Be Careful What You Ask For

Years ago a friend and mentor told me that every day he said a kind of prayer to know God's will for him. He said it with full earnestness, and then one day he was smacked right in the face with a challenge that was way bigger than he had ever imagined. It became his job but he told me, "Be careful what you ask for - you just might get it."

I have been asking for a way to learn how to stay vulnerable while doing the work for which I trained throughout my adult life. It turns out that there isn't really a way to learn it - like there is no step one then step two. Nor is there a way to just put one's big toe into the pool of vulnerability to test the water temperature. It appears to me that vulnerability, as a state of being, either is something you are
or you aren't. It's kind of like being pregnant - there is no such thing as somewhat pregnant. And my lesson of late is that it is the same with vulnerability. You either are or you are not.

So it has come to the point where I must jump into the deep end of the pool and decide to live this way. There is no other choice - I cannot turn back and and stay defended and closed any longer. It is no longer a choice I will make. And what has opened up the deep end to me is that I had to let go of the fear of "what will people think?" The answer came pretty clearly to me over the last few days of training in which I have been participating: They will think I am being vulnerable. And overall that is not such a bad thing.

Brene Brown says that vulnerability without boundaries is not vulnerability. It's stupidity! So it's not like choosing to be vulnerable and live life from a more transparent stand means walking around naked all day or through a tough neighborhood alone at night. It means creating safe places and conditions for vulnerability to live and pull us all together. And with that it means knowing that home and among friends are some of those places. At least it is where I am starting. And the more I practice that with the ones I love and trust, the more I am able to know how to bring it to life in the public world. Wish me luck!

Rising Strong

Recently I have been reading Brene Brown's new book Rising Strong, and I love every page of it - take that as highly recommended reading! But I would like to offer a slightly different take on the comeback from adversity.

Modern cultures, and predominantly the cultures descended from white, Anglo-Saxon, alpha types, have adopted the mindset that obstacles are to be overcome. We are programmed to set goals and pursue them with abandon. I even have a t-shirt with the motto, "I don't stop for obstacles; I destroy them!" and another with a Gandhi quote about power being derived from "indomitable will." But the wisdom of mystics from all traditions tells us that there is another way. According to mystical wisdom, the goal is not to knock down every hurdle and barrier so that we remain unchanging, but rather to allow ourselves to be bent and shaped by nature so that we emerge as re-formed and wholly new creations of that encounter.

Listen to how Rilke describes it in his poem The Man Watching: "If only we would allow ourselves to be dominated, as things do by some immense storm, we would become strong too, and not need names." And the modern mystic poet, David Whyte puts it this way in Working Together: "We shape ourselves to fit this world and by the world are shaped again. The visible and the invisible working together, in common cause to produce the miraculous.
I am thinking of the way the intangible air passed at speed round a shaped wing easily holds out weight. So may we, in this life, trust to those elements we have yet to see or imagine, and look for the true shape of our own self, by forming it well to the great intangibles about us."

This journey of transformation has been one of learning to trust those great forces, and to listen to the creaks and moans of my branches and bones in the immense storm. It is allowing the forces in so that I might become one with nature, and in doing so, take my place as one with all humanity.  Like so many of us, I have spent my life amassing knowledge without understanding, chalking up credentials like so many bullet points on a resume. But in the words of Pope Francis, "Our goal is not to amass information or to satisfy curiosity, but rather to become painfully aware, to dare to turn what is happening to the world into our own personal suffering and thus to discover what each of us can do about it."

Rilke ends The Man Watching by saying, "Whoever was beaten by this Angel went away proud and strengthened and great from that harsh hand, that kneaded him as if to change his shape. Winning does not tempt that man. This is how he grows: by being defeated, decisively, by constantly greater things."

I have been awakened. I am feeling deeply (because I finally can). And while I may walk with a limp, like the Biblical wrestler of the angel, I have been resurrected as a stronger, and more fully alive human.

Fragile Power

With apologies for continuing the metaphor...

