Sunday with JCC and around town: worship, fair, music and more!
SUN, Oct 6
- INTERFAITH GATHERING – resumes next week: Sum, Oct 13 @ 8am, after Rev Gail returns from vacation
- CHOIR REHEARSAL with Dominique Dodge & Sharon Novak
9:15am • Jackson Community Church & Zoom- 4-week choir-building this autumn: Oct 6, Oct 13, Oct 20 and Nov 3 (Sundays)
- Come if you love to sing! All ages and skill levels wanted!
- WORSHIP & WORLD COMMUNION with guest preacher Sue Davidson
10:30am • Jackson Community Church & Zoom- Worldwide Communion Sunday will be observed.
- Join us for song, prayer, scripture, sacrament and message about the Sermon on the Mount, focusing on Salt & Light
- Learn about upcoming programs, one-time volunteer events, ongoing teams, and service opportunities
- Zoom for those who cannot attend in person: Join Zoom Meeting (link required). Contact the church for zoom link prior to Sunday morning.
- Music by Sharon Novak
- Guest preacher Sue Davidson
- Theme: Salt & Light story from Sermon on the Mount in gospel of Matthew
- HOSPITALITY following church
11:30am • Parish Hall - Community Event: FRYEBURG FAIR
- More info: https://www.fryeburgfair.org/
- Community Event: OPEN HOURS @ Jackson Historical Society
1-3pm • Jackson Historical Society (Also open by appointment.)- More info: https://www.jacksonhistory.org/
- Community MUSIC & ENTERTAINMENT around town:
- Shannon Door: 6-9pm
Themes from story of Mary and Martha: being busy, always on the go vs making space for mindfulness and being present
Do you ever feel like there’s just too much to do and that you can’t get it all done? Do you feel like you don’t have enough time for the things that really count? — Mary Stephens
Help me find a way to be a perfect blend
of Mary’s heart and Martha’s hands
— from song: Mary’s heart and Martha’s hands
by Carlene Thissen & Martha Christian
SONGS about BEING:
- Let It Be by the Beatles (rock): https://youtu.be/CTcb_33-DiI?si=1aEy8YwvqjAgF8fr
- Every Little Thing’s Gonna Be All Right / Three Little Birds by Bob Marley (raggae): https://youtu.be/CuNJ5j2fybo?si=VSMsG9Y1_R-6HgoH
- It Is Well with my Soul performed by Auudrey Assad (Christain hymn): https://youtu.be/zY5o9mP22V0?si=1a4KYLIv_CdhLpKw
- Mindfulness Music Playlist by Plum Village (Thich Nhat Hahn’s Buddhist community music for children using his writings): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=obDspQjDUCo
- Be Still and Heal Playlist by Plum Village (Thich Nhat Hahn’s Buddhist community music for children using his writings): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r376tTqZh7U
- As the Moon Starts to Rise by Milk Carton Kids (childrens/folk): https://youtu.be/JRhPgHIoAa0?si=44cZi2twQRyF7A8L
- Enjoy Every Second by Michael Franti (children): https://youtu.be/LyH65i3GTFc?si=v-ZbTXt1CGSHDiN2
- LIttle Things by India.Arie (pop/indy): https://youtu.be/4xZPMlCkDY8?si=rx1oMBsgIwhCRuST
- Right Now by Sabrina Carpenter (pop): https://youtu.be/mxmv70xNUh8?si=NRev3Uup_7zIWYkQ
- Monday (Every Time I Turn Around) by The Bottle Rockets (rock): https://youtu.be/yVsNfzZ3Evo?si=fB3ezODSecbRMLNv
MARTHA and MARY — Annie Johnson Flint
Martha was busy and hurried,
Serving the friend divine,
Cleansing the cups and platters,
Bringing the bread and wine;
But Martha was careful and anxious
Fretted in thought and in word.
She had no time to be sitting
While she was serving the Lord,
For Martha was “cumbered with serving,
Martha was “troubled” with “things”—
Those that would pass with the using—
She was forgetting her wings.
Mary was quiet and peaceful,
Learning to love and to live.
Mary was hearing His precepts,
Mary was letting Him give—
Give of the riches eternal,
Treasures of mind and of heart;
Learning the mind of the Master,
Choosing the better part.
Do we ever labor at serving
Till voices grow fretful and shrill,
Forgetting how to be loving,
Forgetting how to be still?
Do we strive for “things” in possession,
And toil for the perishing meat,
Neglecting the one thing needful—
Sitting at Jesus’ feet?
Service is good when he asks it,
Labor is right in it’s place,
But there is one thing better,
Looking up in his face;
There is so much he can tell us,
Truths that are precious and deep;
This is the place where he wants us,
These are the things we can keep.
A BLESSING for PRESENCE — John O’Donohue
May you awaken to the mystery of being here
And enter the quiet immensity of your own presence.
May you have joy and peace in the temple of your senses.
May you receive great encouragement when new frontiers beckon.
May you respond to the call of your gift
And find the courage to follow its path.
May the flame of anger free you from falsity.
May warmth of heart keep your presence aflame and anxiety never linger about you.
May your outer dignity mirror an inner dignity of soul.
May you take time to celebrate the quiet miracles that seek no attention.
May you be consoled in the secret symmetry of your soul.
May you experience each day as a sacred gift, Woven around the heart of wonder.
THE BUSYNESS EXCUSE — Beverly Joy
Mary had finished her daily chores
When Jesus came knocking on their door
Come in, come in, Martha welcomed them
They often stayed there to eat and rest.
Martha decided to cook up a feast
For Jesus and friends at the day’s end
Mary sat and listened, at Jesus’ feet
A rare opportunity, the dishes could wait.
Martha was seething in the kitchen
Angry at Mary for not helping
Nobody noticed how hard she was working
Cooking the feast, so perfect and quick.
