Everybody by John Prine
While out sailing on the ocean
While out sailing on the sea
Bumped into the Saviour
He said, “Pardon me”
I said, “Jesus you look tired”
He said, “Jesus so do you
Oh, sit down son
‘Cause I got some fat to chew”
You see, everybody needs somebody
That they can talk to
Someone to open up their ears
And let that trouble through
Now you don’t have to sympathize
Or care what they may do
But everybody needs somebody that they can talk to
Well, he spoke to me of morality
Starvation, pain, and sin
Matter of fact, the whole dang time
I only got few words in
But I won’t squawk
Hell Let ‘im talk
It’s been a long long time
And any friend that’s been turned down
Is bound to be a friend of mine
‘Cause everybody needs somebody
That they can talk to
Someone to open up their ears
And let that trouble through
Now you don’t have to sympathize
Or care what they may do
But everybody needs somebody that they can talk to
Now we sat there for an hour or two
Just a-eatin’ that Gospel pie
When around the bend come a terrible wind
And lightning lit the sky
He said, “So long son, I gotta run
I appreciate you listening to me”
And I believe I heard him sing these words
As he skipped out across the sea
“Everybody needs somebody
That they can talk to
Someone to open up their ears
And let that trouble through
Now you don’t have to sympathize
Or care what they may do
But everybody needs somebody that they can talk to
Everybody needs somebody that they can talk to”
Sermon: How We Respond to Trauma
In the week before seminary classes began, I met my classmates. Lowell turned me on to something that facilitates deeper sharing. First, I was to listen to her and think about her. Later it was my turn to be thought about and listened to. She called it “co-counseling,” the informal name for “Re-evaluation Counseling” or RC. In 86, while on a cross-country trek promoting nuclear disarmament, I walked into a room where there was a day long RC training. The energy and quality of attention in that room was nothing I had ever experienced before. Back at seminary my school offered an RC class. It was like many things I learned at Starr King that aimed to develop resource within the congregation. Divine or transformative power wasn’t said to come only from the heavens above from a god removed from us, it could be cultivated within our community, within our relationships and discovered within ourselves.
I fell in love with this process. I gave it my all for a dozen years. I taught classes and workshops. I believe RC was decades ahead of most of the mental health system in terms of its understanding and effectiveness in healing what people now call trauma. It forever changed the way I understood human behavior.
Before I share further from RC, I want to invoke and remind us of our UU covenants. We don’t expect everyone to conform to one set of beliefs. I trust you will consider what I share, that you will keep whatever you find useful. OK now here comes some far out stuff.
In “The Human Side of Human Beings” Harvey Jackins founder of RC posited an extremely generous or liberal view of people. He asserted that the nature we each inherit consists of the following: 1) intelligence, the ability to come to each new situation with a tailored to fit response. 2) love, desire for cooperation and mutual support. 3) Zest; humans love challenges. We love to learn. We “get a whale of kick out of being alive.”
Each of us can probably provide examples of human behavior that does not match his claim. Jackins said that when humans speak and act in ways that are inconsistent with love, intelligence and zest, it meant that we are putting on display how we had been hurt. We seek another human consciousness to help us get free of a burden we acquired during a past hurtful event. I later heard something similar from “A Course In Miracles.” It says that people either show us love (which is who we are) or they are asking for love.
I began testing RC theory. Doing so, I started treating people differently. Instead of assuming that some people were just cruel, that it was just the way some people are, I began considering this possibility that people might be giving us information about how they had been hurt. To my surprise, people who I just met started telling me their big stories. Often they would get tears in their eyes.
RC taught me to welcome tears. Tears, laughter, animated speech, sudden variations in the quality of someone’s voice, sudden changes in skin temperature, hot or cold sweating, shaking and yawning could all be signs of release from painful emotions recorded from past distressing experiences. Bottom line, instead of valuing composure, we learned to notice and value these occurrences. We learned to assist each other to find our release valves, to welcome spontaneous aliveness and the revelations that often came with these outward signs of release.
Part of our nature and our ability to heal is tied to our ability to cry out when something hurts. The silencing of our cries enables oppression to expand. Learning to listen and express the cries of our body and spirit, we reclaim our humanity. And we heal.
As UUs we respect nature. Thwarting our natural responses interferes with our natural healing processes. We then operate on a confused and incorrect assumption that getting someone to stop crying means we have helped them to get over it. Denying and repressing our grief tends to keep us stuck with beliefs and patterns that dampen our humanity and our vitality.
