"it's all right..."

"you can close
your eyes,
it's alright..."

There are so many version of this JT classic on YouTube. This morning I got lost while watching covers of it, by artists like Sting, Linda Ronstadt, and others -- but it's James Taylor and Carly Simon's version of "You Can Close Your Eyes," that I always come back to. It brings me such peace.

I have been thinking a lot about how naturally we trust God -- without even realizing it. We lie down at the end of a long day, close our eyes, and surrender the mechanism of the human mind's whirring, to the peace of conscious knowing. We watch our children and grandchildren drift off to sleep, without a concern that they will not wake up. We release ourselves from worry, and rest our hopes, concerns, uncertainty on the presence of Something unseen.

There is grace in this level of trust. It is not something we earn. It is not something we have to work at. It comes so naturally to us. We know it from birth. As a mother, I would lay my tiny infant daughters down for a nap, and the go take a short nap myself. There was no "what if," in the complete surrender I felt, to the rest that I knew would come. I trusted.

This week's Bible study is all about Who and What we trust. It is all about God, and His love for each of us. It is about the grace that doesn't demand some kind of intellectual understanding about the "why" of our trusting.  It is all about the inherent trust that comes from being a child, in the arms of his/her divine Parent.

I remember some years ago feeling like I was in an uncomfortable position -- physically and socially. My body hurt, and my heart hurt even more. Everything felt twisted and upside down. I prayed to feel right-side-up and in control.

That was when I came upon a photograph of a father holding his infant. The baby was being held in what is sometimes referred to as a "football hold."  The baby's head was in the palm of the dad's hand, with her arms and legs draped on each side of his arm. His other hand was supporting both his own arm, and the infant. The child was upside down, and her eyes were closed and her face couldn't have been more peaceful.

I looked at that photo, and for a split second, I could see the baby without the dad in the photo. "Wow, what an awkward position," I thought. It looked as if the baby was hanging upside down in mid air, with no visible means of support. I immediately "got it."

My Father's love for me was just as attentive, tender, and firmly supportive as that infant's. And He loved, not only me, but our children, grandchildren, global neighbors, strangers, and friends -- with the same kind of tender care. I could close my eyes and rest in the constancy of that love. My life might seem awkward and I might feel as though I am hanging in mid-air -- arms and legs dangling -- but I am not. None of us are. And, at the deepest level, we know it.

We can close our eyes -- and its alright.

Whether you are feeling under-supported, or you just aren't seeing how it will all work out, remember that in the deepest part of yourself, you do trust that there is Something or Someone that will hold you while you rest. At the deepest level, you know that you can:

“close your eyes,
it's alright..."
 

Rest your heart here.

offered with Love,

Kate

"dreaming of elephants..."

"Oh dreamer,
leave thy dreams
for joyful waking..."

My sister-in-law, Lisa Redfern's recording of "Oh, Dreamer,"  is the perfect accompaniment for this post. And, I so love her voice.

Two weeks ago I was facing a demanding travel schedule. In order to be at the airport early on the day of my departure, I made plans to drive over the pass the day before, have dinner with my sister, and stay the night with her and her sweet husband.

After a lovely evening we all turned in and I was grateful to fall asleep quickly and peacefully -- as I was anticipating very little sleep during my 25 hours of in-flight travel the next day.

About two hours later I woke with a start. I was feeling the symptoms of something coming on. The symptoms were aggressive and the thought of heading into that demanding weekend-- so physically challenged -- was alarming. Immediately I began praying for clarity and freedom. Although the symptoms persisted, my prayers were actually quite joyful.

At some point I must have dozed off in the middle of my prayers because again, I woke with a start. This time I was drenched in a cold sweat. "Oh my gosh," I thought, "I don't want to disappoint Alison." Alison is the Ranch Director at a summer camp near our home in the mountains. I'd dreamed that I was supposed to bring two elephants from camp to the Denver airport for her, and I couldn't figure out how to fit them in my car. The feeling of panic was visceral. It had woken me up, and I was actually -- physically -- covered in damp perspiration.

Then, within moments, I was fully awake. Whew!  I was in my sister's house. There were no elephants. I had not promised Alison that I would bring two elephants to the airport.  Because, there were no elephants. I sat up and giggled quietly. It was just what I needed.

