god written by a girl

on unconditioning love (pt 2??)

gm,

Vivid Void

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Pews padded blue melt into hardwoods swollen soft in Alabama stick. Like most in the Evangelical American South, my first altered state of consciousness was a religious experience. Unlike most, my father’s voice booms from his pulpit. For a moment, I touch god—or something infinite. I stare at white swirling bliss, and my eyes are wet. I want more, and he says I can have it if I trust and obey. Seven years of innocence damned, he buries me in water and raises me in His life and calls it all salvation. It takes me twenty odd years to de-conflate the eyes of father from the eyes of God.

Those all-knowing eyes glare black and white. God is perfect, man is depraved. Of course, there’s the possibility of skinny sanctification, and it’s imperative, else people I love burn eternally. I build beliefs compatible with the bounded probabilities of salvation. I set my sights on holiness: “I will be who He says to be” and the compulsive self-coercion predictably loops back to the same dark place: “God never fails, it’s all your fault.” I absorb a generalized guilt for existence itself. For my own spectacle of human ignorance and error and illusion, a death away from union with the divine, never quite good enough.

Still, there’s a presence I can’t shake. I feel it when I text you and you say, i was about to text you, babycakes. grey glacier. new years. When you lose the bet and actually get one of my bitcoin private keys illegibly tattooed on your left butt cheek. When I brush and braid your hair and you drip salt into chamomile tea because she broke up with you. When you&you&you&you buy me psychedelic laced lingerie for my birthday, and tell me to take it slow, you know me. I see a kinder god in the ones I love, over and over and over.

So faith persists and evolves. I expand my beliefs to hold space for the humanity I see in you and the humanity you see in me. I learn Greek and Hebrew. Sin is an archery term that translates “to miss the mark,” often employed as, “to confuse who God is.” And who is God? Yahweh names Itself once, and it translates to “I will be who I will be.” And who will God become? I wrestle wisdom literature to pin it: Job (pain), Psalms (praise), Proverbs (order), Ecclesiastes (chaos) and my definition of God expands from a divine test to a divine expression. I find the Bible tells the same story over and over and over: one of finding and losing and finding again. So I do that. I deconstruct the politic of mores and modernity and reconstruct every theological belief from first principles, and I never abandon my faith. It abandons me.

At least it feels that way when the chaos of god’s will moves faster than I know how to survive. Walls break apart around my neck and I can’t breathe. Like most who have their mind broken open, existential terror doesn’t alter consciousness, it destabilizes it. For months, I touch hell—or something infinite. I stare at a black spinning void, and my eyes are dry. I collapse all belief to be compatible with the bounded probabilities of condemnation: you are unworthy, you fucked it all up, you deserve it. I’m down thirty pounds and I can’t stop shaking and I’m desperate. The doctors say the only way out is through, trust yourself. I set my sights on health: “I am who I am,” and the compassionate self-construction predictably loops back to a hazy place: “nobody’s perfect.” I absorb a generalized hurt for existence itself. For the collective spectacle of human ignorance and error and illusion, fully capable of harming and healing, over and over and over.

Still, there’s a presence I can’t shake. I feel it in the subtle sound sand makes as the tide pulls back. In my dog’s laugh when I tickle that spot on his throat. In the whispers from the ceiling fan. In the pleasant sensation that is my own breath. I see a kinder god in and around me, over and over and over.

So faith persists and evolves. I call my parts by name and speak to them in tongues, or some secret language. I practice the jhanas and they’re kind of like that time I worked out so hard I came. I explore the color, texture and taste of raw sensations until their felt wisdom unravels. I expand my beliefs to hold space for the bounded inevitabilities of existence: life always includes suffering (pain), all is exuberantly provocative just as it is (praise), everything changes and ends (order), people are not loving and loyal all the time (chaos). I forgive reality for being what it is. I realize I’ll do this over and over and over. Because there will always be constrictions and resistance to love, and they will always activate our potential to love.

I slip in the back and I notice they took the blue pads off the pews. It looks better. My heels click a little too loudly across refinished hardwoods and my father’s voice barely reaches me from his pulpit. I hear a subtle shake as it strains to wrap words around gratitude. I stare at him, and my eyes are wet. We share a moment—or something finite. I know it won’t last for long, and I know we will do this over and over and over. That is more than enough. It takes me twenty odd years to see the eyes that hold my gaze of god are the same eyes that first held god’s gaze of me. It’s god in me, loving god, pouring out.

