Tiny Bubbles in the Silence

A new friend gave me a bottle of bubbles today.  Well, she gave them to me last night but they were for my day of silence today.  She wanted me to spend some time playing. And I was looking forward to playing almost as much as taking photographs in my silence. 

I walked down to a park on the lake near Christ the King Retreat House where I am attending a Hearts on Fire retreat with speaker, Terry Hershey, author of Soul Gardening and various other books.  There is just something about retreat leaders that get us to pondering and digging around in the dirt of our lives while seeking the light, yes?   He asked us, "What is it in your dirt that you are afraid of?"  And I suppose I never really moved much beyond that question, I got caught up in my digging.  There is just something about the silence that invites digging and, woe is me, I am a reflective over-achiever.  

I kept coming back to a quote of mine that emerged in some poetry I wrote last fall that I shared on my imamosaic blog called "i see you ~ come home."  I wrote it after walking the Celtic Triple Spiral Labyrinth at Grunwald Guild and it has become one of my favorites, it is just so deliciously dark.  

I carefully spread my scarf on the grass by a beautiful large tree on the top of a hill overlooking the park and the lake. I laid down in the grass and looked up at the sun and the sky peeking through the bountiful branches overhead.  I listened to the wind breathing through the leaves before finally blowing bubbles and bubbles and bubbles. I let the quote rumble around in my soul and I invited myself into using an adaptation of it to spring into some new writing:

Terrified of being trapped
in a story not written for me

But ...

what if

my story 

is a thousand tiny bubbles

floating in the air

each rainbow orb

not simply a note

in the symphony of my life

but the whole composition

echoing in the heart of God.

And me?

I am the air God breathes

 

Before I left home, I picked up a pottery prayer piece made by a potter friend of mine.  It was calling me, beckoning me to take it with me on my retreat.  There is a dragon fly on one side.  If you turn it over, it says "freedom."   I have found it a very surprising companion this week for I didn't know I was being held captive by this fear, believing it to be left behind in other fields of dirt.  Exploring it these past few days and deepening the exploration in the silence has been liberating for me, one more step in my journey toward wholeness. 

Thank you Terry Hershey for leading us on this grand gardening adventure!   Peace be with you!

Reflections on Silence

If you are looking for my Reflections on Silence, the account of my journey with the Olivetan Bendictine Monks in April 2014, take the Links in this order ... 

On the blog, they are in reverse which confuses some people.  I invite you to move forward slowly.  You can move through them by taking the link at the bottom of each post to the next post.

1. Arrival at the Monastery
2. Moving into Silence
3. Dwelling in Silence
4. Lingering in Silence
5. Departure from the Monastery
6. Coming Home

Endings & Beginnings ...

When May arrives many of us experience various endings and beginnings ... dying and rising again an echo of our Easter journey.  It seems for me that, with Easter so late this year, those endings and beginnings came much quicker.   Add to that, there are transitions happening all around me and I'm not sure I'm ready.  

I feel a little un-moored ... like I am floating down an un-named creek on the river of my life.  So I'm in the process of pondering and re-writing the "rhythm and rule of my life" in order to provide a stronger container within which to hold all of the pieces of my life so they might re-gather anew.  

Always we begin again, yes?

 

Question for Reflection:  
How is your rhythm and rule of life serving you and your ministry these days, connecting you to the One within whom you "live and move and have your being?"

Reflections on Silence: Coming Home

Everybody has their own way of looking at their lives 

as some kind of pilgrimage ... Mine, I suppose, is to know myself.

~Eric Clapton

Is my life a pilgrimage?   Certainly, I feel that I am coming to know myself.  At least I have begun the journey, I think.  And I am finding that is not necessarily comfortable.  As I come closer to my-self, I find things that I like and things that I don't.  I am finding a desire to change some of those things that are keeping me from being who I truly am.  And ... I am finding that is not necessarily comfortable!

For me, silence is the most important aspect of my spiritual life.  I need time to hear the whispers of my soul ... to hear the whispers of God within my soul.  I need the silence to wake up, to become aware.  Silence increases my awareness, not just of God's presence, but of all of creation and my space in the web of nature.  

Wanderer, your footsteps are
the road, and nothing more;
wanderer, there is no road,
the way is made by walking.
By walking one makes the road,
and upon glancing behind
one sees the path
that never will be trod again.
Wanderer, there is no road–
Only wakes upon the sea.

