Anna Redsand

This entry was first published in The Gallup Independent on August 5, 2023. Reprinted with permission.

When I taught in an alternative middle school classroom, my high-risk students attended for half a day. My afternoons included supervising after-lunch detention, home visits, consultation with my supervisor and community resources, and planning. My classroom stood away from the main campus, across several fields, so the janitors almost never came to clean. Most days, when detention was over, and before I went out into the community, I cleaned the chalkboard and swept the floor. One afternoon, my supervisor called, and I told him I'd been sweeping the floor, so it had taken me a minute to get to the phone.
 
"Why are you sweeping the floor?" he asked. "Aren't the janitors coming out to clean your classroom?"
 
"Hardly ever. Maybe twice last semester. But I don't mind, really. It's quiet, and while I sweep, thoughts come to me about the morning and about what different students might need."
 
"Oh, you're collecting your thoughts while you collect the dirt." He laughed.
 
"Yes, and sometimes I'm collecting my internal dirt, too."
 
In Chaim Potok's novel, The Chosen, a character explains some of the teachings of the Ba'al Shem Tov, who is considered the 18th century founder of Hasidic Judaism, saying, "He taught them that the purpose of man is to make his life holy––every aspect of life: eating, drinking, praying, sleeping." I would add to that, "working."
 
Making a conscious connection with the Holy One is what spiritual practice is about. As I understand it, the Ba'al Shem Tov was saying that we can seek conscious contact with the Presence through every action in our daily lives. In the yoga school where I have taken courses, the work we did––in the kitchen, in the gardens, cleaning toilets, digging ditches to repair plumbing––was called "karma yoga." In Zen monasteries monks chop wood and carry water. And sweep floors.
 
My teacher taught that karma yoga is work done for the sake of the work itself. Not for someone's approval, not because it earns us money, not to get through it as quickly as possible. To do work for its own sake, it is necessary to be aware of what we're doing, to be present, to do it as well as possible, also knowing that it is a task we may have to do again the next day, and the next.
  
Another teacher at the yoga school also said that karma yoga is work done with love. To me that means love of the work itself, as well as love for the people who will benefit. The Lebanese-American poet Kahlil Gibran wrote, "Work is love made visible."
 
I can't say that I always swept my classroom with complete awareness of what I was doing, and as I told my supervisor, it also became a time of reflection, of problem solving. But those are things that often happen when we make contact with the Holy One through the work we are doing or through prayer or meditation. Our awareness of the work itself may shift, as we are led to answers we need.
 
As I swept the floor, I can't say, either, that I was thinking loving thoughts or feeling love for my students. But the act itself was love made visible, especially if we think of love as action, rather than feeling. In creating a clean and orderly space for my students, I was loving them––making love visible.
 
A spiritual practice is something that is done regularly. Work, whether done at home, whether done out in the world voluntarily or for pay, can form a spiritual practice when it is done with consciousness. Today, I live in a place far from my homeland so I can be close to family, but I long so often for New Mexico. There are certain tasks, and they are often more physical than mental, that remind me that I am doing karma yoga. Watering plants is one of them. I check the needs of the plants, remove leaves that have died and thus sap energy from the plant, note if a plant might need a larger pot. I feel gratitude for the pleasure the plants' beauty brings me. In those moments of conscious work, I discover that I am content to be where I am, maybe because I'm fully present then––the essence of spiritual practice.

HAVING A SPIRITUAL PRACTICE:
IT MAY NOT BE WHAT YOU THINK

 
A somewhat different version of this entry was first published in The Gallup Independent on June 24, 2023. Reprinted with permission.

 
I count among my friends atheists, practicing and non-practicing Jews, people of Islamic heritage, Christians––both progressive and evangelical––agnostics, people who identify as spiritual but not religious, people who practice Indigenous spiritual traditions, Buddhists, pagans, and animists. No doubt more. One of my atheist friends is one of the most spiritual people I know. She told me when she is out hiking, she often sits in one spot for three to four hours. She is inhabiting the landscape as she witnesses it. I don't know if she would describe it this way, but when I (for a much shorter time) sit in one place in the natural world, I feel I am becoming one with the rocks, the trees, the grasses, the animals. She might say she is connecting with something larger than herself. I would say that in those moments, I am in contact with the Presence through all that is sacred.
 
When I was around seven, my dad took his oldest sister, my younger brother, and me fishing in the San Juan River. It was a spot we could get to only by a two-track dirt road. We left for home after catching several catfish. Suddenly my aunt's heavy, black 1940s sedan jerked to a stop. Its underbelly was caught on a large rock. The car's wheels spun fruitlessly, and Dad was worried that the oil pan could've been damaged in a way that would mean severe harm to the engine. The sun was setting, chilling the air. While my dad worked to free up the car, I said to my brother Rick, "Let's go behind that salt bush and pray." A few minutes later my dad shouted as the car rolled forward, oil pan intact.
 
