FROM PERFORMANCE TO BEING

Folly Beach sunrise July 14, 2020

A New Day Dawns

Dearest reader, buckle your seat belt.   I'm about to take you on a whirlwind ride through my journey from performance to being. 

For as long as I can remember, I've been a performer.  As a little girl and throughout my school days,  I brought home all A's on my report card.  I respected my elders and did what I was told to do.  Because I was well behaved and smart, I could easily be the teacher's pet in any classroom.  Achievement was the way to get approval from the grownups.

Performance gave a little girl with no self esteem a way to feel good about herself.  She danced and danced and smiled and smiled.  And worked very hard.

As a young adult,  I knew no other way to feel good about myself than performance and hard work.

When my twin sons entered kindergarten, I took a job so that I could pursue studies at the University of South Carolina.  I worked my way through college and graduated Magna Cum Laude with three full majors.  Getting a B was not acceptable to me so, even though I was overwhelmed with the care of young children and a home, I did the work necessary to get an A.

Still dancing and dancing and smiling and smiling.  And working very hard.  I knew no other way.

My efforts were noticed by my professors who sometimes called me in to laude some aspect of my work.  One of them, a psychology professor, liked the work I was doing with a couple of troubled adolescent girls in a practicum under his leadership.  As always, I was working very hard and giving my best efforts to my relationship with these teenage girls who I grew to love.

 Little did I know that my work with these girls was going to put me on a path that would change my life forever!  You see, the professor who lauded my work in the practicum was designing an innovative program for adolescent drug abusers in the state of South Carolina.  He was on the lookout for bright students about to graduate who could work in his program and ensure its success.

A few months before my graduation from USC,  he met with me and said, in his professional opinion,  I would be a good family therapist working with adolescents and their parents.  He had seen the potential for it, he said, in my relationship with the troubled girls and their parents.  I was shocked, to say the very least, that he saw me as capable of such a high calling!

The professor encouraged me to apply for the job and said he would write a recommendation based on my work in his practicum.    Apply I did, and after a series of interviews with various therapists in charge of the program, I got the job.   I am still astounded at the opportunity afforded me in my very first job as a college graduate!  Essentially, I received on-the-job training as a family therapist, the equivalent of a Master's or MSW Degree in Counseling while being paid. 

A new day dawned and my professional life began. 

After four years of intense work as a family therapist,  I needed a break.  As always, I had given 100% to my work and was respected in our treatment facility as a good therapist.   I turned my attention to community organization and leadership.

Performers like me love new challenges!  I took a job as an executive director that allowed me to form community-wide and statewide coalitions. I worked with the governor and state superintendent of education and other statewide leaders.  I was invited to travel with them to the National Governor's Association meeting when South Carolina's Governor Campbell was president of the association.  He introduced me to the governor of Arkansas, Bill Clinton, who had just announced he was running as the Democratic candidate for the presidency.  I enjoyed my work with other leaders tremendously.  As soon as I got bored, I developed a new set of goals to achieve.

At the end of my work in South Carolina,  I turned my attention to Nashville, Tennessee, a city that had a reputation for effective coalition building.  Confident that I would find work there, I moved to Nashville after selling my house in Columbia.  A new beginning at age fifty!

Soon after my arrival, I took a position overseeing an Americorps Program in the countywide school system.  Our goal was to help underachieving 1st through 3rd graders learn to read at grade level.  The program was highly successful, partly because I hired high achieving Americorps members to be tutors and we all worked very hard.   At the end of the year,  I accepted a position as an executive director and led that agency for 4 years before switching gears again.  This time I decided to become a fundraising consultant to assist executive directors I admired who disliked fundraising.

Little did I know how being in Nashville was going to change my life.  High achieving me was about to encounter a practice that would allow me to simply "be."  And amazingly the practice found me! 

Thomas Keating, a Cistercian abbott, came to Nashville in 2000 to talk about a method of silent prayer he had developed called centering prayer.  A friend encouraged me to go to hear what Father Keating had to say.  Out of respect for her, I went to learn more.  Much to his credit in following the leading of the Spirit,  Father Keating switched plans to talk and led us in sit of prayer instead. Those 30 minutes of prayer opened me up spiritually in a way nothing else ever had.  I recognized the Holy Spirit's leading and power in it. 

A new day dawned and I was hooked!

As a high-achieving performer, I could never turn off my mind, even when I wanted to.  It seemed I was always thinking about how to solve some problem.  My body and my mind were on high alert all the time.  It was exhausting. 

Centering prayer helped me to let go and to be in the present moment.  It was liberating to be able to sit quietly and enjoy whatever task was at hand.  This was the gift of a regular practice of centering prayer.  I could hardly believe the results in my life as the months went by and I continued this method of silent prayer twice a day. 

