“…What you sow does not come to life unless it dies.” 1 Corinthians 15:36
Keep a list today. On a small piece of paper. One you can fold up. Fit in your pocket. Carry with you wherever you go. Unfold and flatten for remembering moments, even fleeting ones, scribbled down perhaps with a stubby pencil.
Collect the glimmers. The moments when hope settles on your heart for a passing second. Delivered in a realization, discovery, or an opening into what’s possible. Name each of these bits of unexpected joys and mercies in an act of gathering and sowing for your future. Continue this act of prayer for as long as it feels good to do so.
God, witness in me this day what I cannot see. Witness the tiny seeds of healing and hope I sow in my own fallowness. Witness in me my life-force still living. Witness in me my surprise in discovering unexpected joys. Receive my thanks for what I do not know will bless me today and tomorrow and in this wintered season of my own healing. Amen.
“Do not fear, for I am with you, do not be afraid, for I am your God; I will strengthen you, I will help you, I will uphold you…” Isaiah 41:10
“And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age.” Matthew 28:20
Reflection
God said, “I am with you.”
Jesus said, “I am with you always.”
Statements opposing our abandonment. God gone. God disappearing. Leaving us alone. All alone in living hell. All alone suffering. All alone sitting in despair. Words telling us God stays with us. Is present with us. We, never alone. Always together with God.
How? How is God with us always?
I don’t know. I just know sometimes things shift. Something opens up within me unlocking breath’s captivity. Or something I once thought an impossible goodness becomes reality. Or someone shows up with life-giving words. Are these moments of God being with me embedding in my body? Surrounding my soul? Being the breath that I breathe?
Who knows? What I know is that these small shifts keep hope alive in me one moment at a time.
Healing Practice: Holding Possible Truth
It’s hard to fully hold this possible truth of God being with us always. But others can hold this possibility for us. Some already do without us even knowing about it. Today ask someone you trust to hold this thought for you. Maybe pick three people. Who cares if they believe in God or not. That’s not their job right now. Their job is to hold this possibility for you.
Prayer
God, are you always with us? Even when we cannot feel your presence. Even when we cannot trust your presence. Even when we cannot believe in your presence. Hold us God in your seemingly absent presence as we attempt this possibility of hope. Amen.
Healing, mine, and my sons, occupies my thoughts most days. What we need. Which modalities works best. Finding new or additional healing ways. Reading another book on trauma recovery or Lyme Disease. Going to therapy. Doing the work–both at home and in the therapy office. Paying the bills.
But I tire of this work being the focus of our family’s life both individually and collectively. As if healing is the only thing that binds us together. I yearn to focus on living. Or what I think living is. Healing seems like the past, living more like the now and future. Yes, we all need to do more healing. I have written elsewhere that the world and its people keep hurting and therefore healing is ongoing. Yet I seem to seek something more, not sure what though. Just know I’ve spent eight years focused on healing first. And I wonder if my focus is sustainable over time.
Yet as I think about it, I am not ready to step away from healing’s many ways. And my unreadiness is not about a lack of courage or living. It is about who I have discovered I am these past eight years. And who I am is someone who in my sensitivity to the world needs places, spaces, and people to work through how life impacts me. I also want to continue peeling away the layers of pain stacked up within me. The ones masquerading as personality and temperament and dictating who am I.
In healing, I find myself in new and fascinating ways. And these incremental discoveries bring me joy! So, what I am really discovering is that healing is life’s nourishment not just its balm. An ongoing focus reminding me of the sentence I composed in magnetic words soon after Tony died. The one staring at us from its place on the refrigerator.
“You can do this life well.”
years later adding a few more words:
“You can do this life well only in ongoing healing.”
Living, for me, is doing this life well through healing.
Heat swells, radiating out,
I flush,
Not in a flash,
(I am past that)
But in a spike without illness.
Sudden warmth startles me,
Colliding with night’s coolness,
Before slithering away,
Never intending to stay.
Twice, this occurs,
First when I ask my mind,
“Do I suffer from anxiety?”
Second, when I ask my heart the same question.
Relieved,
(somewhat)
When asked,
My gut has nothing to say.
The body practice described in my poem above is based on the work of Suzanne Rivers. I learned about the practice in Susan Raffo's book, Liberated to the Bone: HIstories, Bodies, Future published by AK Press. This practice begins on page 150.
Image by Martina Bulkova for pixabay.
Take a moment to notice where your body is in your space, in your environment.
Notice your feet against the soles of your shoes or your bare feet on the flooring or your heels and legs against the couch. Notice the heat of this meeting between your feet and what they wear and perch upon. Or the coolness. And, notice the gentleness or roughness of the carpet, upholstery, socks, air. Notice.
Notice where your arms are. On the table. Or against your body. What does that feel like? This meeting between your arms and something else?
If sitting, notice your derriere in your seat. Is your seat soft, hard, warm, cool?
These noticing are through your skin, your largest organ, interacting with the external environment. Now, let’s move our attention inward. I invite you to travel inside your body. To the middle of you, to your bones.
Sense your bones.
Sense the bones in your feet traveling into the bones in your legs.
Sense your hip bones.
Sense your rib cage.
Sense your spine.
Sense the bones in your arms, shoulders, neck, and jaw.
Sensing your bones, I invite you to travel inside your bones. For now, just pick one bone, like your jaw bone or a bone that seems to want your attention. Travel into the living essence of this bone. Into the marrow. Into where blood cells are made.
Describe to yourself what being inside your bones feels like. What looking at your body from inside out is like.
Is there anything you would like to ask your bones? If so, ask.
Listen for a response. A response can be nothing or it can appear in images, felt senses, or words. As you listen, be gentle with yourself. Take note.
And breathe asking the universe or God to remain curious with you about your bones.
Now, slowly move back toward the outside of yourself, out to your skin. To get there, travel through the rest of your body—your organs, tissue, bodily fluids. And when you are back in your skin, so to speak, I invite you to open your eyes and return to the room.
Based on a practice originally written for Wartburg Seminary’s Trauma-Informed Worship class, September 18, 2023.
Please shift this practice to meet the needs of your body.
Jennifer Ohman-Rodriguez 