Live Everything...

"Have patience with everything unresolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves as if they were locked rooms or books written in a very foreign language. Don't search for the answers, which could not be given to you now, because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps then, someday far in the future, you will gradually, without even noticing it, live your way into the answer."

~~Rainer Maria Rilke, Letters to a Young Poet

Magpies and Tongues of Fire

I have been struggling with the idea of quitting my day job to focus all of my professional energy on freelance writing and editing. I even quit once last winter only to have my home equity line of credit fall through and force me to unquit a few days later.

Every time I make plans to quit, something goes wrong. Most recently, it was our tax return, which ended up being half what we thought it would be. It's clear now that there will never be a good time to quit, only better times. Now is as good a time as any. And James thinks that I should just go for it.

But I'm scared.

And then I have a flash of inspiration and decide to take the plunge.

And then I get scared.

You can see the pattern here.

I think about this incessantly. I pray about this a lot. I talk about this ad nauseum.

I'm tired of the whole thing.

I look for signs to tell me what to do, and then I ignore them. Or rather, I embrace them, then I think about the money situation, and then I ignore them.

A few days ago I was reading a letter from Linford of Over the Rhine, and one line just got me where I live. It said:

"A good life: Believe in what you do, and do it."

Two parts here. First, believe. Second, do.

I went downstairs and announced that I was ready to quit. (That's when I went over the financials one last time and chickened out.)

My day job is not a bad job. But it does not feed me. In fact, it wears me down. It makes me feel like less of myself. Thus, I hate it. Even though it's not a bad job.

I was reading the Superhero Journal today and she wrote, "Sometimes I feel like I've lost my mojo." Amen sister.

She went on to explain a game she plays with the dictionary: "I discovered that I could meditate for a few minutes on an issue or question, open up the dictionary at random, point to a word, and find my answer." She calls this game Magpie, which is the word that came up when she asked where the answers were coming from. (In the comments section she explains that in Native American folklore, the magpie is the messenger between the two worlds. Interesting.)

I'm all about looking for answers and signs. But I also think that they should come from God. But I'm game for a game involving words and random questions. So I got a dictionary, silently asked "When should I quit my job?" and opened up the pages. The answer?

Pentecost.

Pentecost is the seventh Sunday after Easter Sunday. This year, Pentecost falls on June 4. Which means, if I gave my month's notice by next Monday, I could be done by Pentecost.

Hm. Pentecost. A sign? From God?

Pentecost marks the day when the Holy Spirit descended on Christ's followers, after his ascension.

Acts 2:1-4 says, "And when the day of Pentecost was fully come, they were all with one accord in one place. And suddenly there came a sound from heaven as of a rushing mighty wind, and it filled all the house where they were sitting. And there appeared unto them cloven tongues like as of fire, and it sat upon each of them. And they were all filled with the Holy Ghost, and began to speak with other tongues, as the Spirit gave them utterance."

This image of rushing wind and tongues of fire. And the ability to speak in new tongues. It's so powerful. Those people must have felt that their souls had been scrubbed clean and empowered. They must have felt so alive.

I long for a Pentecost of my own. I feel so flat inside. Could this be God's way of telling me to take a leap of faith and to trust him?

The Hope of Easter and Spring

They may not exactly be lilies, but...

"Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat or drink; or about your body, what you will wear. Is not life more important than food, and the body more important than clothes? Look at the birds of the air; they do not sow or reap or store away in barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not much more valuable than they? Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life?

"And why do you worry about clothes? See how the lilies of the field grow. They do not labor or spin. Yet I tell you that not even Solomon in all his splendor was dressed like one of these. If that is how God clothes the grass of the field, which is here today and tomorrow is thrown into the fire, will he not much more clothe you, O you of little faith? So do not worry, saying, 'What shall we eat?' or 'What shall we drink?' or 'What shall we wear?' For the pagans run after all these things, and your heavenly Father knows that you need them. But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well. Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own." (Matthew 6:25-34)

March may be the second cruelest month

Walking to my car today after work (it's Spring Break, so there's actually parking on campus within reasonable walking distance this week, which means I don't have to take the little shuttle-bus), I felt like I was coming out from down under. Down under the blankets. Or out from a dark hole. Up for air.

Maybe it's because the light doesn't fade until after 6:00pm these days. Or maybe it's because spring is nearly palpable. Or maybe it's because I'm prone to unexpected mood swings.

Photo from Angela in Europe,
who got me thinking
about "The Waste Land"
with this picture

I have felt weighted down for at least the last four or five months. Maybe I'm finally surfacing. Or maybe not. It's always hard to tell.

I know it's only March, but I'm restless. I'm anxious. I hear T.S. calling to me:

APRIL is the cruellest month, breeding
Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing
Memory and desire, stirring
Dull roots with spring rain.
Winter kept us warm, covering
Earth in forgetful snow, feeding
A little life with dried tubers.
Summer surprised us, coming over the Starnbergersee
With a shower of rain; we stopped in the colonnade,
And went on in sunlight, into the Hofgarten,
And drank coffee, and talked for an hour.
Bin gar keine Russin, stamm' aus Litauen, echt deutsch.
And when we were children, staying at the archduke's,
My cousin's, he took me out on a sled,
And I was frightened. He said, Marie,
Marie, hold on tight. And down we went.
In the mountains, there you feel free.
I read, much of the night, and go south in the winter.

What are the roots that clutch, what branches grow
Out of this stony rubbish? Son of man,
You cannot say, or guess, for you know only
A heap of broken images, where the sun beats,
And the dead tree gives no shelter, the cricket no relief,
And the dry stone no sound of water. Only
There is shadow under this red rock,
(Come in under the shadow of this red rock),
And I will show you something different from either
Your shadow at morning striding behind you
Or your shadow at evening rising to meet you;
I will show you fear in a handful of dust.

Frisch weht der Wind
Der Heimat zu.
Mein Irisch Kind,
Wo weilest du?

'You gave me hyacinths first a year ago;
'They called me the hyacinth girl.'
—Yet when we came back, late, from the Hyacinth garden,
Your arms full, and your hair wet, I could not
Speak, and my eyes failed, I was neither
Living nor dead, and I knew nothing,
Looking into the heart of light, the silence.
Od' und leer das Meer.

~The Waste Land, lines 1-43; T.S. Eliot