Recipes for a Sacred Life: True Stories and a Few Miracles

by Rivvy Neshama

  Then, one morning, while my eighty-something mother was visiting from Philadelphia, she came out on the patio and sat down nearby, just as I was doing my morning “hellos” to the world. She regards my diverse spiritual practices with some bemusement, but tries not to intrude when I’m at it. Still, she’s also curious, which spurred her to move closer to hear.

  “Hello to the birds and the deer,” I said, arms open wide.

  “Don’t forget the squirrels,” Mom interrupted.

  “Hello to the flowers, bushes, and trees.”

  “You have some beautiful trees,” Mom said. “Really.” Finally, I spread my arms even wider and announced,

  “It’s a good day to die!”

  “Well,” Mom chirped in, “it’s not a bad day to live either.”

  She had a point. So now I end my blessings like this:

  “It’s a good day to die!” I say.

  And then, with gusto, “It’s a good day to live!”

  THE WHERE TO BEGIN

  Deepak Chopra is known for his many books of guidance. The one I like best and keep at my bedside is The Seven Spiritual Laws of Success. It’s a small book with short chapters that tell it like it is: Do this and you’ll get that. And if you follow his advice, what you’ll get is “harmony with nature,” “success in every endeavor,” and “an experience of the miraculous.” Not bad.

  In chapter 1, Chopra presents the first law, “The Law of Pure Potentiality.” Here, he shows us how to create the openness that can lead to fulfillment. It’s a simple recipe—only four things to do daily—and when I first read it, it seemed easy:

  Have a time of silence and stillness when you do nothing at all. (Sounds good!)

  Meditate. (Check!)

  Spend some time in nature—say, watching the moon rise—and feel the beauty and perfection of the universe. (Got it!)

  Practice non-judgment throughout the day, beginning with an intention like “Today, I will not judge.” (Right!)

  Ready to go, I began meditating on a daily basis, even if only for five minutes. I also remembered to sit still a bit and not even read. Then I’d walk outside to stare at a flower or the sky. And finally, I began to notice when I would judge.

  What I noticed was I judge almost always, and I didn’t know how to stop. I judge myself, I judge others, I judge myself for judging others. I judge friends, strangers, events. I judge neighbors, politicians, the weather . . . I’m an all-inclusive judge!

  This was not good news. I wanted to move on to the second law, and the third, and fourth . . . and live a life of Harmony, Success, and Miracles. But I felt I couldn’t read further until I had the first law down cold. Otherwise, it would feel like cheating. Besides, it probably wouldn’t work.

  So I kept rereading chapter 1. Then I would meditate, be silent, look at the birds . . . and watch myself judge. It was hopeless, and so was I.

  It reminded me of the salsa class John and I took one winter. Our teacher, Carmen, made the lessons so easy that within a few weeks we were moving our hips, getting the rhythm, and feeling, hey, we can do this. But in the last two sessions, Carmen taught turns, and try as we would, this was not meant to be. John would turn one way, I would turn the other, and we’d never end up in the same place at the same time.

  The next month, Carmen offered Level 2 classes, but knowing our problem with turns, we signed up for another go at Level 1. This worked out well. We got even better at the basics. So good, in fact, that Carmen said “Watch John and Rivvy” and made us dance at the front of the room. Our classmates were impressed with our style and savvy—until session five, when Carmen again taught turns. Well, I thought, we could just keep signing up for Level 1 and have a few weeks of glory.

  With that same reasoning, I decided I could make Deepak’s first law my life’s practice. And then, one day, while yet again reading chapter 1, I noticed something he wrote that I must have skimmed over before. If a whole day of non-judging seems too daunting, he says, start smaller. Say something like “For the next two hours, I won’t judge at all.” Or lower the bar even more: “Just this hour, I will not judge.”

  This sounded doable, and indeed, I could do it! For one hour, I would notice my judging, let it go, and move on. And as I stopped judging, I began to feel a wonderful lightness, a sense that everything, including myself, was okay.

