The path to my hoped-for building site.

Hello from my isolation to yours!

 I am here in Kentucky at my farm. Seth is watching Monty Python and laughing. Eric is busy building porches and renovating our tiny house. We had planned to use some inheritance funds to build a house on the ridge of our land, but we decided it would be more sustainable to fix this one up. At first, I was disappointed, because since we bought this 25-acre farm, I’ve planned and expected to move out to the lower acreage, where it’s breezy even in hot weather and where the view is gorgeous year-round. I pictured spending my older years there, at least until it becomes impractical.

 But that particular dream is not to be. Losing something that you never had is nonetheless a trigger for grief. I went through a deep depression after my divorce thirty years ago, even though I was the one who left. It took me many years and much internal work to understand that I was grieving the loss of a future with my family intact. It doesn’t matter whether the loss was expected, celebrated, or sudden and devastating. The effects are much the same. Grief is different than depression. It’s necessary, and it ultimately makes us free. 

Is there a dream or a future you hoped or worked for, but must let go? It could be dancing, writing, travel, having a happy marriage or a big family. It could be a healthy old age or a good relationship with your grown children. Your deepest Wisdom will tell you, through your dreams, your health, and finally, if you don’t grieve, through depression. Isolation makes depression worse. If you notice signs of clinical depression worsening, please reach out. There are resources out there for everyone. What we can do for one another right now, when isolation is mandatory, when we cannot go to our exercise classes, our book groups, or our church services, is to keep our GNUUC community alive in spirit as well as body.

I’m working with your leaders and we all desperately want each of you to know we are here for you. If needed, I can be in Nashville in under 3 hours. There are younger, healthier members who can bring you things you may need. There is money that we can use to help you if you are out of work or financially challenged. We can also help you find the resources you may need.

Finally, as I’ve told you, my son Colin likes to tell the rest of us when we are gloomy, “Go help someone!” It’s annoying, but he’s right. It always works. If we can reach out, even in small ways, to others, we will feel better!

So, what I ask for you today is to help me and help one another. It’s difficult for me to make calls here because our cell connection is iffy. I will be calling a few people a day, but you can serve by calling one other person a day. If you aren’t comfortable calling, look at your GNUUC Directory and send someone that you don’t know well a note or card. Introduce yourself and tell them about you. Maybe they will write back!

If you find that the isolation is too much, if there are things you need or need help with, you can contact me by e-mail or by text or call (brief calls work fine) at cyncain@gnuuc.org OR (859) 221-3034.

I love you and I know we will get through this! We can do it with fear or love. Choose love.

Cynthia

Here are a few resources I recommend!

Calm is a meditation app that usually has a fee, but is providing music, stories (they are wonderful!), sleep and many other guided meditations. Click here for their free resources

If you’d like to try Zen practice or listen to a Dharma talk, check out Upaya Zen Center here.

The view from our yard out to the ridge and forests. Innisfree Farm

The dream is the small hidden door in the deepest and most intimate sanctum of the soul.

 ~  C.G. Jung

Hello Dear GNUUCers!

I’ve missed everyone so much! It’s been a little over two weeks since I saw most of you, but it feels much longer. Yesterday was the first day I left the farm (other than to go for walks) and the first time I drove in 14 days. It’s humbling and edifying to depend upon others and to be confronted with mortality and lack of mobility. It can make you discouraged and depressed or be a spur to live more intentionally and learn the greatest wisdom: the wisdom of letting go.

As a fan and erstwhile student (by which I mean I am no expert despite having read and experienced Jungian philosophy for ten years)of Carl Jung, I rejoice in his proclamations that life can be fully experienced and explored until it ends. He often said that it was the second half of life during which we gain wisdom. And as long as we are cognizant, we can experience the wonders of travel, that is, travel inwards to explore what he calls the “soul” or what we may call the “Self.”

An excellent way to engage in self-discovery and to tap into the wisdom that we already possess is to analyze our dreams. I’ll be talking with you about that and other doors to consciousness on March 8th and 15th. If you’d like to send me a dream that you have recorded, you can do so via e-mail. I may include it in the morning’s service with your permission. A few requirements: write the dream in the first person PRESENT. “I am going into a house and I see a tall, slender woman with black hair.” Just write as much as you remember without including any reflections. Then, after you’ve written it (snippets are fine), tell me what your feeling was during the dream": Fear? Joy? Annoyance? Let me know if it’s a recurring dream.

