Give it a frame

Give it a frame

through which to view

the year

your year

ahead

Never the same

as what may have come

of the year drawing

to a close

May it no longer be tamed

nor reduced to a simple game

To be repeated

ever more

or less so tame

and lame

as to be unwittingly turned away

from all the possibilities

that bring you joy

For your consideration:

When I was the Features editor for my school newspaper, I took great care in selecting from among the many photographs submitted by the photographers, paring down to the very few that most captured the emotions of the moment. The Sports editor, not surprisingly, focused on selecting the most dynamic action shots. It was with intention and a devotion to the story.

The same process can be applied to the new year. As you review all that was (and wasn’t) 2021, what are you bringing with you into 2022, and what are you leaving behind?

I encourage you to give yourself the opportunity to put a frame around the new year. As you would with a painting or a photograph, what are you choosing to put within the frame? What are you bringing into clear focus by framing it as such? And, by design, what are you thereby leaving outside the frame?

Put another way, we speak of the “framers of the Constitution.” The founding fathers — alas no founding mothers at least not officially — deliberately and with intention decided what would be included in, and excluded from, the nation’s foundational charter. (For more on that, follow this link to a previous edition of Soul Notes here.)

It makes a difference where you place the frame.

Okay, your turn:

What is it about the turning of the calendar from one year to the next that excites you? Anything about it that actually instead drives you a bit batty?

Do you approach each year with intention? If not, will you do so this year? Are you willing to give it a try?

I invite you to share your observations, feelings, and experiences by leaving a Reply in the Comments section, below. Soul-to-soul!

© 2022 Lori A. Noonan. All Rights Reserved.

“Today is the first day of the rest of your life.”

“Today is the first day of the rest of your life.”

This phrase, popularized during the 1960s and ’70s has a nice ring to it, indeed. A catchy phrase, so to say. It’s a way of reminding us that we can start fresh, start over, each day brings a new dawn. It’s the latter part of the phrase, though, that can be confounding. The “rest” of your life, as in the remainder of your life, what is that, exactly? It’s unknown. It’s the grand mystery. The remainder could be years, months, or an instant.

Today IS your life, yes?

Sure, there’s the unfolding. There’s the becoming. There’s the planting, the cultivating, the growing, the expanding, followed by the harvesting and the fruits of our labor. There can be beauty, grace, lessons, and meaning in all of these. Heck, many a Soul Notes article has been devoted to these topics. In my own life, and in others’ lives, I advocate for the process of envisioning, and easing into the flow, and merging with the natural cycles.

There’s wisdom in setting sail and course-correcting with awareness and intention. It’s not an either, or. It’s an all-in. All-in this moment. All-in with all senses engaged. All-in awareness. Now. And again. And again.

For your consideration:

Here’s another popular phrase: “We have time to kill.” If we’re simply treading water waiting for the ‘real’ event to happen, then what happens in the meantime? It’s ALL in the meantime!

As the signs say along the tracks of the London Underground: Mind the Gap.

Living with awareness brings the present moment into focus. Living without awareness is a life, erm, not really lived — a life suspended, like a tolling of a statute of limitations. Don’t be that person. Be you. All of you. All the time.

Okay, your turn:

Rephrasing the ‘the first day of the rest of your life’ into: Today IS your life — When you read this, what comes up for you?

I invite you to share your observations, feelings, and experiences by leaving a Reply in the Comments section, below. Soul-to-soul!

© 2021 Lori A. Noonan. All Rights Reserved.

From disciple to discipline

 

Once a student

always a scholar

 

Disciple comes from the Latin for student

and Old English for scholar

 

Who is teaching

and who is learning?

 

A disciple:

One who follows

and yet who is leading?

Truly?

 

What does it take to lead

Or to follow one’s lead

 

Is it discipline?

 

A steady, consistent

grounded

follow through

in a way

that invites a welcomed result

without leaning too hard

on specific expectations

rather on beautiful outcomes

 

and remaining open to surprises

not unlike

the writing of poetry

or the reading of poetry

 

the writing of a poem

the reading of a poem

 

Did this take an unexpected turn?

Are you surprised?