There were no elephants -- and there were no symptoms. Both were dreams that I could wake up from. Within a few moments the perspiration had dried, and I realized that I was also fully free of all of the symptoms that had seemed so real only an hour before.

Over the course of that weekend, there were many issues that presented themselves for healing. Each time I reminded myself:

"there are no elephants..."

And each time it broke the mesmerism -- the suggestions that tried - over and over again - to convince me that whatever I was "dreaming," was actually going on. I simply needed to wake up - more fully - to the truth of God's omnipresent goodness and harmony.

It was helpful to remember that panic I had felt that night in my sister's house -- it had felt so real. The perspiration that had drenched my nightgown -- it too had felt so real. But it was all based on a false premise -- the premise that there were elephants that needed to be taken to the airport. And from that premise, the human mind had projected a whole story about how I wouldn't be able to get them in the car,  and how, if I couldn't, Alison would be disappointed in me, and then I would feel horrible for disappointing her. When, in fact -- there were no elephants. Without the elephants, my car wasn't too small, and Alison's disappointment in me vanished.

It's the same when we find ourselves feeling symptoms of fever, or pain, or depression. The human mind thinks those feelings are as real as the perspiration that drenched my nightgown, or the rapid beating of my heart. Then it -- the human mind -- works backwards searching for a cause. But just as there were no elephants to legitimize the cause of my panic and perspiration, there was no legitimate cause for the symptoms of illness -- that seemed as real as the perspiration on my nightgown. When I could see that both were a dream, the symptoms disappeared even more quickly than the perspiration dried.

One of the "dreams" I had to challenge on this trip was the one that said, "Kate, you never sleep on planes. It is impossible. Your legs are too short to reach the floor, and the angle of the seat makes it impossible to find a comfortable position.  And since you will have no time to sleep, once you get to your destination you are going to be too tired to do what you are going there to do.   And that doesn't even account for jet lag."

But, as I sat in my seat on the plane that night I thought, "there are no elephants." What that meant to me was that there was no reason -- no basis for -- why I could not rest peacefully on this flight. So I found the small travel pillow in my bag, laid my head back, and within minutes I was fast asleep. And according to the woman in the seat next to me, I slept peacefully -- and without fitfulness -- for the next nine hours. When I awoke, I was rested, and could hardly believe that we were being told to prepare for landing.

So much of our lives are spent in a semi-wakefulness. We go about our day like sleepwalkers. Lulled into believing that we are supposed to transport elephants, over a mountain, in the back of a Toyota. When there are no elephants!

In her primary work, Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, Mary Baker Eddy offers this profound observation:

"Lulled by stupefying illusions,
the world is asleep in the cradle of infancy,
dreaming away the hours.”

And in her Miscellaneous Writings 1883 - 1896 she further assures us that:

"Waking from a dream,
one learns its unreality;
then it has no power over one."

Sleeping can be lovely, and dreaming fun. But when we are awake, we have the right to be fully awake, and to know that we are awake. It's important to claim our right to leave those dreams for joyful waking.  To rise and sing, "I am free."  We have the inalienable right to know that there are no elephants.

offered with Love,

Kate

"you can close your eyes, it's alright..."

"Well the sun
is surely sinking down,
but the moon
is slowly rising.

And this old world
must still be
spinning 'round;
and I still
love you..."

I've always loved James Taylor and Carly Simon's, "Close Your Eyes."  It feels like a lullaby from divine Love.

The fact that most nights we close our eyes and surrender control of our lives to the Unseen, is such profound evidence of our trust in something Divine.

Remembering how peaceful it felt to watch my new babies drift off to sleep -- without any concern that they would not wake in the morning (or later in the night) -- is still something that takes my breath away.

Perhaps, without realizing it as a young mother, I was witnessing in myself an innate trust in God as the Source and substance of all life. I can honestly say that I never worried that my daughters would take their next breath. I watched the rise and fall of their little chests with such an unwavering trust in Life carrying itself out -- breath-by-breath.

This week I read a passage from Scripture that brought this trust into clearer focus:

"In quietness and confidence
shall be your strength;

Ye shall have a song,
as in the night
when a holy solemnity
is kept...”