Don’t worry. I will not be analyzing anyone. Only the dreamer can say for sure what the dream means.

I’ve long felt that dreamwork (which I started at least 25 years ago) is a perfect spiritual practice for UUs. Jung would say that dreams originate in both our own unconscious and the collective unconscious. You may find that a stretch. But even if you acknowledge that dreams are comprised of our own inner landscapes, it’s not hard to find helpful messages. Jeremy Taylor, a UU minister (now deceased) and widely acknowledged dream instructor/author, says that dreams never come to tell us something we already know.

I hope to see you all this Sunday as we have an introduction to the topic of Wisdom, and through the month as well. Thanks to each and every one of you for the cards, notes, texts, and well wishes. You are a genuinely caring and loving group of friends. What a blessing to one another and to all who join you.

Cynthia

Hello GNUUCers & Friends,

I hope you enjoyed learning a bit about Jung and a few of the principles he discovered. His writings are somewhat dense and dry, but much has been written and spoken about him that is helpful if you want to take a deeper dive. I will list a few podcasts that you may enjoy and suggest some books.

One of the juiciest things about ministry is that when I embark upon a topic, I spend time either reacquainting myself or familiarizing myself before I engage with the sermon. It’s been several years since I read about and studied Jung, and my grasp of the concepts had grown stale.

But whenever I share a topic with you during the service, I always find that I need to hear the words I’ve spoken as much as or more than you may. It’s much like any kind of teaching: in order to be helpful to others, you will be learning and growing, too.

After speaking with you on Sunday, I had surgery on my 65th birthday. It was a bit more extensive than I had planned, and I spent one night in the hospital. What I noticed about myself was that I engaged so much more personally with all the nursing and care staff. I remembered and called them by their names. I made sure to tell them how much I appreciated them, asked them how they managed 12-hour shifts and commented upon something I liked about them. I focused upon them as individuals rather than an extension or projection of my discomfort or worry. I looked around me before the operation began and noticed more details about the room and the people than I ever have done before surgery.

I wasn’t consciously doing this because I’d been studying Jung, but so much of his message deals with how we can have more joyful and meaningful lives through our own decisions and interactions. We all have burdens, griefs, and unfilled dreams. We cannot control so much of life and its vicissitudes. But we can control how we engage life. This makes us more resilient and more individuated. Much like the lessons taught by mindfulness, recovery programs, and Jungian Dream work, we really can center ourselves in this day which, no matter what the news tells us, is all we really have. It will make us more aware of those around us, more loving and forgiving, and ultimately happier and more resilient.

I wish you a happy moment or two or a dozen this day.

Yours with love,

Cynthia

PODCASTS

https://jungchicago.org/blog/

https://speakingofjung.com/podcast

https://jungian.libsyn.com/

BOOKS

These are for relationships and very good:

https://harvilleandhelen.com/

Dream and Dreamwork:

http://www.jeremytaylor.com/books_and_dvds/index.html#

Jeremy Taylor was a UU minister and one of the most accessible and renowned dream experts.I recommend Where People Fly and Water Runs Uphill  to start with.

A word of caution: do not use dream “dictionaries”. Do not engage in dream analysis without some training. Do not employ Jungian theory or practice upon yourself. Don’t use the materials to diagnose yourself and especially not to diagnose/judge others. It’s always a temptation but I caution against it! Find a Jungian analyst, spiritual director, or Imago therapist to visit. That said, using the concepts to understand yourself and others can always lead to forgiveness, understanding and resilience. More on dreamwork coming in March!

Thank you so much for the cake and for your generosity of love and spirit!

This past Sunday, I decided to attend services as an observer. Here are some things I saw:

I saw our teens Miles and Xander courageously lead parts of the service. Did you know speaking in public is the second biggest fear after death? We help empower them with unconditional love.

Kristin and the youth did an inspiring and thoughtful service. Although it’s called “Family Service,” there’s plenty for all ages to contemplate. I was still musing about resilience that afternoon.

There were two new children who were about 5 and 2. Little blonde boys who appeared to feel quite at home, and who (along with Lillie and Alice) added that dimension which reminds us that part of our ministry lies in the world we create for the youngest.

I saw Larry gently guiding one of the young boys to take his parents’ offering to the ushers. Theresa and I shared a smile, seeing this. The gentleness and encouragement from Larry made an indelible image for me.