Often when people allow themselves to share what’s disturbing them, they apologize. There are many counselors and therapists skilled in assisting people to open up to share. We have also seen a tremendous rise in the number of peer support groups that create space where deep sharing is welcomed and respected. We can learn how to create and hold space for sharing. We don’t always need experts to figure things out for us. We need allies who won’t let discomfort keep them from sticking with us when the going gets rough. Heart, caring, tenderness and gentle authenticity can make valuable contributions in this regard. We don’t need flawless companions. We need people willing to learn with us.
I came up with my own definition of normal. Would you like to hear it?
A normal person is someone that you haven’t gotten to know very well. (pause). I have found that each of us carries impacts of how we have been injured in life. Besides scars, we have limiting beliefs, patterned behaviors, reactions and habits formed to cope with deep seated pain, residual pain from unhealed hurt. Each of us has had events that we never want to happen again. Each of us has control patterns, things we do in attempts to avoid ever feeling what we felt during some painful period of our life.
Here’s the good news.
Beliefs can be changed. Humans have the power to change their behavior. When we bring our patterns and limiting beliefs into the light of consciousness, we begin to reclaim lost choices and abilities. When we heal and resolve inner conflicts, our capacity for inner peace increases. We can bring peace into challenging situations. As we heal, our perception of the world changes. “We will intuitively know how to handle situations that used to baffle us.” ** (AA BB p84)
We are perfectly suited for life. We enjoy learning, and we don’t have to wait until we are perfect to be worthy of our own love, kindness, respect and appreciation. We can overcome isolation patterns and discover that we are connected to life and community. What some express as being loved by G*d, others might experience as awe or peace or wonder at the beauty of the complexity and vastness of connections that form the web of existence. There are many ways to heal.
The healing bend of our congregations gives me hope that society could do better and could overcome the limiting beliefs which keep us from enjoying our kinship and connection with each other. Do you know the hymn “red, yellow, black and white we are precious in God’s sight?” What if all became precious in human sight? What if it began with us?
Learning about mental emotional spiritual or attitudinal healing can help us develop compassion. Compassion is possible because we understand human vulnerability to pain and hurt. It grows from the knowledge that none of us gets out of here alive. (laughs). Every thing we enjoy is temporal. Every person is mortal. With awareness of the universality of loss, we can bring empathy to improve people’s quality of life. Compassion grows from recognizing that deep inside us are the same needs for love, joy, companionship, contribution, meaning, security, play, trust and on and on.
Here we are one year after the greatest natural disaster in Kerrville’s history. There has been a whole lot of trauma in Kerr county! There has also been a lot of giving and coming together and rebuilding. We can choose our attitude, and our relationship to our hill county home. We can move forward together, and each of us can write our own story.
Whatever we are experiencing in a given moment, we accept ourselves. We can practice self-compassion. Or We could judge or shame ourselves. We can tell ourselves that we should feel differently than we do.
I believe our job as a UU congregation is to provide acceptance of one another and encouragement to spiritual growth. I believe we do that, not by shaming, not by insisting people conform to our idea of the right attitude. Our shared ministry is to walk with each other humbly, providing companionship, witness, compassion, connection and honesty. The honesty part means that each of us gets to feel our feelings. Each of us has our own spiritual lessons to learn.
This all applies to other things going on in our lives. We know that members of this congregation have gone through many losses and forms of hardship this past year. Some of you have come to me with difficulties. You shared times when it became hard to accept what life had dealt. And you’ve reached out within the congregation. People reach out where they experience a sense of connection. Some of you don’t wait to be asked. I give thanks for any time, you’ve checked in on someone! Each time that trust is earned, faith grows. Our shared ministry creates space for learning together.
I hope you find it fulfilling. I know ministry can get different. We wish we could help and sometimes feel a loss to know how. We wish we could ease another’s pain. Often the person we most urgently want to feel better is ourself. Sometimes challenges keep us from being able to show up for our dear ones in the amount or way we want.
Sometimes we manage to show up and meet people right where they are. Sometimes we meet each other with presence, authenticity, humility, and respect. Sometimes people share themselves with us, and we see what a gift they have given. We can also give the gift of listening and taking the time to try to understand what they are experiencing. When we respect the dignity of a person regardless of what they are going through, we see beauty and perhaps a miracle or two.
We have a place where friends show up with their joys and sorrows. We co-create this space together. Our shared ministry facilitates connection, promotes healing, respect, peace and justice. We are walking together and we pass through loss and pain, joy and celebration. We rest. The journey continues. So until next time, thanks be to all of us for making a journey and continuing the journey together.
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