She’d forgotten that her work was for God’s honour
Not to receive the honour for herself
That she was the servant to serve her Lord
She lost her true purpose in her work.
Jesus would have been happy with takeaway
Allowing time for Martha to spend time with Him
He would be gone the next day, travelling far away
But, she chose the busyness of chores over time with her Lord.
She accused Jesus of not noticing
But Jesus has seen the dark kitchen scene
“Martha, you’re always so busy
You choose busyness over me.”
Is our agenda more important than God’s
What matters to our Lord is our attitude to work
Yes, it’s important to do our chores
But it’s more important to love our Lord.
We rush about doing this and that
While Jesus sits under the tree and waits
For us to stop and sit with Him
To listen and learn, to chat and relax.
MARY, sister of Martha, at your feet for the first time — Andrea Skevington
You came in search of rest
away from the road,
that bright, shadeless road,
where so many came,
and you gave so much.
You came and sat down
in the cool room,
the shutters pulled
against the heat,
and Mary sat, too,
and it was enough.
Just sat, quietly, at your feet,
her face turned up to
yours as she listened.
And you saw how the light
fell across her,
as if for the first time.
And this is what you want,
what you long for.
Not the elaborate
preparations we would make,
not ourselves swept and
scrubbed to perfection,
our acts and our
thoughts impeccable
in lifeless rows,
but to be, here in this light,
to be, here at your feet,
MARY, sister of Lazarus, at your feet a second time — Andrea Skevington
She sits in the shuttered room,
the room where her brother had laid,
dying, dead, the messengers sent out
returning empty, with no reply,
like prayers that bounce off ceilings
or stick to the roof of the mouth,
choking with sorrow.
When you stay by the Jordan
that shuttered room is where Mary stays.
This is her shadowed valley, the dark forest of her path,
foreshadowing yours, it is all foreshadowing you.
The room where her brother had laid,
how can she ever leave it now?
But leave she did, at last, when you called for her,
she came quickly, running, trailing darkness behind
her weeping. Mary, once more at your feet,
and when you saw her weeping, you wept too.
You know us in our grief. You come to us, call to us.
In our darkest, most shuttered places,
your spirit moves, breaks with ours.
Death lay heavy upon you, too, and all the sooner for
this, what you do now, standing before that tomb.
For now, you who are Life,
Word made warm and beating flesh,
and weeping,
call Lazarus out,
You, who are life, and will rise,
call out one who is dead from the cold tomb.
You watch as they run to free him from the graveclothes,
pull darkness from him, calling in strange bewildered delight,
and you see Mary’s face as she sees now,
her brother, who was dead, once more in light,
astonished, seeing your glory, part of your glory,
as she weeps again, is weeping again
breathless with joy.
MARY, of Bethany, at your feet a third time — Andrea Skevington
And so you come once more to Bethany,
and share a meal with Lazarus,
a resurrection feast,
foreshadowing, foreshining
all those kingdom feasts you told of:
wedding banquets with long tables
set wide with good things,
with room enough for all,
welcome at your table.
Now, in Bethany, the house is ablaze with light,
shutters and doors thrown open,
all wide open with joy unspeakable,
music, laughter, dancing, wild thanksgiving
for one who was dead is alive again,
And all night, while crowds pour in from Jerusalem,
the feast goes on, and on,
as Mary enters now, cheeks glistening with joy,
past her brother at your side, back from the grave.
She kneels at your feet again,
pours out extravagant nard,
scandalous anointing of your warm, living feet,
unbinds her hair and lets it flow like water
over them, wiping them in such reckless
and tender thanksgiving.
Fragrance fills the room, the house, the night,
as more people pour from Jerusalem to you,
to you, who comes to us in our weeping,
who shares our bread with us,
and brings us to such joy as this.
To LEARN From ANIMAL BEING — John O’Donohue
Nearer to the earth’s heart, Deeper within its silence: Animals know this world In a way we never will.
We who are ever Distanced and distracted By the parade of bright Windows thought opens: Their seamless presence Is not fractured thus.
Stranded between time Gone and time emerging, We manage seldom To be where we are: Whereas they are always Looking out from The here and now.
May we learn to return And rest in the beauty Of animal being, Learn to lean low, Leave our locked minds, And with freed senses Feel the earth Breathing with us.
May we enter Into lightness of spirit, And slip frequently into The feel of the wild.
Let the clear silence Of our animal being Cleanse our hearts Of corrosive words.
May we learn to walk Upon the earth With all their confidence And clear-eyed stillness So that our minds
Might be baptized In the name of the wind And the light and the rain.
The SONS of MARTHA — Rudyard Kipling
The Sons of Mary seldom bother, for they have inherited that good part;
But the Sons of Martha favour their Mother of the careful soul and the troubled heart.
And because she lost her temper once, and because she was rude to the Lord her Guest,
Her Sons must wait upon Mary’s Sons, world without end, reprieve, or rest.
It is their care in all the ages to take the buffet and cushion the shock.
It is their care that the gear engages; it is their care that the switches lock.
It is their care that the wheels run truly; it is their care to embark and entrain,
Tally, transport, and deliver duly the Sons of Mary by land and main.
They say to mountains, ” Be ye removèd” They say to the lesser floods ” Be dry.”
Under their rods are the rocks reprovèd – they are not afraid of that which is high.
Then do the hill tops shake to the summit – then is the bed of the deep laid bare,
That the Sons of Mary may overcome it, pleasantly sleeping and unaware.
They finger death at their gloves’ end where they piece and repiece the living wires.
He rears against the gates they tend: they feed him hungry behind their fires.
Early at dawn, ere men see clear, they stumble into his terrible stall,
And hale him forth like a haltered steer, and goad and turn him till evenfall.
To these from birth is Belief forbidden; from these till death is Relief afar.
