Finally, a spiritual discipline I can conquer in one easy step.

 

Apathy and discipline don’t normally go together — apathy meaning “lack of interest, enthusiasm, or concern,” and discipline meaning “the practice of training people to obey rules or a code of behavior.”

How could lack of enthusiasm or concern be a code of behavior? Let alone a beneficial code of behavior. Don’t they each repel the other?

 

But think of the people you know who radiate peace.

Might they have a lack of concern about specific outcomes, or about plans? Aren’t they difficult to get riled up?

Many of my best parenting days were those when I didn’t have an agenda of any kind, and we let the day unspool as it did, so I tried to be agenda-free as often as I could (at least until I had to start making dinner).

 

Let’s go to my favorite word resource, the Webster’s Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913 + 1828):

Want of feeling; an utter privation of passion, or insensibility to pain; applied either to the body or the mind. As applied to the mind, it is stoicism, a calmness of mind incapable of being ruffled by pleasure, pain or passion. In the first ages of the church, the christians adopted the term to express a contempt of earthly concerns.

Ew.

Okay, here’s where I have to confess that I misheard a friend. I heard apathetic prayer, but she’d said apophatic prayer, and the mishearing stuck in my head as kind of funny.

Truth is, I couldn’t be apathetic if you paid me.

 

While I seek increased calmness and rootedness in my mind and in my life, I have no desire to be incapable of being ruffled by pleasure, plain, or passion. This earth is what I have — I am concerned about it and about its citizens. I’m glad I can easily laugh with people, cry with people, cheer them on, get bothered about things. My passionate nature keeps me connected to the people around me and to God.

So while there’s something that sounds good about coming to God in prayer and not being attached to the outcome, it really would have to be a discipline for me. In some ways, I do that already: I’ll often just lift people up in prayer, or ask for blessings, or for love to wrap around someone. That way, I’m not telling God how to do the job. But I’m always passionate about those people and those prayers, I always have my own hopes and desires for that person and that situation, and I’ll probably cry about it, whether it goes well or poorly.

So no apathetic prayer for me.

Apophatic prayer, though… “‘Apophatic’ prayer has no content. It means emptying the mind of words and ideas and simply resting in the presence of God.” 

That sounds appealingly experiential; I think I get there sometimes when I dance in church, or on those rare occasions when I’ve danced a prayer. That’s something I could try to practice (assuming that I will do it poorly for a good long time).

* * * * *

If you want to listen to the conversation in which my friend Lisa Delay does not say apathetic prayer, here it is. It’s in the second part of the podcast, in her interview with Ed Cyzewski.

Also, I had a lot of fun with http://giphy.com/ for this post.

 

With the Psalmist, we cry out,

I am sick at heart. How long, O Lord, until you restore me?

How long must I struggle with anguish in my soul, with sorrow in my heart? How long will my enemy have the upper hand?

We join with Habakkuk’s plea,

How long, O Lord, must I call for help? Violence is everywhere. Must I forever see these evil deeds?

We add our own call:

How long, O Lord, will white people be so consumed by their fears and prejudices that they kill African Americans? How long will the culture that feeds those fears and prejudices continue to thrive? How long will people deny that the virus of racism infects our country down into its roots?

Thank you, Lord, for bearing our grief and anger and frustration, for hearing our cries for help and rescue and action.

Thank you for being the source of the and yet.

Because of you, we can say, with the writer of Lamentations,

I have cried until the tears no longer come. My heart is broken, my spirit poured out … Yet I still dare to hope when I remember this: the unfailing love of the Lord never ends!

Help us dare to hope — that there will be unity among your children, that there will be a “mighty flood of justice, an endless river of righteous living.”

Help us to be the hands of feet of your unfailing love.

Help us to uproot racism wherever we see it, whether in ourselves, our loved ones, our church, our school, our workplace, our entertainment, our government.

Protect our hearts from bitterness and despair and hatred while we do this work. Protect us from walling in our hearts and our churches because of fear. Protect us.

May we delight in your Word so we are like that tree along the riverbank, with roots that grow way down deep into God’s love, deep enough to keep us strong — not for our own private sake, but for the sake of our brothers and sisters, for the sake of your kingdom.

May the roots of your love smother and destroy the roots of racism — and may we be a part of it.

In Jesus’ name, Amen.