The time of sharing joys and sorrows/concerns was a micro-service. People of all ages, shapes & longevity at GNUUC shared the sources of their hope. It was the perfect day to introduce resilience as a theme. While some came in looking like deflated balloons after a week of despair for our nation, I’m pretty sure many left with glimmers of hope. That’s why we exist.

I don’t remember all of the sharing, but one that I can recall was Dan Crowe’s. He stood and said the best antidote for despair is to help others, then listed several area service organizations that need help. It reminded me of my son Colin who says to us when we get into self-pity, GO HELP SOMEONE. That reminds me: we need a few folks to help with transportation and other things for Room in the Inn THIS week. Contact Jesse.

After the service, conversations ranged from casual to deep. At the table I joined, we started out with banter about the Chicken Soup for the Soul books so popular last century, then spoke about death, and how long is too long to live. We didn’t arrive at the answer, but I saw and felt deep listening and respect for all opinions. Someone told me our lunches are the most important thing we do.

At least an hour past the service, I peeked in to see that Mike, Sarajane, and a few others (I know Loretta helped that day, too) still tidying up the kitchen. It’s a mostly thankless task, but I hope those who do it regularly know that it is a ministry, creating a space of hospitality and warmth for cultivating new connections and deepening old ones. (And, if you’d like to give some of these folks a break, volunteer to help. At present, I think Jesse is the person to contact here as well. I saw Nathanael sitting with the family who visited and thought: if I met someone as upbeat and friendly as he, I’d return for sure!

Two new members signed the book! There are others who intend to. When about ten or twelve folks have joined, we’ll have a welcoming ceremony (with cake).

You are all such beautiful people! I’m so grateful to be a part of your collective and individual lives,

With Love,

Cynthia

AGE

As I write this, I'm sitting here at CVS waiting to get a flu shot. The pharmacist told me that if I wait until 2/10, I can get the super flu shot they give people starting at 65. But, I'll be having surgery to fix my hernia repair on my birthday! And I want to be protected before that.

Sometimes, your age bothers you more than others. When I see my high school friends on social media, I realize it's true: we ARE old! But to those for whom 65 seems eons away: it comes along faster than you can imagine, and you will still feel young inside even as your face and body age. You won't be a different person, even if you look entirely different! 

Our February topic is "resilience"... and aging is just one of many things we need to bend and reimagine ourselves for. Parenting, grief, adversity, and illness are a few others.  And it's one of the best reasons for belonging to a faith community.  We can be so much more together than we can separately! We can influence the present and the future. We can learn from and be inspired and challenged by one another. Best of all, we can companion each other as we walk the long journey of life. What a privilege we have in each other!

Thanks for allowing me to companion you on this journey. 

Love, Cynthia 

GNUUC friends:

I won’t see you this weekend! I’m here in Kentucky resting, studying, and cooking!

Here are some links and addenda from Sunday’s sermon.

I talked about the connections between Gandhi, Thoreau, and MLK. Here’s a link to King’s UUA Ware Lecture

Here’s a link to one of the stories about Nashville’s history of racism.

I encouraged all of us to find a way to be of service. One opportunity I learned about this weekend was The Little Food Pantry.

I know that many of us as individuals and all of us as a congregation give money to local organizations. I urged you to consider in-person service as well, particularly when the service takes you to a neighborhood that you may not otherwise visit. Doing this throughout my ministry, and especially taking my kids along, probably made a drop in the bucket of need, but it helped me become more aware, more empathetic, and more informed. I am sure it helped my kids grow into adults who practice service and are dedicated to the liberation of all persons. Marjorie has used her fluency in Spanish to serve marginalized communities; Casey does yoga workshops and marathons to benefit social service groups, and Colin goes weekly into jails and rehabs to lead 12 step discussions. None of them are saints, but they have a heart for those less fortunate than they.

Here’s another link to look for volunteer opportunities in Nashville. If you try something new, let me know how it goes!

As MLK wrote:

Life’s most persistent and urgent question is, “What are you doing for others?”

Have a pleasant week! Stay warm, Cynthia

Good Day, Dear GNUUC!

First: In the interest of integrity… a correction: It was not Walter Middy who lived a little distance from his body! It was Mr. Duffy in A Painful Case, a short story in James Joyce’s Dubliners.

