Reading Stephen Cope: Braving Stillness

This post was meant to be for Monday, but alas...

I started writing this on Sunday afternoon, and then around four, I realized that I felt horrible. Just horrible. A depressing sadness had descended upon me and I could not figure out why or from where.

Marcy and I learned two hours later that our dear friend, Ken, had passed away at 4:15. (Make the connections there that you wish.) As soon as I knew this, the depression lifted. I felt such relief that he was no longer suffering.

Of course, the freshness of this death is affecting my work. I am distracted. I am moody.

Yet I find that I am craving just what the first chapter of Stephen Cope's The Wisdom of Yoga says is necessary for any sort of spiritual growth: Stillness & Silence.

...we will have to convince ourselves of the necessity, the magic, the absolute brilliance of stillness. Over and over again, we will have to do this. (Cope, 19)

"We will have to convince ourselves..."

How often do we get so absorbed by our daily to-do lists that we cannot even fathom of a way to make room for silence and stillness?

How often do we convince ourselves that this busyness that we mistake for life is permanent?

How often do we decide that running errands, running around, running, running, running is more important than taking care of ourselves? Than sitting and listening?

And so we must be brave and we must choose our priorities very carefully, because whether we choose carefully or not, our choices become us. We become them.

Soon, we are at the end of our lives and wondering what happened...

Are you consciously choosing or are you allowing the undertow that is material life to drag you further out to sea...so far that your drowning becomes an inevitability?

Think carefully about these things. Do not allow your usual knee-jerk excuses to assert themselves as the final answers.

Are you brave enough to face your stillness?

Are you brave enough to sit in silence?

Are you brave enough to be responsible for the life you are living?

(Feel free to answer in the comments or to write your own blog post and then leave a link in the comments.)

For me, poetry is a primary Path into Stillness and so I leave you with this poem. What could it mean, metaphorically, in your own life?

No Matter Where You Are

Stop saying that you are
from some place else.
Pay attention to the ground that is
under your feet.
Take off your shoes, and
go barefoot in the grasses,
in the sands, in
the waters, in the here,
in the now, in this
right place.

Stop saying that you are
from some place else.
Claim the land
of your birth.
Get on your knees and
put your hands in
the dirt, pull out
weeds by their roots,
plant seeds.
Stay and watch
them sprout and
grow. Care
for them, know
them all.

Stop saying that you are
from some place else.
Lift your face to this
sky, breathe in
deep, feel the air
on your skin.
Open your eyes to
the clouds, open your
ears to the birds.

Be the native
that you
are.

(Photo Credit: Christine C. Reed, False Indigo, 2009)