I smile as I write this

I hope you do too

as you read this

 

Following

a follower

or a following-through

of sorts

 

Hopefully devoted

to devotion

or so it seems

at the seams

along the edges

then all-in

fully immersed

in the sea of wishes

and dreams

and with the continued discipline

to see them emerge

in their fullest

expression

 

And we’re back.

 

For your consideration:

What about following, or leading, evokes a stirring within you? Anything?  All things? Certain things?

For me, curiosity runs through me almost like life’s blood. It doesn’t waver. To try to stop it would be like trying to hold my breath.

Questioning, seeking, learning, solving, not quite solving, learning again, solving, not quite solving. Life offers a Rubik’s cube of possibilities.

Okay, your turn:

Would you consider yourself a follower, or a leader, or both? Are you always learning, studying? When do you turn from being a learner to a doer, to an experimenter, an explorer, an adventurer? Or, do they blend into one another?

I invite you to share your thoughts, feelings, and experiences by leaving a Reply in the Comments section, below. Soul-to-soul!

© 2020 Lori A. Noonan. All Rights Reserved.

Planting seeds and envisioning orchards

In elementary school, our teacher often told the folkloric tale of Johnny Appleseed (whom I researched recently to find out was a real person named John Chapman — an early American colonist and missionary —  who was a member of the New Church of Christianity).

While details of his life and legacy are the stuff of legend mixed in with documented history, John Chapman (“Johnny Appleseed”) was known to travel throughout New England and into the Midwest, spreading apple seeds for others to grow apple trees on their land. It has been reported that he was quite the businessman and enterprising in that he followed the then law that prescribed that a person with 50 apple trees or more could stake claim to a plot of land as part of the early homesteading rules and regulations.

And his religious beliefs, stemming largely from the New Church’s forbidding doing harm to any of God’s creation, informed many of his day-to-day activities. He is believed to have built fences around apple trees to keep out livestock and other animals. It has been reported that he even helped heal an injured wolf and a hobbled horse.

Johnny Appleseed also was someone who made it his mission to spread apple seeds in a way that allowed apple trees to grow and the fruit to propagate naturally. He disfavored the intervention through the then and now common practice of “grafting” from one tree to another. Apples intrinsically have a wide variety of genetic variability. As such, not unlike a box of chocolates (an appreciative nod to the movie Forrest Gump), you’re never quite sure what you’re going to get. Without grafting, apple seeds are allowed to sprout into an array of unpredictable varieties.  That lends to them being hardier and more able to adapt to and incorporate their ever changing surroundings.  While less ‘standardized’ and less ‘consistent’ in their outcomes, non-grafted apples allow for the element of surprise and naturally occurring complexities to emerge from the mystery and manifest into form.

So, what’s the spiritual lesson in this, you may be asking?  I’d say it’s this:

Plant the seeds and let go.  Provide them water, soil and sunshine, sure; but otherwise, let them be.  Allow specific outcomes to remain uncertain. Resist the temptation to impose person-made alterations that prevent nature from enjoying its full expression and dare I say potentially quirky “imperfections.”  So, too, may it be with regard to your own dreams and aspirations.

With your desires, envision them coming into form.  And, then let them go.  Allow them to run their natural course. Don’t allow your over-thinking and over-manipulating to “graft” onto your dreams and drain the life out of them.  Don’t try artificially to “contain” the fruit of your dreams.  Allow them to adapt and blend into the naturally shifting conditions and environment.  That, to me, is what we mean when we say “to be in the flow.”

The analogies between personal development and spiritual growth, and growth in nature, are abundant. When I started to envision the topic for this particular edition of SOUL NOTES, I didn’t anticipate that it would lead me to the tale of Johnny Appleseed.  Alas, here we are.  There’s more to his story, as I know there is more to yours as well. Tales to be told, and shaped, reshaped, and retold.

The longterm impact and leaving a legacy

Johnny Appleseed also exemplifies that planting seeds in the short term can reap dividends in the long term. As each of us continues to grow in our own spiritual development, the world stands to gain from that growth.  As each of us plants our seeds of intentions, desires, and heartfelt aspirations now for the betterment of all, we help to provide for generations to come.  In doing so, we indeed stand to leave an important and loving legacy.

