by Lisa Nygard
It always felt safe there. Away from the chaos of my childhood home, that tree house was a constant friend holding my confusion while providing a sense of both internal and external safety. Hopefully we’ve all had at least one experience or place like this where we knew we could come to for rest and a sense of peace. For you it may have been a grandmother’s lap, the reassuring embrace of a parent or the security of a faith community.
Fast forward to today, alive on planet earth in the year 2022. We’re all desperately looking for the path home, a way back to a sense of internal security and rest. The truth is, if we have no well-worn path to our own internal peace, there’s no way we can be a helpful presence to our friends, neighbors and enemies who are in urgent need of a signpost along the way.
In the beginning of Genesis chapter 2 we read about the first time God and humanity enter into sabbath rest together. What we might not think about is although sabbath is God’s 7th day rest, it is humanity’s first full day of being alive and a part of the story. Humanity is created on the last half of day 6. Then they sleep overnight and wake into their first full day of being alive and are asked to…stop. They are invited to rest in the fullness of God’s creation where all is literally right with the world. There is no work to be done other than to enjoy the companionship of God and the good world that has been made.
In today’s urgent, crumbling world the invitation back to Eden’s 7th day rest may seem like a pipe dream; an unattainable ideal. Surely this was part of God’s reasoning for instituting Sabbath as a ritual that has repetitive cycles within creation. Rest for the land, rest for animals, rest for humanity. If we don’t have this pattern baked into our psyche it may seem impossible to stop striving for our own safety and provision. It may seem particularly impossible when all the things, people, and institutions we’ve come to rely on seem as though they can no longer hold the weight the world is demanding of them right now.
Never has there been a more important time to begin, in whatever small way, to move towards habits and actions that will bolster our inner life with God. We simply were not made to live in a state of constant stress, overwhelm and motion. We are finding that things start to fall apart if there is never a pause button, including ourselves. Our central nervous system cannot sustain the weight of the world on it. We must find our pause.
Small steps will begin to add up. Try turning the radio off when you are traveling in the car. Try setting the alarm on your phone several times a day to remind yourself to stop and take a deep breath. Find a patch of dirt, grass or snow and sit in silence for 15 seconds. It will probably seem like an eternity the first time you try it! Grab a friend or enemy to join you in your attempts at creating some pause in your life as it is nearly impossible to start new habits without the help of the people around you. Before long you will notice what might look like a path being worn towards an internal place where there is room to breath and your body can find rest. It might even begin to feel like sacred safety.
Author: Lysa Nygard- Spiritual Companion, Artist, Teacher, Leader, Learner