This is the way you slip through into your innermost home:
close your eyes, and surrender.
—Rumi
You may recognize spirit in its absence—when you feel drained, weak, or depressed—but what calls spirit to rise to the occasion of life, especially during caregiving? Where do we connect with spirit? What heals us?
There are many ways to think about spirit. Some are organized bodies of thought about our relations with the eternal. Others speak to the degree of life we feel within us that has more to do with our relationship to our inner being, and it shows up as... well... uplift. Some say the growth of spirit is about all of that, suggesting that a life force, around us and within us, connects us to humanity, nature, and the All of creation. Whether you are clear about your beliefs, are a seeker, or have no particular spiritual beliefs, the following inquiry may offer you some new access to inner peace.
I believe, as many do, that caregivers with some form of spiritual practice have an easier experience. So where does one begin? One community adept at moving the spirit is the Quakers, or the Society of Friends. I was raised Quaker, which for me has been less a set of beliefs than it is a way of being, a way of thinking and living. The skills I learned for Quakerly, compassionate reflection put backbone into my caregiving, were the “rod and staff” that kept me vertical.
As there are numerous ways to speak about spirit, there are many places we can find it. The book Faith and Practice, from the Society of Friends, suggests that we might find inner peace “through group worship; through a relentless pursuit of truth; through a sense of the beauty and wonder of the world about them; through meditation; through art, music and literature; through sympathy and love in the family, and among their fellows.”
Certain locations or times of day can be conducive to connection with your life force. My spirit is most alive in the early morning when I feel at one with nature. As John Woolman tells us in his Journal and Essays, “The place of prayer is a precious habitation... I saw this habitation to be safe, to be inwardly quiet, when there was great stirrings and commotions in the world.” Communing with the spirit makes everything a bit quieter, a bit easier. It calms the “great stirrings and commotions” of caregiving.
Caregiving forced me daily to seek ways of healing my spirit, and so I created my own ways of communing with spirit. As Idrove to visit my mother in the nursing home, I would visualize aprotective cloak around me, a barrier to the force of her negativity. Ihad never been one to pray, but one day as I drove, I found myselfspontaneously saying aloud, “Dear God, still my soul. Bring me thypeace. Give me a vision broad and blue to tent my day.” Verbalizingthis prayer gave me instant peace.
I gradually learned to choose life exactly as it was. Saying “Yes” to my life became one of my biggest tools for leveraging my well-being. But then there were times when I just felt like quitting. In such moments, my prayers took on a more infantile tone. I’d like to go away with God’s blessing. I’d like Him, or someone, to clean up my life, saying, “You go on now. I’ll take care of this mess and these people.” So maybe I’m not a mountain climber after all. Maybe walking by the water in the valley will really make my cup run over.
Wanting to seek relief or to take a break is so very human. You can make room for that feeling too. As you allow your state of mind, whatever it is, and accept that you are merely a part of a much bigger whole, life gets easier. You may need to set aside time to tune in to your spirit, or you may be able to do it moment by moment
during the day. Whatever it takes, whatever it means to you, for the sake of everyone involved, make spiritual recharge a priority.
My Prayer of Acceptance
Listen here! I’ve done my best!
(Now I lay me down to rest)
I won’t stop here but could this be...
(Where is thy staff to comfort me?)
Don’t need to know what waits me there
(Be thou my comfort and support)
But keep me well. And keep me whole
(And after all, be still my soul.)
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Showing posts with label Spirituality During Caregiving. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Spirituality During Caregiving. Show all posts
Tuesday, February 16, 2010
Saturday, December 12, 2009
A Caregiver's Affirmation
Tomorrow is a new day; begin it well
and serenely and with too high a spirit
to be encumbered with your old nonsense.
— Ralph Waldo Emerson
and serenely and with too high a spirit
to be encumbered with your old nonsense.
— Ralph Waldo Emerson
As I cast my mind back over my life and my time of caregiving, I see the lessons I have learned, the growth I have experienced, the intuition I have tuned and strengthened. All this is available to serve me. I gather my resources and rise to the occasion.
When people aren’t responding as I would want, I have the intuition to recognize it, the voice with which to respond, and the wisdom to choose constructive words. When my support systems fail me, my purposeful resourcefulness will bring me through. Some supports can be mended, while others can be replaced. I have the inner resources to do what must be done. I am even strong enough to ask for help.
And more turmoiled moments, when my mind wanders into its “bad neighborhood,” I can take a mental step backward, raise my vision, and look at the whole of this caregiving journey within the context of my life. I am not the cause and I am not the solution. I am playing my part. That is all I can ever do.
