Awkward Prayers (like this one)
When you don't know how to pray,
pray awkwardly.
Pray with a tongue unsure of language.
Bow your head or lift your head,
but whatever you do, use your face in the process!
Your face isn't the only place you pray, from,
but it is one of them, and your face reflects your heart.
Move your body or quiet your body,
but whatever you do, let your body lead in the process.
Your body isn't the only place you pray,
but definitely, definitely,
your body is an important part of prayer!
The whole body, from toes to tiny hairs,
craves the act of prayer, which reflects your heart.
You are a living temple in need of prayer,
like all of us are.
You might not have any idea
to who or what you are praying anymore.
You might not believe in the old gods
or the new gods or the ideas you have been taught
that they represent or the stories
that are told by people
you aren't sure you trust anymore.
But pray anyway.
Because whoever the Divine really is,
they will hear you no matter what words you use,
as long as your heart feels the call!
And yes, I call the Divine, They/Them/We
You might not feel you know the old goddesses
well enough to use their ancient names.
Or you might feel the new goddesses haven't called you.
You might be afraid even to call on
the Ever-Emergent Ma.
She who has been appearing for 50,000 years
in every village, in every street, in every rock or river.
She just keeps showing up
no matter how they try to hide her.
Not possible. Did you hear me?
Not possible. Not possible!
Dear One, have you been called?
Has she called your name
in the places between places?
Summoned you from the depths or the heights?
Have you been called to crawl into her lap for a nap?
I have….
She Knows Our Secret Names, Even If We Don't Know Hers
Sometimes I just cry out, Ma, Ma, Ma,
and it becomes Mama, Ma Ma.
Ma, Ma, Mama, Ma, Ma, Ma, Ma, Ma, Ma, Ma, Ma, Ma, Ma,
Mama Mama, we have forgotten
who you are forgotten who you are.
You are our mother. You are our mother.
You are our mother. Yes, you are.
Yes, you are.
The Mother Hears the Calls of Her Children
And in the calling, you create a relationship
that isn't about her answer,
but about you showing up in such a way
that shows you are willing to be changed.
Have you heard?
She changes everything she touches,
and everything she touches changes.
She Changes Everything
She Touches Everything
She Touches Changes
She Changes Us
You are willing to be changed,
willing to be supple,
willing to not know and yet to know.
This time you don't know
how you are going to make it through.
That's how I feel too.
I call this a prayer shawl time
because the other day I had hat head.
Yep. Hat head. You heard me right.
You know, I wear my cowgirl hats
and I get this sweaty ring thing.
So I put on my prayer shawl
right over my head and I just knew it.
I knew it in my whole body,
This is prayer shawl time.
I took off my hat
because I was somber and afraid of war
and despairing of our sweet sad world,
and I had to speak to you,
but I didn't have words and my hat felt too jaunty!
The shawl went around me and my hands went up
and my body went upright and my face turned up
and I began to pray with you.
This is enough some days, just to begin.
Just begin when I don't know what to say anymore.
So you don't feel alone. So you know, I'm here.
Sometimes, sometimes I just beg.
Sometimes I just say, Ma, I don't know what to say.
And this is how prayer begins,
awkward prayer.
Last winter I was praying in my own awkward manner
and I was in a body of water
and it just seemed the thing to do
because I felt desperate for connection.
By the way, being desperate for connection
is also a perfect time to pray.
Well, this particular day I was audacious
as I sometimes am,
I am a wild child as you know
and so I was audacious enough
and I prayed for a sign.
I don't do that often.
To me, it seems inconvenient for the deities
to get all these requests for signs in nature.
So I try hard not to ask them.
But you know, every time a raven flies and caws,
every time an owl hoots or the dove coos,
or I hear the sound of wings, I call it a sign.
It's enough of a sign to see a bird!
You know how you feel special when you see a bird?
What if every time you saw the bird you were looking for,
you just started praying?
Well, on this particular day, I heard a voice.
Yes, yes, I know.
I don't hear them often,
but it's true for me in my own body
and in my own auditory listening.
And I heard this:
“Praying for the sign is the sign.
Praying for the sign is the sign.”
Just like that
and I laughed out loud.
And then I got hundreds of jellyfish stings.
But that was enough and I've been riding that answer,
‘the praying for sign is a sign‘
for going on about nine months now.
But you know what? I have a testimony! I do.
Two whole people,
actual human beings that I didn't know before.
They have told me they are the answer to THAT prayer.
I know it sounds strange, right?
And awkward and wild!
One of them, precious one of them,
He/She even told me on a random Tuesday in April:
“She, Mama Mary, she sent you a whole person.
Me, I'm the sign.”
I believed and he/she lives across the world
and is my prayer and poetry anam cara.
We speak different languages,
but our hearts are the same.
So if someone tells you they are answered prayer,
I figure…..better believe them. And I did.