Here’s the paragraph:

Mr. Duffy abhorred anything which betokened physical or mental disorder. A medieval doctor would have called him saturnine. His face, which carried the entire tale of his years, was of the brown tint of Dublin streets. On his long and rather large head grew dry black hair and a tawny moustache did not quite cover an unamiable mouth…. He lived at a little distance from his body, regarding his own acts with doubtful side-glances. He had an odd autobiographical habit which led him to compose in his mind from time to time a short sentence about himself containing a subject in the third person and a predicate in the past tense. He never gave alms to beggars….

Here’s a link to the story:

http://www.online-literature.com/james_joyce/964/

The point was (and is) that most people of European/ Caucasian descent live less in our bodies than in our heads. We tend to over-think, over-analyze, and over-worry. On the topic of Integrity, we practiced some easy chair yoga, and I hope those who were there felt some of the benefits of simple yoga postures. Besides those I mentioned, yoga can help with sleep, digestion, and anxiety. It’s all about mind/body integration, a word closely related to integrity.

As I write, we are on the precipice of war with Iran.

We (the American people) have been lied to and/or had the truth hidden from us throughout history, but this phenomenon has been exacerbated by the omnipresence of social media and “news” streams that enable and disseminate half-truths and outright falsehoods. Lying and deceiving has become the accepted norm for many.

There is much we can not control. But the endeavor to be truthful and courageous in our own lives is something we can manage, and it’s more vital than ever.

The courage it takes to live from our own truth is evoked by the Mary Oliver poem I shared on Sunday:

The Journey by Mary Oliver

One day you finally knew
what you had to do, and began,
though the voices around you
kept shouting their bad advice – – –
though the whole house
began to tremble
and you felt the old tug
at your ankles.‘
Mend my life!’
each voice cried.
But you didn’t stop.

You knew what you had to do,
though the wind pried
with its stiff fingers
at the very foundations – – –
though their melancholy
was terrible. It was already late
enough, and a wild night,
and the road full of fallen
branches and stones.

But little by little,
as you left their voices behind,
the stars began to burn
through the sheets of clouds,
and there was a new voice,
which you slowly
recognized as your own,
that kept you company
as you strode deeper and deeper
into the world,
determined to do
the only thing you could do – – – determined to save
the only life you could save.

We will continue with our study of Integrity next Sunday, by focusing upon honesty. You might try going through an entire day being truthful. It’s a great exercise to notice how often we bend or stretch the truth, often because we want to be liked, get approval, or not hurt someone’s feelings. 

Have a good week! I’ll be back in town starting Thursday morning.

With love and hope for peace,

Cynthia

Happy New Year!

I wrote to all my offspring and their partners (There are now SIX plus Christina’s daughter Willow!) and told them I hoped that at least one or two of their dreams come true this year. My daughter Marjorie texted back: Why not ALL our dreams? Because, I said, you’d soon be unhappy and want more, and what would you have to work toward?

I don’t buy lottery tickets or gamble. I don’t put much faith in crystals, tarot cards, omens, portents, or wishing and hoping. Some people I know do, and that’s fine. Ultimately, they’ll be disappointed, or reality will confront them in some way.

Life is hard. What we get is what we work for. And…for many people who start out disadvantaged, they may work hard and still not get what they deserve. Life is also unfair.

I believe in karma in the sense that life itself is our own reward and punishment. 

I believe in dreams (by which I mean actual sleeping dreams) as a manifestation of our innate wisdom and the collective unconscious as discovered and defined by Jung.

I believe that human nature can be good, benevolent, and unselfish. But it also can be cruel, dishonest, and petty. In some cases, evil. I don’t believe in heaven or hell as they are commonly understood.

Can you write some statements about yourself like this? For January, we will look together at integrity. For me, the best definition of integrity is this: what I say is consistent with what I believe and with what I do. I’ve never achieved what I consider integrity for more than a short moment. But I keep working toward that goal. I may change my mind again, but for now I’d say a good life is one I can look back on with the satisfaction that I lived with integrity more often than not. Either way, it will keep me busy for years to come!

The person who comes to mind immediately when I think of integrity is Wendell Berry. I know him and his family because his wife Tanya’s parents were Unitarians and I was her mom’s minister in Lexington until she died.  Here’s one thing I wrote about him some years ago:

(On Staying Put)

Nor Wendell Berry, our Kentucky prophet who also “came back,” after fourteen years’ study and wandering, with both affection and loving judgment. He writes in Renewing Husbandry, “Perhaps because I was a returned traveler intending to stay, I now saw the place more clearly than before. I saw it critically too.”

