Be still...?
Photo by Thomas Jörn on Unsplash
Blog by Debbie Williams, MitE Volunteer Coordinator
Learning to sit quietly in stillness is at the heart of pretty much any form of spiritual practice.
Life has become so busy: people to see, ever longer working hours, stress of travelling to and from work, taking care of children and / or elderly relatives, paperwork to complete, technology to master. Some days the list seems endless. The busyness of life leaves little time for stillness and resting in God’s presence, or for those who don’t believe in God, simply resting, healing the heart and soothing the mind.
Yet now, when so much of the busyness has been suddenly removed for so many of us, how do we cope with the sudden, enforced quiet and stillness of life? If, indeed, it is quiet and still. For those who have young children to care for there is the stress of entertaining children when you can’t go out into the local parks even for more than an hour a day, when they can’t meet their friends to play or can’t visit their grandparents. Regardless of whether you are working from home, have children or parents to take care of, are retired, or worrying about not having a job, life in this moment is so totally different from just a month ago.
How do we keep ourselves connected to whatever it is that makes us feel nourished, loved and protected as an individual? There is good advice to be found on-line from the NHS and from a variety of health and well-being sites such as Action for Happiness which mainly involve motivating, keeping some structure to your day, finding ways to communicate with friends and family, finding at least three things to be grateful for each day, eating as healthily as possible and taking some form of exercise, however gentle.
Motivation is one of the key things that is required to keep us engaging with any of those activities and I think it is also one of the most difficult things to maintain when life changes so dramatically. It’s all too easy to fall into the ‘what’s the point’ mentality especially when conversation gets difficult when so many of our newsy bits of chat are shut down due to the lack of opportunity to observe and chat about things we’ve seen or heard when we’re out at work or leisure activities. The news is full of Covid-19, lots of it scary and depressing, we don’t want to talk too much about that - though it’s so important to be thankful for all of the people who are recovering and all of the people who are doing their part to maintain social distancing and keep each other and the NHS safe. We don’t hear so much about the positive things on the news so sometimes it’s difficult to keep these in mind. Finding even a few minutes to be still and to centre yourself is a really good way to help develop or maintain motivation to do the other things that contribute to well-being. As a Christian, my motivation improves dramatically when I make space in my day to sit quietly in God’s presence, focusing on Him and giving myself time to connect emotionally as well as mentally with my creator.
Mindfulness is a good way to centre yourself if you don’t have a faith - a mindfulness course is actually what helped me to explore and engage with Contemplative Prayer. I found that being mindful of the moment and learning to let go of distracting thoughts actually helped me to sense the presence of God in the here and now with me. In the stillness, focusing on my breathing, I gradually became aware of a sense of being loved and experienced peacefulness no matter what was going on around me. That sense of love and peace really helps to recharge my motivation, to enable me to feel more whole and nourished and then instead of thinking, “What’s the point? Why should I exercise or do that chore now?” I start to feel more energised and think something like, “I feel so much more light and able, why wouldn’t I exercise a bit or do that chore now?” Nowadays I don’t even have to be sitting in stillness to experience that sense of peace and the presence of love. I may be washing dishes, writing this blog or doing something else and I’ll notice something like sunlight through the window, a small bird on the bird feeder, a bee pollinating a flower or my dog sleeping peacefully and it will connect me with the spiritual and cause me to focus on God’s blessing in my life. To spend a few minutes being intentionally grateful, feeling loved and creating a deeper connection with God, but also with the world around me however small that world may have become at the moment.
The way to practice this type of centring is to be intentional. Initially you need to make a dedicated time even if it’s ten minutes each day to focus on being thankful. For me it’s time to focus on God and His presence in my life but gratitude is a great motivator whether you have a faith or not. Intentionally spend at least ten minutes each day being grateful: you don’t have to think about things you are grateful for if that’s too hard on a dark day - just focus on the feeling. Remember it from a better day, savour it, let it fill you with peace and hope, focus on your physical response to feeling gratitude. What is happening in your body when you connect to that feeling? Are you tingly? Do you find yourself smiling? Are you sitting up straighter? Do you feel tension leaving any part of your body as you focus on feeling grateful?