Physical Therapy for the Soul ~

     I am a believer in the power of physical therapy.  Thirty some-odd years ago, a well recommended orthopedic doctor in Boston, took a look at my x-rays and offered this “Why do you have the knees of a sixty-year old?”  Finding his offering less-than-helpful, I hurried back to my primary care doc and said ‘please, who else do you know??’ Within a week I was happily doing some funky leg lifts with a physical therapist who noted that although I had very strong quadriceps, the inner head of the muscle wasn’t nearly as developed as the outer head.  Many leg lifts later I was no longer doomed to pain management & multiple knee replacements.   You still wouldn’t want my legs, but committing to a practice of exercising an easily ignored muscle made all the difference.  And that difference kept my world open to experiences that would not have been possible otherwise.  That difference kept my world open to service that would not have been possible otherwise.  That difference changed me for the better and in doing so altered our world for the better as well.

         Just as we can alter our bodies for the good with physical therapy, I’m a believer that we can work out our soul-habits for the good with similar disciplines.  As minister of the week at our UU Camp & Conference Center at Ferry Beach for a week this summer I invited 80+ youth and adults into a daily practice of looking around at each other before meals then bowing their head and silently naming three things for which they were grateful.  “Whatever comes to mind, I told them.” For me it had been daisies, peace and purple.  It has been love, my children and the feel of sand between my toes.  It has been humor, sidewalks and raspberries.  It has been my partner, Gini, lighthouses and clouds.  It has been justice workers, my vocation and sea turtles.  “Don’t try to control it, just let it flow,” I told them, “And trust me, it will begin to flow easily.”  

    I testified that it would alter their lives and in doing so, better our world.  We then began naming gratitudes and importantly, we named things for which we ended up being grateful even if they were difficult.  Times people offered us honest but difficult feedback.  Hardships that allowed us to discover new strengths.  Even loss.   It was a wonderful week as each age group led this special grace at mealtime.  I enjoyed hearing stories of gratitude throughout the week.   

    Just as focusing on that one muscle changed my legs and therefore my life forever, if we hone our ‘gratitude’ muscle, our ‘thank you’ muscle, we become better selves and if we become better selves surely the world becomes better too.

     What came as a surprise that week was how this proof of this practice landed squarely in my own lap.  I was sitting at lunch with several of the adults.  One was talking about how he used to practice law for a firm that specialized in defending drunk drivers.  He was telling us how he worked hard to avoid taking those cases.  Another at the table shared how she had been involved in accidents involving alcohol.  Yet another chimed in on how they had intersected with drunk driving.  I tried to stay but found I couldn’t.  I stood up, meal unfinished, and said ‘My niece was killed by a drunk driver.  I need to leave this conversation.” What they couldn’t have known is that on Dec 14, 2000 my 24 year old niece was struck and killed by a drunk driver.  Her father, had died six weeks earlier from Lupus.  He was 49.  She had been an angel in caring for him.  On the day she was killed, she was on her way to her job at a local hospital, wearing the engagement ring she had received that day.  Instead of looking forward to a wedding, we all returned to the same funeral home in which we had viewed her dad,  less than two months earlier and then listened to the same minister at the same church memorialize this angel.  They couldn’t have known.  But I had to leave.

     I don’t remember bussing my dishes or even making the decision to go to the beach.  My body seemed to know just what I needed.  Minutes later I was calf deep in water, my feet sinking into the sand, my body swaying gently with each wave. Tears flowed freely down my face, salt water drops rolling off my face and joining their siblings in the sea, my heart broken all over again.  The pain of losing her so violently.  The pain of experiencing too much loss in one family.  The pain of having to share the news with the rest of the family and of seeing the anguish on their faces while feeling it on my own.  

     And then something happened.  As the sprawl of the ocean witnessed my pain and her waters caressed my legs, an inner wave of gratitude moved through my body and images of her alive and laughing and joking and smiling and playing streamed through my mind’s eye.  Still I stood in the water, still the tears rolled, but my heart swelled with love and joy.  Not joy for HAVING known her but true joy for having these images in my head and heart.  It was if in that moment, someone was treating me to the best multi-media show EVER.  Images of her alive, engaged, loving and loved.  Images of her playing on the beach with my children who just adored her.  Images of her joking with her father, engaged with her mother, laughing with her sisters.  Sounds of her laugh,  HER voice with its distinct cadence and tone.  The way she would roll her eyes at something her father said and at the same time smile.  As the images ran through my mind I was truly awash in gratitude.  Not a ‘Oh Wendy be glad for the time you had with her.’  Not a ‘Oh how lucky she lived that long,’ or “Be glad that her Dad didn’t experience her death.”  Not even the analysis that says better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all.  This was simply gratitude – and happiness.  My smile was a soul smile and as real as the heartbreak and pain that just ten minutes earlier dragged me to the sea.

     The gift of this beautiful girl now fully present in my head and heart, I reveled at her beauty, her impish personality and my heart moved from smile to soar.  She made me smile.  And from that happy place I realized I was grateful for the interaction at lunch, painful as it seemed at the time.  I am certain, had I not been actively “working out” my gratitude muscle, I would have only felt the pain.

     This experience did not make her less dead.  It did not make her loss less horrific.  It did not teach me to ‘do grief’ differently or to see death differently.  But it did alter me and for the better.  I don’t ever want to stop feeling pain about loss.  I don’t believe in putting up brave fronts or pretending that bad stuff doesn’t happen. I’ve lived there too.  I’m not a fan.  Living gratitude isn’t that.  It isn’t about being allllll rosy or even, all outward and about other people.  It’s not about shutting out the bad, the ugly, the sad or horrific ....it’s about developing a new muscle.  About making possible,  things that would not, could not,  have happened before.   Living gratitude makes room for things never scheduled to arrive, given our bodily and soul makeup. 

     Rumi tells us that with each morning, a new arrival – a joy, a depression, a meanness --- unexpected visitors all ....welcome them, let them in ...

     I tell you today, prepare the largest room for gratitude.  Leave the door open wide.  Work your thank-you muscle so well that gratitude visits each and every day and many times each day.   The others will find their way – joy, depression,  grief.  But make gratitude the most welcome of all.  Know it and welcome it so well it thinks it is at home.

   And I promise you, as I promised these young people in July, you will change.  And THAT friends, is our pathway to a better tomorrow  - one of our making.  Some call that heaven.  Others beloved community.  I call it ------------- possible. I call it - ------ ours to build.  and I implore you to join me on the way.