Category: self-care

Help from Our Friends

by Steve Harsh, posted in Aging to Sageing, Faith and Values, self-care, Wellness

“Then some people came, bringing to him a paralyzed man, carried by four of them. And when they could not bring him to Jesus because of the crowd, they removed the roof above him, and after having dug through it, they let down the mat on which the paralytic lay.” (Mark 2:3-4)

I had a very humbling experience last week that reminded me of the story from Mark’s Gospel about the paralyzed man brought to Jesus in a most unusual way. All three other Gospels contain a similar story where someone is carried to Jesus for healing, but only Mark has this most dramatic detail about the man’s friends being so committed and creative that they lowered him down to Jesus through a hole they dug in the roof.

Wouldn’t you love to hear the insurance adjuster’s response when the homeowner explains the hole in the roof with this story? My experience last week was far less dramatic but still very emotional for me.

The back story, no pun intended, is that because of chronic back pain and peripheral neuropathy I sometimes have a difficult time walking any distance. This is especially true after I’ve been sitting in a confined space, like an airplane seat, for any extended period of time. Last Wednesday my wife and I flew from Columbus, Ohio to Houston, Texas to visit family for the Thanksgiving holiday. The flight was delayed for 30-40 minutes while we sat on the tarmac in Columbus waiting for the pilots to arrive on another delayed flight from Houston. That made the total time on the plane around 3 hours.

Upon arriving at the Bush Intercontinental Airport in Houston we had a long walk (and a train ride) from Terminal E to baggage claim in Terminal C, and I was struggling to get there pulling a carry on and wearing a backpack. My dear wife offered to help with my luggage, but she already had plenty of her own; and I stubbornly kept pushing on.

By the time we got to Terminal C I was really tired and unsure how much further we had to go. We stopped to ask for directions from an airport employee who just happened to have an empty wheelchair, and he graciously offered me a ride. He was a life saver, and I was very grateful for his help. He not only pushed me to baggage claim, he took our claim tickets and got our luggage for us and then took us another good distance to where we could catch a shuttle to the car rental center. He even loaded our suitcases on the shuttle bus for us.

But here’s my problem. While I was very grateful for the assistance we received, I still felt helpless and frustrated that I needed that kind of help. I have not come close to mastering St. Paul’s advice in Philippians 4 to ”be content in whatever state I’m in.” I am reminded every time I look in the mirror that I am 77 years old, and if I forget, my aches and pains remind me of that fact; but I still try to deny it.

So I wonder how the paralytic man in the Gospel stories felt about his situation. We aren’t told why or how long he has been paralyzed. We don’t know if he asked these friends to take him to Jesus or if it was their idea. We don’t know how he felt about being carried up on the roof. That had to be little scary for him!

The truth is the story really isn’t about the paralytic, just as my wheelchair ride wasn’t really about me. The Gospel story is primarily about Jesus, and my story if I step back from my own pity party is really about the kind man who helped us. Yes, he was doing a job he is paid to do, but he did it with such kindness and grace that it was obviously more than just a job.

And Mark’s point in sharing this story in just the second chapter of his Gospel is not primarily about the paralytic but about the healing power of God and who Jesus is. We need to read the first chapter of Mark to realize how central that fact is. Mark wastes no time getting to the radical ministry of Jesus. In the very first chapter he includes four specific healing stories, including Simon’s mother-in-law, casting out many demons, a man with an unclean spirit, and a leper. He goes “throughout all Galilee,” and even though he tells them all not to tell about their healing by the time he returns to Capernaum even though there was no social media to promote his good works Mark tells us “the whole city” is crowding around to get to Jesus. He’s a bigger celeb than Taylor Swift.

But here’s the thing about the story in Mark 2; it’s not just another healing story. For the first time Mark tells us Jesus dares to forgive the paralytic’s sins, and that of course ticks off the Scribes who are nearby and take offense that Jesus dares to claim such divine authority. I love Jesus’ response to the Scribes. He basically says, “OK, to show you my power, how about I just say to the man ‘take up your bed and go home?’” Which of course the miraculously healed man does, and the crowd is amazed because “we have never seen anything like this.”

As I was thinking about all of this I came across this picture of Pope Francis, and it hit me again. My story like the paralytic’s story are not about the helpees but the Helper. If a great man like Pope Francis can accept the help of others who am I to think I am somehow better than that. The truth is we are all dependent on the help of others. It may be emotional support or sometimes physically taking us to the spiritual or physical help we need. It may be realizing we are dependent on the farmers, truckers, and grocers who get food on the shelf for us to purchase.

