Entering a new era: a solstice sermon

December 21st is the winter solstice, the longest night of the year, after what might feel like the longest year in our life. It’s a profound night: astrologically, a new era is coming to light. A once every twenty-year Great Conjunction between Jupiter and Saturn will light our sky—some liken their bright, combined planet power to the Star of Bethlehem. This cosmic phenomenon collides with the solstice and her change of seasons—a season that welcomes more and more light.

Everywhere we look: more light. And with more light, comes greater ability to see. For those with eyes wide open.

When meeting with a client recently, she described this image that came to her during our guided meditation: radiant light pouring into an old, dark and dusty room. I asked, “What happens when we pull back the curtains and open a window to a room that has sat dormant and dark for so many years?” Dust kicks up. We start to see the stacks of whatever we’ve left behind, buried, forgotten. The greater the light, the greater the shadow.

Our wondering tapped into a deep truth of what she was experiencing on a personal level, and what we are experiencing on a collective scale. Light is pouring into our darkest corners and deepest crevices illuminating our losses and our longings. Long lost chambers of our hearts, minds and bodies are seeing the light of day, and starting to shine forth. In this emerging era, we can no longer hide from our woundedness or our worthiness—there is too much light.

As important as this illumination is, it can be hard to look at. It can be painful, even paralyzing. It’s tempting to tuck it away in that dark room; and instead return to the stories we want to believe and the images we want to project. But therein lies the source of our deepest pain: we are never fully seen.

Take me for example. When I’m feeling lonely, sometimes instead of reaching out for connection and risk being rejected or misunderstood, I find it safer to hide behind self-reliance (I'll do it myself, thank you), perfectionism (must stay in control cause my chaos ain't pretty), and righteousness (being right makes life simpler, besides being wrong means I'm imperfect). The thing is, being independent, perfect and right leads to even more loneliness (not to mention, exhaustion). It also means I'm never wholly seen because I never let you see me whole.

But what if we could see ourselves through sacred eyes?

Behind every wound there is our sacred self that sees us with grace and gentleness. Not shame or should’ves. But with understanding. She honors whatever experience we’re having, no matter how intense, ugly, or socially-incorrect it is. She knows this wound has been waiting, likely for years, to be felt. Not to be denied, disgraced, buried: but to come into the light and be held in love.

Seen, finally.

Deep breath.

From this sacred seeing, we gather our strength because how we see ourselves impacts how we see the world. And we need to see the world through these same sacred eyes right now.

How we see ourselves impacts how we see the world.

People are rising up. Waking up. Shaking up the status quo. We are seeing more clearly, more acutely the brokenness and mayhem within our institutions: our government, healthcare, corporations, religions, schools. We are seeing the devastating division and segregating worldviews within our country, our communities, our families.

We are living in a time when we can no longer hide: We are seeing and being seen. Our false and fanciful images are being shattered. An image of our country and churches shattered. An image of our structures, strangers, and selves shattered. Shattered by the light.

The greater the light, the greater the shadow.

Individually and collectively, what lies just beneath our perfection, our pretending, our people-pleasing, our pomposity, our proclamations of right and wrong, is our pain. Our country's original sins, and our ancestors’ untold stories and unfelt wounds, are aching for redemption, repair and reconciliation. Through us. Today. Together. It's perhaps what we hold most in common: we are hurting and looking for our way home.

This is hard, hard work. Our ego is designed to protect us and do whatever it can to stop pain. Instead of feeling pain, the mind wants to quickly create a story that makes the pain go away (to tuck it away in that dark room). A popular response is to project our pain onto something or someone else (thus, creating “the other”). Robert Burton, a neurologist says that our brains reward us with dopamine (feel good drug) when we quickly create a story that can make sense of the pain. The story doesn’t have to be true; it only has to feel true. It’s why dogmatic beliefs work so well. It’s why some can’t be convinced with science. It’s not about the rational, but the emotional. Instead of feeling the pain or discomfort or uncertainty, we can quickly retreat to a story (or scripture) that ties it up in a more bearable bow. Our mind then releases the dopamine drug, and we can feel good and “safe” again.

"Of all you see, only love is infinite." —Rumi ... Art by Michal Madison

It’s tender terrain we’re entering. So much is being revealed: personally, politically, spiritually. As these parts of ourselves and our world come out of hiding, it’s essential that we remember: how we see is as important as what we see.  Do we see ourselves and one another through critical eyes, righteous eyes, shameful eyes, fearful eyes? Or sacred eyes? One of my favorite quotes is from novelist Anais Nin: “We don’t see things as they are; we see them as we are.”

