One of my favorite scenes in the 1985 movie Out of Africa is a quiet moment shared between actress Meryl Streep, playing Danish writer Isak Dinesen who penned the memoir for which the movie is named, and Dinesen's head servant Farah, played by actor Malick Bowens. Dinesen, Farah and several servants from Dinesen's home and coffee plantation in Kenya have set out across the African plains to bring much needed supplies to Dinesen's husband Baron Bror von Blixen and British troops fighting in the East African campaign during World War 1. The journey for Dinesen and her servants is arduous. They travel on horse, by foot, and in wagons laden with food and gear that are pulled by oxen.
On one particular evening, Dinesen and her servants are seen preparing for bed. The campsite is quiet and all are engaged in their evening rituals. Out of the evening calm, a pair of lions rush the oxen and take one down. Meryl Streep is shown in her tent, and upon hearing the uproar, she springs into action. She begins yelling that the lion is to be hers. Unable to find her rifle, she grabs a whip and carelessly pushes her way through a very thorny bush to get at the lion before it has a chance to kill her oxen. After much yelling and lashing of whips on the part of Streep and her servants, the lion reluctantly abandons its prey. In the end, the ox is dead and Streep is back in her tent, this time being ministered to by Farah. As he pulls out the thorns in Streep's back and cleans her wounds, he provides the following wise observation.
"Sabu is bleeding. She does not have this ox.
"This lion is hungry. He does not have this ox.
"This wagon is heavy. It does not have this ox.
"God is happy, Sabu. He plays with us."
Why do I like this particular scene so much? It reminds me of how often I think that I am in charge. It reminds me of how easy it is for the ego to trump reason. It reminds me that even when I think I'm fighting on the side of what's "right," things can still go wrong. And Farah, God bless him, tenderly delivers his lesson to Streep's character not as a scolding, but as a compassionate admission of our human bravura and frailty. Maybe what I like most is the fact that this is a scene about love and surrender. Farah has learned something about how we must ultimately surrender to life and its myriad demands--fair or otherwise--and he is passing along his hard-earned counsel with great kindness to a woman he has vowed to serve.
At the end of January, I had the opportunity to attend a two-day retreat with Lama Surya Das. This man who has for so long occupied prime real estate on my nightstand in the form of one of his books--Awakening to the Sacred--spent a Friday evening and much of a Saturday at a local church where he entertained us with his wit and taught us all how to teach by listening to the questions we ask. His axiom for the weekend was one-step enlightenment. His mantra: "This step, only step. This breath, only breath." He encouraged us to dance more with life and reminded us on more than one occasion of what St. Catherine learned in her contemplative moments that "all the way to heaven is heaven." In his own way, Jack Kornfield advises the same when he says to recognize (and invite in) "this, too. This, too."
I love these words for their brevity and clarity in the same way I love the words of Farah's character in the film Out of Africa. They are poignant, powerful, precise. And, they are meant to rattle us a bit.
So, when Lama Surya Das insisted that we turn off our to-be lists, knowing full well that many of our resolutions for the new year had already begun to turn against us, he intended to be brief and clear. He also intended to rattle, which he succeeded in doing brilliantly with me.
When I get rattled, I often sit down and read a book. In this case, I chose another book by Lama Surya Das. It occurs to me now that this might be a publicist's ploy on the part of Surya Das. Right? Shortly after the retreat, I ordered a copy of Letting Go of the Person You Used to Be. I figured that in this book Surya Das most likely elaborated upon the challenge he gave to us during the retreat about our to-be lists. It turns out, I figured correctly. Here's what I learned. In order to let go of our former selves--the person we used to be--we also must be able to let go of the person we thought we were going to be. In other words, we have to come to terms with our losses. Otherwise, those unnamed losses--the ones that we know linger but which we do not take the time to bring into our awareness because they are all too painful reminders of how we have failed--prevent us from healing.
It surprised me to discover that I still have such a to-be list at my age. It feels a lot different from the one I had in my early twenties. That earlier one felt as though it had wings. My current one sometimes feels like a labor camp. After taking up Lama Surya Das' challenge at the retreat to turn off my to-be list, I have begun to turn that list inside out. It's been a bit like emptying a pocket. Some things fall away easily. Others get placed in a pile for my immediate attention. It is for those items that I find myself calling up the image of the actor playing Farah in Out of Africa with his tender ministrations to Meryl Streep's Isak Dinesen and her wounds from life's most recent battle.
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