The secret to it all is being humble enough to recognize and ask for whatever help we happen to need at any given point in life. We all come into this life totally dependent on others to nurture, protect, and care for our needs for several years, and the cycle of life means that most of us will end up pretty much in the same need for caregivers at the end of this life. Our choice is how humbly and graciously we accept that care.

Ode to My Beloved Bikes

by Steve Harsh, posted in Aging to Sageing, self-care

In the words of that great philosopher, Kenny Rogers, you gotta know when to hold ‘em, know when to fold ‘em and know when to walk away while you still can. I needed that wisdom this week.

I made a good but sad and hard decision to give up yet another activity I have enjoyed for about 70 years. I don’t remember exactly when I first experienced the joy of riding a two-wheel bike without training wheels, but I would guess I was 6 or 7. That had to be one of the first liberating rites of passage right up there with learning to walk and potty training.

My bike riding for the next 65 years was pretty routine. And then about four years ago I bought a step-through bike, aka a girl’s bike, because I was having trouble with my balance swinging my leg over the cross bar of my 30 plus year-old Schwinn that my father-in-law had willed to me when he could no longer ride. Almost immediately I discovered that my balance issues had more to do with my neuropathy than the kind of bike I was riding. I was still able to ride for awhile in spite of a few minor low-speed falls that happened while starting and stopping. No injuries ensued, but I gradually gave up trying to ride.

A few weeks ago I went into a bike shop in search of adult training wheels to see if I could still ride some with that kind of help. Talk about the circle of life!!! But a kind salesperson offered me an alternative that seemed to be a way out of that circle. He had me try an electric bike with a small motor which would give me a boost at start up where I had the most trouble getting up enough speed to establish my balance.

After test riding the e-bike (pictured above) in the store’s parking lot I was sold and brought it home on a trial basis. Unfortunately I discovered over the last two weeks that my balance and reflexes just aren’t up to learning the new skills required to master the e-bike. I had a couple minor falls on it, again miraculously without damaging myself or the bike. The last fall was on a short trip down our driveway to get our mail, and I sadly concluded it just isn’t worth the risk of a major injury to keep trying.

So with a heavy heart I asked my wife to help me load the bike in my SUV and returned it to the store. In addition to the sadness of adding bike riding to my growing list of things I used to be able to do, I’ve been processing how to gracefully surrender to the realities of aging without totally giving up on living.

That task is a work in progress, but I believe a piece of it is to be grateful for all the decades of good memories that bike riding has provided for me.   Many of those memories are from the years before I could drive when my bike gave me the first taste of freedom to take myself to the neighborhood grocery store for a pop cycle or candy bar.  It was only a block away, but the longest journey starts with a short one.  That 1-speed (probably also a Schwinn) took me to Little League practice, the community swimming pool, and later every morning for a year to deliver newspapers clear on the other side of our small town.  OK, it was only two miles, but on frigid January mornings at 6 a.m. in northwest Ohio if felt like 20!

The summer I was 15 my good buddy Denny Dafler and I road 200 miles on six 25-mile trips and a 50 to earn our cycling merit badges for Boy Scouts. That was also the summer of my first great love, and she lived 5 miles out in the country. My legs were never in better shape than the summer of 1962.

As an adult my biking has been more relaxed rides of 5-10 miles on bike trails near home—good exercise and sometimes a therapeutic way to burn off frustration or other unresolved emotions. My exercise bike is a poor substitute from feeling the wind of the road in my face, but it is safer and more age appropriate at this stage of my life, and no helmet hair results either.

Farewell my biking self.  Thanks for the memories.  

Mid-Year Reflections on Gratitude

by Steve Harsh, posted in Faith and Values, self-care, spiritual discipline

Having just passed the mid-point of 2023 this seems like a good time to reflect back on goals and intentions I had for this year when it was in its infancy. Among the therapeutic values of blogging or journaling is the ability to look back at what I was thinking and writing about at some point in the past. When I did that recently I was reminded that a key goal I had for myself in January was to practice gratitude.

I must confess I have not done well with that goal and had mostly forgotten about it, as often happens with New Year’s resolutions. Rereading the two posts I wrote about practicing gratitude has been a wonderful reminder of several really good ideas from other people that I wrote about there, including my mentor Dr. Bill Brown, Robert Fulghum, dear friends Jean and Katy Wright, Dr. Brene Brown, Kate Bowler, and Kelly Corrigan. (I am quite proud of the two posts I wrote back in January and really grateful for all the wisdom I borrowed from those friends and scholars.)

So the question now is how do I stay focused on that wisdom and not let it slip again into that vast pool of great ideas I enjoy pondering but fail to integrate into my daily life? If I had a magic potion to make that happen I would gladly share it, but as I said in January gratitude like any skill requires the hard work of practice. Wishing doesn’t make it so or I would be the most grateful, joyful person around, and my dear wife can tell you that unfortunately is not the case.

