Hi, friends ~
This past Sunday, as we were determined to use the rainy day to clean out the basement, the power went out, and we were left in the shadows. Minutes passed dimly, so I called our electric company’s automated helpline and reported the outage. One by one, we texted with our neighbors to determine the extent of the situation. It was throughout our town, and estimated recovery time was about 3 hours.
Only ninety minutes later, power was restored. As lights came on around us to blinks and beeps, my knees felt week with gratitude, my mind flashing to neighborhoods near and far where electricity is not a “given.” Where automated help lines and neighbors and recovery and
safety are
not a “given.” We stood and prayed our gratitude to the heavens for all the gifts in this life. It is a considerable list.
One such gift is our new marriage, only seven months old. The space of allowing which this relationship represents is unlike any other in either of our lifetimes. We remark on it, celebrate it, and pray for it continuously.
I’m using the word “prayer,” but it’s not the type of prayer I was taught in church. It’s not the
Hail Mary or a verse I could quote from a holy book. It’s more an ongoing conversation with the sky and all that resides within and beyond my physical experience. It happens in a space of allowing. And it happens day and night, spontaneously and, well, religiously.
We pray in the morning; we pray before sleep. We notice and name the gifts in every moment, even the ones in strange wrapping paper.
It’s new for me, this habit of informal, sustained prayerful conversation with the Universe. And it’s not entirely one-sided, either. In my practice of deep soul writing ( à la
Janet Connor), I have learned to create a space of allowing on the page where I can quiet myself enough that the Divine whispers its response through my pen. It’s mysterious and magical and marvelous…
Mostly.
But there’s something that’s happened more than once, and I don’t like it one bit: we eat cold food. I mean, food that’s meant to be steamy warm and delicious goes cold. It goes something like this: I make a
*in my mind* gourmet dinner and serve it piping hot on warmed plates, no less, and then my love commences to pray…and prayyy….and prayyyyy! It’s like the moment the food arrives, all the thanks and requests and family and friends and wars and strifes are served up, too, and we are compelled to name and be present with each one. So, lovingly or impatiently, we pray.
And it continues until the only thing left steaming is
ME as I hold my palms over the top of my warm plate, futilely attempting to preserve its heated deliciousness. Not exactly the space for allowing hearts to be joined in gratitude or supplication. In those moments, I’m such a BRAT! As soon as that bratty part acts up, it’s met by my righteous part, reminding me to be thankful for ANY food at all! Then I feel ashamed and the whole process of inner work activates til I can make space to recover a measure of peace. By then, you guessed it: cold food.
More recently, though, I’m noticing my relationship to prayer is shifting. It doesn’t switch on and off at assigned times of day, but rather, it accompanies me like a quiet subterranean stream, flowing, bubbling, trickling along, ever-present, ever-nourishing when I turn my attention its way.
It strikes me that this essay and its curious exploration may seem kind of childlike. I guess parts of us grow up at different times. In this wondrous marriage to a man of honor, prayer grows between us, a significant facet in the diamond that is our love.
So, I pray for myself in this moment as I gently meet my impatience and let it teach me how to grow, how to love more deeply and broadly, how to make of myself a space for allowing the miraculous and mostly-warm nourishment of prayer to add dimension and texture and meaning to each breath.
And it’s not just “prayer into the air,” but prayer-in-action that brought #SpaceofAllowing and #WritingTowardPeace to my awareness and life. Those prayerful, cosmic conversations between my self and my Self enable the download of wisdom that guides my steps, my relationships, my time with you, my every day…
Amen.
With prayers for allowing,
Nancy
