"Be here now..."

"Be here now.
No other place to be.
All the doubts that linger,
just set them free.

Let good things happen.
Just let them come --
into every moment,
like the rising sun..."

 There is something so peaceful about Mason Jenning's "Be Here Now." It reminds us that there is really no other place we can be, but here...now.

But how many hours have I wasted thinking "if only." If only I could be "there," then I would be happy. If only I could be back in a time "when," then I could make changes that would have brought healing. If only I could fast forward and know what was coming, then I could relax and be at peace with things as they are today.

But I clearly remember the day I realized that every one of those hours spent anywhere but here, and now, was time spent focused on something besides God.

God's name -- the only name He give Himself (excuse the gender assigment) is "I AM." So for me to let my thoughts dwell anywhere but in the "I AM" of being -- I am here, I am now -- is to feel separate from God. To feel separate from love, beauty, peace, goodness, grace.

I've spent way too many hours wondering "if only." Wanting to go back and make different choices, live in a different place where I'd have different choices, chase a future where the choices are boundless. But it's all fruitless. I am here. I exist now. This is the truth.

Mary Baker Eddy says, in Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures:

"The spiritual sense of truth must be gained,
before Truth can be understood."

 For me, this says, that until I understand the presence and power of God -- operating as the only Cause and Creator of my life - as it is right here, and right now -- I will never find God, Truth, anywhere else...ever.

Sobering, and beautiful.   At least for me.

Shared with love,

Kate

"...release from things of time and place..."

"So far Away…
Doesn't anybody stay in one place anymore?
It would be so fine to see your face at my door
Doesn't help to know that you're just time away
Long ago I reached for you, and there you stood
Holding you again could only do me good
How I wish I could, but you're so far away…"
- Carole King

I've just returned from Africa…24,000 miles in ten days…almost four days, or 50+ hours of it "en route" from here to there...and back again.  That means I only spent 6+ days with the one (and only) reason for my travel…my daughter, Hannah.  And what a glorious, wonderful almost-week it was, just being with her…seeing her laugh, interact with her family and friends, eat, sleep, breathe.  Any mother reading this will understand…just staring at her while she sleeps, giggles or speaks is food for the heart.

But this trip, without my even realizing it ahead of time, was such an opportunity for a significant healing in my own heart. 

Those who know me are well aware of how geographically driven I am.  Place is paramount to my feeling of home, peace, joy.  I have let geography define my level of content for longer than I wish to admit.  Place me on the edge of the sea or on the porch of my cabin at camp high in the Rocky Mountains with the sound of a stream and hummingbirds whirring…and I am serene.  The alternative is not always the case.  I have a tendency to list (for those of you who are sailors...this means to lean) in the direction of the sea or the mountains and am rarely quite "in my own skin" when I am "stuck" in the Midwest…which happens to be where I currently reside.  This is not always good for those around me…and it leaves me feeling dissatisfied and unhappy,  always waiting for the chance to break free and "get home".

But this summer it occurred to me that if I was spiritual, I was not psychological, chemical, chronological…or geographical-ly-driven or defined.  I was spiritual, therefore I was myself…the full reflection of divine peace, creativity, strength, joy, fullness of being…everywhere.

This idea of not being defined geographically is more of a stretch for me than knowing and living out from being not chemical.  I was happy to give up being defined by what food I was eating or whether I used a particular cream or conditioner...piece of cake.  But seeing myself as complete and whole no matter where I was...this was hard.  It felt like once I gave in to this concept I might have to consent...on some deeper level...to the possibility of never "going home"...and whenever I did this I would feel paralyzed and hopeless.  

But if there was ever a summer to discover the truth of this Truth, this was the one.  My husband was going to be at home in St. Louis, we had a daughter on the west coast, a son on the east coast, the twins were going to be in Colorado, then Maine, then Missouri at different camps, and my beloved Hannah was in South Africa….and I would only be in Colorado for the first two months of summer instead of staying there after camp as planned earlier this Spring…had we relocated as expected.  Plans that changed once the girls decided that they wanted to continue at their St. Louis school for another year.  Add to this equation my deep desire to see Hannah who was half-a-world (literally) away, and you can see that I was being bombarded by "things of time and space"

The suggestion that geography could push and pull at my well-being and happiness had never been more insidious.

