It occurs to me…

More from Anne Lamott in Help, Thanks, Wow, this at the conclusion of the “Help” part:

“Praying ‘Help’ means that we ask Something give us courage to stop in our tracks, right where we are, and turn our fixation away from the Gordian knot of our problems.  We…turn our eyes to something else: to our feet on the sidewalk, to the middle distance, to the hills…someplace else, anything else.  Maybe this is a shift of only eight degrees, but it can be a miracle.

It may be one of those miracles where your heart sinks, because it thinks you have lost.  But in surrender you have won.”

I think Lamott has this about right.  Sometimes, until that “Help” request comes from within me, my insistence on doing things (cue up Sinatra) my way blinds me to any possible path or outcome other than the one developed in my head.    Merely (merely?) asking for “help” takes me away from that foolish thought just long enough to let some light in, as they say, through the crack.  In that sense, the miracle is not necessarily the ultimate outcome, but that I softened my hard-headedness just long enough to consider that I might possibly be wrong, or (I like this option better) at least that I may not know everything.

More on prayer from Anne Lamott in Help, Thanks, Wow:

“The response probably won’t be from God, in the sense of hearing a deep, grandfatherly voice, or via skywriting, on in the form of an LED-lit airplane aisle at your feet.  But the mail will come, or an e-mail, or the phone will ring; unfortunately, it might not be later today, ideally right after lunch, but you will hear back.  You will come to know.”

 “The response probably won’t be from God….”  No, but it will be OF God.  Too often I miss the answer to prayer because it is not my desired answer, not the answer I wanted, the answer I had hoped for.  It is easy to let prayer slip into what I call the vending machine mode – to pray for a particular outcome, result, or resolution, to push a particular button and then judge God’s responsiveness by what pops out of the chute — whether He delivers exactly what I prayed for.  On reflection, that seem a bit silly when petitioning an all-knowing God (and why pray to any other type?).  What comes to mind is a person on the street seeking handouts and deciding that today, he/she will ask for and accept a specific currency or coinage – say Friday is one dollar bill day.  If anyone offers a five, a ten, a twenty, or coins, it is rejected and returned.  A sandwich or something to drink, no way, that’s not what was asked for.  How crazy would that be?  Yet when the answer to my prayer comes from an unwanted source or takes a form not wholly consistent with my expectations….

More on prayer from Anne Lamott, Help, Thanks, Wow: The Three Essential Prayers:

“Most good, honest prayers remind me that I am not in charge, that I cannot fix anything, and that I open myself to being helped by something, some force, some friends, some something.  These prayers say, “Dear Some Something, I don’t know what I am doing.  I can’t see where I’m going.  I’m getting more lost, more afraid, more clenched.  Help., but something else isn’t.

These prayers acknowledge that I am clueless.”

There’s a theme here, I think, which I can pick up on if I dwell on it enough.  Not a theme that settles well within my “if you want it done right, do it yourself” self, but a theme nonetheless.

I am never too far from having a Radney Foster song rolling in my head.  This one popped in there today as a result of a conversation with a friend – from Half My Mistakes:

“…And if I had it all to do over

I’d prob’ly win and lost just as much

But I’d spend less time on the right and wrong

And a lot more time on the love”

That makes sense to me, but it occurs to me that there’s no need to wait on the “do over.” Now, particularly now, in these right and wrong, red or blue, with me or against me times, is a better time than any to start spending less time on right and wrong, and a lot more time on love .  And if I’m wrong, well, I don’t think much has been lost.

Right/Wrong/Love — Pick one.

In a circuitous way, I came upon this Thomas Merton prayer I have seen before, and it reminds me of the basic components of prayer – surrender, connection, and trust.

“My lord God, I have no idea where I am going.  I do not see the road ahead for me.  I cannot know for certain where it will end, nor do I really know myself, and that fact that I think I am following your will does not mean that I am actually doing so.”

You have to love any prayer that begins with “I have no idea where I am going,” which in its plain truth contains the surrender necessary in any good prayer.  And in case God did not get the surrender the first time, Merton lays it on more.  I don’t know where I am going.  I can’t see what’s ahead of me.  I don’t even know where the road ends.  In fact, now that I think about it I am not even sure of who I am or what I am doing.