~Antonio Machado

Since I've returned home from the Monastery and a couple of working retreats, I am spending more time in meditation and reflection, wondering how my experience changed me, transforming me from the inside out into the world. I'm taking long walks on trails close to my home and I'm breathing in God's presence through the nature that I find in my world. I even signed up for Yoga just for ME.

And I continue to develop my personal rhythm in the silence:

walking ... praying ...  returning ... resting

At the monastery, it was the resting into which my soul came home to herself.  Laying down on my bed, my head resting upon the green prayer shawl in the the window of the monastery, gazing out upon the trees, I felt twinges of the familiar deep in my little girl soul.  And yet I am filled with wonder because I was such a fearful child ... driving with my parents down those dark gravel roads in Arkansas, visions of monsters lurking along the edge of the roads, filling my dreams, and making me tremble.  Looking up into the trees, dark leafy silhouettes against the night sky, reflecting a quality of light born only of moonlight and stars.  Suddenly, I remember the soft voices of my parents and the warmth of my mother's welcoming lap as I laid my head down and fell asleep to the subtle roar of the truck engine.  I am safe.  I am loved.  I am only, ever ... me. 

Listen ... this year

I have planted my feet

on this ground

and am practicing

growing up 

out of my legs

like a tree.

~ Linda Lancione Moyer, Women Prayers

Reflections on Silence: Departure from the Monastery

My Silence at the Monastery

Early in the morning, with only a few short hours left with my Silence, I rise to find out if I would get a sunrise.  But no, it was a foggy day.  Disappointment welled up within me but as I peered down the road I realized the fog had an elusive beauty.  With each blink of the eye, it changed.  And I almost ran to see my Dancing Woman Tree.  And there she is, swaying in the morning breeze, dancing with her reflection, hauntingly beautiful.  She takes my breathe away.   

 

I linger and watch the fog roll in.  I wander down the gravel road and the honeysuckle tickles my nose with it's sweet aroma.  Have you ever tasted honeysuckle nectar?  I felt like a little girl again as I reached out and caught droplets of nectar on the tip of my tongue.  A bountiful breakfast for a girl steeped in silence.  

Reading Psalm 145 on my last morning and these words drew me in, "you open wide your hands."  When I think of open hands, I think of giving and receiving.  I think of letting go and taking up, of loving and being loved.  Open hands mean balance, symbiosis ... living in a symbiotic relationship with all living beings.  Open hands, going away and coming home.  

There's not much time now.  But my time with the psalms does not feel complete.  So I continue to read through until I reach Psalm 147:15 and the words "Peace on your borders" almost explodes off the page!  Wow.  How easy it is, to have peace in your center when God resides there.  It's the borders, the margins, the edge of my boundaries where peace often alludes me.  Out there I am not protected.  I am not safe, secure, warm, confident.  I do not feel fully loved.  I read my verse again, and I read it more fully this time.  "God has established peace on your borders."  It really isn't up to me to make the peace radiate from my center out into the world.  God does this from my simple obedience to seeking peace for my center.  And may it be so. 

How beautiful ...

are the feet of the messenger 

who announces peace.  Isaiah 52:7

 And may it be so!  Amen!

Goodbye dear Monks!

Take this link for Part 6 of Reflections on Silence:  Coming Home

Reflections on Silence: Lingering in Silence

My Silence at the Monastery

Friday 6:30 am Clouds drift across the sunrise, obscuring my view but beautiful anyway.  Pink and orange strands of light, peeking through and dancing with the clouds here and there, a symphony of frogs, crickets, and ducks playing along the edge of the gravel road I'm standing on.  A lovely morning prayer to accompany my musings and give me sweet visions of God ...

A vein of sapphires hides in the earth

a sweetness in fruit

and in plain-looking rock lies a golden ore

and in seeds the treasure of oil

Like these, the Infinite 

rests concealed in the heart.

~Mahadevi, India 12 c, in Woman Prayers

Today is the day to begin the ascent, emerging out of the Silence, confident that transformation has taken place in the soul, a deepening and widening, an expanse of space from which to live.  It is a day to begin turning toward the world and it's people.

 The Holy may speak to you from many hiding places at any time.  