They are concerned with matters hidden – under the earthline their altars are
The secret fountains to follow up, waters withdrawn to restore to the mouth,
And gather the floods as in a cup, and pour them again at a city’s drouth.
They do not preach that their God will rouse them a little before the nuts work loose.
They do not teach that His Pity allows them to leave their job when they damn-well choose.
As in the thronged and the lighted ways, so in the dark and the desert they stand,
Wary and watchful all their days that their brethren’s days may be long in the land.
Raise ye the stone or cleave the wood to make a path more fair or flat;
Lo, it is black already with blood some Son of Martha spilled for that !
Not as a ladder from earth to Heaven, not as a witness to any creed,
But simple service simply given to his own kind in their common need.
And the Sons of Mary smile and are blessèd – they know the angels are on their side.
They know in them is the Grace confessèd, and for them are the Mercies multiplied.
They sit at the Feet – they hear the Word – they see how truly the Promise runs.
They have cast their burden upon the Lord, and – the Lord He lays it on Martha’s Sons !
ON MARY and MARTHA: A Sermon— Nadia Bolz-Weber (article: https://www.patheos.com/blogs/nadiabolzweber/2013/08/sermon-on-mary-and-martha/)
Just to get it out there, this story about Mary and Martha has always irritated me, because I think Martha is awesome, and she’s always made out to be a busy-body and a whiner.
See, Jesus is welcomed into the home of Mary and Martha and the thing to understand is that Jesus didn’t exactly travel alone. Dude had an entourage – so to welcome Jesus is to welcome who Jesus brings in with him. And to extend hospitality to that many people, takes a lot of work, so Martha becomes understandably overwhelmed by her tasks and tries to get Jesus to talk her sister Mary into helping her, since Mary up until this point has only been sitting at Jesus’ feet listening. Jesus tells Martha that Mary has chosen the better part and it will not be taken from her.
Now, you guys know I’m not one to lay on the guilt trip – I never really mastered that technique employed by clergy since time in memorial – so when I tell you that at our last leadership meeting we found ourselves once again trying to figure out how to get the monthly jobs covered I am not saying that to shame anyone except myself – because, in the end, I honestly got a little bit snarky and slightly self-righteous (even for me) and said the following of which I am not proud: I said, “It’s like I really want to say to folks that every week they show up here at 5 after 5 SOMEONE has set the chair up that they get to sit in, and SOMEONE has baked the bread for the Eucharist they receive, and SOMEONE has greeted them at the door and handed them a bulletin and when they leave right after the dismissal, SOMEONE will sweep up and wipe down the counter and that maybe it’s their turn to be that SOMEONE for others”
Now all of this is well and good, and yes of course we need people who are willing to serve, who are willing to do the sometimes thankless tasks of making hospitality and community work since to welcome Jesus is still to welcome all who Jesus brings in with him…
And yes, I spent several days this week distracted by how much work it is to keep this community running and how Martha gets a bad rap, and that all felt really satisfying until Saturday when I went to my 12 step meeting…the one I’ve gone to for 15 years and I arrived 5 minutes late like I so often do. I took my seat on a folding chair and sipped at the light brown coffee in my hand before realizing: oh dang it. SOMEONE had set up all these chairs and SOMEONE had made the bad coffee and when I leave right after the Lord’s prayer, SOMEONE will clean it all up and in a decade and a half that SOMEONE has never been me. Wa-wa.
So try as I might this week, I could not find a comfortable place to land in this story when I was trying to make it into a moralism about the relative merit of doing or not doing tasks. …of action versus contemplation. Because it felt bad to be snarky about people not doing the work and it felt bad to realize in another situation of my life I was the one not doing the work.
Honestly there is merit to action and there is merit to contemplation and I really don’t think that was Jesus’ point.
When Jesus said to her Martha, you are distracted by many things Mary has chosen the better part it will not be taken away I wonder if he meant not that we are distracted by work itself, but that we are distracted from the better part when we judge the actions or inactions of others through the lens of our own personality.
Here’s a small example – when I am sitting in the turn lane waiting for a green arrow…I take it upon myself to consider the people behind me and to leave as short a distance as safely possible between me and the car in front so as many of my fellows as possible can also get through the turn signal. Inevitably, when someone leisurely leaves 4 car lengths between them and the car turning in front of them allowing only 2 cars to get through a green arrow instead of 6, I assume that they are not a team player, only out for themselves and either just selfish or lazy. Wow. That’s a lot of judgment on the personhood of someone based solely on how quickly they turn on green.
But that thing we do where we judge the actions of others based on how we ourselves move through the world – that is a distraction from the MAIN THING.
If the reason you help set up chairs is because you value this community and are grateful that others have set up chairs for you, that does not mean that those who don’t set up chairs do so because they don’t value community or because they are ungrateful to others. And the more we live our lives in these kinds of judgments about the actions of others, the more distracted we are from the better part – from the MAIN THING which will not be taken from us.
When we think the main thing is who does what and why, when you think the main thing is whatever you get out of this, or the main thing is that your friends are here, it all is just busyness and distraction and all of it will eventually be taken away. The main thing – the thing that will not be taken away and that we (myself included) so easily forget is our sacred story. It’s a simple story, really. Even as it is unfathomable in it’s beauty…So here it is again…since I too often forget – there is a God who created us and all that is, this same God spoke through prophets and poets, claimed a people to be God’s own and freed them from the shackles of slavery. This same God led those people through the wilderness to a land of milk and honey, and told them to always welcome the stranger and protect the foreigner so that they could remember where they came from and what God had done for them. Then in the fullness of time, and to draw ALL people to himself, God came and broke our hearts like only a baby could do and made God’s home in the womb of a fierce young woman as though God was saying, from now on this is how I want to be known. And as Jesus God kissed lepers and befriended prostitutes and baffled authority. Jesus ate with all the wrong people and on the night before he died held up bread and told us to do the same thing and he promised us so much: that he would be with us, that forgiveness is real, that we are God’s, that people matter and that grilled fish makes an awesome breakfast. And from the tree on which Jesus hung he pronounced judgment on us all. “Forgive them Father, they know not what they are doing”.