As I emerge from this transformation, just as the butterfly begins to open its wings, there is an sense of unknowing that lives just above the level of abject terror that arises from within. There is nothing in my memory as a caterpillar that has anything to do with wings, let alone flying. This new body seems far less rugged, in fact it feels frail, thin and vulnerable. And I have lost that voracious appetite for any and all things.

Yes - it is kind of like that. Only I can't seem to connect with the DNA that would instruct my wings to work yet and I've yet to experience a gentle wind that would lift me off this branch I seem to be so desperately clinging to. Perhaps I am not suited for butterfly life. Worm life was simple: eat, shed, grow, repeat, eat, shed, grow. This life seems not only fragile but finite. Something in me knows that there is not a next step after this form. And most certainly there is no way back.

But there must be some power in these wings. If only I can figure out how to use them I might begin to see what this branch is attached to and where it is in the bigger picture. With the power of wings I can see well more than the ground or leaves I walked on. I think that might be a great new perspective. But this fragile new power is very much an oxymoron. I have no clue what Paul meant by, "When I am weak, I am strong." Though I think it is dawning on me that "I have died and something else is living in me."

How Wings Are Formed

At this point, I am pretty certain, though I have absolutely no hard evidence to support this certitude, that there is absolutely no intentionality on the part of the caterpillar when it comes to forming wings. Most certainly though it is in the DNA of the caterpillar-turned-chrysalis that when guts are cooked for enough time inside the protective layer of the cocoon. But that operative word there is cooked.

This business of being transformed is not easily done nor is it without any associated discomfort. In fact I feel like it is as violent a process as the actual formation of the chrysalis in the first place. I was meditating last Sunday when the image of the crucifixion came into my mind, and instead of letting the intruding thought image float away down stream as I normally do with other intruders, I looked at it, and took it in.

I had always seen this image as one of death and pain - an execution of an innocent man - as well I should because that is what was happening. But this time I saw it differently. It is a very powerful image indeed, but not as an image of the scapegoat upon whom we placed our collective transgressions so that we could be cleansed. Nor was it significant as an icon of the "savior" conquering death so that we mere mortals now could have a free ticket to some beautiful vacation land called heaven. Not in the least!

It was an image of a man with his arms wide open - the posture we take when we see a long-lost friend - ready to embrace the beloved - welcoming whatever stories and hurts they brought back with them. Only this man, this one on the cross had no alternative, as his arms were nailed wide open. It suddenly occurred as THE message of the crucifixion - the "follow me" message. What if my arms were nailed wide open; what if I had no other choice than to welcome and accept whatever life threw at me with open arms?

Rumi's poem "Desire" starts with the line, "A lover knows only humility, he has no choice." While it is often taken as a purely love poem, ecstatic Sufism speaks of the Divine One as the Beloved and brings it down to the visceral corporeal level. I might paraphrase Rumi to say, the crucified knows only humility, he has no choice. The chrysalis knows only humility, he has no choice. Wings are forming and I must receive whatever this life offers - in full humility - I have no choice.

Greetings from Inside the Chrysalis

The really remarkable thing about my brother's photography (See my previous post on "You Thought It Was Easy?") is the process he used called "Focus Stacking" which provides an image so rich in detail that it can be blown up a hundred fold and still not pixelate. As the caterpillar turned to just worm-guts and then hardened its outer surface in the creation of the chrysalis, it was clear that there was no element of butterfly inside that package. And yet over the next few day's pictures, as the outer layer of that jade cocoon thinned you could see something happening. New lines and dark shapes could ever-so-faintly be seen through the surface. Change - real transformative change - was happening.

