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When Meaning Breaks Down · Infinitely Precious

• 0:00
  Intro: Welcome to the infinitely precious podcast produced by infinitely precious LLC. Your host is James Henry. Remember, you are infinitely precious and unconditionally loved for the gift you already are.
• 0:11
  James: Hello, beloved. It's me, James. It's good to be with you today here on the Infinitely Precious Podcast. A lot of things churning in the world, churning in me, and the Infinitely Precious Podcast is an opportunity for me to share some of those things that I've been thinking about. I do want to take a moment just to thank you for being here with me, a companion on this journey with me.
• 0:37
  Even if I don't know you, if I haven't met you in this world, the fact that we share a common thread of spirit is encouraging to me. So thanks for being a part of the podcast and thanks for sharing it whenever you get a chance when it has meaning for you. And speaking of meaning, that's my topic for today. What happens to us as people in this world when meaning breaks down for us? When the ways in which we framed our lives, that we saw our lives, that we understood our lives don't make sense the way they once did.
• 1:19
  Perhaps all the ways that we interacted in the communities in which we find ourselves seem to no longer bring us that sense of purpose, of direction, of meaning in life. And we're trying really hard to figure out how to cope with that, how to deal with a world that is rapidly changing, technology that is rapidly changing, a landscape in our particularly if you're in The United States, a political landscape that seems to be rapidly and consistently changing or inconsistently changing, quite frankly, these days. And when our own faith is a struggle in trying to find ways to hang the pieces that make any kind of sense, when all of the neat arrangement of our understanding of who we are in this larger universe in relationship to the divine, in relationship to each other, in relationship to the very material out of which the universe is made when those don't seem to make as much sense as they once did. If I'm being really honest and I try to be in the podcast, I hope you're honest with yourself as well. My faith has been changing probably since I was a small person.
• 3:01
  The way I looked at the world changed as I learned more about the world, as I learned more about how the world worked, as I had people come into my life, some of whom let me down, changed the way I understood people and their dependability, my ability to trust, risk, reach out, As I came to understand love through a variety of lenses, all of that kind of information, that kind of experience of life sort of filtered its way in and asked of me, how does this piece of information, how does this experience of life fit into your understanding of the universe and of the divine, of yourself within that whole picture. So I've been constantly, I think we all are seeking ways to speak of our meaning, understand what our meaning is, our purpose, our direction, where we come from, where we're going, what it is to be alive right now in this place. And so my faith has probably always been in flux. But the more I've grown and aged, the more I'm aware when something feels out of kilter. And it's not something I can just fill in a space for, that I can just read the next book and it's going to magically answer all my questions, or I'm going to find that next chapter of scripture that's going to speak to me, or the next guru who will show me how to understand myself.
• 4:48
  It certainly has come to the fore for me in the last ten, twelve, fourteen years. I could almost trace it to beginning a regular meditation practice that it has been especially both grounding and challenging to understand my meaning in this world. The more I meditated, the more consistent I was in my meditation practice. I found that pieces that I had been afraid to let go of were suddenly I felt more freed to let them slip away. That they were part of a house of cards that were just waiting to fall apart anyway.
• 5:33
  And then there were other things that I felt more deeply and strongly about. I realized that my faith needed to find new ways to be practiced. And it certainly came to a head for me when I went off to study with Richard Rohr, James Finley and Cynthia Bourgeois among others, Doctor. B in the living school at the Center for Action and Contemplation from 2018 to 2020. That really became an intense period of beginning to ask deep questions of faith about a kind of engagement with the world that saw the world for more than what is on the surface.
• 6:23
  The life of contemplation invites us to see what is real, to lovingly look for those things in our lives, to paraphrase Richard Rohr. That's what the life of really seeing is. There's so much out there that's not real. Reputation, it's not real. It's created.
• 6:45
  It's created. It's a construct that we have allowed ourselves to live in and we buy into on a regular basis. And it's used as a tool both for us and against us in the world in which we live through advertising and other things. So, as I began to ask these questions and find that I had more questions and less answers or less defined answers, then my meaning began to break apart. And for a long time, I've been struggling to figure out how to put it back together.
• 7:24
  And part of that was that when things break down, we want to find solid ground to stand on as quickly as we can. It's hard to remain floating with the uncertainty to remain in what we might think of as threshold spaces, liminal space between the worlds. That's not a comfortable place for most human beings to exist. That's why a contemplative practice gives us a ground of being groundless. It's a good place to finally realize, wait, I don't have all the answers, but I can sit with the answerlessness for a little bit longer.