It is this trust in the presence of God as Life, that feels like a holy solemnity to me. A promise made and kept between a Mother and her child:

"Lo, I am with you alway...”

We are never alone.  Not in our waking and not in our sleeping.  Elsewhere in Scripture we are assured:

"When thou liest down,
thou shalt not be afraid;
yea, thou shalt lie down,
and thy sleep shall be sweet.”

This promise doesn't need to be read from sacred texts to be known. Every child knows that he/she can lie down and closer his/her eyes - surrendering, without fear, to the presence of something felt, but not seen.

As children everywhere seem to be facing so much -- violence in war-torn countries, family separations in immigration detention centers, economic uncertainty, educational inequity -- this one thing brings me peace and provides a springboard for my prayers. No matter what my child may be facing, he/she knows that she can close her eyes and trust that morning will come, the sun will rise, her consciousness of being -- simply being -- will greet her when she wakes from sleep.

Nothing can touch this quiet confidence. Nothing can shake the presence of "I am..." from the core of her being. Tonight I will sing this precious lullaby from our balcony, into the vast velvet of a Colorado night sky.

"Close your eyes,
you can close your eyes,
it's alright.”

And I will pray. I will listen for the peace that passes all understanding. The peace that each of us can rest upon. The peace that fills the "I am..." in every man, woman, and child -- regardless of gender, socio-economic privilege, nationality or geo-physical location. This deeper peace is based on God's presence.  A divine Voice that reaches us in the darkness of a warm bed or under an aluminum blanket on a concrete floor.  A voice that silently sings the song of songs:

"And I still love you...”

May we each feel this promise, and our rest be sweet.

offered with Love,

Kate

"Resting in the presence of Mind..."

"...There's a magic every moment
There's a miracle each day
There's a magic every moment
Oh won't you let the music play..."
- Dan Fogelberg

Have you ever had one of those night when the hands of the clock on the bedside table seem to be swimming through molasses.  Nights when you slog through the past in golashes of regret only to find yourself walking in circles of "what if". 

Sometimes, for me, the past creeps in through the dark slivers of space under the closet door and swirls and hisses and threatens its claim that mistakes (mine or another's) made in the "once upon a time"  will reverberate throughout eternity…or at least this chapter of it…and undermine all the good I would try to do…today.

When these demons are most vivid…calling up detailed moments of bad judgment or forcing us to wander through a mental photo albums full of  deckle-edged snapshots recalling a misbegotten youth…I often lie there captive waiting for them to choose when to stop their howling and cackling.

I forget that I am not a prisoner of war.  I am a child of God, a child of "the Great I AM"…not the great I was.

One night when the Past Monster (an adult version of the boogeyman) crawled out from underneath the rag rug by the closet door and tiptoed over to my bedside standing so close the his whisper felt like a voice inside my own head…mimicking my own voice so that I would believe he was really "my mind" as my own consciousness…I realized that…surprise, surprise…I was thinking.  And that if I was thinking, I was in the present, not in the past.  And what I called "remembering" was really happening in the present.  And in the present I had the right to think about it in a fresh new way. 

The past - remembered experiences - often seem like they are intractable, carved in stone". "Well", we think, "it happened and that's the way it happened, it's over and done with and there is nothing I can do to change it"  But in the present…if we can stay in the present...we can decide that if we are going to think about something – even something that happened twenty years earlier – we can choose how we are going to think about it NOW. 

Our thinking is always in the present.  Our thinking…about anything…is always something that is going on right now.   And because it is happening now,  we can identify it with the Great I AM that is Mind…the source of all thought.  Mary Baker Eddy, asserts, in Science and Health, that "…it is wise earnestly to consider whether it is the human mind or the divine Mind which is influencing one."  If I choose to see that the divine Mind, the Great I AM is all that has the power to be influencing me in that moment, then I can only remember what the divine Mind remembers (thinks) at that moment.  And as is states in Jeremiah, "I know the thoughts that I think toward you, saith the Lord, thoughts of peace, and not of evil, to give you an expected end."

Remembering is just thinking.  And since there is only one Mind that is causative…that can cause our thinking…or remembering, we have the right to yield to what that one and only Mind knows at that very moment…and what Mind, God knows is always good.

