Awkward....


Right now I am reading a book called "A Chosen Faith."  Its sort of a primer to the Unitarian Universalist faith.  I am thinking about formally joining our local congregation.  (I already sing in the choir.)   Unitarian Universalism seems to line up with where I am right now.  However I find myself still in the awkward getting to know you stage with the congregation.  Folk are fairly friendly and there is a lot to do and a lot to get involved with.  However there are not a lot of younger childless couples in the church so its a bit harder to form those easy friendships one does with ones peers.  This has me thinking about the place of awkwardness in the spiritual experience.  We'd all like to be up on the mountaintop, blissing out to a spiritual high, but life is not often made of moments like this.  I think the Buddhist view of the present moment helps.  i.e. "Dwelling in this present moment, I know this is a wonderful moment." Thich Nhat Hanh.   If I remember to breath and be at peace with awkwardness and uncomfortableness it can be easier to deal with.  However, sometimes these awkward experiences have caused me to discount the "authenticity" of a spiritual experience.  For example, when someone starts sneezing during meditation, I  can loose my peace and start getting annoyed and uncomfortable.  Then I might start discounting the whole experience, thinking "If this were an "authentic" spiritual practice,  would anybody really sneeze.  Wouldn't we all just start glowing with inner light or something?"

I appreciate that Buddhism convicts me to accept things as they are.  I think a lot of people I consider "spiritually flaky" are all about finding these perfect, blissful experiences, which can often lead them to have no common sense in the real world.

I think that when we are on the mountaintop, we should appreciate it for all it's worth, but being back down in the valley, trucking through the mud, is a spiritual experience too.   The mountain top experience may in fact be a reward for learning the lessons that the muddy valley had to teach us.  When we spend all our time dwelling on being annoyed and uncomfortable, I think we miss what the here and now is trying to show us.

Comments

Cassandra said…
I'm not familiar with Unitarian Universalist so I looked up the website. I like the emphasis on social justice. I think people have a right to be treated well regardless of who they are and it's nice to see a group of people working toward that goal.

You have a good point about spiritual experiences in the valleys. We can learn a lot there!
November 23, 2012 at 8:29 AM
Noah said…
I am pleased you are attending a UU church there. Not sure whether I will ever formally join a church again tho. Attendance+support aka both time+financially should be good enough.
November 27, 2012 at 2:21 PM
Robert said…
I agree with your last thoughts totally. It's learning how to be happy with pain, depression,everyday stuff that is the hard work.
December 20, 2012 at 1:14 PM
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Eating SDA Style

(This is an essay I wrote for part of a Cultural Memoir Assignment) One former Adventist friend of mine always says, “It was the table that fed me” in referring to our shared Seventh-day Adventist background. My friend was referring to the morals, values and spirituality of Seventh-day Adventism that we still hold onto, even though we disagree with the Church in many ways. I, however, can’t help but think of feeding in the literal sense. Seventh-day Adventism did truely feed us, but in very unusual ways. Seventh-day Adventists have something they refer to as the “Health Message.” Just like the Mormons we have our very own prophet, only she was a woman and not a polygamist. Ellen White encouraged healthy living and vegetarianism in the Seventh-day Adventist church. In many ways this has been a blessing to the church. Adventists who follow the health message are some of the longest living folks in the nation. On the other hand it has brought a spirit of legalistic infighting ove
Read more

Dogs Become Street Stoics

I had a bizarre dream last night in which the phrase "Dogs become street stoics" appeared. Seems prophetic, no? Okay, so I really have no idea what that phrase means. I doubt it means much at all, just random brain twitching during sleep. Another part of my dream did have some events worth considering. Often the issues I am wrestling with, or have wrestled with appear in my dreams. I have dreams about high school insecurity, job fears, friendship and family issues. I still dream about massive fights with my mother even though we haven't really fought for several years. One common dream I was having was the "heaven/salvation" dream in which the end times were upon me and I managed to get saved. I was never "lost" in any of my end time dreams. It should be noted that I have a great deal of will power when it comes to dreaming. I rarely have nightmares, and when something bad does happen in my dreams I can usually work my way out of it. Often i
Read more
Image
I know the feeling stick man...I know the feeling. It's an irresistible urge to correct certain opinions that I strongly disagree with. The urge be to snarky in combating said opinions is especially tempting. Having seen many internet debates devolve into mudslinging and anger I've tried to refrain from engaging (or starting) internet debates. However, I think the real problem is their aren't a lot of safe spaces in our society for people of differing opinions to converse. The media gets people all hyped up into an us versus them frenzy (both sides are guilty of this). People get very protective of their opinions as well. Rather than recognize that we all have a lot to learn, we build up bulwarks of anger and self-righteousness to protect our opinions and then refuse to hear what anyone else has to say. Our opinions must be very fragile things indeed if they need so much protection. I like to refer to this phenomenon and invincible ignorance. The fact is that
Read more