Physical exercise is a good analogy for regular practice. During the pandemic I started an exercise program of swimming 2-3 times per week, and worked my way up to being able to swim a half mile. I kept that routine up until some health issues and travel caused me to get out of the habit earlier this year. I have just gotten back in the pool a few times in the last 3 weeks, including a 350 yard swim today. Swimming is great exercise because it works the whole body, is aerobic, and provides a quiet, meditative respite from other cares and concerns. But having said that, I must add that I am totally wiped out for the rest of the day after just 18 minutes in the pool. It would be easy to get discouraged about that, but I know from experience it takes time to rebuild my endurance.

Gratitude practice is a similar challenge. It requires the discipline and focus to consciously practice paying attention to all the blessings I am privileged to enjoy. I can choose to take time during the day, especially first thing in the morning and at bedtime, to call to mind what I am truly grateful for, even if I forget. I can give thanks for the beautiful home and yard I am privileged to occupy and not just complain about the work and expense it takes to do so. I can choose to be grateful for all the activities I can still do instead of regretting the ones I have had to give up. I can remind myself how fortunate I am to live in a peaceful place free from violence and war and so far immune from the worst ravages of extreme weather caused by climate change.

But this is not an either-or Pollyanna approach to life that ignores the injustices and suffering of others my community or world. I have used the word “privileged” several times above intentionally. I need to remind myself that I am truly privileged in so many ways largely to the accident of birth. And with that privilege comes the responsibility to use that privilege to do whatever I can to do what the prophet Micah tells us God requires of all of us, “To do justice, love mercy, and to walk humbly (gratefully) with God.”

Put Out Into the Deep – or Shallow

by Steve Harsh, posted in Christian Discipleship, self-care, Wellness

Because of multiple life contingencies I have gotten out of the habit of swimming for exercise in recent months. After two years of very faithfully swimming 2 or 3 times per week travel, injury, spring yard work, and other forms of exercise have usurped the time previously devoted to time in the pool. I had forgotten that swimming is more than just physical exercise for me. It is also a form of meditation and solitude that other forms of exercise do not readily offer. So as I have begun to swim again in the last two weeks I have been reminded of those other benefits of time in the water. I had two radically different but essentially similar experiences in my swimming last week and this.

Thanks to Silver Sneakers (a wonderful insurance benefit for seniors) I have memberships at both our local YMCA’s and a private gym with a small pool. Last week I swam at the private gym and literally had the 4-lap pool entirely to myself for the 20 minutes I was there. It was as peaceful and quiet as any place I can imagine. By contrast this week I went to one of our Central Ohio YMCA’s and almost left without swimming. The cool weather we are having this week meant that the outdoor pool at the Y was closed and consequently the shallow end of the indoor pool was filled with a gaggle of elementary age kiddos making a joyful noise to the Lord or to someone!!

Being a devout introvert I was at first put off by all the noise. As I hesitantly walked into the pool area to see if there was even a lap lane available one of the life guards said to me, “Welcome to the party!” He also pointed me to an open lane which was of course right next to the semi-organized chaos in the shallows where brave high school-aged counselors were riding heard on the younger kids. The guard said I might get a stray beach ball in my lane but otherwise said it was all mine.

These two diametrically opposed scenarios turned out to be essentially the same however once I put on my snorkel and began swimming my laps. With my head submerged in the water I was totally alone in silence, repeating the mantras I use to turn my swimming time into one that is also meditation.

Finding time and space for solitude is increasingly difficult in our extroverted and fast-paced, multi-tasking culture. It requires a great deal of discipline to carve out such time and space in most of modern life, but nothing I have found works as well for me as donning a snorkel and submerging myself in the amniotic, baptismal water of a pool or pond. It doesn’t require deep sea diving experience or equipment. My head is never more than a few inches below the surface of the water, but those few inches filter out all the external distractions. And if I can also quiet the inner noise of my worrisome mind I am as close to a mystical peace as I have ever been.

It reminds me of Luke 5:4 where the disciples have been out fishing all night and have nothing to show for their labor. Jesus tells them to “put out into the deep and let down their nets.” Peter argues that they have been there and done that, but if you say so we’ll try again. It’s like Peter is humoring this carpenter. It makes no logical sense, just like swimming a few inches below the water should not silence all the noisy children just a few feet away. But it works. The disciples’ nets are filled to the breaking point because they obeyed, and my initial resistance to the chaos in the pool was transformed by the lifeguard’s positive attitude to reframe the child-like exuberance into an invitation to a party.

