Writing the Sacred Journey: The Art and Practice of Spiritual Memoir by Andrew Elizabeth Jarrett

Author:Andrew, Elizabeth Jarrett [Andrew, Elizabeth Jarrett]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Skinner House Books
Published: 2004-12-14T16:00:00+00:00

Journeys

One day I left the house with a pair of scissors. After a seemingly eternal winter, the crabapple trees were canopies of pink, the grass blindingly green, and the soil alive with earthworms. In my front yard I cut narcissus, glad for their sunny faces. And in the backyard, along the alley, I entered the lilac’s sweet realm; I reached between the branches to snip three generous sprigs. Their scent buzzed in my head and made the afternoon reel. Coming into the house, I heard the screen door slam behind me. For an instant the kitchen was dark and formless, but then my eyes adjusted. The lilacs in my hand sugared the air, the narcissus brought in sunshine, and for the first time this season my home was consecrated with color.

It doesn’t take much to go on a journey. You leave a place of familiarity, encounter the world, and return changed. The most ancient metaphor for life is a journey, and there’s no dimension of experience that cannot be understood within the journey framework. Certainly each minuscule spiritual venture (each foray into doubt, each intentional walk around the block, each worship service or sesshin) is a journey, inasmuch as we are transformed, however slightly. It takes very little for the heart to travel outside of its comfort zone and be moved. Whenever we leave home to encounter newness, we embark on a journey.

Write about a moment of departure, small or large. Be sure to include the sensations of the moment. What was known? What was unknown? What did you fear? Expect? What did you carry with you? Where were you going? In hindsight, where did you actually go?

When does a journey become spiritual? There are occasions when we set out with the intention of nourishing the soul, when we seek insight (in the landscape, in a holy site, in a guru) and follow our longings beyond the borders of the familiar. George Crane does this in Bones of the Master , traveling with his teacher to China to pay homage to a lost monastic tradition. In The Snow Leopard , Matthiessen travels to the Himalayas with a field biologist, ostensibly to find the snow leopard but also seeking peace with what is. During my last year of college, I saw myself falling into a pattern of stagnation and self-effacement; I took a semester in Wales to bike the mountains with the hope that I would learn how to listen to my spirit. These journeys are conscious and deliberate; they are the equivalent of a retreat or midday walking meditation. On spiritual journeys, we expect transformation, we open ourselves to movement.

But then there are occasions when we’re blundering along without any intention of spiritual growth and new awareness bursts through regardless. You’re in a poor country for the first time, and suddenly see your own luxuries as meaningless. Or you are struck with an illness that forces you to question your life’s purpose. Although a certain amount of open-heartedness is necessary for newness to break upon us, the sacred can catch us by surprise.

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