Holding On, Letting Go, and Awakening

My Tarot card of the day was number 20 in the Major Arcana:  Judgment--Awakening as it is shown in my new favorite deck, The Gaian Tarot, by Joanna Powell Colbert.  She writes that this card is about awareness of a shift in consciousness—an opening up to a life of the spirit.  In discussing the shadow side of the card, she talks about how difficult it can be to release our attachment to old ways of doing things, old habits, and old beliefs, even when these ways no longer serve us and indeed are perceived as negative.

I’ve been in a period of Awakening for quite a while now—opening up to a life of the spirit in a multitude of ever deepening ways. And yet, I am also aware of the difficulty of letting go of some of my old habits—things I know I need to release, and yet somehow always seem to fall back upon in times of stress or distress. I am sometimes amazed at the tenacity with which the vestigial remnants of my old self can fight for what comforts it, despite the many efforts my awakening self makes to shift those patterns.

The last 48 hours have been extremely windy—gusts up to 50 mph where we live. I’ve spent much of today upstairs in the studio, weaving and listening to the wind howl through the trees and make the wind chimes dance. From time to time I’ve gone to one of the windows to watch the trees swaying in the wind. From the east window, I can see the bare branches of a lovely oak tree, which has been doing its share of dancing. My attention has focused on one branch—one broken branch about at eye level—swinging and swaying in the repeated gusts of winds.     

           

This branch was broken during the unusual Samhain snow storm we had this year.  It is visible from the ground, but not reachable with our tallest ladder.  It will have to be brought down as it was broken, by the efforts of Mother Nature.  I have been expecting this to happen all afternoon.

As I have studied this swinging branch, I have come to realize that even though it is broken, it is not likely to fall soon.  The branch is perhaps three inches in diameter.  The top half is broken, and the rest is bent, which is why it hangs down and swings.  But the bottom half is not broken—merely bent with the weight of the branch.  It is still pretty firmly attached to the unbroken part of itself and likely to remain so until Time and Mother Nature slowly dry out the green wood and break the connecting pieces bit by bit.  .

This broken branch no longer serves the mother tree.  Although it may produce a few new leaves when spring comes, it is unlikely to flower or produce fruit.  And yet, it is still firmly connected—still receiving energy from the mother tree, who is not quite ready to let go of this broken branch.

I find this to be an interesting metaphor for the process of releasing and letting go of old patterns and beliefs.  Sometimes in ritual, or therapy, or perhaps both, we identify something that no longer serves our authentic selves and make a determination to release it.  I think ritual and therapy are both important tools in this process.  However, it is probably unrealistic to expect to immediately and completely let go of something just because you say you want to, or have, especially when you are discussing a habit that has been forming for decades or more.

My personal experience is that it takes a while to fully release something I truly wish to let go.  I may break the branch, but parts of my subconscious will continue to send energy to that broken branch.  Vigilance and diligence are required to gradually reduce and eliminate the energy sources of which I am only dimly aware at first.  Slowly, over time—it may take more than a season—the old habit or broken branch will completely dry up and then fall away. 

Observations today have convinced me that the broken branch on my oak tree will likely be there this time next year.  By then, perhaps, it will have lost enough energy sources for its connections to the mother tree to finally be broken. 

I’m taking a lesson in patience from this observation.  Broken habits and branches can ultimately be severed from the mother tree, but it is rarely a quick and immediate process.  Change—even change we devoutly desire--takes time.  That does not mean I cannot continue to grow and evolve into my new authentic self.  The continued attachment of a negative pattern or two does not stop that process.  But it does remind me to be gentle with myself when those lingering patterns rear their unwanted heads.  Change takes time and patience is a virtue.  I think I’ll have a piece of chocolate.