Like most who experience divine love, it doesn’t alter consciousness, it becomes it. I expand my beliefs to hold space for the bounded possibilities of love. I see god in the longest thread of every experience. Everyone’s life includes suffering, but the divine thread in devastation is devotion. So we expand our capacity for pain so we can care for each other well. Everything is provocative just as it is, but the divine thread in experiencing is joy. So we expand our capacity for praise se we can revere each other well. Everything changes and ends, but the divine thread in terror is awe. So we expand our capacity for order so we can abide with each other well. People are not loving and loyal all the time, but the divine thread in despair is hope. So we expand our capacity for chaos so we can surprise each other well. I set my sights on wholeness: “it already is” and gratitude, as fickle as it is final, continuously opens a divine place: “I will be who I will be.” I absorb a generalized awareness of existence itself, of the collective spectacle of human ignorance and error and illusion, fully capable of being and becoming, over and over and over.

Still, there’s a presence I can’t shake. It’s when my bones quake at the evidence that you won’t be loving and loyal to me, and I really wish you would. It’s when my teeth sink into my tongue, biting back the whole terrible truth because I don’t perceive you as being able to handle it. It’s when I willingly ignore the conditions of my existence, because I want what I want, goddamnit. It’s when I don’t see my same old copes show up in subtle new ways, trying to hide that I am confused and scared. I become the moment—or something finite. And the humanity, as final as it is fickle, continuously opens a humble place, “will you give me grace?” as I give you grace? as we give god grace? over and over and over? Because nothing new happens without forgiveness.

Like most who experience long-suffering love, it doesn’t alter consciousness, it opens it. It’s been said to love someone means to see them as god intended them. I think that’s true. You’ve always believed in me, even when I lose faith in myself, and I’ve always believed in you. But it’s more than that, too. To love someone is to, like god, hold space for their becoming. Space is a thing more ancient than exacting constructs like words and writing or time and timing—those things they say most of love gets lost between. Space, like god, expands and bends and holds, over and over and over. So I do, because I am faithful to what I love.

Faithfulness is persisting:evolving. Faithfulness is fully holding the disturbing gaze of god’s begotten pain, praise, order and chaos and still caring, revering, abiding, and surprising. So I continue to make space for the full integrity of You&Me&God, because I finally saw that regardless of what beliefs I wrap around my expanding but bounded perspective, we are simply finite forms continuously experiencing the infinite. And when finite forms share a moment of infinite experiencing, the moment becomes us. I&You&You&You become intertwined threads in the everything knit from nothing. Still, if you look closely, the nothingness shines through. It is both a divine expression and a divine test. And the test isn’t easy—are you still looking?

When I am, there’s a presence I can’t shake: We will be who we will be.

***

Influences

Paul Valery

“God made everything from nothing, but the nothingness shows through”

Theodore Dostoevsky

“To love a person, means to see him as God intended him to be”

Richard Rohr, A Mutually Loving Gaze

If we can learn how to receive the perfect gaze of the Other, and to be mirrored by the Other, then the voices of the human crowd, even negative ones, have little power to hurt us. Best of all, as Meister Eckhart (1260–1327) has been quoted, “The eye with which you will look back at God will be the same eye with which God first looked at you.” [1]

Standing humbly before God’s gaze not only unites the psyche but it does the very thing that I know when I teach contemplative prayer. It unifies desire. It frees us from what Henri de Lubac (1896–1991) called the “vertigo of the imagination.” [2] It’s the whirlpool of imagination, looking here, there, and everywhere. Standing before one, accepting God literally allows us to be composed and gathered in one place. We can be in one place; we can be here, now. We can stop always looking over there for tomorrow’s happiness. As the apostle Paul wrote, “now is the favorable time, today is the day of salvation” (2 Corinthians 6:2).

The Beatitudes (inhabited blessedness)

Blessed are the poor in spirit,
    for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.
Blessed are those who mourn,
    for they will be comforted.
Blessed are the meek,
    for they will inherit the earth.
Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness,
    for they will be filled.
Blessed are the merciful,
    for they will be shown mercy.
Blessed are the pure in heart,
    for they will see God.
Blessed are the peacemakers,
    for they will be called children of God.
Blessed are those who are persecuted because of righteousness,
    for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

*

P.S.

Am I doing jhanas wrong?