"forever hushed..."

"And echoes
in the sound,
of silence..."

I wrote about this experience in a post from 2006. Having just revisited that post, I realized how much clearer its message is for me today. There is a sound to peace. It is a sound that overarches the noise of pain and fear. It is the  "Sound of Silence."  I hope you enjoy this Pentatonix version of Simon and Garfunkel's classic.

Here is, what I hope will be, a more concise version of this experience:

The routine was the same. Pick the girls up from preschool. Drive home while they stripped themselves of shoes, socks, sweaters. Arrive home. Open the door of the van. Watch them run in the back door. Gather shoes, socks, sweaters, books, totes. Find them in the kitchen, banging their sippy cups on the counter next to the refrigerator while screaming, "I want juice, I'm thirsty, give me juice." Over, and over, again. Day after day.

And I would drop everything, and get them juice.

Until one day, I stood in the kitchen looking at them and thought, "why don't they just get their own darned juice?" Good question. So I just stood there. I didn't rush to get them what they wanted, but just watched what was happening. And it occurred to me - quite quickly - that they were only screaming because they knew that they didn't have the authority - or the strength - to open the refrigerator, hold the heavy pitcher, and pour the juice without spilling it. They knew that I did, and they were trying to convince me to do what they wanted me to do.

They weren't screaming because they had power, but because they felt powerless.

So, I took a deep breath and said, "Girls, put down your sippy cups, put your shoes and socks in the mud room, hang your sweaters and backpacks on the hooks, go potty, wash your hands and come back downstairs, and I will get you juice. And they did it. Just like that.

As I stood there -- somewhat in shock -- I just knew this was a more profound insight for me, than how to manage our after school routine.

I had been in pain for days. A voice had been screaming in my head, "I am in so much pain, I cannot think." Over and over again. But all the while, I had been thinking. It hadn't been able to stop me. I had been thinking. I had been loving. I had been reading, and praying, and helping others.

It was as much a helpless, incoherent sound as the girls' urgent screaming had been. It was simply trying to get me to give up, lie down, go to sleep -- or worse. But, it couldn't make me do those things. It could only try to convince me to do those things myself. And I had been refusing -- but barely.

When I saw that pain -- and for that matter, fear -- were not powers, but powerless voices, I stopped thinking that they had information for me. They were sounds, rather than conditions. They were not informants.  They didn't have some underlying meaning about my life, my body.  They were not leading me to a "why."

With this realization, I began to stand up to them in a different way. I no longer felt bullied. I could look at each situation with dominion. I was not a victim of the noise. The noise had no authority. No embodied entity to push me around.

That experience happened almost twenty years ago. It has been a milestone in my understanding of the insidious nature of pain and fear. These passages - among many - from Mary Baker Eddy's Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures have been the edifying authority in my understanding of how to silence their inarticulate voices:

"It requires courage to utter truth; for the higher Truth lifts her voice, the louder will error scream, until its inarticulate sound is forever silenced in oblivion."

and

"Spirit will ultimately claim its own, — all that really is, — and the voices of physical sense will be forever hushed."

Truth -- not Kate thinking about Truth --  is lifting her voice with supreme command and declaring: "God is All-in-all." And in the face of Truth's authority, the inarticulate sound of pain, fear, doubt is forever silenced in its own oblivion. Love hushes the screaming of the physical senses, and peace is forever Sovereign.

offered with Love,

Cate 

"falling in love with You..."

"take my hand,

take my whole life too.
for I can't help
falling in love with You..."

I want to tell the great love story of my life tonight. Pentatonix touching version of, "I Can't Help Falling in Love" is the perfect musical backdrop.

I love falling in love. But I also love staying in love. I have never wanted anything but the deep and lasting kind of love. The love that never wanes, but only grows fuller with time.

I have been blessed with just a few great loves in my life - my list is short, but none have been casual or insignificant.

One of the things that I have learned, is that love changes you. Love is a power. It refuses to be contained or localized. You cannot love, without having the boundaries of your heart enlarged. Love dissolves all of the rigid outlines that we impose upon ourselves. "I can love this, but not that." "I am this kind of person." "I could never do that."

But losing in love has also changed me. Each time I have felt my heart break, I have turned to God for wisdom, guidance, strength, courage -- and for comfort.

Then one morning, when my heart felt shattered - again, I opened my Bible to this passage from Revelation -- and yes, it was a revelation:

"Unto the angel of the church of Ephesus write;
I know thy works, and thy labour, and thy patience,
and how thou canst not bear them which are evil:
And hast borne, and hast patience,
and for my name’s sake hast laboured,
and hast not fainted.

Nevertheless I have somewhat against thee,
because thou hast left thy first love..." 

I had been using God, to help me through each of my relationship struggles. But in that moment, I realized that I'd had it all upside down and backwards. I could suddenly see that the love I was seeking most -- the infinite, eternal, enduring kind -- would only be found by using each and every relationship, as an opportunity to deepen my relationship with my first love -- not to get, keep, or fix my relationship with others.

Love is a funny thing. When we are in love with someone, we think of them all the time. We long for any amount of time - that we might steal away with them. What they love, becomes our own love. Because the object of our affection enjoys skiing, we try to ski -- even though we really, really don't like hanging out in the cold.

When we love someone, we find ourselves wanting to do what made no human sense - only moments before. We actually find ourselves wanting to give up the right to self-indulgence, for shared responsibility. We long to do something as self-sacrificing as having children -- the ultimate exercise in self-denial. Then, through our love for those sweet children, we open our hearts to their friends, interests, school community -- the worlds they live, work, and play in.

When I fell back in love with my first love -- God, I was naturally more in love with His children, His world of ideas, His glorious creation.  The good that He delights in, became my great delight.  The Truth that occupies His Mind, filled me.

And when I trusted that this "first love" was the core influence in the heart of every one of his children, my relationships with others ceased to be my obsession, but became the opportunity that I was always looking for, in order to spend time more with my first love. I stopped using God to improve or repair my relationships, but used those relationships to deepen my love for Him/Her.  My time with my first love, became the most wonderful part of my days and nights.

Just a glimpse into my greatest love story.

offered with Love,

Kate