The title of the book “This Is Not the Story You Think It Is…” is absolutely true. In Laura Munson’s memoir her life is falling to pieces around her and she makes the conscious decision to choose love over fear. This wise and witty wordsmith has captivated me—my eyes are wide open, along with my heart.
In Chapter Two she shared this excerpt from The Cloud of Unknowing by Anonymous (an unnamed English monk):
Take just a little word of one syllable rather then two… Such a one is the word God or the word love. Choose which you prefer…and fasten this word to your heart so that whatever happens it will never go away. This word is to be your shield and your spear, whether you are riding in peace or in war. With this word you are to beat upon the cloud and the darkness above and beneath you. With this word you are to strike down every kind of thought, driving it down into a pool of forgetting. If any thought should press upon you, asking what you would have, answer with no word but this one. If your thoughts should offer, out of their great learning to analyze your word for you and tell you its meanings, say to your thoughts that you want to keep it whole…It is not a matter of analyzing or elucidating…No one can truly think of God. It is therefore my wish to leave everything that I can think and choose for my love the thing that I cannot think. God can be loved but not thought. He can be taken and held by love, but not by thought.
I’m fascinated by this suggestion, “No one can truly think of God…God can be loved but not thought.” And this struck a deep chord of knowing within me, “He can be taken and held by love, but not by thought.”
My choice of words is passion for life. It summarizes my whole perspective. 🙂
Although a pretty notion, and I think it’s lacking in substance. If I’m thinking about God (thought), than are my thoughts not holding him? In writing about God (also requiring thought), are my thoughts and mere words not holding him? I think they are.
Love may be an added way to hold him (but so may hate, you know?), but I think that unless one holds God so profoundly with love that even thoughts about thinking about God cannot be separated the essence of love (or any other feeling) in the person’s own thoughts, then it’s a specious argument to say that God can’t be held by thoughts.
xoxox
A
I ~ passion is ideal for you! 😉
A ~ thanks for sharing, you pose interesting questions. I have never read the book this passage is from which might clarify the authors complete intention.
I wonder: if I hold you in my thoughts am I ‘holding’ “you” or my ‘ideal’ of you? If I ‘feel’ you, love you, isn’t that separate from thought?…kinda like meditation…no thought just emotion. That feels closer to God to me than ‘thinking’ about him, more like experiencing him. (I don’t like him/her for God but don’t know how else to clarify)
Vugs!
Thanks for reading my book and for your kind words! Also for your good questions. The Cloud of Unknowing was written by a Christian monk in the latter half of the 14th centruy. I think the idea of not “thinking” about God has to do with heart language. Pure intention that skips the mind. That sort of communion with the creator that is past thought. I think the suggestion is that thought gets in our way. That we can trust the heart more than the mind. That the mind needs to be engaged, so therefore, give it a word. Keep it simple. Mark its intention and purity. That is your prayer. Return to the pulsing of the heart. Something like that. Hope that helps. You can buy the book on Amazon. It’s intensely powerful. Reads like a hymn. yrs. Laura
Hi Laura! What a great name
WOW the internet is AMAZING, you found my lil bitty post about your terrific book!
I greatly appreciate your taking the time to post and comment. My ‘one little word’ for 2010 is ‘release’ and interestingly it fits for a word for God when I pray. Your words are so true, “That we can trust the heart more than the mind.” and they DO help, so thank you again for sharing.
I wish you much success with your new book and those to come. Vugs! (virtual hugs)
I’m so glad that you shared that, Laura (Laura Munson). I still don’t agree, but more context is always wonderful!
Laura (Laura Allen), you could hold both if you think about me. I don’t think it’s a “pick one” sort of game. 🙂
And yes; feeling and thought can be separately done, but they’re not always done that way.
For me, it’s unkind and lacking in compassion to say that people who think are somehow not doing it as well as those who skip that. Or that the knowing of God (or anything else) isn’t as profound.
Each of us is different. God made us that way, and it makes sense to me that we’d each do it, in our ways, a little bit differently from everyone else.
xoxox
A