Perspectives: Our Interior Desert

There are times when life's Lent seems to last forever. 

At such times we feel parched, arid, and dry, sometimes for months or years on end. Emotional and spiritual thirst can be intense at such times and feelings of sorrow or loss unending. It can be hard to get up in the morning, difficult to get through the day. The desert seems interminable; spring farther than we can see. We slog forward, shifting sands making steps harder and progress slower. One day it feels like hope might be over the next horizon, the next it's nowhere to be found.

A long Lent can be occasioned by years of caring for young children or old parents. It might be caused by a bout with illness or a season of grief. It may even be caused by fear of death, worry about illness or infirmity. Or maybe your Lent is simply cultural exhaustion, worsened by politics, the shallowness of Facebook or the malevolence of Twitter. The "comparison game," whereby everyone seems to be trying to be "better than" everyone else, might intensify your interior desert. Life's interminable busyness probably doesen't help, nor does its frenetic pace. Or maybe the cultural crud crept into your life slowly, ushered in by omnipresent TV and Internet. 

Now faith is sparse; joy depleted. 

It turns out a person can only handle ‘fluff’ and ‘nonsense’ for so long before becoming disillusioned—or disgusted. We feel sick, as if we've gorged on cotton candy and People Magazine. For many of us, the daily replay of the Spiritual Ground Hog Day becomes unbearable. Waking up every day chasing after the twin mirages of materialism and egotism gets pretty old, very fast. Eventually, according to St. Augustine, we realize, “Our hearts are restless, Oh God, until they rest in you.” 

Unfortunately, even when we realize the mirage-of-plenty leaves us soul-thirsty, we still experience the desert of busyness, the daily drudge of should do's and musts do’s. The desert of sadness at the illness or death of a loved one; the desert of sorrow for our troubles; the way of the cross we walk daily, bent beneath the weight of the world—each of these slows our spiritual walk. 

We trudge onward, exhausted. 

On the practical level, symptoms of sadness, depression, or anxiety need to be reported to our physicians and therapists, with necessary medications taken and counseling sessions attended per recommendation. Practical tools such as these which help to alleviate clinical signs of depression and are essential to wellbeing. Speaking to loved ones, attaining and maintaining their support, and taking tender care of ourselves and others are also good ways to cope.  Excercise always helps and needs to be a priority even when you feel like you just can't do it.  Just walk and keep walking. (Or run and keep running, bike, attend a gym, whatever works for you.)   

For an interior desert experience caused by cultural malaise or the hectic pace of life, it's important to slow down, seek insight, explore answers, and craft a recovery plan. Sorrow from (uncomplicated) grief, loss, and caregiving fatigue need remedying as well. (Complicated grief can need both medication and counseling.) Grief experts remind us: "The only way out is through." This applies to desert journeying too. 

Perseverance and perspective help, as does lived faith and chosen hope.    

No matter the cause of our desert experience, we all long for spring, for growth, for new life. The desert was OK for a while; the solitude good for a bit. But the cracked earth and barren landscape has gotten old; the dearth of water unbearable. We need to find our way out. 

Or do we? Perhaps, rather than escaping the desert and heading, literally, for greener pastures, we might first explore what is hidden, discern what is real. 

What if, for example, the desert isn’t as baron as one might think? What if the sorrow-filled times in our lives are more than pestilence and penitence? What if, instead, these times are intervals for growth, times to clarify choices and illuminate paths? What if the Lenten journey is a necessary part of life, a time to heal, reflect, and prepare for light-to-come? 

Anyone who has ever explored the desert knows there is quite a bit more life, even in winter, than one sees at first glance. Water hides in hidden caynons, sometimes even seeping forth from within sandstone rock.  What might look like only saguaro or prickly pear cacti turns out to be a landscape teaming with hidden life, with lizards, desert tortoises, hummingbirds and desert hares. It's true, there are coyotes and cougars too, and lethal snakes and deadly insects. 

No place is without danger and no life without difficulty. 

Jesus's life was certainly difficult. And sadly, dangerous as well. He experienced privation, poverty, and prejudice: his life ended in horrific violence. Sorrow, grief, loneliness, and exhaustion were familiar to him, as was constant caregiving and ever-present busyness. And yet our Lord found respite in the desert. And clarity of purpose. Somehow, in the quiet of that baron place, amid the small creatures and desert landscape, he discovered the grace and beauty of surrender to God and the essence of prayer. He heard the voice of God and chose to follow God's will for his life and accept God's loving plan in his death. What followed was a time of fellowship, living and preaching the Gospel, healing the sick, and joyous self-giving. 

