Crescendo
As part of my Spiritual Formation class, I'm required to visit a local non-profit with a small group of peers. This past week I visited the Father McKenna Center (a Jesuit run day shelter for homeless men) for a final time before the end of the semester. I chose the Father McKenna Center for a number of reasons, not least of which is the feeling of genuine concern for these men I get from the staff and volunteers.
Perhaps one of the more unique features of the center, is their midday "check in" group. During this time, the men (numbering in the 40s and 50s) share their feelings, anxieties, joys, and dreams with the group. A moderator oversees the meeting, answering technical questions about affordable housing or job training, and sometimes delivers a motivational message. In general, I tend to be suspect of self-help style pep talks. In my opinion, they have a propensity to communicate the destructive myth that your value comes from what you produce. However, I rather liked the message this last moderator had to deliver.
Speaking of his time on the street, he told the guys about his desire to reach a daily crescendo. Crescendo, of course, is a term used to describe the dramatic build up (usually in music) that leads to a final resolution. The speaker went on to say that over time drug abuse and random acts of violence desensitized him to a "normal" pattern of life. He was addicted to having an adrenaline rush, so for this reason he sought out highly dangerous and emotionally-charged situations. He found it difficult to let a day go by without incident.
After beginning a recovery program and landing a job with a steady income, he struggled with the uneventful nature of normality. One day, he says his brother sat him down and said: "You wake up in the morning and go to work. You come home, eat dinner, watch some TV, and go to sleep. If you're lucky on the weekends you can set work aside and catch a movie or something. This is normal life."
Compared to a daily crescendo of gun violence and other illegal activity, a little dinner and some TV sounds like a good alternative to most of us. But he confessed normalcy was actually a loss he had to grieve.
The more I think about this bizarre idea of "crescendo," the less I see it operating outside of what I expect from my own life. There's something about the nature of life that causes us to feel as if it is building up to something important. I suppose for some of us singles that "thing" is marriage; or if you're married, having kids. For others it might be a successful career, or even attaining a certain physical appearance. Essentially, we think of life "in the meantime" as a drumroll for what will ultimately give our existence meaning.
But I think the truth is that life, is just life. There is no intensifying movement towards an ultimate "resolution," at least not one that is capable of satisfying us in an eternal sense. Operating under an "if-then" paradigm (e.g. IF I get this job, THEN I will be happy) will always disappoint us because it promises what it cant deliver.
I think there's something to be said for the mundane details of our everyday lives.
I see the value of this sentiment most clearly when I reflect on my Dad's current health situation. Fully aware he will never have the physical capacity to achieve one of these "crescendo" moments we wait so fruitlessly for, he is holding onto life for the moments we so often take for granted: trips to the grocery store, making coffee, getting up early to go to work, staying up late to tell stories... All of these innocuous moments are precious because this is the stuff of life. On the surface they seem of little value, but in the finite reality of our humanity they should resonate as invaluable.
Every time I act as if my days are a "crescendo" and then they don't live up to what they've promised, I feel myself losing sensitivity to the present. When we can accept that life isn't actually building towards anything, we set ourselves free from the lie that what we have today is less than what we could have some day.
Perhaps Abraham Joshua Heschel put it best, when he said: "Just to be is a blessing. Just to live is holy."
God rid me of my lofty expectations for the consolation of a simple life humming with reverence.
Perhaps one of the more unique features of the center, is their midday "check in" group. During this time, the men (numbering in the 40s and 50s) share their feelings, anxieties, joys, and dreams with the group. A moderator oversees the meeting, answering technical questions about affordable housing or job training, and sometimes delivers a motivational message. In general, I tend to be suspect of self-help style pep talks. In my opinion, they have a propensity to communicate the destructive myth that your value comes from what you produce. However, I rather liked the message this last moderator had to deliver.
Speaking of his time on the street, he told the guys about his desire to reach a daily crescendo. Crescendo, of course, is a term used to describe the dramatic build up (usually in music) that leads to a final resolution. The speaker went on to say that over time drug abuse and random acts of violence desensitized him to a "normal" pattern of life. He was addicted to having an adrenaline rush, so for this reason he sought out highly dangerous and emotionally-charged situations. He found it difficult to let a day go by without incident.
After beginning a recovery program and landing a job with a steady income, he struggled with the uneventful nature of normality. One day, he says his brother sat him down and said: "You wake up in the morning and go to work. You come home, eat dinner, watch some TV, and go to sleep. If you're lucky on the weekends you can set work aside and catch a movie or something. This is normal life."
Compared to a daily crescendo of gun violence and other illegal activity, a little dinner and some TV sounds like a good alternative to most of us. But he confessed normalcy was actually a loss he had to grieve.
The more I think about this bizarre idea of "crescendo," the less I see it operating outside of what I expect from my own life. There's something about the nature of life that causes us to feel as if it is building up to something important. I suppose for some of us singles that "thing" is marriage; or if you're married, having kids. For others it might be a successful career, or even attaining a certain physical appearance. Essentially, we think of life "in the meantime" as a drumroll for what will ultimately give our existence meaning.
But I think the truth is that life, is just life. There is no intensifying movement towards an ultimate "resolution," at least not one that is capable of satisfying us in an eternal sense. Operating under an "if-then" paradigm (e.g. IF I get this job, THEN I will be happy) will always disappoint us because it promises what it cant deliver.
I think there's something to be said for the mundane details of our everyday lives.
I see the value of this sentiment most clearly when I reflect on my Dad's current health situation. Fully aware he will never have the physical capacity to achieve one of these "crescendo" moments we wait so fruitlessly for, he is holding onto life for the moments we so often take for granted: trips to the grocery store, making coffee, getting up early to go to work, staying up late to tell stories... All of these innocuous moments are precious because this is the stuff of life. On the surface they seem of little value, but in the finite reality of our humanity they should resonate as invaluable.
Every time I act as if my days are a "crescendo" and then they don't live up to what they've promised, I feel myself losing sensitivity to the present. When we can accept that life isn't actually building towards anything, we set ourselves free from the lie that what we have today is less than what we could have some day.
Perhaps Abraham Joshua Heschel put it best, when he said: "Just to be is a blessing. Just to live is holy."
God rid me of my lofty expectations for the consolation of a simple life humming with reverence.
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