Particularly enlightening was how content I was to sit with my two-year-old granddaughter, Molly Grace, at her tea party.   Sitting on a quilt, I was perfectly content to receive whatever trinkets she handed me, finger them like she did, and admire their beauty.  Perfectionistic, high achieving me had changed.  I was the perfect playmate for my two-year old granddaughter!  An hour could go by as we played, but I was hardly aware of any passage of time.

Centering prayer had changed me.  My mind no longer raced with thoughts.  I was able to relax deeply and to be in the present moment.  No one was more shocked than I was!

As I continued my prayer practice, more changes occurred.  Healing flowed into all areas of my life. Old wounds were healed.  Forgiveness issues were resolved.   I could relax for longer and longer periods of time.  People remarked about the fruit they saw in my life:  peace, kindness, patience.

My life filled with wonderful friends in Nashville, people of character, deeply spiritual and loving.  I was very active as a leader in my church and enjoyed this work immensely.

Although I loved Nashville and my friends there, I felt called back to South Carolina to be closer to my granddaughters who were very young.  In order to teach them how to hunt for treasures from the sea, which I thought would be a delightful activity for all of us, I moved to Mount Pleasant, a coastal city close to the Isle of Palms, a beautiful barrier island.  Beach bum Grammy wanted to be with her girls at the beach! 

Little did I know the spiritual changes that would emerge from my move to Mount Pleasant.

Mepkin Abbey, a Cistercian Monastery in Moncks Corner, was within a 45 minute drive of my house.  Every weekend or whenever I had time off from work, I went to the abbey to pray with the monks.  I felt at home with these Cistercian monks and embraced their way of life.

It was at our Lady of Mepkin I heard the call to a life of contemplation.

While sitting quietly in the choir stall after all the monks had departed for work, I offered a prayer, "If I known this existed, I would have chosen this."

Much to my surprise, I heard an immediate response, "It's not too late."

That was not my voice speaking because I most certainly believed it was too late to pursue a life of contemplation in a monastery.  I was too old.  Besides, I was Episcopalian, not Catholic!  There were no Episcopal monasteries, or so I thought. 

However, within a few months, I discovered a contemplative monastery in the Episcopal Church called the Order of Julian of Norwich. Both monks and nuns were housed at Julian House monastery.  Quite frankly, I was astounded at this discovery!

I had to go to see this place for myself and to meet these monks and nuns!

I had already asked my supervisor for a week's leave in mid October and my request was approved.  When I called Julian House Monastery in early May to inquire as to when I could visit the monastery,  the guest-master apologized that the only opening they had for guests that year was in mid October.  Chills rippled down my spin in recognition of God's leading.

In mid October, I flew to Waukesha, Wisconsin and met the eight contemplative monks and nuns who lived in the monastery there.  After many discussions with the guardian of the order during my week there, he invited me to return to their monastery during Lent which was just a few months away.  He recognized that I might have a call there as a contemplative nun.

It was during my second stay at the monastery, which was for two weeks, that the guardian invited me to return to test my vocation as a contemplative nun.  His invitation was to live at the monastery!

Of course, I accepted his kind and generous invitation.  Gratitude and humility filled my heart. 

A new day dawned and I could hardly believe the opportunity extended to me!

When I returned to Mount Pleasant, I divested myself of all my possessions except for my car and a few clothes.  It was the happiest year of my life as I let go of everything I owned.  Often in the present moment, open and listening to God, I experienced more interior freedom and delight than I ever dreamed possible in this life.  I learned firsthand that the more you give away, the more you receive. 

A new day dawned as I stepped into my new life as a postulant at Julian House Monastery.  I was 59 years old. 

When I returned to the monastery in mid December, I gave Jesus a birthday present that had cost me something.   My sole desire was to give my all to God.  I determined that I would embrace this new life and learn all I could about being a contemplative.  I wanted to ease and enrich the lives of my brothers and sisters there.  I wanted them to get to know me.   This was my pledge of love to them and to God. 

I was like a sponge, eager to absorb what the other monks and nuns could teach me about deepening my life of prayer.  To my great joy, I was clothed as a novice nun.  I felt more fully alive and more fully myself than at any other time in my life.

I loved the structure of the prayer hours and the daily routine of our schedule.  I loved working hard and learning a whole new way of life.  In short, I took to the life of a nun like a duck takes to water!

My joy and ability to easily adapt to the rigid routine and constraints of monastic life led to problems with my fellow monastics who had not adapted so easily and thought I was having way too much fun as a novice.  Some of the nuns started shunning and making fun of me.  I was shocked and hurt!

How could this be happening?  How could nuns be so unloving?

When I asked the nuns what I was doing wrong, I was told, "You're too nice.  You give too many compliments.  Maybe you're trying to manipulate us." 

