Our Deepest Gladness by Ruah Bull
Monday, February 8th, 2010“Prayer is not asking for what you want, but asking to be changed in ways you can’t imagine” (Kathleen Norris)
Nine years ago, when I turned 50, I began to say a prayer: “Great Spirit, take away from me anything that interferes with my becoming who I came here to be, so that I can do what You want me to do”. It was a scary prayer-as I had no way of knowing what would follow-but it was what came to me whenever I got quiet. Soon after the prayer began to take up room in my heart, my spiritual director taught me Centering Prayer, and consenting to the presence and action of the Spirit in my life became a daily prayer practice.
As someone called to and committed to the contemplative journey, I continue to discover, sometimes to my dismay and sometimes amusement, the ways and places in which I still try to control my journey with the Holy. I hope –and pray–that at some point in this long unravelling of the false self/ego I will be brought to the place where in fact I can more fully trust and surrender. Years ago a friend who was a therapist told me that no one would undertake therapy if they fully realized what it was going to be like. I think the spiritual journey may sometimes be like that too—so I just continue to ask for help in following this mysterious path into unimaginable places . I don’t know what you are doing, Spirit, but something inside of me keeps saying YES! (My Irish Nanna would say, “God help me!)
