In this sixth conversation, on the theme, Life, Living and Learning, let me explore how we can continue on a personal journey of learning from our biography.
The personal biography of our lives is a gathering of the history of our birth, growth and transitions in life. The events and experiences form the bulk of that history. The parents nursed, nurtured and accompanied us in our formation. There were relatives, teachers and friends and some others who made us what we are. Our informal and formal learning process gave us foundations upon which we are building our lives now. We have had some major events in our lives- education, career choice, preparation to be a professional, etc. As and when we enter into a marriage relationship, this biography enlarges even more.
Most of what constitutes our biography are our feelings, responses and interpretations. They are subjective and relational to our mood and perceptions. There is a baggage of emotion associated with these. Psychologists, behavioural therapists, Counsellors and psychiatrists are trained to help us to interpret the story of our past if the past events affect us in a traumatic or disturbing way. The study of dreams is another resource to unravel the mysteries associated with the past events in our lives. In fact, the personal biography is the substance of our being.
Although our biography is most related to our past, our present is an expression of the past. A fuller appraisal of our past would lead us to a better understanding of the origin of our thought processes, attitudes, values, conduct, actions and reactions. This knowledge of how we have been formed would throw light into the source of our strengths and weaknesses.
Those of us who have been used to journaling the events and experiences of our lives have a record of events in our lives for easy recollection as and when we want to. Some maintain a journal of dreams at night and take time to reflect on them or seek help to find their meanings.
It was while talking to a friend, I realized how the decision of his parents to study medicine created so much of a disturbance in his life that it is a weight on his life interfering with his learning process. I observed him to be struggling in his studies contrary to his outstanding performance in his earlier years. I happened to enquire into the reason behind it. For the next one hour, he narrated his woes and regrets for not having been allowed to pursue interest in literature and journalism. There were occasions of outburst of anger. At the end he confessed that it was the first time he talked about it to anyone during the four years in the Medical College. The decision made by his parents seven years back is still haunting and hurting him.
Our biography can have many memorable experiences which too need recollection because in reliving them we receive new insights that escaped our attention at the time of those experiences. An objective and structured approach to learn from our biography is usually part of a personal development plan, some of us can undertake as part of our preparation for mid-life transition.
Let me explore this under three headings:
1.Revisiting events and experiences
2.Finding a continuum
3.Looking for the larger meaning
1.Revisitng events and Experiences
Our biography of life starts in our mother’s womb, about which the Psalmist has something profound to say: ‘Thou didst form my inward parts; Thou didst weave me in my mother’s womb. I will give thanks to Thee, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made; wonderful are Thy works; And my soul knows it very well’ (Psalm 139:13-14). Our beginning and all events thereafter are under the watchful eyes of the God of our lives. But this consciousness fades away from our mind sometimes when the circumstances of life overwhelm us.
Our lives get submerged in the events that happen to us. We might get drawn away from a path that we had foreseen for our lives. The circumstances might force us to act in ways that we would not have normally chosen. We might feel being a victim of circumstances. Sometimes we were left with no choice and we felt trapped by the circumstances. Many feel unsettled when the freedom to choose or plan were denied to them. That is how one drifts in life with disappointment, anger and reaction.
Moses of the Old Testament was one such person. Moses’s mother seeing that he was beautiful, hid him for three months and then left him in a basket in the river Nile (Exod 2:2-3). The daughter of Pharaoh found him and got his mother to nurse him. His mother brought him to Pharaoh’s daughter and handed him over to her when the child grew older. Moses became her son (Exod.2:10). When Moses grew up, he seeing an Egyptian quarrelling with a Hebrew killed the Egyptian and buried him in the sand (v 11-12). When hearing of this Pharaoh wanted to kill Moses. Moses escaped to the land of Midian.
The turning point in the history of Moses was when he offered to help seven sisters (Exod.2: 16-22) to gather water from the well by drawing water for them to feed their sheep when some shepherds obstructed them. The father of the women, surprised by the kindness of Moses invited Moses to their home for a meal, which subsequently led to Moses staying with them and getting married to Zipporah and having a child (v.22).
The third chapter of Exodus brings to us an extension of this story with another surprise. Moses while shepherding the flock of his father-in-law, Jethro travelled through wilderness to Horeb, the mountain of God (Exod3:1-5). The wilderness journey was to reach Horeb.