*****

Bible passages quoted, all from the New Living Translation:

• Psalm 3:6
• Psalm 13:1-2
•  Habakkuk 1:2-4
• Lamentations 2:11, 3:21
• Amos 5:24
• hints of Psalm 1:3, Ephesians 3:17

When Jesus saw [Mary] weeping, and the Jews who came with her also weeping, he was greatly disturbed in spirit and deeply moved. He said, “Where have you laid him?” They said to him, “Lord, come and see.” Jesus began to weep.    (John 11:33-35, NRSV)

This exchange takes place near the end of the story about Jesus raising his friend Lazarus from the dead. Jesus had known Lazarus was sick, but had chosen to delay traveling to his friends for two days. In fact, before he set out, Jesus already knew Lazarus was dead.

“Our friend Lazarus has fallen asleep, but I am going there to awaken him.” (v.11)

Jesus has travelled to Bethany for the specific purpose of raising Lazarus from the dead. He’s already spoken with Lazarus’s sister Martha about resurrection of the dead, and hinted at what he’s about to do, but now he’s confronted by a sobbing Mary, as well as the people who’ve been mourning with her.

Jesus, here, has the ultimate in perspective: he knows that Lazarus will not be dead much longer. He’s known it for days. Yet Jesus still weeps.

Does he weep out of compassion for Mary and Martha and the grief they’ve suffered? Does he weep because he’s had an intellectual understanding of what he’s about to do, but the reality of his friend being dead truly hits him when he’s about to go to the tomb? Does he weep out of compassion for Lazarus, who died, sick and in pain, thinking that Jesus didn’t care enough to come to him?

We can’t know exactly why Jesus weeps; we just know that he does.

Well-meaning Christians often try to give grieving people perspective too soon, by talking about the person who died being in heaven, or dancing with angels, as if that would (or should) make the sadness go away. But if even Jesus honored grief by weeping, we should feel free to do so, too. Eternal perspective does not negate grief.

So let’s follow our Lord’s example, and feel free to grieve, to cry, to weep, to be deeply moved by the death of a loved one, by the sadness of a friend. 

 

Given the title of this post, you may be expecting a rah-rah go you, you’re awesome, you’re the star, so get out there and do it! kind of post. Not from me. Those words terrify me. I’m the hero?

Hear these encouraging words by Lisa Cron about the hero from Wired For Story (substituting hero for protagonist):

…as much as you love your [hero], your goal is to craft a plot that forces her to confront head-on just about everything she’s spent her entire life avoiding. You have to make sure the harder she tries, the harder it gets. Her good deeds will rarely go unpunished. Sure, every now and then it’ll seem like everything’s okay, but that’s only because you’re setting her up for an even bigger fall. You want her to relax and let her guard down a little, the better to wallop her when she least expects it (p.169).

Constantly upping the ante gets the [hero] in shape, which is crucial, since the final hurdle he’ll have to sail over will be impossibly high. The more you put him through before he gets there, the better (p.174).

…it’s your job to dismantle all the places where your [hero] seeks sanctuary and to actively force him out into the cold…a hero only becomes a hero by doing something heroic, which translates to rising to the occasion, against all odds, and confronting one’s own inner demons in the process (p.183).

Leaving aside the issue of whether you believe there is an Author of your life, and whether that idea pisses you off or comforts you, the above sounds like life to me.

Heroes are always in the middle of the action. Bad things happen to them and to people they love. Things feel out of control. Heroes are forced to confront their fears, their deepest assumptions about themselves or others; sometimes these are confirmed, often they’re challenged. Some challenges may be exhilarating, others painful and sad.

In the middle of the situation, heroes are always thinking, “things can’t get any worse,” or “this has got to be the bottom,” and “after this, things will get better,” and that’s rarely the case. In fact, it’s usually the sign that things are about to get way worse. (Kind of like when another character says, “trust me” — always a bad sign.)

Heroes are not alone. There are plenty of people in heroes’ lives who are ready to help and to hinder. But which is which? Is the advice from the hero’s dearest friend good, or is he a gatekeeper, who, out of love (or his own fears), wants the hero to stay the same/safe/like him? Does the comment from someone the hero don’t like contain the truth of her situation, a truth she needs in order to move ahead?

