DEEPENING: Divine Messiness

Look for God's realm peeking through our imperfect world.

Deb Kaiser-Cross

My friends, Kathryn, Sharon, Karen, Jennie and many others speak of feeling closer to the Divine in nature than anywhere else. Jennie, one of my writer friends, writes eloquently about it. With them in mind, I set off on Thanksgiving morning for a walk in the woods at the center where I am engaging in a personal, silent retreat, hoping for Divine guidance to deepen my memoir.

Where I experience the intimacy my friends speak of is most often in my journal. Writing letters and reflections to the Divine in my journal is my major spiritual practice. On occasion, a wisdom beyond my own emerges from my pen giving me guidance and a new perspective on life.

 But I’m curious about my friend’s experience and so, as I embark for the woods, I declare, “On my walk, I’m going to be more present to my surroundings to see if I can have their kind of experience with the Divine.”

From the windows in the back of my little cabin, I’ve been marveling at the large expanse of trees reaching their limbs to the sky. As I enter into their midst, my attention is drawn to that which is rotting—wet darkened leaves, broken limbs, and fallen trees. I chuckle at my neat, tidy, orderly, perfectionist self. The woods are messy. I probably miss my connection with the Divine in the woods because I’m not able to control the messiness.

I head for the aptly named Stillwater River at the edge of the woods. A huge rock provides seating as I gaze at the gently flowing water and journal my reflections. I much prefer the metaphor of the river flowing as life flows—around barriers, smoothing our rough places.

Once back in the silence of my cabin, I notice the messiness in my journal. In my writing, I wade through the messiness in my monkey-mind until a clearing of new awareness and understanding emerges. This weekend the still small voice of the Divine within gives me what I came hoping for—clear guidance for deepening my memoir.

Awe fills me as an awareness of the messiness of nature mirroring the messiness of life becomes clear. My memoir is about the messiest stretch of my life. I am reminded that in the midst of the mess, I have my most profound encounter with the Divine.

An intention for 2015: Increase my awareness of the light of grace in the midst of life’s messiness.

You Are Accepted...How Sweet The Sound

Recently Elizabeth Gilbert, author of the celebrated memoir, Eat, Pray, Love, posted this Paul Tillich quote on Facebook. I added it to my page noting that the reason my memoir, A Long Awakening to Grace, has that title is because it took me so long to experience this truth.

Elizabeth Gilbert

Patricia Hollinger’s poem, Amazing Grace, appeared in True Words from Real Women, a Story Circle journal of short pieces of life-writing by SCN members. The topic for the September issue was grace. Patricia gave me permission to share her poem with you.

Amazing Grace

                      Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound...

                                Just hearing the tune makes many a heart pound.

                                That saved a wretch like me!

                                Is what follows and causes me to plea.

                                I was NOT a wretch, “Damnit,” I said,

                                From such words I often fled.

                                With religious angst and major depression,

                                These words reinforced a negative impression.

                                I changed the word wretch to a soul like me,

                                After hours and hours of therapy.

                                Yes, I was lost in the throes of religious zealots,

                                Their words often stung me like BB pellets.

                                Now I am found in the truth of my soul,

                                Seeking this became my ultimate goal.

                                My eyes had been blinded for many years,

                                As I heard sermons designed to elicit fears.

                                “Tis the grace of the presence of a listening ear,

                                As I poured out my hopes and fears,

                               That brought me home to my true self,

                               Never again in fear will I sit on a shelf.

Patricia Ropp Hollinger

Dichotomy: Intellect & Soul

I could relate to Patricia’s blindness, having been blinded to grace myself for some of the very same reasons. While I didn’t intellectually take in the dogma, the words in the liturgy and music about sin and unworthiness found their way into my psyche, making my already difficult life circumstances even more grueling.

Thankfully, the preaching in my progressive denomination, often influenced by Paul Tillich’s theology, leans more toward emphasizing the love of the Divine. My own preaching certainly did. Still, like Patricia, I needed to pour out hopes and fears to compassionate listening ears. Much of my struggle in A Long Awakening to Grace is related to the confusing dichotomy between my intellect and my soul.

