Waiting for Petunia

I bought a Prius about a year and a half ago. I named her Petunia because somehow the name just fit that little, delightful car. In keeping with the warranty, I’ve been diligently making my “every 5K mile” appointments for her check-up, tire rotation and oil change.

One bleak, cold and rainy morning, there I sat in the waiting room at 7:00 a.m. with a bunch of other sleepy people doing the same thing. You know what these waiting rooms are like – the smell of burnt coffee, the cacophony of BOTH the TV and the Muzak whining at the same time… ugh.

I don’t know why, everywhere you go these days, there is a TV on and blaring. 

• I had a doctor’s appointment recently and the TV in the waiting room was on one of those screaming news channels. By the time I got into the treatment room, my blood pressure was sky high!
• My nail salon also has several TVs on constantly, with the local news looping the same information every 20 minutes. I go there to get AWAY from the news and all other electronic bombardments to our daily life.

Noise, noise and more noise.

Back to the waiting room: The weather was not conducive to going outside that morning, so I brought along some of my subscription magazines to catch up on my reading and hopefully mentally drown out the competing noises in the room.

First up: Shambhala Sun, the November 2013 issue titled, Spiritual But Not Religious? I open it up to the page of contributing authors and there I see the photo and short bio of Roger Lipsey, the husband of a friend of mine who is the author of a new biography on Dag Hammarskjold. The title of his article is “Stillness in Action: Reflections on Dag Hammarskjold.”

Most of us know the name Hammarskjold for the plaza named for him at the United Nations, and that’s about it. However, he was the Secretary General of the U.N. from 1953 until 1961, at the height of the cold war, and was much admired for his peacemaking methods including shuttle diplomacy and creating the model for UN peacekeeping forces. He was also known as a deeply-spiritual person, a highly-effective diplomat and man of integrity. What struck me while reading the article (and I have not yet read the book) was his quest for emptiness, stillness and silence.

For those of us engaged in conflict resolution and peacemaking (and believe me, I don’t even try to hold a candle to Hammarskjold and his accomplishments!), the concept of stillness and quiet is quite appealing. I always take a few minutes before my clients arrive to still myself, close my eyes, and say a little prayer for guidance and calm.

One of the things I learned in reading the article is that in the United Nations building, Hammarskjold inaugurated and helped design a Room of Quiet. For its inauguration, he wrote:

“We all have within us a center of stillness surrounded by silence. This house, dedicated to work and debate in the service of peace, should have one room dedicated to silence in the outward sense and stillness in the inner sense. It has been the aim to create in this small room a place where the doors may be open to the infinite lands of thought and prayer.”

Amen.

Comments From Social Media

So well written and clearly felt. It’s so encouraging to realize that Dag Hammarskjold’s perspective and wonderful words continue to inspire others, as they inspire me. Here is something he quoted from Meister Eckhart, the 13th-century Christian mystic and preacher who was, in his adult years, his primary teacher: “You must have an exalted mind and a burning heart in which nonetheless reigns silent stillness.” This paradox sets the standard – an impossible standard but all the same….

Roger Lipsey 

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