Category Archives: Decision making

an Epiphany

05 Tuesday Jan 2016

Posted by in Decision making, Motivational thought, Spirituality, Vocation

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According to some tradition, Christmas isn’t over yet. Today is the 11th day of Christmas. That song…”on the first day of Christmas my true love gave to me…” wasn’t just a randomly written folk song. In the orthodox liturgical calendar there are technically 12 days of Christmas – the first being Christmas day which is widely celebrated religiously, culturally, and commercially. The last day, the 12th day, marks the beginning of a liturgical season called Epiphany. In the greek language, the word epiphany means to reveal, to show, or to make manifest.

I love this word epiphany. Webster’s dictionary defines it as: a sudden, intuitive perception of or insight into the reality or essential meaning of something, usually initiated by some simple, homely, or commonplace occurrence or experience. It’s a striking definition considering I often spend a lot of time seeking or trying to gain insight into things. I love to read and research. I love to ponder things and contemplate life. Those who know me and spend time with me know me as someone who you’re not likely to have a casual conversation with. I’m always looking underneath the surface of things.

Lately, I’ve been reading a book about vocation, by Parker Palmer.  In Let Your Life Speak, Palmer writes, “If we are to live our lives fully and well, we must learn to embrace the opposites, to live in a creative tension between our limits and our potentials.” In my reading and reflection of his writing, and in examining my own gifts and vocation, I’ve come to terms with aspects of myself in ways that are both disturbing and relieving. I think we can spend a great deal of time trying to be things we are not. Or avoiding being who we are because of the limitations our gifts place upon us.

In my younger years, I was pretty much the same kind of girl I am now…I liked to read and write. I was quiet and focused. Sure, I had playful moments. I loved all the usual kid stuff…swimming, skateboarding, sledding, riding bikes…and I played just about every sport until I finally gave up softball in college. But if you put me in the house with a stack of books, I was good to go. I wasn’t a restless child, I didn’t need much company (well, I had three sisters so that was often enough!). My point is, in digging for “Who I am”…I’ve really just rediscovered who I’ve always been…. a writer. To write, requires one to sit still and focus on getting what’s in your head out onto paper…or the screen (as I’m doing now). To write also requires one to be comfortable with feeling stuck, and this odd feeling of nothingness that comes upon you. It’s akin to feeling, well, bored! But it’s in boredom’s finest moment that the muse shows up. Full of ideas. That emptying of yourself, and resisting the urge to fill the emptiness with some activity, gives my imagination the endless opportunity it desires to be filled. I know how to hold space, be present, make like a container and get filled.

So yay! I’m a writer. Vocational life crisis solved, right? Psssh. Except…coming to terms with oneself usually always means coming to terms with one’s whole self. My vocation is writing, and with it all the other mundane things I mentioned I’m really good at – being still, feeling empty, getting bored. And then new crisis emerges because none of this sounds like fun. Unless I shift my perspective and define fun based on what gives me pleasure, rather than what brings someone else pleasure.

And herein lies the Epiphany. Coming to terms with our gifts and our limitations may not always be a pleasant experience. Especially for those of us who pride ourselves in our ability to do anything or be anything. Though I often procrastinate and make excuses (would I truly be a writer if I didn’t?;) I typically do not like saying, “I can’t” do something. I like being capable and accomplished. I’m rewarded when I am able to perform tasks. And naturally, I love to be rewarded. Who doesn’t? But to get to the bottom of who we truly are, and what we are born to be and do in this world, we will have to come face to face with who we cannot be in this world. At first this meeting feels like defeat…but it passes. Like a dense fog lifting and then suddenly you see you are standing in the middle of a beautiful lavender field at sunset…sky above you stretching for miles…

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You’ve been standing in this field your entire life. You just didn’t realize it.

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Be fruitful people

19 Tuesday May 2015

Posted by in Decision making, Spirituality

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I was on a fast track. Everybody was telling me that I was a really talented TV producer. I can be really good at a lot of things, so I believed them. But this time (perhaps because being good at producing a TV show actually counted for something trackable on IMDB, and accumulated to real dollars in my bank account), I noticed I was also becoming really easily influenced by other people’s perceptions of me. I was getting too comfortable being what other people wanted me to be.

It’s a human thing. We need acceptance. And as children being accepted by family, and schoolmates, peers is how we develop our self-image and a healthy sense of self-esteem. Especially in our rewards-based educational system. When we do good, we are rewarded and consequently accepted. It’s how we learn to do life in our formative years.

But as you mature in the spiritual life, formation takes on a slightly different form. You begin to notice a distinction between Doing and Being. You may begin to sense that what you are good at doing is not quite the same as who you were created to be. And at a certain point along the road to spiritual self-discovery, you find yourself asking not, “What am I doing?” but, “Who am I being?” And God is drawing you to that question because our perceived ideas about who we are that are based on what we do, the role we play in this world, hinder our ability to become who God intends us to be.

