Wabi-sabi

I want to tell you about Russel, a man in my grad program. He is somewhere in his 50s, has a long, curly, white ponytail that reaches to the middle of his back, and is typically dressed in some kind of eccentric, Hawaiian poncho. He rides a motorized wheelchair despite the fact that he can walk, has tribal gauges in his ears, and rarely wears shoes. He is a self-proclaimed Buddhist, professor at a different university, foster parent of 15, and has several master's degrees. His voice is so painfully loud that I was convinced he was joking for about 6 months. He is the real life Jacob Silj: http://www.hulu.com/#!watch/276438. Voice immodulation is real.

Life lessons always come wrapped in such interesting packages.

Our class was assigned a project in which we had to work in groups and present to the class all pertinent information about various modes of therapy. Russel's group chose to present on Morita Therapy, a form of Japanese psychology. You can find more information about Morita Therapy here: http://moritaschool.com/content/morita-therapy. It's actually quite brilliant and I look forward to it making it's way into western mental health. When I saw a shoeless Russel stand up to present with his group I knew I was in for an interesting treat. I didn't know his message was about to change my life and jump start my very own healing process. Russel started the presentation by simulating sitting on the toilet! He said things like, "Cold porcelain on my warm skin," and, "My digestive system is working properly, not everybody can go to the bathroom on their own." I was both traumatized and intrigued by this haunting visualization. He was teaching us about the concept of mindfulness. Mindfulness is paying attention to the present moment in a particular way, on purpose, nonjudgmentally. Paying attention to the present on purpose is something I have avoided since I was a child; I have always lived in the future. Quite frankly, that was the only way I survived a childhood of divorce, abuse, and neglect. I was a little girl with big dreams and the present was only going to slow me down and/or destroy me. The present was my enemy. While having goals and working hard to reach them is important, I realized that my entire life could be summed up by this image:

The sad thing is, unlike this cat, I am never going to catch the string. The life I had always dreamed of and worked so hard to get is finally here, but after years of training my mind to avoid the present I couldn't even enjoy it. I was still chasing a string. A constant complaint I have always made about my spiritual journey is the inability to feel God present in the moment with me. I have always had an understanding of what God was trying to do yesterday and where He might be leading me in the future, but could never feel Him here with me now. It took me seeing Russel sitting on a fake toilet to realize that God has been present... I haven't. Spirituality is not as much about "getting there" as it is about "being here." To live and breathe in Christ is to exist exactly where I am, exactly as I am. God is not waiting for me in that wadded up piece of paper at the end of the string I have been chasing. He is sitting here right beside me right now. So why am I still running?

I excused myself in the middle of Russel's presentation and locked myself in the bathroom in a very Lindsay Lohan in Mean Girls sort of way. I sat there alone in a sad, maroon stall and began to cry. Then it hit me: now I'm the weirdo sitting on a toilet. After moments that felt like hours of deliberation and internal apprehension I decided to take Russel's advice and do what I had never done before. I was going to pay attention to the present moment in a particular way, on purpose, nonjudgmentally. I secretly hoped somebody would barge into the bathroom and throw off my zen but nobody ever did. I stopped running and began to look around me. My hands were shaking and I was glad I couldn't see my stereotypical, ugly cry face in the bathroom mirror from where I sat. I was in Topeka, Kansas. My toes were perfectly painted dark red and I was wearing my favorite black scarf. My ears were ringing from Russel's low grade voice immodulation. My stomach was tied in a knot and I started to feel lonely and afraid, just like I did when I was a girl. I wished my brother Joe was there. I felt extraordinarily uncomfortable as if I was about to unravel irreconcilably. I was angry. I deserved a safe home to grow up in. I missed my dad. My skin was cold. I was never going to be a good therapist. Do I make Mike happy? My racing thoughts about myself in the present moment were so ugly, so untamed, so desperate. No wonder I hated it here. I took my scarf off and buried my face in it. I thought to myself, "This is what I get for taking Russel's advice. I did this to myself." As I stood up to pull myself together and splash some water on my face I noticed my hands as I placed them under the faucet. I was always reaching for something. As I looked in the mirror and reflected on the presentation and my strange bathroom catharsis a message came to my mind:

"The Lord is not interested in my perfection. He doesn't care about my degrees or my grammar or my ability to respond like a robot to the stressors of this life. To be "unfinished" before Him is the very definition of intimacy and trust and care. Stop reaching. The Lord is extending His hand right here, right now. He is reaching for you. Stop running away from it. You are broken. You are desperate. You are loved."