This creature just did what it was programmed in its DNA to do. But we humans, and this one in particular, far too often are wed to the past understanding of who we think we are.  Our memories of past successes and failures are blended and baked into a story that becomes our map for moving forward.  Constructivism (a field of psychology) says that we can only perceive new events within the context and framework for which we have a vocabulary and a basis of antecedent experiences with which to make sense of them. Actual "new: learning or behaviors are difficult to produce because we simply do not have the tools to produce them and we are too attached to the story already and always running in our mind. But what if that story (and that is what it is, the story we made up about what some event meant - not at all the actual event itself) is fictional? Mark Twain once quipped, "the older I get, the more vividly I can remember things that never happened!"

But inside the chrysalis, nothing of caterpillar, except for some of the worm guts, remain. Caterpillar is lost - not just forgotten - but totally gone forever. And that is what is called for in transformation: I must lose the story. All of it. I must lose the one about how I can do it by myself. Lose the story of how I am alone in this quest. Lose the story of "if you want something done right, do it yourself (thanks dad and Abe Lincoln for that one)." Lose the story that I am somehow better or stronger or more creative on my own than with any others as a pair, trio or group (Yes I know how arrogant that sounds - and inside here, that arrogance must die as well).

I am baffled as I peer through the enlarged picture of the cocoon and see what look like lines of a patterned wing are beginning to form. How is that possible? How can a black, yellow and white striped multi-legged worm lose all its defining characteristics and, as we will see in a few days, emerge as a skinny, six-legged insect with vibrantly colored orange and black wings. Transformation makes no logical sense.

You Thought It Was Easy?

For some years now I have been claiming that I am committed to helping others with their transformation all the while seemingly ignoring the implication that it also meant that I must be involved in my own transformation. So finally the lie has been exposed and I am called to account for my duplicity. I am, I must admit, now deeply involved in a transformative passage. And the truth is, I have no clue what I am doing! I guess no one in the throes of transformation does, but that wasn't obvious to me before.

My brother - an incredibly gifted amateur photographer - caught the chrysalis formation process of a monarch caterpillar on film earlier this summer. But what he showed was, as he said, nothing like was described in high school biology class. It was in actuality an incredibly violent and seemingly difficult process (thought neither of us asked the butterfly). As the caterpillar shed its last skin and started forming the cocoon, it convulsed and shook as if in severe pain.

Yeah, that would be what transformation is.  Not the cute caterpillar spinning an outer shell to hide and quietly morph into the beautiful monarch, but an earth-shattering, paradigm-shifting revolution that rips one inside out and causes one to convulse and writhe in sheer pain - if not fear - from what is coming and yet unknown. A full change in form - trans (from one to another) formation (creation).

Okay, I get it - conceptually - now can someone stop the merry-go-round, 'cause I want to get off! The only problem with transformation is it's a one-way ticket and the ride does not stop until it is done. I somehow think women learn this lesson in childbirth - that there are certain transformative processes in which we humans are not in control. But we masculine types never get that lesson. And just personally speaking, it sucks, thank you very much!

So the next few entries most likely will be from within the chrysalis. Wish me luck.

On "Losing it All"

The graduation address at ANTS this year was drawn from the book "The Things They Carried" that (among other themes) described the characters of the story by the objects they had with them in combat - from canteens to pictures and bibles. We tend so often to define ourselves and our lives through the things we have, the things we own or, perhaps more accurately the things that begin to own us. At least I do - that is until a few weeks ago when became apparent that all of those things were about to become dust, ashes, memories, and lost.

I just lost a very big gamble - a company for which we had borrowed a lot of money to launch. In failing, all of that investment was lost, flushed right down the proverbial toilet, and lost. Well not entirely lost inasmuch as I still remain accountable to repay the vast amount of money borrowed in the first place.  But what went down with that company was a set of dreams, hopes, vacations, and a whole lifestyle we had hoped on in our retirement. Gone. Poof! In a matter of just a few weeks all of that was no longer something that I had - and now is something that has me.

In my meditations I am looking for the release - looking for the sense of nothingness and freedom that having nothing and owing a lot carries with it. And I find that I am still carrying pictures of that lost dream tucked into the band of my helmet. I am still carrying stories of what I would do if... in my duffel bag. I am still carrying all those things with me into battle. I want desperately to let go and to step into the humility of this new naked life that has been thrust on me pretty much against my will. And to tell the truth, I am not there yet.