Eventually, Jesus's end of life approached. He walked the Way of the Cross, helped by Simon of Cyrene but abandoned by many of those close to him. Seeing his mother, he likely wept at her sorrow and his own. While carrying the burden of our sin, did he reflect on his time in the desert, on his "Yes" to the will of his Father? We do not know. We do know he willingly and lovingly offered his life for ours. 

Death, as we know, was not the end for him. As it is not the end for us.  Rather, it was and is the Beginning. Resurrection followed, filled with life and light and hope and spring. 

Perhaps we, like Jesus, might discover the Resurrection in the heart of our desert. Perhaps through prayer and fasting and lovingly helping those placed in our path, we, too, might discern clarity of purpose, grace, beauty, and surrender to God's will. In the face of such clarity, perhaps the importance of facebook and twitter, politics and culture, hectic days and materialistic ways will fade into dust. During the stress of caregiving and the anguish of loss, may we, hear the voice of God and be comforted by his love. 

The words of Isaiah are a consolation:   "And the LORD will continually guide you, And satisfy your desire in scorched places, And give strength to your bones; And you will be like a watered garden, And like a spring of water whose waters do not fail."

Maybe, too, our own desert might reveal to us an interior life we need to explore before spring's glory can be revealed. Maybe in the light of a desert evening, at sunset, we can begin to contemplate our own evening, the time when we, too, will be called home. 

Maybe we will come to realize our time in this desert is holy time, the time between now and eternity, the time between this moment and our last. This time is individual for each: different for all. Some of us have years—many, many years—before us on this earth. Others: a single day. The timing of the journey depends on so much—the body, the soul, illness, injury, chance and ill-luck, age, and so much more.

But eventually we all must take the final pilgrimage. Someday, if not this day. 

To be prepared for the journey—even well in advance of its beginning, is a great good. It is tough to think about; this preparation; this final journey. But it is the most important one we shall ever make. Acknowledging its eventuality can set us free to live well now, to rejoice in every single day, to breathe the blessings of the moment, to live mindfully the sacrament of the present moment with those we love, even during desert times. 

It can free us to see the beauty of the desert, to live in awe of the gift of this one life, to recognize the fragile beauty and delicate ecosystem of every person we’ll ever meet, to tread carefully and forgive readily. Seeing the journey as real and the distractions as mirage can help us seek wisdom in experience and cherish those who have walked the path of life before us.
 

So, how can we learn from those who have gone before us in the sign of faith—those who have crossed the barren desert, gone forth from Lent to Easter, and preceded us into the Kingdom? How to we survive their loss?

What can those we have loved teach us? 

How can we learn from the wisdom of Saints and the lives of the good? 

What must we do to live well and die with grace? 

Have words of love and forgiveness been spoken to loved ones? 

What of their desert of grief?  Our bereaved loved ones will follow our footsteps in shifting sand— across the barren desert of sorrow and loss. Wind and heat will sear souls; burning sun will leave them struggling to breathe, to get up each day, to walk even a few steps forward without us. In the time of sorrow, shade will be elusive; comfort fleeting. Nights will be dark and cold; days hot and arid. 

But always, hidden deeply within, for them and for us, will be a well-spring of heart-love, a river wide and deep with memories and smiles, loving words and gentle asides from which is drawn life’s remembrances—a heart-vessel, a canteen which can be filled or refilled—life saving waters to be sipped or gulped in time of need. And the well of loving remembrance, like Elijah’s in the desert, will not run dry. 

The desert of dying and remembrance is holy ground, the holiest we will cross since our birth. Then we were tiny, pre-born. Then too, we did not know what to expect. We cried as we entered the new world; we cry as we leave. Both times waiting arms catch us to break our fall, loving arms envelop us, holding us close.

One day we all must cross the desert to the oasis beyond, to the place of no pain; no sorrow; no suffering. But the time-of-crossing is different for each of us. This time-before-crossing-time is mystery. It is unknown. It can be a fearful time. Or it can be a time of preparation, a time to live each day mindfully, with daily blessings breathed, gratitude remembered, lovingkindness chosen. 

When our journey’s end approaches, we will be accompanied. Even if alone, we do not die unattended. 

Angles accompany us always, crafting from wings of love, Jacobs ladder, whispering to us songs of glory, soon to be remembered from the time before. So that when the day-of-leaving comes, we may rest on eagles wings, carried past barren deserts, and up stairs of living love, to the place of oasis, the very Heart of Love. 

“Eye has not seen, nor ear heard the glory God has prepared for those who love him.” 

“Well done, good and faithful servant, come and share your masters joy.”

We have little understanding of this promised glory, even less experience of it. But we are offered “the peace which surpasseth all understanding." 

All our Lents lead to Easter.