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- Seeing with the Eye of the Heart: The Practice of Visio Divina
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Borderlands are a familiar experience for me. During the Wednesday gathering what came into focus for me is grace is a gift, not a reward! and during the week grace is a “flowering”. Initially on Sunday, the image disturbed me – these black fingers – gradually – I noticed the two ringed fingers on each hand – it is only the index finger that had no ring – this is the finger I often use by pointing…It is this pointing that holds the key to “flowering”. It can be used in judgment ( not seeing reality as it is), or “oh look at the “flowering” of grace. I experience this flowering as joy and gratitude, and sink into the blessing of the moment, even though I have been in the grips of a virus this week.
Breath and body praying through a difficult week; spending time with Hildegard of Bingen, { Sept.17 her feast day this week}, breathing in God’s love….. “ceaseless grace”.
The fledging in the this week’s image is speaking wordless volumes into my life. A new awareness of the Jesus’ list of those to hate includes my triad egoic attachments. Another new awareness: ” divine love overflows from the interior life into our hearts”. The “heart” represents for me my openness to: the part of me that embraces the outpouring of God’s love; “the embracing of this moment just as it is” following the letting go of my trio of detachments.” A meeting I attended this week, a humungous leap into “spaciousness”, another new awareness providing tangible sensation that strain the ribcage of my chest area to contain “this spacious” as I inhale/exhale to accommodate an unbelievable spaciousness.
HUMBLY-GRATEFUL/THANKFUL/BLESSED!
Yesterday during the group C.P./Lectio{viso}/sharing, two words in the chosen text stood out for me: “new light” and “sheer humility”. “New light ” connection was front and centre , many years ago, when John 8:12 was given to me and has shaped my discernment since then; Christ is my light, not my egoic self. This week it was like a consolation and a further dip into “humility”: “what’s mine to do/what is not mine to do”. “Sheer humility” brought to mind Elijah’s experience at the mouth of the cave experience (1Kg:9), “the still small voice= {sheer silence}. In this context. “Sheer humility “can only be received/revealed once our task is completed and our last breath given. As Jesus gave his last breath :” it is completed”. Somehow the image does not speak to me of humility. Humility is not a grasping but a total opening of hands with fruit spilling over as a gesture of blessing…”sheer humility”!
“To guide us toward the love that we most desire, we must be taken where we could not and would not go on our own” Today is a special anniversary for me; some call it diamond, others sapphire; I prefer sapphire. Looking back Gerald May’s phrase rings so true. ‘The narrow gate”, we get it in small doses; every CP sit is me before the narrow gate; the gift of consenting is like the image; without my knowing, the pulsating movements carry me, breath by breath, dad by day, year by year to today – bowing THANKFUL/GRATEFUL/BLESSED – I sit in the movement of the image, obscure is okay!
“Is there a time in your life when you felt it necessary to move against the expectations of someone close to you? What do you sense was lost or gained?” I have done so several times. I am engaging in such an experience. For me the image says it all. A significant part of me is in the crucible; just to the left of the torch is my little flame. Another part of me is to the right, an owl perched on a pair of glasses, oh, not just a pair of glasses but successive pairs; just beneath is a lion, whose face is behind the left lens. The latter is ego letting go in stages of penetrating the depts of “seeing” and the courage signified by the roaring of the lion. Without my knowing past struggles in similar situations, there is the me that has been chosen and that chooses the “fire pit of life” ={The Christ is here}, Jesus, me, and a host of others. I rest truly grateful and blessed in my moth-ness.
Addendum: July 17, 1965: Jn 13, Be Washers of Feet/Sieger Koder painting.
Certain physical places can have a unique resonance in our personal history, setting off a kind of vibration that suggests a meeting-point of earth and heaven. These may not necessarily be places of grandeur or even of beauty, but simply places where we feel the engulfing presence of the Mystery of God in our lives, perhaps because of a person, an event, an insight.
My thin places, as revealed this week: The cloud formations/prairie winds of my childhood {spirit/SPIRIT}; prairie willows, whispering{SPIRIT/spirit} aspen poplars are a prairie slough ( a small collection of water from spring run off usually dry by late summer { my God, a giant willow; me, a very small willow so close to the giant willow}; heavy fog along the Elbow River in AB, the meow of a cat as the fog slowly lifted, then I knew: John 8:12; on the south side of the church of the Transfiguration, Israel, the panorama view {BELOVED/beloved ,<chosen>- suffering}. These are my anchor “thins spaces” that popped up this week because they are faithful companions, my spontaneous go-to spaces. BLESSED/THANKFUL/GRATEFUL wrapped in JOY!
On my exit door I posted a sticker “Christ is here”. In my comings and goings this week what was surprisingly exposed is my holding back compassion for a small specific group { who don’t think like me}. I entrust my re-aligning to the indwelling Spirit… willingly consenting…..
We wait patiently; in silence, openness, and quiet attentiveness; motionless within and without. We surrender to the attraction to be still, to be loved, just to be.” As I begin this week I sit at the very bottom ( at least in my current perception) consenting to the surrender of the attraction……at best i am willing. (barely willing).
I lived through a very difficult situation ( the thorn Paul Talks about) this week; grateful for the image. The blue sky with fluffy white clouds. My attraction to these clouds/sky/wind go way back to my first awareness of being alive. How many times have they comforted me, encouraged me, gave me the strength to go way I would rather not go; touched my inner most soul-ness! The gentle ripping of the summer fields. Growing up on the bald prairie. So NO thorn removal. YES to the enough-ness of God’s GRACE and Mercy.
