Standing Still in the Present
Standing Still in the Present
Monday of the Fourth Week of Lent – March 23, 2020
Each of us has our own ways of running away from ourselves. We have our own patterns that distract us from seeing what is true and real about ourselves, God, others, and the world.
But it seems to me that in these very different days, as we keep one eye focused on the coronavirus and another eye on our own altered daily routine, many of us find our usual patterns upset. We may not have our usual distractions available to us.
I’ll confess that we’re only a few days into the social distancing and days apart from close contact with others . . . and already I’m finding myself out of sorts. It is easy enough to rehearse good days in the past . . . or to fantasize about what may or may not happen in the future. But I also realize that whenever we fixate on the past or the future, we immediately pull ourselves out of the present.
It is a challenge to stand still in the present . . . to allow the present to be what it is . . . to allow this moment to be the time of encounter with God.
As Esther de Waal says, we are invited to “stand still in our own centre.”
The vow of stability tells me that I must not run away from myself. It tells me to stand still, to stand firm, not in the sense of standing still in some geographical spot, which of course is simply not possible for most of the time in our highly mobile twentieth-century world, but in the more fundamental sense of standing still in my own centre, not trying to run away or to escape from myself, the person who I really am. Whenever I encounter that insidious temptation to say “If only,” whether of the past or of the future, I must firmly put it away from me, and instead tell myself that God is present in my life here, in this moment in time and in this place, and it is no good searching for some other place and time where I believe I might find him. “You have a home,” Henri Nouwen reminds us that Christ is telling us. “I am your home . . . claim me as your home. . . . It is right where you are . . . in your innermost being . . . in your heart.” The more attentive we are to such words the more we realize that we do not have to go far to find what we are seeking. The tragedy is that we try to find that place elsewhere, that we wander off searching for it, and so become strangers to ourselves, people who have an address, but are never at home. And, we might add, unless we are at home we shall never be able to receive the figure of Christ who stands outside, knocking, waiting to come in.
[Esther de Waal, Living with Contradiction: An Introduction to Benedictine Spirituality (Harrisburg, PA: Morehouse Publishing, 1989), 1997.]
For Reflection:
o I consider my own unique avoidance strategies, that is, the ways I run away from myself and avoid looking within myself. What do I notice?
o Sometimes we hear of a person who is in a frantic search for themselves, looking in this philosophy, that practice, or in some religious experience to find themselves. Most of the time, the outward search is a lot of busyness that yields little result. The key to our personhood is within us already, not in some outward expression.
o If “home” is the place where I most belong, I consider what “home” might mean for me.
Monday of the Fourth Week of Lent – March 23, 2020
Each of us has our own ways of running away from ourselves. We have our own patterns that distract us from seeing what is true and real about ourselves, God, others, and the world.
But it seems to me that in these very different days, as we keep one eye focused on the coronavirus and another eye on our own altered daily routine, many of us find our usual patterns upset. We may not have our usual distractions available to us.
I’ll confess that we’re only a few days into the social distancing and days apart from close contact with others . . . and already I’m finding myself out of sorts. It is easy enough to rehearse good days in the past . . . or to fantasize about what may or may not happen in the future. But I also realize that whenever we fixate on the past or the future, we immediately pull ourselves out of the present.
It is a challenge to stand still in the present . . . to allow the present to be what it is . . . to allow this moment to be the time of encounter with God.
As Esther de Waal says, we are invited to “stand still in our own centre.”
The vow of stability tells me that I must not run away from myself. It tells me to stand still, to stand firm, not in the sense of standing still in some geographical spot, which of course is simply not possible for most of the time in our highly mobile twentieth-century world, but in the more fundamental sense of standing still in my own centre, not trying to run away or to escape from myself, the person who I really am. Whenever I encounter that insidious temptation to say “If only,” whether of the past or of the future, I must firmly put it away from me, and instead tell myself that God is present in my life here, in this moment in time and in this place, and it is no good searching for some other place and time where I believe I might find him. “You have a home,” Henri Nouwen reminds us that Christ is telling us. “I am your home . . . claim me as your home. . . . It is right where you are . . . in your innermost being . . . in your heart.” The more attentive we are to such words the more we realize that we do not have to go far to find what we are seeking. The tragedy is that we try to find that place elsewhere, that we wander off searching for it, and so become strangers to ourselves, people who have an address, but are never at home. And, we might add, unless we are at home we shall never be able to receive the figure of Christ who stands outside, knocking, waiting to come in.
[Esther de Waal, Living with Contradiction: An Introduction to Benedictine Spirituality (Harrisburg, PA: Morehouse Publishing, 1989), 1997.]
For Reflection:
o I consider my own unique avoidance strategies, that is, the ways I run away from myself and avoid looking within myself. What do I notice?
o Sometimes we hear of a person who is in a frantic search for themselves, looking in this philosophy, that practice, or in some religious experience to find themselves. Most of the time, the outward search is a lot of busyness that yields little result. The key to our personhood is within us already, not in some outward expression.
o If “home” is the place where I most belong, I consider what “home” might mean for me.
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