The Eighth Day of Creation: Part II, Giving Spiritual Practice a Second Thought
Worship Leaders: Meredith Guest & Jodi Boyle
Description: Whether established by religious protocol or fashioned by an individual, spiritual practice takes many forms. Continuing with the theme of creation from August 15th, let us examine the elements of spiritual practice and consider that such a practice can be the means by which we gradually pry off the shackles of unconsciousness and, fully free, consciously create the selves and the world of our highest aspirations.

Full Sermon

Giving Spiritual Practice a Second Thought

We are always creating.  This is where we left off a couple of weeks back.  Our thoughts, words and actions are always creating.  And if our thoughts, words and actions are going to create something we might as well wield this creative power to our advantage and create the experience of ourselves we’d like to have and the world we’d like to live in.  So here is the question… why, as a species, aren’t we humans creating more of what we say we want – already?  Why do we seem much more adept at creating world conflict than world peace… suffering than joy… technology to destroy each other rather than care for each other…

Well,we are really new at this being human.  Really. We tend to think of ourselves as a pretty evolved species but if you consider human consciousness in the context of life on earth it becomes clear that we are just warming up.

Robert Ornstein and Paul Ehrlich in their book New World New Mind give us the picture:

“Suppose Earth’s history were charted on a single year’s calendar, with midnight January 1 representing the origin of the Earth and midnight December 31 the present.  Then each day of Earth’s ‘year’ would represent 12 million years of actual history.  On that scale, the first form of life, a simple bacterium, would arise sometime in February.  More complex life-forms, however, come much later; the first fishes appear around November 20.  The dinosaurs arrive around December 10 and disappear on Christmas Day.  The first of our ancestors recognizable as human would not show up until the afternoon of December 31.  Homo sapiens – our species – would emerge at around 11:45 P.M.  All that has happened in recorded history would occur in the final minute of the year.”

So we don’t want to be too hard on ourselves.  We’re only a minute old!

And what we are up to as human beings is no small thing.  Go back into that “calendar” and consider brain development.  First on the scene was the reptilian brain always vigilant for the need to fight or flee.  The mammalian brain developed next with its capacity to detect not only exterior stimuli but the  interior stimuli we know as feelings.  We humans possess a third level of brain development where thinking, logic and reasoning occur.  This is the place where the data from both the sensing and feeling processors is put together, analyzed and understood at a higher level.  It is where conscious decisions are made, based on all the input and an understanding of the consequences.

There is nothing wrong with the input we get from the more primitive centers of the brain but the task before us humans is to recognize that we have a choice as to how to respond to that input.  In order to live into our full capacity as human beings we need to increasing shift the locus of control to the higher brain center which can comprehend that whatever we do will create something and that we have  a choice in what we create. Just because something is threatening does not mean I have to run.  Just because I feel angry does not mean I have to lash out.  I can get that input and then I have a choice as to the story I tell myself about it.  I have a choice as to what to think, say and do as a result.  And I choose to think, say and do so that I create an experience of myself that I want and build, action by action, the world I want to live in.

So in some sense what we are up to is quite literally raising our consciousness.  How do we raise our consciousness?  Through spiritual practice.  Now if the idea of spiritual practice makes you want to immediately scuttle away like a lizard or lash out like an angry lion, just know you’re not alone and that we’ve locked all the doors so there is no escaping.  Just kidding.  I’d ask you though to give spiritual practice a second thought.  Take it in this morning through the the part of you that understands what you want to create in your world and ask yourself throughout… might this help me achieve that?

Part of some people’s spiritual practice is bringing others into this time of devoted attention. Often these are issues about which we care deeply or people we love. I have a prayer I say frequently that goes like this: It always begins with Thank you. Thank you for this beautiful and incredible planet on which I live. I pray that the people’s of the earth will come to our senses. We will put aside the differences that divide us by which we justify our hatreds and our wars, and we will unite in a common commitment to restore the earth, to protecet and preserve her and to pass her on to future generations as a gift of love.

This prayer is followed by a prayer for my children that goes like this: Thank you for Caleb and Lia; for the wonderful gifts they are to me. I pray that they may have eyes to see and ears to hear and hearts to feel that piece of the Creation that calls to them, and they will give themselves to it with passion and devotion that that it, in turn, will call forth from them the very best that they can be.

• Now as we do here every week, I invite you to share the name or names of anyone you are holding in your thoughts and prayers, and when it seems to me all who wish have shared, I will close this time with the ritual words of the embracing meditation.

For the names that have been spoken and those that remain in the silent sanctuary of our hearts, this community offers our support, our love and our mindfulness.

