What Faith Looks Like
“I see my path, but I don’t know where it leads. Not knowing where I’m going is what inspires me to travel it.”
-Rosalia de Castro
I wish I could say the not knowing inspires me, but the truth is most of the time it leaves me feeling one part crazy and another part terrified. To not know is our truest state, though we do whatever is necessary to fool ourselves or forget. Every truly wonderful thing that has ever happened to me has come from a space of not knowing. And every incidence of pure magic followed when I was convinced there was no way to know at all.
I’ve always thought of myself as someone of little faith, even though taking big risks and attempting impossible things is often my matter of course. I often think that if I had even a little bit of confidence in providence or divine intervention, I could take on my adventures with more peace in my heart or at least a dose of genuine joy. Instead, I jump, assuming at the end there will be a hard crash into concrete, but knowing there’s no life for me in avoiding the cliffs. Overcome with a resigned kind of terror, I take the dive, hoping for some miracle in the end, but willing to take the consequences if there’s not.
It’s only when I get close to bottom do I feel the weight of the little faith I do have. It’s only when sure and sudden disaster is in sight do I get a glimmer of hope that it will work out after all.
I don’t know why it works this way for me, but I’m starting to realize being willing to be terrified, being aware of not knowing and jumping anyway might be the definition of faith after all. That faith might be…
living in the world the way that you want it to be more than calculating the way the world is.
wanting to take the risk to create a new possibility, just in case something strange and unheard of can come into being simply because you dared to hope it could exist.
understanding you could be exposed as over-reaching or stupid or foolish and accepting that’s worth the chance of finding out you are not.
embracing a view of the world that welcomes people who dare and refuses to punish those who are willing to be confused and disoriented in pursuit of something tender, something honest, something true.
taking a gentle view of your longings and believing that everything unfolds, always and always, exactly as it should with all that yearning held close and not forgotten.
Of course, it’s also possible that these are the hallmarks of mental illness (fingers crossed) but I can think of few remarkable people on this earth who weren’t considered seriously flawed or slightly insane for choosing the path less traveled.
Tell me, inshuti wanjye (my dear friend), what faith looks like to you.
July 19th, 2009 at 12:27 am
What does faith look like to me? Take a look in your mirror my friend. THAT’S what faith looks like to me.
July 19th, 2009 at 12:29 am
Hey Jen, This is so beautifully said that there are few words I can add. It seems to me that faith is letting go. When we have the courage to just believe that we do our best and trust that there is a higher purpose, that is faith. It is truly a case of “The more I learn, the less I know.” So, here is to not knowing!
July 19th, 2009 at 12:36 am
I always think of Anne Lamott’s words on hope: “Hope begins in the dark, the stubborn hope that if you just show up and try to do the right thing, the dawn will come. You wait and watch and work: you don’t give up.”
To me, faith is showing up with the stubborn idea that if you keep trying for the right thing, you’ll get there.
July 19th, 2009 at 12:48 am
Sometimes I think I have faith, when I can see the order of it all. Other times I have faith only in randomness.
July 19th, 2009 at 1:08 am
F-EAR
A-NXIETY
I-NTUITION
T-RUST
H-OPE
May you have it in abundance Precious Jen
Namaste
July 19th, 2009 at 2:43 am
I do so know where you’re coming from…
My faith in myself (which is the only belief I’ve got) to make the right decision is currently tested quite a bit.
Faith is for me to believe that everything will be ok, and then work hard to make sure that everything is ok. I believe that things happen for a reason and although it may sometimes be difficult to quite understand this reason at some point you will find out why. Faith is for me to learn from your past, but to not let it dictate your present (which is very hard, especially at the moment) and take what you’ve learned to make a better tomorrow for yourself and those around you.
Faith is a tall order. Not having faith would be the easier option, but I prefer to work on a challenge.
Love
Melx
July 19th, 2009 at 4:14 am
I don’t know much about faith. When I’m honest I don’t know much. But still I wish for all beings to be free of suffering and the causes of suffering and still I keep my eyes open, every day, for ways that I can add my actions towards making that reality. Still I’m grateful, every day, for friends like you. I’m grateful for the good company of people who are settling down into their vast stores of truth, love and peace and who are ever willing to share that - boldly and despite all our fears - with the world. So how about that teahouse? I’m going to email you. x
July 19th, 2009 at 4:45 am
I’ve heard it said that faith is spelt R.I.S.K. and I guess thats what you are saying. I also know for myself it is until I take that jump that something doesnt feel as alive.
July 19th, 2009 at 4:48 am
I’ve spent much of my life on the road less traveled. And I do have faith - “the substance of things hoped for; the evidence of things not yet seen.” I always believe when I decide to leap, the net will appear.
July 19th, 2009 at 7:12 am
faith looks like what i see here and why i return to this place time and again…1,310,720 pixels of faith illuminating my own path.
with great love and admiration,
wendy
July 19th, 2009 at 7:48 am
For me, faith isn’t about what it IS, but Who it’s IN.