Moreover, heroes don’t correctly interpret their trials. They follow the wrong leads or make bad assumptions or miss the red flags (and the green flags!) in front of them, or they listen to bad advice or keep getting in their own way. No matter what kind of villain heroes are fighting, heroes are often their own worst enemy.

Clarification: heroes don’t correctly interpret their trials when they’re in the middle of them. A particular struggle may take days to resolve, or months, or years. The struggle may even be chronic, and heroes can only change their thoughts and feelings about it. Heroes can only draw the proper connections by looking back over time, sometimes in the middle, but often not until a situation has been resolved.

Isn’t this just like life?

For example

Let’s say you’re an out-of-work hero, and all you want to do is find a job and make a living. In fact, you need to find a job so you and your family have food and shelter. You start out with a plan, and it’s a good one, so you execute that plan. Some heroes will be hired at this point, but if your plan doesn’t land you a job, you cast your net farther afield, maybe you take what you think of as bad jobs, maybe you stop talking about your search, maybe you talk about nothing but your search, maybe you get even more disciplined, maybe you give up and get depressed. Maybe you lose your house and have to live on friends’ couches for as long as they’ll have you. Maybe you have a few close calls, when you’re in the top two or three for a job that you’re sure you’re perfectly suited to, but you don’t get it. Maybe you don’t even get a call-back for jobs you should at least get an interview for. Maybe some job-related, one-time mistake keeps coming back to bite you. Maybe it’s all a series of bad breaks, but maybe there is something wrong with your skill set or your self-presentation. Maybe you need to change careers, or give up on the current dream and exchange it for another. You don’t know and probably can’t recognize the series of events, conversations, connections that land you that job — until you land that right job that allows you to shine.

Looking back, you can trace your story and see how it made sense, how one lesson lead to another which lead to another which lead you to take one action that seemed so tiny at the time, but it was the thing that led to another thing that finally tipped the scales. In the middle, it’s a horrible, confusing, frustrating mess that makes you doubt your value to the world.

Let’s see:

* Places where you seek sanctuary dismantled … check — you have no job in a society that highly values paid work. Perhaps you had to swallow your pride and accept help from family, friends, the government, charitable organizations. Perhaps all the above turned their backs on you.
* Actively forced out into the cold … check — you kept looking, kept putting yourself out there, kept trying to figure out what all this might be telling you.
* Rising to the occasion, against all odds … check — you followed every possible lead and personal insight you could.
* Confronting your inner demons in the process … check — your skills, dreams, sense of value and purpose were all in question. You probably had to overcome some assumptions about yourself or others, or how easy things should be “when they’re right,” and work through deep-seated fears.

In other words, you’re the hero of your own life. It may look like a horrible mess, and you might follow some red herrings, but some of those red herrings may give you precisely what you need to resolve your situation. You might hit your “dark moment when all seems to be lost” many times.

But you’re the hero. Your change drives the action. So keep at it.

That’s what I’m saying to myself these days about my writing and publishing struggle. Things were pretty dark last fall and early winter. I put my best work in years out there, a project I was deeply passionate about, and I got nothing. Not one request for a full manuscript. And you know why? Because it wasn’t good enough. My recent reading of Wired For Story reminded me of an off-hand comment my mother made to me about the main hero of my story: David didn’t change. His situation did; his life was very dramatic. But he, himself, remained static. That’s not good.

Lisa Cron states, in no uncertain terms: “Story is about change, which results only from unavoidable conflict” (p.124). And, “the why carries more weight than the what. Think of it as a pecking order: the why comes first, because it drives the what” (p.152).

So I need to tease out David’s character arc. It won’t be hard; I already have it all planned out. The seeds were in the story the whole time. But I needed that dark period to make me keep seeking answers. Will this revision be the one that tips the scales towards publication? I have no idea.

But I’m the hero. My change drives the action. So I’m keeping at it.

You keep at your struggle, too, whatever it is. We’ll form a hero support society. We need all the encouragement we can get.

 

 

 

So we’ve reached the last day of January, the month I’ve given myself to take care of as many nagging jobs and deferred decisions in my house as I could. I started the month with a list of 52 items. As of this morning, only 18 remain undone.  And at least 8 of those will be taken care of by the end of today.

For me, that’s nothing short of miraculous.

I actually did what I set out to do. I didn’t give up halfway through. I’ve written before about how emotional all this getting rid of stuff has been, but there has been another emotional aspect. Any time I go through a process of fixing up the house, I think of my friend Natasha, who loved fussing with her house. This was more intense than usual this month, because she was very ill, and then dying, and then she died.