I want to suggest in a metaphorical sense that it was during the journey through wilderness Moses revisited his childhood. To be abandoned by his parents in river Nile, rescued by an Egyptian woman, nursed by his mother initially and later brought up in the Egyptian traditions, killing an Egyptian arising out of accumulated ‘hate’ of Egyptians for keeping people of his race subdued to extract work from them for the prosperity of Egyptians, fleeing for his life to another land…! Moses’s story was complex, traumatic, long, convoluted, and stormy, till Jethro showed kindness to him, most probably not knowing any of his background. At the end of a journey through a dark tunnel of pain and fear, Moses received welcome and acceptance in Jethro’s house. The walk through the wilderness was an inward journey and not just physical alone. It was during this journey, Moses would have become confessional, honest to himself, and coming face to face with his inner darkness of hate, anger and rebellion. Moses would have felt broken, heavy of heart and repentant in spirit for his violent thoughts and deadly actions.
It is from this emotional wilderness that Moses reached the mountain of God. What followed was a sight that Moses beheld in utter surprise and reverence. An angel of the lord appeared to hm in a ‘blazing fire from the midst of a bush’ and ‘bush was burning with fire, yet the bush was not consumed (Exod 3:2). Seeing this, Moses said, ‘I must turn aside now and see this marvelous sight, why the bush is not burned up’(v 3).
Moses went through three transforming experiences. The phrase ‘turn aside’ tells us all about the profound attention Moses was ready to give to make sense of a spectacular sight. He was overseeing the flock, but was willing to leave it aside to pay attention to a significant surprise. A difficult choice indeed! Fortunately, he did not ignore it or set it aside lightly.
The second was the outcome of Moses’s turning aside to look. ‘When the Lord saw that he turned aside to look, God called him from the midst of the bush and said, ‘Moses, Moses’! What if Moses ignored the sight of the burning bush! It would have perpetuated his state of living in anguish, despair and fear. Some events that happen in our lives, surprises, difficult or pleasant experiences might be ‘calling attention’ experiences, in which God is present with a message and direction. It is only when we stop to pause and ponder, we are taken beyond the present story of our lives in which we are entangled in.
The Third transforming part of the experiences was, Moses’s response when he heard his name, ‘Here I am’ (v.4). What followed was an instruction, ‘Do not come near, remove your sandals from your feet, for the place on which you are standing is holy ground’ (v.5). Moses was ready to engage the situation, but he was warned to become ready for this encounter experience. Removing the sandal and told not to come close to the presence of God are symbols of preparation needed to be in God’s presence. Moses carried a history of living in the wild and on this occasion when God made His presence known to him to redeem his life, Moses needed a sense of awe, wonder and surrender for which he needed an inner readiness.
The story of our life is sacred because God has been with us during good and difficult times. The events and experiences can only be revisited to receive the larger meaning if we receive a new optic to look at them. That optic comes to us when we allow the emotions attached to the events and experiences hitherto, get replaced by an objectivity and a willingness to review and receive a new meaning.
Apostle Peter while in prayer had a vision of a ‘great sheet coming down lowered by four corners to the ground and there were in it all kinds four-footed animals and crawling creatures of the earth and birds of the air. A voice came to him, Arise Peter, kill and eat’ (Acts.1011-14). Peter denied to eat, as he considered them to be unholy, although a voice came to him three times, ‘What God has cleansed consider no longer unholy’(V15). It was after this experience and while Peter was reflecting on the vision, three friends of Cornelius came to look for him to take Peter to meet Cornelius, a Roman centurion to minister to him. Cornelius sent for Peter after he himself had a vision to call for Peter to minister to him. This vision was to help Peter to dissolve his reluctance to welcome non-Jews from becoming followers of Jesus. The friendship between peter and Cornelius was a historic occasion to allow non-Jews to be followers of Jesus. Both of them reviewed their historic racial antagonism towards each other, after they reviewed their past beliefs and practices.
Our past resides within us and is often a baggage that needs attention. Some of the experiences would emerge to be valuable resources for growth and transition. Some experiences which weigh heavy on us with disappointments or grief would receive a new perspective when we draw near to find meaning out of it.
2. Finding the continuum
Life is not a stand-alone compartments of past, present and future, but a cohesive amalgam of life events. Moses having had an encounter experience with God in the Burning Bush had an experience of his past getting subsumed or integrated with his experiences thereafter. Moses was not known for his past after God commissioned Moses by saying, ‘Therefore, come now, and I will send you to Pharaoh so that you may bring My people, the sons of Israel out of Egypt’ (Exod.4:10).
