Nekkid (Part Three)

Nekkid Part One
Nekkid Part Two

How could I have thought that there was ever anything to want or anything to fear in this wild, holy world?

...And yet so often, these past few years, I am fearful. Fearful of and appalled by my first tastes of a deeper, more distressing nakedness, a persistent stripping away of pleasant illusions about myself that leave me feeling even more “exposed” than any exterior gross-body nudity could.

People on meditative and contemplative paths eventually encounter (and re-encounter) this fear. It may first emerge several weeks or months after taking up a contemplative discipline, when the initial “honeymoon” period of the seeker’s journey has started to wane. Any feelings of consolation, bliss, luminous clarity and joy that may have accompanied the heart-opening inrush of unconditional divine love—various revels in the mystical love-flood -- eventually wind down. After regularly returning to prayer (or meditation) day after day -- releasing distractions, resting in silence, consenting to the dynamic presence of God, watering the hidden garden of the soul – fresh shoots emerge. This is one of the first appearances of the gifts of the Spirit: knowledge. Not so much an intellectual awareness, but knowledge that begins as a kind of “unknowing,” or relinquishing of veils and veneers.

What was once hidden begins to come into view. The feeling is very similar to standing uncomfortably naked in front of others, except that it is interior flaws, weaknesses, and illusions -- rather than unappealing physical bulges and warts – that appear. Instead of embarrassment over a pock-marked stomach, I notice my deep-seated addiction to the approval of others. Where I once winced at my unveiled cellulite, I recognize the subtle manipulative control-games that I play. And my attempts to hide a wide behind are upstaged by a painfully bright awareness of how I try to disguise my own greed and envy. 

Initially this intensified awareness can be, at best, uncomfortable, and at worst, psychically nauseating and searing. I find myself interiorly recoiling and contracting – similar to the way I might squirm and curl my arms around my bodily flaws while physically naked in front of others. The light is painful to my inner eyes, and I cannot help but squint and try to turn away from what is being revealed. I am tempted to flee – to withdraw again into the soft shadows, to return to a protective corner of the room, to clothe myself once again in all kinds of appealing distractions that might buffer me from this un-knowing knowledge of my own "wretched" being.  

But that would be to no avail, really. If I am to remain on this journey, what has been seen cannot be un-seen.

And, let me be clear: it’s not that I ever thought I was free of flaws and illusions. No. It is, instead, a greatly enhanced recognition of those flaws. What was merely glimpsed before (and forgotten and re-forgotten) in brief flashes of lightning is now laid out in full noonday sunshine. What was previously viewed on a two-dimensional screen in grainy black and white has now been re-released as an extended director’s cut in technicolor 3D with surround sound.

Here is another description of the surfacing of contemplatively-informed self-knowledge, from Fr. Thomas Keating’s book Open Mind Open Heart:

“As the deep peace flowing from [contemplative] prayer releases our emotional blocks, insights into the dark side of our personality emerge and multiply. We blissfully imagine that we do good to our families, friends, and business or professional associates for the best of reasons, but when this dynamism begins to operate in us, our so-called good intentions look like a pile of dirty dishrags. We perceive that we are not as generous as we had once believed. This happens because the divine light is shining brighter in our hearts. Divine love, by its very nature, accuses us of our innate selfishness.

            Suppose we were in a dimly lit room. The place might look fairly clean. But install a hundred bulbs of a thousand watts each, and put the whole room under a magnifying glass. The place would begin to crawl with all kinds of strange and wonderful little creatures. It would be all you could do to stay there. So it is with our interior . . . .

            Self-knowledge in the Christian ascetical tradition is insight into our hidden motivation, into emotional needs and demands that are percolating inside of us and influencing our thinking, feeling, and activity without our being aware of them. When you withdraw from your ordinary flow of superficial thoughts on a regular daily basis, you get a sharper perspective on your motivation, and you begin to see that the value systems by which you have always lived have their roots in prerational attitudes that have never been honestly and fully confronted.”

            Some contemplative teachings make reference to a “false self” -- the small “s” self or overly-ego-identified self. According to Keating, this is the aspect of the self that seeks happiness and release from suffering through the garnering of security, approval and esteem, or power—primal needs that must be met for healthy living but which, when clung to beyond basic necessity, morph in to egocentric motivations and addictions. Greed; dances for approval; excessive attachment to control; addictions to pleasure; apathy and withdrawal – these become the strategies one uses to avoid suffering or to defend against conscious and unconscious wounds, past and current.  Since this tendency of the self seems to be universal to the contemporary human condition, the term “false self” may be a misnomer. “False” sounds too much like “wrong,” “phony,” or “inauthentic.” If this so-called “false” self is the one we are most familiar with, then for all practical purposes, that is who we “truly” are! It might be more accurate to speak of the undeveloped or unaware self – or – here’s my current preference: the (metaphorically) de-centered self. That is, the aspect of the self that lives as if its own separate individual ego, rather than the ever-unfolding Divine Mystery, was the “center,” or heart, of the cosmos.

(Another alternative: the overly-adorned self. The self that too closely identifies with the layers of  “clothing” that are donned in an attempt to be, or be perceived as,  powerful, strong, genuine, compassionate, happy, secure, brave, aware, authentic, etc. all on one’s own steam – without a genuine connection to the Source of All That Is.)

In his book Return of the Prodigal Son, Henri Nouwen describes what it is like to catch the de-centered self in action. It is a kind of uneasy double-awareness, a painful embarrassment upon reading one’s own diary:

     Constantly falling back into an old trap, before I am fully aware of it, I find myself wondering why someone hurt me, rejected me, or didn’t pay attention to me. Without realizing it, I find myself brooding about someone else’s success, my own loneliness, and the way the world abuses me. Despite my conscious intentions, I often catch myself daydreaming about becoming rich, powerful, and very famous. All of these mental games reveal to me the fragility of my faith that I am the Beloved One on whom God’s favor rests. I am so afraid of being disliked, blamed, put aside, passed over, ignored, persecuted, and killed, that I am constantly developing strategies to defend myself and thereby assure myself of the love I think I need and deserve. And in so doing I move far away from my Father’s home and choose to dwell in a “distant country.”

How I long to be as unashamedly naked – as nekkid – as is Jesus in those paintings depicting his baptism: naked heart, naked being, humbly accepting his gift, inheritance, and responsibility as Son of Man and Child of God. But, mystical adolescent that I am, I am still reeling from the painful awareness of my de-centered self as it continues to cling to its ego-absorbed dreams and nightmares. It’s a strange, liminal half-nudity, a predawn sleeplessness, the time when the chrysalis turns uncomfortably inside the cocoon. I see my illusions and wish to be rid of them while simultaneously perceiving my desire to be rid of them as another facet of my de-centered, egoically-driven cravings! All the concern over "how I'm progressing" or "evolving" (or perhaps not!) on the journey seems suspiciously narcissistic and spiritually materialistic. And it seems I find subtler and subtler ways to hide disquieting truths, be they ugly or lovely, from myself and others – always pushing those breasts below the water line, always holding that big security towel in front of this startling nakedness. . . really, I’m not as vain, as ashamed, as pained as all THAT . . . am I?

How long, Lord, how long? How long before the towel fully drops? How long before I am finally nekkid?