We never do, really, we never seem to know what we are doing and sometimes we think the Bible is going to solve that for us…that a story like Jesus’ visit with Martha and Mary is going to give us a clear moral lesson so we can know what we are doing. And then we think we’ve got it down and then we begin to judge the actions of others and the moment we do this we’ve once again lost the plot.
So maybe choosing the better part isn’t about choosing between action and contemplation, maybe it isn’t about working or sitting at Jesus feet, since the Christian life has always been a combination of the two. Maybe choosing the better part is not judging the actions of other through the lens of your own personality. Because when we do so it is just a distraction from the Main thing – and this story around which we gather…this MAIN THING, can never be taken away because it is always forming who you are and like water on rock, it slowly and sometimes imperceptibly shapes us into the glory of God.
That’s why we come here. It’s not to see our friends or to take advantage of free popsicles, it’s to remember our story. And the story of God and God’s people will stand. And unlike so much else in life, It will not be taken away.
BEING vs DOING: The Difference Between “Being” and “Doing” — This article was adapted from Mindfulness Based Cognitive Therapy for Depression, by Zindel V. Segal, Ph.D., C.Psych., source: https://www.mindful.org/difference-between-being-and-doing/
How our goal-setting mind causes us to fixate on one track, and how we can become more responsive to the richness and complexity that each moment presents.
The activities of the mind are related to patterns of brain activity. Different mental activities, such as reading a book, painting a picture, or talking to a loved one, each involve different patterns of interaction between networks of nerve cells in the brain. The networks involved in one activity are often different from those involved in another activity. Networks can also be linked together in different patterns. If we looked into the brain, we would see shifting patterns in the activity of networks and in their connections with each other as the mind moves from one task to another (being vs doing). For a while, one pattern predominates, then a shift occurs, so brain networks that previously interacted in one pattern now do so in a different configuration. Over time, we would see the different activities of the mind reflected in continually shifting and evolving patterns of interaction between brain networks.
If we looked long enough, we would see that a limited number of core patterns of brain activity and interaction seem to crop up as recurring features in a wide variety of different mental activities. These core patterns reflect some basic “modes of mind.”
We can think of these modes of mind as loosely analogous to the gears of a car. Just as each gear has a particular use (starting, accelerating, cruising, etc.), so each mode of mind has its own particular characteristics and functions. Over the course of a day, as the mind switches from one kind of activity to another, the underlying mode of mind changes—a little like the way that a car, driven through a busy city, there will be a continuous series of changes from one gear to another. And in much the same way a car can only be in one gear at a time, when the mind is in certain modes, it will not be in other modes at the same time.
Our continued dwelling on how we are not as we would like to be just makes us feel worse, taking us even further from our desired goal. This, in turn only serves to confirm our view that we are not the kind of person we feel we need to be in order to be happy.
The fact that a limited number of fundamental modes of mind underpin a wide variety of mental activities has important implications. It opens a way for us to use aspects of everyday experience to learn new ways to relate to the kind of mind states that lead to rumination. We can think of mindfulness training as a way to learn how to become more aware of your mode of mind (“mental gear”) at any moment, and the skills to disengage from unhelpful modes of mind and to engage more helpful modes. We might describe this as learning to shift mental gears. In practice, this task often comes down to recognizing two main modes in which the mind operates, and learning the skills to move from one to the other. These two modes are known as “doing” and “being.”
Being vs Doing: The “Doing” Mode
The ruminative state of mind is actually a variant of a much more general mode of mind that has been called the “doing” mode. The job of this mode of mind is to get things done—to achieve particular goals that the mind has set. These goals could relate to the external world—to make a meal, build a house, or travel to the moon—or to the internal world of self—to feel happy, not make mistakes, never be depressed again, or be a good person. The basic strategy to achieve such goals involves something we call the “discrepancy monitor”: a process that continually monitors and evaluates our current situation against a model or standard—an idea of what is desired, required, expected, or feared. Once this discrepancy monitor is switched on, it will find mismatches between how things are and how we think they should be. That is its job. Registering these mismatches motivates further attempts to reduce these discrepancies. But, crucially, dwelling on how things are not as we want them to be can, naturally enough, create further negative mood. In this way, our attempts to solve a “problem” by endlessly thinking about it can keep us locked into the state of mind from which we are doing our best to escape.
How the Discrepancy Monitor Works:
- First we create an idea of how we want things to be, or how we think they should be
- Next, we compare that with our idea of how things are right now.
- If there is a difference between how things are and how we want them to be, then we generate thoughts and actions to try to close the gap.
- We monitor progress to see whether the gap is increasing or decreasing, and adjust our actions accordingly.
- We know we have reached our goal when our idea of how things are coincides with our idea of how we want them to be.
There is nothing inherently wrong with this doing mode. In fact, quite the reverse: This approach has worked brilliantly as a general strategy for solving problems and achieving goals in the impersonal, external world—whether those goals be as humble as buying all the items on our weekly shopping list or as lofty as building a pyramid. It is natural, then, that we should turn to this same doing mode when things are not as we would like them to be in our personal, internal worlds—our feelings and thoughts, or the kind of person we see ourselves to be. And this is where things can go terribly wrong.
But before we go on to describe how, it is important to forestall any possible misunderstanding. We are in no way suggesting that the doing mode necessarily causes problems—it does not. It is only when, doing mode “volunteers for a job it can’t do” that problems arise. In many, many, areas of our lives, doing mode volunteers for a job it can do, and our lives are the better for it. To make the distinction clearer, we call problematic applications of this mode driven–doing, as opposed to the more general doing.
