I found this poem, sent from my sweet friend, Selena, in my inbox this morning:
The Devil's NOT In The Details
The details are holy.
Wholly
life-affirming,
life-saving,
attitude-adjusting.
How can you not be recharged by
constellations marching
sun glinting
blue skies blazing
trees changing
hawks soaring.
The details are holy.
©Mary Lee Hahn, 2011
It was perfect timing, really. See, just this last weekend, I'd turned to the details for aid in taming the wild, reckless thoughts commonly present in the minds of ...well, everyone I would guess. Deadlines, financial challenges, setbacks, longings, parenting dilemmas, co-worker drama, phobias, temptations plague most of us to some degree or another, and I am certainly no exception. Trying to reason yourself out of these stress-inducing ponderings is like trying to untangle sticky chewed gum from your fingers with your fingers and only getting more and more entwined in the stickiness in the maddening process - yes, I speak from experience. No, it's best (for me anyway) to walk away completely, turning my attention elsewhere ASAP. And that's where my own, self-defined, version of phototherapy comes into play. When life gets hectic, scary, complicated, I take pictures.
There is something calming about reaching for my camera and holding it to my face, squinting my left eye and peering through the view finder with my right. The first thing I notice is my field of vision significantly decreasing. In an instant I am blind to everything peripheral. From there, I begin focusing intently on the mundane, becoming consumed by the quest for a new perspective on the simple sights I'm surrounded by every day but so often take for granted.
Then there's the light. When attempting to capture a compelling image, light is everything. The first light and last light of any day is ideal, the way the rising and setting sun creates depth, highlights and shadows. I am hyper aware of light, thanks to photography. I seek it out, marvel at it's magic - transforming dew drops into glittering jewels. How could I not be recharged by such pure brilliance?
Phototherapy doesn't help pay our bills or erase the hard things I'm called to endure. Some might describe it as escapism, but I prefer the term medicinal - not eradicating mental and emotional disease itself, maybe, but providing me with the internal resources necessary to fight it off, to keep and keep on healing even when infected repeatedly by affliction.
Phototherapy points me always back to the present, to the details, where God is.
The details are holy.