I awoke feeling blue this morning. It’s a feeling I’ve known plenty in my life, but I found it unexpected when I arose today. There’s been a lot of change, even disruption during the last couple of months, but I largely feel hopeful with the ‘new thing’ God seems to be doing in my world. “So why am I blue?” I thought to myself.
I made some tea and lit a candle and meditated on that for a bit. Being receptive to an answer is not generally an easy posture for me to take. I’m much better at telling God what I need then listening for the still small voice that might be quietly, but fervently, knocking on the door to my heart, or head, or soul. And listening, when it means tending to a tender emotion is all that much more unpleasant. But, it’s necessary. Or so that’s what everyone says.
My blueness on this particular day seems attached to some unconscious material from my dreams last night, along with a recently broken relationship … oh, and throw in a little family drama … I guess being blue makes some sense. And that’s about as deep as I care to go being receptive this morning. It’s a start.
It’s not uncommon to feel blue during the holiday season, although it is somewhat uncommon to feel safe admitting it to others. With so much red and green gracing our homes, businesses, institutions and shops, blue doesn’t seem to fit in (and no I don’t mean Hanukkah, although some of my Jewish friends might disagree as Christmas still clearly takes over most of our environments here in America at this time of year).
But blue is actually the liturgical color of Advent. While we often mean that we are sad or grieving when we say we are ‘blue,’ in the Church, blue is the color of hopeful anticipation. This is the time of year when we once again await the arrival of a baby born in a manager, One who will forever turn our world upside down in a most beautiful way.
A quote I can’t quite remember and don’t know who to attribute to comes to mind … “But the Word is sad before it is glad.” And it strikes me that this is rather biblical. That first Christmas was likely very blue, in our common nomenclature way of understanding. An unwed pregnant female teen riding a donkey in the cold and dark only to find no room at the inn when she and her fiancé first arrive at their long awaited destination. I wouldn’t have wanted to be Mary that day. Or Jospeh … presumably he walked most of the way, leading a young woman bearing a child he had no part in creating and yet was humbling claiming as family. How uncomfortable is that? It sounds like a pretty interpersonally messy experience, made all the more challenging by a world not welcoming them with warmth and hospitality.
This year, as last, has brought an unbelievable amount of loss to people on a global scale. Many come to this ‘joyous time of year’ feeling almost no joy. Can we admit this when this describes us? Can we allow it in our friends? Or how about that stranger honking at you in the street, or yelling at the cashier? Making room for challenging emotions or the people feeling them is certainly uncomfortable. It requires being vulnerable, trusting those around us, and the God who speaks quietly into our lives and promises to see us through the hard times, just as the good ones. Taking that open stance is risky business. It means being willing to be uncomfortable. Are we willing? Hear an invitation to do so in Rumi’s poem The Guest House:
“This being human is a guest house. Every morning a new arrival.
A joy, a depression, a meanness, some momentary awareness comes as an unexpected visitor.
Welcome and entertain them all!
Even if they’re a crowd of sorrows, who violently sweep your house empty of it’s furniture,
still, treat each guest honorably. He may be clearing you out for some new delight.
The dark thought, the shame, the malice, meet them at the door laughing, and invite them in.
Be grateful for whoever comes, because each has been sent as a guide from beyond.”
Can we trust Rumi’s message, heed its call? Can we allow ourselves to be blue if that’s how we are? Will it help us to do so?
Maybe the Virgin Mary can be our guide. When presented with a reality most unpleasant (she’s going to bare a child … when she’s an unmarried child herself … what will her parents say? And Joseph? And the towns people?), she ultimately says, “Let it be. Let it be as you say God. I will accept this new reality, the one I am currently standing in, the one You seem to be presenting me with.” Maybe this is the key … letting be what is and allowing the feeling to pass through us so there is room for new ones within the Inn of our soul.
Peace and grace to you this day.