Tag: Transformation

LAST POST: A TOUCH OF HEAVEN

Rev. Dr. Kate Winters, “Dwelling in Presence,” February 9, 2024

A shooting star greeted me as I opened the back door to the deck this very early morning. First, I took in a quick breath of surprise and wonder. Taken unawares, I experienced beauty and blessing. Second, when my brain started to engage, I realized that in that flash of a moment with the tiny trail of light, I actually accomplished what makes me, and all of us, most human. Out of this random encounter, I made meaning.

Think about it. I don’t know where the light came from or what it actually was. It could have been a tiny speck flung from a meteor across the galaxy. It could also have been a piece of space junk falling down to earth, entering our atmosphere. But what do we commonly call these things? Falling stars, shooting stars, signs of good luck. Some of us make wishes on them, feeling an unusual power in the sighting. Some simply stare in awe, waiting for another touch of heaven to descend. In any case, this is an event that does not go unnoticed and unmarked, but somehow changes us at the same time that we make our own meaning of it.

As for me, I felt my heart fill with light and gratitude. It was a sign of something that I’ve learned more surely as I have written this blog in my first year of retirement. Staying present, or “dwelling in presence,” brings not only meaning, but joy to our nights and days, dawns and twilights. To know blessing, we must be ready to receive it, open and aware, even in the midst of triple bypasses and pain. Every bit of life is precious. In every second is meaning to be found. We only need to open doors to the darkness, feel the cold air on our skin, and catch the falling star. Amen.

Note: This is the last post for “Dwelling in Presence.” I will seek another way to connect with myself and you! Thank you for taking this year-long journey with me.   

 

 

“WANING” (?)

Rev. Dr. Kate Winters, “Dwelling in Presence,” January 6, 2024

A pretty quarter moon hovers over me as I write this morning. It is a waning moon, raising the question: What things are waning in my life these days? When I write this blog, I tend to focus on growth and addition, not contraction and diminishment. Perhaps that word, diminishment, is part of the problem. It hints at a lessening, a negative event, when maybe there are many ways that our lives enhanced by becoming somehow less, smaller, more circumscribed.

I am finding that growing older is an experience of waning, at least for me. The most obvious evidence of this is in comparing my appointment calendar of 2022 to the one of 2023. Now the first year of retirement is bound to have fewer engagements than the one before, having little to do with the reality of aging. Also, having major surgery in a year is bound to slow one down. But I did spend whole weeks without seeing anyone at all, except Joel of course. To be honest, that slower pace, having many periods of wide open days, seemed to suit me. It may be that growing older is allowing me to settle into my introverted nature a bit more, withhout an ounce of guilt! I could have been more actively engaged with others, but chose not to.

Accompanying the longer stretches of solitude, came more mindfulness in conversation, and thus the waning of idle chatter, perhaps a more judicious use of words. I have experienced conversation to be more intentional, with a larger purpose than just “talk”. It may be as we age we are less likely to want to stay on the surface with people. Teenage gabfests with friends were very enjoyable as were grad school “debates” about anything, but I really have no interest in repeating them. I feel a deeper urgency to get to the heart of things, to the heart of myself and others, and this seems to require less verbiage and more silences. Does this mean my social self is waning while something else is waxing? I don’t really know.

What else is waning thse days? I wish I could say it is my need to “please” people, but sady that seems to be hanging on. All wrapped up with caring about what others think of me, I’m afraid these will be two of my last ego traits to fall! But the good news is the more I can observe my thought patterns in the silence and solitude, the more I recognize it when these habits take over. I can, if I will it, stop!

One thing that has surprised me as I turn sixty-eight this week is that I have lost none of my drive to grow and perhaps have even increased in my ability to make personal changes. I am learning that the older I become, the less adamant I am to hold on to the old ways I used to think. Growing up I heard a lot about old people supposedly “stuck in their ways.” In my pastoral work I have found this to be more true of the young and the middle-aged than it is of their elders. Now, I am ready to learn new ways of being and thinking, my insistence on former ways is waning. Growing older is much more exciting than I thought!   

 

 

STARE TRANSFORMED

Rev. Dr. Kate Winters, Dwelling in Presence, June 10, 2023

This morning finds me back in stare mode. It took me a good hour and a half to lift up this journal and begin to write as the candle burns down beside me and the coffee has turned cold. There is a thick fog rolling in from the coast, and it seems to have clouded my brain. The birds, however, sing right through – this morning I hear cardinals, the song sparrow, chickadees, the titmouse, gold finches, and catbird. At least, those are all I can distinguish right now.

Joel is up and sits by the open window reading. It is a great sadness for him, therefore for me, that he cannot hear most of the birds. He is deficient in hearing, especially at the higher decibels. But he will spot a bird, a color, a shape, a pattern of flying, long before I do. The highlight of his week is spotting a new bird, then finding it in Sibley’s or one of our Audubon books, and reading up on it. His passion has been passed on to me.

Perhaps this is a way to break through the stare – to keep one’s senses sharp and working. Notice the fog creeping in and its dissipation, distinguish the songs of the birds and the rhythmic tapping of the woodpeckers, go for a second cup of coffee when I can no longer smell its goodness or breathe in its steam, watch the wax dripping down the candle creating pleasing shapes of their own. If I must stare, I could stare with appreciation for the life changing around me. Know that I am part of this ever-changing scene. Even if I feel stagnant, the truth is I am part of this developing tableau.

Last night, I was awakened by the call of the barred owl somewhere near my bedroom window. I awakened Joel who also loves to hear this beloved bird. I then lay there as its haunting call moved further and further away. It dawned on me as I was listening that this was more than staring into the night. The call had awakened my longing to be in relationship, reaching out for this manifestation of creation that I love. Perhaps it was reaching out to me as well and both of us were changed.

The purpose of staring mode (written in a previous post as being “blank”) has changed for me. It seems to invite us to sharpen our senses, note what moves us, calls us, invites us, to a deeper consciousness of life and beauty in order to enter a more profound relationship with them. The birds, the fog, the coffee steam, the candle wax all called to me this morning. I think Martin Buber would say that these initial “I/It” relationships were moving toward “I/Thou.” All of being inhabits a spirit we can relate to. And be changed by.