Image by Elena Enciso Courtesy of UMC LEAD
Choco Crop
This time last year, acclaimed author, activist and “Nana,” Anne Lamott, urged her Facebook followers to join her in a New Year’s “Anti-Diet.” In her words,
“I can still get my jeans on, for one reason: I wear forgiving pants. The world is too hard as it is, without letting your pants have an opinion on how you are doing… The self-respect and peace of mind you long for is not out there. It’s within. I hate that. I resent that more than I can say. But it’s true.”
Anyway, only 8% of people actually keep their resolutions to lose weight, save money and be a more efficiently functioning automaton. This year, then, instead of setting unrealistic goals, I will try to do four things that really matter, and I will try them at least once.
1. Breathe.
This one is simple. I am not going to practice centering prayer for twenty minutes everyday or follow Elizabeth Gilbert to India and become a yogi. No, in the words of one-hit-wonder Anna Nalick, I plan to “just breathe.” If you try this, don’t hold yourself to some standard, making it yet another thing to achieve. Just breathe. You can even do it right now, and it counts!
My church in Nashville is dedicating five weeks in January to the practice of stillness and silence. From worship to Wednesday nights and everything in between, we are trying to all take a collective breath and simply be still. Some of us will spend time in groups practicing centering prayer. Others will study what scripture has to say about stillness and silence. All of us will be discovering what it means to pray without words.
Last week I stood in the shower at the gym and practiced breathing for about three minutes. The cascade of water over my ears helped me focus on the sound of my own breath. I began to slowly repeat the word “peace” as a makeshift mantra.
What did I gain from those three minutes? Nothing. And that’s the point. Contemplation is not a means to an end, but an end in itself. I had three minutes of stillness that were holier than a lifetime of piety. That’s worth trying at least one more time.
2. See another person.
In South Africa, Zulu-speaking people will greet each other with the word, Sawubona. It translates to English as, “I see you,” but the greeting means much more. It speaks another person into being, as the greeter uncovers the humanity in the other. The traditional response, ngikhona, translates, “I am here.” This exchange reveals the deep power one person has to give life to another.
Our world of screens and isolation and addiction and consumerism has drawn a shade between people. We look at other people, but we do not see them. They are like silhouettes only dimly perceived.
The overarching message of protestors after the deaths of Michael Brown and Eric Garner has been, “Black lives matter.” These three words unearth a basic deficiency in our culture that makes systemic racism (and sexism, classism, homophobia, islamophobia, etc.) possible: We do not truly see one another. If we could learn to see the soul of another human being, it stands to reason that our trigger fingers might be less jumpy and our words more kind.
When a society decides to see all of its members, no matter the cost, those on the margins will not have to cry out, “I am here!” They will not have to remind the rest of us that their lives matter.
But we can start small. One person in the grocery store or at the restaurant:
“I see you.”
“I am here.”
3. Let go of something you cannot control
If I drive down I-40 today and accept that I cannot change the driver in the black Suburban who refuses to use turn signals and treats the interstate like a game of Frogger, I will count it as a miracle. I have lived so long under the grand illusion that my own angst will somehow rid the world of all annoyances and evils.
Unfortunately, anyone who has lived past kindergarten knows that other people are going to do what other people are going to do. The lesson I am trying to learn right now is that all I can change is my response. I have to take care of my side of the street. I cannot change that kid who won’t stop raising his hand during the children’s message in church, but I can choose to respond in love and grace rather than frustration that he is ruining my brilliant message!
Love, in fact, is the art of letting go. Thomas Merton, in The Way of Chuang Tzu, wrote, “The beginning of love is the will to let those we love be perfectly themselves.” Howard Thurman articulated the relationship between letting go and love this way: “I have always wanted to be me without making it difficult for you to be you.”
If I can let go of what I cannot control – especially other people – I have to believe I will be that much closer to offering my neighbors the kind of grace I have received.
If you can wholly let go of something beyond your control this year, count it as a resolution successfully fulfilled! I find support in Reinhold Niebuhr’s “serenity prayer,” appropriated by twelve-step groups:
“God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.”
Or, as pop culture icon and my future wife, Taylor Swift, sings: “Haters gonna hate (hate, hate, hate, hate)… but I’m just gonna shake it off.”
4. Appreciate a piece of dark chocolate
Every once in a while, something mystical happens when I bite into a piece of dark chocolate. There is a moment – just after my mouth closes and right before I start to chew – where eternity creeps into the present. It feels like watching a basketball player suspended in hang time at the peak of a jump. As the cocoa lifts me up with jarring bitterness, I rest in the sugary cocoon of dopamine that leaves me suspended mid-bite.
Not to make a big deal of it or anything.
My problem is remembering to enjoy that moment. I never learned that other verbs can precede “food” in a sentence besides “devour,” “inhale” and “gobble.” In our society, food addiction is the Trojan Horse disguised as convenience and freedom of choice. McDonald’s and Little Ceasar’s train us to eat until there is nothing left to eat, rather than stopping when we are full. There is always something left to consume.
Dark chocolate, however, has the unique ability to make me slow down, truly see what I am eating, and say a wordless “thank you” to the cocoa gods of the universe.
I believe that moment is what Jesus was talking about when he said, “Do this in remembrance of me.” The Eucharist is an opportunity to hang in that suspended, sacred time as a community. We pause and see the bread and wine. We watch as eternity creeps into our present, and we say together, “Thank you.”
Maybe dark chocolate doesn’t have this affect on you. Maybe something else leads you to slow down and be present in the moment. Whatever it is, live in that moment, just once, this year.
Every day, so many of us push ourselves to do better, achieve more, and control more tightly. This year, I resolve to do authentically, breathe, let go, and enjoy that piece of dark chocolate.
Gabe Horton is a student at Vanderbilt Divinity School and a pastoral intern at Belle Meade United Methodist Church in Nashville, TN. This essay is reprinted with permission from UMC LEAD.