She once described the process of purging her attic as, “Feng-ing it up and shui-ing it out.” Feng shui (pronounced fung shway), in case you don’t know, is the ancient Chinese art of managing the flow of energy in a space (home, office, wherever), a major tenet of which is getting rid of clutter. It is not normally used as a verb, neither is it generally spoken of so flippantly, which made it memorable, even for my husband, who is not as allergic to feng-ing things up and shui-ing them out as some other husbands I know, but he doesn’t delight in it like I do. Even so, the phrase has a permanent spot in our family vocabulary.

There’s a flipside to all this weepiness over getting rid of things and reveals the best purpose behind clearing the clutter: Which emotional items to keep? Which objects can now shine?

I’ve gotten rid of some of my kids’ baby clothes, but I’m still keeping others. I discovered that I’ve kept fewer of my son’s baby things than my daughter’s, which makes me feel like a bad mommy. In my defense, he did have baby boy cousins who I passed a lot of clothes down to, and the quilt I made him became damaged, so I threw it away in my last giant purge session. But I do have the little grey and red sweater and booties my cousin Esther (who died several years ago) knitted for him, so that counts extra. And I have vowed to store what I decided to keep properly so nothing else will get irreparably damaged.

I took photos of all my kids’ school projects — the giant tri-folds, the dioramas, etc. — but said good-bye to the originals.

I framed a few beloved T-shirts, just for fun.

Then came the big one: wedding paraphernalia. I still had everything except my borrowed item, a beautiful pearl necklace that went back to my mother-in-law. My headpiece and bouquet rested in a lovely basket … shoved in a far corner of a shelf in the storage room. They were dry. Dry. I tried hard not to even sneeze near them in case they’d fall apart. They were still lovely — my friend Rose did a great job with them 18 years ago (see the original to the left).But it was time to say good-bye.

So I put on my wedding dress and had one last photo session.

     

You may have noticed that not everything in the bouquet has faded with time. There was a red fabric rose in there. I’ve had it since I was sixteen, when my father gave it to me along with this poem (reprinted with permission, also note that Vader is Dutch for father, not a Star Wars reference, and I am my father’s only daughter):

I know you did not know it,
But your Dad can be a poet;
All it takes
Is someone who makes
My heart rejoice
At the sound of a voice
With such joie de vivre.

Roses are red,
Violets are blue,
I love you true;
And until there is a Fred,
This could be the last chance when I may
As a Vader
On this sweet sixteenth birthday
Give the single red rose
to the girl I chose
to be my favourite daughter.

And as you’ll notice
Unlike some roses
Which fade,
This rose is made
to be a lasting reminder,
though lovers may be fickle
And make you feel like a pickle,
You will always be
Your Vader’s
Favourite daughter.

I’m keeping the red rose. And the poem. Nothing could persuade me to part with them. They’re why the fenging up and shui-ing out is good: now the important stuff can shine.

What sentimental items repeatedly survive in your house? 

 

 

My head is spinning with flora and fauna of the Bible, habitats of animals and which ones the Israelites could eat and how they might kill or trap them and where to find water and which wild plants can provide food or shelter or protection. So I’m happily putting 1,000 BCE to rest for the night to revel in some great dancing. There will be tons of dancing! Each contestant is dancing three times: one solo, once with a fellow contestant, and once with an all star. AND Christina Applegate is the guest judge. I love the stuff she says, it’s always very real and demonstrates that she actually knows stuff about dance.

Group number: I hate the strobe light effect with a burning passion. I can’t see the dancers because my main desire is to protect my eyes. They really should stop it. That said, they put Chehon and Eliana in the front and I didn’t want to watch anyone else.

Tiffany and Benji (season 2 winner, the first season I watched the whole thing, I loved him!), swing:
This is the first number of hers that I’ve loved! The choreographer let her be cute and energetic and that was perfection. And how amazing was is to see Benji dance again! The energy of this number was out of this world and relenting and they never let up. It was awesome. I wish I could’ve seen it live.

Witney solo: she’s doing a paso doble by herself, a lot of posing and walking. Meh.

