Silence isn't always golden

No matter how many times I tell myself that setbacks are bound to happen, I can't seem to recover as quickly as I'd like when they happen. Following a series of, what seemed to me to be productive meetings with Bill B. at First Community Bank, then a conference call with his board and a few key advisers we've entered into a period of radio silence. They'd asked for a final proposal, they'd asked questions about our fees but made no mention of them being unreasonable and they'd even wanted to know what we would do first. But now, nothing. Last week I tried twice to get Bill to tell me where they were and got a deafening silence. Such discouragement leads to all kinds of second guessing and self recrimination. Honestly, no matter how good I feel about our progress and the righteousness of our intent, until somebody validates us by hiring us, in the dark recesses of my mind I know that we are just another of the universe's good ideas that we weren't good enough to sell.

Hayden wrote a choral work that I can't get out of my head called "The Creation" that thematically explores the Psalmist's lament, "out of the depths, I cry unto Thee, O Lord. Lord hear my prayer." Prayer habits are some of the most private affairs of all, I guess because, despite the cultural acceptance of corporate prayers, congregational responses, table graces and prayers offer at a child's bedside, nobody talks much about it. And despite the Apostle Paul', and my own mother's entreaties to "pray ceaselessly" my own experience has been wholly more inconsistent. Until recently. No, that's not altogether true, there have been a few periods in my life when the stakes seemed so high and my personal sense of dread so disabling that I prayed ceaselessly for a favorable outcome. And such episodic influences has enable a cultivation of a more or less regular, ritualized routine of prayers of thanksgiving for blessings that seem undeserved. Over time, I've come to reflect prayerfully on the richness of the experiences that I've had and how I've learned from them. I attribute the opportunities for success in this and other endeavors to the accumulation of such insights and have been sincerely thankful for them. But these days, I am in near constant need of Divine reassurance that I'm not going to let everyone down, that I'm not going to fail miserably, that I'm going to find the strength and fortitude to keep going. I've got two friends, one close one casual who are both struggling with terminal illnesses. I know them to be strong guys with spiritual groundings. I imagine that they pray ceaselessly for deliverance from their illnesses, but sadly neither seems likely to improve. I watch my partner Matt, valiantly try to keep up appearances when I know that his heart is broken, still I'm selfishly terrified enough of our present circumstances to insist that he row the boat harder, notwithstanding his distress. Where's my compassion? Then I realize that I've spent my whole life cultivating the ability to feel sorry for myself and to use that as an excuse for insufficient effort to legitimately succeed. The role of the victim of some circumstance is deliciously tempting. When one is a victim, the pain of responsibility is more easily shifted, denial possible. But in my heart of hearts I know that prayer seems designed to change me, not the world. So I pray for the strength and the wisdom and the fortitude - maybe so as to remember that I claim each, in some measure and I go back in and face the day, as bravely as I can, not feeling very brave today.