Ah, a day without the news is like seeing for the first time the sun bursting through the clouds, directly into my heart. It was that good, that peaceful and liberating. Granted, a Trump conviction may have elicited more celebration, but enough is enough. Since the news is fixated on everything Trump and fear of Covid, I no longer feel the need to entertain it.
Years ago, I remember reading about a man who went on retreat to a Himalayan cave for a year. When he returned to the world and turned on the news, he was struck by how nothing- NOTHING had changed from the moment he stepped into the cave until the moment he stepped out, as far as the news was concerned.
He, on the other hand, had touched the still small voice in his psyche and was ready to carry that forth into the world.
Our your long meditation retreat with Will Johnson is the perfect focus for me going forward. Last night, as I communed in the quiet of my sanctuary room, Pearl lying at my feet, breathing softly, sometimes snoring after our long walk together, I was grateful for pulling away from the constant belaboring of negativity. I think I broke free. On the radio earlier today, on my way to work, I turned off a journalist as he bemoaned a travesty he experienced in Iraq.
Forty years ago, I came to a crossroads: to choose journalism or nursing as a career. My intuition led me to nursing. That identity does not define who I am as a human embodied in a formless soul, in the world of suffering. Nursing in the age of Covid is more challenging than it used to be. We are in the business of alleviating suffering. We cannot look away and deny the reality of its existence.
Love is everywhere as we drop the denial. OM