For your consideration:

Feel into your dream theme for this year, and determine what seeds you’re planting now so that they may continue to grow throughout the year into a strong and vibrant orchard, for you and for others to enjoy. You are the steward of that legacy. You are the gardener.

Okay, your turn:

What are you planting now, in the ground, in your life, in your relationships, and how you show up in the world?  Are there any seeds you’ve been keeping tucked away deep in your pocket so to speak, that it’s time to plant into the ground and to allow to grow out into the light? If so, what is it exactly that you are waiting for? The season is now.

I invite you to share your thoughts, feelings, and experiences in the Comments section, below. Soul-to-soul!

© 2019 Lori A. Noonan. All Rights Reserved.

Using a dream theme as your north star

A star, a star, shining in the night…will bring us goodness and light. At holiday time, we hear songs that highlight the stars in the sky and how they lead us in holy directions and toward holy destinations.  They light our path, and lead us ‘home.’

Following your North Star is unique to you and an opportunity to create a year centered around what you feel most inspired by and for and by which you and your soul desire to be guided.

Around this same time last year, as you may recall, in Soul Notes we introduced the idea of a Dream Theme.  Did you select one for 2018?  If so, in what ways did it serve you?  Would you like to create one for this year?  I invite you to do so!

Just as the other stars in the northern sky of our galaxy rotate around the North Star, I invite you to allow a dream theme to help you by being your guidepost throughout the year.

You know how compasses work?  Compasses are designed so that the needle points toward the Earth’s magnetic North Pole.  The compass lets you know where you are, at any given moment, in relation to all points North. Technically, there are variations in the movement of true north on our planet, but you get the point. While the exact true North is somewhat fluid and always in motion, a compass remains a reliable tool to orient you when you are not sure where you are or where you may be headed.

Similarly, your dream theme can do that for you as well. It can serve as a guidepost.  When in doubt or uncertain about your next move in your career, your relationships, your health or hearth and home, you can always refer back to your dream theme for insights.

For 2018, I grounded into and made union my ultimate choice for the year’s dream theme.  The theme can be a word or a phrase.  It can be a noun (union or unity), or a verb (to unite) or a feeling (of united).

For 2019, I’m feeling into connection as my dream theme.  Accordingly, my year will be guided by my connection to the divine, and to myself, to my loved ones, to my community, and to my values and convictions. Yes, I’ll also come up with focus points and lists of what I desire to bring into form throughout the year.  And, I’ll likely have a list (or several) of action items for various parts of my life.  Those will be anchored, though, if you will, and stem from, my dream theme.  Whenever I feel off track, I’ll make the appropriate course corrections by consulting with my dream theme.

For your consideration:

Feel into what one or two or three dream themes are coming up for you, and allow the one that’s most strongly resonating for you to come to the surface.  If more than one seem ‘fitting,’ and you can’t quite decide, consider running them each through this short list of inquiries or ‘filters’:

If you were to select that particular one as the theme for your year:

What would it mean for you in terms of how you conduct your daily practice, your interactions with your loved ones, your clients, and your business or law practice? How well does it match up with where you’d like to see yourself headed this year?

Okay, your turn:

What dream theme are you considering to make your North Star for 2019?

Need help in coming up with your dream theme, or need someone to help keep you on track and moving forward consistently toward your own North Star?  Do you sometimes find yourself starting off on the right track, only to lose focus and then find yourself veering mightily off course?

I invite you to share your thoughts, feelings, and experiences in the Comments section, below. Soul-to-soul!

© 2019 Lori A. Noonan. All Rights Reserved.

Why do we resist change?

In this edition of Soul Notes, let’s talk about change.  I’m not talking about change for change’s sake.  I’m referring to those anticipated or even avoided changes that gnaw at us, and keep us at best distracted or at worst completely stuck, immobile, and hunkering down and ducking from opportunities that may expand us, help us and others, and even allow us fully to flourish.

Rather than resisting or avoiding change, perhaps it’s worth flipping it on its head:

What if instead it was a matter of welcoming and embracing change, in spite of, or even especially when, the outcome is uncertain?  It need not be reckless nor done with wanton abandon.

