One of the gifts of recent
parenthood has been living into the liminal spaces. Liminal spaces are those that are marked by
transition. From the latin limin, meaning threshold, liminal spaces are times of
change. Babies are all changes all the
time. As soon as we’ve gotten used to
the latest pattern- from how much they eat or sleep to how much they weigh or what
they can do (rolling over yikes!), well as soon as we are good and used to
things, they change.
I say gift because being a new
parent has put right in my face something that is always happening-change. As the old saying goes, change is the only
constant. We joke about this, have
bumper stickers that allude to it and authors like Pema Chodron build a life on
learning how to live with it. And yet..
It still surprises me. What something changed? How?
When?
Especially people. I expect people to be absolutely
constant. So, whatever I’ve decided
about you in the first ten seconds, well you should just behave according to
this perception all the time.
Of course I am exaggerating a bit
here. But I do think a good deal of us
spend an unfortunate amount of time living out of our stories of others as well
as ourselves. When folks do enact
genuine change and transformation they often encounter immense resistance by
those who love them the most in their life.
You need only watch one episode of the Extreme Weight Loss to see
change-resistance phenomena in action.
Or talk to anyone who has stopped acting in accordance with an abusive
or oppressive system.
This month our theme-based ministry
resumes with the theme of compassion. The more I study Buddhist practices of
cultivating compassion and the more I try to cultivate compassion in my own
life, the more it seems that compassion relies upon a healthy embrace of
change. When we can grant ourselves the
ability to grow and let go, as well as gift that to others, we ultimately
become more compassionate beings.
The cynic relies upon life as it is
and will always be but the hopeful, compassionate heart is open to the process
of change and transition.
It is hard spiritual work to be
open to change. Sometimes it feels like
a screaming child at 2 am that awakens the soul to the fact that things are in
transition! But ultimately, when we can
embrace the evolution of life in unwelcome changes (cue screaming baby at 2 am)
we open ourselves as to the blissful (such as the acceptance of our humanity at
2 am broken open there before the aforementioned baby).
Glad to be back friends, looking
forward to living into compassion with you and what’s more sharing a bit of our
journeys together.
In faith and compassion,
Rev. Robin
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