I think this is very true and I have agreed with it since the very first time I heard it, but again in my life there is a difference between the way things are understood (head knowledge) and the way things are practiced (heart knowledge). It’s almost like I have an interior world. Everything that happens on the outside has an expression on the inside. So with the panic attack, there are actually physical things happening in my interior world that help me understand my exterior world. In this case it’s that as soon as I sit down at the piano in the exterior and have trouble reading the first note I get scared and that adrenaline rushes and on the inside I scream. Before I screamed I was sitting at the piano but now I have jumped up and screamed at the top of my lungs and am running like crazy around the house. I am nowhere near the piano anymore. I’m not going anywhere, I’m just running and somehow I find myself out the front door down the street and run until I can’t run anymore.
That`s what’s happening inside when I`m having the panic attack on the outside. When I finally do tire out and can’t run any longer I stop and look around. I am in the strangest place. It`s an intersection of roads that don’t seem to lead anywhere. I somehow know that every road leads back to the house (something tells me God has something to do with that) so I don’t have to worry about which road to take I just have to start walking. Over the years, the trip home has gotten shorter and shorter but the amount of time that I spend running has gotten longer and longer (regular laws of physics don`t apply. A long run means its a long time before I stop panicking and a short walk home means I don`t try to avoid God anymore).
So we did an exercise today using God`s house (read up on Ignaatius sanctified imagination for more info).I lived in my spiritual world for a few moments to see what happens when the panic attack starts and how to resolve things. Usually what happens is I have my spastic panic screech and run out the door. Eventually I do come home and God is always at the front door and I have nothing left. I don’t even have the energy to walk into the healing room or the throne room or the kitchen. God scoops me up in his arms and he rocks me like an infant until I stop crying. He continues to rock me until I calm down and realize that I am back home in his arms. He takes me out to the terrace to just swing in the glider for a few minutes. If you don’t remember, the terrace is out by the kitchen near the throne room. It`s where the three paths are, the one with the briars, the one with the lawn and the one with the pathway. Apparently we’ve decorated the terrace cause it now has a glider swing. One of those outdoor rocky swingy things for 2 people. Me and god just sit there for a while. He doesn’t need me to say anything cause he already knows everything, he doesn’t need me to do anything cause there’s nothing he can’t do. He doesn’t need me to be better or change or do anything at all. He only needs me to just be and to remember that I am cherished and that we will try it again.
So eventually all of this works itself out. I’ve calmed down and I`m back in those arms back in that place I like to be. We’re chilling out on the terrace and we can chat. What he told me today, what hadn’t clicked before...It’s not just about saying a little prayer before you start playing to invite God into your playing. Instead, it`s that I need to invite him to play a duet with me. God said if I want to jam with him, all I have to do is ask. I can invite him to play with me any time and we can play it as a duet. I think that`s what happened years ago when I played Bridge Over Troubled Water and completely forgot that I had an audience. I didn`t know about the recital hall or God`s house yet but somehow I tapped into it. To me it is a glorious image of what I would like to be doing.
I am again floored by how quickly things click when I finally get them. Even today when I was on Mediashout, before church started I was thinking through the steps and wanting to do so well but it didn`t quite do enough. I still was nervous and tense and panicky and not sure if I was going to do right and that was even before I went to church this morning. Now I`m thinking of next week. I`m scheduled to play piano in church and have no organist to accompany me and playing clarinet in public for the first time when Im so new at the clarinet. Right now I`m actually thinking about this and I`m in a place of joy. I can`t wait to see what it`s going to be like to play a duet with God. Don`t get me wrong. I`m not kidding myself. I`m still going to be nervous and I`m probably still going to have a panic attack. My hope is that this time the panic attack doesn`t send me screaming through the house. My hope is that I can remember that God is there listening and playing with me. My hope is that I am not there playing for the people in the room but sitting in the house jamming with God. I`m getting ecstatic at the idea of being able to play around and jam with God. It is going to be such an absolute blast and I am so looking forward to it.