With, in many instances, hotly contested races in the midterm elections held in the United States this week, many voters heartily embraced a change in the ruling political party and a rebalancing of power among the three branches of government.  Not everyone held on for dear life to the status quo.

Some changes are certain.  They are taken as a given, without resistance: The ebbing and flowing of the tides.  The waxing and waning of the moon.  The rising and setting of the sun.

Stages and seasons of growth in nature:  those are accepted as certain, or nearly always so. Nature takes a certain trajectory, follows a certain course, pattern, cycle, movement, and rhythm. Of all the species, it is humankind that is perhaps the most not-so-kind to the natural world.  We are the species that most interferes with the grand design of this world.

It is we who inject and impose contorted calendars and appointment schedules into what is an otherwise orderly order.  We invoke what are for the most part arbitrary time changes such as “daylight saving time.” It is this imposing of our will over divine will that I would venture to say brings us strife and grief, and long-term suffering at the hands of fleeting, or even altogether unmaterialized, gains.

Maybe it really does come down to the invocations expressed in the Serenity Prayer:  Accept the things we cannot change, change the things we can, and invite in the wisdom to know the difference. For those circumstances we cannot change, we can still indeed change our response.  (See The Meaningfulness of Meaning here, referencing the work of Viktor Frankl.)

We are in control.  We get to decide how we respond. We get to take inspired action.  We get to adapt, move forward, expand, and grow.  And why not?  To stay stuck is tiring, uninspiring, and altogether dull.

For your consideration:

Is change something to be avoided at all costs?  Why or why not?  Does it depend on the situation?

Okay, your turn

Where has embracing change, even when initially it seemed scary, brought about improved outcomes for you?  On the other hand, when would you have benefited from accepting a situation exactly as-is, and had fully appreciated it in that moment?

I invite you to share your thoughts, feelings, and experiences in the Comments section, below. Soul-to-soul!

© 2018 Lori A. Noonan. All Rights Reserved.

There’s sage and then there’s sage !

Sage, as we know, is a type of herb. The sage plant has been used by a number of cultures for thousands of years.  It has been used in Chinese medicine.  It has been used by Native Americans in various ceremonies and for medicinal purposes. Some have even suggested that it leads to immortality!

In China, sage tea has been called the “thinker’s tea.” Along with its anti-inflammatory properties, it has been known to help improve memory and overall brain function.  Perhaps that is why the word “sage” also is used to describe a person who is wise.  It can also be used as an adjective (as in “sage advice”).

The title of this article is a deliberate play on words.  Sages and ages. They both connote a harkening back to ancient times as well as serve as a current example of ancient traditions put to good use in the so-called modern age.  Has there been a resurgence, or have these practices been put to good use all along?  Are we perhaps simply more aware of them now, due to the internet, globalization, and social media?

Sage has even become a somewhat trendy baby name, at least in the United States.  I wonder if it’s part of the ‘Apple’ craze?  (Referring to the celebrity’s baby’s name, not the computer company.)

We all remember being asked the question when we were young: What do you want to be when you grow up?  Me:  a philosopher.  I didn’t hear anyone around me saying that they wanted to be that.  It wasn’t exactly listed anywhere as a possible career track.  That didn’t matter to me.  If it was needed, and served a purpose, why couldn’t it be an occupation?

I wasn’t even exactly sure what all a job as a philosopher would entail. I knew in my heart, though, that it was a role that would be important and one that would be of service to others.  In my imagination, philosophers were the wisest people in their communities.  And, as such, they had a responsibility to answer seekers’ questions and provide helpful suggestions, recommendations, and solutions.

Sometimes we picture “wise ones” sitting on a mountain top, or living in caves in the Himalayas.  In my mind’s eye, I pictured them more along the lines of a wise man or wise woman in Ancient Greece sitting quietly in a town square, as the local villagers would stop by whenever they were seeking an answer to an inquiry or when wrestling with a concern that was weighing heavily on their soul, or when struggling with a conflict they couldn’t quite resolve.

