At an earlier time in my life, I was a workaholic, as so many folks in the nonprofit world end up being out of necessity; particularly those of us who worked at the intersection of justice and spirit. There are never enough hands or resources to meet all the urgent needs in our fractured world. The problem with that, of course, was that I destroyed my own body in the process. I wasn’t listening to the needs of my own spirit.
I’d like to say that once the lesson was learned, I’ve been in perfect balance ever since. But the reality is that in the 20 years since, I have fallen back into that pattern a few times. I still wasn’t listening. I’ve learned that if I push, my body will push back, and so I need to account for that in all I do. Audre Lorde said that rest is a revolutionary act – a transgression in our production-oriented capitalist society. It is hard to listen when we get so many messages to ignore our own needs, let alone honor the needs of others.
I entered a grand experiment in listening this winter. For those who’ve been getting my newsletters here (and formerly directly in email), you’ll notice that I didn’t write any blogs or hold any local programs over these past winter months. I listened to my body’s need to resync with the natural rhythms of the seasons, which have been calling to me. The winter is more than a time of death and cold dreariness. It is the pregnant pause, with life gestating under the snowy earth. So this year, I listened and allowed my body and my spirit to wait upon the upsurge of the rising sap and resourcing of spirit.
In earlier generations, the winter quiet was when nets and knitting were mended, food preserved, plans made for the coming year’s harvests. In my quietude, I recovered from an autumn surgery, cared for family members, met with my spiritual direction clients and gestated the vision of a new program at the seminary, which has been growing over the spring. And two months ago, I finally had a surgery that has been 20 years in the making; to repair my hearing.
Those who know far more about the mind-body connection wouldn’t be surprised to see the correlation between listening and hearing. But I had a profound Aha! Moment several weeks after surgery when I went to a Holly Near concert with my beloved. Anyone familiar with Holly’s music knows that folks sing along joyously to her music. During one song, it struck me that I was hearing in surround sound with the hearing returned in an ear that hadn’t heard for 20 years. As this new reality reverberated in the coming days, I realized that my own voice had become unsure and constricted over the years, as I could no longer hear harmonies and so didn’t trust my voice would blend.
It got me to thinking about what else I might not have been hearing. How has my voice been silenced, and whose voices have I not perceived? Can I apply my ability to listen to my body and enhance my ability to hear again, in new ways?
During these same twenty years we’ve heard more and more stridency and anger, as algorithms of social media siloed what we listen to. But in the divisiveness and polarizing anger – as loud as it is – we seem to have lost the ability to listen for the fear which underlies the discord. When we can only hear our own voice, in distorted forms, we miss out on the harmonies possible when we listen to the fears, needs, and hopes of one another. While some are anxious to return to a time when things were “simpler” for them, they have become deaf to the reality that those times were anything but simple or safe for others. Similarly, in our urgency to foster change in a world on the brink of environmental collapse, some of us are equally deaf to the reality that others in our community have not thrived and feel left behind. While it is true that both sides are being manipulated by those in power (who are quite adept at sowing division to distract us all), where once we could share heated and heartfelt debate, now it seems we cannot hear one another at all. How do we relearn how to hear each other? How do we listen for the wisdom of Spirit?
Yesterday our Christian friends celebrated Pentecost, and in a few weeks, Jews will celebrate Shavuot – both holidays of revelation – listening for the voice of Spirit in our lives. In both cases, the people in their respective times were living in fear. For the early Israelites it was the fear and oppression growing out enslavement, birthing a new people from of a mixed multitude. Similarly, for the early Christians, it was fear and oppression growing out of imperialist persecution, as the disciples also birthed a new people, this time out of Jews and Gentiles. In both cases, fear was supplanted when they listened to the Spirit to offer a vision of hope and love.
Who are the mixed multitude today, who can step out of the dominant capitalist culture, steeped in fear and oppression? How do we listen to the Spirit, when the systems of religion no longer speak to so many people? What can the wisdom of our bodies teach us, as we listen to the need for rest, change, and hope?
Just as listening to my body’s need to rest in winter’s season, made space for me to envision new possibilities at the seminary, it also created space for my family to step out of the 20th century nuclear family illusion of self-sufficiency, to reclaim the shared caring and support of a multigenerational household. The spring has brought an upsurge of growth and work, on all fronts, but in a way which supports our collective wellbeing. Just as the natural world around us is sprouting and growing, the spring and summer months are reminding us to listen to bird song and to new forms of life all around us.
Listening to our own hearts and the hearts of others can only happen when we slow down and live into the unitive rhythms of nature around us. When we are listening to the needs of our bodies, we are engaged in that radical resistance, that Audre Lorde espoused. When we can listen, only then we can have compassion – for self and for others. When we listen to the chorus of our companions, the harmony of Spirit rises and enflames our souls to dream into possibilities. We can become that mixed multitude that transforms into a new people and envisions a new way of being in relationship with each other and the planet. When we can hear the notes of each unique truth then the harmony of hope can remind us that it is only when we come together – because of, not despite our differences – that we can manifest miracles.