Glue of God

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I have a broken body though you can't see it. I hide it pretty well. Unfortunately, years of chronic pain have twisted my mind toward the negative. I am working on reversing that trend and I see rays of hope.  This invisible cloak, however, isn't always so easy to wear. Take, for example, the time I was desperate and visited a new physician begging for help. "Well, you don't look sick," he said. I told him looks could be deceiving.

But then, last week, I witnessed my predicament in reverse. Overtly wounded veterans looking tall as they strode in – braces, canes and prosthetics in place – on Segways in a ceremony giving them the gift of mobility in return for their courage and loss. It all transpired at the Alamo.

It broke my heart. Broke. 

At the conclusion, we were invited to meet these veterans of Afghanistan. Staring into their young faces startled me. My instinct was to grab their hands and hold on for dear life, theirs and mine. I detected anguish and uncertainty in those brave eyes. I think they were soldier expressions for the most part. And not used to being looked at so directly since the loss of wholeness. But the touch, that was revealing. Some was tentative, but some was fierce, accompanied by a constant round of thank you Mams after I thanked them. I felt they were reaching for connection in this new state. Perhaps thanking me for noticing they were still human, if bionicly so. No complaints, no whining, simply a demeanor of acceptance and a preparedness for what comes next.

What a lesson for me! I have never experienced being seen as unwhole in the way I suspect these injured soldiers have.

Stilled awed, I stumbled away, caught off guard by a city ambassador with whom I struck up a conversation. I related what I had just witnessed at the Alamo. He was riveted and mentioned a fellow guide was struggling from the ravages of war silently, mentally and alone. He was angry at how this invisible wound is not recognized. We talked a bit more and he said a WWII veteran told him once, "There are no atheists in the fox holes."

I believe that means we're not alone, ever ... in the good stuff or the bad. It's mostly that we don't notice during the hopeful times.

All of this brokeness can be overwhelming until I am reminded of healing and that mending often makes the wound stronger. Knitting together injured parts creates a new bond, one that had not previously existed and one tougher than the original. It's that liminal place where two or three come together to create a newness. The wounded, Spirit and healing.

Our brokenness makes us stronger, if only we could recognize and acknowledge that in each other, then thank God.

• In what ways have I been broken?
• How have I experienced that in others?
• How do I respond to brokenness?
• What has it taught me?
• Where do I see God in the brokenness?


each time a ceramic
broke, I'd collect the debris,
saving it for some
colorful, new creation

something old and broken
made new in a
mosaic

the adhesive holding
the smaller pieces,
binding them
ever more tightly
together

the glue
of God can
do similarly
in our minds,
spirits and
bodies

if we
open ourselves

Please, use my brokenness

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I awoke with a new prayer on my lips and in my heart yesterday:

Please, use my brokenness.

Certainly, I have prayed for healing and for God to use me, but never to use my brokenness. Before the words formed, there was an image of a mosaic, specifically the cement binding all of the broken pieces together and I knew that's where God, silently and mysteriously, resides. If I can admit that I am I pieces and give them to God, then something transformative can happen. Nothing of my own volition can make this change. I have to totally surrender and let God work.

Am I brave enough for that surrender?

Yesterday in worship, I felt so empowered by the prayer even in the midst of messages about how, as Quakers, we should be socially active in the local Occupy movement. I wasn't sure how it even connected and I wanted to share my message, my new prayer, but it never felt right. Perhaps I wasn't brave enough. I am so broken, I thought, I can't focus, except for prayer, on another cause. And yet the prayer of using that brokenness charged me with energy and a feeling of empowerment. It brought me peace yesterday.

Today, I am totally broken and in pain in a way I have not experienced in several years. I thought I was healing and over this, I sobbed to myself. Why am I here again?

Of course, my tonic, a warm swimming pool, closed today for maintenance and I am at loose ends. I have committed to so much this week and having a lower back that feels like two boards that do not meet and prevents me from standing straight was not on that to-do list.