The world may whisper in your ear.  

Or ... the spark of God may whisper in your heart.  Listen.  

~Rachel Naomi Remen

I pray, "whisper, my God, whisper your Word into my Heart." 

1 Corinthian 15:51-58.  These words capture me:  Listen, I will tell you a Mystery!  It is a verse that sings in my soul. It is the deepest of mysteries in its context for the mystery is the resurrection.  As I leave the monks and our midday prayers, once more I walk the Stations of the Cross.  Over these days I have been drawn to each station in different ways at different times.  Walking the Stations has become ... remembering.  Remembering Jesus.  Remembering the journey.  Remembering the sacrifice, the death.  Remembering the Risen Christ.  Remembering ... LOVE.  Loving God, Loving Self, Loving Others.   And therein lies the fruit of my devotion. 

As the sun begins to wane ... I pray with the monks.  Eucharistic Adoration ... in silence.  Vespers.  Rosary ... then silence.  Compline.  And I read the Gospel.  Luke 24:1-12 and as the words jump off the page, my heart sings, "Remember ... he is risen."  O God, you are precious!  And I am filled with awe and love and deeper devotion as I drift off to sleep my last night "under" the stars.

"Devotion by itself has little value ... 

and may even be a form of self-indulgence ...

the spiritual life of individuals has to be extended

both vertically to God

and horizontally to other souls.

The more it grows in both directions, 

the less merely individual 

and therefore the more truly personal it will be.

~Evelyn Underhill

Take this link for Part 5 of Reflections in Silence: Departure from the Monastery

Reflections on Silence, Dwelling in Silence

My Silence at the Monastery

I pray privately each morning, watching for a sunrise that never materializes ... fog and clouds obscure the sun's rising for the most part ... praying the psalms, lectio divina, journaling and simply watching nature through the window.  On Thursdays the monks pray their afternoon prayers privately so today I am on my own.  And the vastness of the silence opens before me.  The design of a contemplative retreat takes us on a descent into the depths of God, and ourselves in God, while our ascent happens on the back side.  I sense that today will take me to my deepest point as I enter into, not simply silence, but solitude.  There is both a simmering excitement and a tingle of trepidation in my soul as I seek the place of "dwelling" within God and God within me.

My word from last night's evening psalm emerges again this morning before I even open up the morning psalms.  Am I behind already?    

Trust in the Lord.  ~from Psalm 115:11

Perhaps this begs the question:  Do I trust in the Lord?  And yet, I wonder "What is trust?" and "What does trust look like in my life?" and How does that trust feel?

Even as I want to say that "I trust the Lord," I'm not exactly sure, it's so easy to say with a dismissive gesture but ever SO hard to do, I think.  I want to be control of my-self, of my life ... of those things that affect me.  And right now there are many things going on in my life that affect me.  I wonder and yes, I worry, but I know that I shouldn't ... I should "just trust in the Lord."  There is that dismissive gesture again.  Taking a deep breath ... I remember yesterday's word:  All day and into the night I will seek your face, O God.

Always we begin again.  ~A book on Benedictine living by John McQuiston

Begin again, I shall!  I read my morning psalms, 146 and 147 ...I'm hearing "God heals my broken heart and binds up my wounds."  Ok, dear God, you must tell me about my broken heart.  Have I a broken heart?  Have I not cried enough tears over my own brokenness?  How does my heart cry out over the brokenness of the world?  How shall I find the healing touch of wholeness in your love today?  

May you be drenched with the longing for peace, and make justice blossom on earth.

~Hildegard of Bingen

Ahhh, the journey from a broken heart to a longing for peace.  And not just a longing but a drenching with longing.  Such a beautiful word ... drenching.  And perhaps the silence I am experiencing in these woods is both a drenching in peace and a longing for peace that deepens my soul and widens my heart to embrace the world, aching for justice to blossom ... an unfolding of your presence, O God.

Spiritual silence demands a deep presence to oneself in each moment ... 

silence allows things to emerge in their own wholeness.

~Richard Rohr, Silent Compassion

I believe that silence can, if one is ready and willing, create an empty space in the soul along with a deep hunger to be filled ... with silence.   I am ready, O God.  I am willing, O God.  Make the empty space in my soul larger, fill me deeper and wider with the healing presence of the Silence that is you.  Make me whole, O God ... as whole as I can be ... so whole that I am only and always who I am.

