The Unclad Soul

Writer and producer David E. Kelley’s HBO series, “Big Little Lies,” is a powerhouse revelation of modern-day marriage. Though the series is often outrageous and extreme in the happenings between people, it does provide a slice of life today experienced by many couples. Set along the gorgeous beachfront town of Monterey, California, it shows how complex relationships can be, and how wounded, damaged people wade through their pain often with incredible courage and sometimes with self-defeating denial. The cast is a brilliant group of actors, including Nicole Kidman, Reese Witherspoon, Laura Dern, Shailene Woodley, Alexander Skarsgard, Jeffrey Nordling, Adam Scott, Zoe Kravitz, Meryl Streep, and others. I don’t think as a society, we have ever come to grips with the reality of just how strenuous and effortful marriage almost always is. Or, as far as that goes, any serious couple relationship. But marriage poses its own unique set of challenges. Perhaps Einstein said it best, ...

I was flying Across the deep And I saw the delicacy Of life Wrinkles on the faces Of the old So pure they glistened Like awards The joy of children Running with abandon Their laughter ringing Like chimes in the wind I saw the soft moving waves Across the sea And the trees releasing Their rainbow leaves Birds joined me on my flight And I saw the surface of their wings Adorned with patterns Glorious and unfurled I saw the tears of the sad And the smiles of the glad The suffering in mourning And the celebration of birth As I descended toward the ground Slowly, slowly, softly I saw the gentle grass of the field And smelled the fresh earth It was a perfect landing © 2018 Timothy Moody

It is easy to exaggerate our current gloom. Especially when it plays out in front of us each day across the myriad of media outlets. Things are bad, yes. Our culture is fraught with disdain, disregard, and the dismissal of rules, standards, and traditions. We are a spoiled society, for the most part, lost in our feelings of entitlement and selfishness, our stubborn beliefs and our unwillingness to revere all humanity, even our own. That, of course, is not the whole story. We do have our better moments, our acts of heroism, our generosity, our compassion, our love. There are vast places across this bleeding nation that are filled with decency, neighborliness, kind words, and good deeds. Not everyone is a bully or a liar, a manipulator or abuser. The country is populated with, yes, saints and angels, people of spiritual and emotional depth, thinking people, noble people who lift, who inspire, who instruct the rest of us in a way of life that doesn’t dominate but cultivates. ...

In the wild and violent HBO series, Deadwood, the Reverend H.W. Smith (Raymond McKinnon) seems oddly out of place. In the midst of Gold Rush outlaws and moral misfits, he is a tall, gentle man, with a kind heart. Deadwood is a savagely unmanageable town in the Black Hills of South Dakota. And Reverend Smith, an upright mystic, and a man of the Bible, struggles to extend the goodness of God to the ruthless and the wicked. A smallpox plague strikes the town and “Preacher” Smith works tirelessly to aid the sick and the dying ignoring the risks of contagion. He somehow escapes the plague but then is afflicted with epilepsy and eventually insanity. In his illness, he finds comfort in the piano playing at the Gem Saloon and Brothel. He is seen there hugging his weathered Bible, his eyes glassy and bleak, smiling broadly with his head raised to heaven and his body weaving to the music. The bar owner, the incorrigible Al Swearengen (Ian McShane), tells the preacher he can’t be...

“Before you learn the tender gravity of kindness, you must travel where the Indian in a white poncho lies dead by the side of the road. You must see how this could be you, how he too was someone who journeyed through the night with plans and the simple breath that kept him alive. Before you know kindness as the deepest thing inside, you must know sorrow as the other deepest thing. You must wake up with sorrow. You must speak to it till your voice catches the thread of all sorrows and you see the size of the cloth. Then it is only kindness that makes sense anymore, only kindness that ties your shoes and sends you out into the day to mail letters and purchase bread, only kindness that raises its head from the crowd of the world to say It is I you have been looking for, and then goes with you everywhere like a shadow or a friend.” ~ Naomi Shihab Nye, Poet/Author

Mary Oliver has a beautiful little poem in which she asks: “Is the soul solid, like iron? or is it tender and breakable, like the wings of a moth in the beak of the owl?” It is both. The soul, we are told by philosophers, theologians, and mystics, is our essence, the permanence of our true self. It is that part of us that lives beyond death. Or so we are taught by religion. Where exactly the soul exists beyond that, has of course, been long debated. There are times in life when something deep within us is, as Mary Oliver says, solid as iron and we operate out of some sense of aliveness, confidence, and inner strength. It may be fleeting, but there when needed; or it may carry us through long periods of endurance when we build a sturdy self, confident and capable of our abilities and talents. This is the work of the soul. This is a part of our spiritual development. This is what enables us to believe there are forces in life, loving and generous and mystical, that nurture an...

“For one wild, glad moment we snapped the chain that binds us to earth, and joining hands with the winds we felt ourselves divine!” – Helen Keller

"Where are you? Where are you, little girl with broken wings but full of hope? Where are you, wise women covered in wounds? Where are you?" "The world is missing what I am ready to give: My Wisdom, My Sweetness, My Love and My hunger for Peace." Please click below: A Beautiful Message on Women

I lost a friend last week. Her name was Angi Jenkins. Only 46 years old, her life ended after a lifetime of battling cystic fibrosis. I knew Angi during my years in Hamilton, Texas. She moved to Dallas not long before I did. We reconnected here and then we became Facebook friends. She was often in and out the hospital dealing with serious health issues related to the CF. I dropped in on her unexpectedly one afternoon when she was having to stay at Baylor Hospital for several days. She apologized for not looking her best, but anyone who knew Angi knew it was impossible for her not to look her best. She had a luminous smile, a glowing spirit, and a bighearted presence that simply chased away any of the dark clouds that surrounded her illness. She dealt with her situation with gifted humor, beautiful poise, amazing courage, incredible love and faith. In these past days Saint Paul’s comment in his letter to the Philippians comes to mind: “I thank God every time I think of you....

