"Meditation is the discovery that the point of life is always arrived at in the immediate moment.” – Alan Watts.
From where did Mother Theresa derive her enormous energy? The short answer is: from God.
But, if Mother Theresa drew (or, more accurately, received) her energy from God, why can't we? The answer is that we can.
Like others, I am forever using Mother Theresa as an example. She was not only a great Loving leader, she was and, in the eyes of many, a saint. But, to some, who didn't see her potential, she was a very unlikely possibility. Like, Gandhi, she was so diminutive that, at a glance, that you might miss her because you would look over her head.
She famously said that her mission was to care for "the poorest of the poor." This means that she committed her ministry of Love to caring for those who seemed totally without hope. In the practical terms of the world, many of those Theresa and her nuns looked after had only days or hours to live. No one else would bother with them. They were perhaps even lower, in the eyes of many, than "untouchables."
Theresa "followed Jesus into the slums," to use her words. How did she find the ability to express such great Love?
She found her answer through prayer and meditation. It was only in this way that she could discern her calling. She not only heard God speaking to her, but she heard so clearly and powerfully that, even when she doubted God, she never turned back from her mission.
The energy of prayer and meditation is that,through silence and self-care, we prepare ourselves to feel God's energy flowing in us and through us. Lovers know that God's energy lies within. They also know it needs constant nurturing and renewal.
We need to reflect, pray, meditate, lest our life be consumed lists & shallow transactions. We all need to find time to pull back in order to assure that our actions are informed by Love. Absent Love, our work, and therefore our life, loses meaning.
Prayer & reflection helps us gain perspective so that we may realign our life energy with God. These practices keep Lovers in touch with what Lincoln called "the better angels of our nature."
There is a great deal we can learn from Buddhist thinking about the energy of prayer and meditation and why it is essential to self-care. Buddhist thinking is not contrary to Christian thinking or the theology of any religion (except that it does not, as do some religions, preach violence.)
Siddhartha (6th century B.C.E.) recognized as the founder of Buddhism, wrote that "Meditation brings wisdom; lack of meditation leaves ignorance…choose the path that leads to wisdom."
Christian clergy have said similar things. Consider the wisdom of the Bishop Jeremy Taylor (1613-1667) who wrote: "Meditation is the tongue of the soul and the language of our spirit."
As caregivers, we can hear "the language of our spirit" in many ways: as we exercise, eat, experience art, serve another, or watch the world. But, it is when we are quiet – in prayer and silence, that we are most likely to hear most clearly the power of this fifth energy - to discover that "meditation is the tongue of the soul."
Mother Theresa discovered that. So have many others. So can we.
-Erie Chapman
Journal of Sacred Work 
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