One of a group of special books I’d recommend to every thoughtful, deep-thinking person is Parker J. Palmer’s wonderful little book Let You Life Speak: Listening for the Voice of Vocation. I can’t remember who recommended it to me, but it was truly life changing. It represented the beginning for me of a journey – a continuing “pilgrimage” of the heart; a dark night of sorts; an interior journey – still harangued by the voices of illusion and the ‘demons’ of ego and false self – out of which I daily seek, trusting grace, Spirit, and love to live into a fuller, deeper, richer humanity.
Reminding me too of the importance of letting your life speak and of a deep listening (in the love of others) was the French documentary – The Look – in which the focus is on the observations, experiences and gained wisdom and perspective of the then 65-year old English actress (Tessa) Charlotte Rampling.
As I watched it, one couldn’t escape the sense that I was both watching and benefiting from the gifts of a journey taken, a life lived and continuing to be lived fully, self-critically, and deeply. Albeit I’d have to say this documentary feels, in places, somewhat superficial. A fact that’s hardly surprising, and thus it benefits the viewer to the degree that it serves as a reminder that there is always more, because so much about us is mystery, mystery to others, and indeed a mystery to ones own self. There's more to Rampling, more to you, and more to me than what others experience, and most especially than we experience of ourselves. We're always only at the edge of vast uncharted territory when we take the inner journey - though it would seem few do, for it takes great courage and great honesty.
There is always a becoming, though sadly, for many, this becoming remains deeply stunted and they never become all that they are capable of becoming in order to become more freely, deeply, and wholly human. Palmer, in the book noted above, in other books, interviews etc reminds us why continuing the journey is just so important, and most especially when its painful.
“In the tradition of pilgrimage … hardships are seen not as accidental but as integral to the journey itself. Treacherous terrain, bad weather, taking a fall, getting lost — challenges of that sort, largely beyond our control, can strip the ego of the illusion that it is in charge and make space for true self to emerge. If that happens, the pilgrim has a better chance to find the sacred center he or she seeks. Disabused of our illusions by much travel and travail, we awaken one day to find that the sacred center is here and now — in every moment of the journey, everywhere in the world around us, and deep within our own hearts.”
Parker J. Palmer, from Let Your Life Speak: Listening for the Voice of Vocation.
Via Len.
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