Journal of Sacred Work

Today’s meditation was written by Cathy Self, Senior Vice President for the Baptist Healing Trust.

"Life is both sides and ongoing. Life is always and all ways."  – Michael Brown

     "The path into an authentically joyful life experience is only possible when we embrace every single experience that life has to offer. Joy stems from embracing the beauty, the fragrance, and the thorns of life," suggests Michael Brown, author of The Presence Process. His words came to mind as I read in this week’s journal Erie Chapman’s writing and others’ thoughts about finding our immovable center. Brown talks about embracing every moment, no matter how rough or difficult as the key to experiencing integration. In fact, embracing every moment offers the opportunity to see and accept every expression of life as a manifestation of Love, whether the rose petal or the thorn. I don’t think this implies that life is meant to be easy – tears will still flow, pain will still be sharp and dull and intense; the prick of the thorn may be sudden, or unrelenting. But perhaps the thorn can teach, remind, and sometimes not so gently cause us to slow down. I wonder if those who seem to have found their immovable center are the ones who have courageously found a way to welcome the thorn into their lives along with the beauty and fragrance of its rose?

     I lived for a while with a painful and life-impacting disease that has since loosed its grip on my body. Even so, I do not really know what it means to live daily with pain, physical or otherwise, over the course of a lifetime. I cannot fully grasp what it means to be homeless or destitute or alone. I am still mobile and can, most of the time, decide for myself what I choose to eat or when I will sleep and where. This past week I spent time with people who do not have those choices. They live now in a place that is not their own, eat what is placed before them, and are not free to walk out into the sunshine without someone else to either take them there or walk in close proximity. Some might say their lives are filled with many thorns and very little beauty. But what I saw were eyes that sparkled and smiles that warmed me to the core.

     I saw people much older than I, many in wheelchairs, some using walkers, all moving slowly and carefully through the room. As one moved from her chair across to a nearby sofa she paused to look carefully at each person she passed, occasionally with a spoken hello or just a smile, and to some with an outreached hand. Her gait was halting, her posture stooped, and the joints of her hands looked inflamed and, I guessed, must have been painful. Each movement seemed to require that she stop to think first, to plan her next step, to move carefully. We chatted for a few moments, she and I, she inquiring about my life, me wishing I could ease the discomforts that cannot not be eased. Her response was to simply say "pain is one of my constant companions now, and it just means I get to move through life paying a little closer attention than I used to."

     Michael Brown makes this astute observation: "Just because a rose has thorns does not mean that it needs to be fixed! The thorns tell us that all beauty in this creation is to be handled with love, care, attention, and the respect inherent in the present moment." Whether in a moment of sweet fragrance or moments of deep sadness or pain, we have the gift of that moment and what it may have to teach us. Life, as Love, is all sides and ongoing, all ways and always. In that center, may we be immovable.