This does not mean you can’t enjoy what you do. I enjoy producing. I enjoy the role I play on set, directing talent, developing stories. It’s good, mostly clean, fun. So when I started to ask myself, “Who am I being?”, I was very aware that I was good at what I was doing, and set no intention to never do what I do as a producer again.  I wasn’t leaving behind a life, I was just letting it go for a moment. It wasn’t a “Bye Felicia”, it was an act of surrender in response to the invitation of God I felt impressing itself upon my heart.

The aim of the spiritual life is to be released from an overattachment, or overidentification with our roles (ie. what I do); and free to identify with who we are in the Spirit. And when God has a vision and purpose for your life, from time to time, he may stop the clock, slow us down…giving us the opportunity to realign ourselves with the truth of who we are in God. And I trust this process.  So much so that I’m starting to envision what I will produce when I get back in the game. I imagine it may somehow be more authentic, more honest, more brave.

Jesus said, we will be known by our fruits. Which implies that first, we must know our roots.

He also once shared a parable to his disciples…it was about a barren fig tree. And I love this parable because it shows us how we can still be alive, with dried up fruit…or alive and not bearing any fruit at all…

“A man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard, and he came seeking fruit on it and found none.  And he said to the vinedresser, ‘Look, for three years now I have come seeking fruit on this fig tree, and I find none. Cut it down. Why should it use up the ground?’ And he answered him, ‘Sir, let it alone this year also, until I dig around it and put on manure.  Then if it should bear fruit next year, well and good; but if not, you can cut it down.'” Luke 13:6-9

This is the spiritual life. You begin to notice a dryness. You ignore it. Until one day, someone comes looking for your fruit. And you remember what you were created for. And you begin to pay attention to the tree. You remember, there’s still life in you. You start to dig around inside, you begin to excavate your soul. It is not easy work. But with every diligent and intentional act of care and kindness you offer yourself, the truth of who you are is revealed. With persistence and courage, you find the joy, you find the fruitful life you were determined to rediscover. Then you begin to produce what you were created to produce.

Go where the peace is

12 Tuesday May 2015

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There’s a misconception about peace. We tend to believe that being at peace means the absence of discomfort, but it’s actually quite the opposite. Our inclination towards being comfortable can mislead us. In reality, God most often leads us to places fraught with challenges because this is how we grow in love.  And what God wants most for us is to be equal to God in Love.

The spiritual life is a journey. We’re all headed somewhere. And like any journey, along the way, there will be danger, doubt, confusion, feelings of being alone, mixed with moments of sheer joy. It is easy to become consumed by what happens to us along the way and distracted from seeing instead, what is happening within us, and what God is becoming for us.

Seeing life through a spiritual lens involves changing our perception of who we are and who God is for us.  And it takes work. Mostly because the first thing we see clearly when we put on our spiritual glasses are the false truths we tell ourselves. We see how we actually prefer the distractions because the way we are accustomed to seeing is more comforting to us than the hard work and discomfort of transformation. Yet it is in this way, that we also begin to see that the peace that God desires for us, offers us a different sort of freedom. Not freedom from trouble or discomfort, but freedom from our own illusions –  that God is not present, at work within us, walking before us, whispering behind us. The greatest illusion is that we are alone, that we could actually drift beyond God’s reach.

This is not an easy shift in perception. But the shift does comes about slowly through a practiced, intentional effort to align ourselves with seeing through a spiritual lens. Contemplative prayer (or meditation) helps to re-align the way we see. As we sit, the mind shows us all kinds of thoughts and worries, even bright ideas. These thoughts will never go away…and that is not the goal of quiet prayer. Resting in Presence teaches you that while everything goes on around you, within you there is a place that is still and quiet, a place that exists beyond our thought world, a place where peace exists within us, regardless of what’s going on around us. We may only access that peace for a few seconds here or there when we first begin to practice. But over time, we will learn to find our way to that place with more frequency, not through any effort or will of our own, but by gently responding to God’s invitation to come and stay a little longer this time.

a chance to be God

21 Tuesday Jan 2014

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I think at our core we know, we do not choose everything. And it’s unnerving in a world where there’s so much choice, that there are some things beyond our control. It’s often when we resist the flow, that struggle happens. This can be a good experience. Because it’s as though our lessons were built into our failures by design. Our failure to let go produces angst, discomfort, tension, suffering. This is okay too. In fact, this is our privilege of being human. That we can choose to go against the flow, against nature. We can will our way to power…perhaps only to learn the cost. Being God ain’t easy. But we get a chance at it. We’re trusted to do our best with it. We experience grace, forgiveness, love. All the riches of life.