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A Pen and A Path

EXCERPT FROM

A Pen and A Path:
Writing as a Spiritual Practice

by Sarah Stockton

 

CHAPTER 22
Trust/Lack of Trust

Trusting is like holding out our hand in peace to the stranger next to us, not knowing if they will grasp our hand with love or slap it away. Will you be the first to hold out your hand? If it is slapped away, will you hold it out again, or turn to someone else? If your hand is held in love, will you continue to offer it to other strangers? How will you decide in the future whom you hold your hand out to? Why hold it out at all? What is gained, what is lost? All of these questions arise each time we trust, yet we continue to hold out our hands, because God calls us to trust, and to trust again. Being with God is not a passive stance; God’s hand reaches out, and we reach back, trusting that it will not be slapped away. Practicing trusting is practicing being with God.

The issue of trust pervades our life on multiple levels. We start out trusting, then learn not to trust, then try to regain a sense of trust, not just once in a linear fashion, but over and over again as we circle through each stage of our lives. Can we trust our parents, our friends, our lovers, our coworkers? What about our religious leaders? Can we trust ourselves to know and do the things that are best for us? Can we trust God? The commitment to a faith community, to the spiritual journey itself, to companionship, or to this writing practice are all indications of willingness to trust. Most of us have had positive experiences of trusting, as well as painful experiences of the violation of that trust. Placing our trust in someone or something makes us vulnerable. Sometimes the temptation is strong to not take any risks at all. The decision to not trust at all means not moving closer to God. Another path open to us involves paying attention and learning from the consequences of trusting, both painful as well as joyful, which helps us more clearly discern the spiritual path toward God. We gain wisdom in these lessons of trustworthiness; we learn what is worthy of our trust, and what is not. Sorting out what risks are worth taking from the risks that bring only harm, we cultivate the willingness to trust God, to hold out our hand.

Reflection
What have been your experiences with trust and lack of trust? Chances are this question will readily summon emotions, memories, even current realities. Take a few moments to enter into these memories or your current experience. Invite God to be with you in these moments, and ask God for what you need or want. If your trust concerns are directly related to your relationship with God and affect your feelings about whether or not you can be safe with God or trust that God cares for you, you may want to share these concerns with your spiritual director or a close friend.

• How has the ability to trust affected your spiritual journey?
• What are some of the positive experiences you have had of trusting?
• What is your experience of trusting God?
• What is your experience of trusting yourself?
• What would it be like to share these experiences with someone? With God?

Pen in Hand
Write about a time when you doubted the wisdom of trusting, yet you went ahead anyway. Choose a time when you thought for sure that your skepticism would be justified, and then it wasn’t. Perhaps you invited a dubious stranger into your home, or you agreed to help someone you knew wouldn’t help you in return, or you gave someone who had hurt you repeatedly another chance. Write about what you expected from this act of trust, and then what the outcome was. Perhaps someone paid you back money they owed, or they came through on a promise. Choose a time when the outcome of your trust surprised you. Write about what it was like to have your expectations turned upside down. What effect did that have on you?

Write for fifteen minutes.

Noticing

• Are you surprised at what you chose to write about? Why or
why not?
• How did this experience affect your relationship with God?
• How did this experience affect your sense of self?
• Were there any unexpected feelings that you noticed as you
wrote about this experience?
• Would you like to offer these feelings to God?

On the Path
By committing yourself to this writing exercise, you are choosing to
trust that the time you invest in reading and reflecting and writing, the
willingness to examine and open yourself to reflection, will prove to be
worthwhile. You may not know what you are putting your trust in, or
why—only that you have chosen to move forward, to give of your
time, energy, focus, and willingness to see what happens. Spend some
time writing about this act of trust. Write about how this exercise
resembles other times in your life when you have made a commitment
to trust something, or someone, or God. How have you trusted
yourself, your spirit, and your heart, to the mystery of creating, of
communicating, of making connection? You may also want to address
these questions:

• What is it like for you to trust the writing process?
• What hopes do you bring to the writing process?
• By trusting the writing process, what do you hope from God?
• What implications does the decision to trust this process have for
the rest of your life?

Contemplation
Writing as a spiritual practice is something you can trust. Because this
process is your own, it cannot be violated by anyone else’s opinions,
judgments, or attempts to interfere with it. The spiritual journey asks
us to trust ourselves and from there, to trust God, and from there, to trust those people in our lives whom we allow into our hearts and into the sanctuary of our souls.
Through writing and discernment and prayer, we can grow in the wisdom needed to make decisions about where to place our trust.

• What other spiritual practices have you learned to trust?
• How does the issue of trust, or lack of trust, play a role in your
creative life? In your personal life?
• How might you foster, or begin to rebuild, trust in your own
inner wisdom?
• How might you bring your feelings about trust and lack of trust,
to God?

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