Spiritual Practice of Fishing

Spiritual Practice of Fishing

"If, then, I were asked for the most important advice I could give, that which I considered to be the most useful to the men of our century, I should simply say: in the name of God, stop a moment, cease your work, look around you."  Leo Tolstoy, Essays, Letters and Miscellanies

I sit outside each early morning on the gulf coast just after sunrise and watch lone surf fishermen come like clockwork to the water’s edge with their fishing rods, fishing rod holders, buckets, bait, and folding beach chairs.  They are early risers before the pelicans and sea gulls and dolphin come out of hiding.  The members of this all male club mark their territory as they spike two rod holders apart into the sand as far away from any other sign of human existence. They unfold their chair, bait the line, cast their line beyond the roaring white ocean’s surf, and sit and wait between the two holders for the rods to jump and bend.  The nibbles are infrequent, so they spend most of the time sitting and staring out into the gulf. They sit and stare as if they can see all the way beyond South America. They do not take out their cell phones or read books. They wait patiently usually for several hours with great faith for some sign that they will be connected to the gift of some unknown food from beneath the sea.

 I have become so intimately connected to each of them that I recognize them by their walk, what they are wearing, who they talk with, what time they come out, and how long they stay.  They have taught me much about spirituality and faithfulness and how to surrender to a spiritual practice. Indeed, some of the fishermen talk about this daily routine as a spiritual practice while others would be appalled at giving their daily exercise such a name. They all agree that this recreational sport does bring them peace, and most realize that it is not fish that they are after.  It is indeed re-creation.

Perhaps this is an unknown about any of our spiritual practices, centering prayer, saying the rosary, walking the labyrinth, praying, fasting, lectio divina, worshiping. The peace comes in the offering of time, a piece of our life, to the practice rather than always reaching any goal or making or receiving a connection.

My second gift from our fishermen is that in spending time observing them I have kept grounded, connected to my surroundings, living in the present moment. The fishermen are teaching me about looking out beyond the turbulent water’s edge and having faith that there is something greater than any of us constantly trying also to connect to us.

Joanna joannaseibert.com

What Matters Most

 What Matters Most

“The things that matter most in our lives are not fantastic or grand. They are moments when we touch one another, when we are there in the most attentive or caring way.” Jack Kornfield,  A Path With Heart, inwardoutward.org, August 4, 2016.

We are returning from an almost sixty-year high school reunion. There were Thirty-three in my graduating class. We thought we could make the trip this year but weren’t sure about the next, so decided to go now. We had lunch with friends I knew growing up in a small town in tidewater Virginia. Some might have called it a one-horse town since we only had one stop light. We would talk about driving up to “the light.” I am so glad we went.  I talked with one of my friends who now lives in a county in Virginia that boasts it has no stop lights!

It was as if it had only been a few days since we saw each other instead of fifty-eight years. Why is it so easy to re-connect to those we grew up with? They knew us before we had no or very few masks. There is no need to wear a mask with them. They know who we are and where we came from. We are all back on a equal playing field. Most of the women in my class went off to college. Many of the boys stayed in our small town, worked at the mill, and took early retirement. All seemed to enjoy life. Most seemed genuinely interested in what others were doing instead of talking about themselves. All had had some tragedy and all had had some magical moments.

As I write my oldest granddaughter is at her senior prom. I see pictures of her friends and can in some small way remember how important these relationships are to her. I wonder what her fifty-eighth high school reunion will be like.

I will keep this day in the memory book of my mind and hope to revisit it again, giving thanks for where I grew up and the many friends who influenced me and taught me about caring for each other.

Joanna  joannaseibert.

De Mello: Selfish

 De Mello: Selfish

“Part of waking up is that you live your life as you see fit. And understand: That is not selfish. The selfish thing is to demand that someone else live their life as YOU see fit. That’s selfish.”  Anthony de Mello,  Awareness,  Daily Words, Inwardoutward.org, June 22, 2015

Anthony de Mello was an Indian Jesuit priest who also was a psychotherapist who died too young in 1987 but whose spiritual writings still speak clearly to us today.  I think de Mello is trying to tell us that loving others means allowing, supporting them to be the person God created them to be. Self-love or selfishness is wanting others to be the person we want them to be. This is a constant struggle because “we are so wise and have such good ideas!” Sometimes we want others to live a certain way to live out a life along a path that we were not able to live. Other times it is a control issue thinking we know what is best. We struggle with this form of selfishness with our children, our grandchildren, our students, our partners, our friends, almost any relationship.

Of course, this also can be a hurdle to overcome in spiritual direction, wanting our spiritual friends to live a certain form of spirituality, especially the spiritual life that has worked for us. Spiritual direction is a two-way street. It is like teaching or any form of mentoring. If we are not learning from our spiritual friends as well as sharing with them, we become even more self-absorbed in our own knowledge and experience. We must constantly remember that it should be the Holy Spirit present with us in spiritual direction, guiding and teaching us as well as our spiritual friends.

My experience is that two things are helpful. First, trying to live the Serenity Prayer, knowing we can only change ourselves and not others. God is the one who makes the change. We are to sit back and wait for the Holy Spirit to bring about changes.

The second is awareness, awareness when we think we know what is best and start planning the agenda of others and not allowing them to become the person the Christ, the Spirit within is leading them to be.

 I am counting on the Holy Spirit to bring in de Mello holding up a big stop sign with SELFISH written all over it when I become aware of when I am doing this.

Next, we are to turn around and prayerfully and humbly ask God to transform that selfish energy directed at others into energy for the Christ within us to continue creating us to become the person God birthed us to be.

Joanna  joannaseibert.com