Your quiet place may be someplace entirely different than mine, but we all need one where we can “put out into the deep” of the mystery of existence.

Practice Gratitude, Part 2

by Steve Harsh, posted in Aging to Sageing, purpose, self-care, spiritual discipline

[Note: This post was written on January 2 but not posted until January 4. It will make more sense with that timeline in mind.] My year of practicing gratitude literally began with a tough challenge. For almost all of my adult years the new year has begun with watching the iconic ball drop in Time Square. Thanks to my own and our cultural addiction with football, 2023 was different. Along with a group of friends I watched a different ball drop this year—a ball that will linger in Ohio State fans’ memories as “wide left.” 2023 was literally just a few seconds old when what would have been a game winning field goal over #1 Georgia sailed like a wounded duck far left of the goal post.

That was almost 36 hours ago, but today as I read several articles about the game in today’s Columbus Dispatch I relived that moment and the frustration of a controversial call that dramatically affected the outcome of the game. I should not have subjected myself to that memory, but I was unable to let it go.

For me, that is a prime example of my biggest obstacle to practicing gratitude. I mentioned one of my mentors, Dr. Bill Brown, and his rhetorical theory called attention shifting in my last post, and this is exhibit A for 2023. In the larger scheme of problems on the world stage or even in my personal life the outcome of a silly game should not be my prime focus. The Peach Bowl is over and done. My dwelling on a terrible call by the refs does not deserve the amount of my attention I am choosing to spend on it. And it is a choice. I can shift my attention to a whole host of things that deserve my attention so much more if I choose to do so. [Remember, I wrote this a few hours before the near fatal football injury to Damar Hamlin, but that tragedy underscores in spades that all football games and other athletics must be kept in proper perspective.]

Notice I did not say that this is a simple or easy shift to make. The local media, my friends, and my social media are full of conversations about the Ohio State game. It is not easy to shift my attention away from all that chatter, but it can be done. I can choose to not read about the game. I can literally switch the tv channel when discussion of that game comes on. Unfortunately I don’t have a remote that can switch the channels in my brain when I think about that loss or my own aches and pains, or other negative and depressing problems in our world. But attention switching is a skill that I can learn if I choose to do so. And making practicing gratitude my priority for 2023 is step 1 in that process

2023 Words: Practice Gratitude

by Steve Harsh, posted in Faith and Values, Faith Development, hope, purpose, self-care, spiritual discipline

 I had the privilege again this past Advent to create liturgies for the lighting of each advent candle for our church. When we got to the third Sunday and the candle of joy (12/11/22 post) I asked some of my fellow fans of Dr. Brené Brown to help me find what she has said about joy.  My friend Jean Wright came through with this gem from Dr. Brown: “In our research we found that everyone who showed a deep capacity for joy had one thing in common: They practiced gratitude…A wild heart can beat with gratitude and lean in to pure joy without denying the struggle in the world.  It’s not always easy or comfortable – but what makes joy possible is a front made of love and a back built of courage.” 

There’s an old joke about someone asking how to get to Carnegie Hall. The answer is “practice, practice, practice.”  Well, apparently the way to get to Joy is also, like any other life skill, to practice. Since I am by nature a skeptical, glass half empty kind of person, learning gratitude for me is something that requires lots and lots of practice. Practice is hard.  Playing scales on the piano is work. Practicing on the putting green for hours is not nearly as much fun as hitting the crap out of a ball on the driving range.  But no one will master the piano or lower their golf score without those basic practices.

It is no coincidence that my friend Jean Wright’s daughter, Katy, recently shared her wisdom about gratitude that she learned from podcasts with Kate Bowler and Kelly Corrigan who indirectly address the practice of gratitude by dividing life experiences into two categories, the “happies” and the “crappies.” The trick, of course, is paying at least an equal amount of attention to the former as we do the latter. 

One of my mentors in grad school, Dr. Bill Brown, developed a rhetorical theory that helps with this task. He calls it “attention shifting,” which I will oversimplify here by saying it means intentionally shifting our focus or attention from one thing to another. I was reminded recently of another related skill for keeping things in perspective and practicing gratitude when my wife and I attended a high school production of “Everything I Needed to Know I Learned in Kindergarten” produced by the excellent Theater Arts Department at Thomas Worthington High School in Worthington, OH. Our great nephew Ryan Buckley has been part of that program for all four of his high school years, and we have enjoyed many plays there; but one scene in this production really resonated with me.

The Kindergarten play is based on the book by the same title by Robert Fulghum. I have read most of Fulghum’s stuff; so this story was familiar, but I must have been ready to hear it again. It’s a little long for a blog post, but I am going to include it here in full because it is so good.

