The Color of That Which Truly Matters

“I'm lonely.

And I'm lonely in some horribly deep way

and for a flash of an instant, I can see just how lonely,

and how deep this feeling runs.

And it scares the shit out of me to be this lonely

because it seems catastrophic.” 

(Augusten Burroughs, Dry)

My garage, and the storage room in our basement, are in similar states - they are filled with stuff. When spring has settled upon us (on the far horizon of this -31 C day) I want to go through this stuff to determine what are useful, desirable bits to keep, and which will be dispersed to new homes. It is a process of reduction of sorts - as in the cooking term wherein the flavor of a liquid is thickened and intensified by simmering or boiling. I want to simmer the contents of my storage areas down to an essence.

“What stays with you longest and deepest?

Of curious panics, of hard-fought engagements

or sieges tremendous

what deepest remains?” 

(Walt Whitman)

Other parts of life are simmering as well. Francis Weller's excellent book, "The Wild Edge of Sorrow" is on my stack of current reading. His writing is an invitation to descend the basement stairs of our being, exploring dim places where long forgotten sorrows may lay dust-covered and mildewy. Weller leads us into rituals of deepening, attending to, and listening to our being. This is an exercise in gentleness and patience, for many of our sorrows arise from stories near-forgotten, barely a whisper on the soul's lips.

"We were not meant to live shallow lives, pocked by meaningless routines and the secondary satisfactions of happy hour. We are the inheritors of an amazing lineage, rippling with memories of life lived intimately with bison and gazelle, raven and the night sky. We are designed to encounter this life with amazement and wonder, not resignation and endurance. 

This is at the very heart of our grief and sorrow."

(Francis Weller, The Wild Edge of Sorrow)

Weller challenges us to engage that which he would say truly matters - our deepest sorrows, our shame, our healing, and our joys. All he says, are intimately intertwined. It takes courage to descend the stairs to the basement of our being; courage to unpack boxes wherein hurts were deposited that had no voice, no one to hold them. 

It is this work, though, of sorrow and grief, that gives meaning to the wonder of sunlight on snow, a grey shadow in the curl of a drift, or the innocent laughter of babies. Here is the grounding to find connection to others; to family, to community. To open our hearts to wonder we must first be open to deepening, to attending and to listening. Only then have we the presence of being to breathe-in this world, to take in the story of another, and to hold our own story as sacred.

Sorrows, some intimately known, some voiceless, await not our confrontation; rather, they beckon embracing. These raw places are full of energy; they pronounce, through a delicate dance, that we are alive, that we are being formed in a crucible, that we will not stand silent in the dark night of the soul. 

And so, a calendar page has turned, birthing the year of our Lord, 2018. A New Year, a new day, a present moment. Be alive in this moment - breathe deeply, feel passionately all that lays within the rooms of your heart; draw deeply from the well of your sorrow that you may quench the thirst of longing for wholeness.

“Consult your memory

to know what matters

most in your life.”

(Amit Kalantri)

2018 - there is only one of you among the 7.5 billion of us; you are rare and precious. May whatever sorrows attend you fall but gently upon your heart. Reduce to their essence the contents of your soul's storage rooms. In both joy and sorrow, grief and renewal, may you know that you are amazingly, truly alive, and may your sorrows be the bridge to that which truly matters.

I leave the last word to 19th century poet extraordinaire, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow: 

“Every man has his secret sorrows

which the world knows not;

and often times we call a man cold

when he is only sad.” 

(Henry Wadsworth Longfellow)

Color of that which truly matters...

darkness rising to meet the light.

A box

buried among boxes

dusty

and forgotten

inside

a single tear

shed

for all the world's sorrows

Breathe

Laugh

Be

To Ponder Further:

- From the Bible: "The LORD is near to the brokenhearted And saves those who are crushed in spirit." (Psalm 34.18)

- From Tenrikyo: "I created you human beings because I desired to see you lead a joyous life." (Ofudesaki 14.25)

- From Sikhism: 

"Farid, I thought I alone had sorrow;
Sorrow is spread all over the whole world.
From my roof-top I saw
Every home engulfed in sorrow's flames."

(Adi Granth, Shalok, Farid, p. 1382)