Mardi Gras Madness

           Today is Mardi Gras—Fat Tuesday—the last day  before Ash Wednesday when the season of Lent begins.  Traditionally Lent involves a sacrifice of some kind—a giving up of something in preparation for the glorious events of Easter, some 40 days hence.  In many Catholic cultures where Lent is seriously observed, the day before Ash Wednesday became a festival in its own right—a community-wide celebration providing participants the chance to enjoy life before beginning a period of serious sacrifice.  Hence Mardi Gras—Fat Tuesday—the ultimate opportunity to eat, drink and be merry.

            In my old life, before I took up residence in the glorious State of Maine, my first husband, David, and I lived in New Orleans for 25 years.  Over those years, we developed our own customs and rituals for observing Mardi Gras, or rather Carnival, the proper name for this season, which begins on Twelfth Night (January 6) and runs until Mardi Gras.  In honor of my friends and family still living in New Orleans, and the many pleasant memories I have of those times, I’d like to share a little about what my life would be like if I were still a resident of that strange and wondrous city.

            We would have gotten up early on this Mardi Gras day, to put the finishing touches on our costumes and get dressed.  The photo below shows David and me the year we dressed as pirates.  After packing up the supplies we would need for a day of walking in the French Quarter—water, sun glasses, band aids--we’d leave the house around ten, stopping a few blocks away to catch the Rex Parade at the start of its run down to the edge of the Quarter.  After Rex passed, we would zip down to the Quarter, taking the circuitous routes necessary to avoid the parades and hopefully get to our destination—the far side of the French Quarter, and find cheap and legal parking—always as challenge—by 11 am.     

            By this time in the Carnival Season, we’ve been to maybe a dozen parades—each following the same basic pattern with distinct and interesting variations.  Parades are put on by different organizations called crewes, many of which bear the names of classical gods—Hermes, Iris, Baccus, Endymion, Orpheus, Muses—and all of which have themes.  Some themes are corny beyond belief, but some crewes specialize in satirical themes, often with a political bent.  Woe be the public figure who pisses the people off—he will find himself skewed in multiple ways throughout this season.  

Mardi Gras parades are not like parades in other cities.  The bands are always excellent and play jazz and R&B instead of marches.  The floats are huge—the Orpheus Parade boasts one float a city block long—and some are lit with neon and other flashing lights.  Each float is inhabited by a dozen or so members of the crewe.  Crewe members are always in costume, are usually drunk, and are surrounded by huge bags holding beads, toys, trinkets and cups which they throw to the crowd.  The crowds are usually equally huge—generally several people deep on each side of the parade route, which is about 5 miles. 

For the more popular parades, people arrive early, bringing chairs, coolers, step ladders for the kids, and bags to carry home their loot.  The Endymion Parade—one of the largest and most elaborate--runs on Saturday night and always has a celebrity guest.  People have been known to camp out overnight on the route for this parade so as to hold a prime spot for parade viewing.  During the day they will be joined by family and friends.  For the locals, parades are family affairs and some families and groups of friends have been meeting at the same location for the same parades for decades.

Throughout the weekend before Mardi Gras, several parades are held each day and night.  People who own houses on parade routes are never lonely during this time, or else they leave town so as to avoid the noise and chaos. 

During our last several years in New Orleans, our Mardi Gras weekend events evolved to include Mardi Gras Balls.  On Friday night, we often went to the Zulu Ball, held by the Crewe of Zulu, the largest and oldest black crewe in the city.  David had a lot of friends among the political elite of the city and was generally able to get tickets.  Mardi Gras balls are always very formal and are basically debutant events.  Thus , if one arrived on time at Zulu, one would sit through the introduction of a dozen or more young women—daughter of XYZ—and her escort, son of ABC.  We learned to arrive around the time the music started—which was generally midnight.  After the first year, I gave up trying to have the most sparkly dress for this event—it was just not possible to out-do the women who had been attending this ball for decades and would willingly wear 12 pounds of sequins in order to out-shine the other wives of crewe members.  Here is a photo of one of our Zulu ensembles.

