then, did I try so hard for so long to get away without
feeling or living deeply?
A friend was visiting with his spiritual director, listing all the
ways that life had disappointed him—his marriage wasn’t
what he wanted; his childhood left him aching for love; his
career wasn’t soaring the way he’d imagined it could. On
and on he went, listing all the disappointments that were his
life. And all at once the usually reserved priest broke in and
yelled his name. “These are the terms! Now what’s the
invitation?”
What an extraordinary idea: there are terms. And there
are invitations. Most of us don’t live this way—or at least
control freaks like me don’t live this way very often. We
like to think we set the terms, and we issue the invitations.
But maturity, perhaps, is the realization that we are not
handing out terms or invitations.
To be very honest, my first several brushes with the
terms of my own limitations didn’t bring me to maturity.
They brought me to blame, to anger, fist-shaking, sputtering
with fear and outrage. But after enough limitations and
failures and small deaths, even I began to come around to
the invitations, to the idea that our lives are not blank slates,
but they’re beautiful nonetheless. No. They’re beautiful
because of that, because they’ve been created over time, in
love and sickness and moments of courage and moments of