Back on the heels of a wonderful trip, I am helping an author-friend with his synopsis, writing a marketing proposal for a potential client and planning an elaborate Italian thank-you dinner for my girls' caregivers while we were away. Oh and sewing last-minute Halloween costumes.

That's the kind of rhythm I used to have, BF (before fibro). And what happens when I feel well and begin to jump back in? My body speaks up, radically. My body or God?

I also acknowledge that I was given a great gift of healing recently when a locked sacroiliac opened after 13 years. This could be the other side re-balancing for the slack it has carried for so long. But it could also still be God.

I have been trying to discern my path for what seems like an eternity. Merging my passion and talents with something that, well, actually pays me. That's the standard of success the world recognizes.

What does my heart recognize? I told my pastoral counselor that the way I live takes so much work because it's again the current. He said that's the way it is. A spiritual mentor said undertaking a spiritual path isn't easy. And I am so trying to understand the real-life aspect of living in this world but not of it. I would just as soon slip into my little cocoon of contemplation.

But God calls me elsewhere: to use, even show, my brokenness in a world that almost refuses to look.

• What new prayer have I been given?
• How am I living that?
• With whom may I share those challenges?
• How do I live in the world but not of it?
• What's my best method of discerning God's call?

security
success
recognition
a title


used-to-bes
for me


living under the shadow
of brokenness is
not glitzy and
often devoid of
human companionship,
understanding or
accompaniament


and yet,
it IS where
God calls and
I have no choice
but to follow
faithfully,
but not always
cheerfully
or easily


may I find joy
along this road

Magic of the mosaic

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My mantra lately seems to be broken open. It was even the theme of our minister's message yesterday. She spoke of  it in the context of 9-11, how, immediately following, there was an outpouring of love and kindness [light] that, eventually, faded into revenge [darkness]. We were, she says, broken open.

I have been broken open time and time again. We all have. I've experienced it recently and it's not an easy place, let alone one our culture acknowledges. The darkness of re-grounding, examining and sifting through what's been broken is, however, necessary if we expect to grow personally or spiritually. I believe it's where our country is as well, though we refuse to cast off the past and what no longer fits. As we cling to old institutions and attitudes, we'll never transform. Just this afternoon at the movie kiosk I had a pleasant exchange with two strangers, the more silent of whom said: "When will America get back to what it was?"

My hope is we never will. And, personally, I know how easy it is to slide back into comfortable, if harmful, patterns. When I told my shamanic pastoral counselor about a recent inspiration for merging my work with my faith community, he responded: "Yes, this is something you have to do, but you have to be prepared, otherwise, you'll go to the place you always do. I've seen you here before."

That's a place of stepping back and down, dishonoring my power and spirit and not trusting for "way to open" in Quakerspeak. It's a place of fear that I almost recognize as home because I know it. I admit, I am afraid of sharing my heart and its work in my spiritual community. It would be much easier to slink backwards. I fear they will say no or not affirm what I feel is my ministry with funding. Of course, they would hardly say no to my volunteering. But what I am after is my vocation and that includes an exchange of my energy for another form of energy.

That's where my work lies: to trust God enough to go to my community and ask for what I need. Not hint or wait for them to approach me, but me to ask boldly, fearlessly and with no attachment to the response.

I am beginning to see the magic of the mosaic in myself and others. A reforming after the breaking apart: so many tiny, colorful pieces, dancing side by side, the jagged edges smoothed by what holds us together. Our healed wounds binds us more strongly than before our cracking because the salve is Divine, connecting us more deeply to Spirit, ourselves and each others. If only we'll let it.

• How have I been broken open?
• What is my usual response?
• What happens when I surrender into it?
• What challenges me to trust and not follow the path of least resistance?
• How does my personal trusting help change the world?


the route I think is easy
just because it's known
require so much more of me
than I realize


shadowing my light
and drawing me further from
the Truth


which creeps in when I surrender
imperfect and in pain and
ask for help


the only kind that can
heal AND transform
my wounds