“Stop the words now. Open the window in the center of your chest, and let the spirits fly in and out.” (Rumi)

I remember the day I was interviewed about starting a hospital visitation training program. I had been teaching for 6 years and prior to that coordinating an educational program at a church, so I was used to “talking”.
Used to posing the questions, coordinating the discussion, shaping the atmosphere where I worked. And yet, here I was in an entirely new surrounding being asked why I wanted to do this.

The immediate answer that came to me was that I was tired of talking and ready to listen. I felt ready to learn a new thing. Without really knowing what I was doing, I was choosing to call upon something new within me.

I’d always expected a lot of myself and this was no different, but I hadn’t realized how undeveloped my skills would be. For example, I’d always prepared myself – worked to “be ready” for whatever I’d committed to do.
The spontaneity of visiting someone I didn’t know in a situation and with needs I was unaware of was shockingly unsettling. (There is a reason why hospitals are always the subject of exciting TV shows – they can be very dramatic places.) And later when I entered a more serious internship in pastoral care and was on call all night, I was faced with “the pager” signaling the demand for my presence in a crisis. I often walked into extreme circumstances with no idea what I would encounter. So, “prepare myself”, “be ready”? No, this work required a completely different part of me to be present.

What that whole experience taught me is something I’m actually still learning. Periodically, I think our spirits need to be jolted awake with a new expectation. If I want to be truly awake and alive in this life, I occasionally need to challenge some new part of myself. Since the hospital work, I’ve repeated the demand for a new part of me to emerge. Sometimes I’ve gotten to choose and sometimes I’ve been forced to learn something I never really wanted to know. But each time I think I’ve grown a wider and deeper capacity to love and to be alive.

Janie Cook is a retired teacher who lives in Austin, Texas with her husband, Gareth. She shares her days with family and friends (a precious privilege), facilitates a bereaved parents’ support group and enjoys digging in the Texas Hill Country dirt & learning about natural gardening.
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