For The Interim Time

I was fortunate to be a part of Jan's tele-class "Living in the Meantime" this past Monday evening. Jan will soon have a podcast of the class available at her blog awake is good.

I had not intended to write a post about the class. Jan does such a beautiful job on her blog and with her classes that I am not sure I would do justice to the message or her delivery. If you haven't visited her blog, I encourage you to stop by. If you are experiencing a transition of any kind, I would recommend that you listen to the podcast when it's available.

I took notes during the class and this week have been sitting with what I heard. Ken is working out of town; we have had some of the hottest days of the summer; and I have been feeling uncharacteristically calm. Outwardly nothing has changed. Inwardly I am waiting patiently, and that is due in part because I heard on Monday night that a lot of what I have been doing is appropriate for someone who is living in the meantime.

I am smack dab in the middle of the meantime. Jan said that to surrender is to trust and that that is big work. She also said that things do work out.

So I have been practicing trust this week. I have taken better care of myself, and I am sleeping better, despite the heat.

Jan shared part of a blessing on Monday night that was perfect for the topic of the class. I had just ordered that particular book of blessings and was anxious to read the entire piece. The book arrived today and I thumbed through it this evening. I found the blessing that Jan shared and started reading, and again the tears started. There is something about the promise that things will work out that gets me every time. It occurred to me that someone else may need to hear that promise tonight ~

For the Interim Time
by John O'Donohue

When near the end of day, life has drained
Out of light, and it is too soon
For the mind of night to have darkened things,

No place looks like itself, loss of outline
Makes everything look strangely in-between,
Unsure of what has been, or what might come.

In this wan light, even trees seem groundless.
In a while it will be night, but nothing
Here seems TO believe the relief of dark.

You are in this time of the interim
Where everything seems withheld.

The path you took to get here has washed out;
The way forward is still concealed from you.

"The old is not old enough to have died away;
The new is still too young to be born."

You cannot lay claim to anything;
In this place of dusk,
Your eyes are blurred;
And there is no mirror.

Everyone else has lost sight of your heart
And you can see nowhere to put your trust;
You know you have to make your own way through.

As far as you can, hold your confidence.
Do not allow your confusion to squander
This call which is loosening
Your roots in false ground,
That you might come free
From all you have outgrown.

What is being transfigured here is your mind,
And it is difficult and slow to become new.
The more faithfully you can endure here,
The more refined your heart will become
For your arrival in the new dawn.

(From To Bless the Space Between Us, Doubleday, 2008, p. 119-20)