Yesterday I laid on the floor in a crucifix position, praying for God to take my ego away.  "Go ahead - rip it out of my chest," I shouted out to the air that might be listening. And the only response I heard was a whisper that seemed to say, "When you are ready, you'll let go of it. It is the only thing standing between you and me."  Damn it, God, why do you have to be so right! Why don't you just let me wrestle you like your boy Israel instead of messing with my mind? Beat me fair and square instead of making it my job to surrender!

Then again, maybe that is what this losing it all is about. Being beaten at my own game.

Wrestling the Angel

For the past two years I have been researching and writing about the dark night of the soul, that place which on the outside looks like some spiritual desert, but inwardly is where the ego is stripped of its death hold on what it thinks it knows of the spiritual realm. On this journey I have met real life mystics and everyday people having mystical experiences.  I have had the blessing of friendships that are transforming and I have lost a few very dear ones as well. In many of these instances, had I not been studying the dark night, these special moments may have zipped right past me or thrown me into an unexpected downward spiral. But somehow I was graced by each of those occurrences and have come out just a tad more aware as a result.

Over the next few months or so, I will post bits and pieces from my thesis as I rework sections for publication.  I hope that which I have captured in this research can provide guidance or sustenance to fellow travelers who wrestle with their own angels or demons (do we ever know which it is that has grabbed us from behind?)

I think Rev. Renita Weems captured it best in the opening of her book, Listening For God: "No one is ever prepared to endure the long silence that follows intimacy. No one is prepared to face it when it comes after lovemaking. No one is prepared to face it when it comes after a season of intimacy with God. It is the hardest thing to talk about, and it is the hardest thing in the spiritual journey to prepare for. The long silence between intimacies, the interminable pause between words, the immeasurable seconds between pulses, the quiet between epiphanies, the hush after ecstasy, the listening for God – this is the spiritual journey, learning how to live in the meantime, between the last time you heard from God and the next you hear from God.

I would be honored if you'd let me know what you think.

Trust Fall

I am currently reading The Ascent of Mount Carmel by John of the Cross; the book in which he outlines the steps and process of the dark night of the soul.  John's description of the way in which one "prepares" for this journey toward god is huge - and risky!  Think of the preparation this way: you cannot be intimate (you know sexually intimate) by yourself - it takes two to do that tango!  But what you can do it prepare yourself for intimacy.  You can adopt the "position" of intimacy - open, vulnerable, hungry and waiting.  And to increase the sensuousness of it all you could even close your eyes and let your lover "surprise" your senses.  Love is a giant game of "Trust Fall."  Close your eyes, fold your arms over your chest, tuck your chin, lean back over the cliff, and let yourself fall into the arms of your lover.

John is saying somewhat the same thing about achieving intimacy with god.  You cannot do this willfully on your own.  But you need to adopt the position of readiness. That position, he says, is that you need to starve your senses, and get to a place of total not-knowing, because any thought that you might have about god or the experience of god is in the way of actually experiencing god this time and the next time, and so on.  Any sensation you have a longing for and any "knowing of what that connection may have felt like before, if still present inside you, will be looking to stuff this next encounter into that same wonderful place.

And god refuses admission to any of those boxes.  God cannot be described, containerized or labeled by any human classification system.  So all our thoughts and feelings have to be stripped away (and they do not go quietly) so that however and whatever is next in the smorgasbord of god-encounters can manifest however and whenever it manifests.

Now here is the thing we need to get: god is already and always there/here inside and with us.  And it is really all of our thoughts, emotions, feelings and memories (including the very moment we have one) of our encounter, our touching, that awareness that get in the way of having that awareness. Close your eyes and lean back!

