Contemplating Mortality and the Role of Prayer

Today, the sun rose on the Anacostia River just as it has from the beginnings of the sun and the river occupying the same general area of space and time.

Sunrise on the Anacostia

Like every other sunrise before it, observed from this spot in space and time, this one was a unique gift that I had the privilege of witnessing.  If I am granted the gift of living to be one hundred and twenty years old, I will have been gifted the opportunity to witness an sunrise that is similar to this one, but totally unique 43.380 times.  That is really not that many sunrises, and I've expended over a quarter of them already.

I'm thinking about mortality because today I worked my way through most of the TED Talks that have been categorized as being related to death, and I received a request for prayer for a friend of mine's father who will be facing multiple bypass surgery tomorrow.

As for my choice to listen to educated people speak on the topic of death, I really have no real explanation other than I'm beginning at the front of the alphabetical index of TED Talks and listening to all of the talks that have an audio only recording in a given area that strikes my curiosity.  I've worked my way up to the letter 'D' so far and this is the next topic to draw my attention. The talks, like all TED Talks I've listened to so far are mostly interesting and always thought provoking. The general theme is one of finding a better way of accepting the normal process of mortality and a number of arguments about why and how this can be approached.

The prayer request, given the potential seriousness of the procedure that my friend's father is facing tomorrow seemed to mesh with the overall theme.  Honestly, I don't know how to respond to these calls for supernatural intervention when they come across social media like Facebook. I can't bring myself to push the "like" radio button, but I do feel compelled to reach out to my friend or acquaintance in response to their request that I entreat a higher power in support of their request for help. It's at this point, the point of wanting to respond, but not quite knowing what to say that I become a bit stuck.

Today, the request said, "Friend, my daddy will have multiple bypass a 6 tomorrow morning. Please pray for him and my mom!"  This request as of this writing has gotten 63 "likes" and 60 "comments."  One of the comments is mine, and I certainly didn't hit the "like" radio button, so I don't quite know what to make of those numbers. I ended up replying with "Done" although that leaves me a little cold and distant.

Part of my problem is that I have come to believe that prayer (and meditation) really represents an effort to grow closer to a higher power whose will is shaping the broad trends of our lives. I believe that the journey we are all called to in one fashion or the other is bringing our own will into alignment with the will of the greater power that surrounds us and having the strength and knowledge to glimpse and carry out the purpose that is laid before us by doing the next right thing moment by moment. I believe that seeking to understand the will of the greater power and having the strength and fortitude to play my small role in in the creation of that purpose is about the only thing that I should ask of that power. Anything more is probably an attempt to manifest my own will on a situation that far exceeds my ability to shape. This belief that prayer for knowledge and strength only is in conflict with my own will to shelter my friend for the pain of possible unwanted outcomes.  That's why I don't know how to respond. I don't know how to say that surrender is the only way I've found effective a coping with the fear and anxiety that this sort of situation can generate.

My friend, their daddy, and their mom are in my thoughts tonight. I want very fervently for things to work out successfully tomorrow in that operating room, and Mr. C to be granted some more sunrises to witness. I hope that I'm granted a sunrise or two in order to bear witness to the outcome. I hope that whatever may come finds my friend surrounded by love because that will make whatever comes better.

Guideposts On The Path...or...The Lesson Will Be Repeated Until It Is Learned

For those that know me in real life, it will come as no particularly stunning revelation that I can be stubborn, hard headed, or at times tenacious.  These can be good characteristics, but as I've been recently discovering, the things that society labels as bad or good are often neither.  For example, I don't think you would find too many contributors willing to put their byline on an article defending the plain good common sense that's associated with procrastination.  Procrastination just doesn't have a "good" cultural connotation in American society.  I have personally encountered situations where the ability to successfully procrastinate was a pivotal skill to determine the positive outcome of a particular project.

There are plenty of other paradoxes where what might generally be viewed as a negative trait might prove crucial to the success of a particular outcome, so I'm not going to bore you with too many stories to attempt to prove that point.  Think about it for a minute, and I'm sure you can name more than a handful of examples that you've personally witnessed.

A Repeated Lesson, or a Coincidence?

coFrom time to time, I find it difficult to decide what I should be doing in the face of these paradoxes.  For times when that uncertainty strikes, I'm going to propose a decision making construct that I've found useful in determining a new course of action in order to keep physical, intellectual, emotional, and spiritual momentum.

Some of my friends say that, "A lesson will be repeated until it is learned."  Coupled with the fact that I believe that the universe is conspiring with you to make you successful, I have found that there are guideposts to help you head down a path of DOING the next right thing.

Prayer has been a critical activity for me in this regard, and one of the more useful approaches to prayer from my perspective is to seek wisdom and strength.  The most reliable way to seek wisdom that I"ve found is to state my intentions, and ask for roadblocks...clear unambiguous roadblocks if this particular way in which I've chosen to exercise my will is not in harmony with the outline of higher powers.

I've also been told that meditation should be a critical component of my communion with the universe.  This is a practice that I've not been as disciplined at working on as I have been with prayer.  Everyone else probably already knows this, but I was blissfully unaware of the difference between prayer and meditation.  Prayer is the act transmitting your thoughts and will to a higher power for adjudication.  Meditation is listening for the judgement or endorsement of the universe in return.

I keep getting messages from my surroundings about working on my practice of meditation.  I'm five days into a thirty day commitment that I made to practice meditation at least one 2-5 minute period for thirty days. The picture above is the only picture with reasonable lighting that I was able to capture all day. In the interest of practicing mindfulness, I am skeptical that this occurrence is a coincidence. I find it much more likely that this is a lesson that's been repeated until I exhibit at least the basics of retaining it.