The Examen Step 3: Noticing Our Soul’s Connection + Disconnection

My youngest just graduated from high school and my oldest just graduated from college. I thought I was going with the flow until I ate a donut, cried, and pretended I was fine.

Welcome to Step 3 of the examen!

--where we do some deep-down listening to ourselves and Love about what's breaking our heart and what's bringing us alive.

Step 3 is a meaty, meaningful, confusing, wonderful, abundant, contemplative, magical, and vague step and there's little I adore more than wrestling with stuff like this. (One might say talking about consolation + desolation is a consolation to me :D)

But rather than dive into some of the spiritual depths and traditions of consolation and desolation, I think a story might be more helpful. I give you:

The Donut of Desolation:

Z had not graduated yet. It was that time before all big milestones where you can't get there fast enough, but you also need more time and for every task you cross off your list, five more things emerge.

After the vet, but before the grocery store, basketball Senior Night, a zoom session on college housing, an exam, bloodwork, sitting on hold with tech support, spraying for aphids, and diagnosing the broken washing machine, Z and I decided to revisit an old tradition of ours: swinging by Angie's Donuts. It was very early. Apparently the vet had a schedule like ours which is why she could see our dog at an absurd hour. This meant we could beat the donut rush and score our favorites: a cinnamon twist for Z and a cake with pink frosting + sprinkles for me.

We waited to open the box until we got home because we're not monsters. We made coffee, gave the dog her medicine, and turned on music. Z curates a Spotify list for the two of us. Four years of high school carpools has meant treasured time to share new bands and songs with each other. We sang in the kitchen. We paused to comment on the excellent bass and to hear a riff again. We crammed donuts into our mouths as we outlined the day's to-do's. Before we told the rest of the family about the big, pink box and went to work/school/life, I mocked Z for choosing too many plain glazed and NO crullers or old-fashioneds. In other words, things were normal. Life was good.

If there was a soundtrack for this moment, it might be "Walking on Sunshine" by Katrina and the Waves, God Only Knows by the Beach Boys, or even the hymn, It Is Well With My Soul. This was CLEARLY a moment of joy, of consolation, a moment where I felt deep connection to my soul and to Love. This was an ordinary moment, but a precious one.

The day went on. Tasks were checked off. Events were attended. We all headed home after Graduation Event Number Kabillion. I got ready for bed, stared at the ceiling, and did the examen in my head and heart:

Gratitude: time with Z, talking to my oldest on the phone, we're all safe, healthy.
Review the Day: tasks, stuff, events, errands, etc.
Reflect: When and where did I feel connected to  Love today? Where was Love breaking through in my day?

So obvious--the time with Z in the morning with the donuts.

Except the more I sat with this reflection, the more I felt heartbreak, grief, and loss. I told myself I was being ridiculous.

I moved on to desolation: Where did I feel disconnected from myself and Love today?

Again, the donuts showed up. I told myself it was because donuts aren't healthy and I'm trying to treat my body better, but that was a dodge. Every time the donuts came to mind, they brought a load of other things with them:  the music, the singing, the laughing, the ordinary sharing of space with people I love in my home.

I started to cry.

I felt like such a sap, such an idiot. This was happy! Things are fine! Why am I crying?!

I've learned from over 10 years of the examen that you can't run away from your humanity even if you want to. What comes up, comes up and before we can heal, move on, or learn from it, we have to accept it, feel it, and know it's valid in and of itself. So I let myself cry.

And then I opened up to Love and said: I'm worried this was the last time I'll get donuts with Z. Things are changing and these little events won't be ordinary for much longer and I'm going to miss them. I want her to follow her life path, but why does it have to diverge from mine? I don't want an empty house. Who am I in such a house? What is my marriage, my work, my me-ness with a sea change like this? And what if there is little meaning or happiness or life to be found once both of the girls are gone?

This was some of it, but a sad donut remained until I finally said the thing I was most scared to say:

God, I'm scared you're gonna leave and I'm gonna leave when Z leaves.

There it was, the truth. Deep down, I was afraid of losing more than donut trips with Z. I was afraid of losing touch with myself and with Love.

Frankly, this felt like an unwelcome truth...like my dog puking up the apricot pit that necessitated the vet visit. It felt like a gross and embarrassing thing to offer to the Sacred: faithless, melodramatic, absurd, selfish, and dumb.

I don't think you'll be surprised to hear that as soon as I coughed up the truth, I felt better. I said to Love, "Here's a place where I'm scared I can't find you" and Love said, "I'm here" in response.

The rest of my examen kind of drifted off, to be honest. I knew processing and honoring all of these changes in my life and in our family wasn't going to happen in one night. Love and I would have to talk about it for quite awhile. But in one ordinary day, I was gifted with a sacred donut moment that brought me fully alive and also broke my heart. It was a moment of both consolation and desolation.

Sharing this with Love made it a bit easier to accept my humanity and Love's presence in it. Which is the whole point of Step 3, to listen deeply, and more deeply still, until we get to some of our foundational graces and fears and can then turn to the Sacred and ask, "Are you really in this with me? Or have you bailed?" The answer, always, is: I am here.  I am with you. But it's important we give ourselves space and permission to ask. The examen ALWAYS gives us space and permission to be fully human, just as Love does. 

It may be that vet visits, Senior Nights, and grabbing a dozen donuts at 7am on a Wednesday are ordinary things that are nothing special. It may also be that they are holding our most tender humanity and Love's reassuring presence in it. The invitation in Step 3 is simply to listen to know which it is.

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