Gaping Chest Wound

I note with great interest our reaction to the Gulf of Mexico oil crisis. How we see the "problem" and how we address it are very telling. We tend as a people to see big problems as what Douglas Adams called SEPs (Sombody Else's Problem) and with that comes a convenient blame that we can affix to the culprit, BP.
But more than that, we seem to be seeing the problem as a separate and distinct entity apart from ourselves. Like so many of our human ailments: cancer, depression, AIDS - you name it - we naievely believe that: a) it is not integrally interwoven into how we live our lives, and b) that there is or can be created a pill (a solution) that can make it go away, without any other effort on our part than simply swallowing it.
How foolish can we be? First of all, how foolish it is to think that poking holes in our body will not have some disasterous results at some point; that it somehow will not result in our bleeding to death. More importantly, how foolish it is to view the earth and a separate entity, an object here for our taking, and not the core and source of our very being as a spicies. In our dualisic logic, we have come to believe that what is not "this" must be "that," that what is not me is other and therefore could possibly be mine or at least used by me without any cost to me. We have failed the first great cosmic rule: that all is one and inseparable from itself. This truth, taught by every great sage that has grown out of this life form and moved about within its veins, is undeniable. We have forgotten that we are merely some six billion hairs growing on the surface of our collective body.
And how foolish can we be to think that this ailment we now face can be healed by placng a bandaid on the hole? We have a gaping chest wound that has punctured our lungs and heart and, with the blood gushing out at a million barrels a minute, we will think to stuff some gauze in it. We hope - in vain I fear - that there is a cure. Where is the Prozac to make this better? Isn't there some antibiotic to make it go away so we can get back to feeding our egos and consuming ourselves?
I am so sorry to be negative. I am so embarrassed to be part of that collective mind that believes this. I want to kick and punch my way out but I can't. I am a part of the whole. I, too, am bleeding to death. I will - like each of you - climb into my oil consuming automobile later this morning and drive off to work, and somehow pretend not to know that I/we are dying.
There is no pill.
There is no individual fault.
And there is no individual way for one person, one company or one country to make it better.
Our only hope is we and us, and to see that this blood spilling out is related to Darfur, Afghanistan, Israel/Palestine and all of the other 90 some wars and blood-letting ceremonies in which we are now engaged, as well as to the deforestation of the Amazon, the melting ice caps.
Oh people, join hands, wake up, help out. This is serious.

When the Convergence Hits the Fan

A friend of mine, Doug, is a transformational coach and lives at the very edge of his being. He is always pushing his own limits of growth and development. It is both exhilarating and something that will wake you up at 2AM in a cold sweat. Doug knows the developmental truth that you cannot get to the next level without passing through the eye of the needle – which is not fun and in essence means that you must experience the breakdown of your current way of being before you can break through to the next.

It is the age-old truth of the universe and of nature herself: the death/rebirth cycle. It is everywhere in nature. Winter is the grandest death with the rebirth of spring causing us all to jump up and cheer everything back to life. But you cannot get there in a straight line - it comes at you in bursts and in random fashion. And it’s what Doug lives on a daily basis.

Nature and life don’t handle things in tidy little packages, all lined up, one after the other. Sometimes they cascade over us, one and then another and then ten at once. Doug calls it “breakdown stacking!” It is a great concept. Especially if we become intentional about our growth and development. Breakdown stacking is that “bring it on” attitude that looks concurrent breakdowns squarely in the face and shouts, “yippee, another breakdown! I must be doing something right to have this much crap bubbling out!” What if we actually looked for our breakdowns – recognizing them as the equal and opposite reactions to our intention to live life at an even higher level? Now that would be stacking. Bring ‘em on!

