practice

It's been awhile, hasn't it? And so many potential posts have come and gone in the interim since I last wrote! This past week especially, my mind has been replete with wonderings, my heart full to the brim of feelings. Every morning I seem to wake with a vivid dream still lingering, usually illuminating something that's been bubbling just beneath the surface.

I dreamt I accidentally slept on my couch at work, and woke up in the still-dark very early morning incredibly confused, wondering if I should go home. I didn't. Another night I dreamt I went to see a movie with a friend and as it began, there was footage of me as a child, looking awkward and chubby and behaving badly. I was moritfied.

And so on and so forth! 

I've been thinking about God - how maybe I am very afraid of God, and how becoming a parent seriously ups the ante with that whole (potential) relationship. I'm profoundly grateful, and I have a very rooted experience of how miraculous my children's existence (and by extension, my own) is. But then - they might suffer. Or die. More accurately: they will suffer, they will die. Like me. And so I think I am afraid to know God better, because I am afraid of what He might or might not disclose to me about that situation: the miraculous, so-beautiful-it-hurts blessing of this life - that much more miraculous because of my family - and the fact that it ends. I'm afraid to get any closer. It's a barely tolerable reality from where I stand, which part of me must think is a Safe Distance, because why else would I be out here on the periphery? But it in fact offers no protection. No protection, and no spiritual depth! As Beatrice often says, with great relish, what the heck?

I'm just not feeling brave enough right to edge much closer right now.

So I am being content with what God discloses to me in the faces of others. Which is quite a lot.

I've been thinking about feminism. I've been thinking about my friends, and about friendship. I've been thinking about my work, and what a privilege it is to walk so intimately with others.  Only recently has it become clear to me that what I do is potentially transformative. I've been so skeptical of psychotherapy for so long, it's kind of amazing to stand back and realize I go to work every day confident that what I do matters. (For my clients, and for me). After all the doubt and meandering of years past, the persistent, relentless what should I do? knocking about in the background, it's almost eerie to realize that the old unsettled urgency is no longer there. Maybe I'm just old. That must be part of it. But I also recognize that I am able to give of myself in a way that feels real and meaningful and call it a job and get paid to do it. Geez.

Not that I don't worry that I'm messing up. Not that I don't miss Beatrice during the day terribly, and feel guilty for all the school day things I miss. Not that I don't occasionally itch for more.

But do you know, even though it seems that caring deeply about one's children and deeply about one's work can create impossible conflicts, I think sometimes, on a really good day, the two worlds inform one another beautifully. Beatrice in particular lives so fully present in each moment. She sings and grins and shouts her way through drawing a picture or stirring oatmeal. She brings enviable focus to every new activity and social encounter. When I can settle down and share that focus with her, even for a few moments, it's a kind of practicing.

Practicing, listening, attending. It might make me a better therapist. It might even embolden me to inch a tiny bit closer to God.

Okay, okay, that's getting a bit lofty, I know. The truth is that inching closer to Beatrice, feeling her warm soft arms around my neck and the intensity of her gaze, needs no greater end. Those moments over colored pencils are uniquely, perfectly complete.