Becoming Yourself

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Tag: Henri Nouwen (Page 6 of 7)

The Surprising Benefits of Silence

December 17, 2022 / / 0 Comments

Silence.

What adjectives come to mind when you read that word? Relaxing? Boring? Wonderful? Scary?

Silence is a surprisingly complex thing. It can be intimidating, yet it offers many benefits such as anxiety reduction, mental clarity, increased creativity, and a deeper connection to self. Intentional silence has been a regular practice of mine for many years, and has become a foundational part of my mental, emotional, and spiritual well-being.

Here’s what renowned author and Harvard professor Henri Nouwen wrote about silence:

At first silence might only frighten us. In silence we start hearing voices of darkness: our jealousy and anger, our resentment and desire for revenge, our lust and greed, and our pain over losses, abuses, and rejections. These voices are often noisy and boisterous. They may even deafen us. Our most spontaneous reaction is to run away from them and return to our entertainment.

But if we have the discipline to stay put and not let these dark voices intimidate us, they will gradually lose their strength and recede into the background, creating space for the softer, gentler voices of the light.

These voices speak of peace, kindness, gentleness, goodness, joy, hope, forgiveness, and most of all, love. They might at first seem small and insignificant, and we may have a hard time trusting them. However, they are very persistent and they will be stronger if we keep listening. They come from a very deep place and from very far. They have been speaking to us since before we were born, and they reveal to us that there is no darkness in the One who sent us into the world, only light. They are part of God’s voice calling us from all eternity: “My beloved child, my favorite one, my joy.”

henri nouwen

What is your relationship with silence? Do you yearn for it or run from it? Start small. Find a quiet place. Mute your phone. Find a calming view. Sit for three minutes. See what comes to your mind and how the experience affects your body. Experiment with longer sessions, with your eyes closed, with different locations, with repeating a focus word or phrase, or having a peaceful mental image. Use a mediation timer like the Calm app or, for those with a Christian spiritually bent, the One Minute Pause app. If you do, you’ll find the benefits quick in coming, and you’ll take another step toward Becoming Yourself.

Text excerpts taken from “You are the Beloved” by Henri J.M. Nouwen, © 2017 by The Henri Nouwen Legacy Trust. Published by Convergent Books. Excerpt published in Nov 24, 2022 daily meditation from The Henri Nouwen Society.

Embrace Love to Reduce Fear

October 8, 2022 / / 0 Comments

I was a fearful kid.

Ghosts. The basement. Dark woods. Bullies. That creepy clown painting my parents had. Fear was a frequent companion of my youth.

Fear continued to maintain its grip into my adulthood. What people thought of me. Navigating parenthood. My mistakes and failings being exposed. Career missteps. Relationship anxieties.

Now that I’m in my fifties, I’ve learned to let go of many of the fears that have plagued me, but not all. It’s still an issue I wrestle with regularly. Will I fail at my new author career? Will my kids continue to thrive? Will my wife get sick? Am I doing enough to help others?

When I read the following excerpt from author and teacher Henri Nouwen, it helped me realign my perspective on fear. I felt my shoulders relax and breathed a deep, contented sigh.

If you struggle with fear as I do, I hope you’ll find a tonic here. You may not believe in God or a Higher Power, and I respect that position. Either way, I encourage you to ponder these words and focus on the Love he describes. If you do, I believe you’ll find some freedom from fear’s grip and take another step toward Becoming Yourself.

“We are fearful people. We are afraid of conflict, war, an uncertain future, illness, and, most of all, death. This fear takes away our freedom and gives our society the power to manipulate us with threats and promises. When we can reach beyond our fears to the One who loves us with a love that was there before we were born and will be there after we die, then oppression, persecution, and even death will be unable to take our freedom.

Once we have come to the deep inner knowledge—a knowledge more of the heart than of the mind—that we are born out of love and will die into love, that every part of our being is deeply rooted in love, and that this love is our true Father and Mother, then all forms of evil, illness, and death lose their final power over us and become painful but hopeful reminders of our true divine childhood. The apostle Paul expressed this experience of the complete freedom of the children of God when he wrote, ‘I am certain of this: neither death nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nothing already in existence and nothing still to come, nor any power, nor the heights nor the depths, nor any created thing whatever, will be able to come between us and the love of God, known to us in Christ Jesus’” (Romans 8:38–39).

Henri nouwen in “you are the beloved”

As shared in the Henri Nouwen Society Daily Meditation Oct 1, 2022. Text excerpts taken from “You are the Beloved” by Henri J.M. Nouwen © 2017 by The Henri Nouwen Legacy Trust. Published by Convergent Books.

The Life-Changing Power of Solitude

June 11, 2022 / / 4 Comments

There is a simple, free, powerful tool of personal development that most of us avoid:

Solitude.

How do you react to that word? What other words or images come to your mind? Loneliness, boredom, useless, longing? Do you picture yourself on a desert island or an isolated mountaintop or in a crowded room full of strangers who ignore you? 

You may live by yourself and experience being alone on a regular basis. Many of us went through forced isolation during the Covid-19 pandemic. But how often do we use our time alone to experience real solitude? When we distract ourselves with television, email and social media, we aren’t really experiencing solitude, at least not in the personal development sense. There’s nothing wrong with any of those things, but they’re generally not transformative.

The type of solitude I’m talking about is being alone with yourself. Your thoughts. Your regrets. Your hopes and dreams. Your reflections on life. On who you’ve become and who you want to be. That type of mental and emotional exercise can be uncomfortable at times, which is why it’s often avoided. Distracting ourselves is far easier.

But wonderful things can happen in solitude. New insights. Renewed hope. Self-forgiveness. Clearer perspectives. And for those of us with a spiritual bent, we can find a deeper connection with God, the universe, Love or whatever we may call our higher power. My daily time of solitude in our bedroom closet for meditation and prayer is the cornerstone of my spiritual, emotional and mental wellbeing.

Author and Harvard professor Henri Nouwen beautifully described the power of solitude: 

“A life without a lonely place, that is, a life without a quiet center, easily becomes destructive. When we cling to the results of our actions as our only way of self-identification, then we become possessive and defensive and tend to look at our fellow human beings more as enemies to be kept at a distance than as friends with whom we share the gifts of life.

In solitude we can slowly unmask the illusion of our possessiveness and discover in the center of our own self that we are not what we can conquer, but what is given to us. In solitude we can listen to the voice of him who spoke to us before we could speak a word, who healed us before we could make any gesture to help, who set us free long before we could free others, and who loved us long before we could give love to anyone. It is in this solitude that we discover that being is more important than having, and that we are worth more than the results of our efforts. In solitude we discover that our life is not a possession to be defended, but a gift to be shared. It’s there we recognize that the healing words we speak are not just our own, but are given to us; that the love we can express is part of a greater love; and the new life we bring forth is not a property to cling to, but a gift to be received.”

henri nouwen

Have you experienced real solitude lately? Do you feel the need? Make the time today. Get alone. Breathe deep. Quiet your mind. Let your thoughts come. See what bubbles up. Process it honestly. You may find unexpected treasures, and you’ll take another step toward Becoming Yourself.

Text excerpts taken from “You are the Beloved” by Henri J.M. Nouwen, © 2017 by The Henri Nouwen Legacy Trust. Published by Convergent Books.

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