Tag Archives: Simply Sacred
That November day back in 1963 began just like any other day. I was sitting at my desk in the back of Mr. Martin’s seventh grade Spanish class. It was still a time of innocence then—especially for someone like me growing up in a small town in a conservative family. My parents would dress up every Friday night for their square dance class—Mom in her full skirt and Dad…I don’t remember what he wore. But they both went out the…..
(Follow-up to last week’s post) During a conversation one evening, Stu (my partner and spiritual mentor) addressed my favorite topic–being present: “The Now rips away secrets. Unless we are present for the twists and turns of each moment, we are not authentic. The Now demands we be there for it. What matters is what we are feeling, experiencing in each moment. Am I the Now or the story I tell myself about the Now? Each moment demands a unique set…..
I come from a family of reserved people. “Don’t make waves, don’t cause any conflict, stay in the background”—these were the messages I internalized growing up. On top of that, our family genetics probably reinforced this way of being. When I was in first grade, the teacher chose me to be the Christmas Angel in the school Christmas play. I was shocked to be chosen. I was certain Mrs. Anderson would pick Anne Webster for the part. Anne sat behind…..
In my book, Simply Sacred, I wrote about a client I called John, a man in his thirties who came to see me at hospice when his wife was dying of a brain tumor. They had tried every treatment to no avail, and she was at the end of her young life. During our first session, he told me he was at peace with the situation. Of course, he was devastated for himself and for his wife, but he had…..
Once, while working at Hospice, I was assigned a client (I’ll call her Judy) who had been in the hospital for several days, having outlived the doctors’ expectations that she would die within a day or two. They were considering sending her to a long-term facility. Each day, after seeing my other hospice clients at my office, I would head over to the hospital to sit with Judy. She could barely speak at this point so we usually just sat…..
One night a powerful storm rolled in over the Big Island of Hawaii, dropping snow on Mauna Kea summit, where winds were measured at an incredible 194 miles per hour. As the storm raged outside, shaking the house and rattling the windows, Stu and I settled in to watch a movie—a documentary on the men who had walked on the Moon. All the Moon-walkers who were interviewed for the documentary decades after their journeys into space, had experienced a major…..
This week has been particularly intense with the burning of the iconic Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris and the troubling political climate in the U.S. It’s also Easter week–for Christians around the world a time of dissolution and rebirth. It seems fitting to reflect on the gift of life and the importance of cherishing the present moment. All of us who were in Hawaii on January 13, 2018, will never forget that fateful day. That Saturday morning we woke up…..
Working at hospice (as well as in my own experiences of loss) I saw that many of us who have suffered a major loss often begin asking the deeper questions about life and death. As we search for answers to why it happened, grapple with our beliefs about life and death and try to find meaning in our losses, new dimensions of life are revealed to us. Our broken heart can become an open heart. We can become more conscious,…..
By now 2019 is in full swing. Did you start the year full of good intentions? Maybe it’s time to reconnect with them and re-energize them. Here is an intention from a few years ago that may resonate, given the tension and conflict swirling around in the world today: It was the beginning of January. Sitting down at my desk in my office at hospice, trying to ease back into work mode after the two-week Christmas break, I turned on…..
It is said that the final words of the Buddha to his followers, who were distressed at the prospect of his impending death were: “All manifest things will vanish. Strive diligently for liberation.” The fear of death comes from the belief that we are an individual entity limited to a body and mind, which are subject to disappearing. When we are liberated from this mistaken belief, we are free from this fundamental fear. I once heard a spiritual teacher say…..