That wasn't an isolated incident in my childlike way of thinking. I had been taught that we could go to God any time we or someone else needed help. But prayer was not only for emergencies; it was a daily practice. We prayed six times a day as a family—before and after every meal. I learned a bedtime prayer as soon as I could speak. When I turned seven, my parents gave me my own Bible and told me I was old enough to make my own prayers before sleeping. Prayer was definitely about relationship, and I often felt a deep connection with the Holy One when I prayed. Dad also invited me to offer an after-meal prayer once in a while, especially after supper when we read from the children's Bible storybook. We read from the Bible or a devotional after every meal and before bed.
 
We didn't call it spiritual practice, but that's what it was. One thing that defines spiritual practice is that it is done regularly, most often daily, sometimes several times a day. The Muslim spiritual practice that is most familiar, even to non-Muslims, is prayer that takes place five times a day. Taking a daily walk in nature and being present to everything around us can be a spiritual practice. Step Eleven in Twelve Step Programs is about developing our conscious contact with God as we understand God, through daily prayer and meditation.
 
A Diné friend once told me that his grandmother had taught him, "If you find a place where you feel the presence of God, go to that place often." "Often" is what I've just been talking about—that daily action, a habit. But the other part of spiritual practice is what my friend's grandmother was talking about––a place or a time where we go to feel the Holy One's presence, to make a conscious connection with the Divine, an aware connection, a connection that is entered into with heart and mind.
 
Sometimes, we may be gifted with spiritual experiences that bubble up without our asking. The deep connection we feel with the Whole at those times washes over us with amazing grace; often we are caught by surprise. Those times of sudden connection are sweet and precious. But the idea of spiritual practice is that we don't have to wait for that unexpected grace. Daily practice allows us to experience regular, sustained connection with Spirit, a connection we know how to find because we practice it regularly.
 
Life in the twenty-first century is so much busier than it was for our grandparents and even our parents. It can seem impossible to find a regular time for reflection, time to draw close to Creator. A friend of mine was attending graduate school and raising her young son who had multiple, severe disabilities. At a regular health check-up, her doctor asked her what she was doing for exercise. She said she'd like to exercise, but she simply couldn't find the time. The doctor said, "Even if you just walk around the block, that's something. And something is better than nothing." Even if your life is too busy for twenty minutes or a half hour (or three or four) of stillness, maybe you can find five minutes to say thank you before you get up in the morning or before you go to bed at night. Spiritual practice is like physical exercise: It offers many benefits, and something is better than nothing.

WHAT'S THE BIG DEAL ABOUT HATE VIOLENCE?

This guest post by Diane J. Schmidt is a shortened version of the column that was first published in the Gallup Independent "Spiritual Perspectives" section on July 29, 2023.

   A jury decided on Wednesday, August 2, 2023, that the shooter in the Tree of Life Synagogue massacre in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania should be put to death. I recall the enormous international outcry when the shooting happened in 2018, and a reaction I'd heard: "What's the big deal? There was a worse mass shooting where I live." It was not the first time I'd heard a "what about" sentiment about a hate crime. And it can come from both the right and left.

