Friday, December 30, 2011

How I'm learning to love my small, ordinary life

...[R]ecognize and accept your own smallness and ordinariness. Then you are free with nothing to live up to, nothing to prove, and nothing to protect.... When you know that your “I” has an inherent dignity and is objectively one with God, you can ironically be quite content with a small and ordinary “I.” No grandstanding is necessary. Any question of your own importance or value has already been resolved once and for all and forever. Fr. Richard Rohr.

I don't pretend to understand "God," but I accept the word as shorthand for the Mystery of the Universe which contains the natural world as I know it, and therein I put my trust.

Here is a reminder that I may participate in daily activities, but when I fail, others stride forward and speak effectively. The world IS about me AND the world IS NOT about me. It's fascinating, how that goes.

I asked for, and received, several Mary Oliver books. I've discovered that reading her poetry lowers my blood pressure. Like a walk to Deer Creek. The truth that carries creation— the underneath and clear, unvarnished truth— really does set one free. It's all true: the closely observed and that which is beyond separation and human comprehension. And somehow every scrap fits together, of all the little pieces fit, all we know and all we do not yet know. Don't forget.

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