Spiritual Discipline

Spirituality is a discipline not a concept, and of late I have been undisciplined. I have not been attending church services, I have not been praying at the beginning, end and/or the middle of my days, I have not been reading sacred literature. All of these practices and more are the disciplines of my spirituality, and I have become lazy and lethargic. Well it is not that I have become that - it's more like that is who I am and the disciplines take me away from my natural state.
I exercise every morning, and people always say things like, "Oh, you are so disciplined. I wish I could be like that!" That is not, I explain, discipline. I exercise because I have no other choice. Without exercise my left leg, orphaned by an athletic injury that cut off much of the nervous impulses that once went there, starts cramping up around 3PM or so. I HAVE to exercise!
But it appears as though my soul does not go into spasms if I forget to pray one day - and the next - and the next after it. It just withers and atrophies until one day I wake up all cranky without the slightest reason for why. My spirituality takes effort, routine and training. I believe the definition for discipline is a practice that shapes and molds the spirit. Without the regular rigor of those exercises, my soul looses shape - without the slightest hint. It just goes away.
Last night I did a whole mess of sit-ups for the first time in a while and my stomach aches today. It's a good ache, the kind I want to feel again in the pit of my soul.

Unraveling The Threads

It is funny how this process works - this introspective thing, I mean. As I have been rapidly approaching the completion of six decades of residence on this orb, a date which is now less than a month away, I have been on a quest of unraveling the icon of self-ness which I have fabricated from the strands of memories, events, accomplishments and failures, to discover what lies beneath and beyond all of that. In two recent blogs I have peeled that down to the raw, naked "so what, now what?" However, that has all been about discovering who and what I actually am in my authentic self. But what then of god?
Following the same logic - that the concept of god is mostly a fabrication of myths and beliefs passed on to me by others, sewn together with experiences and reflections of my own - then what is or might be god that is not that when and if we are able to strip that away? The theologian John Ackerman makes the beautiful distinction between the god of our experiences and the experience of god. It raises the question of whether we can ever, really experience god's god-ness devoid of our preconceived categories and language for those experiences. Is it possible to have an authentic experience of the divine? I cannot speak for anyone else here, as I am certain to offend the righteous, the devout believers and he "faithful," so I will speak only of myself.
I have entered on a quest of discovery to seek the authentic experience of god without categories, words, theologies, epistimologies, and eschatologies (don't you just theo-babble!!). I choose to call this phase of spiritual development the Seeker phase (for lack of any better term). I feel like a Seeker. Armed with only a knapsack, a notebook (as it were) and nothing more, I have strapped on the proverbial hiking shoes and headed out into the wilderness of not knowing. These posts have been postcards from that trek, notes along the way as I continue to explore my unknown world. I would love to invite you along and ask that those of you who read these posts occasionally check in with me. Am I making sense? Do you take issue with these precepts? I will never know by myself, just as I will never know who I am without being in relationship with you all. Well? Is there anyone out there?

The Space In-Between

It's Saturday - the Saturday between "good" Friday and Easter Sunday. I suppose Saturday could get jealous - if it were that kind of a being. But such is not the case with this Saturday. Its purpose is very clear - to be a space in-between.

How should we observe In-Between Saturday? What happens on this day. I think for most of us it is just a day to get over or through. But imagine THAT first one - the the one that was not yet In-Between. The darkness was all around, the execution had happened, the curtain in the temple had been ripped and the earthquake had really shaken everyone. They probably hid and got drunk trying to numb it or just blot the whole damned thing out. Half horrified, half scared out of their minds (who was going to be next to suffer that fate?

Saturday - a time of crouching in the corner and thinking waaaay too much. Who am I? Who was he? What do I really believe - if I can ever believe in anything again? We don't talk much about Saturday as "Holy Saturday" (I think perhaps traditional Catholics still do). But this is the truly "holy" space. It is the in-between space where god does god's best work on us. It is only when we are sufficiently disturbed, sufficiently ripped out of our made up "realities" that we are not deafened to the Divine message. It takes going into the in-between space (what Richard Rohr calls the liminal space - the threshold betwixt and between) to get the real work done.