We wait patiently; in silence, openness, and quiet attentiveness; motionless within and without. We surrender to the attraction to be still, to be loved, just to be.” As I begin this week I sit at the very bottom ( at least in my current perception) consenting to the surrender of the attraction……at best i am willing. (barely willing).
Visio Divina of the image by He Qi this week has provided a rich source of plumbing the depths this week’s theme. The robin egg blue of the left eye of the Christ down the left side of the nose, showing up between the nose and lips – now in my ripening years I see this as the path from intention to heart presence/action; my breath ( the Hebrew Ruah, my spirit{ true self} and the Holy Spirit) the connection to the “one thing necessary). My breath allows me to name the fear, the anxiety (Welcome Prayer) to the “better part”. Earlier in the week, it was Jesus’ hand upper right, like the stop sign, then to the right of the hand consenting to the Spirit to descend to the depths of my self. I used to fear plumbing these depths, but now I trust the Holy Spirit. The Guard of Heart this week: Ps. 63: 2-9) the word. line chosen for me as my day/night unfold. The similarity and intense red of the lips of Martha, Jesus, Mary, one LOVE radiating.
“Allow the parable to become a mirror that reflects back to you your own state of consciousness. If you work with it that way, you’re using it the way Jesus really intended it, as a tool for personal transformation of consciousness” (The Wisdom Jesus, pp. 48-50).
In my non-judgemental, merciful self -inquiry. I saw myself , after many once a gain’s as that young man with my same question ” Who is my neighbor?” but this time from a much deeper place with that voice of a me I am beginning to befriend, my egoic me far behind me , not standing with anxiety but as a curious observer.
Many years ago now, my egoic me knew that day in the fog by the lake when these words wrapped me in this special blanket of loving kindness on hearing the words” I am the Light of the world. One who follows me will not live forever in darkness, but will have the light of life.” This week I consented to being bathed and held in this bubble of Divine Light. I felt it, tasted it, smelled it, heard it, I basked in it, I soaked in it in a “felt sense ” way this LIGHT flowing through me.
My latest revelation morphed into my conversation a half hour ago, as I listened to my sister who just celebrated her 90th birthday describing to me her day of celebration.
As a young woman listening to this parable I always got as far as mercy. In fact with my egoic heart ( especially on my overloading persona) I rather felt a comfort in just the word MERCY. I (egoic self)can do that.
Today my many times humbled egoic in charge self was able to stand at a distance. (shedding persona, needed much Welcome Prayer praying) This week I allow myself to sink into : “mercy, within mercy, within mercy.” as my true self heart is opening.
“Being contemplative is about being aware and awake to God’s presence in the ordinary … It’s about taking a long, loving look at all that is…..” during Lent I participated in Thomas Keating’s THE GIFT OF LIFE, then in June, 30 days of CONSCIOUS AGING, then yesterday the visit of one of the few BEHM cousins I have. My Grandpa Behm left the turmoil of Eastern Europe to find a new home. After 14 years he managed to have 2 sons join him, my dad age 17 and my Uncle John age 15; the others either died in the Great Influenza or were deported to Siberia. Karen’s grandmother was a cousin to my grandfather. Yesterday’s visit churned up memories of life in a new country, the only life Karen and I have known. Gazing contemplatively at this week’s image going back through many chapters of “walking with…” I have this “felt sense” of being sent , many versions with many companions, by the One who called Abraham and the generations of people who shared my DNA; the One whom every morning I greet with “Behold I come to do your will.. your commandments, my inheritance, and my joy.” My dreaming time has been very active spilling over into this liminal space before waking. Visio Divina of this image allows me to embrace a “blessed spacious-ness”. My Word of the Week companions bless me along my present path; for this I am grateful.
During the time that I could not access WoW, I was praying/reflecting/journaling my way through “Conscious aging” an S&P offering with Cynthis Bourgeault. I wonder if this might a bit of humor from The Holy Spirit. One thing that was a blessing was Cynthia’s light hearted humor; her lived wisdom, her curiosity; a person like me a well with a developed practice of inquiry ( and I am wondering a perhaps a person somewhat on the neurodivergent spectrum.)
There were 1350 signed up; a scattering in their 50’s, 60’s, the bulk of us octogenarians/nonagenarians. Because I am a long time practitioner of the Welcome Prayer , my waking life/dreaming life/liminal became a non-boundary practice morphing into praying my life all the way back to my childhood, even further, the past of ethnic group’s anxieties, determination and such.
This Sunday’s Word of the Week became a blended follow through where “Conscious Aging” left me the threshold of ” freedom”. The image this week, all the colors and shapes speak to me of “spacious-ness”. Praying the desire to let go of power and control spoke to me of freedom as “spacious-ness”.
In the thread of the many spontaneous sessions of the Welcome Prayer, I saw word’s like: rigidity, my agency as in ” bending the world to me dreams and ends; my truth” etc., all the opposites to spacious-ness, named as they float way, swallowed up like the dying stars that get swept up into the big black holes of outer space. I feel ( a felt sense) so at home in the colors and shapes. That little cross shape vertical red color on the blue base/ horizontal black color with the three faint curves: me and the Holy Spirit, sending out spacious-ness blessings; I embrace each of these moments, so I won’t forget. And so I send spacious-ness blessings to my of Word of Week and ” Conscious Aging” companions.
