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Dear Brothers and Sisters:
Let’s continue with Bruce Elkin’s article, Chords of Life.
Higher order simplicity is
creative simplicity. It begins with asking the questions "What
truly matters to me? What do I really want to create?" The answers to
these questions quickly take us beyond material things and superficial
experience. We want love and supportive relationships. We want to feel
appreciated. We want to participate in communities of shared vision and
faith. We want to develop and express our strengths. Mostly, we want to
engage in challenging, flow-producing activity. Frances Moore Lappé
says, "Engagement is the good life." In a recent Yes! Magazine
interview, she said, "What could be more exciting than getting involved
in something that you care about and joining with others and seeing
something change? What could be more thrilling?"
To fully engage our lives, it is critical to recognize two kinds of
freedom: "freedom from..." and "freedom to...." Both are
important. When we are free from the anxiety of not being able to
satisfying material needs, we begin to be free to engage life fully. We
can enjoy the gratifying sense of flow that comes from mastering
meaningful challenges. But only if we add "freedom to..." to our
"freedom from...." Imagine that you're standing at the edge of a
1000-foot cliff. You're free to jump off that cliff. That is, you're
freedom from constraints such as fences or laws preventing you from
jumping. However, you're not free to jump off the cliff and stay alive.
Freedom from... is, by itself, a simplistic, incomplete form of freedom.
However, if through focused, fully engaged practice, you master the
skills of hang gliding and equip yourself with a sturdy glider and
safety gear, then you are free to jump. The jump is no longer a threat,
it's a challenge. It's a way to stretch, to express your mastery and
knowledge. It is a way to experience that Zen-like flow state in which
we come fully alive. It's also a way to experience a focused, higher
order form of simplicity.
"When goals are clear, feedback relevant, and challenges and skills are
in balance," says Mihaly Czsiksentmihayli in Flow, "attention becomes
ordered and fully invested.... (A) person in flow is completely
focused... Self-consciousness disappears, yet one feels stronger than
usual. The sense of time is distorted: hours seem to pass by in minutes.
When a person's entire being is stretched in the full function of body
and mind, whatever one does becomes worth doing for its own sake; living
becomes its own justification." This intensely focused sense of flow is
an example of the simplicity on the other side of complexity.
It occurs in, but is not
limited to, adventurous physical challenges such as hang-gliding or rock
climbing. But tango dancers experience it. So do artists and sculptors.
Public speakers and jazz musicians talk about getting in the "groove"
and flowing as one of the highlights of what they do. We experience flow
interacting with our children or losing ourselves in a good book or
movie.
Merely being "free from" material needs is not enough. To live a
masterful, fully engaged life, we must develop the capacity to create
the results we truly want. We need to develop and apply the skills and
discipline to do things that matter and to do them well. Mastering the
skills and structures of the creative process involves envisioning
desired results, grounding vision in an objective description of current
reality, holding vision and reality in creative tension, resolving that
tension by taking action, learning from experience and following through
to completion. Applying these skills for creating almost anything to
crafting deeply desired results gives us the capacity to maximize our
freedom. It enables us to create what we most want to create. When we do
so, we shift from accumulating more stuff and good but fleeting feelings
to taking on the challenges that make life worthwhile and deeply
interesting. Regularly applying skills and strengths is more than
instrumental. Martin Seligman and others have found that "authentic
happiness" comes from exercising our "signature strengths" every day.
For example, my strengths include "gratitude," and "appreciation of
beauty and excellence." I exercise them daily by going for short walks
in the woods or along the shore. I'm constantly amazed and delighted by
the changing beauty of nature and deeply grateful for my place in the
scheme of things.
My strengths also include
"love of learning," "perspective (wisdom)," "intellection (thinking in
multiple directions), and "input (collecting ideas, stories and
quotes)." I exercise these strengths by writing. I weave together
the ideas I find. I try to see them from multiple perspectives and,
sometimes, express my insights in ways that differ from accepted,
conventional approaches. Doing so -- pushing the edge, taking risks,
saying what I mean -- exercises my last skill, "bravery and valor."
Exercising any of my
signature strengths can make my day happier. Exercising them in
challenging ways often puts me into Csikszentmihalyi's flow state. One
of the most important things that people give up when they reactively
over-simplify their lives is the opportunity to engage in meaningful
challenges and to fully exercise their "freedom to...." However, many
people now choose to limit their consumption of material goods and
experiences so they can engage in mastery building.
Activities such as yoga,
writing, running, music making, do it yourself renovations, gourmet
cooking, and the challenges of social, political and environmental
activism exercise freedom to.... By taking on challenges appropriate to
their skill and experience, they find themselves regularly dipping into
that marvelous flow state and experiencing another powerful element of
the good life well lived. In flow, we no longer seek comfort or
pleasure. We no longer compare ourselves to others. We no longer measure
success by the feelings or emotions it generates. Indeed, the flow state
is free of emotional content. Only after we have finished the rock
climb, created the painting, drafted the essay, or heard the tango music
die away, do we become aware of the results we have produced. Instead of
temporary comfort or fleeting pleasure, we're more likely to feel deep
gratification and gratefulness for the result and for our mastery in
producing it.
When we add a challenging,
fully engaged life to a simple yet pleasant material life, we are better
able to rise above the messy complexity of life. We are able to move
toward the focused and lasting simplicity on the other side of
complexity. However, there is still more to an integral life than
material pleasures and the deep gratifications that come with mastery
and flow. There is meaning, purpose, and that mysterious connection to
Spirit that the Great Traditions urge us to explore. …
To be
continued next week
Et Cetera…Next weekend we
welcome to our parish, Rev Michael B. Semana who represents the Most
Rev. Emmanuel Trance, D.D., Ordinary of the Diocese of Catarman in the
Philippines. Father Semana is this year’s mission coop representative.
Catarman is one of the poorest dioceses in the Philippines; I ask that
you extend to Father Semana your warm welcome, hospitality and your
generous response to his appeal. Next week’s second collection will be
for the mission appeal.
---Let’s give our minds and
hearts to the Lord!
Father Joe |