The guardian told me that the nuns were certain that my upcoming psychological review would render me unfit for life in the monastery.  They were shocked when the psychologist told them instead that I was an emotionally healthy individual and that, because of my warmth, I was an extraordinarily wonderful gift to their community. 

The psychologist's glowing assessment seemed to cement their dislike of me. 

That's when I came face-to-face with how easy it is to love God, but loving people who are mean and rejecting is another matter!  My work there involved learning how to give gifts to people who belittled me.  I learned to give blessing in return for insults.

I've never worked so hard in all my life and enjoyed it more.  There was so much to learn and I was a most eager student!  However, the cruelty of the other nuns cut deeply into my soul.  I was often outraged at their cutting, mean behavior and demanded that the guardian confront them.    He did so and asked them to stop, but they refused to obey him.

It was the best of times and the worst of times.   Simultaneous with fully embracing the life of a contemplative nun and excelling at it in most areas, I was confronted by the pain of rejection which was constant and unrelenting.

It was humbling and broke me down.  It was hard and painful and required faith and trust.  I cried out to God in tears and lamentation.

The next Christmas, one year after my arrival, I made a Christmas card for each of the monks and nuns and wrote a note of appreciation for how he/she had enriched my life the past year.  Each card was a gift of love straight from my heart.  I was willing to walk in love with those who belittled me.

Martin Luther said, "Love God by loving others."  These homemade Christmas cards were my love offering to God and my brothers and sisters at the monastery.   With humility and peace, I walked throughout the monastery, placing a hand-colored card in the door-box of each monastic.

All hell broke loose as a result of my homemade Christmas cards.

The novice master called me in and severely reprimanded me.  She announced angrily that no monk or nun there had ever given a Christmas card or gift to the others.  She punished me for my "transgression" and humiliated me for "setting up expectations on the others to make cards."

It was clear the nuns there would never accept me.

The next week, on New Year's Day, the guardian met with me to tell me he was going on sabbatical to Norwich, England and would be away for an extended period.  He said the nuns' cruel treatment would only increase in his absence.  He asked me if I were ready to leave the monastery.  I answered his question with a question, "Are you releasing me from my novitiate vows?"  He said softly and lovingly, "Yes."  I threw up arms and said, "If you're releasing me, then, Yes!"  Humiliated and exhausted, I was grateful to be released.  Although I had no idea how to live as a contemplative monk in the world, I left the monastery to return to the world, trusting God would rebuild my life one day at a time.

Another new day was dawning. 

It does not take long to become institutionalized when you're broken down and told everything to do.  The monastery is a small, confined, and constricted world that has its own rules and norms.  Now I was going back into the world of limitless choices. 

Unfortunately, making a new beginning, I was also in a state of shock and felt like a total failure.

I felt led to Nashville to stay with a friend to recover emotionally and to figure out what God wanted me to do next.

Three months later, I felt led to a quiet, rural community, Sewanee, Tennessee, where I had no friends or family.   There was a convent there with loving nuns with whom I prayed Morning Prayer and celebrated Eucharist each day.  God led me deeper into the wilderness of myself.

Centering prayer anchored me in the present moment.  The beauty of the rural area where I lived filled my heart with overflowing joy, at times ecstasy.  My creativity was uncapped and freed.  I began taking photographs that the artists in my community encouraged me to exhibit in our local art gallery.  My love and appreciation of the natural world deepened along with my connectedness to all living things.

My heart healed and filled with more peace than I dreamed possible.  I taught on prayer and wrote a little prayer manual.  Weekly, I ministered to Alzheimers patients at a nearby nursing home.  Being with them filled my heart with joy. 

I led a weekly centering prayer group in my community and felt close to loving and spiritual people who attended the group.  I offered spiritual direction to a number of people who sought my help, some of them on an ongoing basis.  There were beautiful flowers in the desert. 

I wish I could tell you it's been an easy journey.  Nothing about it has been easy.   However, the ten years in the wilderness of a rural community brought deepening into "being" which released new freedoms.  It's a continuing process that keeps unfolding.

Last year I moved to Charleston, South Carolina to live in my favorite city and to be closer to the beach.  It's the perfect place to enjoy visits from my sons and granddaughters.  I've joined a wonderful church across the street that I can walk to and begun teaching QiGong, the grandmother of Tai Chi, to members of my community at Canterbury House.  Toward the end of last year, I took a full time job at the Census Bureau and worked there until March 2020 when the coronavirus emerged. 

This pandemic has been an unprecedented opportunity to go deeper into simply being.  That's where I am now at 72 years old.  Amazed at the journey I've traveled over my life.  Allowing each moment to simply unfold. 

Grateful for this morning's dawn. 

July Folly Beach sunrise

The Journey Continues