I had a small "kitchenette" in my room which consisted of a small table, a mini-fridge and a small microwave.  There was a coffee pot, too, but I don't drink coffee. 

As I sit, eating my solitary lunch, looking out upon the squirrels at my window, I remember how good my food tastes in the silence.  Each morsel is a lovely delight and full of zest.  I'm not sure who enjoyed their lunch more, me or the squirrels! 

There were 3 of them, my squirrels, taking sweet moments to tease each other.  One was quite jumpy and almost anytime I moved, he ran to the tree and froze in this lovely defensive position.  One rarely showed himself at the edge of my viewing area.  He was larger and wiser, I suppose.  One didn't seem to mind my presence at all.  She came close and dug deep and came up with juicy orange tidbits that she enjoyed with gusto.

I really didn't mind bringing my own food and preparing a couple of simple meals and a few fruit and nut snacks.  When I encounter the silence, I find that I am not as hungry ... or since I am not so frantically moving through my life ... I consider each bite and notice when I am satisfied more likely. It is good, so good.

Breathe deep ... feel the sacred well that is your own breath.

Breathe deep ... Breathe deep ...Breathe deep.

I walk down the gravel road along the edge of the monastery

The horses and the cows, they didn't seem to care that much for my presence.  Hello, over here!  The horse snorted at me and cows just kept eating.

So I make my way back onto the grounds and walk around the tiny lake by the chapel. I sit in the silence and contemplate the flowers, the trees, and Mary, Mother of God.  She is a great protector and a fine companion for the silence.  She is strong and understands my heart.

As the day winds down, I read the Gospel passage from the Daily Office for Vespers.  It is a beautiful passage for a beautiful day, Matthew 28:16-20 and these words shimmer on the page.  I find such comfort and rest for my soul ... Remember I am with you always, to the end of the age." And I pray, returning to the word from my first day, the word that seems to be the foundation of my silent retreat.  "All day and into the night, I will seek your face, O God."  Is this a paradox?  I seek you with a desperate longing, God, my Love, but you are always with me.  As I rest in the silence, I realize I see you everywhere.  I see you in the ducks and the squirrels, the horses and the cows, the trees and the flowers.  I feel your love in the monks and hear you in their chants.  Silence quite simply makes your presence real to me.  As I lay my head upon the pillow, I know deep down in my soul that I see you in the mirror, too.  Deep.

Either you see God in all things

or very quickly you cannot see God anywhere.

~Richard Rohr, Silent Compassion 

Take this link for Part 4 of Reflections on Silence:  Lingering in Silence

Reflections on Silence: Moving into Silence

My Silence at Mother of the Redeemer Monastery

 The View out my window, I moved by bedside altar and laid my head on the pillow at night by this window.  As I listened to the bullfrogs, the crickets and sometimes the duck joining their symphony, I felt as though I was sleeping under the stars.

 

I dreamed about Mom last night, she loved being outside, it renewed her.  In all her twinkling deviousness, I smiled, I understood, I helped her ... to be given the love she so desperately desired.  I miss you, mom. I love you.  You are always with me.

The sun awakens me early in the morning, I'm not used to this!  But I love it today.  Drinking in the fresh air simply gazing upon the trees ... and listening.

Listen, the wind is breathing in the trees.  ~Stephanie Kaza

My soul waits ... and I wonder, "what shall I do with all of my silence?"  

The glorious, glorious silence, I love you.  As often as I am drawn to the freedom I find in solitude, I am feeling drawn to pray with the monks, so close by and there are so ... few of them.  They have a hospitable spirit wrapped in silence because of who they are, immersed in their silence and their daily work.  In the 2 little stain-glass windows of the chapel it is written "ora" and "labora" ... work and prayer. I commit to feeling my feelings and letting them fill me with wisdom in these days. I find the Daily Office and determine to weave it into my rhythm with the monks.  The morning psalm is Psalm 105 and verse 15 captures me.  Search for God and the strength you will be given.  Continually seek God's face.  This becomes my mantra for the day ... 

All day long and into the night, I will seek your face, O God.

