Journal of Sacred Work

Days 90-94 - Abstract & Real

   When I asked a friend of mine recently about her reaction to abstract images she responded, "If it doesn't speak to me I pass it by."  I like the honesty of her response. I also wonder how much you might miss if you "pass by" too much of life too quickly.

  John O'Donohue says that "There is a sublime coherence at the heart of beauty, an order which has a lyrical simplicity." Inside this "sublime coherence" there remains mystery.

   I looked at a recent self-portrait and asked myself what was abstract and what seemed real. In this image, the two conepts sit beside each other in an odd mix of simplicity and mystery. 

   If art fails to challenge it does not matter. But, you must give it a chance. Picasso went so far as to claim that if art was not dangerous, it was not art. 

   That is how I see Radical Loving Care. If love is not dangerous, is it love?

   Caring for the sick and wounded is risky. The more you open to another's agony the more you have the chance to heal - and to feel the pain yourself.

   Of course, you can choose to "pass by." That "passing by" can happen even if you are with the patient since you can always limit your encounter to a transaction instead of something sacred.

   O'Donohue sends another gift your way: "God is that beautiful danger wherein the earth no longer needs to behave, where the levels are no longer separate." 

   We want order. We pursue what we believe is real. 

   Difficult as it may be for some, the truth lies in sublime abstraction.

 -Erie Chapman 

                                                                        ---------------------------------

Postscript : In a weekend post, Liz Wessel offered a quote from Helen Keller about her shattering experience "listening" on the radio to a performance of Beethoven's Ninth by simply touching the speaker. What the deaf woman heard from the deaf composer and how she described it is so powerful that I offer a partial reprint of that quote below, placed here because I know many hurried readers prefer brevity in the body of these posts. 

   In these paragraphs lies Ms. Keller's eloquence about "sublime coherence" living inside one of art's most abstract forms: Music.

...I lightly touched the sensitive diaphragm. What was my amazement to discover that I could feel not only the vibration, but also the impassioned rhythm, the throb and the urge of the music! The intertwined and intermingling vibrations from different instruments enchanted me. I could actually distinguish the cornets, the roil of the drums, deep-toned violas and violins singing in exquisite unison. How the lovely speech of the violins flowed and plowed over the deepest tones of the other instruments! When the human voices leaped up thrilling from the surge of harmony, I recognized them instantly as voices more ecstatic, upcurving swift and flame-like, until my heart almost stood still. The women’s voices seemed an embodiment of all the angelic voices rushing in a harmonious flood of beautiful and inspiring sound. The great chorus throbbed against my fingers with poignant pause and flow. Then all the instruments and voices together burst forth – an ocean of heavenly vibration – and died away like winds when the atom is spent, ending in a delicate shower of sweet notes.

Of course this was not “hearing,” but I do know that the tones and harmonies conveyed to me moods of great beauty and majesty. I also sense, or thought I did, the tender sounds of nature that sing into my hand-swaying reeds and winds and the murmur of streams. I have never been so enraptured before by a multitude of tone-vibrations.

As I listened, with darkness and melody, shadow and sound filling all the room, I could not help remembering that the great composer who poured forth such a flood of sweetness into the world was deaf like myself. I marveled at the power of his quenchless spirit by which out of his pain he wrought such joy for others – and there I sat, feeling with my hand the magnificent symphony which broke like a sea upon the silent shores of his soul and mine.” (emphasis added)

 The Auricle, Vol. II, No. 6, March 1924. American Foundation for the Blind, Helen Keller Archives.

Days 88-89 - Love’s Energy

John 1:1 IN THE beginning [before all time] was the Word (Christ), and the Word was with God, and the Word was God Himself.2 He was present originally with God. 3 All things were made and came into existence through Him; and without Him was not even one thing made that has come into being.

 In the beginning was the Sacred Sound Aum. The Aum was with God, and the Aum was God. Through the Sacred Sound Aum all things were made; without the sacred sound nothing was made that has been made (Vedas; the oldest Scriptures of Hinduism).

 I am one who believes that the many expressions of God are manifestations of one Source. Sound has a uniques ability of uniting us beyond creed.

Aum, known as the sacred sound of the universe is a resonating vibration, not created by striking something but rather a divine flowering of the luminous.

Have you ever intoned the sound Aum, felt the all-encompassing expression of the Holiest well up from within the depth of your being? The experience of singing the Blessed creates a sense of joy, a connection that expands beyond thought and distinction.

