Spiritual Disciplines as Trellises, Not Prisons
My pastor talks a lot about the “Rule of Life,” a monastic idea about structuring our days with patterns and habits that cultivate intentional spirituality. My pastor notes how the word “rule” comes from the Greek for “trellis,” like a garden trellis that Morning Glories or snap peas wind up and around in the summer.
What a lovely image for spiritual disciplines.
I haven’t had a super healthy relationship with spiritual disciplines. I abandoning them altogether for a bit, because I didn’t know how to practice them in a way that wasn’t harsh and shame-filled and driven towards a kind of manic impossible perfection. I imagined spiritual disciplines as bars holding me in, restricting my motion, and demanding my obedience.
A trellis, though, is different. The criss crosses of a trellis aren’t prison bars. A trellis is open. It is just present, tall and rooted and wide open to the sky. The vines can grab on to it to help them reach higher, or trained to make it easier for them to hold on, but they don’t have to. Trellis are invitations, not demands.
A personal “rule of life,” or spiritual disciplines, can be a safe place to cling to when we’re feeling wobbly, habits that hold steady when the ground under us shakes. Spiritual disciplines can also be invitations to growth, adventure, and spaciousness, in times we’re feeling our best self - brave and ready to climb. They’re built for us and our flourishing. They’re supposed to make it all easier, not harder!
Spiritual disciplines can be a refuge for our weakness or empowerment for our strength, but they are always wide open & safe, not rigid or shame-inducing.
I love coming back to spiritual disciplines with this new image. If I hadn’t taken time away, though, I might not have seen it so clearly. The Christian life can be like a spiral upwards - we leave ideas behind because they hurt us, or are untrue to our current experiences or wisdom. But sometimes (often!) we rediscover the same theology or practice later, in new & safer ways.
This Lent, may we be brave enough to drop some old ideas, and curious & hopeful enough to recognize abandoned ones when come again, this time in safety & in grace.
Breath as a Spiritual “Discipline”
In the moments when we don’t know what we have left to give or be or seek, there is our breath.
It’s not “out there” waiting for us, it’s already here. When our restless hands and chaotic minds and running late and spiritual anxiety hit so hard that “spiritual disciplines” are impossible - we are already breathing. The noticing is all.
In yoga classes, they say, “draw your attention to the breath.” They don’t say “breathe more!” Just - notice. You are already here, you are already breathing, you are already home. Our bodies are working to keep us alive in the moments we notice, and also in the moments we don’t notice.
In Jewish theology, life begins with breath. God breathes into dust, and Adam was. God breathes into the valley of dry bones and dry bones live. Jesus breathes on His disciples and they go into the world bravely. Breath is life & courage & creativity & the presence of God, and we don’t need to go looking for it - it is happening in our bodies right now, not something to create or chase after or pin down.
Our breath is with us already.
I heard an (extremely apocryphal) interpretation once that the Tetragrammaton YHWH, the Jewish name of God, could be the sound of our breath. Breathing in, breathing out, we speak the name of God. The idea that every time I breathe, I say God’s name, feels so safe. I’m praying when I don’t notice, in stress & joy & on runs & while I sleep.
I think a lot about how we don’t have to chase God’s presence, that when we “draw close to God,” we’re only noticing how close God already is.
God is already as close as God can be. So is our breath.
We notice we’re breathing.
When we stop noticing, our breath still carries us.
We notice God is here.
When we stop noticing, Love is still with us.
We don’t need to notice our breath for it to hold us. But there is a gift in the noticing. There is a moment safety in a storm. There is one heartbeat of peace when everything shifts.
There is so much defeat & despair everywhere. There are moments when flourishing feels like an impossible goal & nothing seems steady enough to hold on to. God is as close as our breath.
We are already breathing. We are already home.
Oh Laura, I keep coming back to this. Reading and rereading, silent and out loud, to myself and sharing with others. For all the moments I don’t notice my breathing, don’t notice God, I will take a deep breath and as I focus on the physical aspect of breathing I am reminded that Love is here too, that Love has been here and will be here after I stop noticing and until the next time I notice.