I was on my morning walk this morning, musing about a few things.   Foremost, I have new stomping grounds, we took the bold leap of moving a few towns over seeking peace, wonder and solitude at a somewhat remote lake house.  So, I have new trails to explore just across the street and all around as we are situated in a large state forest in Massachusetts.  These new trail explorations are steeped in excitement, just a bit of fear (oh my is that a bear, no just a mountain biker!) and more importantly with wonder, awe and surrender.  There are so many spiritual qualities we can cultivate when we move away from the chatter of our daily lives and step into the stillness of the forest. 

One thought that that came into my mind this morning, pretty random was Christmas in July.  I always thought that was a goofy marketing scheme but we are more than half way through this year and I was reflecting back on my new years word and some common threads that seem to be running through my heart and spiritual growth this year.  Ok full disclosure, I have forgotten the word I had chosen for my new year’s word!  This is a practice I have been doing for a few years around new year’s instead of a resolution, a time to reflect on what quality I could bring into the year to help keep me focused and growing on the spiritual path.  Even though I had forgotten the word, there was a feeling of spaciousness, simplicity and peace.  I felt a feeling of freedom associated with being a seeker that does not need to have all the answers, an earnest seeker that finds God here and now and maybe this is enough. 

Ok my word of the year was harmony!  Living in harmony with nature and with God and all his people.   You can reference back to my blog from January if you are interested.  This idea of being in harmony and the flow of the now in which we are held in a net of protection, peace and provision that we cannot see or touch but as believers we sense and know.  We grow wise to the ways of our God.   I have been truly inspired by the writings of Estelle Frankel in her book The Wisdom of Not Knowing.

 Estelle writes from the perspective of her Jewish faith and from her life’s work as a psychotherapist.  She says this about wisdom; Wisdom teachings are like time released medication- their healing power is revealed over time. – page 181 .  These teachings like stories or kaons can be like seeds that we plant or carry within us, not knowing when or how they may bloom or be truly revealed or applied.  This sense of not knowing is part of the spiritual practice.  By always having everything lined up and figured out and always doing and producing, it leaves very little room for moments of awe, wonder and surrender. Surrender to me is not a passive practice, it is a beautiful active practice of not knowing, of leaving ourselves open to be touched, nudged or whispered to by the Beloved.   Estelle expounds on this idea; These deeper truths can become a source of inspiration and illumination.  So instead of feeling frustrated over the things we cannot comprehend, we learn to carry them on our journeys until we are ready for their stored secrets to be revealed.   -page 181

In her book Estelle discussed the symbolism of a painting by Marc Chagall, the painting is entitled Mosses Receiving the Tablets of the Law.  His work of art is an artist’s rendition of the story from Exodus where the mountain becomes dark and over shadowed, the people cower in fear as Moses goes up the mountain to receive the Ten Commandments directly from God. In the painting Chagall depicts God reaching down from the cloud just his hand visible and Moses reaching up into the cloud to grasp the Tablet.  There is two handbreadths between their two hands that do not meet.  Estelle states;

The two handbreadths in between where God and Moses hold the tablets are a metaphor for the ungraspable mystery of divine revelation.  It suggests that Moses’s illumination comes from which he cannot quite put his finger on, or understand with his mind.  The two handbreadths represent a place beyond thought… it is precisely in this shared space of unknowing that illumination derives.  – page 176

Such a beautiful metaphor that speaks to me of a God who literally fills in the spaces.  His mystery, the unknowing is part of the sacredness and a sense of spaciousness in a life lived in a way that knows it’s creator, a knowing that is often beyond understanding.  My most enamored yoga teacher Julie is deeply spiritual but always cautious with her words so as to be inclusive to all beliefs.  However, she often spoke of God but without using his name, she simple said that which cannot be understood or beyond words.

Returning to this sense of illumination that comes from the unknowing or from that which cannot be understood, we return to The Wisdom of Not Knowing where Estelle discusses a Kabbalah teaching which points to two kinds of light, inner light and encompassing light.  She describes it like this; our inner light represents the wisdom, understanding and knowledge we have embodied and made our own, while our encompassing light is comprised of the wisdom, understanding and knowledge we have yet to internalize, it represents our soul’s limitless potential for growth and expansion. – page 178

I pray that these musings give you permission to open yourself up to this possibility of illumination, growth and expansion.   I pray that you truly give yourself the permission to simplify, to amble and to make space to sense the inner light as well as the encompassing light.  As Estelle and so many other wisdom teachers suggest the deepest mysteries of life can not be gleaned through thinking mind but rather through intuition, illumination and real-life experiences.   For me, the most meaningful real-life experiences include nature where I meet God with awe and through surrender when I open to the possibility of a loving God that I can not see but feel illuminating all of my moments.   True wisdom can not be found in a text or online, it must be lived and living with the wisdom of not knowing is truly recognizing that we are surrounded by sacred space and light.