A new beginning of being God’s spokesperson to Pharaoh to lead people out of Egypt! Moses was a new person after his encounter with God in the burning bush. He no longer had to suffer under unsettlement, guilt and shame of his past. God viewed Moses in the light of his readiness to walk in the new path that was set before him.
I remember meeting with a friend, who was refused a faculty position in the college he studied, due to his suspension from the hostel for having been found in a drunken state during his student days. He told me with a heavy heart, how the college still judged him on the basis of his wrong-doing. He lives a fractured life because of his past.
We have an example of Zaccheus (Luke.19: 1-10), who was blessed by Jesus in spite of his several acts of commission and omission. Jesus received the confession made by Zaccheus (V8), ‘Behold, Lord half of my possessions I will give to the poor and if I have defrauded anyone anything, I will give back flour times as much’ and helped Zaccheus to move on in his life. We find Jesus releasing Zaccheus from the burden and guilt of the past and leading him into a new mission in his life.
This is a pointer to how we are to process our biography. Our biography is sometimes heavily leaning towards our past. We behave on the basis of the beliefs we pursue based on the understanding we have from our past. We view a person who offended us on the basis of his wrong doing, rather than be open to receive him in the light of his present perspective to life. We have strong inclinations to keep remembering our past or the past of others for wrong reasons. We live in the present dictated by the impressions of the past. This limits us from moving on to the future which might be altogether promising and transforming.
When we live with impressions of the past relationships weighing upon us, we are poor collaborators or critical thinkers of opportunities that lie ahead of us. We do not engage an opportunity to make a difference. I remember how Dr Raj Arole and Mrs Dr Maebel Arole, public health specialists and founders of Jamkhed Public Health Initiative created a new approach by training Village Health Workers to provide primary health care in rural Maharashtra, in the Ahemmednagar district in 1970. It was for the first time such an experiment was done. This model became a way of reaching health care in rural parts which the WHO endorsed and popularised since then. Dr Arole had disappointments while working in a mission hospital immediately after his undergraduate training. He felt disappointed that people lived and died in rural India without being able to access health care. He turned his disappointment in to an opportunity to create a new model and demonstrated how it would work. When the trained women volunteers were able to conduct safe delivery, immunise children, treat diarrhoea with Oral Rehydration Solution, treat Malaria, etc, the health care scenario in rural areas changed dramatically. Dr Arole was able to free himself from conventional approach in health care and leave behind his disappointments about institution centred health care and move on to envision a future of new prospects in rural health care.
We have a past, which we can turn into a resource to move forward. Or we can hold on to it to influence our thinking and practice negatively. A friend who often talk about his disappointments in his workplace could not use his brilliant clinical leadership to innovative initiatives because he was not able to see others as his collaborators. His solo journey in research took him to new heights, but he was not an effective mentor. Some working with him took longer than five years to complete research toward obtaining a Phd and a few left without completing. His disappointment about not getting an academic leadership in the specialty that he was originally trained, weighed heavily on him even when he was successful in research which brought him recognition.
That is why the story of the latter years of Moses was most impressive because, he did not remain paralysed because of his traumatic past, but walked the journey that God placed before him. Moses in his engagement with God had a restrained attitude to himself when God was preparing himself to respond to God to lead people out of bondage in Egypt. His response to God initially was: ‘Please, Lord, I have never been eloquent, neither recently nor in time past, nor since Thou has spoken to Thy servant; I am slow of speech and slow of tongue’ (Exod 4:10). God’s response was: ’Who has made man's mouth? or who makes him dumb or deaf or seeing or blind? Is it not I, the Lord. Now, then go, and I even I will be with your mouth, and teach you what you are to say’(v 12). Moses’s response was: ‘Please, Lord now send the message by whomever Thou wilt’ (v13).
Let me say, that our hesitation to move beyond our own impression or beliefs about ourselves is often so strong, that even when we are given a glimpse of the enabling presence of God who promises us to lead us on, we live as prisoners of our past. God in his favour towards Moses gave Aaron as a companion, although we are told that God’s anger burned against Moses (v14).
