#SOL16: Hope and Doubt

Bluebird (M.A. Reilly, 2012)

“I am no bird; and no net ensnares me: I am a free human being with an independent will.” ~ Charlotte Brontë .

This was the quote for Day 11 of Oprah and Deepak's Getting Unstuck 21-Day Meditation and I found it hopeful and wanted to pass it along.  The talk that day was about developing awareness. Deepak stated, 

"Awareness opens the door to new possibilities. Therefore we must master the skill of being aware." 

He then outlined three key practices that can help us to develop our capacity to be aware: 

1. Pay attention to what is happening in the environment: self, other, environment
2. Practice holding focus--the opposite of being scattered. Key is being interested and engaged.
3. Learn the skill of stillness: Bear witness, restful alertness.

Each morning as I meditate, all three of these skills are present in that action. Mediation lodges me in the present moment, now. On the day before, the quote was from Thích Nhất Hạnh who wrote, 

“The present moment is filled with joy and happiness. If you are attentive, you will see it.” 

In losing Rob, I better understand that life is what we compose. We have choices in how we react, in how we understand, in the ways we frame possibility. Truths are largely what we make, not what is ordained. Deepak talks about hope and doubt explaining that hope pulls us forward into the now, while doubt pulls us backward out of the present moment. There are tensions between hope and doubt and often represent ways we approach the unknown. Doubts limit us, while hope does not. Living in the here and now is the only rational space to stand.

#SOL16: An Old Chair and All We Cannot Know

Rob's chair.

I.

It was just an old, undersized, mauve reclining wing chair. 28 years old to be more precise. My parents bought it for Rob and me and we moved that chair three times across the last few decades. Today, I gave the chair away.

Rob always hated the chair. He said it was uncomfortable and though I defended the chair for decades, the truth is no one sat in the chair very often. About two years ago, Rob bought a chair of his own to replace an oversized recliner. He kept the chair in the guest room alongside the shelves and shelves of books he had read or was reading. This past Sunday, I finally summoned the courage to reorganize the room, removing old and damaged books, office supplies, and other odds and ends that found their way there. And getting rid of the clutter allowed me to better see Rob's chair. It was exhausting work--the third room I had cleaned and it was late in the day and so I sat for a bit in the chair, I think for the first time, and realized that Rob knew comfort.  The chair fit like an old friend and it was an old friend I so needed. And though Rob died in late winter, I felt as if I was saying goodbye to my husband this past Sunday.  At one point I asked Rob to send me a sign, something, anything.

Some days grief is nothing more than raw, unprocessed pain. Just pain. Sunday was such a day.

II.

On Sunday evening, I dragged Rob's chair to our bedroom, thinking I would swap it with the mauve recliner. Devon helped me to get the recliner out of the room and as I eyed it I noticed it was faded and no matter what I did to clean it, it still, would be uncomfortable.

Is this something you really want to keep? my son asked. 

I don't know. My mom gave it to us. 

It was never comfortable, mom. 

I laughed and said, You sound just like your dad. He too must be laughing at this, cause you know what? He was right. I never told him that, but that chair was never comfortable. 

We each stood at the top of the stairs, the chair between us as I considered what to do. Okay, let's take it downstairs.

I thought to donate the chair to the Vietnam Vets who have been to our home more times in the last few months than most, but learned they don't accept recliners. So instead, the chair sat in the hallway for another day until we hauled it outside. I then posted information about the chair on a Facebook group for my town and am hoping someone will take the chair away.

III.

For the last two weeks I couldn't meditate. I'd sit and begin to fidget 10 minutes in. I remembered a friend saying that her brothers had specific places in their homes for meditation. That made sense to me but I found that couldn't determine such a place in my own home. After settling Rob's chair into a corner of our bedroom, I wondered if I might have found my meditation place. Early this morning, before getting involved in the world, I sat in the chair, feeling it fold around me and I easily meditated.

No fidgeting, just that powerful fall to no time, no space. As I sat in the chair, I felt surrounded by Rob's spirit.  On Monday evening, I was telling this story to a group of women and one named what I could not say, "You got your sign from Rob."

