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~ James 1:27
1
“How in the world are you?” Dr. Robert A. Cook would say at the start of each one of his radio observations. Well, it takes an increasingly concerted effort to healthfully persevere, while remaining unfettered by ubiquitous and shrill newsmedia. One thing within my control is a proverbial off switch. It’s not easy, but it’s possible to be fairly informed while staying unfettered by the world. As “influencing” replaces reporting, so editorialists comment with declaratives about one another, instead of treating the topics of the times. For those that engage the challenge of stepping back or looking up from news feeds, how do we perceive the issues of the day manifesting albeit without social media infiltrating our thoughts? What is perceptible when our invasive devices are shut off? What remains for us to read in a reputable newspaper (assuming you can find one) that publishes multiple viewpoints, or hear from individuals in our municipalities, workplaces, on public transit? There’s inflation and intolerance; conflict and the narrowing of opportunities- all to be seen and heard, without overdramatized chat-shows to fuel anxieties and tell us what we apparently need. Alas, such things are one-way streets, preventing us from informing the tanned and toned actors about what they need. No doubt, there’s plenty to bring all of us down, but staying down doesn’t look advisable.
2
Pausing to think and write, the reminder arises that I mustn’t let the cultures of my living and working to reduce my universe into something small-minded. It is imperative to keep finding ways to spiritually push back. Thus, my questioning turns to my typically quixotic nature, wondering whether I still have a future worth my struggles. As a prompt for a recent journaling workshop I taught, my question to the class was to make a list of questions that burn holes through your thoughts- even waking you up at night. I dare say that most of us have at least a few. The list you make can join your own growing stock of self-made journaling prompts. What kind of future may I dare to expect? I’ve thought about this since childhood. But today we’re all forced to confront a hypersensitive and perfectionist world asserting that anyone exceeding thirty-five years of age is too irrelevant to be a valuable worker. Eventually, everyone will have to lean into that howling headwind and persevere while being extraordinarily productive and, would you believe it, relevant. Is there still a chance for life to improve?
The other day, while writing at a café on Boston’s Newbury Street, I saw many burgeoning graduates carrying their commencement caps and gowns- calling to mind how we all get some version of a ceremonial graduation speech to the effect of having a bright future ahead. Does that have an expiry date? What about the conflicting ratio of increasing accomplishments versus decreasing callbacks on applications? And that’s not to mention other discriminatory factors over which qualified and alacritous applicants have no control. Yet there is no giving up; why on earth would I ever do that, thus consenting to a status quo? Inevitably, my belief remains that I really do have a future that is worthwhile, appealing, and more open than the present (and surely the past). More accomplished is more to offer to benefit others. Perhaps seeing metaphor in too many ordinary things, the day-in-year-out commutes on broken walkways and odoriferous buses symbolize warnings against viewing and wearing life into toxic trenches instead of preferring beautiful aesthetics and fresh air. No doubt, my eagerness and drive remain for the redemption of my genuine and hardworked efforts. It’s an ache to see forbearance, muscle, and wit find fruition. Aspiration and endurance! Let us ask ourselves about what is fair to wish for, and let’s also see how brilliantly we can be unreasonable. It’s the juxtaposition of long-haul prayer and ambition.
3
Holding fast to a cultivated sense of vision demands sharp navigation through gauntlets, both broadly societal and narrowly corporate. But there are no matters too large or small for neither philosophical ethics nor for what my field calls professional best practices. Living often has the aspect of being an extemporaneous “laboratory” for the merging of theoretical and practical. Comprehending the virtue of hope- a confidence in limitless, Divine goodness- is cultivated, more felt than seen. Now the incremental arrival of spring, notably in a climate such as in New England, appears in rotations of senses amounting to hopes launching forward. Signs of the nascent season are arriving very late.
Recently from the courtyard at Beacon Hill Friends House, I heard the ecstatic full-throated sounds of birds. As with Chaucer’s pilgrims in the early seasonal rains of April, the physical indicators of nature are pulling everyone forward. Or perhaps pushing us all ahead. This is indeed the season exemplified by onward motion. Birds’ voices and green reaches of trees repudiate the naysayers of growth. The most poignant of the post-Easter liturgical readings are the paragraphs that chronicle the very human travellers in the depths of their misery while en route to Emmaus. It’s not one, but both companions (one corroborating the other) that had seen everything of their wishes destroyed. The essence of their shocking intervention was the vividly tangible demonstration (and both witnessed this) compelling them to not lose hope. There really was a persuasive return to life, and there were numerous additional eyewitnesses whose perspectives were worth a listen. On top of that, both these convinced sojourners told each other about how their hearts burned within them. They encountered enough to keep going. In my own instances, I’ve experienced enough resonance to not stop trying- to pray without ceasing, as the great Apostle emphasized. If anything, endeavor itself is fuel for the fire. Astonishingly, the flame within somehow endures. As sustenance, that knowledge is going to have to suffice for the most part, especially in the face of unrelentingly fickle employment markets. I’ll simply proceed as my own Dr. Cook of Briarcliff Manor, and tell myself to not give up. With scant few things as demoralizing as persistently foraging for professional opportunities, many of us have to dust ourselves off and keep working, always refining the pitch. That virtual inner Dr. Cook says to disregard the cynicisms and hold to the higher road of faith. Let the lengthened days of a renewing season present new promise.
