I was born on the cusp of dawn in a wild Irish forest near the edge of a deep-water lake, and to the deep water in a wild forest on the cusp of dawn, I surely shall return. In the interim—let’s just say—it’s been one-hell-of a spiritual ride. I’ve lingered an hour of two on holy mountains in sacred lands and languished for what seemed like three lifetimes in dark places, unable to reach for a helping hand.
I didn’t set out with this destination in mind.
In case you haven’t noticed the spiritual journey in full of paradoxes—you know—like, you have to be broken before you get healed (Isa 61:1; Luke 4:18). Or, St. Paul’s little gem, “When I am weak, then I am strong” (2 Cor 12:10). I refer to myself on this blog and elsewhere as a misfit mystic. The first of these I have always been. The second took forty years of misfit living before I tentatively stepped into the dusty, well-worn shoes of a modern mystic.
Now, you can bet your own shiny shoes that I didn’t set out with this destination in mind. Far from it! I recall a particular evening that profoundly influenced my early adulthood. A chance meeting led to a conversation with a self-made millionaire. “Do you want to be a winner or a loser, rich or poor?,” he asked, with all the brimming confidence of someone with money in plentiful supply.
It only took a fleeting moment of thoughtless, soulless time for me to be seduced by money’s endless chime. Forgotten in an instant were my high ideals of universal solidarity, compassion, and the innate dignity of all.
Storming through life on the wrong damn train.
Did I want to be a winner? Sure did, did I want to be poor? Not a chance in hell! So I jumped onboard the badass winners’ train and rode it as hard as I could for the next twenty years. But as I wrote in a poem about the fateful evening so long ago, there is a deadly downside to all that desire for power and gold: You can end up all hard-hearted and find your soul is soul.
Today I ride a different train, down a misfit mystic mercy track, where losers are the winner’s and powerlessness the king, and surrender is the only thing that really lets you win. Yep, the spiritual life is full of paradoxes, comrades! And when I’m writing about it, more than a few metaphors. In a recent tweet, I said:
Sometimes you’ve got to get seriously wet in the long dark night, storming through life on the wrong damn train, before finally getting diverted back onto the paradise track. I was born on the cusp of dawn in a wild Irish forest near the edge of a deep-water lake, and to the deep water in a wild forest on the cusp of dawn, I surely shall return. The spiritual life is one-hell-of a ride, comrades!