In the following letter written by Helen Keller we catch a glimpse of her glorious experience in touch with the vibration of Love's energy.

 

Dear Friends,

I have the joy of being able to tell you that, though deaf and blind, I spent a glorious hour last night listening over the radio to Beethoven’s “Ninth Symphony.” I do not mean to say that I “heard” the music in the sense that other people heard it; and I do not know whether I can make you understand how it was possible for me to derive pleasure from the symphony. It was a great surprise to myself. I had been reading in my magazine for the blind of the happiness that the radio was bringing to the sightless everywhere. I was delighted to know that the blind had gained a new source of enjoyment; but I did not dream that I could have any part in their joy. Last night, when the family was listening to your wonderful rendering of the immortal symphony someone suggested that I put my hand on the receiver and see if I could get any of the vibrations. He unscrewed the cap, and I lightly touched the sensitive diaphragm. What was my amazement to discover that I could feel not only the vibration, but also the impassioned rhythm, the throb and the urge of the music! The intertwined and intermingling vibrations from different instruments enchanted me. I could actually distinguish the cornets, the roil of the drums, deep-toned violas and violins singing in exquisite unison. How the lovely speech of the violins flowed and plowed over the deepest tones of the other instruments! When the human voices leaped up thrilling from the surge of harmony, I recognized them instantly as voices more ecstatic, upcurving swift and flame-like, until my heart almost stood still. The women’s voices seemed an embodiment of all the angelic voices rushing in a harmonious flood of beautiful and inspiring sound. The great chorus throbbed against my fingers with poignant pause and flow. Then all the instruments and voices together burst forth – an ocean of heavenly vibration – and died away like winds when the atom is spent, ending in a delicate shower of sweet notes.

Of course this was not “hearing,” but I do know that the tones and harmonies conveyed to me moods of great beauty and majesty. I also sense, or thought I did, the tender sounds of nature that sing into my hand-swaying reeds and winds and the murmur of streams. I have never been so enraptured before by a multitude of tone-vibrations.

As I listened, with darkness and melody, shadow and sound filling all the room, I could not help remembering that the great composer who poured forth such a flood of sweetness into the world was deaf like myself. I marveled at the power of his quenchless spirit by which out of his pain he wrought such joy for others – and there I sat, feeling with my hand the magnificent symphony which broke like a sea upon the silent shores of his soul and mine.”

 The Auricle, Vol. II, No. 6, March 1924. American Foundation for the Blind, Helen Keller Archives.

 

Contributed by Liz Sorensen Wessel

Mandala by ~liz

Days 83-87 - Hearing Your Soul's Voice

 

"All holiness is about learning to hear the voice of your own soul." - John O'Donohue

   Here we are, you and I, walking through time with our lives on the line. What do you see?

   Suddenly, O'Donohue's words illuminate your journey. Every bit of holiness you honor is about learning to hear the voice of your very own soul (and what does it mean to own your soul?) 

   The holy is ineffable. Yet, the truly alive are passionate and must pursue what cannot be caught: the secrets of the sacred. That is why painters paint and poets write and lovers love. 

   Sometimes, the curtain slips open. Through the seam lovers catch a tantalizing glimpse into the mystery of the precious.

   Is ecstasy the music of your soul singing through your body?

   This is the challenge of understanding the spirit with our earth-based minds. You cannot think your way into sacred mystery. You can only feel her truth.

   O'Donohue writes that the voice of the soul is "deeper and surer than all the other voices of disappointment, unease, self-criticism and bleakness." Why listen to anything else?

   The world's transactional noise interferes. Imagine your serenity if you could live dancing with the feet of your spirit instead of marching to the clatter that confounds your days.  

  The ghosts around us must be amused by the ways you and I occupy our bodies. After all, they don't have one. And they cannot experience the physical sensations that tell us we are en-fleshed.  

   O'Donohue writes, "The voice of compassion is not absorbed with itself...it is imbued...with healing." 

   Your finest and most healing hours come when your body transmits your soul's voice. That is when you sing life's most holy hymn: Love. 

-Erie Chapman

Photograph: "Night Sculptures" - Erie Chapman

Days 81-82 - Returning Home to One's Soul Place

Note: This essay is by guest contributer: Anne Milligan; artist musician, singer and a lovely soul.

