You are the place where I stand on the day when my feet are sore

Photo by Matthias Gellissen

Some years ago I was listening to an interview with the Irish poet and theologian Pádraig Ó Tuama and he was speaking about trust and he said: "In Irish, when you talk about trust, there’s a beautiful phrase from West Kerry where you say, “Mo sheasamh ort lá na choise tinne”—“You are the place where I stand on the day when my feet are sore.”

This moving image stopped me in my tracks. And I remember thinking, I want that!!

On the surface, what I wanted was for someone else to be that kind of place for me, but I also had a hidden hunger to feel that way about myself, for myself.

Except this felt like a tall order.

I had lived for so long in so much self-doubt and I carried around this idea (like most of us) that trust is dependent on outer circumstances and can only be given when it’s been earned and that life can only be trusted when the universe proves itself to be trustworthy. So I waited and waited and waited (getting more and more resentful, by the way, because life will never be trustworthy enough).

But I learned a powerful alternative approach from one of my teachers, Cynthia Bourgeault, an Episcopal priest and modern-day mystic. Cynthia teaches that trust is a sacred spiritual substance or nutrient, just like hope, love, patience, forgiveness, courage, gentleness, etc., and that it’s a subtle energetic compound with real power and that it’s desperately needed for the well-being of our planet and the cosmos. These substances are not dependent on outer circumstances or being “earned.” Rather, they are offered from a sober and clear heart and out of an intentional commitment to a larger vision.

This kind of proactive or “donated” trust (or proactive kindness or proactive love, etc) is not something we have to wait to start engaging with and we don’t have to conjure it up on our own. It flows into us from the heart of the divine and we can then consciously choose to let it flow out of us as well. And we, as humans, actually have a responsibility to transmit these sacred substances and to participate in what Cynthia calls a kind of “cosmic dialysis.” (You can read more about working with this subtle energy exchange in her book Eye of the Heart).

I found this so enlivening and I began to see that my very life is the great place where I can stand, even/especially on the days when my feet are sore.

What do you think? I’d love to hear.

With care,
Brianna