I walk, I sit under the trees in the field at the end of the Stations of the Cross.  There is a very little almost empty cemetery with a large crucified Jesus hanging on a large cross.  I walk, I pray, I listen to the trees and all the creatures of the woods.  I pray, I read.  I pray, I draw with my oil pastels and I write in my journal, my thoughts and my poetry and my prayers. I walk, I take photos to honor the space.  I walk down the road and I gaze upon the rice field.

The rice field on the border of the Monastery grounds

I am moving ever so gently forward into the silence and it is beautiful. 

 Silence has a life of it's own.  

~Richard Rohr, Silent Compassion

Perhaps this is why I believe that Silence teaches each one of us how to "be" in the silence, with the silence, with-in the silence.  I am friends with the silence ... "O Silence, I want to be your lover." All day long and into the night, I will seek your face, O God.  All day long and into the night, I listen to the wind breathing through the trees, into my soul, and my soul awakens with longing in the morning breeze ... flowing gently, touching softly

As I sat beneath the trees and closed my eyes, this arose in me asking to be expressed ... wind breathing through the trees

It is time to pray with the monks.  Perhaps that is overstating, mostly I move my lips and listen for there would be something dissonant, I feel, about joining my voice with the monks.  Their voices chant and blend together in a way that sends me to heaven as I am enfolded into their prayers.  Before vespers, we sit in silence.  It is called Eucharistic Adoration but I simply sit, with a vast emptiness creating a cave for the divine in my heart. Before Compline, we say the Rosary.  I have trouble with this, too many words and I tire.  I have no Rosary beads so I count on my fingers and listen for the prayers to move through the monks and finally it is over ... 15 minutes seems like an hour.  After my prayers with the monks, I walk the Stations of the Cross and become more familiar with the story with each walking.   

And there is Jesus, hanging on the cross. 

Can I confess that I have never understood this?  I stand, I sit, I wonder ... and these words come to me, "do not hold on to me ... go."   As long as Jesus continues to hang on the cross, he cannot be the Risen Christ walking in the midst of brokenness.  Suddenly, I ask myself, "why is there such peace and tranquility sitting and gazing upon the Crucified Christ?"  It is a mystery made manifest in the silence.  

Silence is an alternative consciousness ... 

the soul does not use words.  

It surrounds words with space, 

and that ... is silence."  

~Richard Rohr, Silent Compassion

Take this link for Part 3 of Reflections on Silence:  Dwelling in Silence

Reflections on Silence: Arrival at the Monastery

My Silence at Mother of the Redeemer Monastery 

the chapel, filled with chants and prayers and silence

When I called, he said, "Most of the monks won't be here, being the week after Easter.  You'll have to bring your own food and take care of your meals."  My soul, gasping for breath, I said ... "no matter, I'll come if that's all right."  Looking forward to the silence like I never have before, I simply kept my eye on the day I would leave.   Inviting silence for others as my vocation ... this would be MY time in the blessed Silence.

Construction in Beaumont, sitting still on the way, getting lost on the gravel roads, knowing they all look the same ... of course, I arrive in the middle of evening prayers ... and the monk is so gracious.  They chant, the three of them in their tiny chapel and I am drawn in.  I won't be in the silence alone, a community is being woven in the silence and the psalms.  I am welcome to come for prayers, there is a schedule in my very simple room.  It's late and it is all I can do to settle before falling asleep ... I always sleep when the silence descends, for as long as it takes for my soul to catch up with me.  I wake only long enough to eat a small piece of fruit before calling it a night at 9:30.  It is good.  Amen.

a place within me opens and parts of myself let go 

that I did not even know were holding on.  

in these moments I feel all the hard parts 

in my heart and in my body yield

to a great softness carried on my breath ... "

Oriah Mountain Dreamer 

Take this link for Part 2 of Reflections on Silence:  Moving into Silence

White Flowers on a Cool Winter's Day

Poetry and Photo © 2014 Cindy Serio

White flowers on a cool winter's day
Resting together in sweet sister tree
A refuge for birds in the falling mist
Gentle beauty for a weary traveler on life's rocky path

My soul is weary and worn
I've been searching for God in distant places
longing for home, I weep

White flowers on a cool winter's day
Give me hope for spring,
warmth and new birth in my soul

Thank you, white flowers for calling me home
Thank you, dear God, for white flowers on a cool winter's day