The basis of all things that we consciously create is intention.  My observation is that spiritual practice is often born out of an experience of oneself as a spiritual being, that is a being that transcends the physical, sensory experience around us and exists in relationship to the energy we call Life or God or the Sacred.  Out of this experience comes a yearning or desire to explore oneself, one’s world, and one’s relationship to Divine Energy. Sometimes there is a particular question or query driving this exploration.  This yearning then gives birth to an intention to find ways to deliberately and deeply explore, experience, and learn beyond what happens in a casual way and an openness to being transformed by whatever is uncovered.

Finding a spiritual practice that feels authentic and satisfies the inner longing usually takes some exploration. You hear about something from someone, you attend a worship service on…say, improvisation, which we did here last Sunday, and you give it a try and see how it feels. If it fits, you keep at it, if not, you move on looking for that synchronicity that connects you to a practice that feels right. Several years before I came out as transgender, I began attending an improvisational movement class based on the teachings of Gabriel Roth. I did this desperately hoping it might help me find some inner peace and relief from the crushing depressions that regularly beset me. In time, movement became a powerful experience of transformation; for in movement, what had for years been imprisoned was finally set free, which is exactly what spiritual practice is all about. I also know that movement isn’t for everyone, nor is it my only form of spiritual practice. As a Christian, I still read and study the Bible. I also journal and work with my dreams, sometimes with Jodi’s invaluable assistance. And most recently, from a passing comment from an old friend, I’ve started doing moving meditation every morning, which I have found very helpful and satisfying. The forms of practice are many and they will evolve and change over time, but all cultivate stillness, inner listening, openness, awareness, honesty and that lovely word from the Buddhists – enlightenment.

Review of the Day

Close your eyes for a moment, if you would.  Take yourself back to yesterday, Saturday.  Begin to see in your mind’s eye the events of the day.  Run those events through you looking for anything that creates an emotional response.  See if you can name to yourself what was going on there. Were you especially loving? Did fear put a stop to something or prevent intimacy?  Were you being authentic?  Simply try to name it honestly.

Silence

And now bring your awareness back to this moment.  Open your eyes when you feel ready.

There are some attributes that turn a collection of activities into a spiritual practice.

Some aspect is done daily, others periodically:

In the complement of activities that make up a spiritual practice some will lend themselves to a daily rhythm, some to a periodic rhythm.  To be powerful, spiritual practice needs to have some component that happens as close to every day as possible.  Sometimes people choose  something they will do upon waking, something in the evening or both.

When I wake up in the morning I set my intention by saying to myself,  “I am God’s body. May I put love into action today.”

Later in the evening, when the house is finally quiet and the kids are in bed I put on my pj’s, pick up the book  I’m currently studying and light three candles in the nook over the fireplace in my living room.  I read for a while, sometimes way too long because I just can’t help it.  When I’m done, I put the book aside and turn off all the lights so that the only light remaining is the glow of the three candles.  I close my eyes and say a prayer.  Whatever is in my heart, I offer it.  Lately what I have been wanting to say is the words to the 23rd Psalm ala Bobby McFerren which the choir has performed several times.  “You are my shepherd,” I say.  “I have all I need…”  (It’s interesting to observe what happens when you work with a set of words over time.)  Then I review the events of my day.  I look for those places where I feel a response to what happened or what I did.  I pay attention to the places where I felt good about what I created, where I put love into action, and I also look for times that I withheld love when I could have given it, was judgmental instead of looking for the best, times when fear took over or my ego was in the driver’s seat and I try to tell myself the truth about what I did.

What almost always wells up from here is gratitude for this whole incredible experience called life. That I get to be a part of it, even the hard stuff, and that I get to participate in this amazing process of co-creation with so many wonderful people, like all of you, just regularly bowls me over.  I say thank you for all of it.

Then I call to mind the people who I’m especially holding in my heart.  I just hold them in my mind’s eye.

Finally, I just sit in silence and feel that life energy inside and around me.  I picture my heart opening.  After a while, I blow out the candles and go to bed.

In addition to a daily ritual other activities might be woven in periodically.  Weekly singing, walking meditation, times of silence, retreats, journaling, meeting with others in mutual support of spiritual practice.

Meredith and I get together every week for a time of meditation, prayer, intentional sharing and reading.  Together we examine the events of our week, both inner and outer, through the prism of spiritual practice.  Because of this practice, all through the week I tuck jewels into my figurative pocket to pull out and examine when we get together.  We’re always looking, as Rumplestiltskin might say, for opportunities to turn straw into gold. We’ve been doing this for the past four years.

Alone and in intimate community:

When we think of spiritual practice the images that often first come to mind are of solitary activities.  And while these types of activities which invite one inward are essential, I would offer out of my experience that a spiritual practice also needs to have elements that are done in community.