Graced with a Miracle: Radical Acceptance

And then, not so very long ago, a miracle happened. Another layer of numb gave way, awakening me to grace at a deeper level than I ever imagined possible. My eyes were opened to my wretchedness and at the same time to my loveableness. From this new vantage point, I could embrace the mixture we all seem to be...I could appreciate as never before our human journey of coming into consciousness of the divinity at our center.

With this radical acceptance of my humanness and my divinity, the dis-ease engendered by fear of condemnation, the stigma of guilt, and the decree of unworthiness has been tempered considerably. Their shadows continue to creep into my psyche from time to time. But awareness frees me to soulfully sing, Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound.

...remember that to be in grace means to submit to the voice greater.

Clarissa Pinkola Estés

Memoirs That Inspire Me: Confessions of a Latter-Day Virgin

Writers are encouraged to read widely in the genre in which they are writing. As a result, I have been reading and listening to a lot of memoirs. It only recently occurred to me to share the bounty with you.

When someone has the courage to allow their life to be guided by their authentic spirit within, I am inspired. That is especially true when everything in their external life tells them they should be someone else.

Confessions of a Latter-Day Virgin

Nicole Hardy

Nicole Hardy’s memoir is funny and thoughtful as she allows us into her most intimate struggles with remaining faithful to her desire to be a writer and not the homemaker, wife, and mother that is supposed to lead to her eternal reward. As a single Mormon, she risks separation from all she holds dear to be true to herself and live a full life that includes expressing herself physically as well as emotionally, intellectually, and spiritually. 

Inspired by a professor in her MFA program, “Write what you fear,” Nicole wrote about her struggles with celibacy and read to a writer’s group of mostly strangers. They received her with great enthusiasm and encouraged her to send her essay to Daniel Jones, the New York Times editor of the Modern Love column. He found her essay, “Single, Female, Mormon, Alone” intriguing and published it. It was chosen as “notable” in 2012’s Best American Essays.

Most touching for me was the way her parents struggled to understand and accept their free-thinking daughter’s choices while never withdrawing their love for her, finally realizing the gift she had given to others in their faith by being her authentic self. Without knowing it, Nicole gave voice to the struggles of many Mormons, opening dialogue between parents and children and the church-at-large, creating the possibility of finding a better way of nurturing the singles in their midst.

Memoirs that Inspire Me: A House in the Sky

When the radiance of the human spirit shines through in a transformative way, I am inspired. That is especially true when the transformation happens in the midst of a journey into darkness.

A House in the Sky

Amanda Lindhout & Sara Corbett

Amanda Lindhout's memoir is an amazing account of transcending one of the most horrific of life experiences. She developed compassion for the Islamic extremist who held her in captivity for fifteen harrowing months.

Upon her release, she emerged as a sought after speaker on topics of forgiveness, compassion, and women's rights. 

Inspired by a woman who tried to help her escape, she founded the Global Enrichment Foundation to provide scholarships to Somali women to attend university. When asked why she did this, she responded, "Because I had something very, very large and very painful to forgive, and by choosing to do that, I was able to put into place my vision, which was making Somalia a better place." She believes that if her captor's mothers had such an opportunity for education, they would have treated her differently.

http://globalenrichmentfoundation.ca/

Where do I begin?

More than a half, maybe as much as two-thirds of my life as a writer is rewriting.

I wouldn’t say I have a talent that’s special.

It strikes me that I have an unusual kind of stamina.

John Irving

For the past six weeks, since attending Antioch Writer’s Workshop (AWW), I’ve been busy rewriting. My first challenge was finding the beginning for my memoir, A Long Awakening to Grace.

I learned at the Mad Anthony writer’s workshop in April that I wasn’t beginning in the right place. I needed more backstory.

So, I wrote more backstory in preparation for AWW. In my one-to-one critique with Erin Flanagan, I learned that beginning there didn’t really tell the reader what my memoir is about. Clearly moved by my story, she made a suggestion for a place to begin.