Fulghum writes: “In the summer of 1959, at the Feather River Inn near the town of Blairsden in the Sierra Nevada Mountains of northern California.  A resort environment.  And I, just out of college, have a job that combines being the night desk clerk in the lodge and helping out with the horse-wrangling at the stables.  The owner/manager is Italian-Swiss, with European notions about conditions of employment.  He and I do not get along.  I think he’s a fascist who wants pleasant employees who know their place, and he thinks I’m a good example of how democracy can be carried too far.  I’m twenty-two and pretty free with my opinions, and he’s fifty-two and has a few opinions of his own.

One week the employees had been served the same thing for lunch every single day.  Two wieners, a mound of sauerkraut, and stale rolls.  To compound insult with injury, the cost of meals was deducted from our check.  I was outraged.

On Friday night of that awful week, I was at my desk job around 11:00 P.M., and the night auditor had just come on duty.  I went into the kitchen to get a bite to eat and saw notes to the chef to the effect that wieners and sauerkraut are on the employee menu for two more days.

That tears it.  I quit!  For lack of a better audience, I unloaded on the night auditor, Sigmund Wollman.
I declared that I have had it up to here; that I am going to get a plate of wieners and sauerkraut and go and wake up the owner and throw it on him.

I am sick and tired of this crap and insulted and nobody is going to make me eat wieners and sauerkraut for a whole week and make me pay for it and who does he think he is anyhow and how can life be sustained on wieners and sauerkraut and this is un-American and I don’t like wieners and sauerkraut enough to eat it one day for God’s sake and the whole hotel stinks anyhow and the horses are all nags and the guests are all idiots and I’m packing my bags and heading for Montana where they never even heard of wieners and sauerkraut and wouldn’t feed that stuff to the pigs.  Something like that.  I’m still mad about it.

I raved on this way for twenty minutes, and needn’t repeat it all here.  You get the drift.  My monologue was delivered at the top of my lungs, punctuated by blows on the front desk with a fly-swatter, the kicking of chairs, and much profanity.  A call to arms, freedom, unions, uprisings, and the breaking of chains for the working masses.

As I pitched my fit, Sigmund Wollman, the night auditor, sat quietly on his stool, smoking a cigarette, watching me with sorrowful eyes.  Put a bloodhound in a suit and tie and you have Sigmund Wollman.  He’s got good reason to look sorrowful.  Survivor of Auschwitz.  Three years.  German Jew.  Thin, coughed a lot.  He liked being alone at the night job–gave him intellectual space, gave him peace and quiet, and, even more, he could go into the kitchen and have a snack whenever he wanted to–all the wieners and sauerkraut he wanted.  To him, a feast.  More than that, there’s nobody around at night to tell him what to do.  In Auschwitz he dreamed of such a time.  The only person he sees at work is me, the nightly disturber of his dream.  Our shifts overlap for an hour.  And here I am again.  A one-man war party at full cry.

“Fulchum, are you finished?”

“No.  Why?”

Lissen, Fulchum.  Lissen me, lissen me.  You know what’s wrong with you?  It’s not wieners and kraut and it’s not the boss and it’s not the chef and it’s not this job.”

“So what’s wrong with me?”

“Fulchum, you think you know everything, but you don’t know the difference between an inconvenience and a problem.

“If you break your neck, if you have nothing to eat, if your house is on fire–then you got a problem.  Everything else is inconvenience.  Life is inconvenient.  Life is lumpy.

“Learn to separate the inconveniences from the real problems.  You will live longer.  And will not annoy people like me so much.  Good night.”

In a gesture combining dismissal and blessing, he waved me off to bed.

* * *

Seldom in my life have I been hit between the eyes with a truth so hard.  Years later I heard a Japanese Zen Buddhist priest describe what the moment of enlightenment was like and I knew exactly what he meant.  There in that late-night darkness of the Feather River Inn, Sigmund Wollman simultaneously kicked my butt and opened a window in my mind.

For thirty years now, in times of stress and strain, when something has me backed against the wall and I’m ready to do something really stupid with my anger, a sorrowful face appears in my mind and asks:  “Fulchum.  Problem or inconvenience?”

I think of this as the Wollman Test of Reality.  Life is lumpy.  And a lump in the oatmeal, a lump in the throat, and a lump in the breast are not the same lump.  One should learn the difference.  Good night, Sig.