Implicitly, Merton is saying (I have heard people do this) that he has tried to do this on his own, has finally recognized his own limitations, and is reaching out for help, making room for God to step in.

I wonder if all this part of the prayer could be shortened to a few words and a gesture?

[Flat-handed slap to the forehead] Duh!  Here I am again?

“And he was angry, and would not go in; therefore came his father out, and intreated him.  And he answering said to his father….”  Luke 15:28-29 KJV

Or, in Petersen’s The Message:

“The older brother stalked off in an angry sulk and refused to join in.  His father came out and tried to talk to him, but he wouldn’t listen.  The son said….”

In reading this I am reminded how easy it is to not do the right thing straight up.  Something happens, and for one reason or another, I miss the clue and do not immediately respond appropriately.  Here, the older brother could easily have joined the party, but it can be someone conveying a sadness I brush aside or don’t respond to, an explained wrong I ignore and move the conversation to something I want to talk about….  Luckily, when I miss the first prompt, there are almost always other opportunities to do the right thing, chances to circle back.  This is where pride can get in the way, and I can continue down my chosen path knowing that to go back is to admit my missing the opportunity the first time.

The downward spiral is obvious here.  How might things have been different had the elder son said: “Dad, you’re right.  I was being a bit foolish there.  Let’s go join the party?”

In this I am reminded of one of my favorite quotes, from Felix Frankfurter:  “Wisdom too often never comes, and so one ought not to reject it merely because it comes late.”

From Max Ehrmann’s Desiderata:

“Speak your truth quietly and clearly; and listen to others, even the dull and ignorant; they too have their story.”

Two things occur to me when reading this.  First, this passage recognizes the human tendency, when we want to be heard, to dial up speech a notch (or several) in loudness and in pitch – that is, we tend to get louder and more shrill.  On reflection, it seems apparent that while that strategy may make us more likely to be heard, it also might make us less likely to be listened to.  Second, the “even the dull and ignorant” part has always seemed arrogant to me.  But as I reflect on that I have to chuckle because my inclination to defend those “dull and ignorant” speakers reveals an assumption which is certainly incorrect – that the “dull and ignorant” are always “them” and never “me.”  So on second thought, yes, listen to the “dull and ignorant,” especially the dull and ignorant!

More song wisdom, this time from Keb Mo, Life is Beautiful:

“Life is beautiful, life is wonderous.

There’s a star above, shining just for us

Life is beautiful, on a stormy night

Somewhere in the world, the sun is shinin’ bright”

He’s right of course.  But damn, it is hard to see, to believe in that star, that sun, in the middle of the stormy night!  I just seem to have an inclination to, okay, a time-honed skill for, identifying the storm clouds.

Nose On the Grindstone 2

More advice from the Tyler Childers song – Nose On the Grindstone

Keep in mind that a mans just as good as his word.  It takes twice as long to build bridges you burn.

And there’s hurt you can cause time alone cannot heal.  Keep your nose on the grindstone and outta the pills.

Daddy I’ve been trying I just can’t catch a break.  There’s so much in this world I just can’t seem to shake.

But I remember your words, Lord they bring me the chills.  Keep your nose on the grindstone and outta the pills.

I particularly like the line: “It takes twice as long to build bridges you burn.”  It is rivaled only by the other advice to remember that “there’s hurt you can cause time alone cannot heal.”

There’s a lot to keep in mind in this journey we call life.

Nose On the Grindstone 1

I have been listening lately to a great song from Tyler Childers – Nose On the Grindstone.  The gist of the song is a son singing about the advice his father gave him.  There’s no new ground plowed here, but then that seems to be the point.  For as much as I try to make life complicated, and as much as it is, it occurs to me that the answers remain simple – if I let them be:

Daddy worked like a mule mining Pike County coal.  He messed up his back couldn’t work any more.

He said one of these days you’ll get out of these hills.  Keep your nose on the grindstone, and outta the pills.

See the ways of this world just bring you to tears.  Keep the Lord in your heart you’ll have nothing to fear.

Live the best that you can and don’t lie and don’t steal.  Keep your nose on the grindstone and outta the pills.