3-Day Challenges

The biggest challenge of preparing for the 3-Day isn't the fundraising. I've been blessed with extremely generous donations from some prosperous people around me, as well as many smaller donations.

It also isn't the physical effort of the training walks. Those are manageable, especially when I pace myself and when I walk with a friend.

The biggest challenge is the sheer amount of time it takes to walk 3, 4, 5, 10 miles.

( I don't want this to be a whine, but I'm frustrated. )

On the other hand, last night, a_belletrist and I went to a Focus Group meeting, which is an informational meeting for new walkers, and it was quite inspirational. I'm glad I'm involved in this event. It's huge, and it's important, and it's life-changing.

But it also demands a certain degree of sacrifice to participate. You really have to give yourself over to it for several months of your life, not just the three days. A journey of 60 miles begins with thousands and thousands of steps in training walks.

I'm glad I'm doing it.
I just need to figure out how to allow my life to be transformed in a way that allows me to also continue to devote the time I want to to the rest of my life.

And I need to find some way of including my daughter more.

Insights and suggestions are welcome.

The Soul Cries Out

While I have continued to enjoy David James Duncan's God Laughs and Plays, and find his writing style delightful, my favorite passage from the book was not written by him. It's a quotation from Simone Weil, and it pretty much sums up the essence of my spiritual history.

In the period of preparation for loving God, the soul loves in emptiness. It does not know if anything real answers its love. It may believe that it knows, but to believe is not to know. Such a belief does not help. The soul knows for certain only that it is hungry. The important thing is that it announces its hunger by crying. A child does not stop crying if we suggest to it that perhaps there is no such thing as bread. It goes on crying just the same. The danger is not lest the soul should doubt there is bread, but, by a lie, it should persuade itself that it is not hungry. It can only persuade itself of this by lying, for the reality of its hunger is not a belief, it is a certainty.

I have been blessed with experiences of intimacy with the Divine, with times of rich faith and sure belief. But there have also been many empty, painful years when my only "spiritual life" was the crying of my soul for God, fearful that I was crying in vain but unable to lie to myself that I was not hungry. And I consider those times of darkness and emptiness as important and devout as the times of sure faith.

The driest times in my life are not my times of wrestling with doubts and fears but when I do lie to myself about my soul hunger, when I pretend it does not exist or that it can be assuaged by anything less than God.

Thought for the Day

Today's Thought for the Day is dedicated to kateri_thinks and a_belletrist.


It would be wonderful if I could always remember all the wisdom I've acquired. But when I'm having a hard day, and forget a few simple, basic truths, it's good to have friends who can gently and lovingly remind me of what I already know.