What Connects Us? Sometimes it is a Desire to Connect.

Every trip I make around the sun offers me more opportunities to intersect and interact with other humans. Others who think and reason differently, who look and speak differently, who have unique traditions and are influenced by rich cultures and ancestral lineages… those who have overcome adversities of every kind, and those who have kindly shared the beautiful gifts and blessings life has kindly bestowed on them.

In many of these intersections and interactions I have also been shown, time and time again, that what often really connects us is a desire to connect – to connect to each other, to connect with our natural surroundings, and to connect with something outside of ourselves… something unseen – unknowable even – but yet this something often has an intricate pull on our human minds, our inquiries, and our curiosities…

I recently visited my mother in a large hospital in Sacramento just a couple days after she was admitted. After navigating a maze of a parking garage, elevators, and long neutral-colored corridors… after passing nurses stations, and patients’ rooms, I find myself in my mom’s private room.

Machines humming… tubes and cords tangled and hanging like spaghetti as various fluids move and drip, drip, dripping… monitors are beeping… and a jagged green line is blipping a soft reassurance that a heart is still beating…

Nurses and hospital staff are moving about, in and out, busily tending to the many needs… and after several minutes my need was for a little stillness… a little quiet… somewhere else… not there.

I step out into the hallway with my backpack on my shoulder and I walk a few steps and sit near a window just to be still … be quiet with my thoughts… a desire to assess what it is I am actually wanting in this moment… what I am feeling… needing…

I know that most hospitals have a meditation room, spiritual center or chapel of some kind… and a nurse dressed in black scrubs passed by and I inquired as to where that space might be…

Making my way to the second floor I walk through a very ordinary and plain door into a quiet, nicely lit space. There were several chairs arranged in a purposeful and specific formation, all facing the front where there was a small table with some candles and a bowl of bright, yellow flowers floating on some water: the altar – or at least in my familiar Roman Catholic “cradle-faith” tradition that is what I would have called it. However, there was no crucifix, corporal, or tabernacle present – all things that you would likely find in a Roman Catholic sanctuary…

And I imagine to another person, or faith-tradition, this little “altar” might be just a simple table holding some sweet yellow flowers floating in water, and candles to gently enhance and brighten the space…

I stood there a moment knowing that I was seemingly alone… blessedly alone… and curious. I wandered about the space in silence… slowly, almost reverently, because even though this space seemed very plain, institutional, sterile, and minimally enhanced, it still seemed to warrant a quiet and meaningful reverence; it felt like a holy place, and I was walking on sacred ground… a space that has held the concerns, thoughts and prayers of many before me…

Continuing to explore I walked through an entry way into another side room … still, there was no one else present, I was still alone. On the wall there was a simple display of various prayer cards… holy words and texts from various faith traditions; some in different languages…

I looked through the prayers… some of the titles and words were familiar to me because they were of my own tradition, and others familiar because of my recent formation and certification as an interfaith spiritual director – but even still, there was a tiny hesitant part of me that wondered if I would be encroaching on another faith tradition if I read them… or prayed them? They were likely printed and displayed to be used as such, but would I be crossing an invisible boundary, or intruding on a faith tradition that was not my own? After a little internal “check-in” I figured it was okay to take a copy of texts that resonated beautifully with my curious, seeking spirit… especially the following:

May I feel protected and safe. May I feel contented and pleased. May MY physical body support me with strength. May I be free of suffering and free of the causes of suffering… May YOU feel protected and safe. May YOU feel contented and pleased. May YOUR physical body support you with strength. May YOU be free of suffering and free of the causes of suffering… May ALL BEINGS feel protected and safe. May ALL BEINGS feel contented and pleased. May ALL BEINGS physical bodies support them with strength. May ALL BEINGS be free of suffering and free from the cause of suffering. (The Metta Resolves/Buddhism)

Upon walking further into this side room, I noticed a small round floor pillow in the corner… and in some cubbies in the wall I saw what I thought might be prayer shawls, or some other sacred textiles provided for prayer or meditation. I didn’t go close or touch them… I left them undisturbed, figuring it was not mine to touch, after all, this was not a museum of sacred relics, these were holy and sacred instruments for those who knew better what they were, and what they were used for. I wandered back into the main room where I noticed three books positioned on three stands.

Still alone in this space, I walked over and noticed they were the holy texts of the three Abrahamic religions: Christianity, Judaism, and Islam – again, something that I explored and learned a little about in my previous spiritual director formation…

Seeing these three sacred books from three different sacred traditions placed side by side moved me… intrigued me… and I found it beautiful to be gifted this moment to stay quietly with this awareness that in front of me were three sacred texts of three different religious traditions – religious traditions that are often at odds in our global human experience – yet these texts are together, side by side on this table in this little peaceful space, in a hospital in Sacramento. I feel this is how it should always be – welcoming and familiar to all who enter! All are welcome – and anyone who needed to be held in the familiar comfort, inspiration, and wisdom of the texts or instruments from their own spiritual or religious tradition would find them readily available to them…

Still alone in this sacred space I walked over to a chair against the wall facing the beautiful table with yellow floating flowers and candles and I just sat there… quietly being aware of the simple sweet aesthetic of the space… aware of the thoughts and emotions just below the surface of my skin… I felt okay in that moment… subtly aware of where I was… but mostly I was calm and present… knowing deep inside I wasn’t really alone at all…

A moment later another person walked in… a man with dark hair and a beard, in tan-colored scrubs walked quietly passed me and into the side room that I had previously explored. And another moment later I heard his voice softly speaking words… almost as a melody… a song… a prayer? I couldn’t make out the words… I really didn’t need to. I came back to my own heart-space, my own thoughts, and my desire to be quiet and connect to something that is higher than myself, something that has been present throughout my life… I imagine just as this man in the other room did.

Two humans, from different backgrounds, different traditions, different understandings of many things I assume… two humans in the same space, perhaps with a similar desire or need to know that there is sustenance and support, there is love, there is peace when in connection with this force, as we were both doing simultaneously on opposite sides of a wall… connecting with a seemingly invisible force… some call it God… some call it Allah… some call it Love… Light… Energy… Source… Spirit… How lovely, how human, that there are many names, many prayers, many rituals used to connect with something that is readily available to each one of us, if we desire it…