THE CONTEMPLATIVE PATH

At an early age I realised that there was something loving that lied behind the life I experienced in my parents back garden. There was always something tangible that I just could not name. These experiences when I was around 12 years of ago were critical before my father decided to leave home, and those of us who were left were left to struggle in pain and sadness. These were tough years, and that little me was deeply wounded by this experience of wounding.

My family did the best they could, but I just sensed there was more to life, so began an ongoing spiritual search beyond atheism seeking significance and meaning that touched on the experiences of my early childhood in that garden.

Much later on in life, after developing a career, and became a Christian interested in spirituality, I realised that deep within me this wounding still took root, and up to that point, there seemed no way of understanding this other than platitudes I heard in forms of sermons. Only later did I realise that pain, and the pain that we carry within, can often catalyse the spiritual journey, as we seek spiritual relief from this relentless sense of brokenness and a constant sense that we are not good enough with all the shame that this entails. Only in my 40s did I really begin to understand the contemplative Christian way, coming out of the lives of the monastics, mendicants and mystics. I realised as got involved in new forms of spiritual community in what sometimes gets called the new monasticism, and I never saw my self becoming a month or friar by the way, I realised then that there was a way of facing all of this. Traditionally to the mystics and contemplatives, this was called the journey from purgation, into illumination through to union. It is a painful journey, one where you have to face all your wounds, the reality of all your shadow self, all the lies of egoic living tied into our materialistic and consumerist society, but the reward of seeking the love of God, to help us learn to love ourselves, to love others, can be truly rewarding. It is a path that only the brave begin and sustain, but what it can bring is truly transformation as we attend to the Spirit of God that awakens within us the desire and yearning for peace, love and a sense of increase integration made possible through the love of God.