In being mode, the mind has “nothing to do, nowhere to go” and can focus fully on moment-by-moment experience, allowing us to be fully present and aware of whatever is here, right now.
If action can be taken straightaway to reduce a discrepancy, and the action is successful, there is no problem. But what if we cannot find any effective actions, and our attempts to think up possible solutions get nowhere? With an external problem we might simply give up and get on with some other aspect of our lives. But once the self becomes involved, it is much more difficult simply to let go of the goals we have set.
For example, if we are upset because a long-standing relationship has just ended, there will be many potential discrepancies between our current reality and how we wish things to be. We may wish for restoration of the relationship, or for the start of another relationship. Most likely, we also wish we were not so upset. There may be solutions we could find. But what if we begin to feel that we are bound to end up alone, concluding that there is, in us, some basic failure, a person that caused the relationship to fail? This conclusion suggests no ready solution, and the discrepancy remains. And yet we cannot let go because we have such a central need not to be this kind of person—what could be more important to us than our own sense of identity?
The result of all this is that the mind continues to process information in doing mode, going round and round, dwelling on the discrepancy and rehearsing possible ways to reduce it. And our continued dwelling on how we are not as we would like to be just makes us feel worse, taking us even further from our desired goal. This, in turn only serves to confirm our view that we are not the kind of person we feel we need to be in order to be happy.
The mind will continue to focus in this way until the discrepancy is reduced or some more immediately urgent task takes the focus of the mind elsewhere, only to return to the unresolved discrepancy once one has dealt with the other task. When the doing mode is working on internal, self-related goals like this, we can more accurately call it the “driven–doing” mode.
If we look closely, we will see the driven–doing mode in action in very many areas of our lives. Whenever there is a sense of “have to,” “must,” “should,” “ought,” or “need to,” we can suspect the presence of doing mode.
In doing mode, by contrast, this wonderful multidimensional complexity of experience is boiled down to a narrow, one-dimensional focus: What does this have to say about my progress in reaching my goals?
How else might we recognize the driven–doing mode subjectively? Its most common feature is a recurring sense of unsatisfactoriness, reflecting the fact that the mind is focused on processing mismatches between how we need things to be and how they actually are. Driven–doing mode also involves a sense of continuously monitoring and checking up on progress toward reducing the gap between these two states (“How well am I doing?”). Why? Because where no immediate action can be taken to reduce discrepancies, the only thing the mind can do is continue to work on its ideas about how things are and how they should be, in the hope of finding a way to reduce the gap between them. This it will do over and over again.
In this situation, because the “currency” with which the mind is working consists of thoughts about current situations, desired situations, explanations for the discrepancies between them, and possible ways to reduce those discrepancies, these thoughts and concepts will be experienced mentally as “real” rather than simply as events in the mind. Equally, the mind will not be fully tuned in to the full actuality of present experience. It will be so preoccupied with analyzing the past or anticipating the future that the present is given a low priority. In this case, we are only aware of the present in a very narrow sense: The only interest in it is to monitor success or failure at meeting goals. The broader sense of the present, in what might be called its “full multidimensional splendor,” is missed.
Driven–doing underlies many of our reactions to everyday emotional experiences—we habitually turn to this mode to free ourselves from many kinds of unwanted emotion. It follows that we can use such everyday emotional experiences, and other reflections of the general driven–doing mode of mind, as training opportunities to learn skills that enable us to recognize and disengage from this mode.
Let us consider an alternative mode of mind, “being.”
Being vs Doing: The “Being” Mode
The full richness of the mode of “being” is not easily conveyed in words—its flavor is best appreciated directly, experientially. In many ways, it is the opposite of the driven–doing mode. The driven-doing mode is goal-oriented, motivated to reduce the gap between how things are and how we think we need them to be; our attention is narrowly focused on these discrepancies between actual and desired states. By contrast, the being mode is not devoted to achieving particular goals. In this mode, there is no need to emphasize discrepancy-based processing or constantly to monitor and evaluate (“How am I doing in meeting my goals?”). Instead, the focus of the being mode is “accepting” and “allowing” what is, without any immediate pressure to change it.
“Allowing” arises naturally when there is no goal or standard to be reached, and no need to evaluate experience in order to reduce discrepancies between actual and desired states. This also means that attention is no longer focused narrowly on only those aspects of the present that are directly related to goal achievement; in being mode, the experience of the moment can be processed in its full depth, width, and richness.
Doing mode involves thinking about the present, the future, and the past, relating to each through a veil of concepts. Being mode, on the other hand, is characterized by direct, immediate, intimate experience of the present.
Doing and Being differ in their time focus. In doing, we often need to work out the likely future consequences of different actions, anticipate what might happen if we reach our goal, or look back to memories of times when we have dealt with similar situations to get ideas for how to proceed now. As a result, in doing mode, the mind often travels forward to the future or back to the past, and the experience is one of not actually being “here” in the present much of the time. By contrast, in being mode, the mind has “nothing to do, nowhere to go” and can focus fully on moment-by-moment experience, allowing us to be fully present and aware of whatever is here, right now. Doing mode involves thinking about the present, the future, and the past, relating to each through a veil of concepts. Being mode, on the other hand, is characterized by direct, immediate, intimate experience of the present.
The being mode involves a shift in our relation to thoughts and feelings. In doing mode, conceptual thinking is a core vehicle through which the mind seeks to achieve the goals to which this mode of mind is dedicated. This means, as we have seen, that thoughts are seen as a valid and accurate reflection of reality and are closely linked to action. In doing mode, the relationship to feelings is primarily one of evaluating them as “good things” to hang on to or “bad things” to get rid of. Making feelings into goal-related objects in this way effectively crystallizes the view that they have an independent and enduring reality.
