Finding Sustenance

by Ani Vidrine

In my reading one morning from Strength to Love, a compilation of some of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s sermons, I was encouraged by his elucidation of the parable of the person asking a friend for bread in the middle of the night (Luke 11:5-13).  It inspired my own musings.

To what “friend” do I go when I need sustenance at my darkest hour?

In considering this, I realized that my darkest hour is not often an external circumstance.  The events of life demand a response, and with careful consideration, I can typically come up with something.  No, my darkest hour is usually an internal process.  It occurs when I am hijacked by guilt and shame or loneliness and despair.  For some of you it may be when you are blinded by anger/frustration or kidnapped by fear/anxiety.

When I am truly consumed by shame, I default to the narrative of my ego to either convict me of my guilt or convince me of my innocence.  The bread which I am seeking is the loving gaze of unconditional love and compassion, but I am attempting to eat from a moldy loaf.  My “friend,” the ego, does not have that gaze to offer because its mode is self-preservation based on judgment.  It preserves itself by seeing itself in competition with and separate from everyone else.  The ego believes that it is self-sustaining and survives by comparison. 

As it happens, I will never measure up to the standard of external perfection which my ego has set.  I will eternally be rejected by the “friend” who doesn’t want to bother getting up with me at midnight.  In other words, my ego narrative will most often make a case for my guilt because the evidence is not substantial enough to prove my innocence.  The narrative of my ego may also sway the other way, at times, making the “other” guilty and me self-righteous.  Either way, there is no nourishment to be found.

The reward of persistence comes when I look to a friend who has a benevolent set of eyes—eyes that see me as beloved.  This means that, rather than argue with my ego for or against my innocence, I simply detach from the narrative and look elsewhere for bread.  The silence of contemplative prayer can make room for the friendly eyes of compassion to arise, for me to experience the traditionally Buddhist address, "Oh nobly born." This time of sacred pause can also facilitate the memory of Jesus' encouraging words, “Ask, and it will be given to you; search, and you will find; knock, and the door will be opened for you.  For everyone who asks receives, and everyone who searches finds, and for everyone who knocks, the door will be opened.”

Asking requires an element of surrender.  I must release my ego narrative, the case for my guilt or the guilt of others, so that I may receive the gift of unconditional love for which I so long. I know the table from which I am eating by my feelings after the meal.  My “friend,” the ego, leaves me hungry.  The banquet of compassion fills me with faith, hope, and love.  Where do I find this nourishing friend?  Within my own heart.