What our wider world and inner worlds need more than ever is for us to learn to see our woundedness with sacred eyes. When we do, our worthiness can't help but shine and be seen. This sacred seeing can shift us from separateness and strangeness to deep connection and intimacy. It will lead us home. So how do we do that when our minds are hardwired to bury it? Here are three practices I use DAILY:

1. Slow Down. Moving at a fast pace is seriously at the root of so many problems. When we begin to slow down our lives, we slow down our minds. When we slow down our minds, we can create a gap between what we’re feeling internally and how we respond to it. When we slow down, we can stop instinctually reacting based on past wounds and old neuropathways, and start being in relationship with whatever is being illuminated. This is the practice of mindfulness, which leads to …

2. Turn your gaze toward curiosity and compassion. When we feel a feeling we don’t like (anger, sadness, anxiety, etc.), instead of letting the inner critic beat up on it and push it away, we can instead practice turning toward it with curiosity and compassion (courage too). Maybe place your hand on wherever that feeling is showing up on your body. Talk to the feeling—like you would a friend or child who is feeling a similar feeling. Turn the kindness you would give others toward yourself. Maybe the feeling starts talking back. So, then you can write about it, put it on paper, share it with a spiritual companion, and let it live somewhere other than inside you. It becomes an invitation to ask: What long-lost truth does it want to tell you? What woundedness and worthiness is it revealing?

3. Look for what is rather than what you think ought to be. Much of our pain comes from wanting things to be different than they are. When I look at someone who holds a clashing worldview and fight to make them agree with me, I miss who they are deep down—their woundedness and worthiness. The same holds true for ourselves. What are we missing when we expect ourselves to constantly be different than who we are right now (return to practice #2) Turn this phrase into a prayer or mantra. Go about your day and when you feel activated say: “I see this person as they are, not as I think they ought to be.” OR “I see myself as I am not as I think I ought to be.” This reframe is a practice of radical acceptance. Acceptance is not agreement. If you accept what is happening, then you stop fighting reality. When you stop fighting reality, you get out of your head and enter into the present moment—and tender terrain. From this sacred seeing, the most loving, efficient, fearless, and generous response can emerge within you.

We are entering a new era and this is the work we are called to do. This is the work we do together in spiritual coaching. After you go out and gaze at the Star of Bethlehem, please reach out or refer a friend, or share this message. I want to walk together in the light, and shadows, too.

No matter our opinion

“There is no such thing as other people’s children.”

I love these words written by Glennon Doyle, author, blogger and activist. She wrote these words as our country began to learn about our government separating children from their parents.

Watch the full sermon (click image), or read the sermon below. 

Right there at the border, children less than a year old, no older than ten, are being torn away from their mother’s grasp and placed in a lonely, ill-equipped detention center.

This is trauma that will be imprinted on these children’s hearts and bodies. This feeling that they are not safe. This story that they do not belong. This terrifying anxiety, “Where did my mother go?” “Why did they take my daddy?” “And will they return for me?”

No matter our opinion on immigration, I know each of us feels deeply for these frightened children.

No matter our opinion on immigration, I know each of us want to spare these children this horrifying pain of separation—just like you want to spare your own child, or niece, or godchild, or neighbor’s kid.

No matter our opinion, we belong to each other.

Sometimes, though, we forget.

We forget because we get scared.
Be not afraid. We belong to one another.

We forget because we think there isn’t enough to go around.
There is enough. When we do it together.

We forget because we think there needs to be winners and losers.
That’s a boring old story that we are ready to outgrow. When you lift up another, you lift up yourself. Your liberation is my liberation.

We forget because we see skin, status, salary, sexuality or political party, and we stop looking, we stop seeing. 
Underneath all that, we long for the same. We want to feel safe. To feel free. To be seen. We belong to one another.

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Then, there are the parents who have lost their children at the border.

In Glennon Doyle’s blogpost: Emergency Love Flash Mob for the Children (which raised $1 million in 9 hours to represent these children, and over $1.5 million total), I appreciate how she conveys a major shift in our government’s immigration policy. “Historically,” she says, “the government has treated immigration violations as a civil—not a criminal—offense.” What this meant was that families were not torn apart while the issue was resolved. That's changed.

Suddenly, these parents are seen as criminal, and treated harshly.

These parents, like so many of our parents, and grandparents, and great-grandparents, and great-great grandparents and so on, are risking their lives in faith for a better one, here, in the land of the free, home of the brave.