By contrast, in being mode, the relation to thoughts and feelings is much the same as that to sounds or other aspects of moment-by-moment experience. Thoughts and feelings are seen as simply passing events in the mind that arise, become objects of awareness, and then pass away. In the being mode, feelings do not so immediately trigger old habits of action in the mind or body directed at hanging on to pleasant feelings or getting rid of unpleasant feelings. There is a greater ability to tolerate uncomfortable emotional states. In the same way, thoughts such as “do this, do that” do not necessarily automatically link to related actions, but we can relate to them simply as events in the mind.
“Allowing” arises naturally when there is no goal or standard to be reached, and no need to evaluate experience in order to reduce discrepancies between actual and desired states.
In being mode, there is a sense of freedom and freshness as experience unfolds in new ways. We can be responsive to the richness and complexity of the unique patterns that each moment presents. In doing mode, by contrast, this wonderful multidimensional complexity of experience is boiled down to a narrow, one-dimensional focus: What does this have to say about my progress in reaching my goals? Discrepancies between actual and goal states then trigger fairly well-worn, general-purpose habits of mind that may have worked well enough in other situations. But, as we have seen, when, in the driven–doing mode, the goal is to be rid of certain emotional states, these habits can backfire and lead to perpetuation rather than cessation of unwanted mind states.
Clearly, doing vs being are fundamentally different modes of mind. Before drawing out the implications of this difference, it is important that we be very clear on one point: Being mode is not a special state in which all activity has to stop. Doing or being are both modes of mind that can accompany any activity or lack of activity. Recall that we gave a particular name to the type of doing mode that causes problems— “driven–doing”—and this point may become clearer.
For example, it is possible for one to try to meditate with so much focus on being someone who gets into a deeply relaxed state that if anything interrupts it, one feels angry and frustrated. That would be meditating in a driven–doing mode rather than a being mode because the meditation is “driven” by the need to become a relaxed person. Or take another example: It is your turn to do the dishes and there is no way out of it. No one is going to rescue you from this chore. If you do the dishes with the aim of finishing them as quickly as possible to get on to the next activity and are then interrupted, there will be frustration, since your goal has been thwarted. But if you accept that the dishes have to be done and approach the activity in being mode, then the activity exists for its own sake in its own time. An interruption is simply treated as something that presents a choice about what to do at that moment rather than as a source of frustration.
A Mindfulness Practice to Shift out of “Doing” Mode
Try this guided mindfulness practice called “‘Two Ways of Knowing” to take a moment and examine how it feels to disengage from a busy mind and shift into “being” mode:
Begin this practice by settling yourself in a chair with both feet flat on the floor. If it feels okay close the eyes.
Part One: Connect with Your Thoughts
- In this first part of the practice you’re invited to take a few minutes to think about your feet without looking at them.
- What thoughts come to mind when you think about your feet? Perhaps there are judgments about your feet. How much you like them? How much you dislike them?
- Perhaps there are thoughts about how you’d like them to be different. Maybe thoughts come to mind about the places your feet have taken you. Perhaps thoughts about problems they may have caused you.
- What thoughts come to mind for you?
- There’s no need to control your thoughts in anyway. Just let the thinking unfold naturally. Taking your time. Taking a few minutes now simply to let thoughts arise.
Part Two: Shift into Being vs Doing
- And now, for the second part of this practice, the invitation is to gently bring your attention down the legs into the feet, sensing your feet directly without looking at them.
- Allowing your awareness to sink into your feet and fill them from the inside to the outside, from the bones, right out to the surface of the skin, perhaps sensing the many small bones within the feet, maybe feeling the sensations of touch on the skin, the sensations in the soles of the feet, the sense of touch and pressure where the feet make contact with the floor. Perhaps exploring with your awareness the boundary between the feet on the floor.
- And now, if you will, clenching your toes, drawing them in as close as you can, being aware of the sensations in the toes, the soles, and the body of each foot. Directly sensing the pressure in the toes, feeling the tightness in the muscles, the coming and going of sensations throughout the feet, ankles, and legs.
- And now, just relaxing the toes, keeping the awareness in your feet and noticing any changes in the sensations in the feet and toes as they relax.
- Before changing your position, taking a few moments to get a sense of the body as a whole.
Ash Wednesday reflection
~ Rumi
I can hear the sizzle of newborn stars, and know anything of meaning, of the fierce magic emerging here. I am witness to flexible eternity, the evolving past, and I know we will live forever, as dust or breath in the face of stars, in the shifting pattern of winds. — Joy Harjo
Will you meet us in the ashes,
will you meet us in the ache
and show your face within our sorrow
and offer us your word of grace:
That you are life within the dying,
that you abide within the dust,
that you are what survives the burning,
that you arise to make us new.
And in our aching, you are breathing;
and in our weeping, you are here
within the hands that bear your blessing,
enfolding us within your love.
SONGS about DUST & ASHES:
- Ashes by Celine Dion (pop): https://youtu.be/CX11yw6YL1w
- Dust In the Wind by Kansas (rock): https://youtu.be/tH2w6Oxx0kQ
- Ashes to Ashes by David Bowie (rock): https://youtu.be/HyMm4rJemtI
- Glimmer in the Dust by Hillsong (Christian): https://youtu.be/bYWgeEoVmhI
- Dust by Eli Young Band (pop): https://youtu.be/QN5QgYuuxs4
- Another One Bites the Dust by Queen (rock): https://youtu.be/rY0WxgSXdEE
- Dust by Steffany Gretzinger (Christian): https://youtu.be/yBJXMX8vti4
- Devils & Dust by Bruce Springsteen (rock): https://youtu.be/cG8ZQkeZvzc
- Ashes By Now by EmmyLou Harris (country): https://youtu.be/eSMqF8EtUsA
- Dirt to Dust by David Aldean (country): https://youtu.be/iaPHIcebF8I
- Ashes by Embrace (pop): https://youtu.be/EtQ9l0oQmXE
- Ashes by Meghan Trainor (pop): https://youtu.be/uwKg4pCRQfw
- Take These Ashes by Sarah Hart (Christian): https://youtu.be/QKQjYYtUZLY
Joel 2:12-13
Yet even now, says the Lord, return to me with all your heart, with fasting, with weeping, and with mourning; rend your hearts and not your clothing. Return to the Lord your God, for God is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, abounding in steadfast love…
Rend Your Heart
A Blessing for Ash Wednesday
—Jan Richardson
To receive this blessing, all you have to do
is let your heart break.
