I work with individuals who are contending with some type of change or transition in their lives, dealing with an unresolved conflict, or hoping to gain a new level of awareness and clarity on specific issues. For many of them who are in a similar stage of life as me (I grew up watching The Brady Bunch and am no stranger to striped polyester pants), I often hear about plans to wind down a career and transitioning to “the next chapter”.

At the core of so many of these discussions is the notion of identity. We all form our identifies based on our upbringing, experiences which gave us joy or hurt us, and how we found our way through the various hills and valleys we encountered. For many people, that all came together in the form of always doing, of being active, of accomplishing, of setting and reaching goals. These individuals acclimated to a go-go-go lifestyle and that resulted in spinning plates, balancing and juggling many priorities, always multi-tasking, and feeling the need to please others nearly constantly. 

Moving forward for such folks is often found in gaining some measure of stillness and quiet. And because so many of us are accustomed to chasing and searching, we do well to pause and recognize what we already have… and that perhaps that that is sufficient. This is, of course, the practice of being grateful.

I like to think of this as moving from a mode of DO/SPIN to one of STILL/GRATEFUL.

The very same notion can be applied to our spiritual lives, to our pursuit of a relationship with Christ, and to our ongoing desire to discern the will of the Holy Spirit. I myself have often defaulted to DO/SPIN when it comes to faith. If I am hoping to draw closer to God, I immediately wonder: What can I do? And this sometimes means: what additional plates might I spin? So, I will buy an on-topic book, subscribe to a related podcast, look for some new retreat opportunity, join a group, and so forth. It’s always about doing and spinning.

More recently, I have been attempting to be STILL/GRATEFUL. What does that look like? So far, it has looked like this:

• Sitting in the Adoration Chapel for an extended period of time without any sort of agenda or preconceived expectation about what I’ll gain from the experience
• Going for a walk without my headphones blaring music or a podcast episode
• Journaling in a quiet space and remembering to jot down all the people and things in my life for which I am grateful
• Not listening to music or talk radio while I’m driving
• Keeping the TV off at night… because once it goes on, I know I’ll get sucked into some streaming show or movie

In other words, I’m trying to learn about being rather than doing. It’s sometimes quite difficult because our culture has trained us to favor a constant and steady diet of noise, interruptions, distractions, notifications, split screen viewing, and other ways of spinning endlessly. And so, we need to retrain ourselves out of this.

Why?…

… Because God is hidden behind all the noise, interruptions, and distractions. We need to actively make room for God… and silence and stillness are the best means to that end.

I often am asked: “What can I DO to get closer to God?” In the past, I have had a number of action-oriented answers to this question, most of which have left the person with a list of things to DO. I’m modifying my approach and focusing more on how a person can simply be STILL.

Perhaps it’s for you to move from DO/SPIN to STILL/GRATEFUL too?