“Astonishingly in touch with what’s here”
The words in today’s title are those of poet Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer. Be present with the here and now. Breathe it in. Feel it in your bones. Trommer joined Kristi Nelson from A Network for Grateful Living, for a conversation on a webinar I attended last evening. The topic, as we discuss the wider practice of “Stop. Look. Go: Bring Gratefulness to Life.” over six weeks, was cultivating perspective.
We cultivate perspective every moment of every day, whether we realize it or not. I have spent many days rushing headlong through the hours, with too much to do and not enough time. I have ignored emotions that were seeking acknowledgement, and asking for full expression and acceptance. I have latched on to toxic, trained thoughts and let them define my view of the world. When I added alcohol, I was literally throwing up all over the good in my life.
Beginning a gratitude practice in 1995, the shift in perspective for me began in tiny increments. And then those seemingly miniscule shifts led to opening my hardened heart and dangerous mind a little at a time. Today, I can look back and see what began as almost negligible continues to add up to a life more fully lived. Over these years, I have experienced some of my deepest joys and most intense pain. The amazing stuff of life, of being in touch with the here and now, includes both. If it didn’t, the pain would become unbearable or the joy would lose luster and become expected.
Rosemerry Wahtola Trommer also added the words “rife with pain, rich with beauty” as she spoke last evening. With profound vulnerability, she spoke of the loss and heartache in the months since her son’s suicide last August. He was just 16, going on 17. She showed us what '“rife with pain, rich with beauty” looks and sounds like. Thank you Rosemerry and Kristi!
The webinar came hours after the school shooting in Uvalde, Texas. It is hard to comprehend the true experience that 19 children walked into school yesterday morning and never walked back out. Smiling and learning one moment. Dead the next. Difficult words to read. I. needed to write them and read them over.
This is not someone else’s problem. This is our problem America. What are we going to do? What can I do? The first question is daunting. The second question is more plausible. I can offer kindness and support to all. I can let go of judgment and open my human heart to other humans, whether they are like me or very different. I can answer a call for help, report concerning behaviors, pictures, actions. If not me, who? If not now, when? These are questions for each of us to answer as we take Trommer’s words to heart: “astonishingly in touch with what’s here.”
I am sitting on my front patio on a rainy, windy, chilly late May morning. The weather fits the sorrow. And yet, the joy of spring makes itself known. And with it, some hope. If not hope, at least enough energy to proceed.