Real persons of faith know this place - they know that this is the only place where faith becomes just that - faith. This place of not knowing, and of not trusting one's own mind and senses - this is where faith is forged. Everyone who was there on Friday, who had any wherewithal with which to perceive anything, knew what happened! And Easter, well, SOME of those who were there saw and believed (blessed are those who did not see and still believed) and some could not. I somewhat suspect that those who saw and believed, and those who didn't and did, were the ones who went deep into the In-Between space that Saturday.

It is difficult to stay in the In-Between spaces. We are an instant gratification culture. We want it now. We even manage and expedite changes - thinking we are in control of it all. But Saturday - Holy, In-Between Saturday, teaches us to sit and wait - a skill we have all but lost. That is how I intend to spend today - sitting, wondering, waiting, scared....

What's It All About, Alfie?

Reflections on Job and the Mystery of Suffering, by Richard Rohr

Though I barely remember the 60’s version of the Michael Cain film and did not bother with Jude Law’s newer/fresher Alfie, the “what’s-it-all-about” question has all the staying power of an old cigarette jingle, without any of the narcotic effects. It is an ancient and hauntingly human question that has no real answer. All of our “why’s” seeking some rational explanation to life, the universe and everything (short of Douglass Adam’s whimsical 42), inevitably fail to assuage the empty itch at the source of the questions. Why am I here? What is the purpose to my life? Why do bad things happen to seemingly good people?

Take, for example, Job – the ultimate Alfie questioner. Faced with what must have been years of insufferable pain and despair, Job keeps asking god, “Why?” “What is this all about?” “Did I do something to deserve this?” Job had lived a good and devout life and he felt that he had done nothing to deserve the pain, loss and despair that he now suffered. To make matters worse he is taunted by three of his (self-professed) friends, Moe, Larry and Curley, who try to convince him of his guilt and harangue him with mainline religious platitudes. No one from the mainstream will ever understand the journey of the dark night. It refuses to fit into logic and comfort.

But Job has to go on a trip of monumental spiritual proportions to get to the other side of his suffering. Through the process, Job seems to map out the emotional course that Elizabeth Kubler-Ross described many thousands or years later – shock, anger, denial, bartering, and finally acceptance. And the cosmic lesson that Job (and all of us) must learn (though I pray not so harshly) is that there is no rationale to justify suffering as long as we are looking for it from a personal/human, ego-justification level. If we read Job thoroughly, we find that he pleads his case before god like a lawyer in court trying to make sense out of it from his (Job’s) ego-perspective. It is not until Job gives up trying to make it make sense and surrenders to god, that god actually concedes to talking to Job.

It seems that there are three deeply profound lessons that we must learn in the Job experience. First and foremost, as long as we are looking for understanding of events from our perspective – as if suffering, or joy (do we ever inspect that in the same way?) must have some deeper meaning – we are bound to come up empty handed. There is no meaning that exists outside of our own personal meaning making. Things and events have no intrinsic meaning. Nothing means anything until we make up a meaning. So Job’s attempt to find some cosmic meaning is fruitless because there is none to be found - and god knows this so he doesn’t even play the game. Furthermore, despite lacking meaning, Job wants to be justified – found innocent of any wrongdoing (the meaning he has ascribed to the source of suffering) – so that his ego can feel okay and virtuous. Again god refuses to even play the game of ego importance. God maintains a stonewall approach to these machinations of Job. But the third (really big) lesson is that not only is god in charge of the whole game, god and divine understanding is so beyond our human comprehension that to try and fix a human rationale to it or to apply some kind of right and wrong checks and balances to it is not only impossible it is downright illogical.

With a final sigh, Job gives up his attempts and instantly, god steps in and speaks – not in answer but in beautiful, powerful metaphor. Even then, when god speaks, he does not even address the questions of rationalization. In a sense, god says, “I am in charge and always have been. Just trust that and try not to figure it out!” It is the ultimate spiritual message – the message of the experience of Job, the teaching of the Nazarene, and of the Buddha and of every great spiritual sage throughout time. Live in the question, surrender to god’s way, and live in relation to god, to others and to the world around you. Let go of your ego’s need for self-important meanings. It is a humbling and simultaneously filling message. Alfie would have been gravely disappointed. Dionne Warwick sang in the theme song, “What’s it all about, Alfie? Is it only for the moment we live?”

