The Power of Attention

Laurence Freeman OSB, THE SELFLESS SELF (London: DLT, 1989), pp. 31-35.

There has always been a great danger, but one that exists especially for us today in our self-conscious and narcissistic society, of mistaking introversion, self-fixation, self-analysis, for true interiority. The great prevalence of psychological woundedness and social alienation exacerbates this danger while calling for gentle tact and compassion in dealing with it. . . . To be truly interior is the complete opposite of being introverted. In the awareness of the indwelling presence, our consciousness is turned around, converted, so that we are no longer. . .looking at ourselves, anticipating or remembering feelings, reactions, desires, ideas, or daydreams. But we are turning towards something else. And that is always a problem for us.

It would be easier, we think, to turn away from introspection if we knew what we were turning towards. If only we had a fixed object to look at. If only God could be represented by an image. But the true God can never be an image. Images of God are gods. To make an image of God is merely to end up looking at a refurbished image of ourselves. To be truly interior, to open the eye of the heart, means to be living within the imageless vision that is faith, and that is the vision that permits us to “see God.”

In faith, attention is controlled by a new Spirit, no longer the spirits of materialism, self-seeking and self-preservation, but the ethos of faith which is by its nature dispossessive. It is always letting go and continuously renouncing the rewards of renunciation, which are very great and so all the more necessary to be returned. . . .We can glimpse it simply by calling to mind those moments or phases in life where we experienced the highest degree of peace, fulfillment and joy and recognize that those were times, not when we possessed anything, but when we lost ourselves in something or someone. The passport into the kingdom requires the stamp of poverty. [. . . .]

And yet learning to be other-centered is a discipline, it is discipleship and it means an ascesis. There is nothing more difficult than to learn to take the attention off ourselves. . . . We are all too prone to let our attention wander, to drift back into self-consciousness, self-infatuation, and distraction. There is then a simple truth to discover. When attention is in God, with the vision of faith, everything reveals God to us. When our attention is on ourselves, in the image-blindness of the ego, everything is a distraction from God.

It seems a demanding challenge to place our attention always in that vision of faith, until we realize that that is precisely what we have been created for.

Meditate for Thirty Minutes.... Remember: Sit down. Sit still and upright. Close your eyes lightly. Sit relaxed but alert. Silently, interiorly, begin to say a single word. We recommend the prayer-phrase "Maranatha." Recite it as four syllables of equal length. Listen to it as you say it, gently, but continuously. Do not think or imagine anything—spiritual or otherwise. Thoughts and images will likely come, but let them pass. Just keep returning your attention—with humility and simplicity—to saying your word in faith, from the beginning to the end of your meditation.

After Meditation...

THE JOURNALS OF THOMAS MERTON: Volume Five 1963-1965 (New York: HarperCollins, 1997), p. 224.

April 4, 1965. Passion Sunday.

Light rain all night. The need to keep working at meditation—going to the root. Mere passivity won’t do at this point. But activism won’t do either. A time of wordless deepening, to grasp the inner reality of my nothingness in Him who is. Talking about it in these terms is absurd. Nothing to do with the concrete reality that is to be grasped. My prayer is peace and struggle in silence, to be aware and true, beyond myself. To go outside the door of myself, not because I will it but because I am called and must respond.

resource: The World Community for Christian Meditation

Desert House of Prayer in Tuscon

Recently, I had the pleasure of discovering the Desert House of Prayer, thanks to the initiative of my friends. The Desert House of Prayer is located in the beautiful foothills of Tuscon, on the way to the familiar Sonoran Desert Museum. This is a great asset to those seeking quiet solitude in a supportive environment. The hermitage's are scattered around the property to allow privacy and contemplation, in true desert surroundings. Everything is simply furnished to provide reasonable comfort while avoiding any resort-like amenities. I have not stayed on the property as of yet, but I am looking for to doing so soon. Below is an excerpt from the website:

Desert House of Prayer is a center for contemplative prayer in the Christian, Catholic tradition. Located on 31 acres of Sonoran Desert outside Tucson, Arizona, Desert House of Prayer, founded in 1974, is a place and community committed to silence. Surrounded by three mountain ranges, the natural beauty of terrain evokes an awareness of God's grandeur. The conditions are ideal for fruitful solitude, in which "all things find their just emphasis." (Rilke)

Desert House of Prayer comprises several buildings, each one opening directly onto the desert: 4 hermitages and 10 rooms with separate entrances and private baths; a chapel, a library, and a central dining area. The accommodations are named after the saints of the mystical tradition (Francis, Teresa, Juan de la Cruz, etc.) and suggest the spirit of the same by simple works of art and decor. Each space is revered as a silent area except during times designated for conversation.

Desert House of Prayer

That nowhere physically is everywhere spiritually...

from The Cloud of the Unknowing: A new translation
by Carmen Acevedo Butcher, Chapter 68

On a related point, another person might tell you to gather together your powers of body, soul and intellect wholly within yourself, and worship God there. This is good advice, well put, and if taken in the right way, you can't find any better. But I don't recommend this because I worry that such advice might be literally interpreted and mislead someone. My suggestion resists distortion. I only ask that during contemplative prayer steer clear of withdrawing into yourself. I also don't want you outside, above, behind, or on one side or the other of yourself.

"Where then," you ask, "will I be? If I take your advice, I'll end up 'nowhere'!" You're right. Well said. That's exactly were I want you, because nowhere physically is everywhere spiritually. Make sure that your contemplative work is fully detached from the physical. Remember that when your mind is focused on anything in particular, that's where you are spiritually, just as certainly as when your physical being is located in a specific place, that's where your body is. Obviously during contemplative prayer, your body's five senses and your soul's powers will think that you are doing nothing because they find nothing to feed on, but don't let that stop you-keep on working at this "nothing," as long as you are doing it for God's love. Persevere in contemplation with a renewed longing in your will to have God, remembering that your intellect cannot possess him. For I would rather be nowhere physically, wrestling with this obscure nothing, than be a powerful, rich lord, able to go wherever I want, whenever I want, always amusing myself with every "something" that I own.

So abandon the world's "everywhere" and "something" in exchange for this infinitely more valuable nowhere and nothing. Don't be bothered that your intellect is unable to comprehend it. I love it even more for its inscrutability. Its infinite worth makes it incomprehensible. Also remember that you can more easily feel this nothing than see it. It can be experienced but not grasped. That's why it seems completely hidden and totally dark to those who've only been looking at it for a very short time. Let me clarify "dark" here. When a person experiences this nothing, the soul is blinded by an abundance of spiritual light, and not by actual darkness or by an absence of physical light.

So who labels this "nothing"? That would be our outer self. Our inner self calls it "all," because experiencing this "nothing" gives us an intuitive sense of all creation, both physical and spiritual, without paying special attention to any one thing.