Martha Herrin Hollis is my maternal great-great grandmother from Alabama, which is one of many mysteries unfolding with the ancestry work. Isn't she grand? 
I have no idea if anyone will read what accompanies this photo, but it's a semi-brief essay I wrote from a Southern perspective after having lived in the desert for a few years and returned to this region. If anyone reads it, my desire is that it brings readers to a sense of unity about "the south"... We're all part of the same story whatever spin is put on it... we are bound together by our heritage (and often even by blood) although we may look entirely different. And most importantly, we are One in the "mist" of the Infinite which is Always and Forever loving and patient with us... 

Returning Home: A Southern perspective on soulfulness and unity
“The end of all our exploring will be to arrive where we started and to know the place for the first time”
T.S. Elliot

It is said that to “return home”, literally or metaphorically, is to find one’s soul place. For me, the mid-southern region of the United States is clearly home for my most heartfelt sense of what it is to have found one’s geographical soul place. None of us own it, but many of us feel it, straight down to the marrow of our bones.

There is a spirit which hovers over the South, with its pervasive gray mist, sometimes threatening, often comforting, and oh so familiar! I feel it slowing my pace even now as I envision traveling the back roads of the Mid-South, questing after my own Holy Grail, my roots. In the mist, I sense the presence of so many who have gone before, those whose blood courses through my veins and pumps my heart. To them, we owe so much honor and respect… Mystery seeks to unveil itself through endless questions about the past: “How did Moses Park meet Mary in the rugged frontier of the 1700’s? How did George meet Harriet, and Hardy L. Park meet Lockie Annie in the early and latter parts of the 1800’s in Tennessee? What were they like together? Was love and loss woven into the essence of their lives also?

Stray cotton balls float freely in the winter mist, evoking collective memories of the harvest time; cotton carnivals, princesses, queens and kings of the plantation… Also, a great sense of despair overwhelms my heart and, at times, all I can hear are the wailing cries so deep and strong that, in my weakness, I can hardly allow it in… It is a cry of heartbreaking loss, bent and broken backs, thorn-tattered fingers, and displaced persons wailing out their haunting melody: 

“Sometimes I feel like a motherless child………A long way from home.”
In the misty grey of winter, where all seems to linger so closely, the past and present collide as a mere droplet in the imminent presence of eternity. Here, now, I feel conscious of having been conceived, raised, and immersed in the mist. I feel deeply sorry for the displacement and suffering inflicted upon the enslaved; I feel terribly aware of the displacement and loneliness of my own mind and heart at times; I’m grateful always for the land; and I am in love with the songs and the flavors of the South. From the mist, I have ventured out with courage at times, and have risen above the clouds for no other reason but to see with new eyes from whence I have come. And I have returned home feeling more grateful and more conscious of the context of our lives in the larger “mist”; that soulful , eternal home in which we all live and breathe and have our being in God the Creator of all.

Written by Anne Milligan

Photo of Martha Herrin Hollis

Days 76-80 - Portals to Peace

 

"As we're liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others." - Marianne Williamson

Morning Sea 2 - Erie Chapman

   Your deepest wisdom whispers to you that peace without comes from peace within. Where is the portal to this peace?    

   My three-year-old grandson found an answer in the Star Wars myth. Darth Vader is the one others fear.

   "How do you defeat him?" I asked. "The Force," he announced.

   "Where is The Force?" I asked.

   "Here!" he trumpeted, touching his chest. 

    Did you ever meet a "Darth Vader" at work? One Chief Nursing Officer told me, "I want my staff to fear me. Then they will do what I say."

   Another executive attempted to hide her use of fear by feigning disbelief that her reported "enemies lists" scared staff.  "I tell people not to fear me."

   If a "Darth Vader" appeared before you saying, "Don't fear me," would you believe him?

   How do you respond?

   You cannot stop outside forces from threatening you. But. you can grow peace without from seeds of peace planted within. 

                                                                                         II.

   But, hold the phone, is it realistic that inner peace can protect you from the core worry of every employee, being fired? Peace won't pay the mortgage or cover the car payments. 

   Still, as you grow your sense of peace your perspective rises. Things that once seemed terrifying may begin to loosen their grip. 

   Rilke is only one of the poets who offered the location of inner peace:

"...a billion stars go spinning through the night,
blazing high above your head.
But in you is the presence that
will be, when all the stars are dead. 

   Centuries earlier, Rumi articulated the same concept: "Why do you weep?/ [The] Source is within you,/ and this whole world/ is springing up from it."

   The Bible is a book of peace and love. Do you sense the presence of this peace within? 