And how right those words felt to me. My eyes grew wet immediately, stung and Yes, I wanted to say, Yes, I did get a sign, even though saying it aloud felt a bit corny. Before Rob's death I didn't pay much attention to signs, nor do I recall placing any great value on stories about signs. Before enduring Rob's illness and death, I was more a doubting Thomas wanting verification through a sense.  Give me what can be observed, what the mind determines. Watching Rob die and living the aftermath has opened me to possibilities that are not rational.  Grief mostly requires us to believe in what is beyond our experience--what is beyond our capacity to name. Grief is its own language full of starts and stops and pauses where early morning light finds a woman humbled by all she could not have known, held in the comfort of her husband's opened hands.

On Empathy and Doubt and Civility

Being Other (M.A. Reilly, 3.13)

I.

I was driving to Connecticut this morning to participate in a dissertation defense and on the way I listened to The Future of Marriage, a discussion that was hosted by Krista Tippett (@KristaTippett ) and part of The Civil Conversations Project.  I'd recommend that you follow the links as the conversation between Jonathan Rauch and David Blankenhorn is civil and provocative and perhaps inspires hope that discourse can change, can be deep and civil.

There were two moments during the conversation when the discussion held my interest most dearly.   First, when Jonathan Rauch recounted that as a child of 9 or 10 he recalls thinking that he would never be able to enter into a marriage and have a family.  He says this understanding occurred prior to the realization that he is gay.  This stopped me and had me calling up memories of being a similar age and how filled my life was with the idea (promise?) that I would marry, raise a family, be in love. It was such a part of the genderizing culture I grew up in and I wondered about the enormous void the absence of marriage and family would have created and how I might have navigated that--if navigation was possible. For a moment, I imagined a younger Jonathan and saw him seated at a piano, much like the one I had in my home growing up, one foot swinging back and forth and the swamping feeling of loss. This memory had me recalling that scene in To Kill a Mockingbird when Atticus tells Scout:

You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view--until you climb inside of his skin and walk around in it.

Later in the discussion David Blankenhorn is asked by Krista to discuss the relationship between civility and doubt.  He says they are partners and likens them to coffee and cream.

Mr. Blankenhorn: …I think that doubt and civility are friends. They go together kind of like, you know, coffee and cream. They’re partners. Um, by civility, I mean treating the other person the way you would want them to treat you. And by doubt, I mean believing that you may not be right even when your position is passionately held. 

Ms.Tippett: You wrote this: “What I need as a doubting person is the wisdom of the other.” 

Mr. Blankenhorn: See, because if I don’t have any doubt, I don’t need you. I should be nice to you out of manners, but I don’t need a relationship with you. I may want you to be available to be lectured by me so that you can come to the correct view and I may want to treat you politely for that reason, but I don’t really need you. As I grow older, I grow in doubt and that’s good. And I feel like that that’s a healthier way to be.And if I am not sure that I have the full truth of the matter, I need you. 

Civility allows me to have a relationship with you. It feeds me what I need.

Doubt opens possibility. It allows you and me to become (other)wise through relationships with those who we perceive as being different.  It is the relationship with other, that is so prized.



II. Feeling Empathy

This film was made at a Cleveland health facility.  It embodies the idea and practice of stepping into someone's shoes that are not your own.




III. The Dissertation

In a few minutes I will be leaving this Starbucks where I have sat writing this post. I am just a few miles south from the college where Merle Rumble will defend her dissertation:  I TOO HAVE A VOICE: THE LITERACY EXPERIENCES OF BLACK BOYS ENGAGING WITH AND RESPONDING TO AFRICAN AMERICAN LITERATURE DEPICTING BLACK MALES.  In the dissertation, Merle constructs and reports on an experiment she conducted with 10 African American boys ages 8 to 11.  She wanted to see if using children's literature depicting African American men and boys and engaging the children through transmediated encounters (drama and visual arts) would make any difference in how the boys related to and comprehended written text.  The very short answer is it did.  The longer one will need to wait until Merle guest blogs and reports in her words her findings.

It's a powerful series of stories Merle tells and through it we can hear the boys as she uses their words and doesn't stop to 'pretty them up.' As I am neither Black nor a boy, Merle's use of the boy's thoughts as told in their words allows me to momentarily step into and out of the experiences they narrate.  And doing so nudges beliefs about literacy and representation and most importantly--fills me with doubt.

It is there in that state of doubt that I hear a door crack open, revealing what I had not seen (nor named) before.

Be(com)ing (other)wise begins with doubt and civility.