And then another one of them
just this past Monday.
Yeah, she told me”
“Yes, she did send me.
Of course she did.
How could it be otherwise?”
Moments before she wasn't sure
but then she was and we laughed
and we prayed and we faced the sun and the sea
and we drummed and we asked for support
and we offered our support to the world
and we believed enough, it was enough.
We are enough, You are enough.
An awkward prayer is more than enough!
You know what the poet Rumi says?
You've heard it, right?
You've heard what Rumi says, because you know,
when Rumi speaks, we better stop and listen.
Rumi says”
“If you can't pray a real prayer,
pray hypocritically, full of doubt and dry mouthed.
God accepts counterfeit money as though it were real.”
Let me say that again.
“If you can't pray a real prayer,
pray hypocritically, full of doubt and dry mouthed.
God accepts counterfeit money as though it were real.”
Mic drop, Rumi, mic drop.
You know what?
It is only an awkward prayer
in the first few seconds
and then it becomes a thing of beauty!
On that one day when we were facing the sea,
our friend came and she stood with us
and we spoke of circle, of song, of land, of tree,
of old times, of new times, of villages, of festivals,
of future gatherings of the women, and
we together believed enough.
And we believed we were called together to gather.
Just a year ago, I saw these women that I was praying with
and my heart leapt and I said, “I want to be their friend.”
And one year later, here we are, praying together
awkwardly and truthfully.
When I pray, I ask: How can I be of a support
to you and your children, Ma?
Usually when I offer myself, I get an answer.
The answer comes in a form of deep longing to serve,
to use my gifts for good, to be a sign in the lives of others.
Awkward prayers turn into stories like this one!
Now, I know, I know,
Is the Ma of the Universe actually sending me humans
as evidence that I am supported
such that I feel the courage to support others?
Just this past week,
people have called me courageous.
And as they call me courageous,
I think of the root word of courageous, which is courage,
which is couer which is heart, heart.
Is the Ma of the Universe actually sending me humans?
As evidence, I am supported enough
that I desire to support others?
I don't know. I don't really know.
But the truth is they are here.
And so I believe. And why not?
What within me withholds my faith?
That's where my work is,
to redefine my relationship with faith
as it has changed.
With so much loss, faith changes shape.
Faith is a shape shifter.
And if I am supported,
will my actions be different
than if I do not feel supported?
Hint: yes!
This is prayer shawl time.
So you know what?
It doesn't really matter
how you show up, but just that you do show up.
You can pray all kinds of ways, you know.
You could pick a flower with each petal,
declare your love and longing.
You could pet your cat and
pray with every furry stroke.
You could sit on a hard gray-red stone
filled with red ochre stardust,
and you could have a conversation with a rock.
And if you haven't done that,
I cannot recommend it enough,
especially one covered in moss.
You could walk.
You could walk out
not knowing where you're going.
You could put one foot in front of the other
and notice it with your whole body being in motion
in the dance of belonging.
You could practice belonging on earth at this time.
Practicing belonging is a real doozy
but it's a gooder too.
You, beloved, you could touch a tree,
a tree with bark, with messages,
and you could stroke that tree,
and you could love it with your whole identity.
And you could give thanks for the absolute miracle of trees.
I mean, come on,Trees! What a good idea!
Whoever thought those up was really having a good time!
And am I ever grateful for trees?!
Trees! They're like my family now
that many of my family members have gone.
Trees are my family.
You, like me, could choose to live
and be in love with the beauty right here on earth.
That's a real good one, right?!
Be in love with beauty. That's my favorite!
Being in love with beauty.
You could see beauty with eyes open wide and wonder,
and as you do, you could give thanks for it.
Just like that. That's prayer!
That's a prayer, baby. That's a prayer!
I know sometimes you're resistant to prayer.
I get it. Me too. That's why I'm here, with you.
This is prayer shawl time and circle gathering time.
You could pick a shawl. Any one will do.
It could be a fuzzy blanket for all I know.
You could place it on your head
or put it on your shoulders and just see what happens.
You might even laugh!
There in the quietude
of your single act of astonishing faith,
something will and can happen!
I don't know what,
but the choice activates the field around you.
And sometimes feeling can happen
and feeling and prayer go together,
which is why it is hard to pray when you don't feel it.
Don't wait to feel it!
Just remember that your mothers, mothers, mothers,
mothers put on prayer shawls in times like these.
That is why you have to start, even if you don't feel like it.
That is why I am here with you right now
to encourage you to not have to feel like praying
in order to begin.
The words you're hearing right now
are evidence that Prayer is Love in motion in your life.
Really!
Sometimes it is a whole person.
Sometimes, often, it is me.
Praying, praying with you.
I started praying with you, for you over 30 years ago.
My 23 year old self prayed to the father for the mother
and she came and you know what?
She hasn't left and she never will.
And there's never been a time
when she hasn't been here.
