It occurs to me…

“What good is it, my brothers, if a man claims to have faith but has no deeds.”  James 2:14

This got me to thinking today.  In this time of sheltering in place and social distancing and virtual church…. it is even easier for faith to become mental, not physical, for faith to be a noun, not a verb.  As noted in James, faith blooms through action, and I don’t know about you, but in my pandemic world action is in shorter supply.  It occurs to me that this is the risk, at least a risk, the risk that because my deeds can’t take their usual form, they just stop even though the needs they address are still there.  If I don’t have a gym to go to I’ll just stop exercising.  What I recognize, in glimpses of enlightenment, is that some adaptation is needed – that I need to ditch “normal” and step into the unease of abnormal (though some would say I have lived there comfortably for years).  Going to church needs to take on some other form and those needs need to be met some other way.  Lunch with a friend who needs to talk (or lunch with me who needs to talk) ain’t gonna happen and will need a substitute.  That Friday morning men’s bible study will need to become virtual for now.  And of course, some needs will be unmasked as unneeded.   Onward.

“Experience is a hard teacher because she gives the test first, the lesson after.”  Vernon Law

This seems unfair, but thinking back on my experience in test taking at school, getting the lessons first provided me a mass of information, only some of which could be learned, remembered, or mastered when the test rolled around, and only very little of which (but I didn’t know which) was needed for the test.  But in taking the test first, I am (if I am paying attention) being told the information that is important, I am provided the outline of that information which is needed to ace the test.  And, mercifully, there will be more tests.

I stumbled across a new word recently – bodhichitta.   According to Pema Chodron, this is a Sanskrit word meaning a noble or awakened heart.  Digging deeper, it seems to be a word of broad meaning depending on its use (which seems circular).  The etymology indicates the word derives from “bodhi” which can be read as awake, enlightened, or completely open, and “chitta” which translates to mind, heart, or attitude.  So bodhichitta = an awakened, enlightened, or completely open mind, heart, or attitude.

Several things come to mind immediately.  They run from Socrates’ “An unexamined life is not worth living” to the “renewing of the mind” in Romans 12:2, and on to the currently popular word – “woke.”

You’d think that after more than 2,500 years (not personally, or course) of listening to and pondering this concept it would have sunk it a bit more into our collective psyche and be fairly well ingrained in not only our thinking but in our action – but here we are, here I am.  Thankfully, the words and concepts are still there, and there is still time for examining, awakening, enlightening, renewing, and waking.

We all have those days.  Yesterday was one.  A lazy Monday afternoon, life plodding along more or less as expected, an email from a client, and suddenly an “all hands on deck” fire drill to address an issue.  After the “fire” was out and I had a chance to catch my breath, the line from Baz Luhrmann’s Sunscreen came to mind (except it was Monday, not Tuesday): “Don’t worry about the future, or worry, but know that worrying is as effective as trying to solve an algebra equation by chewing bubble gum.   The real troubles in life are apt to be things that never cross your worried mind.  The kind that blindside you at 4:00 p.m. on some idle Tuesday.”

On reflection, it becomes clear that yesterday’s “fire drill” was handled using knowledge and skills developed in handling many similar ones.  Moreover, I did so while in my fourth month of working at home in the midst of a pandemic that finds me owning several of those masks I used to occasionally see someone wearing in an airport – and scoff at.

What came to mind on further reflection is that at some point along the way I might just come to realize that the “fire drill” is not the oddity so much as the lazy Monday afternoon. Its not that we all have those days.  We all have those lives.

“Many are the plans in a man’s heart, but it is the Lord’s purpose that prevails.”  Proverbs 19:21

Can’t I at least get an agenda?  An Outlook calendar invite?  A Zoom meeting notice?

A friend pointed me to a song recently – Wildfire, by Mandolin Orange – it’s worth a listen.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r9jwGansp1E

Anyway, amongst all the lyrics jumping out of that song and grabbing my attention, one seemed to jump the highest, and stick in my head:

“It should have been different,

it should have been easy,

but pride has a way of holding too firm to history.”

That last part, “pride has a way of holding too firm to history” is what caught my attention as a truth.  It is indeed easy to hold onto some thing, some thought, some idea that has nestled in my head over time and lose sight of the possibility that that thing, thought, idea might mean something entirely different to someone else.  On this serious topic, oddly (though “song jumping” is pretty normal for me) what comes to mind are some of the line’s in Brad Paisley’s I’m Still a Guy

“When you see a deer you see Bambi, I see antlers hung on a wall

When you see a lake you think picnics, and I see a largemouth under that log”

Though perhaps my favorite line from that is this:

“You see a classic French painting, I see a drunk, naked girl.”

All that is a long way around to circling back to “pride has a way of holding too firm to history.”  It is easy, way too easy, to believe that my interpretations of history, and the feelings I have about them, are the only ones, or at least the correct ones.  Way too easy!

Funny how the mind works.

So my phone rings at 9:52 last night, late even for west coast clients.  A glance tells me it is not a call from one of the kids, or from anyone else in my address book as my phone doesn’t recognize the number.  All that data suggests that I let it ring.  But it is a local number, and my phone does not give me the “Telemarketer” or “Spam Call” indicator that someone is wanting to sell me something, convince me to vote for someone, or take a survey.  And who would call this late anyway unless they needed to reach  me.  Still, three rings and three seconds into it, the decision is made – do not answer.  If it is a legitimate call for me I’ll get a message, and if it is a wrong number, she’ll hang up.

I say “she” because my phone tells me there is a message, and on checking it the caller was, by quality and character of voice, as well as content, an elderly woman.  She leaves this message:

“I’m sorry.  I was calling my grandson and I dialed the wrong number.  Thank you.”

So all is right in the world.  No calamity I need to address, no troubled soul for me to listen to, no child of mine broke down on the side of the road, or worse.  But as I go to erase any evidence that the call or message ever came, my mind engages further.  Who listens to a phone message, and knowing they made a mistake, instead of hanging up quickly, leaves a message expressing regret and seeking forgiveness for dialing a wrong number?  Well, SHE does.  The word that pops into my mind, though it is not quite the right word, is “kindness.”  Then my mind engages further.  “All is right in MY world.  I, me, mine.  Funny how the mind works.  It then occurs to me – why was SHE making a call so late?  Is everything okay in HER world?  HER GRANDSON’S?  I mean, she didn’t sound panicked or particularly troubled in message, but why was she calling so late?

Though I have the phone number that could provide the answer to these questions, that would be a weird call, even creepy.  Still, I purposefully say a prayer of thanksgiving for well-being, for enlightenment, and for her and her grandson.

Funny how the mind works.

Photo taken a few years back; recently came upon the poem.

Wandering through a book of quotations I came across these two:

“A huge percentage of the stuff that I tend to be automatically certain of is, it turns out, totally wrong and deluded.”  David Foster Wallace

“It is the customary fate of new truths to begin as heresies and end up as superstitions.”  T.H. Huxley

It occurs to me that those help explain our (presumptuous, I know) collective anxiety in these pandemic times as we are being shown with glaring clarity how “wrong and deluded” we have been on some of our “certainties,”  (e.g. I have to hop on a plane and fly cross country to be at that meeting), how easily “heresies” (e.g. working from home) can become “normal” on their way to becoming (?) superstitions.  Did we ever really “need” the handshake?  Spectator sports?  Music concerts?….

Interesting times, for sure.

A good first step in the direction of humility, and, well, toward many things:

“Everyone you will ever meet knows something you don’t.”  Bill Nye, the science guy

It occurs to me that this is just further proof that we all have something to add to the conversation, but of course that requires listening.  (Damn, there’s always a catch!)