John Scoble
"I am happy because I want nothing from anyone. I do not care about money. Decorations, titles, or distinctions mean nothing to me. I do not crave praise. I claim credit for nothing. A happy man is too satisfied with the present to dwell too much on the future."
Albert Einstein
Introduction
In Episode 6 of the Butterfly Series [1] , we focused on Cleaning Up. That involves taking a “helicopter view” of one’s life, identifying behaviours or habits that are inconsistent with Jesus’s teaching and resolving to diminish or completely detach from those behaviours or habits in the future. Richard Rohr relates Cleaning up to shadow work. “Your shadow is what you refuse to see about yourself and what you do not want others to see. The more you have cultivated and protected a chosen persona, the more shadow work you will need to do.” [2]
Gospel accounts show us that Jesus himself lived a contemplative and prayerful life. He often ventured out alone, sometimes being in prayer through the night. These prayer sessions acted as a period of recovery from the ordinary stresses of his day. His example shows us that we need to continually pause to let go (what scholars call kenosis or emptying) of egoic attachments, fear, judgment, or expectations and then a return to the Divine Presence again and again.
The Desert Fathers and Mothers yearned for complete union with God. They sought to remove all obstacles to the deepening of their relationship with God. Obstacles included unhelpful attitudes and motives, thoughts that stalled their pursuit of God, and emotional ties that complicated their inner journey. Although the journey began with giving away possessions, desert ascetics understood that what possessed them was greater than the sum of goods owned. All that owned them, all that possessed their minds and hearts, their attachments, and compulsions, must be healed and reconciled. Desert ascetics called this process of moving toward inner freedom detachment. Detachment allows for greater direct experience of the Divine Presence as the seeker is attached to fewer distractions.[3]
Reverend Barbara Holmes describes our common modern experience this way:
“Unfortunately, in the West, we don’t let go of anything. We hold onto reputation and material goods long after they are no longer needed. We store acquired stuff in every nook and household cranny before renting a storage unit so that we can continue to hold onto our stuff. Dazed, we clutch at relationships long after they are on life support and cling to a past that no longer exists, grasping, desperate, and confused.” [4]
Detachment expands your self-awareness and supports your ability to see in a new way. It helps to remove the unnecessary or unimportant, leaving room for the new and important to emerge and grow. It draws us nearer to the source of all being.
Spirituality is about letting go. Instead, we have made it about taking in, attaining, performing, winning, and succeeding. True spirituality echoes the paradox of life itself. It trains us in both detachment and attachment: detachment from the passing so we can attach to the substantial. But if we do not acquire good training in detachment, we may attach to the wrong things, especially our own self-image and its desire for security.[5]
Detach from ego
In his seminal book, “Falling Upwards: a Spirituality for the Two Halves of Life”, Richard Rohr explains about the focus in the first half of life on the false self, driven by ego. However, this is a necessary stage in human development as we focus on identity, career and family. Rohr was influenced by the Cistercian monk, Thomas Merton. Reverend Mandy Smith observes:
“Thomas Merton used the language of the false self to describe our ‘shadow’, which are those parts we try to hide from others (and even ourselves) and our ‘disguise’, the alternate persona we try to show to the world instead. This is helpful language because it reminds us that whatever God calls us to let die is not our actual self but our false self (even though these false selves have been ours so long that at first it seems he is asking us to let our true selves die). Merton’s language helps us discover a different way to understand what should die and what should live.”[6]
Our challenge then is to take the time, periodically or even regularly, to do some healthy self-analysis, push our ego and false self to the side, and focus on the “other”. The more we do this, the closer we will draw to the Spirit of Being and the more joyful our life will become.
Detach from things
Our consumerist society encourages a tendency towards accumulation of material things, some necessary, some aesthetically pleasing, some peripheral and some totally unnecessary for a Christian life. Possession gives us control; control provides perceived certainty and security. Advertising uses psychologically clever means to attract our attention and feed the impulse to purchase. Just look around your house and count the number of items that you wouldn’t miss if they were instantly removed.
Angel Kyodo Williams comments:
“None of us escapes desire, and we don’t want to escape. That is not the point. We would just like to stop holding on to them for dear life. We want to see them for what they are. They are cravings. They are desires. They do not own us. They do not need to force us in every possible direction, contorting our bodies to chase down the next thing. I won’t be captive to my desires, helpless in their power. More important, I won’t make myself miserable because of my attachment to my wants.” [7]
Edward Beck suggests that the more we give away, the more we gain. He writes:
“Detachment requires a non-grasping stance toward life – to be able to behold and revere without having to possess. But how hard that is. In our insecurity and neediness, we think attachment secures our happiness. We want what is ours and we want it totally and completely. But paradoxically, sharing produces its own abundance in a magnanimity of spirit that trumps anything our hands can hold. In the end, we have more.” [8]
There are simple measures one can take to detach from things. Sort through your clothes and donate to charity those that you never or rarely wear. Find items in your kitchen that might be more useful for others. Search your garage or storage facility for items that are no longer needed. Harder still is to relinquish those cherished items of clothing, artworks or knickknacks that are special to you. Don’t give in immediately to the impulse to purchase an advertised item. As a friend once told me, “Go home, take two aspirin, lie down and wait for the feeling to pass”.
Detach from habits
More difficult than material things is detaching from habits. These have often developed over many years and are part of your persona. One way to identify your habits is to examine where you spend significant amounts of your time. To illustrate this, I will provide a personal example.