  At last, I was ready to move on to chapter 2, “The Law of Giving,” and step up my spiritual life. But the funny thing is, I’m still reading chapter 1, over and over, and practicing “The Law of Pure Potentiality.” It’s the basics, the footwork, the where to begin—just like Carmen’s first class got us out there and dancing.

  GRATEFUL IN HARLEM

  I don’t always feel that grateful. Sometimes, when things are really bad, I don’t even try. But then I remember the darkest time of my life, and meeting Billie, and learning the power of being grateful.

  My first marriage, to the man I thought was my soul mate, had ended. We parted, he found a new place, and our two young children, Tony and Elise, moved back and forth between us, clutching their overnight bags and looking as confused and fragile as we were.

  It wasn’t long after then that I began to have panic attacks. I didn’t know that’s what they were called. I only knew I couldn’t breathe and thought I was dying or going crazy. Night after night, I sat up in bed, praying for sleep or to make it through.

  Most of all, I prayed for salvation. And it came through two things: my job and my children. They made me get up and keep moving; they gave me a purpose and a life.

  The job was in Harlem. I was a community organizer helping school kids at risk. A team of us worked out of a church, and we were a motley crew: one ex-debutante, two guys from the ’hood, one church lady, and me—white girl with good intentions.

  The men were a lively pair, always slapping each other and giving high fives. They seemed to bop more than walk, and their talk was fast and fluid. But what I liked most about them was they were real—no fake smiles, no pretense at all—and I found that comforting. They didn’t hide their pain: I saw it in their faces. I even saw it sometimes in the face of our boss, the activist reverend Dr. C. I once asked Dr. C how he was doing and he said, “I’m hangin’ in, honey, hangin’ in by a thread.”

  The one who helped hold us up was the church lady, Billie, a handsome, hearty black woman whose humor was sharp but softened by her smile. She was my first live church lady, full of faith, and her own calm center helped me feel anchored and safe. And then there were her cakes, baked from scratch, awesome cakes with lemon icing that she’d bring to the church.

  One day Billie found me crying and asked, “What’s wrong, child?”

  What’s wrong seemed beyond words. I was lost, frightened, and deeply depressed. With my soul mate gone, I forgot who I was, and each day was a battle against my own pain.

  What made the pain worse was that it felt unworthy, compared to what I saw daily in Harlem: junkies falling in slow motion on sidewalks, and young kids killing themselves or others.

  “Your pain is your pain,” Billie said softly. “We’ve all got our struggle. But what you need, child, is to practice some gratefulness.” Then she gave me this recipe to help me begin.

  Billie told me to get a journal and write down each night—free form, no thinking—two lists, as long as I could make them. One was to be titled “I’m grateful for . . . ,” and the second was “I love in me . . .”

  “Just write down whatever comes to mind,” Billie said, “and they can be the same things each time.”

  So that’s what I did nightly before trying to sleep. Sometimes my two lists would merge: “I’m grateful for . . . the walk I took in the park” and “I love in me . . . walking in the park.” The more I did it, the more things came to mind:

  “I’m grateful for . . . my children . . . eating soul food at Sylvia’s . . .”

  “I love in me . . . my smile . . . teaching Lakisha to read . . .”

  Just writing these lists, I
began to feel better; each line was a rope that pulled me to shore.

  But there’s more to this story. For there still were days lost to despair, when I felt too broken to ever feel grateful. On one of those days, a cold day in November, I left work, trudged through soot and snow to the subway, and walked slowly, very slowly, down to the train. It was impossible to move any faster because of the three elderly women in front of me who cautiously stepped down the wet, slushy stairs.

  It’s hard for me to tell the ages of older black women. They don’t wrinkle and dry up like white people do. But I could see they were very old, these women, with their hollowed cheeks and wispy white hair. And I could tell how poor they were by the thin, worn-out coats they wore in this, the coldest of winters.

  One of the women, the eldest perhaps, would rest on her cane and speak after each step. She was instantly echoed by her two friends, as if they were her congregation.

  “Praise the Lord!” she commanded.

  “Praise the Lord!” they repeated.

  Slowly, carefully, another step was taken.