   The hardest life practice is to stay centered in peace. And it is the most worthwhile.

   Between the clouds and sea within you lives the light of peace. Find your portal to this peace and enter it. 

-Erie Chapman

[Note: Too deepen your sense of peace today you may now wish to listen to a lovely rendition of an old song about peace sung by Johnny Mathis. Click on this light gray print>>>: 13 Deep River (Album Version)]

 

Days 74-75 - Reminiscing or Mr. Toad's Wild Ride

 My first car was a Volkswagen bug. I purchased it from a friend “as is” for $30. I was 17 and had just obtained my drivers learning permit. At the time I was living in Vermont, attending high school and working the 3:00-11:00pm shift at the in-patient mental health facility.

I remember one of those hair-raising situations I managed to get myself into while I still held the invincible mindset of youth.  It was the dead of winter, and I had accepted an invitation to spend the night at a girlfriend's big country farmhouse because I was thinking of becoming roommates with the four girls that lived there.

My friend Carole and I planned to drive out after work that night. The house was in a remote town 20 miles away. We had never been there before but we had directions. When we left work it was snowing heavily and the road conditions were perilous. I was an inexperienced driver and not familiar with a stick shift but my friend Carole was there to teach me.

As we headed out of town a police officer pulled as over. When I stepped from the car my knees were shaking so hard, they could barely hold me up. I thought I was in big trouble for driving with only a learner’s permit. However, the officer was only concerned with our safety. He noticed my headlights were dim and asked if we needed any help. We failed to heed his cautionary warning but thanked him and continued on our way.

The country roads were engulfed in darkness. The house was high up on a mountain top. We reached our destination sometime well after midnight. As I attempted to park, I hit a snowbank and the car was stuck. We decided to go in the house and deal with it by the light of day.

The next morning was bright, sunny and affirming. The snow, pristine beneath a clear azure sky and the air crisp. We tried to free the car from the bank but the wheels just spun around. To our surprise two  guys who happened to drive by stopped to offer assistance. They pushed my car free and with grateful ovations we bid them farewell.

We started down the mountain. All was well until the breaks went out. “Carole, I cried out in a panic, “what should I do?” Carole yelled excitedly, “Shift the gear to neutral!” I did as instructed but the car only gained increasing momentum. Like Mr. Toad's wild ride, we whipped around the winding mountain faster and faster. I gripped the steering wheel, knowing that with one wrong move we would plummet to our demise. As we hung on for dear life, I took each turn with a newly found precision.

Miraculously, we made it all the way down. The road ahead was flat and straight. Just when we thought we were safe, we hit a patch of black ice and the car spun around 360 degrees, went backwards down an embankment and into a shallow creek. As the car abruptly landed, Carole and I hugged each other and laughed with the realization of our close call.  We thanked God, thrilled to be alive!

A few minutes later a passing car stopped and I could not believe my eyes. It was the same guys who had helped us out of the snowbank just minutes earlier. They looked at our predicament and shook their heads, laughing, “Oh no, not this time!” and drove off.

We never set foot in that car again but managed to find it rest at the junk yard. As I look back, I wonder how I could have been so foolish to take such risks. Yet, since I am still here to tell, it is one of those funny stories I like to tell from time to time.

This story may stir up a few memories of your own. Reminiscing is a powerful way to affirm our life experiences. Caregivers understand the immense value of listening to stories and how this mutual sharing can enrich our lives.

By the way, did I ever tell you about the time I drove to Guatemala? 

Liz Sorensen Wessel

Photo: Liz sorensen;  age 17

Days 69-73 - Why Don't Caregivers Care for Themselves?

“In the different voice of women lies the truth of an ethic of care, the tie between relationship and responsibility, and the origins of aggression in the failure of connection.” - Carol Gilligan

   The United Airlines flight was gearing up for departure. I buckled up my seat-belt and carefully cradled my then six month old son (left) in my lap. 

   The voice of the flight attendant intoned the usual instructions about seats forward and tray tables in the upright and locked position. I tuned her out until she said, "Should the plane lose altitude suddenly oxygen masks will drop down..."

   I thought, "Well, obviously, she will say put the mask on your baby first."

   Of course, I would have been wrong. You put the mask on yourself first. You cannot help your baby if you are passed out.

   Caregivers are terrible at self-care. Part of the reason is that they mistakenly think that caregiving means an unrelenting sacrifice of the self.