My husband was an angel.  He made the distance between us seem like nothing when he hopped into a friend's car at the last minute one evening  to help her drive the 16 hours to camp just so he could spend 16 hours with me before catching a plane back to St. Louis the next day. 

He then booked a flight for me to go to see Hannah before hopping on another plane to fly out to Colorado just to get in the car and help me make the drive back to St. Louis from camp....whew...

Emails and express-mail care packages to the girls at camp helped me feel closer to them even though we were thousands of miles apart, but it was actually facing my fear of flying that lifted the veil of darkness on my sense of who I am as a spiritual, rather than a geographical, being.

There were so many spiritual truths that shored up the foundations of courage and strength in me…but the one that I kept going back to was one that helped me let go of our move to Colorado when it became clear that we were to stay in St. Louis.  It was simply that as a spiritual being, a verb, there was nothing vital that I could do in Colorado that I couldn't do in St. Louis…I could love, I could pray, I could respond to the needs of others, and I could mother, nurse, nurture, appreciate, and reflect…wherever I was.

As the day of departure got closer I thought about how I could express consistency of being…as I embarked on a 24,000 mile journey. 

I refused to see this trip as an event.  I refused to buy new clothes, travel toys, or entertainment.  I knew how I liked to spend my day…reading, studying, praying, knitting…I would BE myself consistently…at 40,000 feet or at sea level…in Africa, Colorado. St. Louis or high above Namibia.

There are so many stories to share, but suffice it to say that I ended each transatlantic leg of my (according to the pilot) "longest non-stop flight in the world" rested (although I didn't sleep), inspired, and ready to continue my journey towards self-discovery, an awakening to being spiritual rather than geographical.  

My days were wonderfully, consistently…me.  I loved my daughter and her family, I read, studied, prayed, listened to new friends talk about the things they care about, and shared my love for their ideas…and I felt as close to my family in the States as I did to Hannah each day.

I love Africa and I loved my adventure there…but not because it was Africa, but because I learned that I am me…constistently me…no matter where I am. 

There are so many more stories from this summer…but this is today's.

"The outward symbols dissapear
From him whose inward sight is clear…"

Symbols of latitude and longitude, compass points, and landmarks do not define us…we are defined and driven by...grounded and at peace in...our relationship with God…consistently, persistently and eternally.

"And know through God's exceeding grace
Release from things of time and place."
-John Greenleaf Whittier

with love...
Kate

Being a Verb

Four weeks ago on an early Spring Friday night we found ourselves sitting in the back of a packed college auditorium waiting to hear one of the freshest political voices of the decade. 

Barak Obama found his way to the podium as students, faculty, administrators and guests gave him a rousing ovation in obvious  admiration for his already strong legacy of thoughtful choices and decisions as a freshman Senator.

He "had me at hello"...smart, humble, clear, concise....thoughtful, purpose-driven and generous...a social advocate of the highest caliber I was ready to offer my services -  in advance -  of a 2008 bid for the presidency.

His statement on holding national office rang true with what we were experiencing of his candor and irreverence for pomp and circumstance when he said, "I don't care about the title of Senator...I don't want to be something, I want to do something."   I sat back in my very comfortable auditorium chair and had to fight to stay engaged in what he was saying...rather than spin off into my own orbit of self-examination....so I took out my PDA  and pulled up a blank memo to capture that sentence for digesting later, and went back to listening to one of the most riveting hours of nonpolitical musing on the state of education in this country that I, as a  former teacher and school principal, had heard in a long time...but more on that in another blog.

In going back over, what became, a long list of bulleted "quotes" from that evening later that weekend, I again was stopped in my tracks by his statement that in essence said,  "I'm not seeking to be something, but to do something..."

I have long been focused on the difference between living my life as a verb, rather than a noun.  But Obama's comments demanded that I revisit how effectively I have been letting my own life articulate that philosophy. 

For most of my adult life I was all about the nouns...or at least thought I was.  I needed a child so I could be a mother, I wanted to be published so I could call myself a writer, I wanted a classroom and a group of students assigned to me for nine months... so that I could see myself as a teacher...you get the picture...without the permission of a noun (the right...or any for that matter ... person, place or thing) I was not validated. 