Some glimpse of goodness like a tiny flashlight in the closet begins to deprive the Past Monster of the darkness he needs to survive. 

This was particularly helpful to me recently.  I had gone to bed so inspired after hours and hours of scriptural study and prayer.  The house was quiet and I settled into a lovely space of gratitude for all that I had seen of God's grace that day.  But out of the dark came the thought, "did you notice how so-and-so looked at you out of the corner of her eye last night?"  I began rehearsing every possible thing I could have done to have warranted a sideways glance.  Before long I was in that ugly spiral of "what if it was this?", "could she have thought that?",  "oh my gosh maybe I did thus and so in a way that she misunderstood".

And on and on it went until I remembered I was not "in" those moments…I was in the now…in the I AM with God.  And if I wanted to think about my friend, even in regard to those past moments, I needed to really THINK about her, not try to find a version of her that I could impose on that remembered moment that would satisfy the picture being suggested by the hissing Past Monster. 

So I thought about her joy, her gentleness, her consistent kindness. These were truths about her that didn't exist in the vacumn of a past moment or a repaired future.  These were truths that were timeless and I was experiencing them in my consciousness of her in the eternal now.  The past monster just shriveled up and disappeared in the light of that truth about her…and me.  

In her book, Gifts from the Sea, Anne Morrow Lindbergh shares her insights about living, and I like to remember that Life and Mind are synonymous…so these insights would also refer to thinking, in the present.  She relates them to the act of dancing…which is probably why it so resonates with me:

"One cannot dance well unless one is completely
in time with the music,
not leaning back to the last step or pressing forward to the next one,
but poised directly on the present step as it comes.  Perfect poise in
the beat is what gives good dancing its sense of ease,
of timelessness,
of the eternal."

I love thinking that when I remember, I am thinking.  And I have the right to feel the presence of Mind to define my thinking about anything, past, present, or future, in it's terms.  The past monster dissolves in this light of God's presence of Mind…and in its place all we can see is "the face of God". 

That night I stopped thinking about what my friend might have been thinking about me based on something I may have done in the past, a began thinking about her in the present…in the presence of Mind.  In this present-tense thinking I could see both of us as God-centered, God-directed, God-impelled in all of our thoughts and actions. 

I could dismiss the swirling demons of "but…what if" with the sweeping hand of divine Love's "what is".  "What is" is always consistent with what "the Great I AM" knows about each of us…and it is always good.

In light of this truth the slide show of our life is just an adventure in thinking about those moments in fresh new ways…shining the light of truth on images distorted by self , only to find God's face, in what once seemed like the dark corners of regret.  Realizing that in those moments when we felt desperate, we were actually learning that God's resources are much greater than can ever be calculated on a bank statement.  Discovering for the first time, that in the hours  we thought we were alone with only our own voice of disappointment for company. we were actually quietly, silently…patiently waiting for God to "move upon the waters…and form the perfect concept" of home, companionship, children.  Hindsight may be 20/20, but seeing every moment of our lives out from the eyes of God, "the great I AM"…is perfect vision...filled with hope.

"…You can see forever in a single drop of dew
You can see that same forever if you look down deep inside of you
There's a spark of the creator in every living thing
He respects me when I work but He so loves me when I sing…"
- Dan Fogelberg

rest well...
Kate

"Rise up...with a sudden sense of wonder..."

Often the most surprising (and frequent) source for life-transforming inspiration and comfort comes to me through song lyrics.  Anyone who knows me knows that this has always been a theme in my life.  I can chronicle my entire 52 years in songs.  Its almost as if I am taking this spiritual journey in a '69 Jeep with a radio playing all the time.   I think this may be why hymns, traditional spirituals, Hebrew and African worship or contemporary Christian gospel, praise -- and yes, pop/folk--music resonates with my deepest longings for a more visceral sense of my relationship to God.   I do find my day-to-day grounding from Bible-based research and study, but there are those moments when something in me shifts to an inner landscape where the heart lies open and naked ready to be clothed anew.

