This Ignatian Life

My landlord invited my roommate and I to leave our apartment this month to do some renovations on the roof, bathroom and ceiling.  At the end of another dizzying school year this seemed like the perfect time for a vacation, yet the shoestring budget of a NYC Catholic school teacher wouldn’t allow much wiggle room for fleeing.  Needing the extra money that summertime tutoring brings and maybe a cake gig or two, I knew I wouldn’t really be able to go far.  Instead, I packed my bags, several books, and my computer and prepared to live a little bit here, a little bit there, visiting friends and doing a little bit of soul renovating along the way.

The first few days of renovation (a.k.a. my displacement) were spent finishing work from the school year–typing Word documents at the speed of light, updating curriculum, preparing reports on struggling students, etc.  I have to commend myself— I was pretty darn productive.  And then the work finished itself up and I was left staring into the tabula rasa that is summer ’10.  This is where the trouble began.  The lack of structure, certainty and purpose in my days was terrifying.  With the predictability and routine of my work environment and my home environment now gone…I too felt gone, lost and unsupported.  My confident, determined, and usually task-driven self all of a sudden felt without purpose.  Why so glum, I thought, when this is SUMMER and well-deserved relaxation should be a welcomed prospect?  The type-A in myself decided to sleep-it-off and wake up in the morning with a concrete list of tasks to put me back on track—go for a walk, do some laundry, call a friend in Omaha, read 2 chapters of a book, bake a pie.  Notice that nowhere along the way did I stop and turn to God…nope, I was the task master.

Go for a walk—check

Laundry—check

Phone call—check

Pie—check

Book— check, and…stop.

The book I picked up was Rilke’s Letters to a Young Poet.  I have read through it several times—sometimes slowly mulling over Rilke’s advice and other times racing through the text on a face-paced commute simply to “kill time.”  No matter when read or in what style, Rilke’s message always feels fresh and new.  There’s always something different I am left with at the end of a simple leaf-through.  This time around, it was his advice on writing that stuck with me and his advice on avoiding look OUT to somehow prove one’s worth WITHIN:

“You are looking outside, and that is what you should most avoid right now.

No one can advise or help you – no one.  There is only one thing you should do.  Go into yourself.  Find out the reason that commands you to write; see whether it has spread its roots into the very depths of your heart; confess to yourself whether you would have to die if you were forbidden to write.  This most of all: ask yourself in the most silent hour of your night: must I write?  Dig into yourself for a deep answer.  And if this answer rings out in assent, if you meet this solemn question with a strong, simple “I must,” then build your life in accordance with this necessity; your while life, even into its humblest and most indifferent hour, must become a sign and witness to this impulse.”

Reading Rilke’s words struck an accord with my schedule-driven frenzy.  What if, just what if, the answer to rest, relaxation and a return to independence laid WITHIN?!  I could literally hear God whispering “duh” in my ear and repeating Rilke’s words as:

“… ask yourself in the most silent hour of your night: must I PRAY?”

Looking within, slowing down, turning to prayer, turning to writing…the middle of my 10-day renovation vacation has led me to the beach.  No more lists for the time being—more Rilke, a little E.L. Doctorow, and embracing the WITHIN.

Yesterday I returned from a retreat at St. Benedict’s Center in Schuyler, Nebraska. Just me, the pond (which they call a lake but being from the Great Lakes State I know is actually a pond), and the comfy brown easy chair in the quiet single room… three days, no computer, no phone, no friends or family. I felt very Ignatian! And though I wrote and wrote while I was there, now I am struggling to know how to share from this, my first ever spiritual retreat.

Whenever I write about spirituality I find I try too hard to simplify it down to one or two catchy tidbits that can stick. I would be great at limericks if there was still a market for that kind of thing. Really what I should say to you is GO, take a retreat. Sit in silence and stare at the water, notice all the layers of reflection. The music you will need is not on your Ipod but the sound of the wind chimes or the birds that made a secret nest in the rain gutter above your head where you can sit and drink cup after cup of coffee and listen. “Eternity is not later or in any undefinable place.” said Mary Oliver to me while we sat together. “These are a few of your disordered attachments…” from God and St. Ignatius.

I’ve read that when we pursue contemplation the fruit in our lives will not feel like consolation necessarily or warm and fuzzy prayer times, but it will be obvious to those around us. I have gotten so many compliments on being a better person in the two days since I got back, “You seem happier.” “You look great.” “You’re like a new person.”  “You’re so optimistic!” All these gifts of a better self that I can offer the people around me come from simply taking some space and stillness. I know I have been given a lot of fruit from those three days away. Yet, while I was on retreat I struggled with the same anxiety I’ve been fighting for the last few months, several times I almost left and drove home. The only thing that kept me there was the fact that the front desk seemed to be providentially closed every time I tried to pay my bill and leave early.

At some point this weekend I realized that this is a season of huge growth for all of us who finished the exercises this summer, and that brings with it anxiety. If we can be present to ourselves, whether on retreat or on retreat in daily life, and listen to what the anxiety is heralding, we’ll be ready for the fruit of God’s work that’s being offered to us.

I have just returned from ten days in the Dominican Republic. I was there with several colleagues and nine students working on a documentary portraying the work of Pedro Alamonte, a Catholic deacon who works with the poor in the city of Santiago. More specifically, he serves in a slum of that city known as Cien Fuegos. The slum is built right next to the main dump of the city, and the people who live there suffer from all of the aliments, both social and physical, that are typical of urban poverty around the world. For more about the project, please visit the course website at http://backpack.creighton.edu.