On the Weight of the Hour

And a man said, “Speak to us of Stress, for the days press upon us like stones, and our nights are a counting of burdens.”

And he answered, saying:

You name your burden “stress,” but you do not know its face. Is it the weight of the hour, or is it the shadow you cast upon the hour? For the same sun that withers the leaf also ripens the fruit, and the same rain that floods the valley also fills the well. Your pain is the breaking of the shell that encloses your understanding. And what is stress but the shell that would keep you from the sun? Even as the stone of the fruit must break that its heart may stand in the sun, so must you know the breaking.

You say, “The future is a mountain I cannot climb.” But I say unto you: your anxiety does not come from thinking about the future, but from wanting to control it. You stand at the door of tomorrow and beat upon it with your fists, crying, “Let me in, that I may shape what lies beyond.” And the door does not open, for tomorrow is not a room to be entered but a road to be walked. And you who would command the road—have you forgotten that you are also the walker? A leaf in God’s forest does not ask the wind for a map. It rests in reason and moves in passion, and in this it is more wise than you.

Your joy is your sorrow unmasked. And the selfsame well from which your laughter rises was oftentimes filled with your tears. Do not think that peace is the absence of storm. The lute that soothes your spirit is the very wood that was hollowed with knives. And the cup that holds your wine is the cup burned in the potter’s oven. If you would know calm, you must first cease to flee the carving. The deeper that sorrow carves into your being, the more joy you can contain. And stress is but the chisel in the hand of a sculptor you cannot see.

You talk of your worries when you cease to be at peace with your thoughts. And when you can no longer dwell in the solitude of your heart, you live in your lips, and sound becomes a diversion and a pastime. In much of your talking, thinking is half murdered. For thought is a bird of space; in a cage of words it may unfold its wings but cannot fly. So do not seek to outrun your stress in speech or in busyness. Sit with it in the silence of aloneness, and it will reveal to you its naked self—and you will see that it is not a monster, but a child frightened of the dark.

And what of your work, which you say is the chief of your stressors? You work that you may keep pace with the earth and the soul of the earth. But you have made of work a chain, and of rest a thief. Know that when you work you are a flute through whose heart the whispering of the hours turns to music. And all work is empty save when there is love. If you cannot work with love but only with distaste, it is better that you leave your work and sit at the gate of the temple and take alms of those who work with joy. For rest is not the cessation of labor but the tuning of the instrument. And you who are restless in rest shall not be trapped nor tamed—but neither shall you find the still point where the weight of the hour becomes light.

Much of your stress is self-chosen. It is the bitter potion by which the physician within you heals your sick self. Therefore trust the physician, and drink the remedy in silence and tranquillity. For the hand, though heavy and hard, is guided by the tender hand of the Unseen, and the cup, though it burn your lips, has been fashioned of the clay which the Potter has moistened with His own sacred tears.

And if you would go in peace, do not seek to be emptied of burden. Seek rather to be widened. Your soul is a sea boundless and measureless. Say not, “I have found the path of peace.” Say rather, “I have met peace walking upon my path”. For peace walks not upon a line, neither does it grow like a reed. The soul unfolds itself, like a lotus of countless petals. And the lotus does not strain toward the sun; it simply rises through the water, petal by petal, and the sun does the rest.

So let the seasons of your heart come as the seasons of your fields come: you do not curse the winter for its cold, nor does the farmer stand in the field shouting at the clouds. You would watch with serenity through the winters of your grief. And when the storm comes, and the mighty wind shakes the forest, and thunder and lightning proclaim the majesty of the sky—then let your heart say in awe, “God moves in passion”. And since you are a breath in God’s sphere, and a leaf in God’s forest, you too should rest in reason and move in passion.

This is the whole of it: stress is not the measure of your days, but the distance between your hand and the hand of the Unseen. Bring them together. The hour will not grow lighter, but you will grow larger. And in that largeness, the weight of the hour becomes the weight of a wing.