I pictured philosophers dispensing wisdom not unlike a modern day pharmacist dispensing medicine.  And, I did truly envision “philosopher” as an actual vocation, and a paid position, for sure.  I even had a specific annual salary in mind.  I thought that a philosopher should make $300,000 a year.  Here was my reasoning:  At the time, the President of the United States’ annual salary was set at $200,000. Knowing that, accordingly, I figured that philosophers should be paid at least 50% more than the President, as they would be at least that much more wise and valuable to the country and citizenry!  Apparently, I really had put a lot of thought into this (grin).

While Philosopher or Sage may not be a job title, certainly there are modern day professions where others seek their guidance and advice.   Lawyers fall into that category (hence, the term “counselor at law”).  As with some other professions, within law, there are rules of professional responsibility.  It is part of the licensing process, and continuing legal education requirements as well.  And, as covered in this week’s Six-Minute Saturdays episode, many lawyers including myself were drawn to the law as a career because of a deep desire to be of service.

Admittedly, not all legal advice is the sagest or the wisest. I would suggest, though, that the profession is at least designed to serve that purpose, and with that intention.  And, ultimately, the client retains control over whether to heed that advice, ignore it, or even to seek additional opinions.

For your consideration:

So, with that in mind then, allow me to pose this question: Upon whom, ultimately, do we need to rely, for the sagest advice of all?

Are we not, each of us, deep down, our own best philosopher?  We simply need to access that inner wise sage.  That’s why meditation is important.  That’s why getting quiet and still is wise. By listening to our own inner guidance and messages, we each hold the power and divinity to reach the most appropriate conclusions and answers for ourselves.  And, that is valuable beyond compare.

Okay, your turn:

What’s been the sagest advice that you’ve ever received?  What’s the sagest advice that you’ve ever given? What’s the best advice that your inner-sage has revealed to you?  What made it so?  Did you act on it?

I invite you to SHARE your thoughts, feelings, and experiences by leaving a Reply in the Comments section, below. Soul-to-soul!

© 2018 Lori A. Noonan. All Rights Reserved.

The Meaningfulness of Meaning: Living a Life Worthwhile

In this edition of Soul Notes, we explore the concept of meaning and what that constitutes in terms of a meaningful life.  In this article, I’ll make references to one of Viktor Frankl’s books, originally entitled From Death Camp to Existentialism, now more commonly known by the title: Man’s Search for Meaning.

A doctor of psychiatry, Viktor Frankl (Frankl) is the founder of the psychotherapeutic school of thought he named logotherapy.  In contrast to Sigmund Freud’s focus on human instincts and the human drive for pleasure, Frankl focused his work on man’s (humankind’s) quest for finding meaning in one’s life.

Part One of Man’s Search for Meaning documents Frankl’s personal experiences as an inmate in concentration camps during World War II.  In Part Two of the book, he elaborates on logotherapy and how his experiences in the camps provided the backdrop for himself to become in effect his own best patient.  Part Two includes examples of patients he treated beyond the camps along with scientific and statistical data to illustrate his points.

Prior to being captured, Frankl had already written the manuscript for his first book, The Doctor and the Soul.  He had tucked the manuscript into his coat before being forced onto the train for Auschwitz.  Once at the camp, he and all the other prisoners were stripped of their personal belongings.  Accordingly, the manuscript he had hidden in his coat was quickly confiscated.

Adding then to the already deep poignancy of Frankl’s observations made during the Holocaust, is the fact that he by necessity documented them all from memory.  He kept his mind sharp by reconstructing in his head the original manuscript of that first book that he would later rewrite and publish.  The only physical remnants of the original manuscript that he had been able to reconstruct while in the camps were in the form of key words and phrases that he would surreptitiously scribble on tiny scraps of paper.

Beyond the physical:  love, spirituality, and a  life mission

Physically separated from his wife in the concentration camps, Frankl didn’t know if his wife was still alive.  It was in his mind’s eye that he would hold onto an image of her.  Just as through love he would cling to an image of his wife –- through a sense of commitment to his life’s work and overall life’s mission –- Frankl with devotion clung to the hope and intention of (re)writing his manuscript and publishing his psychological findings, all to the benefit of his profession and mental patients worldwide.