I just didn't know about her.
You know, when they say
the divine feminine is returning,
I say she never went anywhere.
She has always been here.
You know what?
I am evidence of love in your life.
I really am.
Because I've devoted my life to you.
Through her.
And my evidence, in your life, and you in mine,
this could be enough right now.
Is it enough for you? It's enough for me.
I declare in this moment that we are praying together.
Will you join me?
Because listening is prayer too.
This is prayer because I'm imagining you
and I'm feeling the Great Life
The Great Lovers whose gyration in the stars
made us.
Caused the cosmic orgasm to spark and fire
and for stars to explode,
and we are evidence of this great love,
this great love moving through us.
and right now through me towards you.
I don't think it works quite like what we've been taught
to believe, because the way we've been taught to believe
makes it so easy to lose faith
when the answers don't come in the way we pray.
I have gone out into the trees, into the wilderness,
into the wild creek, into the Two Raven Canyon.
I have gone out beyond doctrines
and descriptions and designations….
But I haven't gone out beyond devotions.
I've gone out not because I'm proud but
because I am humbled.
I have gone out because my prayer
has turned in to tears and because my heart
has been shaped and reshaped by impossible grief
and so many unanswered prayers
from the old days in the old ways
when I used to pray for answers in a specific way.
Now, now I know praying is about
how I engage with the Divine.
It's about what I bring,
not about what the Divine brings me.
Not about what the Divine does for me
in my human timing.
Jeez, that took a long time.
Jesus, my old friend, that took a long time,
I know You tried to tell me.
I stand in the presence of
the Great Life that is this Creation.
An animate, living, breathing cosmos
that I am a part of, that I get to call home.
Home. I am home.
Being at home is a Prayer Answered.
Under a thousand-year-old Bay,
over fifty women
did pray in each our own way,
in praise of friendship and belonging
and the love of California,
our home.
I passed them the red thread
under those fragrant leaves,
As we spoke our presence
we declared ourselves into the circle of life.
I wore my prayer shawl and I stood in the glory
of community rising, rising, rising!
And we did drum and we did sing and we did dance.
And this is an answer to birth and prayer and arriving.
I am in awe of the reality
of getting to have a body,
not just any body,
but this gorgeous, beautiful, breathing body of my own.
I have a body and a spirit that came together
to appear as me in my identity.
I mean, come on,
you have to admit, it's pretty cool, right?
Having a Soul you can know, it just feels so unlikely!
A cocktail of stardust and salt water and soil
and the kisses that formed me and the journey I arrived on
the night my parents tripped out on Vitamin L.
And here I am. Here I am.
And here you are, right? Cool, right?
Yes, awkward and unlikely we are,
but yes, we are.
You are. You exist!
Some, even you, may find this prayer as awkward
as it felt to begin it,
but some may find in this prayer
how agreeing to pray in my awkward way,
how I found what I was looking for,
I found laughter, I found tears, I found jubilation,
and I found what I was looking for when I started.
((((((((((((You))))))))))))))
I moved from sadness to joy, and I found you.
And you know what else I found?
I found awe and wonder and majesty and presence
and deep, deep love moving as a river through
my stardust blood and I found language
and I found rhythm and I found story.
Amen.
Ase’.
Aho.
Right on.
Hallelujah.
(and Shalom)
As we say at Glide.
And I say
All that is truly good and right and just
Be here with us, with me, with you, with us all.
What if we are creations of a loving Creator
created to create?
And in our intentional creating,
we feel the life of Creator in our bones, baby!
In this bonehouse of being,
I pray with strange words in slow motion
and find what I seek between words
and surges of emotion.
I pray with strange words in slow motion
and find what I seek between words
and surges of emotion.
And the motion of my body rocking in prayer
held in the arms of the Divine beneath the Bay.
I smell it. I smell the bay. Do you?
I pray with my scent.
I pray with my listening.
I pray with my tasting.
I pray with my kisses.
I pray with my sight
and my skin
and my solar plexus.
I pray with my belly button and my vulva.
I pray with my hands and my feet
and my whole body
and my field.
I pray.
And all I need to do is imagine I'm leaning in and you,
you are leaning in and we are learning to pray.
And we know it will take a lifetime!
And I don't know about you,
but I have all the time I need to learn how to pray.
Today, later today,
I will gather the women in circle
and somehow, in my own awkward way,
I will find a way to pray on this very day.
Love Always,
Curate Shiloh Sophia
~
Photo by Lynnea B.
For you. All of you.
For Arjun and Ali - answered prayers in the forms of humans.
For Brenda and your birth and homecoming.
With gratitude to the Grandmothers of the Bay (V and W).
For my sister Shannon, and all the times we laughed
about Rumi inviting us to pray with dry mouths.
~
IF you are in the Sonoma area we have women’s circle tonight.
Awkward Prayers (Like This One) and Praying for Signs