• 8:06
  I don't have to rush for ground because the quicker we rush for ground, the more we feel uncertain, the more we want meaning now, the more likely we are to try to put back together the broken pieces of our meaning just the way it was before. Find some kind of glue that is going to make it just like it was. Can't we go back to that golden age when I just believed everything and I had deep faith and I was willing to take deep risks. And the answer is really no, you cannot go back to that place. There is no going back.
• 8:43
  There is only going here now, being here and laying a groundwork for whatever may or may not come into the future. It's hard. I know from personal experience to have all of that footing that seems so firm come apart under your feet. And so then you begin to look for anything you can hang things on. Initially, there's it can even lead to a kind of quiet desperation.
• 9:14
  For me, as a person who speaks into faith with regularity, is looked to with some kind of as someone who is some kind of authority about faith in my day job, in my work, in my vocation that I've been called to, it's especially hard in those moments when you're uncertain. What do you say? Do you just regurgitate what all those who have gone before you have said? Do you pull an old sermon out from a bin you have somewhere? I don't have an old bin with sermons in it anymore because I don't write them that way.
• 9:57
  There aren't manuscripts that I can pull out and just rework and pull out. Have to speak from the place that I find myself in conversation with the scripture and my experience, tradition and reason. All those pieces come into play when I'm trying to find meaning again. So there are moments in life when we will feel lost because we don't know where the meaning is. And I want to tell you, first of all, you're not alone when you find that truth.
• 10:29
  When you find that to be true for you, you don't know. It's gonna be hardest to do this but what I wanna encourage you to do is what I've been trying to do in those things for better or worse. And that is to stay with the uncertainty. To ask questions of that uncertainty. Where is this uncertainty coming from?
• 10:54
  What is it that I am truly uncertain about? Are there things about which I still feel a certain degree that they hold weight, that they matter? As the other pieces, as the pieces of meaning seem to be crumbling are what's being left behind in its wake. Is there something? What is that something?
• 11:25
  Who am I in the midst of this? And what could my meaning be when things come apart? You're not alone. Things come apart. Meanings crumble.
• 11:38
  As we are growing and learning and meeting the challenges of everyday life, it happens. It happens that things come apart. So breathe. Recognize that you're not alone. Recognize also that this is an opportunity for you to reflect on where you are.
• 12:09
  About when the pieces that gave you meaning before no longer give you meaning now, it gives you an opportunity to ask what does give you meaning, what might give you meaning, what space is having those other things fall away? What space is being created in my life for me to figure out more about who I am, more about who the divine is for me, and witness to that in the way that I am in this world. As you know, I ground this whole podcast, the Infinitely Precious podcast on this phrase, you are infinitely precious and unconditionally loved for the gift you already are in this very moment. Meaninglessness and all if you are at a place of meaninglessness. And the same is true for me.
• 13:04
  I'm infinitely precious and unconditionally loved for the gift I already am, even when meaning is breaking down for me. I'm not alone in that. I have room to question and God doesn't mind, the divine does not mind my questions. As quickly as I would like to find ground, sometimes I have to sit with the ungroundedness and just let it be what it is, waiting for the right thing to arise, not just the most convenient thing to arise, and to keep at it, which is the hardest part of it all. And also to know sometimes it is letting go that gives us the freedom to discover.
• 13:57
  So letting go of those pieces that no longer hold meaning for us give us room to create a new framework, a different framework, perhaps one that completes us or fulfills us more than the previous one ever did. It is a hard place to be. I just want to tell you that. If you feel like it's a hard place to be when meaning is breaking down, when you look around in the world and in all the other places of your life and you are finding it difficult to find recognizable, meaningful pieces of your life, you are not alone. It is the way that we all eventually make our way on this path.
• 14:43
  I want to encourage you and by encourage for you to find heart, courage. The word courage comes from the French word and even before that the word cur heart. I want to encourage you, take heart, hang in there, don't give up, find someone you can trust, and share with them your own struggles of meaning and the breaking down of meaning. Perhaps read some new stories into your life. Look for the things that are coming into being in your life and look for the signs of the greening around the edges.
• 15:30
  And by greening, mean just like in the springtime when you just notice the buds popping up on the flowers, Things are just beginning to turn green. The trees are budding. You notice the signs, look for the signs. And if you don't see them right away, be patient with yourself, catch your breath and know no matter what, being in a place of meaninglessness is an invitation to ask good questions and try to find your way forward in the midst of that being on the threshold of whatever is yet to come. Remember always, you are infinitely precious and unconditionally loved for the gift you already are.
• 16:11
  And until the next time, I wish you all the best. And if you're struggling, you're not alone. You are not alone.