Spiritual Direction: Paying Attention to Spring

Paying Attention to Spring

It can be a challenge for us to pay attention to spring.

For many of us, our lives have become long strings of days following each other. It can be difficult to distinguish one day from another. Some of us tend to forget which day it is today.

The pandemic has made it hard for us to pay particular attention to each day.

We might not have noticed when spring began, in this hemisphere, a few days ago.

I grew up in a place where spring did not bring much immediate change. The end of winter and the beginning of spring felt remarkably similar to people waiting for the frozen ground to thaw. Our spring was a gradual process from snow and subzero temperatures to when crops would survive.

Now I live in a different place which has been described as endless summer. The ground does not freeze here. Changing seasons here are more a matter of subtle differences. We have winter days when the temperature is in the 80s.

Our relationship to changing seasons is not the same as it was where I was a child. Many people here do not recognize the constellations of stars in the night sky. They come here looking for a different kind of stars. We do not want to believe we are as dependent on the environment, except for earthquakes and wildfires.

Some of us go to specific places to visit nature and appreciate spring. We take trips to pay attention to spring in small doses.

It can be easy for us to lose track of the seasons. They feel similar as we walk through them to get from our cars into a building.

What season is it for us right now?

How important is it for us to pay attention to spring?

The Hope of Spring

The sun dawns a little earlier on each morning of spring. Every day of spring brings a little more light and a little more warmth.

Some of us want to fold up winter and put it away for a few months.

We wake up to more than sunlight on an early spring morning. As we practice opening our eyes we realize each morning is more than a list of things to do. Each morning reminds us it holds more than we expected.

Some of us have lost our hope during a long, cold, challenging winter. It is all we can do to keep getting out of bed each morning.

It can be easy for us to miss how spring turns the world around us brighter and warmer each morning. Some of us are exhausted by the changes we are already experiencing.

Winter may have taken so much out of us we are not certain we can handle spring. Hope may have disappointed us in the past and we prefer to live without it.

It is enough of a challenge for us to deal with what we were already expecting. Why would we want to hope for more?

Some of us believe hope is unrealistic, possibly even the opposite of realistic.

We may be convinced we need to face the bleakness of our prospects in all their stark darkness. Some of us are committed to do whatever it takes to completely understand the practical depth of how hard it will be.

Difficult situations do not inspire us. Hope inspires us. We remember we have dealt with issues like this before, or we know people who have, and we find hope. It encourages us forward, helping us find ways through or around what threatens to defeat us.

Finding the Hope of Spring

Hope can feel small. It is not the bright flame of persistence or brilliant analysis. Hope is the spark which lights the fire. With no hope the fire within us would go out.

Our hope may feel small or weak because we do not practice exercising it. It may help us when we step into situations which stretch our hope. Some of us help build more powerful hope in other people.

Many of us live in days and nights which can feel hopeless.

We take time to listen for a few minutes as we savor the stillness and hope of spring.

Spring creates each morning with its own unique flavors. We taste each one, rolling it around on our tongues before we swallow.

We glance through our windows to see spring waiting for us outdoors.

Each morning of spring is its own particular gift waiting for us to open it.

Spring reminds us hope is not something we need to hoard or protect. We have an abundance of hope waiting for us. There is no need to conserve it for a less hopeful time. There is no deficit of hope, no matter how we might feel.

A Spring for Revelry

This is a spring for revelry.

Each of us has the opportunity to choose how, and for what, we will celebrate this spring. We remember the hope we have each day and we celebrate in the face of challenges and obstacles.

Some of us revel in the fact we have survived the last few years. We may celebrate the people we love who have not survived.

This is not a spring for celebrating the final resolution of our struggles and difficulties. We celebrate, even when we do not have our final answer, because we have hope.

Spring reminds us our hope continues. It is not because we have nothing to fear or we have overcome our anxiety.

We celebrate the ambiguity of life, the unfathomable wisdom of spiritual life.

This spring I am reveling in the peace which passes understanding, and I celebrate it is more than I can understand.

The fact we do not understand means there is more to be explored, more to be discovered. We revel in the hope of spring.

How will we remember to pay attention to spring today?

When will we revel in the hope of spring this week?

[Image by Dvortygirl]

Greg Richardson is a spiritual director in Southern California. He is a recovering assistant district attorney and associate university professor, and is a lay Oblate with New Camaldoli Hermitage near Big Sur, California. Greg’s website is StrategicMonk.com and his email address is StrategicMonk@gmail.com.