Cole and Melanie (Sonya Tayeh jazz): nice, they’re not going to make Cole do another version of creepy
It was very good, but Melanie doesn’t really do vulnerable, which made it not quite connect for me. It was interesting that Melanie did so much lifting of Cole, which played to Melanie’s strengths. Cole was really good, but I wouldn’t have gotten the emotional content if they hadn’t talked about what it was supposed to be about.

Chehon solo: I always love them. I even watched his mother’s message to/about him clip passage, just to hear her Swiss accent. (I’m fast-forwarding everyone else’s parental message.)

Eliana and Twitch (I am crazy excited about this. Maybe it’ll match the Twitch/Alex Wong number), Christopher Scott hip hop:
This made me smile the whole time. I love it when Christopher Scott does a number to a Motown song. Although the Sasha Twitch song last year had more impact, this was great. Maybe a little cutesy. Not so much wow dancing. But entertaining.

Tiffany solo: Very good, but I don’t connect with it.

Chehon and Katherine, Tyce doing a serious, emotional number:
Tyce’s choreography can be a little obvious (which is fine for me to do, but I think a pro should be better), but this was marvelous. Chehon’s face was so heartbreaking at times. When he bent double and she stood up on his back, it was so moving. And Chehon didn’t dance super pretty, super lifted like all his training would have him do. When they passed the suitcase to each other, it was gorgeous and sad. The contrast between throwing themselves around and the moments when they stopped was deep. Chehon is becoming what he wanted to when he tried out for the show. Masterful, indeed.

Cole solo: (Okay, I watched a bit of his Mom package because she didn’t have the usual body language; she was great.) Compelling. I didn’t want it to end. He was clearly about to turn into a werewolf. I love it when someone does constant, fast movement to a slow song. This was a perfect example of what he does and I really wanted it to be a whole dance, not just a blip of a solo. Except I could’ve done without the skirt.

Witney and Marco (who I don’t remember at all, now I do, he shaved all his hair off, he was 3rd last season):
Very good. She really knows how to connect to a partner, which is why I think they kept her last week. She was fluid when she needed to be, sharp when she needed to be. I believed the story they were telling. We could tell that she doesn’t have the solo kicks and jumps other girls do, but she was still good.

Christina Applegate is f-ing brilliant. YES, there’s too much hairography on this show — too much hair flipping and in the face and we can’t see half of the performance.

Eliana solo: she was killer on pointe last week, this week merely extremely good.

Cyrus and Comfort, a dub step routine:
That made me want to swear repeatedly. Both Michael and I laughed. We sat with our mouths open. It was sick. It was fast, precise, angular, mathematical, amazing. Dayum! [Christopher Scott should do one routine when he choreographs for the show, because he always done one incredible routine and one that’s just fine.]

Witney and Chehon, cha cha (I admit that I’m nervous, he didn’t do so good with the hip movement in his first Latin dance):
Better than I thought, but I think he does better with women who are a little more mature. I’m a little mad that they gave him another big hip dance so close to the finale — it makes me nervous for next week. But I love Christina Applegate’s commentary.

Cyrus solo: He timed it perfectly. It was a completely number, but I wanted to see more. Love it when people do hip hop to orchestral music. This had emotional content. So great and strong.

Eliana and Cole, Mia Michaels contemporary:
Incredible up until the fake scream at the end. Another fast movement to slow music. Loved this. They were astounding. They matched each other and fought each other completely. Some incredible moments.

Cyrus and Tiffany, Spencer Liff Broadway:
They gave her another dance in which she had to be a young teenager, which she is, and again, she was fantastic. Cyrus was full of personality, as usual, and didn’t highlight his weaknesses. It was fun, they related to each other exactly as they were supposed to. Great routine.

Guest dancers. Way cool duet from the Access Dance Company, one able-bodied dancer, one in a wheelchair. They’ve been on the show before. This number was fascinating, the acrobatic use of the wheelchair and mirroring walking and being in a chair from both of them was stunning.

Who’s going to the finale?
Tiffany and Eliana. After this week, I’m a lot more excited about Tiffany.
Chehon and Cyrus. Inside my head, I’m screaming, YES YES YES YES. I will get to see Chehon and Eliana dance together. If it isn’t epic, I’m going to be mad.

But now I’m confused. Is the voting for the finale based on voting this week? Must be. Weird. That somehow doesn’t feel right. The rest of the season, it’s been odd, but for the very end, it doesn’t seem at all fair.