by Michelle

Earlier this week Paul Campbell at People for Others posted three short rules for maintaining our relationship with God. He wondered what rules other people might have. I hear “rule” and think “rule of life” – I’ve spent a long time praying with the Augustinians and I fear it shows. Years ago, the Augustinian who was my spiritual director encouraged me to write my own “rule of life.” A whole rule? I was too intimidated to try. Two decades later, I can sum up my rule of life and right relationship with God in three words: Stop. Look. Listen.

Stop. When I’m on the move, I have to watch where I’m going; so I don’t trip over anything, so I know when I’ve arrived. But all this focus on where I’m going too often reduces my vision to a tunnel. “Be still and know that I am God.” All around me.

Look. When I don’t have to watch where I’m going, I can notice what is around me. Stopping lets me see not only God before me, but God behind me, God beside me, God beneath my feet, God above me and – thankfully -God within me. (To take a page from St. Patrick.)

Listen. A friend who is a Sister of St. Joseph and a physicist once pointed out that sound is a touch, there is a direct physical connection between the source and the listener. Can I let God touch me? Can I allow the Word to touch my ears that I might hear; touch my lips, that I might speak His name in thanks and praise and petition; touch my heart that I might love; and touch my soul that my very being may grasp the image in which it was fashioned, the end for which I was created.

And I will admit that sometimes I get no further than “stop” before my to-do list starts snapping at my ankles. But I take heart in Abba Bessiaron’s wise advice from the 4th century. There is no need to cling. God is here, God is everywhere. Even when I’m not looking.