Ten-Finger Exercises

Have a meaningful day.

Meaning is in the eye of the beholder. You may quote me on that. Many definitions of spirituality include something about finding meaning in one's life. The idea used to elude me.

I don't know what the meaning of my life is, and I can't really say that I think that it has a meaning. But that's not the same as saying it doesn't have meaning. The article "a" makes a lot of difference.

One of the things that is giving my life meaning this year is my connection here at WDC. (Oops, should have entered the Birthday Tribute contest, but I didn't have any idea I was going here right now.) (Hmmm, where was I going?) (Or maybe I need to practice my stream of consciousness writing, starting a new trend by making each new thought parenthetical.)

What I started to say was that today wasn't a very meaningful day, and then the Wise Woman said, "What do you mean? Didn't you change the sheets and do the dishes and wash the laundry and fix dinner all right there in your house without having to go to the well for water, etc.?" Well, yes, I replied, but...but I do that sort of thing every day. "And does that take away the meaning it has for you?"

No, not really. And I'm not being Pollyanna about this, or shamed into being grateful. Those simple tasks of life that I take for granted are truly part of what life is about for me. If suddenly my house burned to the ground, like Arlene's, or my husband died, I would struggle for a long time to find meaning in my life again. It took me a good six months to begin to get over losing my job at the hospital, and I'm not entirely done grieving that yet.

"So, you're saying that home and family are part of what gives your life meaning?"

Yes, and so is my work that I was just complaining about this morning.

"What changed your opinion?"

A patient who was alert enough to tell me about some of the meaning she has found in life. Her name is Etoile. She said I could use it. It's French for 'star.' Her birth mother was Canadian, and didn't know how to spell, so she spelled it 'Etoilla.' But her adoptive mother couldn't say it or spell it, so she called her 'Suzie.' She is an artist, although she can't paint any longer. She can't sit up even. Her house is in a crime zone, and is old, but it is decorated so interestingly, and many of the pictures on the walls are signed by her.

We haven't had much conversation until today. That's what made the difference. This morning I told my spiritual advisor that I didn't have any patients I look forward to seeing each week. Suzie changed that today. She and I decided that it would have been wonderful to have met much sooner, because I could write stories about her pictures and vice versa.

She had a pet crow once. Her son called from Seattle and said, "Mom, quick, you have to come over here and get this crow that landed in my yard and can't fly." So she did. She named her (the crow's gender seems a little arbitrary to me) Fribonia, for her great grandmother who she says looked just like that crow. She taught the crow to talk, and it would walk down the street with her, hopping along, saying "Hello, hello" to everyone.

"And so, to press the point, could you tell us, and yourself, what it is that helped you find meaning in your life today?"

It's something I've discovered before, but not written down quite this way. I find in the simple things of life those things which make my life feel rich. In observing the pond and the geese and the hawk that I write my haiku about, and in the stories people tell me, their faces as they talk and in the intimacy of the telling. And, when I take time to notice everyday tasks that I don't usually give much thought to, I find joy there too. Pleasure in folding clean towels, in stacking blue bowls in the cupboard, in picking tomatoes and smelling the vines, smoothing clean sheets onto the bed. Today I also found comfort in talking with Chotard, my spiritual advisor. If I hadn't talked and heard my own frustration, then I wouldn't be finding this peaceful place right now, where I didn't know that I was headed for. She helped me find focus, which is what we prayed for. Praying with someone is so difficult at first, but then so good.

Anthony de Mello was right. I remember it once again. God is in Awareness.