As I reflect on the year 2022 it is very easy for me to see the entire year through the lens of the last couple of months which have been rather crappy for me. Following my 76th birthday at the end of October my 77th trip around the sun began with an unexpected hospital stay because of a very serious urinary tract infection. That urinary infection has turned out to be one that is very hard to get rid of and has been bothering me off and on for about seven weeks now. Because of that it has been easy for me to throw a pity party for myself if I forget to keep my focus on the larger scheme of things. This illness is just an inconvenience. Other than the time I spent in the hospital and I a few days after that, I have been able to continue my normal daily activities. Those activities included the aforementioned opportunities to create Advent liturgies for worship in our church. And by sharing those liturgies in my blog, they have also been used by a number of other readers and worship leaders, for which I am grateful.  I even got a bit of a chuckle each week during Advent when I noticed that the number of clicks on my Advent liturgies always seemed to go up about Thursday or Friday. I remember from my days of active pastoral ministry those were the days of the week when I suddenly realized I needed some help with worship resources for the coming Sunday.

I also realized this week that part of the attention shifting/gratitude practice is keeping my focus on the big picture and not just what is immediately in front or behind me. By paying too much attention to my recent illness I had completely forgotten about an amazing therapeutic golf program I became a part of this summer. That program is quite appropriately called “Fore Hope.“ In brief, this program pairs a wonderful volunteer “caddie” with each golfer. These caddies help the golfers with whatever that individual needs, from loading clubs on the golf cart, putting the ball on the tee, hunting for wayward balls, or literally holding the golfer up while he or she swings if there are balance issues. Having the opportunity to be a part of that program has given me a lot of hope and a new lease on life because I have been able to do something that I dearly love, which I thought was gone forever because of my health concerns. It has enabled me to play golf again with my son, and for the first time with two of my grandsons, and to my surprise as an introvert it also made me a part of a whole new community of friends.

I played my last golf with that group in mid-October and could not have written a more satisfying script for that evening. It was chilly, as October evenings are want to be in Ohio, and I almost wimped out and didn’t go; but I am so glad that I did. You see it turned out to be one of those magical times on the golf course when every putt found its way into or very close to the cup. And what is so special about the Fore Hope Golf community is that everybody is a cheerleader. We don’t keep score; so there is no insidious competition, and when any player makes a good shot everyone genuinely affirms that accomplishment.

But here’s the thing—about three weeks later I was flat on my back in the hospital and in the ensuing recovery from that experience, because I did not practice gratitude, I forgot all about the sheer joy I felt sharing those days on the golf course with my new friends. So for me, at least, an important part of the practice of gratitude is paying attention more often to the happies, and not letting the crappies which come along for all of us knock those moments of joy out of my awareness.

A PRAYER FOR INTROVERTS

by Steve Harsh, posted in Aging to Sageing, prayer, self-care

Even though I had 9 good hours of sleep last night I still woke up tired.  So I’ve been thinking a lot all morning about how exhausting the two week holiday marathon at the end of December can be for introverts like me.  When I was a full time pastor I blamed my tiredness on how busy the Advent/Christmas/New Year’s season is in the life of the church.  Now that I am retired that explanation doesn’t work; especially this year when we celebrated Christmas Eve on line because of the nasty winter storm which canceled in person worship for many churches.

And then I read on Facebook that today, January 2, is actually World Introvert Day.  Here’s what I found in a quick Google search: “Introverts worldwide will be able to celebrate World Introvert Day on January 2. This is the day following the dreadful celebrations of the previous year has ended. It allows them to enjoy solitude finally and recharge their social batteries.  World Introvert Day started when psychologist and author Felicitas Heyne published this blog post calling for a day for us quiet ones.”

And so I wrote this prayer:

Holy One, I am grateful for the spiritual lessons of Advent and Christmas and for the changing of the calendar as a time for reflection and renewal, but I’m worn out.  I enjoyed time with families and friends and lots of good food and fellowship.  But I’m tired; I’m tired of people and parties.  I’m tired of hearing the same holiday songs on a continuous loop.  I need some peace and quiet, solitude and time to just breathe and be. 

I need a sabbatical, and I know you get it, God, even if my extrovert friends never seem to run down.  You took a day off after creation and rested.  You included honoring Sabbath rest in your Top Ten rules for living.  So thank you for that.  Please help me to not feel guilty for putting my feet up and taking a nap today.  Please help me set healthy boundaries on my energy levels; to remind myself and others that we introverts need downtime and solitude to recharge our batteries. 

We can do the party circuit.  We can prepare holiday meals and clean up.  We can play games with the grandkids.  But it drains our energy, and we need time to refresh, especially this time of year when the calendar is super full of events we want to attend.   I even surprised myself this year that I was able be more present and active with family and friends, even when I didn’t feel like it beforehand.  And then I crash when the party is over. 

