Conversations with a Soul (4 page)

Sometimes I hear folk reflecting about their parents or grandparent(s) who had a particular way of seeing that somehow marked them off as keepers of wisdom. It is not so much about
what they said
as about
who they are or were
. There’s no need to lecture about love when you simply lived it. There was never a suggestion of needing to pay attention because you were about to become the recipient of some great learning. Instead you intuitively knew that the insights that were shared had a power and vitality that were immediately pertinent to your own attempt to make sense out of life.

And they did!

Sometimes our Keepers of Wisdom are, teachers or professors, pastors or friends, each of whom seems to incarnate a way of being that leaves us different, richer, thinking about things we’ve not thought about before. It is not as though these keepers of wisdom give us the right advice, rather, it is, being in their presence and listening to their words and reflecting on their lives, we find something
coming alive within ourselves
. We know ourselves to be
in the presence
of wisdom and that mediates new insights and greater courage.

Suddenly we see the diamond buried in the muck, just lying there and it could so easily have been passed over but for the fact that someone, a Wisdomkeeper, pointed it out. Mitch Albom reflecting on his own experience wrote:

Have you ever really had a teacher? One who saw you as a raw but precious thing, a jewel that, with wisdom, could be polished to a proud shine? If you are lucky enough to find your way to such teachers, you will always find your way back. Sometimes it is only in your head. Sometimes it is right alongside their beds. The last class of my old professor’s life took place once a week, in his home, by a window in his study where he could watch a small hibiscus plant shed its pink flowers. The class met on Tuesdays. No books were required. The subject was the meaning of life. It was taught from experience. The teaching goes on.
¹⁰

After the freedom of the eternal central African plains, a tiny studio apartment in the heart of the City imprisoned all three of us, but that was all she could afford. No more a playground that stretched from horizon to horizon, or the night sounds of a thousand insects, the baying of ridge-back dogs that had picked up the scent of a prowling leopard, or the maniacal laughter of hyenas; all replaced and swallowed up by accelerating engines, horns, sirens and the muffled voices of those who lived around us.

The nearby park only added to the feeling of confinement.

It was surrounded by tall, sharply pointed fence posts, whose purpose seemed to be to keep people out. Everywhere offensive signs sternly prohibited running or walking on the grass or climbing trees. Definitely no clambering on the stone lions that adorned a monument to those who had died in the war. No games of any kind even on the sidewalk that led up to the monuments and solemn brass plaques. Apparently those who had died in a war were offended by skipping and hopscotch and the sounds children make when playing.

An eagle eyed attendant (we called him the “Parkee”) ensured the signs were obeyed, regularly threatening to
call the police on us if
he caught us breaking one of the rules.

Joubert Park was not a friendly place!

The streets and sidewalks seemed friendlier than the parks that were clothed with prohibitions, so we made friends with the shops, movie houses, apartment cleaners and night watchmen, especially Joseph, a towering black man, who guarded the building that housed the apartment in which we lived.

He radiated authority in his fine khaki uniform and would sometimes pretend to chase us as if we were robbers. Best of all he would occasionally allow us to play with his handcuffs that were fixed to his broad brown belt.

Then, on one of our sorties through the City, tucked behind the Fattis Supermarket and the bus terminus, my brother and I discovered a pet shop!

Here was a magical place that had puppies, kittens, guinea pigs, white mice and rabbits. Living creatures that wanted to play with us. Along two walls there were tanks of brightly colored fish. A few tanks, without water, housed sleepy tortoises, and everywhere the sound of birds: canaries, finches, pigeons and the loud squawks of brightly colored budgerigars.

Once a week we made our pilgrimage to the pet shop just to be in the presence of living, playing creatures.

It lost a foot in an accident with the cage door
, said the pet store owner one day.
I can’t sell it so you two can have it if you want. You might as well have that small cage in the corner and I’ll give you a bit of seed.

The “it” was a yellow and green budgerigar!

That bird was the most wonderful gift I could have received. In the weeks that followed we continued to visit the pet store. Frequently we returned home with more budgerigars: some had lost their head feathers, one had a beak that veered off in a strange direction; a few had broken wings or legs that reset at the wrong angle. Often the gift came home with us because it had “molt,” causing it to lose a good percentage of its feathers and which, apparently, influenced potential customers in a negative manner.

Each bird shared in our triumphal entry back to the tiny apartment. Each was given a name and admitted to the bird cage.

