Robert Johnson: Inner Work

Johnson: Inner Work

“All forms of interaction with the unconscious that nourished our ancestors—dream, vision, ritual, religious experience—are largely lost, dismissed by the modern mind as primitive or superstitious. In our hubris and faith in our unassailable reason, we cut ourselves off from our origins in the unconscious and from the deepest parts of ourselves.”—Robert Johnson in Inner Work: Using Dreams and Active Imagination for Personal Growth (Harper & Row, 1989).

My spiritual director recently posted this quote on Facebook. It affirms an alternative path that many are rediscovering. Our book group reread the revised version of Joyce Rockwood Hudson’s Natural Spirituality. Recently, in a clergy group, we announced that we were studying Natural Spirituality. Two members who had recently finished seminary had no idea what we were talking about. They were even more in the dark when we mentioned dream work and were perhaps a little suspicious. However, older clergy in the group had been studying dreams for some time and affirmed the value of that study.

We have been involved in dream groups for over thirty years. Dreamwork is one of the many ways to discern what God calls us to do. My experience is that it is vital to participate in a group that studies its members’ dreams, both their own and each other’s. Unfortunately, most of us find it challenging to discern dreams on our own. 

There are many factors to consider. Dreams reveal what we don’t already know. Parts of ourselves may block new information.

Think of our experience in other discussion groups when novel ideas come up. At least one person invariably throws out an automatic “no” to an alternative way of doing things. “That is not how we have done it in the past.” It always takes time for the entire group to process the information and decide to go in a new direction.

Likewise, a dream group of friends, looking at a dream from outside our own ego, may gently guide us in a new direction that the automatic “no” part of us might have shut down. We look for these insights into our inner life until the light bulb turns on, both inside and outside us. I like Joyce Rockwood Hudson’s subtitle for her book, A Handbook for Jungian Inner Work in Spiritual Community.

Joanna https://www.joannaseibert.com/

Searching for God

Searching for God

one of my bookcases

“Are you, like me, hoping that some person, thing, or event will come along to give you the final sense of inner well-being you desire? Don’t you often hope: ‘May this book, idea, course, trip, job, country, or relationship fulfill my deepest desire’? But as long as you are waiting for that mysterious moment, you will keep running helter-skelter, always anxious and restless, always lustful and angry, never fully satisfied.”―Henri Nouwen, Life of the Beloved: Spiritual Living in a Secular World.

From my medical career, I know where to find answers, having read extensively about diseases to solve the mysteries of what is going on with my patients. It is only natural that I carry that over into my spiritual life. I have filled bookshelves and bookshelves and bookshelves as I seek the truth of peace and connection to God. The answer seems right there on the next page. I go to the book’s last page; it must be hiding, for I cannot find it. So I eagerly purchase the author’s next book, again hoping to connect with the truth that seems so close. I will attend their next workshop or conference. I find another author there, and I repeat the same cycle. I attend day retreats, silent retreats, week-long gatherings, and pilgrimages, knowing that answers will be found in those places or at those times. 

Nouwen says, from his experience, that this compulsive journey only leads to spiritual exhaustion and, ultimately, spiritual death.

I return to my medical practice and remember that I often learned the answers from my patients when I listened to them. My patients and their medical findings, including where it hurt, how long they were in pain, and how it felt to touch. That is where answers come in the present moment.

In our spiritual life, C.S. Lewis tells us we meet God in the present moment. This means God’s presence in the present moment is not found in the busyness of seeking God in a new place or with a new mentor. The present moment is always right in front of us. It is in the air we breathe. It is with each person we meet in our daily routine. It is in the tree outside our window or in the birds that come to feed. God is present in all these other places and people right in front of us, wherever we are. We only have to stop our busyness long enough to say, “Hello, I love you, too, and thank you.” 

But we cannot hold onto the love and peace that living in the present brings. Instead, we must share this love with each breath, with each person, and with each part of nature we encounter. There, it multiplies and changes not only us but the world.

Joanna   https://www.joannaseibert.com/

The Spiritual Practice of Fishing

 Spiritual Practice of Fishing

“If, then, I were asked for the most important advice I could give, the one I considered most useful to the men of our century, I should simply say: in the name of God, stop a moment, cease your work, and look around you.”—Leo Tolstoy in Essays, Letters, and Miscellanies (Scribner’s, 1929).

All the fishermen I know are early risers. Some go out on calm rivers, often with an experienced guide.

I also know other fishermen who prefer the ocean's larger waves.

I sit outside each morning on the Gulf Coast just after sunrise, watching lone surf fishermen arrive like clockwork at the water’s edge with fishing rods, rod holders, buckets, bait, and folding beach chairs. They are early risers, arriving before the pelicans, seagulls, and dolphins come out of hiding. The members of this all-male club mark their territory by spiking two rod holders into the sand, the only signs of human presence. Then they unfold their chairs, bait their lines, cast them beyond the roaring white surf, and sit and wait between the two holders for the rods to jump and bend. 

The nibbles are infrequent, so they spend most of their time sitting and staring out into the Gulf. They peer out as if they can see all the way beyond South America. They do not take out their cell phones or read books. Instead, they wait patiently, usually for several hours, presumably with great faith that their efforts will connect them to the gift of unknown food from beneath the sea.

One fisherman describes some days of fishing, feeling the joy of being a young boy again. On other days, he identifies with Hemingway’s struggles in The Old Man and the Sea.

I have become so fascinated by watching the fishermen that I recognize them by their walk, what they wear, whom they talk to, when they come out, and how long they stay. When I speak with them, they teach me a great deal about spirituality, faithfulness, and surrendering to a spiritual practice. Indeed, some fishermen call their daily routine a spiritual practice, while others would be appalled at calling their fishing such a name. Nevertheless, they all agree that this recreational sport brings them peace; most realize they are not after the fish. It is re-creation. 

Perhaps this uncertainty, grounded in faith, is also part of our spiritual practices: Centering Prayer, the Rosary, the labyrinth, prayer, fasting, Lectio divina, and worship. The peace comes from offering time, a piece of our life, to the practice, rather than always reaching a goal or making or receiving a connection. 

My second gift from our fishermen is that I have stayed grounded, connected to my surroundings, and living in the present moment by observing them. The fishermen are teaching me to look beyond the turbulent water’s edge and to have faith that there is something greater than any of us, constantly connecting with us.

Joanna.   https://www.joannaseibert.com/