Well, yup, that’s about it!

Deepening Faith

Hey, no one needs a market analyst to recognize that the market here and abroad has recently fallen through the floor. While it seems bottomless, there is no solace in knowing that there is an absolute floor of resistance the the averages will bounce off of. People - everywhere - are scared and the recession-proofing that was built into the stock market, does not account for fear of this nature. Interestingly, people living in poverty are not as scared. And to be certain they will bear the brunt of this recession more than anyone. They aren't scared because they have not lost anything - they had none to lose.

But we in the middle and others like my client I wrote of (Moment of Truth, 10/7/08), we have lost some of the future in which we had invested: retirement plans, 401K's, Social Security. Uncertainty has become the state of things for now and the foreseeable future. And yet our leader (W, himself) wants us to pretend that all is well in happy land. Sorry, Dubyah, I do not have faith in you, nor do I accept your ignorance and empty promises.

So what are we to do in times like these? Politicians and money brokers are looking out for their own best interests and that may or may not work out for all of us in the long run (secretly, I think that whatever solution "they" work out will ultimately benefit mostly "them"). The answer is not what you want to hear - nor is it an answer at all. You see, these are the times without answers. These are the times of doubt. These are the times that try men's souls. So the reality is that we look into these times and hone our faith. We need to view these situations like Peter stepping out of the boat, and ask ourselves, "do we believe?" "But when [Peter] noticed the strong wind he became frightened and, beginning to sink, cried out,'Lord, save me!' Jesus immediately reached out his hand and caught him saying, 'You of little faith, why did you doubt?'" (Mt. 14:30-31)

Do we have faith now when there is no reason to have faith? Do we believe when there is nothing in which to believe? We need to move beyond our inner Peter and inner Thomas to exercise true faith. So yesterday the Almighty Dow jumped in some shark-like feeding frenzy response of bargain-hunting. And we are all happy again. Indeed! "Have you believed because you have seen? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have come to believe." John 20:29

Moment of Truth

One of my clients told me yesterday that he had lost more than two million dollars over the last week. When I share that with others, I am surprised at the reactions: "That's a rich man's problem, at least he had it to lose!" "Wow - I guess it's a sign of the times." But the one that got me was: "Why did you continue the session instead of letting him get back to work?" That translates to why talk about improving his leadership when what is most needed is action? But really, when is there a better time to talk about leadership?

I have written before about faith - the kind of faith that one finds when there is no reason to believe and nothing in one's mind and soul wants to believe. I think the same is true about leadership. Most situations of leadership are a cake walk. when people willingly line up behind the leader and when the mission is clear, it really doesn't take much to lead - just the title and the willingness to open one's mouth and say, "Let's go!" But when the chips are down, and when everyone is either looking the other way or at least over their shoulder, it takes everything you have and much of what you don't have to lead.

What doesn't work at times like this is cheerleading, pie-in-the-sky optimism, bravado, or sexy powerpoint presentations. What doesn't work is all of the aphorisms learned at leadership school, the lessons of leadership in Jack and Built To Last and The One Minute Manager. What doesn't work is "been there done that," "this too shall pass, and "win this one for the gipper."

This is the moment of truth, the dark night of the soul, the death valley experience. And what works here for you has not yet been invented. What works here is not resident in one person. What works here is simple, gut-wrenching, knee-to-knee, eye-to-eye engagement with others in the process of discovering through open, co-creative dialog what none of us knows nor even knew we had. Leadership at the moment of truth is open and inviting, humbling and being humbled, questioning and being willing to listen to what is said but perhaps as importantly to what has not been said. Most of all, leadership at this point takes the courage to be incredibly present to others - each other we encounter - and to stay present when everything inside wants to duck and cover. After all, leadership isn't about the leader - it is not about you.