couple of months – it’s the written version of a week-long visit at Dharamsala. Bishop Desmond Tutu, his holiness the Dalai Lama, and writer Douglas Abrams spend days discussing what true joy is, obstacles that prevent us from experiencing lasting joy, and the eight pillars that foster a joyful life. There are some wonderful stories, a few pictures, and a lot of play and laughter – something found on the many video clips of the encounter, and somehow found in the book’s very pages. In a time of uncertainty, this is a wonderful book to discuss with others.

It’s the pillars of joy that I’m reading at the moment. Why not read and write? If you have the time and inclination, pick up The Book of Joy and read along with me. I’d love to hear your thoughts…

Peace, Johnna

[Dalai Lama, Desmond Tutu, Douglas Abrams; The Book of Joy: Lasting happiness in a changing world; New York: Avery, 2016]

It’s the little stings

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Preserve me from minding little stings or giving them

One of the most destructive people I’ve ever known never raised her voice. A backhanded compliment offered here, a snide remark whispered there, a sarcastic line spoken with a smile: she made it her business to know everyone’s vulnerable spots and she spent her workdays poking small holes in them with verbal needles. The damage was barely noticeable at first, but it added up. A workplace cheerful in her absence became tense and sour in her presence. When she left for another job, everyone started to breathe easier.

While few people had her talent for destruction by little stings, I think most of us have returned them when we’ve been on the receiving end. But if we can overlook such little stings, if we can remember that minor insults are only harmful if we take them seriously, we can refrain from returning the verbal (dis) favor.

The thing about little stings: they come at a cost. To sting another effectively, we must put ourselves in the others’  shoes: how else would we know what will damage them? Every sting we give, we try out on ourselves first. Such damage adds up, even if we never receive a retaliating sting.

Lord, give me strength to avoid the whole damaging cycle altogether. Amen.

[For more on this series, and for the full prayer, click For Today: Phillips Brooks Prayer.]

Eating My Words

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Conversations with my chef friend, Penny Cameron

1996, West Windsor, New Jersey

Me: How can it cost $5 for a loaf of decent bread?

Penny: Make your own in a bread machine. It’s easy.

Me: Not likely.

2000, New Hope, PA

Me: Genuardi’s is out of the good chicken stock again.

Penny: Make your own. It’s easy.

Me: When pigs fly.

2001, September, New Hope, PA

Me: Sugar free applesauce is almost impossible to find.

Penny: It’s easy to make on the stove and freeze in ice cube trays. Even better, can it – apples are cheap right now.

Me: I don’t I have an inner farmer to channel.

Since those conversations, I’ve done everything Penny suggested. I’ve made my own chicken stock for almost 20 years. I’ve canned applesauce and more for almost a decade. I’ve channeled an inner farmer enough to become a teaching gardener, showing preschool children how to grow and enjoy herbs and vegetables.

Penny died just a few months after my applesauce complaint – liver failure. Whenever I take a chance and try to grow or cook something new, I feel her spirit surround me. What a beautiful way for the Spirit to show me how to eat with intention and thanks.

Generosity in Giving

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I will try this day to…exercise generosity in giving…

My twentieth summer, I worked at Dockside restaurant in Alton Bay. One day, a stranger with a bed roll and backpack came in for lunch. He was thin, and his clothes were frayed. After giving the menu careful consideration, he ordered a cup of chowder and a glass of water.

The cook/owner, Lois, took one look at him through the kitchen window, and said in a low voice, “Oh Lord, someone looking for a handout.” I wondered if she would refuse to serve him, ask him to leave, or just send out the cup of soup and hope he left quickly and quietly. After a minute or two, she rang the bell for me to pick up the order. Lois had put pasta bowl full of chowder and three large pieces of grilled bread on a plate, garnished with a mini salad. “He’s hungry. Take it on over and don’t charge him for it” was all she said.

When he was down to the last piece of bread, he began counting out coins to pay for his meal. I told him the owner took care of it. He said thanks, asked for her name, and left a while later.

On the table was a remarkable mandala drawn in pencil on a clean napkin; on the bottom, the stranger had written these words:

Thank you, Lois. You are a gift from the universe.

Food for the body given on a plate, food for the soul returned on a napkin: Generosity in giving going both ways.

[For the full prayer, click A Morning Resolve above.]

 

Charity

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I will try this day to live a simple, sincere, and serene life, repelling promptly every thought of discontent, anxiety, discouragement, impurity, and self-seeking; cultivating cheerfulness, magnanimity, charity, and the habit of holy silence… [A Morning Resolve, Forward Day by Day]

Charity isn’t a virtue if it means giving the least amount of money possible to maintain the appearance or feeling of moral superiority above those who receive it.

Charity is a vice if writing a check is a way to avoid seeing the poverty of others.

True charity is building half a bridge out of my God-given resources, trusting that the rest will be built out of someone else’s need.

True charity is knowing it’s an honor to cross over from either side, and a blessing to meet friend or stranger in the middle.

 

Great Soul

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Cultivating cheerfulness, magnanimity, charity, and the habit of holy silence; exercising economy in expenditure, generosity in giving, carefulness in conversation, diligence in appointed service, fidelity to every trust, and a childlike faith in God.

Magnanimity: Loftiness of spirit enabling one to bear trouble calmly, to disdain meanness or pettiness, and to display a noble generosity. [merriam-webster.com. Merriam Webster’s online dictionary]

The other day, I tested a new product: window markers. Since my drawing abilities are somewhat limited, I drew a simple heart in red. It wasn’t very noticeable through the storm splashed, February filthy window.

Passing my office door a couple of days back, I noticed a new mark on the floor.

Had someone Sharpie’d a heart on my carpet? That’s what I thought, until I looked up.

The unremarkable heart on my window had cast its colorful shape.

Perhaps magnanimity is just the same: standing in God’s light in all our imperfections and in all circumstances, casting a reflection of love so much bigger than ourselves.

[For more on this prayer, click A Morning Resolve above. A Morning Resolve, Forward Day by Day, inside front cover; Cincinnati, Ohio: Forward Movement. www.ForwardMovement.org.]

Cultivating Cheerfulness

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I will try this day to live a simple, sincere, and serene life, repelling promptly every thought of discontent, anxiety, discouragement, impurity, and self-seeking; cultivating cheerfulness, magnanimity, charity, and the habit of holy silence… [A Morning Resolve]

A good person, but not someone you’d want to go out for a beer with.

That’s most of the people I knew during my doctoral years at Princeton Seminary – faculty, administration, and students. There were notable exceptions, maybe 20% of the total population altogether. It isn’t as if the other 80% weren’t interesting, sincere, intelligent, or well-meaning: they were. It’s just that they weren’t particularly fun to be around outside a classroom. They were serious people with serious things to ponder and accomplish, and they had little time or patience for shared laughter and fun. Did I come across the same way?

As there were no classes on cultivating cheerfulness, and very few professors capable of teaching such a class if there had been, maybe a different kind of mentor was needed- someone who was comfortable enough in the non-academic world to help those who weren’t. It’s not just learning the social skills to talk with a wide range of people: it’s seeing in a stranger something of value, even before beginning a conversation. It’s knowing that there’s a whole wide world of fascinating people and ideas to explore, and being grateful for the opportunity to do so with whomever happens to be there at the time.

To lighten someone’s day, and to get a kick out of the world in general – that’s a spiritual gift worth cultivating.