According to Frankl, love goes very far beyond the physical person of the beloved. Love finds its deepest meaning in one’s spiritual being, within the inner self. He also said that even during his time in captivity, glimpses of nature, music, and humor helped him and others to survive.  They were grateful, he said, for the smallest of mercies.

Frankl further went on to contend that by devoting oneself to a cause to serve or another person to love, that the more human and actualized one becomes. In view of the possibility of finding meaning in suffering, he suggested then that life’s meaning even can be potentially unconditional.

If and when conditions get tough on the outside, spirituality can play an even more important role from the inside:

“In spite of all the enforced physical and mental primitiveness of the life in a concentration camp, it was possible for spiritual life to deepen. Sensitive people who were used to a rich intellectual life may have suffered much pain (they were often of a delicate constitution), but the damage to their inner selves was less. They were able to retreat from their terrible surroundings to a life of inner riches and spiritual freedom.” (Man’s Search for Meaning, page 36, emphasis added).

In other words, the type of person each prisoner would become resulted more from that person’s mental and spiritual state, than purely his physical state.  Profoundly, Frankl maintained that one can decide to keep (and benefit from keeping) one’s human dignity, even in a concentration camp.

The meaning in suffering

Frankl was not suggesting that to have a meaningful life, one must suffer.  He did profess, however, that if there is meaning in life at all, there must certainly be meaning in suffering.  According to Frankl, those prisoners who discarded their inner morals, and who concluded that their lives were pointless, and thus “gave up” psychologically, were those who “forgot that often it is just such an exceptionally difficult external situation which gives man the opportunity to grow spiritually beyond himself.” (Man’s Search for Meaning, page 72).

The importance of having faith in the future and the power of personal choice

Frankl also understood the importance of having faith in the future. Without a belief in a better future, he said, a prisoner was subject to losing his spiritual hold, and thereby made himself more susceptible to mental and physical decay at a much more fervent pace.

So, what to do?

We may not be able to change every situation that we face in life.  We can, however, change ourselves and our approach.

Through our attitudes, choices and decisions we make and the actions we take, we can rise to any challenge and accept the opportunity to infuse any situation with meaning, even the most difficult ones.  Meaning is possible with or without (although perhaps most strikingly during times of) suffering.

Our lives are lived in moments.  And every human being, as exemplified by Frankl, has the freedom to change themselves — and their experience of any situation in life — in an instant.

 “[E]verything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms – to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way.” (Man’s Search for Meaning, page 66).

Each of us gets to decide what our existence will be in any given moment, and what we will become in the next moment.

That is true freedom.

Freedom plus reasonableness

Freedom alone, however, is not enough.  Frankl makes clear that freedom to choose must be combined with responsibleness.  Otherwise, as a race, the human race, we are destined for destruction. Every person has both potentialities within us – to be either a swine or saint, he said.  Which one is actualized, says Frankl, depends on the decisions we make, and not on the conditions we face.

So the beauty and the promise of Frankl’s work and legacy I would say is this:

Each of us has the challenge and the opportunity to bring with us the values of our past, make empowered choices and take responsible actions in the present, and thereby create futures of the highest value to humankind.

With that, we find meaning.

All is not lost.

Much is gained.

 

For your consideration:

What makes life meaningful? Can there be meaning in suffering?  Is suffering required?

Okay, your turn:

What has helped you bring a sense of meaning into your life?  Was suffering part of it?

I invite you to share your thoughts, feelings, and experiences by leaving a Reply in the Comments section, below. Soul-to-soul!

© 2017 Lori A. Noonan. All Rights Reserved.

That call at 3 AM

Yes, that one. The one that jerks you awake – the bolt straight out of bed when the phone rings – kind of phone call.  Some years ago, I received such a call:

In the jet black of night, I answer the phone.

“Hello, is this Lori Noonan?” I hear a man’s voice ask on the other end of the phone line. “Yes,” I manage to say while in complete darkness as I fumble for a light switch.

“This is the County Coroner. I have news about your brother.” I am barely able to register what he’s saying and what’s really happening. I feel as if I’ve fallen into a deep, dark, hollow well.