  “God is good to us!” she said with reverence.

  “God is good to us!” they acknowledged.

  All three now leaned on their canes or the railing, tired, out of breath, in old-age pain. And while they rested, I wondered about their prayer. God is good to us? They thought that now? Shivering in their thin coats, barely able to move?

  Then their leader took another step, looked upward, and said, “It could be worse!”

  Suddenly turning to face me, she asked, “Right, missy? It could be worse?”

  She stumbled, almost losing her balance, so I offered my arm. “Yes, ma’am,” I agreed, as we walked down together. “It could be worse.”

  Which is why, years later, I still write my gratefuls. On good days, they’re a way to always give thanks. And on bad days, each line helps to pull me to shore—and reminds me, it could be worse.

  Life is glorious, but life is also wretched. It is both. . . .

  Gloriousness and wretchedness need each other.

  One inspires us; the other softens us. They go together.

  —PEMA CHÖDRÖN

  TEA AND COMPASSION

  While staying in Manhattan to visit family, I went with John one Sunday to see my Sufi teacher, Halil Baba. He had asked us to meet him at Aisha’s apartment, where we’d all met twice before. The first time it had felt strange, seeing him in a mundane setting and wearing a sweater and pants instead of the white robe and prayer cap he wore as a sheikh. But his kind, weathered face and soft brown eyes were familiar, and it was a special treat to be together at Aisha’s. Nonetheless, on this day I felt uneasy because early that morning John and I had a fight.

  I have a dark side. I guess all people do. But mine just might be a little darker. Anyway, most people don’t get to see that part of me. I save it for my dearest John—a dubious honor. Not that John is perfect. Still, like most men, his sins are more passive—grumpiness, sins of omission—while mine have drama and flair. I won’t go into scary details, but I’ve noticed that when I’m bad, I’m often bad the same way. Later, I feel so remorseful, and John always forgives me, though I have trouble forgiving myself. I also feel like a total phony if I’m off to do something spiritual, like writing this book or hanging out with Halil Baba.

  Which is why I felt uneasy that Sunday afternoon when John and I went to Aisha’s to meet him, right after one of my darker moments. If he knew what I’m really like, I thought, he wouldn’t want to be my teacher.

  Aisha, a fellow Sufi, lives on the Upper East Side and, like Halil Baba, is from Turkey, where hospitality must be a national trait. She always welcomes us so graciously: “John! Rabia!” she exclaims with great pleasure, Rabia being my Sufi name. And no matter what time it is, she offers us an abundance of Turkish delights—vine leaves stuffed with rice and nuts, carrots in olive oil, sweet chocolate halva—which she serves on a round brass tray. With Halil Baba, we sit in a circle on the floor, resting on large velvet pillows as we eat, sip tea, and exchange niceties.

  No one does niceties like the Sufis from Turkey. They don’t just ask “How’s your family?” but are always blessing them as well: “Blessings on you, Rabia, and your sweet daughter and son, and blessings on your beloved mother. And may Allah bless you all with good fortune, good health, prosperity, and peace! Inshallah (God willing)!”

  Then, at some point, we begin to chant together the names of the Divine—a Sufi practice called Zikr, remembrance of God—and talk about matters on a higher level.

  “Do you have any questions, Rabia?” Halil Baba asked on this particular day; for though he once modestly said he didn’t consider himself a teacher, he added gently, “perhaps a guide.”

  So I told him in a roundabout way that I’m often not the person I hope to be or he sees me as, and that, in fact, I can be quite dreadful. “I always feel so sorry afterward and swear I’ll never be that way again,” I said, my eyes downcast. “But then I am.”

  Halil Baba nodded kindly and said, “When children do something bad, they cry and say they’re sorry and promise their parents they’ll never do it again. And their parents see their good heart and intentions. So they kiss them and love them and forgive them—even knowing that they’ll likely do that very thing again!”

  We all laughed and Halil Baba continued, “Well, with Allah it is the same. Allah is our parent. We are all his children. And every time we sincerely say we are sorry and promise we won’t do something again, Allah sees our remorse and good heart and loves us and is happy—even knowing that we’ll likely do that very thing again!”

