A Way to Cope, a Way to Rest

People find all kinds of ways to cope during difficult times. The plague of coronavirus coupled with the anger and divisiveness that’s rocking our nation currently, has sent many people to their therapists seeking help.  My daughter, who’s a mental health counselor, says her online client load has tripled.

I’ve benefited at different times in my life from therapy, but one of my mainstays for good mental health, something that is both free and easily accessible, has been meditational prayer.

I learned to pray going to church as a young girl when God was a magical, white-bearded being that looked and acted a lot like Santa Claus.  My every wish was his to grant.  If I just prayed hard enough and long enough, always humbly on my knees, I would be blessed with getting what I wanted.

As I grew up and changed, so did my prayers.  They became less about God doing my will, and more about me finding answers within myself.  And, in order to gain this understanding I had to inventory my thoughts and feelings in an honest, nonjudgmental way.  I talked to the “god within me” to help sort out my life—and found in the process not only comfort, but clarity.

For example, when I first married a desert farmer, I had a bad case of buyer’s remorse.  It wasn’t that I didn’t love my new husband, I just missed my home back East, the spreading oak trees and grassy lawns, the friends and neighbors I’d known growing up in a small town.

One time I felt so trapped and isolated living in a trailer in the neck of a canyon, I threw open the trailer door in a rage, and started walking.

I wasn’t watching where I was going, I just stomped out into the sagebrush, tears of frustration rolling down my cheeks. I ranted and swore at God about how I’d become this lonely farm wife.  Love or lust had kidnapped my life plans.  I lamented a languishing college degree and lost career.  I didn’t like living on a farm.  I didn’t want to plant a vegetable garden or sew curtains.  I just wanted some television reception, which seemed near impossible, a shaky antennae the only conduit for a few radio waves that managed to find their way to us.

When I was done praying, I felt better. I stood there a moment staring at the canyon wall in front of me, my eyelashes still moist from crying, and noticed some kind of trail going up the side. From a distance it looked like a path animals might use, maybe the deer I spotted out the window this morning, or the coyotes I heard baying at night.  Suddenly, I wanted to follow this trail, just to see where it led.

When I got to the top of the canyon wall I was sweaty and hot from climbing, but the view of peaceful farm fields along the Snake River was magnificent.  I experienced an incredible sense of calm, and knew then that everything would be okay.

Dr. David Rosmarin from the Harvard Medical School discussed prayer and praying in The Wall Street Journal recently.  He said research shows prayer calms the central nervous system and the “fight or flight” instinct. Prayer, much like meditation, rests our brains because it turns off our anxiety switch, and turns on our ability to self-reflect.  Praying is a time when we can be thoughtful, rather than reactive, about our life.

I’m a very relaxed pray-er.  So much so that I’ve had to be conscious about people nearby who might think I’m a little crazy, muttering to myself.  Mostly though, I pray alone, walking outdoors where the natural world almost always puts me in a spiritual space. Praying is especially doable during the Covid-19 pandemic. You may be six feet apart from everybody else, but when you pray, you get very close to yourself.

 

Image credit:  Coronavirus Prayer    Image credit:  Trailer House    Image credit:  From the top of the Canyon by Diana Hooley

A Reckoning on Racism at a Resort

I was floating in the heated pool at the Sun Valley Lodge when I heard protesters in the parking lot shout, “Black lives matter!!  Black lives matter!!”  The irony of this situation was not lost on me.  And yes, I felt some “white guilt.”  In my defense, my stay at the Lodge was a birthday present from my husband.  How many people, especially poor minorities, can afford to stay at a resort?

But, as George Floyd’s death demonstrates, money and what money buys is apparently not the biggest issue for black men, staying alive on the streets of America is.

When I got out of the pool I visited with a family, an older man, his wife, and their daughter vacationing at the resort too. They told me they saw the protesters, about 70 people, almost all of them white, like us. I wasn’t surprised by this demographic, since it was Sun Valley, Idaho. They said the crowd at one point knelt, in a show of solidarity with African-Americans battling institutional racism.  The teenage daughter of this couple told me she joined the protesters in taking a knee.

“I’m sorry,” her mother began, frustrated and looking at me for some kind of support, “but don’t ALL lives matter?”

“Mom,” the daughter moaned, “you just don’t get it.”

“What don’t I get?  What don’t I get?” she repeated, her head whipping back and forth between her daughter and me.

I was dripping on my pool towel and getting a little chilly. The mother said she’d read in the Wall Street Journal that much of the crime committed in America today was perpetrated by minority men, especially black men.

“No wonder the police profile,” she glanced at me smugly while her daughter stared stonily into space. Her husband seemed unusually preoccupied with the mountain scenery.

Did I want to step into this cauldron of family drama with my own, no doubt provocative thoughts?  No.  I just wanted to dry off and enjoy the rest of my birthday present at the Lodge.  The world has a way though, of pulling you in.  You can’t bury your head in a bath towel for long.  And besides, I thought the daughter needed to know someone was in her corner.

“I think,” I began hesitantly, “‘Black lives matter’ underlines or puts an exclamation point on ‘All lives matter.’”  What I mean is, there’s racial injustice in America, and tragically, not all lives do matter.”

The daughter looked hopeful and nodded her head vigorously. The mother looked chastised, so I threw her a bone. “Some people feel like you do, that the police are justified in racial profiling. But stereotyping, having preconceived ideas about a whole race of people, is racism, pure and simple. And there’s no excuse for police bullying or brutality.”

I mentioned that we can see bigotry and racism at work when African Americans make up only a small portion of the population (I later found out 13%), and yet comprise the majority of those wrongfully convicted.  According to sentencingproject.org, black men are five times more likely to go to state prisons than whites, and where George Floyd lived, Minnesota, ten times more likely.  I thought about turning the tables on the mother by asking how she’d feel being profiled for staying at this spendy and exclusive resort while the rest of America struggles with unemployment due to Covid-19.  But then I’d be speaking my own issue.

The mother sat thoughtful for a moment, and finally said, “I don’t know too much about the number of innocent black men in prison.  I guess I haven’t read anything about it.”

“That’s what these protests are about mom!” the daughter cried plaintively. “They’re about awareness!  Waking people up to what’s going on!”

I could tell this discussion would continue for a while, and I was beginning to shiver, I was so wet and cold.  I finally said my goodbyes and padded barefoot to the locker rooms.  As I walked away though, I couldn’t help but smile.  That daughter, she was what America would become, the next generation–and suddenly the future didn’t seem so bleak.

 

Image credit:  Sun Valley Lodge    Image credit:  Peering through the flag