Please help me be gentle with myself; to not give up or get frustrated, but to rest when I’m tired.  I think Isaiah must have been thinking of us introverts when he said, “God does not faint or grow weary; God’s understanding is unsearchable. He gives power to the faint and strengthens the powerless. Even youths will faint and be weary, and the young will fall exhausted, but those who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength;  they shall mount up with wings like eagles; they shall run and not be weary; they shall walk and not faint.” (40:28-31)

Thank you, source of all energy, for Sabbath moments or days when we can simply wait on you.  Amen

All Nighter Prayer

by Steve Harsh, posted in prayer, purpose, self-care, Uncategorized

Hey God, do you ever have trouble sleeping? Oh, if you are omnipresent, I guess you can’t ever sleep can you? Or do you let the angels take over sometimes to give you a break? Yes, I know that anthropomorphic stuff isn’t real, but it’s 1:20 am; and I can’t sleep. I don’t know anyone else who’s awake at this hour that I can talk to; so you’re it. My sleeping pills have let me down. Reading and doing Wordle haven’t worked; and my blasted neuropathy has my feet feeling like they are on fire.

The more I think about my feet the more they hurt. The harder I try to shut my mind off, the louder the racket in my brain seems. At this hour all my aches and pains seem worse, and my list of things I need to get done in the next few days looms like some Sisyphusian boulder daring me to push it up that damn hill again.

I’m actually scared, God. The pain in my feet has never been this bad before. I’ve always been able to manage it with cream, drugs, and/or ice; but tonight/this morning nothing is working, and I don’t know what to do. I can’t handle sleepless nights like I used to when my youth groups did all night lock-ins at the church, or when I pulled all nighters to study for an exam or finish a term paper.

When you wrestled with Jacob all night long I guess he must have had a lot of adrenaline flowing to keep him going that long. That night near the Jabbock river Jacob had even more things on his mind. He was about to face the music of meeting his brother Esau years after he had swindled him out of his birthright and their father’s blessing. Jacob has sent huge amounts of cattle and other gifts across the river to assuage Esau’s anger, but restless Jacob is afraid it is not enough to buy his brother’s forgiveness. This one who has stolen his brother’s blessing is not satisfied with all his ill-gotten gain. What he asks of God to end their marathon wrestling match is a blessing. Will that salve his guilty conscience? Does a divine blessing imply grace and forgiveness?

In a way yes because the blessing God grants to Jacob is a whole new beginning – a new identity in the form of a new name. He is “born again” long before that New Testament term is coined. Jacob no longer is stuck with his birth name which means “heal grabber” because he tried to yank Esau back into their mother’s womb so Jacob could be the first born. His new name/identity is “Israel” which means “one who contends with God.”

I could use a new identity too, holy parent. My physical aches and pains try mightily to label me as a victim of old age, but when I am caught up in that identity I have little to offer you. I am like a fly trying to escape from a spider’s web, turned in on my chronic ailments instead of focusing my energy on all that is right for me and how blessed I already am.

I could do a lot worse for a new name than “one who contends with God,” even if that means walking with a limp. Please help me, eternal Being, to appreciate my gray beard and arthritis as reminders that I have been blessed with decades of life to wrestle with you and your call upon my life. Like Jacob let me know again that you are not far off at the top of some stairway to heaven, but right here in the sweaty ring of life with me even in the wee hours of the night.

Thanks and Amen

Existential Equinox

by Steve Harsh, posted in Aging to Sageing, purpose, self-care

“So teach us to count our days that we may gain a wise heart.” Psalms 90:12

(365 x 76) + 19 = x? One of the blessings/curses of autumn means that the anniversary of my birth is once again on the horizon. That means if I make it another six weeks I will have logged 27,259 days on planet earth!!!! Yes I know that isn’t what the Psalm means by “counting” my days, but it is a very daunting number that raises the question, “what difference have I made in the world in all those days?” And for me it means it recent years asking the other uncomfortable question – how many more days do I have left? Wouldn’t life be easier if we knew the answer to that, or would it? For the next logical question is what do I want to do with whatever that unknown number is?

I do most of my calendaring on my phone these days, but I still like a paper calendar on my desk to get a wider angle lens on my schedule. I also mark the days of the month off on a wall calendar above my desk, not so much to mark time as to make it easier to see at a glance what day it is.

That is kind of redundant since my watch also shows the day of the week and the date. But with all those reminders I still forgot a PT appointment this morning until it was almost too late to get there. A friend of mine who has a four year old said her daughter has underwear with the day of the week on them, and she uses those to keep track of which days she has pre-school. I think something like that might be useful for retirees!

I mentioned to my therapist recently that turning the page on the calendar gives me a sense of pause now that it didn’t do in my younger years. Having surpassed the 70 year life span mentioned in Psalms 90:10 several years ago the still small voice of mortality keeps reminding me with each passing month or season that numbering my remaining days now takes much smaller numbers than it used to.