Sometimes this shift occurs when inspiring and evocative songs create a catalytic charge that triggers an avalanche-like dislodging of all that is not inherently good and pure.  This crumbling away makes silent space for other songs of inspiration that allow a reforestation of this inner landscape with tender seedlings of hope...in the rich soil of humility and grace.  The following song by singer/songwriter David Wilcox is just one of those songs.  "Rise" (lyrics below) came into my life on the heels of a period when I was stripped of all pretense and self-preservation.

Finding the courage to take divinely inspired steps into uncharted territory had left me drowning in a deep pool of sorrow for all that had been hoped for, but would never be.   The cleared path that followed my own life-transforming avalanche now looked like empty loneliness and confusion.  Depression which had only been a far-off land visited by others now became my prison.  Escape seemed to come only with dreaming, and sleep was the vehicle for getting to this place of reprieve.   I lived in limbo between the waking reality of my sadness and the dreamy invitation to escape from that sadness, through sleep. 

Depression, and the constant invitation by pharmaceutical companies to join the club of millions who suffer from countless symptoms that only their drug can relieve, invites its victim to let go and sink deeper into the weight of its pull like a tired swimmer in an endless whirlpool of overwhelming emotions.

Wilcox's "Rise" was a life preserver thrown to me when I was most exhausted from the downward spiral I was in.  I would listen to this song in the car as I carried out the details of my day. Details which required that I get dressed and leave the hypnotic cocoon of sleep and dreaming for school hallways, coffeehouses, and church-baed responsibilities.  One morning after the children had left for school I climbed back into bed begging God for just one more hour of dreaming.  But without even asking for it (in fact I was actually begging for its opposite), the heaviness in my head, eyes, and limbs lifted like the fog off a New England lake early on a summer morning, and I could feel the sun on the side of my face.

My familiarity with the lyrics to "Rise" swept over my heart like the wings of angels...."The sun itself is in the room beside you...With a message of how good your life can be..." In that moment I would remember that the sun which came through the window and sat in the room beside me was a reminder of how good my life could be.  And because "what blesses one, blesses all" I could know that everyone who shared that room with me was touched by the light, warmed by its touch, and illumined by its wisdom.  The words of comfort and encouragement I found in this song were divine messages on the wings of angels for me.   Over and over these angel messages swept their wings over my heart until all the dust and cobwebs of depression were gone.  And I rose....

Wilcox, in the liner notes for this CD titled Into the Mystery shares, "I have fallen in love with music again.  I feel like my first ten recordings were practice, and now I'm ready to begin.  These songs are able to say what I never could find words for.  Enjoy!  Thank you for listening." No, David...thank you for not stopping after recording number nine, thank you for continuing to let your heart stay open to the raw beauty of honesty and for sharing your inner journey with others.  Thank you for letting me hear your words and thank you for trusting all of us, your faithful listeners,  with your truth.  Thank you for sending your words on angels wings to save me from despair and to plant a seedling of hope in my heart.  I am tending it with love and patience.  Thank you.

Sometime "a song is just a song"....or is it?

Rise
"I see you dreaming by the ocean window
I hear you breathing like the waves upon the shore
The tide is turning on this time of sorrow
You will never be so lonesome any more

The breezes whisper as the curtain dances
Your dreams are deeper than the mystery of the sea
The sun itself is in the room beside you
With a message of how good your life can be

I know that a heart can just get buried
Stone by stone, crushing hope until it dies
Far away, but the message somehow carries
Beloved, it is time for you to rise.

Time for you to RISE UP...
With a sudden sense of wonder
RISE UP
As the joy comes to your eyes
RISE UP
From the burden you've been under
Beloved, it is time for you to rise.

There's nothing wrong with taking time for sleeping
Your eyes are weary with the things that you have seen
A deeper promise is what your soul is keeping
Right in time for this appointment in your dream

Angels whisper so as not to wake you
There's nothing else in this whole world for you to do
But follow on to where your dream may take you
To see your footsteps from an eagle's point of view

Now I know that a heart can just get buried
Stone by stone, crushing hope until it dies
Far away, but the message somehow carries
Beloved, it is time for you to rise.

Time for you to
RISE UP
Though the promise goes unspoken
RISE UP
When the joy comes to your eyes
RISE UP
For your soul was never broken
Beloved it is time for you to rise
Time for you rise."

- David Wilcox

K