Wounds as Doorways

Rock of Cashel: Tipperary, Ireland

I think of wounds as barriers—obstacles closing off a path I was originally intended to follow. Thus, my new year’s resolutions have often sought to circumvent the pain of my story the way you would finagle faulty electrical circuits in an old house to accomodate a modern, high voltage appliance. I’d write my resolutions in a new journal couched in words like healing, transformation and growth. All good words, but looking back I see my desire was to circumvent my wounds rather than allow them to usher me through a threshold I am meant to cross.

So today, on this day after Epiphany and, more gloriously, my kids’ first day back at school, these lines from a poem by Jan Richardson ignite in me a genuine spark of hope as I face this new decade.

“Singing to the Night”

Who would have thought

the sky could be so pierced,

or that it could pour forth such

light through the breach

whose shape matched

so precisely

the hole in the heart

that had ached

for long ages,

weary from all its emptying?

And what had once been

a wound

opened now

like a door

or a dream,

radiant in its welcome,

singing to the night

that would prove itself

at last

not endless.” ***

How are you weary from feeling emptied by the past or aching from a historic breach of your heart? How might this wound, if trusted, understood and allowed to guide you, lead you closer to the end of a long night? What if, this year, you didn’t seek to be different but only to be whole?

***To read the rest of the poem, download Jan Richardson’s free Epiphany retreat here. It’s seriously the best free thing on the planet! https://sanctuaryofwomen.com/WomensChristmasRetreat2020.pdf

A Christmas Benediction

May you know comfort as well as joy

May the path to misery be closed off to you

May nothing cause you dismay

May glad and golden hours come

May the weariness of your world not prevent your rejoicing

May you, along with all peoples, be raised up

May all your oppression cease

May you not be a stranger to your weakness

May you be released from your fears and sin

May you rise with healing in your wings

May death’s dark shadows be put to flight

And may your soul feel its worth.

Reversal Relief

Reversal.

Living in the northern hemisphere, I have always cherished July’s long days. During summers home from college, I’d watch sunsets stretch across the big Texas sky over my small town, perched on my lifeguard stand and waiting for the clock hands to hit 9pm and set me free. Conversely, I consider Colorado’s short winter days a suffering to be endured. Earlier this week, the dimness of a partially-clouded sky served as a signal to remove my sunglasses. I was aghast when I looked at my watch and it was only 3:45pm. I quickly comforted myself by counting how many days left until December 21st, when the the amount of light would start its victorious reversal.

Relief.

As a trauma survivor, coming to the end of my rope is difficult to admit. Deaf to subtle whispers of tiredness in my spirit, I must often hit a wall in order to surrender to a limit. Natural, human weakness was a luxury I could not afford growing up, and powerlessness in the face of my weakness surfaces humiliation rather than honor.  As a result, the word relief has always carried shame. I am eager to feel relief if someone else’s sickness or an unchosen snow storm cancels my chaos, but stepping back from intensity for my own sake equates undignified failure. Wholeness for me has meant learning to appreciate relief when I’m weary rather than condemn myself for needing it.

Today’s night is the longest one of the year, which means tomorrow’s darkness will be diminished. Even though, apart from atomic clocks, it is an imperceptible three second difference, it begins a reversal of light that will build until it crescendos into the joy of a June 8:32pm sunset.

A mere three seconds. That’s all. That will be my hemisphere’s first deposit of relief.

But some of life’s most important events happen within the span of three seconds. Engagement rings are slipped onto fingers. Umbilical cords are cut. Unretractable, relationship-shattering sentences are spoken. Championship winning three-point shots leave a player’s hand and swoosh into a net. Three seconds of an awkward first kiss, an orgasm, a car crash or mocking laughter can alter the trajectory of our lives.  

We need to befriend darkness and make peace with our cosmic ache, but when we are tired of both, allowing ourselves to relax into the relief of three additional seconds of light and warmth is an act of courage. At least for me.

What is your relationship with relief and rest? Are they merciful gifts or indications of failure and unfaithfulness? What story of a life-altering, three-second event do you need to tell in order to let a sliver of additional light into your world?

Cosmic Ache

It’s ironically confusing how the most anticipated season of the year can hold the most heartache. For all the filling we do of stockings, tummies and calendars, there remains an inescapable emptiness we are required to reckon with.

This symphony of wise voices anchors and settles me in the elusiveness of the holidays:

In the words of Anglican priest and author Tish Harrison Warren:

To practice Advent is to lean into an almost cosmic ache: our deep, wordless desire for things to be made right and the incompleteness we find in the meantime.

In a section entitled “Loving our Longing” from his book Addictions and Grace, psychiatrist and spiritual counselor Gerald May wrote:

Human life is meant to contain yearning, incompleteness and lack of fulfillment. To claim our rightful place in destiny, we must not only accept, claim and affirm the sweetly painful incompleteness within ourselves, but also come to fall in love with it.

Finally, words from activist and novelist Anne Lamott:

Death is incredibly hard to bear, and we don’t get over losing people we love. We Christians like to think death is a major change of address, but the person will live again fully in your heart, at some point, if you don’t seal it off. Memories of the people you love will make you smile at inappropriate times, but their absence will also be a lifelong nightmare of homesickness for you.

How could making peace with abiding ache, incompleteness, and homesickness transform your posture towards yourself and others during this intense time of year? What childhood stories of intolerable heartache did you survived with a strategy of “filling”? How might returning to those stories lead you to a deeper soul rest as you make peace with emptiness?