Caregiving is an honorable service. I am a character in a complex play that I cannot fully understand and certainly cannot control. My presence and my compassion are my biggest gifts. I will look for opportunities to celebrate life.
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Sunday, September 6, 2009
Embracing the Moment
(from http://happydays.blogs.nytimes.com)
A reader responding to the Zen priest Norman Fischer’s post, “For the Time Being,” writes: Please, Mr Fischer... How do we/you go about resolving living in the moment with active engagement in the world?... If the awareness — the “embracing of the moment” — is available to everyone, we need more about how this can happen among the relentless demands of daily life.
Norman Fischer replies:
Well, very briefly, there is no contradiction between living in the world as it is and “embracing the moment.” Though a retreat may be helpful training, it is just that. Everything takes place in a moment of time — conflict, annoyance, love, peacefulness, anxiety. A moment of time is the only place we are alive, every day, all day long. We want to live all of human life, the good and the bad, but be able to be there for it, rather than try, unsuccessfully, to run away. Being there is more satisfying, more fun, and more effective. So I work with (for instance) caregivers for the dying, using mindfulness and presence to be there with patients and families, with grief and joy. I use it with conflict resolution professionals to help them be more clearly present with their own emotions, so they can help their embattled clients better. How do you do this? It would be great if I could write a post on The New York Times Web site that would explain it step by step, and that was all there was to it. Great, but too simple, of course. Yes, there are ways and techniques to employ, but the main thing is practice, repetition, reflection, effort, suffering, the usual. Eventually you are able to see that it does work. And you are continually challenged. You keep on practicing, keep on learning. It’s a process, and a commitment you are happy to make because you like it, and it works. Life gets better and more interesting. At least this is what I have seen for myself and in thousands of others. Maybe it is not everyone’s cup of tea.
Read more!
A reader responding to the Zen priest Norman Fischer’s post, “For the Time Being,” writes: Please, Mr Fischer... How do we/you go about resolving living in the moment with active engagement in the world?... If the awareness — the “embracing of the moment” — is available to everyone, we need more about how this can happen among the relentless demands of daily life.
Norman Fischer replies:
Well, very briefly, there is no contradiction between living in the world as it is and “embracing the moment.” Though a retreat may be helpful training, it is just that. Everything takes place in a moment of time — conflict, annoyance, love, peacefulness, anxiety. A moment of time is the only place we are alive, every day, all day long. We want to live all of human life, the good and the bad, but be able to be there for it, rather than try, unsuccessfully, to run away. Being there is more satisfying, more fun, and more effective. So I work with (for instance) caregivers for the dying, using mindfulness and presence to be there with patients and families, with grief and joy. I use it with conflict resolution professionals to help them be more clearly present with their own emotions, so they can help their embattled clients better. How do you do this? It would be great if I could write a post on The New York Times Web site that would explain it step by step, and that was all there was to it. Great, but too simple, of course. Yes, there are ways and techniques to employ, but the main thing is practice, repetition, reflection, effort, suffering, the usual. Eventually you are able to see that it does work. And you are continually challenged. You keep on practicing, keep on learning. It’s a process, and a commitment you are happy to make because you like it, and it works. Life gets better and more interesting. At least this is what I have seen for myself and in thousands of others. Maybe it is not everyone’s cup of tea.
Read more!
Monday, June 8, 2009
Musings on Balance, Imbalance and Change
You might as well fall flat on your face
as lean over too far backward.
~ Thurber, James
A few years ago, I wrote in my caregiving journal, The balance is shifting. I'm putting more of myself in the mix, yet in other ways I’m holding more of myself back, so I'm not sucked dry. Sometimes it feels like some people suck all my stuffing out of me. Gotta keep my stuffing.
One dictionary definition of balance, perhaps the most usual, is “mental steadiness or emotional stability; habit of calm behavior, judgment, etc.” However, in my life, I find it to be more complex and interesting than that. Though balance can imply steadiness with a degree of predictability, it is Not mere stability. Balance implies a degree of control while in motion. In fact, a smidgen of imbalance is necessary if one wants to stay in motion. But when one is about to lose control, one’s condition becomes a “balancing act”. And when off-balance, one is about to fall on one’s face. But wait! Is that true? Things are not always as they seem. I have actually learned a few things from being off-balance.
In ‘98, I wrote, When Mom walks she must look up to keep good balance, and when I walk I keep looking down to stay in the moment. Funny. Perhaps I'd better look up so as not to get obsessed by the moment, but to see the bigger flow that I am a part of. A bigger flow in the moment. Keeping a focus on the bigger picture was a way of grounding myself during caregiving, to stay balanced while in motion. It enabled me to notice the learnings that surrounded me every day.
