The opposite morning, my husband and I have been strolling on the park, taking in all of the sights of crops and flowers and the sounds of birdsong. A big swath of yellow buttercups stuffed a close-by area. My husband reminisced about how, when he was a toddler, children used to select a buttercup, place it beneath the chin of a good friend, and ask, “Do you want butter?” Lore mentioned {that a} yellow reflection from the flower on the chin indicated the individual did, certainly, like butter. In fact, the buttercup’s brilliant, sunny yellow was mirrored on the chins of just about everybody. I keep in mind enjoying that very same childhood “recreation,” one which apparently dates again to at the least the late nineteenth century. My husband famous that it’s hardly even sensical; in any case, who doesn’t like butter?
Whereas I have no idea the origin of the previous exercise, it did make me take into consideration how a lot magical pondering fills our experiences of childhood! Kids would possibly play within the forest and picture a world the place fairies exist. Some make a fairy backyard with acorns, twigs, leaves, and the like. My very own kids beloved to gather leaves, pinecones, seashore shells, and stones. Pure objects appear to own a type of sacredness and are stuffed with risk.
Although we are able to, after all, clarify phenomena like yellow chins below buttercups scientifically, there’s additionally a religious aspect to childhood that permits for creativeness to imbue objects with meanings past their seen traits. Perhaps a flower is only a flower, or possibly it has particular powers to inform whether or not a good friend likes butter and whether or not that good friend is extra just like the yellow flower when her chin turns yellow. So my pondering went as a toddler, anyway.
After I go on my annual retreat every summer season, I prefer to attempt to get again into a little bit little bit of that childhood mindset. For me, which means being extra sensory, on the one hand, and being extra imaginative, on the opposite. Prayer could be reflecting with Scripture and delving extra deeply into who Jesus is, however it may additionally contain mendacity on my again on a big seaside rock and watching the clouds shift form, very similar to once I was a toddler. This, too, is prayer, because it’s a approach to let myself unfold earlier than God via creation. I shed a few of the elements of my on a regular basis self that may get in the way in which of a deep retreat. I shed the bag that hauls my books to work and the enterprise jacket, however I additionally shed some psychological layers as effectively. When I’m open to admiring the buttercups that line the trail to the pond or let myself odor the scents of the seashore roses, an area is created in me that’s not full of my “to do” record or worries. After which God has a little bit extra room to enter in.
Lately I’ve additionally tried to deliver that openness into on a regular basis life. Even once I do don my work garments and discover God in my vocation as a trainer, it’s good to pause and to concentrate to the flowers, bushes, and sky and to immerse myself only for a second within the extra childlike consciousness of a Creator that’s working via all the things.
