The Waters of Meribah

I had thought that I was finally through the bitter waters – that I had conquered the anxious edge that drags on consciousness, where the brightness of day or of someone’s smile seems obscured by dank mists of self doubt. I was surprised to find myself lost in the internal clouds again.

There is a singer whose music I love, who died, I believe, from despair. I never understood how she could have done that, when all her songs are so uplifting. They are not songs of one who’s never been in darkness, but of one who has been there and come out. I thought, here in these songs is the proof of healing. How is it that she still succumbed?

I had been in the brightness of Love for many months. I was buoyed by the practice of unconditional love, and saw many old constraints fall away. I told myself in wonder, there’s nothing people can say to me to make me unhappy. There are no conditions that can make me unhappy. Good is here now, and my only job is to notice it.

Then I encountered turbulence. It grew out of what felt like a competitive edge in some people I hoped were friends. Suddenly I found myself asking, What have I accomplished in my life? Where are the fruits of my labors? Where are my labors? Have I even found the “on” switch for productive activity? Has all my sense of OKness been delusional, hiding from myself the serious flaws that everyone else has obviously seen all along?

I grappled with these demons and won. I came out with the following conviction: No amount of personal achievement will ever make me immune from feeling terrible about myself. The voices may say, if only I would accomplish this; or if only I had developed that skill; or exercised the strength of character needed to actually complete that task, I would be worthy, and I could relax. But the voices offer false promise: those demons could still come to me no matter what peaks I scaled.

Conversely, no personal achievement or lack thereof can keep me from my innate worthiness as a child of God. I can be immune from feeling terrible about myself by leaning all of my being on the goodness of being itself – by trusting that the order of the universe, which keeps the planets in their right place, also keeps me in my right orbit, and I can relax in that.

Having won the fight, I emerged triumphantly into the sunshine. But a week or so later, I found myself back in the clouds again. The sunshine seemed as fleeting as actual sunshine in Seattle, instead of being the burning rock core that I needed it to be. And that’s where the waters of Meribah came in.

I found this quote in an address Mrs. Eddy gave in 1899: “The Christian Scientist knows that spiritual faith and understanding pass through the waters of Meribah here – bitter waters; but he also knows they embark for infinity and anchor in omnipotence.” On reading it, I immediately identified the bitter waters as the waves of despair that seemed to want to engulf me again. What I sensed from the passage was that the suggestion of despair may come with the territory, but that I don’t have to indulge in it. I can recognize it as a reminder to draw close to God – to cuddle close in consciousness to the wonder of being that is always there; to put aside my sense of needing to control or achieve, and draw my sense of who I am from what Life is.

When I looked up the waters of Meribah in the Bible, I found that they were waters that Moses struck from the rock for the Children of Israel, while they were complaining that God didn’t provide what they needed. The waters nourished them, but they were bitter because they showed that the Children of Israel hadn’t yet learned to trust God, and in that state of non-trust they wouldn’t be capable of perceiving, and therefore entering, the promised land.

So I see that from time to time I may again fail to see the ways in which my sustenance is provided, especially as I learn to crave that higher level of sustenance that is fed by healing Love. But I have this promise - that as long as I look to infinity for my understanding, I will pass through the waters safely.