No matter our opinion on immigration, each of us can connect to that deep desire to live in freedom, to live in security, to live in hope for more for our children.

No matter our opinion on immigration, I know that if we as parents risked our lives for our children’s sake, and our actions were then deemed criminal, we would want to know our children are safe, fed and fairly represented. We ourselves would want to be regarded with respect, acknowledged for our bravery, understood for our humanity.

No matter our opinion.

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But our opinions do matter.
I should know, I was voted “Most Opinionated” in my high school senior class.

They matter because they’re exactly what’s getting in the way of humanity.

Our opinions—as sound, brilliant and thorough as they usually are—can get in the way of us achieving whole and lasting transformation in our country.

Our opinions keep us in our head, not in our heart.
Our opinions make us certain, so we don’t have to feel uncertain or uncomfortable.
Our opinions protect us from being vulnerable, wrong, mistaken or incomplete.
Our opinions shut us down from curiosity, and compassion.
Our opinions allow us to be right—but not in relationship.

Sure, opinions can indeed change minds—but not if you haven’t first made an authentic, heartfelt connection, where openness and possibility reside.

My experience has taught me that connection and intimacy require spaciousness. Everything is moving so fast in our culture, that there is no space for Life to be felt. Or relished. Or enjoyed. Or appreciated. Like there usually isn’t enough space for the nuances, the complexities—in conversations, in relationships, in that moment—to reveal themselves, so we jump to these labels, these stereotypes, these opinions, these automatic, conditioned responses. We just start responding without thinking, without reflecting, without hearing, without pausing.

Pausing is where intimacy happens. Where connection happens. Where something other than what we’ve always known becomes possible.

If we want whole and lasting transformation in our country, we have got to learn to pause. To stop our mind from automatically responding with its opinion. Between that moment when we hear a person’s differing opinion and when we choose to respond, we must practice pausing our mind.

Create a space. A gap. A crack. A window. Where a new idea, a new possibility, a new connection can be born. Where humanity gets a little bit bigger, and a little bit closer.

It’s in those spaces, cracks, gaps, windows, pauses, that Spirit can be heard.
Where the us vs. them, the right vs. wrong, the good vs. bad fall away,
and we see each other as brother and sister.
We’re living in the same household, but wow, how we see things differently, right?

If you’re really courageous, in that pause, turn toward curiosity. Genuine curiosity. Heartfelt curiosity. Not the kind where you’re just gathering evidence so you can disprove their point. But genuine curiosity as to how this person with his/her life experience could hold this opinion.

Now, when we step outside our echo chambers, and engage someone with a different opinion, especially one as heated as immigration, remember you are brave. No matter the side you’re standing on.

It is HARD WORK to engage difference. To be open to something new and unfamiliar. Newness is scary to our mind. Its job is to maintain status quo. To keep things the same. If your mind is not well-practiced at listening, receiving, and wondering about our differences—then more times than not, it will shut down or fight back.

I read an article from PBS titled: “’Nothing normal’ about U.S. detaining immigrant children.” Hashtags followed: #NotNormal

100% I agree. This is not normal. This is not okay.

But to a person who passionately opposes immigration, when they read that title, perhaps what they hear instead, is some rendition of: “I’m a bad person.”

It’s likely they don’t hear those thoughts consciously, but rather, on a deeper level, their worth and personhood feels threatened. When that happens, his/her mind must defend. It’s what the mind does.

I know, I know, to someone who welcomes the immigrant, your mind might be saying, “They are a bad person.” Fine, that may or may not be true. What I’m saying is, it may not be effective. Nor helpful. Nor in alignment with who you say you are: a person who values the worth and dignity of every human being.

So, what if we gave as much care and attention to the person with whom we disagree, as we do the immigrant?

What if we set our opinion aside? What if we paused? What might be possible? We won’t know until we try.

I’m not saying stop. Keep shouting “This is not right!” “This is not normal!” All that needs to be said. Again and again and again. What I’m saying is it may not be enough.

There may be more we are called to do.
Especially for those of who us who are not in harm’s way.
Yes, send your money. Yes, write your representatives. Yes, share the story and shine awareness.
All of that matters. Don't stop.
And let’s not stop there. Perhaps an even braver, harder thing we can do is go to our neighbor. Go to our family member. Get out of our echo chambers and engage someone different than ourselves.
Create space between your thoughts and opinions.
Be open to intimacy and connection.
Let Spirit be heard.
Turn toward curiosity and compassion.
Imagine in this everyday, mundane moment, a new world is being born.