Someone to hear our deepest story

And to love us for it.

As anyone who reads this newsletter knows, I quote Father Richard Rohr¹ more than anyone else. I got to meet him in 2021 at the Soul of Money workshop in Baja CA:

I got to see him again last October at my friend Doug’s wedding in Santa Fe, New Mexico. Father Richard is Doug’s spiritual father, and officiated the wedding, and I was part of the wedding party. The morning of, as we were preparing, I had a moment with him, and I said, “Thank you, Father Richard, for loving my brother Doug.”

He looked at me and said:

“Of course. Once you hear someone’s deepest story, how could you not love them?”

That story came to me this week and I wanted to share it with you, even though it has nothing to do with money. And perhaps that’s the point. Despite all our efforting in the work/spend cycle, what we really want is for someone to hear our deepest story. And to love us for it.

In that vein, a couple of offers:

1. Give the gift of being seen. Drew and I created The Appreciation Effect, a platform where you can create a daily feed of gratitude and appreciation for a loved one. It’s free. From what many Recipients have said in the last two years, getting appreciation notes from family and friends for days on end is the greatest gift many people have ever received.

2. Try spiritual direction. Spiritual direction is the practice of giving attention to your inner life, in the presence of someone fully listening to you.² I was trained in the Franciscan tradition and have discovered that offering attention while someone focuses on their spiritual life is its own spiritual experience. For more information, my website here.

There is being listened to, and there is being listened to with love. Beyond that, there is being listened to and being loved because of our story, or as Thomas Merton said, to see us for our secret beauty. Raymond Carver speaks to it in one of my favorite poems, Late Fragment :

And did you get what
you wanted from this life, even so?
I did.
And what did you want?
To call myself beloved, to feel myself
beloved on the earth.

In the end, after all our ceaseless trying, there is only love, forgiveness, and understanding. In other words, grace. It’s really the only thing we’re seeking. It’s really the only thing we can give.

1. For an intro to Richard Rohr, a New Yorker profile in 2020 of him. You can sign up for his daily meditations at the Center for Action and Contemplation website.

2. As Father Richard puts it, spiritual direction is being listened to by someone who has no agenda for your improvement or reform.