  Then he told us a parable, which is how Sufis teach, through stories and fables from their oral tradition.

  “There is a vast, deep ocean,” he said. “And on that ocean there is a tiny island. And on that island there is a parrot sitting in a tree. And on the beak of the parrot there is a tiny speck of dirt.

  “Can you see that?” Halil Baba asked, his brown eyes shining. “Well, that tiny speck of dirt is our sins. But the vast, deep ocean is Allah’s compassion.”

  I felt my heart open—to the day, to myself, to compassion.

  Then I smiled at John.

  He smiled back at me.

  And we both knew, most likely, I’d do that very thing again.

  Come, come, whoever you are . . .

  Come, even if you have broken your vows

  A hundred times,

  Come, come again, come.

  —RUMI

  MY MOTHER-IN-LAW’S BEDROOM

  John’s mum, Dorothy Wilcockson, always lived simply. She grew up poor in rural England and left school for work at age fourteen. By the time I met her, she was a widow in her eighties and had enough money from her pension to live a nice life. Mum shared a home with her elder son, Dave, by the creek in Dorking, Surrey.

  Yet despite her savings, Mum lived as simply as ever. She kept their home clean and unadorned and only bought what she truly needed. On our yearly visit, there was good food to eat, but just enough—nothing extra, no waste.

  She didn’t waste words either. Each day of our visits, we’d sit together in the living room and Mum would ask us how we were feeling and how our grandchildren were and then settle down to knit scarves—“For the old people,” she’d say and then laugh, because they, in their seventies, were far younger than she. While she knitted, Dave read the horse-race results in the paper, John communicated with his computer, and I played my guitar. Now and then, someone would say something about what they were reading, or comment on the changing light outside, or Mum would say, “That’s pretty, dear,” about the music.

  It was a routine that seemed foreign to me—raised in a Jewish home on the East Coast where you had to speak loud and fast to be heard—but I grew to love it. There was an acceptance and warmth in the silence we shared. Its peacefulness soothed me. Then, at 4, Mum would always ask, “Would you like some tea?” Later, we’d cook dinner, play Scrabble, and go to bed.
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  John and I would stay in the large and airy blue room: light blue walls, white bedspread with blue flowers, and sheer white curtains. I thought of Mum’s room as the lilac room because when I’d peek in, I’d get a feeling of lilac. Perhaps it was the walls or her bedspread . . . I just knew I saw lilac.

  I never entered her room until after she died. It was such a little room, such a small space she took for herself, that it felt invasive to enter it when she was there. But after she died, I wanted to see it, to know her better in any way I could.

  I walked into the room with reverence, and that seemed right, not only because she had died, but because it looked like a young girl’s bedroom to dream in or a nun’s room for prayer. The furnishings were sparse: a small bed with a wooden nightstand, one chest of drawers, and a little dressing table with a mirror. Only a few objects were on the table: a hairbrush, some face cream, a photo of her with her children, and two picture postcards we had sent from Colorado. The purple curtains were homemade, the ruffled bedspread was white with blue and lilac flowers, and the wallpaper was a pale mauve-pink.

  Everything was perfectly neat and clean and had a purpose. Nothing extra, no waste. Just a simplicity and sweetness that made her room feel almost holy. Like Mum, it inspired me and said, Here’s another way to live.

  MIRACLES TO SHARE

  I was reading a book with a great title, Stand Like Mountain, Flow Like Water, by Brian Luke Seaward, and something he wrote struck me. After revealing that he’d had several mystical experiences in his life but felt guarded about sharing them since few people do, he said, “I imagine that if, indeed, we did share these on a regular basis, we might be living in a much different world. Perhaps a better world.”

  Now I believe, as Seaward does, that many, if not all of us, have experienced the miraculous sometime in our lives. Not just the ever-present miracles of creation, but something specific to our own life story. We might not have called it a miracle; we might have said, What an amazing coincidence, or, Thank God that happened. But maybe, just maybe, it was a miracle.