fast track

A friend of mine has a great behavioral barometer: "Want to know why you're doing something? Stop doing it."

Besides being a test of willpower, the Christian season of Lent can be a testy time, as observant folks run loose without the usual fixes that keep society too hyped up on (fill in the blank...coffee, chocolate, booze, TV) to realize we're riddled with anxiety. I wonder if anyone's done a study on increased accident rates during the 40 days between Ash Wednesday and Easter. Moses fasted for forty days and forty nights, twice; the second time he returned to find the Israelites partying and busted the holy tablets in anger...I can relate after a few weeks without sugar.

The Biblical lesson more commonly referenced among contemporary Christians is the 40 days that Jesus spent in the wilderness before beginning his ministry, a time of being tested by Satan and shoring up his relationship with God--a journey which culminates in Good Friday's crucifixion (kind of makes you want to read the fine print on the release form before repeating that outing) and the resurrection of Easter. So the period of Lent is one marked by abstinence, solemnity, and introspection. Many religious traditions embrace some form of fasting and penitence as a means of drawing closer to God by withdrawing from our human attachments --from the great fast of Ramadan to the penitence of Yom Kippur.

Exploring my ecumenical ways, it's been a while since I've observed a traditional Lent, but always found it a provocative time. One year I gave up using the words "I'm sorry" just to see what would show up in its place. Chocolate, meat, wine, or TV--the tweaks of cravings or temptation of habits invited me to wake up from the sleepy patterns of my daily routine. And, once awake, to lean into the gap that was left when I left my familiar crutches behind. It takes a while to cultivate a taste for sitting in uncomfortable emptiness without shoving a brownie in it. The Buddhists are really on to something here.

Yesterday I sat in St. Lawrence's Basilica with devout Catholic friends visiting from Charlotte. I opened to what I would be willing to leave behind this Lent, what fast would shake things up and make more space for God. The prayer alone felt like a step into the wilderness.

There's hidden sweetness in the stomach's emptiness. We are lutes, no more, no less.

If the soundboxes stuffed full of anything, no music. If the brain and belly are burning clean with fasting, every moment a new song comes out of the fire.

The fog clears, and new energy makes you run up the steps in front of you. Be emptier and cry like reed instruments cry.

Emptier, write secrets with the reed pen.

When you're full of food and drink, Satan sits where your spirit should, an ugly metal statue in place of the Kaaba.

When you fast, good habits gather like friends who want to help.

Fasting is Solomon's ring.

Don't give into some illusion and lose your power,

but even if you have, if you've lost all will and control,

they come back when you fast,

like soldiers appearing out of the ground, pennants flying above them. A table descends to your tents, Jesus' table.

Expect to see it, when you fast, this table spread with other food, better than the broth of cabbages.

~ Rumi ~Ghazal No. 1739 from the Divan-e Shams-e Tabrizi

brave heart

There are a lot of not-so-great parts about getting through a breakup, but one of the toppers has got to be Valentine's Day--especially when said break up is in such close proximity to said "holiday." Everywhere I turn are looming towers of bad milk chocolate in pink cellophane and ubiquitous reminders to remember my sweetie February 14. Ouch. But lest this entry become just another lament on love or diatribe on commercialism, I want to talk about the real issue at hand, or rather, at heart.

Last Sunday I attended an ebullient and gracious religious service during which a congregant got up to share a rather personal valentine's story. He is a family practice physician, and despite the insurance against disease one might guess would come with that line of work, this was the one-year anniversary of his open heart surgery. His talk was accompanied by a slide show with video of his own heart in the operating room, projected in images 5' x 4' on the wall of the sanctuary. He warned us when to close our eyes. I've never been one to look at such things on TV, but the sheer intimacy and courage of such an offering drew me in to watch. I could hear the 7-year old girl sitting next to me, "Yewwww, that's disgusting!" My contorted face echoed her sentiments in silent agreement, but I could not not watch. (Ok, I scrunched up my eyes and closed one in a couple of parts.)

The point of the story-- and the graphic accompaniment --was that in his career as a doctor, he had never successfully resuscitated a patient when applying defibrillation more than 3 times. During his surgery, after the implant was established, the surgeon applied the paddles directly to his heart to prompt the familiar "thum-thump" that would carry the body and the person back into life. The video showed the excruciating suspense of one.. two... three... four... five... six tries. On the sixth, it worked. We breathed a collective sigh of relief, even though the happy ending was standing before us in flesh and (full-on pumping) blood.

Our speaker didn't have to say it: What if the surgeon had given up at the 5th try? In his unsentimental, but transparent account, the man conveyed the almost indescribable gift of appreciating, literally, a second chance at life. This radical experience for which I was an intimate participant truly brought the point home for me. The heart and its vulnerability is magical in myriad ways, and unquestionably a brilliant work of divine design. Being exposed like this invited me to never see this organ the same way again. Watching the grisly images of this fist-sized, miracle mass of muscle--center of our being and energetic seat of love--graphically reminded me of the immensity of life contained in its 11 ounces.

Can we survive a broken heart? Definitely. Then there is rest, and recovery, and healing to be done. Then, what will we do with it? Will we give up on the 5th try? Is it too scary, too fragile to take it back out there? (Well, ummm, YES!) But if we don't, what's the point--isn't that just another kind of death? Most of us would certainly rather not have the pain that's packaged with loving a friend, a child, a parent, a mate. But just like the heart is built to pump 5000 quarts of life-juice each day, we humans are built to love--despite the risks and the breaks and the gluing it back together--because there is also joy to be received, and given, again.

So happy v-day everybody. Brave hearts, all.

p.s. And if you're struggling with the recoverty part, check out this article on Death Bear, the break-up aftercare crusader.