“When your mother asks, ‘Do you want a piece of advice?’ it's a mere formality. It doesn't matter if you answer yes or no. You're going to get it anyway.”  ~ Erma Bombeck This is an early Happy Mother’s Day wish to all of the moms I know and love. You are amazing women and loving mothers and I admire all of you. And I hope on Mother’s Day your family showers you with generous love and thoughtful gifts and warm embraces. My mom was a lot like Erma Bombeck’s quote. Ferris Bueller would never have gotten away with any of that stuff he pulled. Mom would have looked around the room, seen the pulley strings, and pulled back the covers. No. Ferris would have been toast. Mom wasn’t one to talk into staying home from school. You had to display signs of the Ebola virus or worse to get out of going to school. “Hop up, now,” she’d say. “You’ll feel better once you get dressed.” She was always right. She was as loving as she was tough. I never doubted that she was always and fo...

“Blessed are the merciful, for they shall obtain mercy.” There is a story out of the days of Napoleon when the mad genius was plowing through Europe with fury. In the midst of battle one of his soldiers, just a boy really, was caught running away. Napoleon sentenced him to death. The young man’s mother pleaded for a hearing before the Emperor. When it was agreed, she told the Emperor the boy had been frightened, was too young to understand all that he was fighting for and against. She asked for mercy. Napoleon said the soldier had deserted his post, had betrayed his country, and left his comrades in danger. He said he did not deserve mercy. The woman said, “But your Eminence, if he deserved it, it wouldn’t be mercy.” Can we show mercy to Donald Trump? Can we look beyond his bravado and outrageousness to see the pretender he is? A frightened and insecure man operating from a deep need to be approved, praised, and loved. A man who can, in limited capacities, show love to others. Ca...

There is a scene in the first episode of the Showtime series "Nurse Jackie" where she consoles a young unmarried girl whose boyfriend, a bike courier, had just died of injuries in a bike accident on his way to work in the crushing traffic of New York City. The girl—poor, pregnant, wearing a stained t-shirt and asking what she is going to do, that she doesn’t even have money to get a cab home—sits on a bench in the hallway outside the chapel in All Saints Catholic Hospital. Jackie, a morally complicated, fiercely dedicated nurse but who is herself addicted to pain killers and whose personal life is a disaster, stands next to the girl and gently puts her hand on the girl’s head and draws her to her. Nothing is said. Just that moment of tenderness. As the scene ends and the camera pulls away from them, we see behind them at the end of the hallway set into the wall, a beautifully sculptured figure of Jesus with his arms extended.   I don’t know what Christianity is anymore....

From the Desiderata by poet Max Erhmann – A line a day for the remaining Holiday season: “Take kindly the counsel of the years, gracefully surrendering the things of youth.” (I struggle a bit with this one. I don't want to give up everything of my youth. I'm trying to age gracefully. But for me, it's not always easy. ~ TM)

Easter approaches with its egg hunts and colorful dress and the festivities of people celebrating bunnies and cashing in their Easter coupons on online shopping and at the mall. Holy Week is here too with its shadows of darkness, its Last Supper where cowardice and betrayal transcend devotion and trust. The disciples never really understood what Jesus had in mind. Many of them still don’t. I often worry that all of his teachings on kindness and generosity and love remain on the Cross beaten and dead to his followers; all of those wise and difficult truths; all of those calls to deeper living crushed by selfishness and fear, by greed and prejudice and the lust for power. The governor of Indiana and his legislative devotees have passed a brutal law primarily against the LGBT community shallowly disguised as “religious freedom.” Arkansas legislators came up with an even more appalling law with even worse prejudicial intent. Why are these discriminating laws necessary? We ...

 "It doesn't interest me what planets are squaring your moon. I want to know if you have touched the center of your own sorrow, if you have been opened by life's betrayals or have become shriveled and closed from fear of further pain! I want to know if you can sit with pain, mine or your own, without moving to hide it or fade it, or fix it." ~ Oriah Mountain Dreamer, Writer/Mystic

 “A person who has good thoughts cannot ever be ugly. You can have a wonky nose and a crooked mouth and a double chin and stick-out teeth, but if you have good thoughts they will shine out of your face like sunbeams and you will always look lovely.”  – Roald Dahl, Novelist

“Relearn astonishment.”  – Elias Canetti, German Novelist & Playwright

“Make a list of what is really important to you. Embody it.”  ~ Jon Kabat-Zinn, Physician/Professor/Author

“The meaning of earthly existence lies not, as we have grown used to thinking, in prospering but in the development of the soul.” ― Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn, Russian Novelist/Historian/Dissident

“I thought the earth remembered me, she took me back so tenderly, arranging her dark skirts, her pockets full of lichens and seeds. I slept as never before, a stone on the river bed, nothing between me and the white fire of the stars but my thoughts, and they floated light as moths among the branches of the perfect trees. All night I heard the small kingdoms breathing around me, the insects, and the birds who do their work in the darkness. All night I rose and fell, as if in water, grappling with a luminous doom. By morning I had vanished at least a dozen times into something better.”  ―  Mary Oliver , American Poet