         For me, the best part of the entire Carnival Season was always Mardi Gras day in the French Quarter.  Early in the day Quarter is filled with costumed locals, many of whom have been planning their costumes since last Mardi Gras.  Some are so elaborate it is hard to imagine how the person moves.  Some are ensemble pieces involving a whole family—Dorothy and her companions from the Wizard of Oz, worn by a group of gay men—or all the impossible colors of mms—orange, green, purple, pink, white—worn by a family with several children.  Often the costumes are risqué, and there is a certain amount of more or less discrete nudity.  I could go on and on, and have boxes of photos, but you get the general idea. 

Casual, informal parades snake through the Quarter this day—always on foot.  Generally there are a couple of musical instruments leading the way—a couple of trumpets and a drum—some professional, some amateur.  Some 2-3 people will be carrying the parade banner, and they will be followed by masses of costumed revelers.  We often joined in these groups, lending our energy to the overall festivities—dancing our way down the street with unselfconscious abandon—taking photos and being photographed—stopping to chat with people we knew, and then dropping to the sidelines for a bit just to watch and enjoy.

This is what the real Mardi Gras is all about—music and dancing in the streets—friends and family gathering to celebrate life—costuming so you can, for a few hours or days or weeks, express your alter-ego.  It is a very different energy from the big parades and the formal balls.  It is organic and of the people.

David and I zigzagged our way back and forth across the Quarter—down to the river front—back up to the crowds—until time to meet friends at the House of Blues for late lunch, as became our custom.  Then we meandered our way to the home of different friends, who actually lived in the Quarter and held an open house.  We’d grab some water, freshen up, and hang out on their stoop, watching the glittering hordes form and reform in front of our eyes.

The party in the French Quarter continues until midnight, when Mardi Gras is officially over and the police clear the streets, sending revelers into the bars for more drink and music.  We always made it a policy to leave by dark.  By then the hordes of drunken guests who have been watching the parades in other parts of the city have poured into the Quarter and the overall energy has changed.  But we have had a lovely day and our desire for revelry has been sated.  We’d wander back to our car and take our circuitous route home—to rest and talk and watch the local news reports of the festivities.         

Lent begins the next day—Ash Wednesday—and I was always surprised by the number of locals who made it to morning mass and carried ashes on their foreheads for the rest of the day.    

My Prayer Practice: Communing with Nature

And I dream that these garden-closes
With their shade and their sun-flecked sod
And their lilies and bowers of roses,
Were laid by the hand of God.

The kiss of the sun for pardon,
The song of the birds for mirth, --
One is nearer God’s heart in a garden
Than anywhere else on earth.
By Dorothy Frances Gurney
 
“Nature is full of genius, full of the divinity; so that not a snowflake escapes its fashioning hand.”
Henry David Thoreau

          A man walks alone on a deserted beach.  Periodically, he stops to observe the movement of the water on the sand and the flow of the clouds across the sky, feeling a deep sense of awe and reverence. 

          A couple hikes a mountain path, stopping occasionally to observe the trees and undergrowth or to listen to birdsong or the rustle of leaves.  They reach the summit and stand, surveying the panorama surrounding them.  Few words are spoken, but a deep sense completion and wholeness is felt.  They hold hands and share this sacred moment.
          A woman works in her garden.  As she plants or feeds or otherwise tends the plants in her care, she is conscious of the amazing gift of life—of the miraculous ability of tiny seeds to grow into plants enriching her life with beauty and nourishment.  She pauses a moment to be grateful for this gift.

          If we combine Angeles Arrien’s definition of prayer as “a way of setting a sacred intention,” with Catherine of Siena’s assertion that “everything you do can be a prayer”, then surely each of these scenarios is a form of prayer.  When I read Maggie Oman Shannon’s book The Way We Pray, I was quite struck by the fact that the author does not include Communing with Nature as one of her smorgasbord of prayer forms.  Communing with Nature has been fundamental in my life as long as I can remember.  Indeed, I think it would be safe to say that Communing with Nature is the oldest form of prayer known to human-kind.