   Noted women's rights authority Carol Gilligan warns that it is the relationship that leads to responsibility and the lack of it that leads to mistreatment. She describes a three-stage progression in caring.

   We grow up paying attention first to our own needs. Second, caregivers look after others. Traditionally, female caregivers in this stage begin to forget self-care, wrongly believing that all of their energy must be committed to self-sacrifice rather then self-care. 

   The wisdom-informed third stage says otherwise.  You must love and care for yourself before you can love another.

   Love can only flow from love. 

-Erie Chapman

Days 67-68 Divine Spark

“To be human is to become visible while carrying what is hidden as a gift to others.” -David Whyte

You are Divine; a divine spark and as your soul awakened Love breathed you into being.

Sometimes internalized messages may overshadow our light. Patterned thoughts can become a self-limiting prophesy. If we look outside of ourselves for answers and see problems as external; that thought is the problem! A reversal of thought is necessary.

As many spiritual traditions reveal, when we return home to ourselves we can begin to make room for all visitors.  We can greet kindly the voices from our childhood that linger in the hands that molded us. We experience a paradigm shift when we begin to look from the inside out.

Through recognition and awareness of our guiding Light, self-criticism, judgment and comparisons begin to loosen and fall away.

Let us celebrate and share the gift of our Divine humanness, the truth of who we are in Love.

The video below is an artistic manifestatation of the dance  of life.

Liz  Sorensen Wessel

Artwork by ~liz

  

Days 62-66 "Ornery Preaching"

   "Good minds have purposes; others have wishes." Washington Irving

   The reason Huckleberry Finn has endured as one of the great works of American literature is that Twain wrote the truth so powerfully. For example, he had Huck report to us things like this: "Next Sunday we all went to church...The men took their guns along...It was pretty ornery preaching - all about brotherly love, and such-like tiresomeness."

   Preaching really is tiresome. I have listened to a lot and done more than my share (as the Journal indicates.)

   We may feel inspired in the moments during and right after a sermon or speech. But, the impact is notoriously short-lived. 

   As Huck says after the preacher finishes, "...everybody said it was a good sermon, and they all talked it over going home, and had such a powerful lot to say about faith, and good works, and free grace, and preforeordestinsation, and I don't know what all, that it did seem to me to be one of the roughest Sundays I had run across yet."

   You have probably spent a lot of time during a speech dreaming and wishing that your dreams would come true. How does that happen?

   It is when you listen to Irving and focus on purposes instead of wishes that your life advances. But, that is just me doing ornery preaching.

  What are your purposes? What are your new goals? What do you need to do to realize those goals?

-Erie Chapman, Nashville

Days 60-61 - A Shifting Culture

“If the only tool you have is a hammer, you tend to see every problem as a nail.” –Abraham Maslow

According to the Institute of Medicine, thousands of patients come to harm during the course of their healing due to preventable mistakes. The Joint commission suggests that communication is a top contributor in medical errors. Often caregivers find it difficult to speak up when they see unsafe practices such as clinicians taking shortcuts, breaking rules or lacking competence.

In a study conducted by Vitalsmarts called "Silence Kills" (2005), results showed that the ability of nurses to raise difficult conversations had a direct correlation with patient safety, quality of care, teamwork, employee satisfaction and turnover. In leadership there is no room for intimidation, coercion, bullying or disrespect as a means of influence. More often than not, errors result from a series of system failures that culminate in someone making a mistake.

Healthcare is evolving in a positive direction. Instead of focusing individual blame or a punitive response when a mistake occurs; organizations are working to develop cultures of safety. Scott Griffith suggests a collaborative Just Culture model that balances system design with accountability for behavior. He promotes an effective strategy of positive coaching that is supportive, compassionate and transparent. He encourages leaders to model behaviors that make it safe for others to disclose mistakes when they occur and to speak up about safety concerns.

Renown healthcare leader, Erie Chapman continually inspires us to approach our patients with authentic intention and to be open to the vulnerability that accompanies illness and suffering. "When deep need is met with a loving response it is a sacred encounter" (Chapman).

 Leaders can begin by being vulnerable and admitting some of their own mistakes to cultivate an atmosphere of openness and trust among caregivers. This will allow the sacred to manifest in their relationships, as well. As Erie so wisely counsels, "the number one job of a leader is to care for the people who care for the patients."

Liz Sorensen Wessel RN, MSN

Photo: August 6, 2006 Rejie, Lee and grandma Wessel-3 generations