Let it crack open.
Let it fall apart / so that you can see
its secret chambers, the hidden spaces
where you have hesitated / to go.
Your entire life
is here, inscribed whole
upon your heart’s walls:
every path taken
or left behind,
every face you turned toward
or turned away,
every word spoken in love
or in rage,
every line of your life
you would prefer to leave
in shadow,
every story that shimmers
with treasures known
and those you have yet
to find.
It could take you days
to wander these rooms.
Forty, at least.
And so let this be
a season for wandering,
for trusting the breaking,
for tracing the rupture
that will return you
to the One who waits,
who watches,
who works within
the rending
to make your heart
whole.
Ruler of the Night, Guarantor of the day . . .
This day — a gift from you.
This day — like none other you have ever given,
or we have ever received.
This Wednesday dazzles us
with gift and newness and possibility.
This Wednesday burdens us
with the tasks of the day,
for we are already halfway home
halfway back to committees and memos,
halfway back to calls and appointments,
halfway on to next Sunday,
halfway back, half frazzled, half expectant,
half turned toward you, half rather not.
This Wednesday is a long way from Ash Wednesday,
but all our Wednesdays are marked by ashes —
we begin this day with that taste of ash in our mouth:
of failed hope and broken promises,
of forgotten children and frightened women,
we ourselves are ashes to ashes,
dust to dust; we can taste our mortality
as we roll the ash around on our tongues.
We are able to ponder our ashness with some confidence,
only because our every Wednesday of ashes anticipates
your Easter victory over that dry, flaky taste of death.
On this Wednesday, we submit our ashen way to you —
you Easter parade of newness.
Before the sun sets, take our Wednesday and Easter us,
Easter us to joy and energy and courage and freedom;
Easter us that we may be fearless for your truth.
Come here and Easter our Wednesday
with mercy and justice and peace and generosity.
We pray as we wait for the
Risen One who comes soon.
PRAYER — Mary Oliver
May I never not be frisky,
May I never not be risque.
May my ashes, when you have them, friend,
and give them to the ocean,
leap in the froth of the waves,
still loving movement,
still ready, beyond all else,
to dance for the world.
MEDITATIONS on MUD & SOIL
― Thích Nhất Hạnh
It is possible of course to get stuck in the “mud” of life. It’s easy enough to notice mud all over you at times. The hardest thing to practice is not allowing yourself to be overwhelmed by despair. When you’re overwhelmed by despair, all you can see is suffering everywhere you look. You feel as if the worst thing is happening to you. But we must remember that suffering is a kind of mud that we need in order to generate joy and happiness. Without suffering, there’s no happiness. So we shouldn’t discriminate against the mud. We have to learn how to embrace and cradle our own suffering and the suffering of the world, with a lot of tenderness.
— and —
The soil of our mind contains many seeds, positive and negative. We are the gardeners who identify, water, and cultivate the best seeds.
Living Psalm 51—Ash Wednesday
Confession for Creation Justice
Written by Maren Tirabassi
To any leader. A Psalm of David, when he took what he wanted, uncaring of the death and damage it caused, which was great.
Have mercy on us, O God,with the love that shaped all creation,
for we confess that we have been the ones
who blotted out —
made endangered and extinct —
creatures of air and land
by destroying their habitats.
If there is any clean water left, wash us,
but only after the creatures
of the oceans and lakes and rivers
return and are healed.
For we know our transgression —
we have torn off the tops of mountains
and our sin has fracked deep
into the very fissures of the earth.
Against you, melting your glaciers, we sin,
and we have done what is evil,
so that wildfires rage across
Australia, California,
and the Amazon rainforest
and the fox and koala and ocelot
judge us by their death.
Indeed, we are guilty against the newly born
who will be eleven years-old,
when our greed changes their earth
beyond hope of repair.
You desire truth,
but we clutch lies about the climate.
Help us repent so we can hear wisdom,
and make us wise enough to repent.
Let us not be clean,
but dirty in a community garden,
and wet with sweat
because we have walked and biked,
taken buses instead of cars,
cleaned ourselves with quick showers.
Let us taste the joy of locavores,
celebrate grizzly, wolf, gray whale,
sea lion, panda,
who have come back to thriving.
Most of all — let our hearts be stirred
not by what makes us wealthy in money
but what makes us wealthy in future.
Create in us a pure heart, O God,
and renew in us
the Spirit that hovers over your creation.
Then we will let our children teach us,
honor sacred lands of indigenous peoples,
open our lips for national parks
and our mouths for wildlife refuges.
Deliver us from being destroyers, O God,
and give us tongues that call for change.
For you have no delight
when we pile abundance on abundance.
The gift that pleases you
is one pollinator saved —
butterfly and bee, O God, is our acceptable prayer.
Ash Wednesday Provocation (day 1 of Lent)
Word for DAY 1 (Ash Wednesday) of Lent: WASTED AWAY.
This phrase comes from Psalm 32: 1-5, from the Narrative Lectionary associated with the first day of Lent. Throughout Lent, we will post words from each week’s scripture and music videos that address the themes raised by those phrases (lifted from the context of the Biblical passage).
Below we share two videos that connect to the idea of WASTED AWAY. They both struggle with the value of human life, and measure it differently.