During caregiving, the times when I was off-balance were, though unnerving, the more instructive times. What do I learn from allowing myself to be off-balance? That I do NOT lose control—I learn to walk differently. I learn that I have far greater resources than I believe, (or than I tell myself). This all sounds so appealing that it’s a wonder that I still fear losing control. So maybe the goal is not to be IN balance, but rather to be ENOUGH in balance to keep from falling on my face. In fact, another definition is “in the balance, with the outcome in suspense”. Maybe not comfortable, but useful. Perhaps in caregiving we can look not so much for comfort as a survival strategy, but rather look for balance that makes for the good and vital living of this life.
There are many definitions of balance. In dance, balance means “to move in rhythm to and from: to balance one's partner.” So here we are again, thinking of balance in motion... as a way of dancing with Life?
In Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, stability is near the bottom under Safety Needs, while balance is listed under Aesthetic Needs, just two levels below Transcendence. So might balance be a state of beauty rather than a state of survival?
The dictionary tells us that balance can mean, “to have equal amounts of the necessary elements such that no one predominates.” Which brings us to the matter of having a balanced life, as distinct from emotional balance (though they can be connected).
During caregiving, when I was able to achieve that delicate balance of the right elements in the right proportion to each other in my life I would find moments of great peace... and then... life, being by nature in motion, would run past me and pull my carefully constructed life out of whack again. So I'd scurry to pick up the pieces. Much as I tried to keep my ducks lined up, they kept swimming away! Maybe the real problem was that I kept thinking those ducks should line up and stay that way. So maybe change isn't a problem—maybe it’s just life. “Just keep swimming. Just keep swimming" as Nemo says in "Finding Nemo." Not bad advice during caregiving.
Read more!
as lean over too far backward.
~ Thurber, James
A few years ago, I wrote in my caregiving journal, The balance is shifting. I'm putting more of myself in the mix, yet in other ways I’m holding more of myself back, so I'm not sucked dry. Sometimes it feels like some people suck all my stuffing out of me. Gotta keep my stuffing.
One dictionary definition of balance, perhaps the most usual, is “mental steadiness or emotional stability; habit of calm behavior, judgment, etc.” However, in my life, I find it to be more complex and interesting than that. Though balance can imply steadiness with a degree of predictability, it is Not mere stability. Balance implies a degree of control while in motion. In fact, a smidgen of imbalance is necessary if one wants to stay in motion. But when one is about to lose control, one’s condition becomes a “balancing act”. And when off-balance, one is about to fall on one’s face. But wait! Is that true? Things are not always as they seem. I have actually learned a few things from being off-balance.
In ‘98, I wrote, When Mom walks she must look up to keep good balance, and when I walk I keep looking down to stay in the moment. Funny. Perhaps I'd better look up so as not to get obsessed by the moment, but to see the bigger flow that I am a part of. A bigger flow in the moment. Keeping a focus on the bigger picture was a way of grounding myself during caregiving, to stay balanced while in motion. It enabled me to notice the learnings that surrounded me every day.
During caregiving, the times when I was off-balance were, though unnerving, the more instructive times. What do I learn from allowing myself to be off-balance? That I do NOT lose control—I learn to walk differently. I learn that I have far greater resources than I believe, (or than I tell myself). This all sounds so appealing that it’s a wonder that I still fear losing control. So maybe the goal is not to be IN balance, but rather to be ENOUGH in balance to keep from falling on my face. In fact, another definition is “in the balance, with the outcome in suspense”. Maybe not comfortable, but useful. Perhaps in caregiving we can look not so much for comfort as a survival strategy, but rather look for balance that makes for the good and vital living of this life.
There are many definitions of balance. In dance, balance means “to move in rhythm to and from: to balance one's partner.” So here we are again, thinking of balance in motion... as a way of dancing with Life?
In Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, stability is near the bottom under Safety Needs, while balance is listed under Aesthetic Needs, just two levels below Transcendence. So might balance be a state of beauty rather than a state of survival?
The dictionary tells us that balance can mean, “to have equal amounts of the necessary elements such that no one predominates.” Which brings us to the matter of having a balanced life, as distinct from emotional balance (though they can be connected).
During caregiving, when I was able to achieve that delicate balance of the right elements in the right proportion to each other in my life I would find moments of great peace... and then... life, being by nature in motion, would run past me and pull my carefully constructed life out of whack again. So I'd scurry to pick up the pieces. Much as I tried to keep my ducks lined up, they kept swimming away! Maybe the real problem was that I kept thinking those ducks should line up and stay that way. So maybe change isn't a problem—maybe it’s just life. “Just keep swimming. Just keep swimming" as Nemo says in "Finding Nemo." Not bad advice during caregiving.
Read more!
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