The Coronor continues speaking, and says rather matter-of-factly: “He shot himself in the head and killed himself.”

The voice continues, stating rather brusquely: “He was found out near some railroad tracks, in his car, with a gun. In his wallet, the only contact info was a card with your name and telephone number on it. So, I’m calling you.”

I try to keep my composure and attempt to process what I’ve just been told.

Without skipping a beat, however, the Coroner just keeps talking, asking me questions and rattling off directives.

“Can you call the other family members?”

“They need to be notified.”

“Can you take care of that?”

In that moment, all I desire to do is to ask about my brother. My heart and my mind go straight there — to my brother, out in the rural outskirts of town, in the dark of night. In my mind’s eye, immediately I picture my brother out there in his car, in his final moments, full of despair.

Why by the railroad tracks, I ponder. Was he planning to stop the car on the tracks? Was that his plan and it somehow went awry? Was he worried about injuring others on the train, and backed away? Or, maybe he waited for a train to approach, but a train didn’t come by at that time of night? Oh, but he brought a gun with him, though, too. What exactly was his plan, and how long had he been planning this? What were his final thoughts? Did he really see suicide as his “only way out”?

My mind jetted from one scenario to the next and back again. Meanwhile, the Coroner is still talking.

Suddenly, the voice on the other end of the line punctures my imaginings, and pierces straight through and into my mindstream. This is when I heard something that I hope I never hear again, and pray that no one else ever has to hear when receiving this type of news:

With agitation in his voice, the Coroner says: “Okay, I gotta go now. I’ve got to get off the phone. Half his skull is missing, and there’s all kinds of blood and mess that I’ve had to clean up, and I’ve already had to stay past the end of my shift.”

I had just been envisioning my brother in the moments before his death. In my mind’s eye, he was still out there in his car, and was still very much alive.   I certainly wasn’t prepared to have that image immediately sliced through with a proverbial scalpel from the Coroner. Envisioning my brother with half his head blown off, and blood everywhere – that was an image that I neither needed nor desired.

The call just seemed so very callous. It was not as if I was an objective bystander, a non-interested third party, a ‘passer-by’ learning of this, for the first time.

It’s 3 AM, and I’m now standing in the middle of my apartment with the phone in my hand, and I feel so, so alone, so very alone.  And, my heart aches so, so deeply, for my brother. It felt as if my chest suddenly had caved in on itself. Heartache, in that moment, was anything but a euphemism.

And, it hit me that I would be the one then calling and informing the other family members.

From the darkness out into the light

Now, my intention here is not to vilify Coroners. I realize that they have a stressful job to do. I just wish that he had handled that conversation differently – with at least a bit of civility, a modicum of compassion, an ounce of sensitivity.

This happened quite a few years ago, and perhaps training and call protocols have improved since then? Or, maybe this one phone call was an anomaly? I’m realizing that it may be helpful for me to find out. It may be time for me to reach out to others who are facing or have faced suicide in their family. It may be time for me to advocate on their behalf, and to help medical professionals understand their point of view.  I’m feeling that it may be part of my own spiritual path.

Answering a Call of a Different Sort

I’m looking into ways that I may be of service, and share my experience with those in the mental health professions, and medical personnel, and the like. Recently, I’ve learned that here in the United States, there is a national organization that provides educational programs and classes for staff members who provide mental health treatment services. And, this organization has trained presenters who present on topics such as “ending the silence” in schools, and out to the general public as a way to promote awareness of mental illness.

Is this part of my calling? Yes, it feels as if it may be. Perhaps I may hold a lantern — to shed light along the dark passageways – for those with suicidal thoughts, and for those family members who feel so alone in helping themselves as well as their loved ones through such travails. At this point, it remains somewhat undefined. I am willing, however, to explore, follow my intuitive impulses, and find out.

Okay, your turn:

Do you recall a time when you received such a phone call? What, if anything, could that person have said that would have “lessened the blow”? In what ways would you be prompted to convey such a message, if you are or were in a position to inform someone of such news?

I invite you to share your thoughts, feelings, and experiences in the Comments section, below. Soul-to-soul!

© 2015 Lori A. Noonan. All Rights Reserved.