The words and images in this first country music video by military veteran Graham Trude are especially heavy and could be triggering, as they grapple with suicidality, so please **proceed with caution**. The lyrics and images also convey the truth of deep trauma and pain, and are searingly honest.
How would you respond to hearing someone in such pain?
Here is a second music video also called Wasted Away, featuring the work of rap artist Tinn Mann.
MARDI GRAS (Tue, Feb 21) & ASH WEDNESDAY (Wed, Feb 22) with JCC and around town
TUE, Feb 21
- FITNESS CLASS with Laurie McAleer
9:30am • Jackson Community Church- Free to all participants.
- Gentle, chair-based stretch and fitness for all levels of ability
- PREP & DECORATE for Mardi Gras
10:45am- Volunteers wanted to decorate the Parish Hall for the party and music on Tuesday evening
- Set up the crepe table
- Community Resource: LIBRARIES
- 10am-7pm • Jackson Library
Contact the library for additional help: 603.383.9731 or by email: staff@jacksonlibrary.org. For more info: http://jacksonlibrary.org/ - 2pm-5pm • Bartlett Library
More info: https://www.bartlettpubliclibrary.org/
- 10am-7pm • Jackson Library
- Community Event: XC SKIING & SNOWSHOEING with Jackson Ski Touring
Trails Open • More info: https://www.jacksonxc.org/trail-report/- Also:
- Great Glen XC Skiing, 1 Mt Washington Auto Rd, Gorham, NH: https://greatglentrails.com/
- Bear Notch Ski Touring, Bartlett, NH: https://www.bearnotchskitouring.com/
- Mt Washington Valley Ski Touring & Snowshoe, Intervale, NH: https://www.bearnotchskitouring.com/
- Also:
- Community Event: DOWNHILL SKIING
- Black Mountain: https://www.blackmt.com/
- Attitash: https://www.attitash.com/
- Wildcat: https://www.skiwildcat.com/
- Cranmore Mountain: https://www.cranmore.com/
- MARDI GRAS with JCC
6-8pm • Parish Hall of Jackson Community Church- Live music by Wayne Peabody and the Tir Na Nog Musical Society featuring guitars, banjos and other string instruments!
- Sweet and savory crepes
- Michelle Chase providing fresh crepes,
- Savory crepe fillings courtesy of Sue Carrigan,
- Sweet crepe fillings courtesy of Tish Hanlon
- Wear your own bling or borrow ours; Masks and beads available
- Selfie photo opportunities
- Free to all; donations welcome
- RSVP if you’re able, we’re seeking RSVPs to get an estimated ‘head count’ for our chefs: jcchurch@jacksoncommunitychurch.org
- Come even if you cannot or didnt RSVP!
- For more info, visit jxncc.org
- Community Event: HOOT NIGHT
- Wildcat Tavern: Jonathan Sarty hosts • 6-8:30pm
- Community Events: MUSIC AROUND TOWN
- Shovel Handle Pub: Rafe Matregrano• 5:30-8:30pm
- Lostbo Pub @ Black Mountain: Jonathan Sarty • 3:30-5:30pm
- Community Event: HEATHER PIERSON BAND
6:30pm Doors Ooen / 7:30pm Concert Begins • Majestic Theater- The concert will feature traditional jazz, Heather’s own compositions, and Mardi Gras standards by Professor Longhair, Louis Armstrong, and more. Join Heather Pierson, Shawn Nadeau (bass), Davy Sturtevant (cornet and guitar), Jared Steer (drums), Mike Sakash (clarinet and saxophone), and George Wiese (Trombone) for this Fat Tuesday event. (video is from 2021 virtual concert.)
- Tickets and info: https://www.conwaymajestic.com/\
- Our volunteers will have carnival masks (wear them if you have them) and we will be handing out carnival beads to mark this festive event.
WED, Feb 22
- ASHES to GO (anticipated schedule, some venues pending confirmation)
- 8-10am: JTown Deli
- 10:15-11:30am: Autumn Nomad
- Noon-1:30pm: Glen Ledge Deli / McSheffreys North
- 2-3:45pm: JCC Sanctuary
- 4-5:30pm: Red Parka (pending confirmation)
- ASH WEDNESDAY SERVICE
- 7pm • Nativity Lutheran, North Conway
JCC attends Lutheran service to enjoy local clergy John Heropoulos , MDiv lead the liturgy
- 7pm • Nativity Lutheran, North Conway
- Community Resource: LIBRARIES
- 2pm-5pm • Jackson Library
- Contact the library for additional help: 603.383.9731 or by email: staff@jacksonlibrary.org. For more info: http://jacksonlibrary.org/
- 12pm-6pm • Bartlett Library
More info: https://www.bartlettpubliclibrary.org
- 2pm-5pm • Jackson Library
- Community Event: XC SKIING & SNOWSHOEING with Jackson Ski Touring
Trails Open • More info: https://www.jacksonxc.org/trail-report/- Also:
- Great Glen XC Skiing, 1 Mt Washington Auto Rd, Gorham, NH: https://greatglentrails.com/
- Bear Notch Ski Touring, Bartlett, NH: https://www.bearnotchskitouring.com/
- Mt Washington Valley Ski Touring & Snowshoe, Intervale, NH: https://www.bearnotchskitouring.com/
- Also:
- Community Event: DOWNHILL SKIING
- Black Mountain: https://www.blackmt.com/
- Attitash: https://www.attitash.com/
- Wildcat: https://www.skiwildcat.com/
- Cranmore Mountain: https://www.cranmore.com/
- Community Events: MUSIC AROUND TOWN
- Red Parka: Win It Wed with Jon Sarty • 4-7pm
- Shovel Handle Pub: Rafe Matregrano • 5:30-8:30pm
- Lostbo Pub @ Black Mountain: Tim Dion• 3:30-5:30pm