| The Lost Art of Communion by Christina Donnell Something profound is affecting the spirit of America. The United States is the richest, most powerful country in the world and yet we are impoverished in spirit. Today in America, nearly 2,000 people a day attempt suicide. 80 percent of Americans report finding their jobs "meaningless." One out of four Americans takes psychiatric medication. The reanimation of our lives is a crucial task for us today in America. This I know to be true, from nearly a decade of teaching and private consultation with men and women throughout the country. I have met innumerable people from all over the world and from every walk of life. In my travels to "underdeveloped" countries like Mexico, Guatemala, Honduras, Egypt, Bolivia and Peru, I have been privileged to sit with these respective people deep into the night, sharing our beliefs about what we know and how we know it. Everywhere I have been, I have participated in ritual -- a covenant for the spirit -- within ceremonial space and time. It is through the Andean priests and Q'ero people of the highlands of Peru that I was awakened to the art of communion -- lost today in modern America. Each time I return to the Peruvian highlands, I am deeply moved by their depth of wisdom. I have sat, studied and been initiated by these medicine people. Yet, I remain most touched by their collective mastery of communion. I have found no such level of mastery elsewhere in my travels. The Q'ero are among the poorest indigenous people of the Americas, yet they are the richest in spirit of any I have met in all my travels. They live daily with a reverence for life that is holy. We may have more corn in our fields, but they have far more sunshine in their hearts. The Q'ero are a simple people who live in complete harmony with nature. They live between 14,000 and 22,000 feet elevation in the mist-shrouded mountains of Peru. They speak directly to the mountains, the rivers and the sun. Their medicine people call in the thunder and the rain, and they spend hours engaged in activities for which we might set aside 20 minutes a day. They are silent, mindful of life unfolding around them. They are a people who live in reciprocal exchange with all of nature, in a near-constant state of reverence for creation itself. They have achieved what Henry David Thoreau believed was the highest art: to effect the quality of the day. My time with the Q'ero has enabled me to see America through a different set of lenses. To return to a sense of place with a rich, deep, authentic connection to all of life is to breathe the lost art of communion back into our lives, our families and our communities. We do not have to acquiesce to the addictive appeals of consumerism. We do not have to watch television at the end of the day, or submit ourselves to constant bombardment by sounds and images, filling our heads with other people's adventures, excitements and desires. These distractions are not inherently bad, but we use them to rob ourselves of the many precious moments in which we might be living more fully. We can develop other habits that bring us back to that place in our heart where the moment unfolding is a gift, pregnant with the spirit of life itself, where we can feel the moment while participating fully in it. This is communion. The art of communion does not belong only to the clergy -- to those literally engaged in what is considered sacred. All of life is sacred. Communion is our birthright as human beings. It should be the main reason to get up in the morning, and the organizing principle for each day. When we relax fantasies of escaping existence or attaining some perfect truth, we gradually make peace with being in our bodies, in life now. The state of communion makes no more excuses. One is free to fall in love with life again. From this revitalizing innocence we are tender and gentle, as well as raw and immediate. There is no spirituality to seek. It is the very nature of life. It is as organic to existence as the breath. To return to a sense of place with a rich, deep authentic connection to all of life is to breathe the lost art of communion back into our lives, our families, our communities and our world. Awakening the lost art of communion requires something of us. We must pay a price. We must care for, appreciate and cultivate an intimate relationship with our life. To live in a state of communion is the greatest of challenges. Sometimes it means being intimate with that which is abhorrent and kissing each heartbreak as divinity itself. When we reawaken and incorporate communion in our daily life at the individual level, we begin to move our culture collectively towards greater sensitivity, wholeness, respect and support for our essential nature as human beings. As Mahatma Gandhi once said, "Human greatness lies not in being able to remake the world, but in being able to remake ourselves." We live in a culture that is leading other nations and the world into the 21st century. Our responsibility for the future of human existence on our planet is enormous. The reanimation of our lives, our communities and our world is a crucial task for us today. May the seeds of communion be planted and cultivated to once again bloom in America. Christina Donnell, Ph.D., is a clinical psychologist who has worked with the Q'ero Shaman for more than 10 years. She is the president of The Winds of Change Association, Ltd. An author, teacher and consultant, she leads expeditions to sacred sites around the world. She resides on the island of Kauai, Hawaii. To learn more about Christina's upcoming workshop in Minneapolis or her other workshops. Visit www.wocaassoc.com Copyright © 2004 Christina Donnell |
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Sept 2004 |
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