Tag Archives: Holy Spirit

What does the Holy Spirit Sound Like?

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This week, a very dear friend of mine died.

We’d met back in the summer of 2010 and spent many long summer nights in conversation; he and his wife came to our wedding, he took us out for my thirtieth birthday. He could have been my grandfather, but he was also a dear, dear friend.

For almost the last month, he had been popping into my mind, “Oh, I must write to him!” I’d think. At first, I resolved to send a letter — I love stationery, and I have plenty of it, and it’s becoming a lost art, you know?

But the weeks wore on and I didn’t sit down to pen my planned missive. The thought popped into my head: “just send him an email, it’s something, it’s better than nothing, he’d love to hear from you.” So I resolved to send an email. I’d sit down at my laptop and type something out.

And another week went by.

Still, he pulled at the corners of my mind. So one night while I nursed my toddler to sleep, I tapped out an email on my phone. Subject: “Hello from the Deep South!”

A few days later, I hadn’t heard back, which was not at all like him. I went so far as to look through my sent folder — no copy. Somewhere my email had gotten lost between my toddler’s bed and my friend’s inbox.

I persevered (this was a lot of effort, looking back!). I re-wrote the email another night while nursing again. This time it got through and he answered within 24 hours, as was his wont.

And then, 72 hours after that, he was dead (a post-op pulmonary embolism).

You can imagine how terribly grateful I am that I listened to that little niggling voice and persevered through demanding children and disappearing email drafts. The peace I am now enjoying in grief is so, so much better than the empty grief that regret would have borne (which thing I’ve also experienced in previous deaths).

What does the Holy Spirit sound like? How do we know when we’re being poked by God? When is the prodding providential?

Well, part of this is what spiritual direction teaches us; listening with others together, whether it’s in a group or one-on-one, to how God most often talks, getting to know God’s voice. As we grow in familiarity with the sounds and tone and cadence and humor of the Lord, and as we practice responding to those spiritual sounds, the resonance grows louder in our lives, I’ve found. Our response time dwindles as we recognize God’s movement and begin even to dance with this partner, not just taking instructions as if we are in an electric slide, but joining a waltz with this divine partner leading our every step.

healing mountains & seas #ujjayi

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You know that noisy breath that yogis practice?  Ujjayi breath calms the mind & body and serves as an anchor for yoga practices.  You don’t have to be posin’ to use it–often I practice the deep, intentional breath walking down the street (my yoga teacher says it’s really breathing that does you good in any exercise).  When you constrict the muscles at the back of your throat and force the air through, up and out of your nose, it sounds like the ocean–that’s what I always hear people say.

As I’ve fallen in love with the mountains over the last year, finding deep comfort in the tall mounds of earth that peek out behind trees and skylines, drawing the horizon higher, I’ve been a little crestfallen that the foundational breath of yoga has to do with the seashore instead.

What joy on Monday: our little family hiked to the summit of Mt. Pisgah, and as we wound higher and higher, I realized that ujjayi breath doesn’t only sound like the waves of the ocean: ujjayi breath sounds just as much like the wind blowing determinedly through the trees and ridges of the mountains.20140430-115653.jpg

Now I envision my dear Blue Ridge Mountains as I take poses and force air through my throat.  Not only does that air mimic the wind of beloved hills, but also reminds me that the mountains and trees stand steady in the midst of blowing tempests, even as it allows the living air to change it slowly and slightly.

 

holding breath

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There’s a reason that holding your breath kills you.

Out in the garden over the weekend, I filled up boxes with compost-y soil.  It was hard work, but that was just what I needed–I’d been too static (stagnant) the last few days and needed some inner stirring up and re-settling.

Having learned in yoga practice to breath through the difficult parts, I noticed how my body hadn’t quite learned to carry that practice to yard work yet.  When I heaved a shovel full of soil into the wheel barrow, I held my breath.  My breath was shallow and short.  As I lifted my shovel and moved the wheel barrow, I constantly reminded myself to take long, deep breaths.

It’s the breath that stirs things up and helps the body re-settle anyway.  “Exercise is all about the breath,” I was told once–we don’t get the same benefit from a work out or a yoga session or yard work if we aren’t letting the breath in and out like bellows, stoking our inner fire, burning off the grumpiness that comes from stagnation.

When we hold our breath to get through a difficult moment, we’re refusing the healing and energizing power of the breath.  When we put our heads down, give up our regular prayer lives, slack on our exercise regimen, stop responding to our friends’ calls,–just to get through a week or a season of busy difficulty–we’re holding our “breath,” refusing the healing and energizing power that God offers us through the Holy Spirit in prayer, in each other, in our own bodies, and in worship.

Whatever happens–especially in difficult, put-your-head-down, hauling soil kind of times, keep breathing.