“It is important that you say what you mean to say. Time is too short. You must speak words that matter.”
― Kate DiCamillo, The Magician's Elephant
My kids and I read every night (It’s a rather new thing, but it’s been a really fun thing.) The last book we finished was The Magician’s Elephant by Kate DiCamillo. It’s a magical story of a boy, a fortune teller, an elephant, a beggar, an orphan, and a police officer. It’s mythical (a story that is truer than true) and magical.
The police officer likes to ask “what if” questions.
'What if?' is a question that belongs to magic.”
― Kate DiCamillo, The Magician's Elephant
I love a good question. I collect them wherever I find them. I’ve been thinking all week about what-if questions. The question that belongs to magic according to Leo Mattine the kind (and unlikely) police officer in the book. It was a what-if question that invited me to start this newsletter.
What if I wrote something that arrived like a little care package in inboxes once a week on Sunday evening? Maybe it would help orient us to orient our lives around things that are smaller and deeper on the eve of a new week.
What if I shared quotes, poems, songs that sparkled and stopped me because of the inkling that there was something more in the words if I just paused to listen a bit deeper.
What if I shared a practice, prayer, or idea that I am learning in Spiritual Director training?
What if there are more people who are longing to think about smaller and deeper things and we started a conversation?
What if you asked more “magical” WHAT-IF questions this week?
Smaller & Deeper {a short history}
Smaller and deeper has been an echo in my heart for several years. It’s easy to scroll through Instagram, Facebook, and most anything on the internets and get the message that bigger is better. So much of what people are saying is: Bigger. More. Hustle. Influence. Impact. Grow. Set Bigger Goals. (you get the idea.)
I wrote the smaller & deeper Haiku in the summer. (You can watch our Haiku Talk here. I share more about smaller and deeper in the video and in the post.) Smaller and deeper feels like a counter-cultural invitation to intentionally narrow my focus and deepen my roots.
Maybe smaller and deeper feels like an invitation to you too?
ideas.poems.quotes.songs that sparkled for me this week.
(I try and pay attention to words or phrases that stand out to me in my reading and listening. There is a spiritual practice called Florliledgium that is collecting short, interesting pieces {words that “sparkle” up} and putting them together. This is kind of like that. Watching for things that sparkle. Gathering them and seeing how they work together and what message, mantra, or new idea might arise.)
A Practice:
Read slowly.
Notice if a word or phrase stands out to you.
How do the words make you feel?
Is there an invitation?
“The fast pace of our lives makes it difficult for us to find grace in the present moment, and when the simple gifts at our fingertips cease to nourish us, we have a tendency to crave the sensational.”
― Macrina Wiederkehr, A Tree Full of Angels: Seeing the Holy in the Ordinary
1.
I don’t know who God is exactly.
But I’ll tell you this.
I was sitting in the river named Clarion, on a water splashed stone
and all afternoon I listened to the voices of the river talking.
Whenever the water struck a stone it had something to say,
and the water itself, and even the mosses trailing under the water.
And slowly, very slowly, it became clear to me what they were saying.
Said the river I am part of holiness.
And I too, said the stone. And I too, whispered the moss beneath the water.I’d been to the river before, a few times.
Don’t blame the river that nothing happened quickly.
You don’t hear such voices in an hour or a day.
You don’t hear them at all if selfhood has stuffed your ears.
And it’s difficult to hear anything anyway, through all the traffic, the ambition.2.
If God exists he isn’t just butter and good luck.
He’s also the tick that killed my wonderful dog Luke.
Said the river: imagine everything you can imagine, then keep on going.Imagine how the lily (who may also be a part of God) would sing to you if it could sing,
if you would pause to hear it.
And how are you so certain anyway that it doesn’t sing?If God exists he isn’t just churches and mathematics.
He’s the forest, He’s the desert.
He’s the ice caps, that are dying.
He’s the ghetto and the Museum of Fine Arts.He’s van Gogh and Allen Ginsberg and Robert Motherwell.
He’s the many desperate hands, cleaning and preparing their weapons.
He’s every one of us, potentially.
The leaf of grass, the genius, the politician, the poet.
And if this is true, isn’t it something very important?Yes, it could be that I am a tiny piece of God, and each of you too, or at least
of his intention and his hope.
Which is a delight beyond measure.
I don’t know how you get to suspect such an idea.
I only know that the river kept singing.
It wasn’t a persuasion, it was all the river’s own constant joy
which was better by far than a lecture, which was comfortable, exciting, unforgettable.3.
Of course for each of us, there is the daily life.
Let us live it, gesture by gesture.
When we cut the ripe melon, should we not give it thanks?
And should we not thank the knife also?
We do not live in a simple world.4.
There was someone I loved who grew old and ill
One by one I watched the fires go out.
There was nothing I could doexcept to remember
that we receive
then we give back.5.
My dog Luke lies in a grave in the forest, she is given back.
But the river Clarion still flows from wherever it comes from
to where it has been told to go.
I pray for the desperate earth.
I pray for the desperate world.
I do the little each person can do, it isn’t much.
Sometimes the river murmurs, sometimes it raves.6.
Along its shores were, may I say, very intense cardinal flowers.
And trees, and birds that have wings to uphold them, for heaven’s sakes–
the lucky ones: they have such deep natures,
they are so happily obedient.
While I sit here in a house filled with books,
ideas, doubts, hesitations.7.
And still, pressed deep into my mind, the river
keeps coming, touching me, passing by on its
long journey, its pale, infallible voice
singing.“At the River Clarion” by Mary Oliver, from Evidence: Poems, Beacon Press.
So this is smaller and deeper. Reflections and space for you to see what sparkles, shines, and speaks to your heart. I hope this has been a few moments of calm as you start your week.
Wishing you a smaller & deeper week.
A Smaller & Deeper Blessing
May you have eyes to see the small delights.
Ears to hear the deeper call.
May you find ease in the right yes and peace in no.
Through the highs and lows of this week, may you know you don’t walk alone.
P.S. I love Carrie Newcomer. She has provided my soundtrack for 2020 (and now 2021). Let this song be an invitation to deeper listening.
“I believe in a good strong cup of ginger tea and that all these shoots and roots will become a tree. All I know is that I can’t help but see all of this as so very holy…”