Then, one day it occurred to me that there were far too many birds in that small cage. They should be free! They should be free to go wherever they wished in our apartment!

Too young to articulate my feelings I, nevertheless, hated the idea that the birds somehow mirrored our captivity. So, mindful of the many warnings to be careful lest the birds escaped, I made sure all the windows were closed and propped the cage door open.

Not a single bird moved.

(They are probably a bit nervous and need encouragement.)

I put the seed and water bowls outside the cage.

Still no movement towards the open cage door.

(More encouragement is needed.)

I reached inside the cage and carefully took each bird out, only to find the moment the bird was released, it scampered to get back into the cage.

When I took all the birds out and closed the cage door. They simply climbed onto the cage, and waited for me to prop the door open. As soon as I opened the door they trampled on each other in their haste to get back into the cage and then fought for a place on an overcrowded perch.

I learned that day that birds which have adapted to captivity fear freedom.

I have learned since, that so do humans.

I have also learned that cages come in many forms and configurations and it takes the fiercest opposition from my Wisdomkeepers to enable me to walk away from the cages that invite me and then imprison me.

My Soul assures me it is a journey of faith.

If we free the word, “faith” from its bondage to religious and sectarian ownership we find that it’s a powerful word, one that nurtures a yearning for something to
believe in
, and suffocates in the shallow, lifeless marriage of
believing that
.

Here’s how I think it works:

I believe that exercise is good for me and smoking is bad. I believe that I need to drink several glasses of water every day: I believe that I ought to lose a few pounds about my middle and I believe that being a responsible parent entails spending time with my children.

So?

Believing
that
exercise is good feels like a mere statement of opinion, copy for an advertising campaign, and doesn’t imply that the speaker, in fact, exercises.

Believing
in
exercise, on the other hand, is a statement of commitment and experience and leads us to assume that the speaker actually exercises. So much so is this the case that if we were to discover that someone, who claimed to
believe in
exercise, never actually exercised, we would feel that we had been lied to. Future declarations about their beliefs would be greeted with scepticism and no small reservation. On the other hand we expect no such personal commitment from someone who merely expressed the view
that
exercise is good for them.

I may, after a lot of reading and questioning, arrive at the place where I believe that bungee jumping is a relatively safe sport. This is very different from believing in bungee jumping! I feel quite safe believing
that
bungee jumping is okay for some people but believing
in
bungee jumping demands a level of commitment I, most adamantly, refuse to make!

Believing in
something always demands a leap of faith!

I may or may not believe
that
Wisdomkeepers exist and potentially exercise a powerful influence upon my life and choices. That’s a far cry from believing
in
Wisdomkeepers, which demands that I invest energy and commitment and obedience so that my Soul might lead me to engage those internalized Wisdomkeepers. It is in an imaginative reaching out to the Wisdomkeepers in my life, engaging in a conversation with someone I could not see, and risking my neck in trusting their wisdom that makes those Wisdomkeepers real and vital.

Looking back over the years and all the deluges of well intentioned advice that must have come my way, I can hardly recall much that set a direction or changed my life. Only in rare instances do creeds and statements of faith or well intentioned advice have any impact on our lives. People who are accustomed to marinating themselves in their negative self-talk, and as a consequence live wretched lives, are frequently purveyors of whatever self-help books they can lay their hands on, usually read with little, if any, lasting impact.

Similarly, hours of earnest encouragement and heartfelt support from friends and family generally affects no behavioural change whatsoever. All of this effort has been in pursuit of a series of statements which begin with
I believe
that
.

I believe that you would be much happier if only you would… I believe that if you would apply yourself . . . I believe that your friends . . . I believe that. . .that. . . that

The only thing that our great advice does is prop open the cage door.

However, let such a person grasp a moment in their history when someone came and reached deep inside; let such a person search out, and then live with, and nurture one of
their
Wisdomkeepers, and summoning all their courage, trust that encounter, so that the wisdom that now claims them might be translated into new behaviours.

New possibilities now begin to peep through the walls of despair, for now we risk something of value because we
believe in . . .

And we’ve just stepped away from the cage!

Hidden deep within each of us there is a place, a space, a land, a territory, call it what you will, for no terms are adequate, although Ross Snyder’s
inscape
works better than most. This inscape is one of the places where a conversation with the Soul happens quite spontaneously! Some folk gravitate quite naturally to this inner world and find that keeping company with themselves to be energizing and creative; others discover the journey through the silent places uncomfortable, particularly when the experience results in feelings of anxiety.