Midweek Faith Lift
The Power of Understanding- Comprehension
Rev. Deb Hill-Davis
February 19, 2025
Spiritual Passages
February 10, 2025
A troubled monk goes to his Abbott for guidance, and after listening intently, the Abbott asks the monk to join him on a walk. They arrived at a pond near the back of the monastery. The Abbott asks the monk to pick up a stone and toss it into the center of the pond. The monk complies. "Now," said the Abbott, "as the ripples come closer to the shore, stick your finger in the water to try to stop them." The monk tries, but as he sticks his finger in the water, the action just creates more ripples. The confused monk looks at his mentor and says, "Abbott, I can't. My actions just cause more ripples." The Abbott smiles, and says, "So, you cannot stop the ripples?" "Correct," said the monk. "But could you have stopped yourself from tossing the stone into the pond in the first place?"
And then for some humor:
Did you hear about the guy who joined the recovery group, Mindfulness Anonymous? In his first meeting, he introduced himself by saying, "My name is Michael, and I’ve been in the present moment for six months."
A meditation student asks her teacher how long it will take her to gain enlightenment if she practices diligently. "Ten years," answered the teacher. "Well, how about if I really work hard and double my effort?" To which the teacher replied, "Twenty years."
Affirmative Prayer for Today: By the Power of spiritual understanding, open my eyes, ears, mind and heart to that greater Reality that is always part of all circumstances in my human experience. May I expand and deepen my awareness to a consciousness of love as I express the Power of Understanding. Amen.
As we engage the Power of Understanding, a sense of humor is a useful perspective for sure. And patience helps too, because that first step of Comprehension is often a doozy! How about trying to understand directions? When someone writes out directions, which to them, are crystal clear, well it can often be clear as mud to the uninitiated observer. And it doesn’t have to be that complicated to be confusing. I remember as a young kid trying to bake something all on my own….it said to grease the bottom of the pan….it didn’t mention that it was the inside of the pan, did it?
And as adults, we have found that checking into an Airbnb can also be challenging, especially in a foreign country when you don’t know the language very well or at all. We learned by trial and error, that in Europe, all the exit or exterior doors open inward, not outward, so you pull the door open to get out of the building. All the pushing in the world won’t open the door. You can try harder, but without understanding, well DUH!! Been there more than once! Trying harder without comprehension, well, not so much. For sure, comprehension keeps you humble.
Comprehension, Realization and Insight are the significant aspects of the Power of Understanding. Today is Comprehension, which is a significant starting point, particularly from our human perspective. How many arguments have you been part of that were because of a misunderstanding? My family was notorious for not giving enough information and then expecting you to “read between the lines” or play “guess what I’m thinking” in order to do what was requested to their satisfaction. Teachers in my elementary school often seemed to do the same thing and if you guessed right, you were smart and a good student. If not, well, then good luck. I did not enjoy it either way, so what I have done in my adult life is to “over” explain, which people do not especially enjoy either! “Mom, I’m not stupid” is something I heard more than once…..I did learn after a bit, to not do that. Understanding happened!
When we read the Scriptures, it is clear that Jesus was very much misunderstood and he frequently went to the mountaintop to pray. My take on that is that he had to clear his head and heart so that he did not call his disciples a bunch of knuckleheaded nincompoops! There were so many things the disciples did not understand, on a human level or a spiritual level. Jesus told the disciples to “love your enemies, do good to those who persecute you,” and they didn’t get it. We don’t get it today, either or the world would look a lot different for sure. Jesus talked about forgiveness endlessly, telling us all that 70 times 7 is about right for the number of times. We still don’t get that one!
So this understanding process is a tricky business and fairly complex. What is true is that the experience of “feeling understood” by another person, or truly understanding your own feelings and behavior is a universal need. When that need is met, people feel deeper connections between one another, and more deeply connected to themselves. There is a sense of relief and inner calm as a result. When someone understands what something really means to you, then trust is deepened because you know in your heart they will do their best to honor your request and your need. And you will do the same for them, to deepen trust and connection.
When we feel understood, we feel loved, empowered and able to make the choices our heart really wants to make, the choices that honor the highest and best for all. That is a place of grace, a place of both human and spiritual understanding and it feels great! It feels wonderful and it is wonderful! We all want to be there for sure. How does it happen? In our culture, we pursue understanding by pursuing knowledge or information, so much so that we are overloaded with it on the Internet, to the point that we have developed silos where we feel understood and we have trust.
But is the heart really involved? When we are “siloed” we are leaving out those who are not in our silo, those who don’t think the same as we do or see the world in the same way. We are confusing sameness with oneness, and oneness, like love, leaves no one out. We are missing the very significant part of understanding that is comprehension or meaning. In Divine Audacity, Rev. Linda Martella-Whitsett puts it this way:
Understanding ultimately goes beyond fleeting facts to settle on changeless truths. Preceding understanding is a desire to understand… Curiosity is desire. Worry is desire. Doubt is desire. Desire summons understanding. (p. 51-51) Fillmore taught “No one ever attained spiritual consciousness without striving for it.” (The Twelve Powers of Man, p.41)
Understanding and an expanded spiritual consciousness don’t just happen. When we tap into the energy of desire, we begin to open our hearts to ourselves; not to our stories or beliefs but the deeper feelings we are holding, some of them unpleasant and uncomfortable. We expand and deepen our capacity to just be with our worry, our fears, our doubts and our anxiety and to hold it, tenderly and lovingly. Our desire is to discover the connections between thought and feeling, between the body’s message and our habits of thought and behavior.
Like the monk in the opening story, we have habits of thought and accumulated beliefs that ripple through our consciousness automatically, without real awareness. When we pause and notice what is there, in our thoughts and beliefs, we are cultivating curiosity, the curiosity, which precedes understanding or comprehension. We begin to comprehend what is motivating us in our thoughts, words and actions. We begin to make sense of this accumulated “stuff” then, we too, begin to realize that our true choice is whether to throw the stone in the first place. Even more significant is that we understand that we have the choice!
How does that look in real time, in real life? Well, let’s go back to my personal example of “over” explaining things, which also was annoying to Todd, and sometimes still is! Imagine that….it is a hard habit to break, just ask him. When I finally cultivated curiosity and self-reflection about this, it was a humbling moment. I began to understand this pattern in the context of my whole life, not just the current situation. The net result is that now when someone calls me out on it, I am, when calm, able to step back and not throw that stone into the pond. The spiritual power of understanding at work in my unfolding will empower me to stop doing that before someone calls me out on it.
The AHA of comprehension empowers me to see the whole picture, the higher perspective, not just my perspective. Otherwise, I am like Mindfulness Michael, in the Mindfulness Anonymous group, stuck in the present moment for 6 months, or longer. I am fairly sure I am not alone in the experience of continuing to advocate for my perspective, replaying the conversation or dispute long after the initial event happened. Take heart, dear one, until you really “get it” and comprehension happens, you are very likely to get that lesson again…and again…until you see and own your part in it. Thank you, God, for prayer and the comprehension that is part of the spiritual power of Understanding.
There is a passage in the Christian Scripture, Matthew 7:7-8 that speaks to this prayer process:
Ask, Search, Knock
7 “Ask, and it will be given to you; search, and you will find; knock, and the door will be opened for you. 8 For everyone who asks receives, and everyone who searches finds, and for everyone who knocks, the door will be opened.
When we pray to understand, to comprehend our own behavior and feelings, and we open to Spirit, we are assured to find the next puzzle piece for unfolding our spiritual journey. And it may not even take 20 more years!
Blessings on the Path,
Rev. Deb