Your Little Voice

I am a parent and a homemaker and a cook and an aspiring farmer.  Of the vast majority of descriptors common to those roles, one of the first that comes to mind is "topics on which the world does not need another blog."  So I'm not going to tell you how to parent, or make your home, or cook, or aspire to farm.

You know that little voice in your head--the one that tells you to do the things you know would change your life if you weren't too scared or too lazy or too busy to begin?  Example: I'm reading one morning and I come to this (it's Thomas Merton):

“There are some things we are obliged to keep hidden from men. But there are other things that we must make known, even though others may already know them. We owe a definite homage to the reality around us, and we are obliged, at certain times, to say what things are and to give them their right names and to lay open our thought about them to the men we live with."

My little voice pipes up, and I can hear it because my children are still asleep. It says, Do that: pay homage to the reality around you--say what things are.  

I countered, "Merton does that.  Novelists do that.  I do laundry--lots of laundry."

Then I continued reading. “The fact that men are constantly talking shows that they need the truth, and that they depend on their mutual witness in order to get the truth formed and confirmed in their own minds.” 

My little voice said, Mutual witness—that's you.

And.........that's it.  Maybe my kids woke up then.  Maybe I got up for more coffee.  In short, I forgot the whole thing for a long time.

I'm ashamed to admit that this is how my life goes--this predictable wave of epiphany and darkness, intention and inertia. It's maddening.  I pay attention for a moment and life comes into focus. But I don't stay there. I never stay there.  I rarely make it longer than about five minutes.

The Avett Brothers have boiled this all down into one of the most honest song lyrics I've ever heard:

“How do I know when it's time to stop

Running from the things I do, being things I'm not

Oh, I have tried, but I just changed my mind--

Every night befalls every morning light.” 

And Merton says something similar: 

“Although we still may speak the truth, we are more and more losing our desire to live according to the truth. Our wills are not true....and they have dragged our minds along with them, and our restless tongues bear constant witness to the disorganization inside our souls.”

My soul is disorganized (Don't I know it).  I want my will to be true, but my will does not comply.  I think that little voice is really just the truth.  Maybe it's the big-T Truth--maybe it speaks to and about our real self.  What if we paid more attention?  What if we deferred to our little voices for a while, just to see what happens?  

My little voice told me to say what things are, so I'm going to try to do that here.  Try to pay homage to the reality around me.  And then...await further instructions, I guess.  What does your little voice say?