Week Seven – Lesson Seven – Signs of Encouragement

Lesson Seven – Signs of Encouragement

Download this lesson as a

Protected PDF

Protected MS Word Document

Prelude

What if there was no conspiracy involved in your tragic loss, but contrary to such thinking there is a conspiracy to bring about healing and the restoration of balance and harmony in your life.

How would you know?

Perhaps, this conspiracy will even lead you to a joy that you had not experienced earlier.

In this lesson we will pursue a path to discover those very signs that are all about you, that you might have overlooked — and understandably – In your sorrow and grief.

* * * *

I live close to the ocean and one day feeling a gloom descended over me, I heard an indistinguishable sound of a motor putting in the distance, over-head?

The sound broke through my consciousness as faint as it was. I looked up for the inspiration of Parasail.

Parasail

What if God decided to revisit
One bright and windy day?

And suppose He chose to ride
An open-air propeller craft
Attached to a blossoming rainbow sail
Puttering forty feet above the surf?

Would you not look up and wave a greeting—
Thumbs up to acknowledge His bravado?
And what about the smile returned to you?
Would He penetrate your heart, catch your longing?
Would the words He mouths above the rush
Reveal a mysterious swirl of color, wind, and music?

It won’t be long before the engine-putter fades into ear-static,
The sail … into sun-white light.

But the vision of God-visit captured within
Restores, refreshes, a solitary visitor to an empty beach.

Take time to record those signs of encouragement in the last few weeks – signs, perhaps, that you dismissed as coincidence.

Part One – Relationships

A good relationship has a pattern like a dance and is built on some of the same rules. The partners do not need to hold on tightly, because they move confidently in the same pattern, intricate but gay and swift and free, like a country dance of Mozart’s. To touch heavily would be to arrest the pattern and freeze the movement, to check the endlessly changing beauty of its unfolding. There is no place here for the possessive clutch, the clinging arm, the heavy hand; only the barest touch in passing. Now arm in arm, now face to face, now back to back—it does not matter which. Because they know they are partners moving to the same rhythm, creating a pattern together, and being invisibly nourished by it.

I once wrote a letter to one of my daughters on the occasion of her upcoming marriage. 

I read the draft to my wife. When she heard the last sentence of the first paragraph, she commented: You must be kidding!

Here is the line that recounts a trek in Nepal I took years earlier to the base camp of Doulagiri at 17,000 feet, located in the western Himalayas.

I find the trek as a symbol of marriage—at least my marriage—and perhaps you will discover similarities in your own unfolding relationship.

I continued reading to the end mentioning along the way the preparation and training my companion and I invested in the trek; the adventure, like when river men tried to rob us; the rigor of the countless ups and downs as we pushed on to the base camp; the joy of our Tibetan porters; the miracle performed by the Nepalese and their terraced gardens along the slopes of the mountain; overcoming the danger in crossing a glacier and learning from a European that his companion had fallen into a crevasse; lilting sounds of bells and then to discover they hung on the pack animals of smugglers traveling between Tibet and Nepal; savoring a bottle of beer at 14,000 feet having purchased it from a native in a modest village on the path.

I concluded the letter with these lines:

And what of marriage? A journey, not a destination, filled with surprises sometimes measured in ups and downs, exhilarating sights, adventure, a sense of flying, breathless music, companionship, solitude, silence, joy, and always an awareness of a presence deep inside, like the black, granite surface of Doulagiri that stood mute but observant as we crawled to its base camp.

Donna’s encouraging response was – you did it!

Instead of marriage, I could have written relationship – all relationships.

For you, relationship is an encouraging sign that the healing is occurring, and not my chance – but because you are working on it; you are addressing the grief directly, and in the process you might already be able to discern that paradoxically the grief is healing you.

Relationship – whether with a close friend, with family from whom you have been distant and injured, with someone who has entered your life by chance, accepting there are no coincidences, first fruits/signs of healing, a restoration of harmony and balance in your life.

So take some time to look back on the recent past and see if relationships are emerging and perhaps at even a deeper level than before your loss; after all, in your grief your shell has been cracked open.

Part Two – Those Signs

It seems like weeks ago – and it was – that you created the matrix to track your emotional reaction to grief and loss. Let’s review those reactions that indicate a return to harmony and balance that you might not have experienced earlier in your life.  Here they are to refresh your memory.

This might surprise you, but all of the above and many more are signs of your recovery that appear in the people you meet, the sites visited, the books read, the concerts attended,  the dinners shared, a silence relished,  the opportunities to serve, and the prayers offered and received.

Take a moment and write a few words about each in your journal to indicate how some, all, or more are taking root in your life.

Part Three – Signs as Surprise

See the shock that precedes loss and precipitates grief and deep mourning as the other side of the surprise experienced in an unexpected expression of love.

Together they reflect the harmony of the Divine countenance.

It did come—the day when the grief became small. For what had befallen me and seemed so hard to bear became insignificant in the light of the demands which God was now making. But how difficult it is to feel that this was also, and for that very reason, the day when the joy became great.

We must let go—let go of what you perceive you lost, let go of preconceived notions of how things should be, let go of the notion that you are in control, let go of the notion that you will live forever in this body.

Let go and observe the water that flows when a dam is dismantled. It is in that release that you will find the balance between joy and grief, and if you really let go, you will discover at the deepest level that joy wins out.

For so long, I sought to find that sometimes hidden purpose in loss or setback.