   We need to be reminded what hate crimes are, and affected communities need to stand together. As the planet heats up, tempers are rising. And with it, prejudice and intolerance are increasing. Hatred of the other manifests. Social tensions are being exacerbated, sometimes deliberately, and racism is now a popular ploy for votes.
   In 2010 a developmentally disabled 22-year-old Navajo man was assaulted in Farmington, New Mexico, USA, and branded with a swastika. The victim finally escaped to a convenience store, where police were summoned. The Farmington police, who'd been trained to recognize hate crimes by the Anti-Defamation League, contacted the FBI. It was the first federally prosecuted case under President Obama's new Shepard/Byrd hate crime law; the principal offender was sentenced to 8 1/2 years in federal prison.
   I'd reported on the trial for the Navajo Times. It was also tried at the state level, and when I interviewed a district court official in Aztec, New Mexico, he said, "What's the big deal? Navajo people are always beating each other up and worse."
   It was fortunate that the Farmington Police had the awareness to report this to the FBI as a hate crime.
   In 2018, an avowed white supremacist and antisemite entered the Tree of Life Synagogue during prayer services and shot and killed 11 Jewish congregants. It is the worst antisemitic act of violence against Jews in the United States.
   In July, the jury determined that the shooter was guilty on all counts, including hate crimes, and was capable of forming intent to commit the crime, making him eligible for the death penalty. The jury heard testimony from survivors and family members, and also from relatives of the shooter and a psychiatrist for the defense. The jury decided to recommend the death sentence rather than life in prison. The governor of Pennsylvania, Josh Shapiro, announced 6 months ago as the trial got underway that he would not issue any execution warrants during his term.
    When the Tree of Life Synagogue shooting received international attention, I wrote for the New Mexico Jewish Link about how religious leaders here came together in condemnation of this act. A friend in Europe, whose country had experienced a terrible mass shooting some years earlier perpetrated by a political extremist, wrote me, at some level annoyed by the attention this shooting received, saying essentially, "What's the big deal?" There is an important difference between a political act and a hate crime.
  A hate crime is motivated by bias against race, color, religion, national origin, sexual orientation, gender, gender identity, or disability, and it is felt widely by the group that the victim may be perceived to be a member of.
   After 9/11/2001, members of the Sikh religion, who wear distinctive turbans, were targeted in many cities with acts of violence, including murder. After COVID began, following a tweet by the former president calling it the "Chinese virus," there was a surge in hate crimes against Asian Americans. Historically, Native Americans, African Americans, and other people of color have been the target of hate crimes. Hatred of Jews is a hate crime called antisemitism.
  A current presidential candidate, known primarily for having a famous father who was a Kennedy and for being a leader of the anti-vax movement, just made the racist and antisemitic claim that COVID was genetically engineered to target Caucasians and Blacks, but not to affect Asians and Jews. That is untrue. 
   One to one and a half million Chinese citizens died from COVID as reported in "How Deadly Was China's Covid Wave?" (New York Times, 2/15/23). Their graph showed that internationally, the U.S. was number one, and Israel was seventh in death rates. Speaking personally as a Jew, I and other relatives of mine got COVID.
   False accusations are particularly egregious to Jews, who for centuries have been massacred over inane accusations scapegoating them. In the 14th century they were accused of spreading the Black Plague, because they were not dying as much as their Christian neighbors. Jews put fresh straw in their bedding every Friday to honor the Sabbath, inadvertently removing flea-carrying rats, the real source of the Plague.
   We must all must find common cause against the rise of hatred in all its forms.

Diane Joy Schmidt is an award-winning writer and photojournalist in New Mexico.

She is a colleague of mine.

LIFE WITHOUT SOCIAL MEDIA

 
Every day the New York Times encourages me to share my Wordle and Spelling Bee accomplishments. Marketing must think if I keep telling people how I did, more will want to subscribe to the Times. That might even be true. Or maybe my friends would just be put off by that most unattractive pursuit––bragging. It's immaterial because, as you may know, I'm not on social media any longer.
 
Last week I was twice invited to "share with your community." "Community" has become almost synonymous with "social media." One of these invitations implored me to tell my community I had donated to their campaign for reelection. Because of the stakes in the next election, I really wanted to share it, although when I was on social media, I eschewed posting about politics. Without mentioning names (though you can most likely guess if you know me at all) I will tell you that I donated because I'd read that this particular team was doing well at raising campaign funds from organizations, but this time around has garnered relatively little from the grassroots. I wished I could prompt my fellow roots to join me. Because things are heating up––literally and figuratively.
 
The past few weeks, soaring temperatures in the US and Europe, wildfires in Canada and Greece, have made it undeniable that we are in crisis. When I turn on the little window AC in my apartment, I wonder if the power companies are preparing for how much more we'll be running heating and cooling systems in the very near future. I suspect not. Some days and in some places, the heat is almost unbearable. I can't help thinking of my beloveds and what life might be like for them after I've left the planet, whether it will even be livable. I am literally filled with dread for them, as we, which means me, keep on living life as usual, our collective heads in the sand.
 
I have hoped to visit Denmark one more time and also spend time in the Netherlands to learn more about my Dutch heritage. I have enough points to fly there and back for less than $100. But air travel produces an extremely high carbon footprint. I love being mobile here in the US, but again, carbon footprint. I started thinking about living somewhere where I could do everything I need to do on foot. For as long as I'm able, which would probably make me able for longer than otherwise.
 
With deep regret, I am giving up on a trip to Europe. I had hoped to drive the vehicle I have now (entirely gas-powered) until I'm no longer able to drive. But on Saturday, I placed a pre-order for a reasonably priced, solar-powered electric car. Aptera Motors immediately invited me to share my action with my "community." And I really did want to share. It turns out that YOU are my online community. So I'm letting you know about it.
 
I know I'm just one person attempting to have an effect on this daunting global problem. But change has to happen at every level, which also means at the grassroots. As Margaret Mead famously said, "Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it's the only thing that ever has.... Never believe that a few caring people can't change the world."