Days 98-102 -Companions in Solitude

If we sit with them long enough, certain questions will startle our lives.

How much of your heart will you commit to whatever days you have left? Which train will you ride into eternity?

What does Love advise?

Sages are always available: "…now let me cast my shadow/ against life,/" David Whyte wrote in The House of Belonging, "before the specter haunts me to my grave."

Love "haunts" with kind angels whose shadows lean backward as well as forward.

Some of my dearest companions lie in the distant past. They speak best in solitude. They make sure I am never alone. They accompany me whether they live in this world or have left it.

Those who love us want the best for us. Their "haunting" is solace. They want you to live your fullest.

Why practice half-measures when the best of life lies in the all-out embrace? Are we so fearful of hurt that we settle for faint feelings instead of full love?

I live in gratitude for loving and being beloved. There are also loving companions who have no awareness of me: The little leaf oak in my backyard, the Bugs Bunny of my childhood, Rachmaninoff whose concertos are lifelong friends.

We carry the currency of companionship with us every day.

David Whyte is a companion. In the middle of the night, I can recall his warm voice reading poetry, can remember his kind endorsement of Radical Loving Care and his sweet praise as, together, we watched my film "Sacred Work" in my office a decade ago.

Whyte handed me gold. I spend it yet.

And you are my companion. As I write this to you in solitude I live grateful for you.

-Erie Chapman

Photograph: Erie "twin tracks" 1974

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Categories: Reflections, Holidays, Spirituality

Tags: caregivers, companions, David Whyte, Erie Chapman, kindness, Love, solitude

8 responses to “Days 98-102 -Companions in Solitude”

JVD

April 6, 2015 at 8:48 am

Being a part of the conversation not apart from the conversation. Enjoying your time with friends, not just watching ”Friends.” Friendship is a partnership of equals. To live, Love and experience aspects of life together and share that time we have.
The photograph shows twin tracks paralleling each other and then going off in different directions in the fog of time. Yet, tracks and roads have a way of reaching a place we can call home. And Home is where Love and Friends belong.
Thank you for sharing your time with David Whyte with us. You again have enlightened us.

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~liz Wessel

April 6, 2015 at 9:13 pm

The tenderness in which you have composed this essay, the loving words spoken, your encouragement and the depth with which you have reflected on companionship; is pure gold, Erie. In solitude, we greet our souls longing and in sharing our heart we find companionship. I love the companions you name that are not aware, as well as your recollections of Whyte. I remember fondly that it was you who first introduced me to his work. Thank you for today’s most beautiful gift. (Fascinating photo too).

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julie laverdiere

April 7, 2015 at 12:06 am

And Erie, you have been a wonderful companion for I think 9 years? Your essays always make me pause and reflect on the spirit of the soul, with the emphasis on caregivers. More specifically, all the struggles we go through being caregivers. Thanks

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Anonymous

April 7, 2015 at 1:44 am

Erie; One of my experiences on the subject “Companions in distant past” was my dad, my loving companion who had already passed come to me in my dream. I was working in a a small hospital in a remote village. I had succumbed sciatic pain in my left leg and it was in traction for a couple of weeks. I was alone most of the time in a small room. There was no TV to watch in those days and my books were my best companions. My dad came to me in my dream and said very clearly ” come with me, why are there suffering”. i told him “my time is not yet” and I woke up. He was present in my solace. What a comfort to experience the man who loved me dearly was present in the very hour I needed him most. Erie: we are your companions and we appreciate your ever present effort in enhancing Radical Loving Care. sbeng.

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erie chapman

April 7, 2015 at 9:37 am

Thanks so much for your lovely observations, JVD. You are surely right that “Home is where Love and Friends belong.” And that is where those tracks rejoin.

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erie chapman

April 7, 2015 at 9:39 am

“In solitude, we greet our souls longing and in sharing our heart we find companionship.” Thank you for this insight, Liz. Your own gold is 14 carat (or whatever is the richest:-)

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erie chapman

April 7, 2015 at 9:41 am

Thank you so much for honoring our long companionship through this Journal, Julie. What a beautiful thing to celebrate. So grateful that our journey together can continue.

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erie chapman

April 7, 2015 at 9:44 am

Thank you for sharing this beautiful story of connection with your late father, Suan. It is such a lovely testament to the beauty of such companionship – and how our relationships are so much more variegated than we may imagine. Thank you also for affirming the way you and so many of us have been brought together by Liz Wessel. It is a sacred gift we share.

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