Minding Matters Mattering Most 5-26-12

DELAYED POSTING FROM LONDON ENGLAND

London, England

I’ve often described emotional sobriety as a bit like a rare tropical fern, something precious needing attentive daily care. To extend the botanical metaphor just a bit, if I want to feel a sense of serenity and peace and be spared the traumas of fear, anger, worry, self pity, and foolish decisions, it’s necessary for me to do the spiritual equivalents of pruning, misting, fertilizing, re-potting, watering, and providing proper light. Having attempted to keep Australian tree ferns alive, I quickly found out just how quickly a beautiful plant can be reduced to a shriveled mass of compost by benign neglect.

Having been through several dark nights of the soul it’s also very real to me just how quickly one can be cast into an unimaginable inner darkness, a bleak life-sapping experience beyond articulation. This can happen far more quickly than the time needed for a tree fern to wither. I’ve seen people transformed in seconds from strong robust self-confident individuals into blubbering frightened husks in need of long-term confinement. What appears to be common to all of us having been through such experiences is an antecedent lack of careful attention to our spiritual condition.

In secular society it becomes all too easy to give time and attention to matters not mattering in the least to our spiritual condition; neglecting the faith, confidence, and serenity deriving from a true trust in God, or as we are inclined to say in recovery, trust in a Higher Power. While chasing after the American Dream, we lose sight of the essentials, often ending up with shriveled nightmares instead of rich living full of gusto.

I’ve just been to a physical form of paradise, a pristine crime-free land of alpine wonder, glaciers, peaks shrouded in iridescent cloud, and rainbows where one finds no ghettos, no litter, no industrial nightmares. I’ve recently returned to another form of urban paradise only to find I’ve not been minding matters mattering most.

I did not do my stretching or strength work in preparation for strenuous hiking in the mountains and paid for about four days with screaming quads. Not only could I not go up and down mountains for a few days I couldn’t even go down stairs and found myself using the elevators to go down. I’ve long used stair climbers and assorted machines in the gym to go up but have not been balanced, not preparing for the downhill journey. Going downhill in life can be far more treacherous than sweet ascensions. My quads gave me daily lessons all week about the need for proper balance.

As I chase down all the architectural and cultural treasures to be had in a thousand year old city, I find myself still struggling with putting first things first, minding matters mattering most. By 3 AM I’ve had a day filled with good things, but perhaps not the best things. I’ve seen the world, observed sublime performances, taken thousands of photographs, written essays, kept up correspondence; yet not noticing my leaves are wilting badly.

In one of my all-too-few times of meditation and prayer on this epic journey, an anonymous writer speaks clearly to me. “Discipline of yourself is absolutely necessary before the power of God is given to you. When you see others manifesting the power of God, you probably have not seen the discipline that went before. They made themselves ready. All your life is a preparation for more good to be accomplished when God knows you are ready for it. So keep disciplining yourself in the spiritual life every day. Learn so much of the spiritual laws that your life cannot again be a failure. Others will see the outward manifestation of the inward discipline in your daily living.”

Perhaps what I do here in the hidden space of my little room in a Victorian row house is far more important than what I do out there on the stage of life with cameras, pen, or word. The Holy Grail of recovery is a vital spiritual experience, a transformation, a result coming from practicing prayer and meditation frequently to improve our conscious contact with God. As we do this, we see the power of God manifesting in our lives. As the power of God manifests in our lives, those around us become curious as to how it is our lives are working so well, we are then able to simply live lives of attraction rather than self promotion.

I can now plan on going to bed the same day I get up, no longer tyrannized by trying to prove anything. I might even find refreshment for my soul, no longer desiccated by putting good things before the best things.

Blessings,

Craig C. Johnson