Jim Cogley: Reflections: Tues 29 Oct – Mon 4 Nov 2024
Tue 29th Oct 24 – Falling
Last week I had a fall that could have been very serious and put me out of action for a very long time. Coming out of Church, and on my way to the shop nearby, the sky began to open and looking at the blackness of the clouds it looked like a deluge was beginning. I decided to run as fast as possible to make sure I would escape the worst. Reaching full speed, my foot tripped against the corner of a kerb, and for a brief second my entire body was feet off the ground, and I was flying through the air heading for a serious crash landing on the concrete. For some reason, in that brief moment, I made a decision not to go rigid in fear and just surrender to what was happening. It didn’t prevent me from hitting the ground face down with full force, but it allowed no part of my body to take much more impact than any other. My glasses were slightly twisted, my knee and elbow a little grazed, my ego bruised, but other than that I immediately got up, felt little discomfort, and this time walked mindfully and gratefully to where I had been going.
Wed 30th Oct – Accidents – Not Being present
Yesterday I shared a story of falling, conscious of the fact that so many are accident-prone. A fall, especially as we get older, is potentially serious and many say how they ‘felt shook’ for a long time afterwards. Reflecting on my own experience I would have to admit that I wasn’t there when it happened, I was entirely somewhere else. My focus was on the shop to where I was going, and I was already there and out of the rain before the fall ever happened. This is the opposite of mindfulness, where I was just not present to the moment, or what I was doing. This is the lack of awareness that gives rise to almost all accidents, and if it happens regularly it’s likely telling us that its not about getting older, but more likely that we are in the habit of being somewhere else, other than where we actually are, and so we leave ourselves vulnerable, especially to blaming something other than ourselves for going on a mental vacation and leaving out home unguarded while we were not at home!
Thurs 31st Oct – The Discipline of Awareness
Mindfulness is all about being present to the moment and what we are actually doing in that moment. It is a discipline that many don’t practice and end up paying a high price when something happens. I sometimes ask someone where they were when the accident occurred and they invariably answer, ‘I was distracted’ or ‘not paying attention so I didn’t see it coming’. The fusspot personality finds this particularly difficult because the mind is always racing in a dozen different directions and never present. They have such a meticulous attention to detail that something important usually gets omitted. It’s a useful practice to just notice how we lack presence. Doing the washing-up do we find ourselves already doing something else, and if so we are not present? Going somewhere we become so focused on where we are going that we notice nothing along the way. Becoming very aware of how little aware we are is the first step towards awareness, but it is a discipline.
Fri 1st Nov – Quality of Presence
Practicing the discipline of awareness is one that reaps great rewards, quite apart from leaving us less prey to accidents. Being more present to ourselves the quality of our presence becomes very noticeable to others. They feel that we are much more with them that when we were simply fussing around doing things for them. In a family where a mother, while based at home, could never sit still and was always going here or there, she still prided herself as always being there for her family. One day her little daughter completely deflated her ego when she said, ‘Mummy, do you know that I really miss you, even when you’re at home?’ We can never measure the quality of our presence by physical presence or by doing things, but only by actual real presence when we are fully there.
Sat 2nd Nov – Fear of Emptiness
The person who is hyperactive and always needing to be on the go may be quite lonely and afraid to face the pain of his or her own emptiness. Not only will he or she be addicted to work but also most likely they will also be dependent on others approval, always looking over the shoulder to determine what others are thinking. Without having some space for quiet in our lives we really leave no space for God and so we have to substitute other things. That’s really where we are at in the Ireland of today. In certain respects, we are losing our soul and rapidly moving towards the place where we will be buying things that we don’t need, with money we may not have, in order to impress people we don’t know. The result is that the more we fill our lives with busyness and external stuff the more unfulfilled we will be.
