The day of my spiritual awakening was the day I saw - and knew I saw

 - all things in God and God in all things. ~~ Mechtild of Magdeburg 

I am just waking up. This is not metaphorical, rather confessional. This is my truth.

Years and years and years ago, a figure of some wisdom advised, "Let the dead bury the dead!" When I first heard it, I wasn't sure what was meant by this saying, by this man. I wasn't sure of his tone and tenor, nor of how his listeners before me understood these same words, back when first he summoned them. However, as I was trained, credentialed, and paid to explain such adages to others, I did. I carried out my responsibility.

My expectation was this. By explaining to others the most troubling words I encountered in life, the most troubling words I encountered about life would leave me alone. Notable, difficult words, it seemed, could and should be made to work my way.

Here was my thinking. If you are walking down a path and weighty words - sayings of mystery and doubt, verses of loss and sacrifice - rumble up behind you, they will always roll over you. You simply can't move fast enough, you can't possibly stay ahead them. You will be flattened.

The best way to avoid being crushed was to master these momentous stones. Get behind words of mystery. Get behind words of doubt. Get behind words of power and import. Get behind the most difficult words as soon as you hear them coming upon you and make them work for you. From behind even the most significant sayings, my teachers showed me, you can control their strength and guide their momentum toward your own ends, over others.

You see, if I could tell you what certain, particular words meant for you, I myself would stay clear of their chastening. By always directing the important sayings toward you, I would avoid them directly summoning me. From behind the gravest words, I was safe from their gravity.

For the most part this approach worked. Rehearse interpreting the most unsettling words for others long enough and eventually you come to believe the value of your interpretations - for others. Practice telling others what this strange saying or that troubling teaching means for them and soon you realize this same saying, that same teaching no longer has dominion over you. The best way to sucker punch a proverb is to pick the sucker up and throw it at someone else. Make them duck or be clobbered.

"Let the dead bury the dead!" was different, though. This proverb refused to be mastered. I couldn't control it. The words rumbled continually. The phrase seemed tireless. It followed every cycle of dropped leaves and drifting snow and warm sunshine. It was always there, behind me; always here, inside me. In various times and places and moods, I would stumble under its force.

Mostly the proverb troubled me at night. In my dreams it came often as a boulder. Again and again this proverb rolled up; again and again these words pinned me down.

Sometimes, though, this saying appeared in the night as a shirt. In this dream the words were not simply printed on a shirt, as if some forgotten advertisement for a stout beer or a middle school fundraiser. In my dream, these words were the shirt. The saying hung together and it spoke - to me! The words were alive and they told me what to do. I was to get up, get dressed, and go outside. Though I would sleep, the shirt summons me to summon others saying, "Let the dead bury the dead!"

Always, however, the shirt was an embarrassment. It was severely wrinkled; several buttons were missing along the front and at the cuffs. There were stains along the yoke and the collar was frayed. So, in my dream I worked the shirt over. I sewed shiny new buttons - now the proverb could be easily secured. I clipped away numerous loose threads - now the proverb would not entangle and inhabit any of my well-rehearsed movements. I smoothed the proverb out upon my desk as if it were an ironing board and my mind hot steel and my studies heavy starch. In my dream, my utmost duty was to steam out the proverb's discomfort, pressing down firm and hot, melding together all the crumbling messiness of this old, ugly shirt.

In the passing of much time spent sleeping and with diligence, "Let the dead bury the dead" became OK. I remade it, eventually. I rendered it acceptable, even presentable. I washed it regularly. I kept it starched for every occasion. Keeping this bit of wisdom clean and well pressed, it made me look good when I went out. I wore it proudly, in my dreams.

Then there was the day of my awaking. The "when" is not important, neither the "how." Only this, I awoke. And, going to my closet, there was only one shirt. In the whole of my house, there was nothing for me to wear but this wrinkled and frayed saying, "Let the dead bury the dead!"

There was no longer the question of what this proverb might have meant "back then." There was no longer compensation for explaining the significance of these momentous words to others. There was no longer my recurring dream of mastery over this saying. When I awoke, I had no iron, no scissors, no sewing thread and needle. There was only this shirt and this day and this moment.

So, I fasten the buttons that remain. I see the unraveled threads and leave them hanging. I cherish every wrinkle, counting each by name. I know by day's end there will be, quite likely, many more. I dress and go out. I am summoned by a voice beyond me, by one continually crying out to me, "Let the dead bury the dead!"

And when I am outside, once I am out in the world, only then do I realize,

I want to live in the world, not behind some wall
I want to live in the world, where I will hear if another voice should call
To the prisoner inside me
To the captive of my doubt
Who among his fantasies harbors the dream of breaking out
And taking his chances
Alive in the world.*

*Jackson Browne, "Alive in the World" (Swallow Turn Music)

This is a test to hold this space.