Time flies! But I find this post strangely appropriate for this time of new beginnings. Here’s wishing us all a new year in which we can afford to be wasteful with the good. Read on to crack this one.
There is a hypnotic bossa written by a Polish soul singer, Mietek Szcześniak, Spoza nas (From beyond us).
I often find myself repeating its lyrics as if they were a kind of personal mantra.
The song has been covered widely, with time acquiring, perhaps, a bit of a cult status.
For a particularly lovely version, try this Polish-Portuguese collaboration of the Chicago-based duo Grażyna Auguścik and Paulinho Garcia.
The lyrics are as follows (I translate from Polish, Paulinho’s Portuguese version changes the text a little):
Don’t be scared of walking on water
Of never making it
Of getting all you wished for
Of a hard total yielded by the soft data
Of a love that’s not for you
Of waiting long for no-one
Embrace this inhuman time
Put your ear to the pillow
‘Cause all that happens to us
Comes from beyond us
The song’s flowy, lullaby-like feeling betrays a message that, if you give it some time, can really seem quite frightening.
We know, of course, that success in life is not a given (do we?) We’re realistic enough (aren’t we?)
But the therapeutic, capitalist self fights this knowledge tooth and nail.
It’s one thing to know, theoretically, that there are some things beyond our control—though, surely, we can minimize this pool with careful planning, waking up at 6, and working on ourselves rigorously, can’t we?
It’s quite another to take this knowledge home, spoon with it tenderly, make it breakfast in the morning.
I remember six, five years ago, when I first attempted meditation, I struggled with many aspects of it. Some of the difficulties took me by surprise.
Finding a pose I would be comfortable in for 20+ minutes was relatively easy. But then, one of the hardest things (!) was placing the hands I held on my knees palms up.
I didn’t have to do it—there are many things you can do with your hands when you’re sitting cross-legged in meditation, and keeping them clasped is perfectly fine.
But I was drawn to the palms-up position precisely because of the resistance I felt within my body every time I attempted it.
This tension told me something was up.
That open hand felt so vulnerable, so unnatural.
When you turn your hands up, there is a shift in your upper body—your shoulders expand slightly, your clavicle lengthens, your ribcage is suddenly out in the open—offered up, defenseless, at rest.
The discipline of gratitude appears consistently on the syllabi of all kinds of life coaches—from dating to simplicity to grief.
Technically, it would seem that the muscle of gratitude is part of the general fitness I’ve spoken of in the previous post. This might make this reason a bit repetitive, a bit redundant.
But this discipline holds a special place in my heart. It also seems to have universal—perhaps fundamental—importance.
Czesław Miłosz, the Polish literate and Nobel Prize winner, said somewhere in an interview that a grateful person will always believe in God.
It sounds simplistic, but he might have been on to something.
By necessity, gratitude aligns us with the Beyond.
The Beyond is scary—don’t I know it!
We spend a substantial amount of our life energy obsessing over it, turning the many possibilities around in our heads over and over again, until madness and exhaustion.
Will I make it? Will I fail, again?
What will happen to me?
Will I ever get what I wish for?
What if I wait in vain?
What if I struggle for nothing?
Time and again, we’re proven right in our fear—or so it seems. (It’s hard to ascertain the value of things that happen to us.)
But wouldn’t it be outrageous, and radical, and freeing, and absolutely narrative shattering if we opened ourselves up to the thought that everything that happens to us—everything that comes from beyond us—everything that we’re afraid of—comes from a place of love?
I know that some Christian theologians like to make Christianity into a kind of complex courtroom drama—a story of a criminal humankind who is arbitrarily placed in the dock by a deity with an apparent chip on its shoulder.
The deity then proceeds to think up some convoluted legal fiction trick in which the criminal record we didn’t know we had is ascribed to someone else so we can live guilt-ridden and in debt to that person forever.
This is, of course, the (relatively) simple retelling, without all the indigestible theological jargon.
But when Christ came to earth, He didn’t talk much about this story.
In fact, on numerous occasions, He dynamited the commandments that lay the foundation for the action of that drama.
He suggested, at one point, that our fixation on sin is inherently self-destructive. Yes, along with Dallas Willard (Divine Conspiracy) I think that when He uttered the infamous words about chopping off your hand if it causes you “offense,” He was being hyperbolic.
He was exposing the absurdity of trying to live up to an unrealistic, indeed inhumane, standard.
He was saying, If you want to be consistent in your quest for purity, why not go all the way?
The Preacher pulled at a similar thread in a disarmingly honest passage in Ecclesiastes, “Be not overly righteous, and do not make yourself too wise. Why should you destroy yourself?”
Instead, in the same Sermon on the Mount, Christ proposes an alternative to “the righteousness of the scribes and the Pharisees,” that is, an alternative to a life marked by obedience to a set of rules.
Do you know that some scholars (see Gabriele Boccaccini’s Middle Judaism) classify Christianity as a type of Judaism? Think about it. It is not so far-fetched at all.
Similar canon. Similar ethics. Sure, there’s the question of who the Messiah is. But does the figure of Christ really make such a big difference to many so-called Christians?
My tango teacher quips when he puts on the music, “Music never bothers anyone.” He’s referring to how many dancers ignore the music and keep dancing the same thing regardless. I think the same can be said about many so-called Christians. Christ doesn’t really bother what they believe.
Anyways, Christ’s alternative to a life marked by rules is a life marked by gratitude.
Gratitude is the lens I use to read a lot of the passages in the Sermon on the Mount. The attitudes Christ describes are all but impossible if they do not stem from this all-encompassing, all-pervasive knowledge that you are loved.
How many times have you thought, If I were rich, I would not have to worry about this. If I were rich, I could sue this man and never have to deal with this again. If I were rich, I wouldn’t be upset about this. If I were rich, I could afford to be kind to people. If I were rich, I would be giving. If I were rich, I wouldn’t have to work so much. If I were rich, I could focus on my loved ones and myself, and the good things in life.
Christ’s message is exactly this: You are rich. You are blessed (=happy), whatever your circumstances or limitations. You are not a victim. You are loved.
Only when we inhabit the reality of that belovedness do the ethics of the Sermon start to make sense.
Christ describes ethics marked by gratitude—by the kind of nonchalant, spendthrift sharing of the good that can only happen when you know you can afford it.
You can afford to forgive.
You can afford to let go of anger.
You can afford to go to sleep without worry.
You can afford to be kind.
You can afford to love with an open heart.
You can afford to throw it away.
You can afford to absorb this calamity.
You can afford to be grateful.
Don’t you feel resistance building up inside of you right now, reading these words?
We live in a culture in which worry is a badge of honor.
Opening your hand like that smacks of irresponsibility, of naïveté.
“If you lie [or otherwise bend the rules of ethics], that only proves how much you want it.”
This third reason takes me straight into the fourth one, but I’m getting ahead of myself.
For now, let me say that the discipline of Christian gratitude is the third reason I still find myself doing Christianity—with joy and happiness. So much happiness.
Beautiful post, Carolyn. Love the lyrics you translated. Also love the simplicity of Christ's message and the way you've been able to distill it. I've been very curious lately about what he often referred to as the "Kingdom of Heaven" and I believe you summarize it quite well. Not some faraway oneday afterlife but this place, right here, right now—if only we can see it, experience it, live it. Happy New Year!!