Whatever might be our past or our present, that is not the final stage of our lives. We have a present and future apart from our past. What happened in Moses’s life after his encounter with God is worth studying. Moses went back to his father-in-law, Jethro and took his permission to leave Midian and go to Egypt (v18). Moses returned to Egypt from where he ran away earlier, as a starting point to live beyond his past. His resolve to go back to Egypt was a clear indication of the strength he found in God to reconnect with his past but live differently in the future. His anger that killed an Egyptian was replaced by a vocation to engage Pharaoh and make him ready to let the Hebrews be free from bondage in Egypt. Moses was a changed man at the end of revisiting his past. He received from God a new mission and a new way of engaging it even though the speaking skills that was needed in his new responsibility was not his strength. He and Aaron found each other for this calling! What a difference! An impulsive and aggressive Moses brought into a discipline of working together and leaning on to each other for a new journey with God.
This is the continuum in life, but living differently with a renewal of vocation and mission!
3. Looking for a larger meaning
Our life is incarnational in nature. We become present in the situations where we are located. We reveal ourselves through our beliefs, practices and relationships. Most of our life experiences are our personal experiences. We share them with others while we live and work in the situations we are located.
Moses went to Pharaoh and said; ’Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel, Let my people go that they may celebrate a feast to Me in the wilderness’ (Exod.5:1). Pharaoh’s response was, ‘Who is the Lord that I should obey His voice to let Israel go’? (v2). The long, difficult and traumatic engagement with Pharaoh began here. Pharaoh following this made the task for the Hebrews difficult without providing them straw to make bricks, but insisted on the same output (v13). Following this, the Hebrews turned against Moses and Aaron and their words were harsh: ’May the Lord look upon you and judge you, for you have made us odious in Pharaoh’s sight and in the sight of his servants, to put sword in their hands to kill us’ (v21). Moses’s response to God at this juncture is revealing of his dependence on God, as against an impulsive Moses known for his reactive behaviour in the past. ‘O Lord, why hast Thou brought harm to this people? Why didst Thou ever send me? Ever since I came to Pharaoh to speak in Thy name, he has done harm to this people and Thou has not delivered Thy people at all’(v 22, 23). This is the contrast between God’s foresight and Moses’s instant expectation of deliverance.
When we visit our biography and ponder to find a larger meaning for our existence, mission or relationships, we night find a contrast from our earlier expectations and the actual experiences. Our aspirations or longings were strong enough to push us in one direction. We might find a different path unfolding before us when we revisit our biography. Our disappointments also would have become way marks in our lives to lead us on in directions unknown to us at that time. But those were occasions of turning points in our life.
In the story of Jesus of Nazareth feeding the five thousand, a boy who had five leaves and two fish had thought of that to be for himself. But when he gave it away to Andrew to hand it over to Jesus, what he saw was his food multiplying to be large enough for many people (John.6:5-14). We celebrate the generosity of the boy who foresaw a larger purpose for his food packet.
Most of us need surprises or shocking or disturbing events in our lives to see beyond our perception. This is the purpose of revisiting our biography. We need to be freed from our conditioned and restricted view of our prospects, strengths and resources.
When I gave a paint brush to a child who was four years old with a pallet of colours, what he did surprised me- drawing the sky and the moon. I was amazed that his vision was on the sky. By them he was learning the keyboard, singing tunefully, reading by himself text with good understanding and narrational and descriptive in his conversations. On enquiry I found that he was exceptional in his abilities because both his parents gave attention to foster every interest he showed. The boy did not know how to pursue his interest, but his parents knew. The result was a new world of opportunities opening before him.
It is because of this we need to value the need of companions or mentors who can help us to interpret the hidden story of our lives, which remain dormant in our subconscious level. We need to know some guidelines to demystify our nocturnal dreams. It too is based on some psycho-behavioural premise and perspectives. Our dreams can be metaphorical, archetypical, symbolic or instructional, all of which need demystifying.
Our life is not just a history or biography but an experience of having been called into being for life abundant.
The former Cardinal Archbishop of Westminister, Basil Hume in his book, To be a pilgrim, wrote that ‘There are two mountains, Tabor and Calvary. Mount Tabor is the scene of the great Transfiguration, when Peter, James and John found it ‘good to be with the Lord’ (Mat 17;1-13). But we are only able to climb Mount Tabor when we have exercised ourselves climbing that hill which is called Calvary. When our Lord calls us to serve Him, He does not promise an easy way. He calls us to follow Him with courage, with tenacity, in the face of difficulties. The call is unmistakable. Do not be afraid of Calvary. Over that hill you come to another one, a different hill and a friendly one. There you will find a tent you will remain for ever’ (p139-140).
The Calvary and the Tabor experiences in our biography together make our life complete. A journey into our biography is to learn from both the experiences, to lead us for a renewal and restoration of integrated living.
M.C.Mathew (text and photo)
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