I slowly walked back to class but it felt more like floating. I could hear Russel's voice in the hallway long before I reentered the classroom. He was screaming/saying, "WABI-SABI. WABI-SABI." His typical, erratic behavior initially served as a harsh reintegration back into reality. As he went on to explain wabi-sabi my mouth fell open. Simply put, wabi-sabi emphasizes finding beauty in imperfection and is part of the practice of being mindfully present in the moment. Wabi-sabi is exactly what just happened to me down the hall in that sad, maroon stall! I was present in the moment and embraced the imperfection. For the first time in my life I understood what God was doing with me in the moment and I never wanted to leave.

I wish this is where the story ended and that I could report a happily ever after in the present moment with God as long as we both shall live, amen... but I can't. My mind daily blasts off into the future and if I don't intentionally reel myself back in by practicing mindfulness and Morita Therapy techniques I will spend more time thinking about my life 5 years from now and all it will take to get me there rather than enjoy the present moment. It's scary to let myself focus on who I really am in the present, but I know that God sees my imperfection and loves me even more because of it. Being undone before my Heavenly Father, family, and friends is what will lead me into the "successful" and "effective" life I spoke about in my previous post. It's easy trying to "get there," but it takes courage "being here." I am perfectly imperfect and I can't wait to share it.

Thanks, Russel.

Wabi-sabi.

Cliff Diving

I planned to start blogging again after I finish grad school this May. In typical Jeri fashion, I'm working ahead to finish starting early. You read that correctly; I am finishing starting early. In the wise words of my soul sister Leslie Knope, "If you're not going to finish something three months early then don't accept the job."

I tracked my last blog post back to three days before I started my master's program. I have spent the past two years trapped inside a busy mind that has had more to say than ever, spending all of my time reading textbooks written by men with impressive beards and tweed coats and writing thousands of pages of material that will earn me a piece of paper stating that I am qualified to be a therapist. The bittersweet part of preparing yourself to work with other people's mental health is the blunt realization that you must first be aware of your own. The awareness of self is basically Counseling 101. Before I could study other people, first I had to study myself, and so it all began. Two years ago I was comfortable: stuck in all things familiar and methodical, but comfortable. I was and still am the epitome of an organizer/planner. I calculated every move before I made it and there wasn't one shelf in my apartment undusted. I knew what each day would look like and never had to worry about missing car keys, being out of milk, or any other inconvenient phenomena that comes along with an unkempt lifestyle. Little did I know I was living in a self-induced prison, albeit an immaculate prison much like Magneto's in X-Men, convincing myself and everybody around me that I was a successful, effective person. But I wasn't. I had quarantined myself through intensive planning and structure from all experiences that would cultivate a life worthy of the adjectives successful and effective.

I ignored the frequent longings I had for adventure and the daunting loneliness that settled on my heart each night. After all, my life was fantastic. I was married to a man inconceivably greater than anything I could imagine and I was blessed with the opportunity to pursue the only career I have ever been passionate about. What could be wrong? It wasn't long before my lack of self-actualization began scratching at the door of my soul and coping with it via academic achievement and washing the dishes only seemed to exacerbate the restless sensation. The scratching became louder and more persistent and eventually the fear of staying the way I was outgrew the fear of changing my ways. A God-ordained journey was set in motion and I haven't looked back. I haven't wanted to.

I am currently right in the middle of what I believe to be the change process that will result in me experiencing life the way it was meant to be experienced: jumping in puddles of mud, getting dirty, and enjoying it. I want to run out of milk. I want to lose my car keys. Dead in the center it is too late to turn back and I still have a long way to go. God continues to thrust me forward into situations beyond my control, forcing me to face my lifelong fears and encouraging me in all sorts of ways not to cope with it like I used to by tidying up and pretending. I don't want to quarantine myself anymore. I was lonely and miserable. I am 51% voluntarily stepping and 49% being violently pushed into a new phase of bravery and authenticity that the Lord is going to use to show me who I really am and what I am made of so that I can help show others who they really are and what they are made of.

Holley Gerth has inspired me to "be courageous and write in a way that scares me a little." I hope to document my journey and fill this blog with honest stories and fearless confessions about this bright, young thing that is my insuppressible life.

Join me!