July 19th, 2009 at 8:18 am
I think faith is in the doing - being terrified and moving forward anyway, because it’s the only thing you CAN do…
July 19th, 2009 at 8:51 am
faith, for me, is trusting in and allowing for what is. every sticky, scary and awesome bit.
you said it all. perfectly.
so glad to have found this, and you, this sunday morning.
much love, lisa
July 19th, 2009 at 10:35 am
when believing becomes seeing. miss you!
July 19th, 2009 at 11:00 am
I’m in a time of trying to make peace with the past; a painful time of lancing old boils to release the hurt & poison & allow them to heal, at last. I think I had forgotten that faith is part of what is driving me forwards, the hope that things can be different.
I have been on a road less traveled my whole life & it has felt hard going. But your phrase: “living in the world the way that you want it to be more than calculating the way the world is.” has reminded me that this is what I try to do & that doing it with the faith & hope that it will make a difference transforms the energy of doing it. It becomes a joy, not a burden.
“understanding you could be exposed as over-reaching or stupid or foolish and accepting that’s worth the chance of finding out you are not.” is the current story of my life
And guess what? I’ve found out that I’m NOT those things!!
So what is faith to me? Determination to keep going & not giving up.
July 19th, 2009 at 1:19 pm
Faith for me is trust in the perpetually uncomfortable position of NOT KNOWING. Faith is the moments of deep understanding that we are all connected in ways we cannot define. Faith is like planting a seed, feeding a bird, loving a child- it is the path not the end result that matters.
July 19th, 2009 at 3:03 pm
Loving Amy’s comment. Thank you for that, Amy. I needed it today.
And Jen, as always, I’m inspired by your faith in the world.
July 19th, 2009 at 5:12 pm
“I jump, assuming at the end there will be a hard crash into concrete”
Oh my. You might want to try jumping, knowing that your wings will keep you aloft.
July 20th, 2009 at 12:21 am
i think faith is saying ‘yes’ to the impossible… and living in a way that it might one day be true
love to you
July 20th, 2009 at 3:08 pm
thank you so much for sharing your journey with us. i think you sell yourself short and have more faith than you realize.
faith is trust. believing and trusting when we don’t know the outcome or the “how to”.
i will add my faith to yours and pray for you. it’s because of faith that we can do big things.
July 20th, 2009 at 9:41 pm
I feel faith when I see good things (like what you are doing) going on in this world….and when I see mountains move for “impossible” things come to be.
July 20th, 2009 at 11:28 pm
you said it, jen: “living in the world the way that you want it to be more than calculating the way the world is.”
like giving your dumpster-dived bread to your black neighbors… and not worrying that they’ll think it’s charity just because you’re white. how insane. can’t a girl just give away some extra bread? and do it with joy and generosity and love? with HOPE in connecting across racial lines?
faith is listening to nudging whispers of your soul, and giving them permission to sing out. to act out. to become real.
love you!
July 22nd, 2009 at 4:56 am
Faith is something I have and also something I am always looking for. I look to your journeys for more deepening in my own faith. You inspire me, provoke me, challenge me simply by being on your own amazing path. You are a light that makes me search deeper within myself to believe in my faith that is there. My faith is deep in God and myself but it builds by challenging myself, jumping off the cliffs and persevering on my own journey when it seems foolish and unwise but in my heart I know it is true and mine. Thank you for your uncanny sense of words that puts them on the page (or screen) when we all seem to need them the most.
July 23rd, 2009 at 9:45 am
Faith is the k-n-o-w-i-n-g that everything is just as it needs to be. And that the greatest of these is love.
July 25th, 2009 at 11:09 pm
Oh, I am so inspired by these words. The phrase that I loved the most … faith is … “living in the world the way that you want it to be more than calculating the way the world is”. That is exactly who I want to be and what I want to believe …
August 12th, 2009 at 3:56 pm
faith is as ive heard it expressed
“When you are about to step from the light that you know and into the darkness beyond you must trust that either there will be something there for you to stand upon; or that you will be taught how to fly”
this always rang true for me
September 1st, 2009 at 1:51 pm
thank you.
this is exactly what i needed today. today as i started my first day of a leave of absence from work to help my family as my father dies. today as i panicked that perhaps the timing isn’t right. today as i second guessed myself. thank you.
this line especially:
taking a gentle view of your longings and believing that everything unfolds, always and always, exactly as it should with all that yearning held close and not forgotten.
October 16th, 2009 at 3:04 pm
[…] Jen Lemen “What Faith Looks Like” […]
December 30th, 2009 at 6:30 pm
wow. feels like you either wrote this just for me or you are my long lost sister or maybe you’ve just been reading my mind?? at any rate, good to know i’m not alone in my feelings on the subject! :~)
May 9th, 2010 at 11:15 pm
Faith is knowing where GRACE is..and how to use it to your advantage.If you dont have a revelation of grace…you don’t have much faith to be free with. I
define faith by how I walk it.