We comprehend the longing to leave home: be it for learning, expanding our horizons, for enlarging our perspective. Those who flee only to escape may never follow this well-trod path of exile and return. But many of us do.

Most of us deeply understand the longing to go home. We resonate with Scott Russell Sanders in Staying Put that humans have an instinct for home that he calls devotion: “I suspect that most human achievements worth admiring are the result of such devotion.”

DEVOTION… implies more than fondness or nostalgia. It implies that, once home, one will endeavor to bring what she has learned home, for good.

Berry is talking about both home and marriage when he writes: “Two human possibilities of the highest order come within reach: what one wants can become the same as what one has, and knowledge can cause respect for what one knows.”

Now, after fifty years of speaking to us through his fiction, poems, and essays, Wendell Berry is beginning to be heard, to be acknowledged, to be heeded (by other than sustainability nuts and UU ministers). Thus it ever has been with prophets. Those once seen as braying donkeys are finally heard, often long after they are gone. Berry will deliver the Jefferson Lecture in Washington DC’s Kennedy Center this month as the recipient of the Nation’s highest honor in the Humanities. “To our national disgrace, he has been a prophet without honor in his homeland.” (Rod Dreher) At least we didn’t kill him first before he saw his honor.

But Wendell doesn’t care for or about honors and accolades any more than did King, or the apocryphal Patrick or Jesus. Some of these stories are fact, some are fiction, some are fantasy, but they are “true” whether they are factual or not. It is human nature to return. It is also human nature to want to improve, oneself and that which one loves. And it is human to refuse to hear the truth, though it be told us again and again. In the case of these four individuals the truth was based in love, devotion, justice and peace.

If you’d like to learn more, go to www.berrycenter.org and browse!

I’ll be “bringing” Wendell via picture and words on Sunday. Will you think about someone you believe has integrity? It can be one of your parents or children, or someone we all know of. Also, bring a cell phone! See the e-blast note about how to be involved (you can do this even if you won’t be there).

Sunday, January 5, 2020 is “Twelfth Night” … let’s celebrate with some play in the spirit of misrule! See you soon,

Cynthia

Season’s Greetings to one and all,

Sunday before last, I traveled from GNUUC to the congregation in Lexington which I served for 14 years. I’d been asked to give the eulogy for a long-time member who died in October. She had dementia for several years; hence, the current minister did not know her well. I was a bit apprehensive. I hadn’t been to the church but once in six years. I knew everyone would be at the funeral. I didn’t know how they, or I, would feel after a long absence. 

Of course, my negative expectations were unfounded. I had delightful interactions with many, many members and felt welcome and at home there, even after so much time. The biggest shock was how gray and how much older some folks looked (including, I am sure, me! I was 44 when I arrived) But, as I sat on the podium waiting for my time to speak, I was still nervous. Others spoke. One of them, a member long before my time, came up to share. She paused, however, and greeted me by bending down and giving me a kiss, saying, I love you.

I can’t begin to explain what that small gesture meant to me. As I thought about it later, I realized that it will be one of those moments I cherish as long as I have memory. It was such a simple thing, but it left a large impression. In that moment, she was like an angel to me.

There are all variety of supernatural angels.

But I’m thinking about the people who, in the moments that they are most needed, show up with love, empathy, and kindness. They are everyday angels.

And what they bring, and how they bring it, is timeless, is mystery, and is miraculous: Love.

I hope you will make time to attend our Christmas Eve service. I’ll be taking on the theme of angels, and there will be some fabulous music presented by our Music Director Fran, our choir, and several other members. Feel free to bring family. It won’t be a supernatural service, but it will feel comfortable and welcoming to those of any faith, or of none. 

Here are some words by the theologian and pastor Howard Thurman:

When the song of the angels is stilled, when the star in the sky is gone, when the kings and princes are home, when the shepherds are back with their flocks, the work of Christmas begins: to find the lost, to heal the broken, to feed the hungry, to release the prisoner, to rebuild the nations, to bring peace among the people, to make music in the heart.

This work is the work each of us must remember to do. And together, we can do.

With Love,

Cynthia