Erin Flanagan teaches English language and literature at Wright State University and taught the afternoon short fiction seminar at AWW. She went above and beyond in trying to help me find a beginning for my memoir, spending extra time and offering kind and supportive feedback. She has written two books that are getting great reviews.

Like holographic slivers,

her stories contain a breadth and scope usually found in novels,

telling whole lifetimes in the span of after-dinner coffee.

Flanagan writes with bleak, searing humor about the survivors of collisions

both physical and emotional, and her acute vision is startling,

reminding readers that every loss is the beginning

of a long, new story of healing and replenishing.

So, when I got home from AWW, I began work immediately on a new beginning. Then I read it to my writing partner, Nita, and she groaned, “No, you don’t want to start there,” giving several good reasons why that didn’t work. Combining the feedback from Nancy Pinard at Mad Anthony and from Erin Flanagan at AWW, we were able to identify a starting place that works. Fortunately, Nita has heard my story in its many rewriting versions several times. We've been reading to each other and providing feedback for over two years. I started rewriting again.

I finally have my beginning and am confident now that it is one that works. 

I was so happy when I found John Irving’s quote and to know that I'm in good company. I’ve been aware I’m not a natural when it comes to writing memoir. All those accolades I got in graduate school for the depth of my thinking and the clarity of my writing only go so far when writing creative non-fiction. The craft is very different and I’m learning as I go.  It is clear that I have a compelling story. My challenge is to write it well. Thankfully, like Irving, I have stamina...I call it perseverance. My life is a testament to that.

Andre Dubus III Won My Heart

The second week in July, I attended the Antioch Writer’s Workshop. What an exhausting and exhilarating week. The benefits continue to accrue. Here’s my first installment.

Andre Dubus III gave the keynote address on Saturday evening and then taught the Master Class on Sunday morning. What a ball of energy he is. I would love to take writing classes from him.

Here are some of the gems he shared with us:

“It ain’t talent! It’s curiosity, wonder, mulling and musing about humans. Someone, somewhere, writes better than you. So what? Protect your creativity. Contend with jealousy in your head but don’t let it into your heart.”

Questions storytellers ask: “What’s it like to be in this thing that happened?”

“Listen to the little voice inside you. Work from the inside out. There’s a lot of mystery involved. Make your writing an intimate experience for your readers. Go inside and transfer feelings from one heart to another...empathy and truth.”

“Do that that makes you feel more like yourself than at any other time.”

“Self-consciousness is death to creativity.”

“I never wanted to be a writer. I just loved writing.”

When Andre relayed his process for writing the book he’s best known for, House of Sand and Fog, the whole room was mesmerized.

When he signed his book, Dirty Love, for me, I told him, “I loved your memoir, Townie, especially at the end, the way you wrote about your transformation.”

  

His eyes sparkled and he leaned toward me with a delighted grin. “You know, I knew I’d changed. But I didn’t know I’d transformed until I wrote it.”

I really get what he meant. As I delve more deeply into my own character and make increasingly deeper connections with my past, I find myself silently exclaiming, “Oh, that’s why that was so important to me,” or “That’s why I acted the way I did,” or “That makes so much sense now.”

After asking what I was writing and if my memoir had a name, he turned to another page and signed,

“For Linda,

Here’s to you &

A Long Awakening to Grace.

Love, Andre.”

That moment of connection with Andre was thrilling for me. His sharing so personably, being interested in me and what I’m doing, his willingness to go the extra mile by signing two pages, the second with a personal inscription won my heart. He's a real pro. Thank you, Andre, for getting AWW off to a great start for me.

Poetry at Antioch Writer’s Workshop

This week, July 12-18, I’m attending Antioch Writer’s Workshop in Yellow Springs, Ohio. I’m learning a lot.

Today I learned about Minimal Poems from Chris DeWeese, an Assistant Professor of Poetry at Wright State University. Minimal poems can have as few as one word. That surprised me.

Chris invited us to write a poem with ten words or less. Here’s mine:

                I am who I am who I will be.

                Who?