Last weekend, I shared the dance floor with my tuxedo’d little brother for the last song of his daughter’s wedding reception. The crafty musicians in the wedding band aimed a musical guided missile straight at his heart. It struck its mark. In the process, the shrapnel hit me. “It’s something unpredictable, but in the end there’s right, I hope you had the time of your life” (Greenday, 1997). That episode was exactly a month removed from my own daughter’s wedding. My brother’s clandestine tears were totally contagious.
For the last month, I’ve been reflecting on how it is that certain events lift us up to high places for a view of all that has come before, and even a glance at the hazy outlines of what’s to come. Speaking from personal experience, as well as some fascinating recent research (Dasher Keltner’s Awe, 2023), top-of-the-mountain experiences are frequently accompanied by inner states of awe and gratitude… and they aren’t limited to weddings. At certain funerals, for example, where a life has been well and fully lived, a song selection or a story will provide instant transportation to an emotional/spiritual promontory. Again, the signature of these experiences: awe, gratitude, a savoring of that transcendent quality that is always present but hidden behind the quotidian normality that shields it from view.
The Monday after Annalise’s nuptials, five weeks ago, Lisa and I packed the mini-van and drove cross country to the bride’s graduation from Law School in Boston. It had nothing to do with the celebrity speeches (Tom Hanks wasn’t bad; Michelle Yeoh was a “Crouching Tiger” of a speaker!), or my daughter’s honorifics (magna cum laude!). It was the spontaneous flash of scenes from her life that provided the locomotion to another lofty lookout. Once again the electricity shot through me. Tears ran off my chin as I recognized that hidden movement of Spirit that blew through and eventually provided direction to my Junie B. Jones loving, diary writing, soccer playing… former little girl.
On our drive home from Boston, through upstate New York (including Niagara Falls!), Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois, I was given plenty of opportunity to reflect back on what had transpired over the last week. There was the amazing party for 180 in the park near my house the night before the wedding during which my wife’s words lifted us to a high place. Her invitation to join arms and sing, “Country Roads, take me home, to the place I belong,” … in the park where all of my kids did most of their growing up, transported that crowd to the top of the “Blue Ridge Mountains,” and made of us a liturgical community.
At the wedding, just before the vows, we called upon the ancestors. The melody and refrain were lifted from a Litany of the Saints (John D. Becker), but the names were changed to all the ancestors from both families, as well as the family members present. At one point, I noticed that my youngest, the Maid of Honor, wept in front of me. My mom who has lost all object permanence to old age, sat behind me. My right hand found its way to my daughter’s hand in front, while my left hand held my mom’s hand behind me. Spanning the generations like that, during a song like that, with all of the ancestors present… well… I predict that this… and all the other memories of that week will serve as my own personal prayer of reminiscence until the day I die, or dementia comes to relieve me of consciousness.
In the Christian scriptures, most doctors of Spiritual Theology believe that, like Elijah in the Jewish scriptures (1Kings 19), Peter, James, and John had a mystical experience on Mount Tabor during what Catholics call “The Transfiguration” (Matthew 17). Martin Buber, William James, Abraham Maslow, and Theresa of Avilla respectively referred to these experiences as, “I-Thou,” “Religious,” “Peak,” and “Mystical Experiences.” Regardless of what you call them, all researchers of this phenomenon agree on their fleeting nature. Eventually, you gotta come down from the mountain top.
I remember the dark place where the stunning movie, “Jean de Florette” left the 1980’s viewer. It was as if the director wanted the audience to see that the brutality of World War I had the power to totally erase all of the good that came before it. By way of contrast, I will never forget my week long private retreat with David Hassell, SJ (1923-1992) who wrote about the “Personal Prayer of Reminiscence,” in his book, Radical Prayer. In retrospect, I now see that he offered me an important discipline for coming down the mountain. According to him, we are to live our lives in memory of these moments. In a world where each life will be touched by some form of suffering… even brutality… I have found that an intentional practice of returning back to mountain top experiences and spiritually re-experiencing them, is an important resilience exercise. Sometimes it takes an act of intentional defiance to conduct a beauty check in the midst of hard circumstances. It is akin to holding onto that audacious belief that love endures.
A Resilience Tool: “The Personal Prayer of Reminiscence” by David Hassel, SJ
Time: Carve out a substantial chunk of time, at least twenty minutes.
Place: Find a place that is sacred ground for you, where you will not be interrupted.
Posture: Place your body into a posture you use for meditation. If you are unfamiliar with meditation, sit up straight on a chair or church pew, or stool, with feet flat on the floor, and hands on knees or lap, eyes closed, or defocused fifteen feet in front of you on the floor.
Prayer: Use a favorite ritual to center or ground yourself. Intentional breathing, or the use of a mantra can be helpful. Seek or ask for the gift of sacred free association guided by Spirit, or choose a Top-of the-Mountain experience, and seek the grace of entering back into that experience.
Prayer of Reminiscence: Just like the form of Lectio Divina that employs your imagination, step back into the experience that surfaced, or you selected. Slowly and carefully, see the scenery with your inner eyes. Hear the sounds again. Smell the scent of this important experience. If there is something to touch? Touch and feel it again. If a gustatory memory is available, taste it again.
After savoring this experience for a good long time, attend to the inner feelings this reminiscence has created in your body (notice the felt sense of it in your stomach, solar plexus, chest, heart area, shoulders, neck, hands, legs). Spend some time savoring it. End your time voicing gratitude from deep within.
Would you sing a song? Recite a favorite poem? Speak spontaneously from your heart?