Today is a day. A day I can anticipate or dread. We are planning to work on prepping the back room for incubating eggs and setting up a brooder. These plans that I make with the Punk (aka, Punkin, Punky, Lemonade, J and many more), are frightening and overwhelming and I thought to myself, I should pray. I should pray some serene and simple prayer that invokes anticipation and open-mindedness instead of this fear and dread that I am currently feeling. But I'm not spiritually sound these days, and my prayers are more like, "...... idk, ..... whatever...." So I thought, I'm going to look up the Prayer of St. Francis, and that I did. I took a side road and looked at the prayer of St. Patrick since today is St. Patty's day, but it didn't inspire me, it just made me tired. I proceeded to the prayer of St. Francis, one that I know that I love.
Peace Prayer of St. Francis
Lord, make me an instrument of your peace:
where there is hatred, let me sow love;
where there is injury, pardon;
where there is doubt, faith;
where there is despair, hope;
where there is darkness, light;
where there is sadness, joy.
O divine Master, grant that I may not so much seek
to be consoled as to console,
to be understood as to understand,
to be loved as to love.
For it is in giving that we receive,
it is in pardoning that we are pardoned,
and it is in dying that we are born to eternal life.
Amen.
Maybe this prayer is inspiring and not tiring because I am familiar with it. Maybe it's because the first line puts the burden back on the Lord.... "make me an instrument of your peace...." I am not responsible, I am humbly asking God to make me into something. And what I am asking is not of my own accord but HIS peace. My spirit is not prayerful or full of wisdom right now. But I know enough about the power greater than myself to know I cannot conjure up a peace for myself like the peace that my higher power can give me.
The current buzz in education is trauma informed, sensitive, responsive. Part of that is to really listen and to seek to understand, and not just listen to respond. And I think, "grant that I may not so much seek.... to be understood as to understand...." Wow. I think that huge and deep and profound. It is enough. I think about myself and all my compulsions and obsessiveness and my desire to write, to talk, to be understood and how it mucks up relationships and communication. So forgive me my selfishness and let me seek to understand. How will that change my relationships with those I love the most? I don't know yet. But for today, I will pray the prayer of St. Francis and borrow his words and seek to give and not receive, love and not to seek love for myself, to console and to understand. Today I will ask God to work miracles in me since I am weak and hate and judgement are the easy paths. Today I will seek to bring joy and be a willing participant in my own story. Today, as I seek humility, I will remember that doing nothing is still a choice, and doing something does not mean I am not open to whatever God will bring me.
Amen. and namaste.
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