Now, while it is true that, for instance, part of my spiritual practice is coming here to worship with you all and that is done in community, what I’m talking about more precisely is intimate community.  In this context, intimate community refers to a small group of people who agree to get together regularly to accompany each other in this process.  That means sharing deeply and honestly with one other about what we are working with, about our individual practice and what that is stirring up, about our places of struggle and wounding, our healing and triumphs.  These people become familiar, over time, with the stories we have grown accustomed to telling ourselves about who we are and what the world is.  They become uniquely able to challenge those stories that are no longer serving us, to push us to conceive of ourselves as bigger than we ever imagined, to broaden the boundaries and comfort-zones and they inspire us.  These are the people who help us to reconcile our inner and outer selves and to take responsibility for our own state of consciousness.

As I mentioned, Meredith and I have been doing this with each other for about four years now.  This has been tremendously satisfying.  It has also, at times, been painful.  We’ve gotten angry, annoyed, defensive and hurt.  We disagree regularly.  But we take time to fully and deeply listen to what the other is working with and we have long conversations about the nature of the Divine, our calls, our addictions, how our egos inhibit our freedom, about the nature and mission of the church, a UU path verses a Christian one, how and where we dance with the Divine and the nature of human experience.  The fruits of this relationship are manifold, rich, sweet, profound and nothing less than life changing.

David is going to lead us in a song the words of which are found in your order of service. He’ll play it through once, then we’ll sing it together. Afterward we will have a period of silence, for it is in silence that we best come to know ourselves and experience the Divine. I will close the silence with the bell.

Find a stillness, hold a stillness, let the stillness carry me.
Find the silence, hold the silence, let the silence carry me.
In the spirit, by the spirit, with the spirit giving power,
I will find true harmony.

Seek the essence, hold the essence, let the essence carry me.
Let me flower, help me flower, watch me flower, carry me.
In the spirit, by the spirit, with the spirit giving power,
I will find true harmony.

Silence

When we embark on something like a spiritual practice how do we know that we are engaging in something powerfully transformational?  I think there are a couple of things that can be called out as indicative of being on a path that is working for us.

Joy and Freedom:

The first thing to note is an experience of increasing joyfulness.  It’s the kind of joy that transforms how things look to you, as if you’re beginning to look through eyes, and feel with fingers, and hear with ears that are connected also to the heart.

Sister Wendy Beckett put it this way…

Ego:

Any legitimate spiritual practice followed over time will inevitably have a run-in with your ego. One of the things I found most fascinating when I read Jack Kornfield’s A Path With Heart several years ago was hearing story after story of how people who practiced Buddhist meditation, which would seem like the most benign form of spiritual practice possible…I mean, you just sit and do nothing, for God’s sake! In meditation were sooner or later confronted with their unhealed wounds and unresolved conflicts.

The external gestures are the ways in which we begin to do things as we come to understand that we are responsible for our state of consciousness, are committed to reconciling our inner and outer lives and feel increasingly free to take the actions that bring them into alignment.

Some things we do may be very visible or public, others not so, but all equally demonstrate the transformation of the inner landscape that is taking place.

A while back Phil and I were talking about some of the personnel dynamics at his job.  As he is talking, I can feel my reptilian brain go on red alert… “Oh no!  This is bad!  Something’s gonna blow!  Phil will  need to find another job!  We’re not going to have enough money!…”  But out of my practice comes another voice, I give it a second thought… “Will you look at that fear!  “What’s going to be created out of that fear?  Is it something you want?  You’ve got a choice here.  What do you want to create now?”  I choose to say something that makes us both crack up.  And then our faces soften and our hands unclutch and wisdom’s there and creativity flows.

Another example is my sitting here leading worship and speaking to you today.  There was a time not all that long ago when I couldn’t have imagined myself doing this.  Yes, I knew I could facilitate a meeting and organize work that needed to be done but I was telling myself a story that I wasn’t smart or savvy or learned enough to present something of value to this community.  But an intention to find an authentic and joyful way to bring whatever gifts I possess to the service of others, a recognition that I have a choice in what I create, a freedom that continues to grow as I tell myself new stories about what is possible and a reconciliation of my outer actions with my inner understanding that one of the single biggest things we can do to heal this world is to transcend the religious exclusivism that pits us one against another (which is the promise of Unitarian Universalism), all of those things bring me to this moment right here.  This is my spiritual practice at work.

Chant – Join me in a chant now.  It is a Taize melody to which I added words inspired by a Sufi prayer.  And as David pointed out at choir when we tried this out, Taize plus Sufi equals Tafi.  pretty appropriate name considering how we push and pull at religious traditions around here.

So let us sing this Tafi chant together.  Join in as you are comfortable and we’ll get lost in it for a while.

There’s light in all forms.  There’s love in all beings.
In this I trust, in this I trust.