My journey out of this noun-based thinking came through what Mary Baker Eddy refers to as the "stress of circumstances"....

In 1988, after years of longing and praying (while both single and married) to be a mom, I was finally blessed with some hope that my dreams would be coming true.  My husband and I were asked to adopt an unborn infant.  I would soon be a mom.  I had waited for so long for a baby so that I could begin my adventure into the inner sanctum of mothering, what I knew was my native land, indigenous culture, and first language...mommydom...filled with lullabies, chocolate chip cookies, and Babygap.   I had helped my parents (and later my widowed mom) raise my seven younger brothers and sisters and I knew I could do it...I had the skillset and the long playlist of lullabies in my toolbelt to get me started, and as a former elementary school teacher and principal, I knew kids.  All I needed was a baby (noun) and I was good to go.   Now it looked like I was finally going to get my chance to be a mom (noun).

After our son was born, I enjoyed some wonderful days of bliss with him before it became clear that his birthmother was reconsidering her surrender and although it took quite a long time for her questioning to become conviction, my peace of mind was shattered with her first indication of uncertainty.  How could I go back to NOT being a mother? 

Since this is a blog and not a novel (and you can always call or e-mail and ask for specific details if you are so inclined...it's a healing that I never get tired of sharing) suffice it to say she did finally decide to parent "our" son herself and I learned some valuable (more so than I could ever have imagined at the time) lessons on the importance of being able to  "surrender" (verb) in the office of motherhood.

My healing essentially came when I ceased to think that I was waiting for a baby (noun) to mother (verb).  To "mother" is a verb.  It includes expressing the qualities of care, order, nurture, affection, support, joy, attentiveness, etc.  Being the expression of these qualities is active...not passive.  You can do it anytime, anywhere, with anyone....it doesn't require a person place or thing to validate it's right to be.  To "mother" is to be a verb...qualities in action.  I didn't need to wait to DO it...and in fact it was exercising my right to "mother" (verb) that brought forth the child (noun)....not the other way around (and that truly is another story). 

I now share the mothering of our four daughters and one son with their birthmothers, their fathers, their step mothers and fathers, their partners, aunts, uncles, grandparents (birth and step), teachers,  coaches, camp counselors, bunkhouse moms....the world family.  

With the realization that being a verb was life...a whole world of opportunities and possibilities opened up before me.  I stopped waiting to get published before I thought of myself as a writer...I was, and am, a writer because I WRITE (verb) and always have written... voraciously...and suddenly I found that I was being published....often!

I ceased to wait until we owned a house (noun) in the right location (noun) before I would invest in home improvement with all the design skills and talents I enjoyed expressing, but started improving whatever space I was in....my office, a friend's backyard, the rental house we were in...first by bringing in beautiful thoughts, then possibly (if asked) by sharing ideas for how it could be rearranged or maybe even how a change in paint color or a decrease in clutter could bring out the beauty of the space...and without realizing it we were in "our own" home making improvements and investing our time and talents more broadly...not more significantly or in a way that more fully demonstrated my sense of "home" but just a further and fuller demonstration of those verbs that were already fully validated by their utility...not through a facility!

And the list of verbs that gave birth to nouns goes on and on!!

This "principle" has been most fully realized in my career as a Christian Science practitioner, or spiritual healer...there was a time when I thought my "practice" was defined by patients....NOT!!!

My practice of spiritual healing is defined, determined, validated by the PRACTICE (verb) of spiritual healing...first in my own heart, life, thinking....by the way I look at the world and those around me....the way I embrace my neighbor, the way I act on calls from the global community to engage in making a difference spiritually, the way I nurture the children (all children...of any agelessness) in my home (consciousness)....and then the calls from patients come in....not because I am a Christian Science practitioner....but because I practice the science (in the laboratory of my life) of being (verb) Christian (verb....loving, honest...you know the rest) unconditionally...without the need for nouns....just be cause it is who I am....I am a verb...

Thank you Mr. Obama for the timely reminder....

Now I am looking forward to turning words like summer and winter into verbs....as in, I summer (verb) in the mountains and I winter (verb) on the beach....ahhh...can't wait to see how those verbs give birth to nouns!!!   No more waiting for summer....camp all year round...heaven on earth!