flickering rays

For a season, I met with a spiritual director. 

On each occasion, a candle was lit, as a signal of being contained in a sacred space.

Often I never got to the meat of what was consuming my mind until the final moments of the hour. Before prayer and the faint line of smoke ascended, each brief utterance allowed my burdens to descend, to be welcomed, realized, and expressed. 

Writing is quite similar. 

Coaxing out mountains of sentences and paragraphs then abandoning the formation to turn attention towards a tiny hill of late-arriving words. 

Over the past weeks, I have written about taking a hope inventory and my last post was full of thoughts, light on words. I keep circling back to these lines:

“Help me gather the gains
and tally the losses
from a tucked-away season”

I am striking my match, watching the wood burst into a golden flame, uniting itself with the wick, illuminating this place. I  am hoping for not just a pool of molten wax but flickering rays, an extended arrow pointing towards perspective.

I am believing this space is sacred enough to share a bit of what envelops my mind.

I hit a wall last week, a wall that had every bit to do with the losses of this tucked-away season.

This wall was a marker and a warning, an obstacle not meant to be dismissed or ignored but heeded.

I must tally my losses not to create an inaccessible fortress sending me headlong into despair but as a way to honor and acknowledge the contents of my life. When I assemble my hard places and encourage others to do the same, it is not an exercise designed to proclaim a winner. It is to lock arms in solidarity as a collective, it’s inclusive, not reductive. 

In many ways, this is the exact right time to express our common plights because it is doubtful there is anyone who doesn’t understand. 

We all get it.

Strike the match.

I have lost silence and solitude.

I have lost simple routines like stepping foot into a library.

I have lost spontaneity.

I have lost spending time with loved ones near and far.

I have lost a beloved father and honoring this loss in a timely way.

I have lost some hope in America due to the skin I reside in.

What losses do you number?

Write a list.

Say the words out loud.

Whisper them to yourself or in your prayers.

Share the many ways you have experienced loss with a trusted someone.

It was difficult to tell my husband, who daily wakes earlier than me, how weary I was. 

Yet it was true. 

He held my thoughts and reflected back the truth of each word.

He encouraged me to keep speaking these words and not bury them.

In essence, he gave me permission to keep writing and speaking my own psalms. The psalms are full of questions, laments, doubts, and rants but somehow, somewhere after a period of uncertainty, there arises the realization of inhabiting a beautiful but challenging world with a good and ever-present God. 

I want to come to this place as honest as possible and leave with the answers by the time I tap the final punctuation mark.

But none of us have gone through a time such as this or have been given a laminated road map.

We are squarely at the intersection of loss and uncertainty. 

I think this placement is central to what makes us excruciatingly weary.

Watch the flame bend and glow.

I have gained time with my home dwellers.

I have gained perspective about all I have taken for granted.

I have gained an appreciation for the importance of intentionality.

I have gained creativity in how to stay connected with my loved ones.

I have gained entrance into a community of those who grieve.

I have reaffirmed my need and gratitude for God’s abiding love and care.

I have gained the awareness that I need hope and still have hope.

We have always experienced gains and losses over the course of our lives. 

This particular time has heightened each one,  same or different,
varying in number and intensity.

Tally the losses and honor them.

But make sure to gather the gains, as the byproduct of loss, not the cancellation.

If you think you have none, remember you are still here.

I am grateful you are.

Extinguish the candle,

watch the evidence escape to the heavens.

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Don’t fear those who kill the body but are not able to kill the soul; rather, fear him who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell.

Matthew 10: 28 (CSB)

Don’t be bluffed into silence by the threats of bullies. There’s nothing they can do to your soul, your core being. Save your fear for God, who holds your entire life—body and soul—in his hands.

Matthew 10: 28 (MSG)