For many years, I would follow the movements of the stock-market closely, making regular purchases and sales of stocks to maximise my portfolio value. I purchased trading software and could spend up to 2 hours a day reading price charts and analysing company performance. I justified this as simply part of providing for my family. Through self-analysis, I came to realise that my true motivations were greed and the pride associated with “beating the market”. I handed my portfolio over to a stockbroker but continue to watch the markets and discuss various companies with him. It took me 3 to 4 years after my initial move to fully detach from my stock-market obsession.
The words of Krishna to Arjuna in the Hindu classic scripture, the Bhagavad-Gita, seem relevant here:
“Never lose sight of the overriding goal, which is to free yourself from bondage during this lifetime, to shed attachment to worldly things, detach from ego, and truly release yourself from the wheel of birth and death. When you do this, you actually become one with God.” [9]
Detach from relationships
Equally important is that we detach from our personal relationships. If our goal is to possess a person, we only view them in terms of what they can do for us. Detachment, on the other hand, becomes a way of holding people with open hands, not strangling them. We give them permission to grow, flourish and become their best selves.
We can recall Jesus’s instruction to Mary Magdalene outside the tomb: “stop holding onto me, for I have not yet ascended to the Father”[10]
Detach from emotions
Our lives are full of emotions, such as sorrow, joy, anger, and despair. They are temporary. They arise and fall away. Meister Eckhart counsels that we should not cling to emotions, as they do not define our ongoing nature, our true self. Rather, we should accept that they arise, recognise them as temporary and let them go. By way of example, Edward Beck recounts the story of two celibate monks on pilgrimage together:
“As they approach a raging river, they see a beautiful, distressed young woman standing on the bank, afraid to make the crossing. The younger monk picks the woman up, puts her on his shoulders, and wades into the river as the older monk looks on, horrified but saying nothing. When the three reach the other side, the monk puts the grateful woman down safely, and the two monks continue their journey in silence. Hours go by without the two speaking. The older monk is obviously angry and upset. He finally looks at the younger monk and says, “How could you have done that?” “Done what?” says the other monk, surprised. “How could you have carried that woman? You know we are to have nothing to do with women and yet you intimately carried her on your shoulders.” “My dear brother,” replies the monk, “I set that woman down on the shore of the river hours ago. Why are you still carrying her?”[11]
Detach from outcomes
Meister Eckhart also spoke in his sermons about detaching from outcomes. He counseled that we should put our energy into performing our duties as well as possible, but understand that we are not in control, and we can’t know the outcome of our efforts. Quite often, we may never know the consequences of our actions. Every time we catch ourselves getting reactive, every time we catch ourselves acting as if the outcome of the situation has the authority to name who we are, we are to take a deep breath and remind ourselves that it’s not true.
Conclusion
In conclusion, part of our spiritual journey involves prayer, honest reflection and self-assessment, and a willingness to take action to detach from anything that prevents us from coming closer to God. Christian detachment does not mean holding back from being really involved in this world. Rather, it is a matter of being attached to people and to things in such a way that we are willing to let them go when we are called by God to do so. Fr Michael Fallon writes:
“As John of the Cross notes in the Ascent of Mount Carmel (I.2.4), it makes little difference whether the leg of a bird is tied with a strong rope or with the tiniest thread. If anything is holding it, it cannot fly. Flight to God cannot occur till all attachments that cause us to resist the call of grace are broken, however apparently insignificant they may appear.” [12]
Finally, I would like to share this poem, “The Only Prayer”, by Lucy Grace:
“There is a flow to life that we must follow, a place where the mystical meets the mundane, the profound collides with the profane, where every butterfly’s wing points the same way. And we can read the runes, pull another card, cry our lives all we like, hoping for a different roll of the same dice. But we do know, we know grace’s whisper, beckoning us on journeys we wouldn’t choose, breathing us things we would rather unknow. And so we will go, dancing or dragged, every day the same prayer. Take these hands, this heart, these lips for your work, your words, I am wholly yours. And yet still I can grieve the things I’m asked to release. I suppose then there’s only one prayer I ever need to know, and that is please, show me how to let go.” [13]
Questions for reflection
1. Have you ever detached from “creature comforts” for an extended period? What was the result?
2. What has been the most difficult aspect of detaching from relationships?
3. How does detachment aid your relationship to God?
Additional reading
Fr Richard Rohr, CAC week of meditations, 23-29 Apr 2023
1 See “Pre-reading for Ep 6 Cleaning up 2022-01” on the SLSG Facebook page.
2 Fr Richard Rohr, Falling Upwards pp 127-128
3 Laura Swan, The Forgotten Desert Mothers: Sayings, Lives, and Stories of Early Christian Women, pp.21–22, 25.
4 Reverend Barbara Holmes, CAC Meditations 4 May 2023
5 CAC Meditations 23 Apr 2023
6 Reverend Mandy Smith, “Unfettered”, p.71
7 Angel Kyodo Williams, “Being Black: Zen and the Art of Living with Fearlessness and Grace" p.71, 72
8 Edward L Beck “Soul Provider” p.18
9 The Bhagavad-Gita, p.21
10 Jn 20:17
11 Edward L Beck, “Soul Provider, p.20
12 Fr Michael Fallon MSC, “The Gospel According to Saint Luke”, p.253
13 Lucy Grace, spoken during interview on Buddha at the Gas Pump, 7 July 2023
September 2023
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