here & now

"Though we see the same world, we see it through different eyes." ~ Virginia Woolf

I find with age, that it is increasingly harder to pay attention to what is in front of me, to be in the moment that I am in currently.  This was my vow for 33.  That I would live in the here and now.  And yet I often find myself ruminating on tomorrow, wondering what the next five years hold, worried about what they might not.  I often spend time pondering the "what ifs" torturous and glorious as they may be.  Sometimes they are things I don't even put words to, rather I toss images around in my head and sit with them for a moment and then release them just as quickly before they can become a real, tangible thought or prayer.

Early in the summer season, I am reminded with deep gratitude that I am walking into a time and space where I feel more free to be in the here and now.  I can stay in the present and fully address what is right in front of me, because this sacred season allows me to.  I am drunk on summer and the restriction free days.  And yet it too is overwhelming for in these long summer days I have the freedom to go to places that the distracted days of fall, winter and spring shield me from.  Summer is where I begin to let my guard down and find a place where I can once again begin to unfold the true self and shed the false outer layers of she who protects me from a cruel and at times frightening world.

You see, the version of myself that I bring to the table in those other 10 months of the year feels like someone quite different than who I really am and find myself to be in space and time the summer season gifts me.  In more constricted and obligatory times I often find I have to pretend to make it through.  I wear the masks that make it okay for me to live and participate in the real world.  This person, this false self, at times a stranger to me, and other times the most intimate of beings, I find needs things that the truer parts of me (the Imago Dei) do not demand when I am able to detach and simply be in the here and now of a quieter, less busy, ultimately safer place.

In summer I am fortunate to find myself taking longer walks, sitting near the roar of the Pacific, venturing to new places, moving at a pace better suited to my heart and soul, writing and reading as many words as I can, living sublimely in the comfort and love of my God.  And I wonder...how do I bring a little bit more of this into the other 10 months of my year...where I can truly be in the here and now without as great of a struggle and pain?

I am old enough and wise enough now to realize I cannot encapsulate this perfection into every moment of my life.  Those other 10 months of the year that demand and expect so much of me, also grow me in ways, stretch and challenge me to do good and hard things, to be others minded in a much more perceptible way than I can be in the beauty and quiet of the summer season. And for that I am grateful.  But as I unwind from the whirlwind, I find that parts of me are wounded and broken that I had not realized because I was hardly in the here and now to see and know and tend to what was really going on.

As I reflected over the last few weeks, I realized where the struggle is rooted in.  So much of this discovery is rooted in my study and understanding of the Enneagram (a post on that journey for another time) but what I uncovered is that so much of life in the real world, in my current job, and even in certain relationships demands that I defend my worth.  The struggle there is that my worth is tied to the wrong things, yet they are the things that most everyone else would say determines the value of a person.  Therefore, ten months out of the year it is as if my worth is under attack.  And while some do not intend to, they do make certain ideas and outcomes the true measure of the worth and value of your entire person.  Before I realized all the false things I tied my worth too, I realized that I had become extremely fatalistic in my outlook on things and people and life in general.  Everything became an "oh well, this is just how it is going to be."  I was defeated because I didn't feel like I could/can really defend my worth or the worth of others for that matter if our worth is tied to such shaky things.  Worst of all, I stopped searching for God's healing, grace and mercy in all of this, because it was hard to stay present in it.  Instead I just believed this is how it is, and this is how it will be.

To cope with such ideas, I turned to the quick fixes, all of which, of course are more damaging and ultimately dragged me to lower levels of shame; my worth completely under attack not only by the world, but also by my own hand.

It's funny, so many of whom I work with, those I live and do life with, don't see much of any of this the same way that I do.  Hence, the Woolf quote at the top of this post, we experience the same world, but our experiences of it are quite unique, just as our view of our own selves and one another tend to differ.  I am grateful for these other eyes that see the world in different ways, however, it doesn't necessarily shift my own views, perspective, ideas about of all it in any automatic way.

Instead, I find myself returning to where 2017 began.  To believe. As I breathe and be...as I live in the here and now, I really begin to again confront that which my belief is rooted in.  What do I believe about God?  What do I believe about myself in relation to Him? What do I believe about myself as human being who has worth and value?  What do I believe about the worth and value of others?  And the answers that come about to these questions determines precisely what I am fighting and living for every day.

So,  I thank the Lord for the summer season.  More specifically, for the opportunity to explore, question, renew, discover and simply be in the here and now.