          I am a practicing Wiccan/Pagan and Communing with Nature in a fluid unstructured way is part of my daily practice.  I walk in the natural world—the beach, the forest, the mountains, my own yard—I tend to my companion animals and the plants I nurture—all with an intentional awareness of and desire to touch at some level the Divine Spirit in everything.  Sometimes I am silent.  Sometimes I verbalize a deep and heartfelt sense of gratitude for the beauty of the world and the blessings I experience by being open to that beauty.  Sometimes I dance.  Sometimes I drum.  Sometimes I sing.  Sometimes I select a rock or a flower and stare at it in deep contemplation of its intricacy and beauty.  If I initiate one of these responses to my experience, it is the way my Divine Soul is choosing to respond at that point in time, to the presence of the Divine in the Universe.  I am communing with the Divine as represented by the natural world.

          This spiritual practice has been with me since childhood.  My parents taught me to say my prayers morning and evening and to go to church on Sunday’s.  But the Divine taught me to climb a tree, sit on its branches and marvel at the pattern created by the bark and the miracle of the fruit it produced.  I believe that a spark of divinity lives within me and within you and within everything created by the Divine—plants and animals, rocks and rivers, planets and stars.    

          Many of the pre-Christian spiritual paths that humans followed considered time spent in the natural world as a source of spiritual teachings and healing.  This is certainly true of the surviving indigenous cultures, in this country and others, as well as the contemporary adaptation of spiritual practices derived from indigenous cultures, such as Shamanism.  Indeed, as I recall my Bible stories, many of the Hebrew Testament prophets, such as Moses, as well as Jesus himself, withdrew to the natural world for the express purpose of communing with and receiving inspiration from the Divine Presence.    

          The nice thing about Communing with Nature is that it doesn’t require any special equipment—no art supplies—no sacred text—no words to memorize or create.  All that is necessary is my body and my intention to be open to Divinity.  As such, this form of prayer is accessible to everyone—small children and the elderly, urbanites and country-folk—anyone who is willing to take a few minutes and “combine concentration with wonderment”, as David Steindl-Rast writes.  You don’t even have to go outside, as windows to the sky provide ample frameworks for connection. 

          There are times in the lives of all of us when even the most well-intentioned words and gestures offered by others cannot break through the wall of misery and despair surrounding us.  Several years ago I experienced just such a dark night of the soul and was healed, in part, by time spent communing with nature.  I lived in New Orleans for 25 years.  In 2005, all the supports and props of my life were swept away from me.  Within a 4 month period, I lost both my parents, survived Hurricane Katrina, and lost my husband of 33 years.  I moved back to New Orleans in November and the misery, pain and anguish engulfed me.  The city was dark and dank and my life was dark and dank and I was not sure if I would be able to find a way to go on.  Into this monochromatic existence floated a gift.  The storm waters had planted a seed in my yard and, unbeknownst to me, it had started to grow.  By the time I noticed, it was growing up the side of my deck—huge verdant green leaves branching off a vine I had never seen before.  The presence of such vibrant color was healing in and of itself and I began to pay attention to this plant. 

          Over the next several months, this plant thrived.  And every day, when I got up, I went outside to look at it.  Observing this plant became the high point of my day.  I began to tend to it—dumping soil on its roots and making sure it had water—which was more attention that I was paying to my own physical needs at that point.  As winter slipped into spring, buds appeared, soon followed by giant buttery yellow flowers.  By now, I was spending part of everyday sitting outside by my vine, soaking up its energy, its beauty, and its wholeness.  Gradually, I got the message—I would survive—I too could flourish if I allowed it to happen. 

          Today I have a new life in Maine—a life I could not have imagined 6 years ago.  I have done massive amounts of exploration and healing, but I will never forget that my first step back to wholeness was guided by a single vine.  Such is the healing power of the very simple prayer practice of Communing with Nature.