I have taken the search so far that I see a lighter side to a serious event, even using what can be described as blackhumor, where at first glance none appears.

For many years, I have refused to accept the figurative wine glass inadvertently knocked over at a formal reception as anything but a good omen—somewhere in the world.

On another plane—once I had time to take a deep breath, pause, take stock of what had just happened in my life—the shock and surprise were for me no different from the shock and surprise when confronted with any unexpected event in this life drama.

It is for each of us to pull in each experience, be it joyful or tragic, to savor it as we do a fine wine, or as we react to a description – a sign – that causes us to look up from the book to take in the meaning, or to a scene that causes a skip in our routine.

It is in that pause, that gap of always thinking and verbalizing, that the deeper truth is revealed. It is with that surprise in not anticipating the ending that we discover a deeper meaning to life’s events.

We realize at those times that we are on stage or even in a dance with those we lose and release, and all we can do is to remain in the present, relishing that present, with no anxiety of trying to anticipate the ending.

This sense influenced the creation of Curtain Call.

Curtain Call

Sometimes it seems
We are on stage
To play our part
In earnest.

Perhaps, the arts attract us
To reflect and contemplate
As we are readied
For our role.

Films, theater, drama,
Music, literature, painting
Expand the linear experience
And community of our solitary lives.

Will we next participate in tragedy, comedy,
Or will a joyous celebration
Be our pull—all together?
No doubt surprise will be our fate.

The only requirement
In this Divine theater
Is that we be willing and
Learn our lines sincere,

Don our costumes, and
Listen for the cue,
Realizing all the time
That this is theater.

And how well we play
Expands our soul
And our consciousness
Of One so Divine.

What a request – to compare the surprise of death, severe loss, and the resulting tears of grief to the tears of laughter caused by the unanticipated punch line in  joke, or the pleasure of a surprising ending in a novel or film!

I wouldn’t blame you if you rend your garments in shock.

But if you can venture in exploring both sides of surprise, what does it tell you about life and death, tears and laughter, ensuring that we don’t dismiss the solemnity of a loved one’s passing?

What does it tell you about your journey through life, considering what you experienced to date and what is unfolding right now before you?

At a minimum, we all might be reminded to keep our bags packed.

Part Four – Anticipating Signs

During my government service and later in the private sector, I actually got paid to anticipate signs, mostly of impending doom, but signs none the less.

Indications and Warning or I&W is a process that serves to anticipate the moves of an adversary. A multitude of indicators are identified that might tell you in advance of what your adversary’s intentions are, or rather how they are changing.

For example, during the Cold War one of the indicators of such change was a Polish factory that made aluminum pie plates during its one shift of operation. If, however, the factory suddenly went to a 24-hour operation, this combined with other indicators might indicate that the Soviets were in the process of modifying their defensive posture to one that was offensive to the NATO forces poised opposite them.

No, we are not here to discuss war strategies, but rather healing strategies.

So, I ask that you create your own I&W system, but let’s us call it Indications and Welcome. Instead of searching for what could go wrong in your lives, you will look to anticipate what is going right.

Refer to the last items on the Matrix you created where you are to track positive glimmers of hope in your life.

For our new I&W, go back further before the signs are even evident and stir up anticipation in the unfolding that is just around the corner on the path you are traveling.

What might be on this list of indicators?

Perhaps, simply a full night’s sleep, delicious meal out, noteworthy conversation with a friend, professional opportunity, spontaneous gesture of support, or adventure once delayed. 

The list of indicators could go on and on as you become expert in the selection process, just as any list of Indications and Warning expands.

It’s your decision what to include. But remember, more is better. You don’t want to miss anything, any change.

This list is not meant to infer that what you wish for becomes a future reality. I leave that to others.

No, this system is meant to attune your receivers so that you don’t miss what is before you, that you peer intently through the fog of life and recognize with favor.

In a sense, I am suggesting that you prepare to anticipate the punch lines before they are uttered, and laugh heartily to what unfolds to confirm your newly developed skill in anticipating the signs of promise in your lives.

Part Five

The following are the exercises and activities for the week.

• Exercise #16 – Signals Received

In order to heighten your awareness of the signs, make a note in your journal on a daily basis of the encouraging signals that you are receiving.

They can be messages such as for me one day passing the name Albright painted in pastel colors on a mailbox in West Virginia, or what are referred to as random acts of kindness shown you, or perhaps an unexpected and welcome e-mail message or phone call you receive.

Consider the possibility that there is a conspiracy afoot to right the balance, to heal the grief, to bring you into the Light. At the end of the week review the list and interpret the significance of the signs.

Plan to incorporate those indicators into the new life that you are fashioning.

Select a destination to travel alone outside your immediate area.

It doesn’t have to be across the country or abroad, but it could be.

Plan this trip as if someone in authority is sending you. 

Research the general area, the sites available to visit especially those that will expand your interests, the climate at the time of your visit, the clothes you will need, the restaurants and hotels available.

Before you depart, but after your preparations have been made, write your goals for this visit in as much detail as you possible.

Once on location, immerse yourself in the adventure, displaying spontaneity, fulfilling curiosity, wonder and openness, recording impressions and experiences briefly in your journal.

When you return, refer to your previously stated goals. Identify those that were achieved, and making special note of the unanticipated surprises that waited to reveal themselves to you.

To sum up:

Complete your matrix for Week #7.