Sunday 3rd Nov – Love and Attachment
The Gospel of today speaks of love of God, love of neighbour and love for self as being the doorway into kingdom living. Love by its very nature is mysterious and takes a lot of figuring out. It’s something that we all want and generally want more of. Yet the very thing that we tend to most identify with love is the very thing that is the greatest obstacle to being loved. Here I’m thinking of attachment. Surely, we imagine that to love someone is to be attached to them and the more attached the better. Yet our experience and even nature teaches us quite the opposite. Two birds can only fly together when they are free but if you attach them together with a string then they may have four wings but will be unable to fly. It’s the very same in the world of close relationships. If you love something you will set it free and if it comes back then it’s yours forever but if it doesn’t it never was. Over attachment is a form of neediness and neediness makes us want to control the other and so has the potential to destroy any relationship.
Neediness can be understood as that unhealthy space where I want someone else to be my life when all they can offer is to be in my life. It could well be described as a form of emotional trespass that can only lead to isolation.
It attachment is not healthy neither is detachment because that would mean to not care or to be indifferent to the other and their needs. Perhaps a good word for a healthy relationship would be non-attachment, which allows the other person to be who they really are and supports who they want to become. The key word with non-attachment would be allowing.
A man complained continually about his wife being involved in so many things outside the home and not being there enough for him. He was a needy insecure person who didn’t realize that it was his need for attachment that was driving her away. When she was asked why she spent so much time outside the home she said she needed space to breathe and that she was being suffocated by her neediness. Obviously, he was someone who had a lot of unmet needs from childhood, perhaps from his mother, and had carried them forward into the marriage. He had then transferred those expectations onto his wife and expected her to also be his mother. These she couldn’t cope with and resented being burdened with, and then she resented him for not meeting those needs. It had become a vicious circle that unfortunately is all too common and was placing their marriage in danger.
With too much attachment we need to control and that comes out in so many forms. One man insisted on keeping all knowledge about finances away from his wife. She never saw the chequebook and he was always vague about how much he earned. Any attempt to earn her own money was argued out of existence. While he appeared to be minding her and saving her hassle, by keeping all the finances under his umbrella, he was actually exercising control. In the world of relationships ‘control’ is always a dirty word. It’s the very opposite of allowing or giving freedom.
A person who is controlling actually fears abandonment and so he or she tries in all the wrong ways to hold on to the love that he actually fears losing. Jealousy is a typical example and has been well described as ‘a dragon that devours love under the pretext of keeping it alive’. It’s where too much wanting can prevent us from having. So many relationships are affected by jealousy and get destroyed because of it.
Finally, a good test to check whether a relationship is healthy and growing or stagnant and toxic is to ask whether it is exclusive or inclusive. An exclusive relationship is where two people draw a tight circle around themselves and have no room for others to get close. It’s where they look to each other to meet all their needs and other friendships are deemed a potential threat. This is just not viable in the long term. Such a relationship is inward looking and should carry a government health warning since it can seriously damage one’s health! On the other hand, an inclusive relationship is open to closeness with others and is able to embrace other friendships in the circle of love that they enjoy. Such a relationship is not about two people looking at each other but two looking outward in the same direction. A relationship like this is continually being enriched by what is coming from the outside and so is able to deepen and flourish.
Finally, for love to flourish attachment needs to give way to non-attachment and this gives freedom. However, it usually doesn’t happen without suffering. Control needs to be avoided at all costs because it tries to rob another person of their power and there is no one to be feared more than the person whose power you have taken even if they have allowed it to happen. To control is to hold on while the essence of love is to let go and it is only with freedom that real love can flourish and mature.
Mon 4th Nov – Present and Presence
If God is the divine presence that permeates all things then there has to be a direct connection between being present and living in relationship with the Presence. This is where Divine Providence only becomes a reality for those who live in the present. It is all too easy to live in the past with mistakes and regrets, or to live in the future with problems and fears, and so to miss out on relationship with Presence. Many are born worriers but what is it but a living in the future that is purely fear based. It is a rocking horse exercise for the mind that gives the impression of going somewhere while there is no progress. Likewise, it could be classed as a form of prayer, but for the worst possible result. Thich Nhat Hahn nailed the significance of living in the present so well when he said, ‘The present moment is where life can be found. And if you don’t arrive there you miss your appointment with life’.