When I told my counselor about those feelings he said, “So changing the calendar is existential for you?” I hadn’t thought about it in quite those terms, but I guess it is. And the arrival of fall is especially so when we drop 30 plus degrees in one Ohio day! The fall season is full of mortality reminders as plants wither and leaves fall with the temperature. And more so for me since I also have the aforementioned October birthday just waiting to add another notch to my solar orbits odometer.

They say age is just a number – an ever larger number! I have the feeling the Psalmist knew it takes more than just adding years and decades to get a wise heart. It takes wisdom not just to mark off 24-hour cycles each day but to live each day we are given to make those days count.

Wilson!!

by Steve Harsh, posted in Faith and Values, Faith Development, hope, self-care, Wellness

“Then the Lord God said, “It is not good that the man should be alone; I will make him a helper as his partner.” (Genesis 2:18)

The recent pandemic has reinforced our knowledge that it is not good for humans to be alone. Our daughter-in-law is a very strong and self-aware introvert. Several months into the pandemic she joked that even a committed introvert like herself had to admit that she was missing human contact. Far more seriously we know that the hiatus from play dates and school has had serious mental health consequences on many children and youth who are behind in their social development and their ability to communicate in ways that are not mediated by technology.

Yes, it is true that technology has helped bridge the human contact gap in significant ways with virtual learning and digital meeting apps like zoom, but anyone who has spent much time using those tools will tell you that kind of meeting or teaching and learning is just not as good as face to face contact.

I was reminded of a wonderful movie that explored the theme of human loneliness when I found this golf ball in my bag last week. I led a men’s retreat several years ago where we watched the 2000 Tom Hanks film, “Cast Away” and then explored what the movie said about the human experience.

In that movie Hanks plays Chuck Noland, a harried FedEx executive, who is cast away as the lone survivor of a company cargo plane crash in the Pacific. The good news is he survived the crash. The bad news is he is washed ashore on a small deserted island where he is totally and completely alone. He manages to survive for years by creatively making use of a few items in packages that wash ashore from the plane crash.

One of the seemingly most useless items that floats into Noland’s island home is a brand new Wilson volleyball. No net, just the ball, and while beach volleyball is a real sport, it does require more than one person. That ball however soon becomes the most important factor in helping Noland maintain his sanity as multiple attempts to sail off the island in makeshift boats end in disaster and even a suicide attempt fails.

Noland discovers a way to meet the need for “human” contact without internet, cell phone, smoke signals, or even written communication. He turns the Wilson volleyball into Wilson, his friend and companion. He paints a face on the volleyball and regularly talks to Wilson about his plight. In the most poignant scene when Noland finally manages to push and paddle beyond the breakers and put out to sea on a makeshift sailboat, his buddy Wilson is washed overboard by a large wave and slowly drifts further and further away. Noland can only cry plaintively, “Wilson! Wilson!” as his faithful friend disappears from his sight.

Our men’s retreat was held at a church camp, and one of the men found a Wilson volleyball in a closet in the lodge where we were meeting. That ball, of course, became our mascot for the weekend, sitting with us as we discussed the film, coming to meals with us, and sleeping on one of the bunks in the dormitory-style room where we slept.

Now I have my own Wilson Jr. golf ball sitting on my desk to remind me again that it is not good to be alone. (And, it helps our bond that I played some very good golf with my Wilson, and he didn’t desert me like so many balls have by disappearing into the woods or splashing down into a water hazard.). Please understand, as an introvert I still regularly need and enjoy solitude. Zoom does make many things easier or even possible, like book clubs, meetings over distances without time-consuming and expensive travel, and especially regular contacts with distant friends.

But nothing, not even a lovable volleyball, can meet our basic need for human contact. My therapist says touch is the first and most basic form of human communication. Research has shown that infants who receive an adequate amount of loving touch not only thrive, but those who are not held and touched literally die.

We can see this phenomenon in other species, many of whom mate for life. Unfortunately many Americans have lost sight of the need for meaningful human contact. Our myth of rugged individualism has turned far too many of our human interactions into a transactional, self-centered dance of using people for our own profit and benefit.

Our consumer driven economy and our fear of an always uncertain future have convinced too many of us that we can never have enough material wealth to feel secure. Perhaps the silver lining in our current inflationary anxiety is that we will learn like Chuck Noland did to be satisfied and live with what we have. Powerful story telling like “Cast Away” is a way of teaching us those life lessons vicariously so we don’t have to actually be stranded on a desert island or isolated in a pandemic to learn them.