I thank You God for most this amazing day
for the leaping greenly spirits of trees
and a blue true dream of sky; and for everything
which is natural which is infinite which is yes.
-e.e. cummings

Where I live, winter is a raw and bitter, wind-swept and white, unpredictable and uncompromising time of year. We go from dry, cold, grey days to deep wet frozen days. The pavement turns from white snow to black ice from one moment to the other. The wind howls around the house, whipping wet leaves and soft snowflakes with it.

One black night everything in sight is fogged in dark; the next morning even the inner city is clear and clean and deep, deep white. Then we stay inside, make popcorn, light the fire, curl up in blankets and play games.

Indeed, winter, for us, is an experience in the struggles of life, in its twists and turns, in its great challenges and small triumphs. We watch where we walk now, we cling to handrails from place to place, we drive slowly, deliberately, cautiously from corner to corner. We go through life more thoughtfully, more quietly, more prudently—with an eye to what might happen as well as for what is happening. We manage it all quite well, of course, but not cavalierly. Every step in life demands attention then.

Finally, in the north, finally, one day, almost without warning, spring comes. You smell it. You taste it in the air. You watch pregnant trees explode with new bloom. Suddenly. And you know. You know that life has changed, that life is new again.

Around the neighborhood, the windows begin to open, one at a time, tentatively at first, one here, then another one there. Then all at once, it seems, then another one there. Then all at once, it seems, the street is open and bold with life.

Children appear in the middle of the road, bouncing balls, laughing loudly. The corner ice cream stand, weeks early, opens and calls the children out of their small, old houses like the Pied Piper of play. And all us older people feel our limbs loosen a bit and our hearts begin to smile.

It is an exercise in “yes,” this slip-slide through the seasons. Yes to today; yes to tomorrow; yes to life again. We all come out of the tomb of winter, new and bright with promise. It is “yes” to life-time now, however old, however jaded we may be. It is the rediscovery of possibility again.

The turn of the seasons in the north is a kaleidoscope of the seasons of life, of the face of God in time, of the very process of what it means to be alive. In the seasons we see the story of ourselves played out: early on, life without shape; later, life in pursuit of direction; finally, life on the way to its horizon; at the end, life, mellowed, going down into the sea of eternity. Through all of them, like warp and woof, lies the essential pattern, the obligation to say “yes.”

Yes, yes, yes life teaches us to say. Yes, yes, yes, we must learn to say back. Otherwise, we will surely die long before we have ever learned to live.

MONDAY, DECEMBER 1: Ignoring the problems of life is not a solution to them. It is not “yes” to the challenge of the day. It is, at best, only a charade, a game of pretend. As G.K. Chesterton said, “It isn’t that they can’t see the solution. It is that they can’t see the problem.”

TUESDAY, DECEMBER 2: Remember that life is to be lived–all of it, in all of its layers and longings. Only then will we ever know our own strength and depth of soul.

WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 3: When we learn to see every flower, hear every bird, we will be closer than we have ever been to being fully alive.

THURSDAY, DECEMBER 4: Life is not to be rationed, parceled out, allotted in sensible pieces—a bit of fun, a touch of joy, a glance at love, as little as possible of sorrow.

FRIDAY, DECEMBER 5: Life is to be lived to the hilt, experienced, accepted. “The only thing better than singing,” Ella Fitzgerald said, “is more singing.”

SATURDAY, DECEMBER 6: Say “yes” to all of life. Say it loudly. Say it fully. Say it with faith that winter cannot last forever and spring comes in strange and sudden guise.

SUNDAY, DECEMBER 7: The frame of mind we take to every part of life will have a great deal to do with the way it affects us.

MONDAY, DECEMBER 8: “Two men looked out from prison bars,” the poem reads. “One saw mud and the other saw stars.” Which says to us: How do you see your life? The answer to that simple question determines whether you are a happy person or a dour one.

TUESDAY, DECEMBER 9: The thing about our winter is that it snows. The thing about spring is that it rains. The thing about summer is that it’s sweltering hot. The thing about autumn is that it’s dark and cold. Isn’t it wonderful? All of it. Every single different thing that makes us adjust and enjoy and live life differently.

WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 10: There was a time when we thought that what happened to us determined the quality of our life. Now we know that it’s what we think about our experiences. William James, the great psychologist wrote, “The greatest discovery of my generation is that a human being can alter their life by altering their attitudes of mind.”

THURSDAY, DECEMBER 11: The personality we bring to life each day determines the climate of it for everyone else. “An optimist,” Susan Bissionette wrote, “is the human personification of spring.”

FRIDAY, DECEMBER 12: It takes a bit of courage to face the seasons, to dress for them properly, to find something we like to do in each of them, to get up the energy to go out into them, head up, shoulders back, and smiling.

SATURDAY, DECEMBER 13: In fact, it’s finding something right about every day of our lives that makes each of them either a positive or a negative event. The choice is ours.

SUNDAY, DECEMBER 14: The way we face the day is the kind of day it will be for other people around us. “Attitudes are contagious,” Dennis and Wendy Mannering wrote. “Are yours worth catching?”

MONDAY, DECEMBER 15: Most of us don’t say “yes” to life at all. Instead, we say either “no,” or worse “I refuse.” Then we wonder why other people are so much happier than we are.

TUESDAY, DECEMBER 16: Oscar Wilde, the Irish writer, put it this way: “If you don’t get everything you want, think of the things you don’t get that you don’t want.” Point: Life is a lot better than it could be. Maybe we ought to be glad we got what we did.

WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 17: No, life is not predictable, but it is livable if we only concentrate on what we have more than on what we want. “Life is a shipwreck,” Voltaire wrote, “but we must not forget to sing in the lifeboats.”

THURSDAY, DECEMBER 18: We live life well only by throwing ourselves into it. As Dag Hammarskjold puts it, “We are not permitted to choose the frame of our destiny. But what we put into it is our own.”

FRIDAY, DECEMBER 19: The truth is that no one has the perfect life—except those who are perfectly committed to make the best of the one they have.

SATURDAY, DECEMBER 20: The trick to having a happy life is to remember that it all comes down to what we ourselves make of the life we have. “The sun shines and warms and lights us and we have no curiosity to know why this is so,” Ralph Waldo Emerson says. “But we ask the reason of all evil, of pain, and hunger, and mosquitoes, and silly people.”

SUNDAY, DECEMBER 21: It’s not the thing we’re facing that counts. It’s the way we look at the thing we’re facing—the long commute across town, the change of jobs, the loss of the promotion, the schedule—that makes all the difference in what it does to us. “It’s so hard when I have to,” Annie Gottlier writes, “and so easy when I want to.”

MONDAY, DECEMBER 22: How is it that we find ourselves doing the very same thing that other people are doing, but they are glad to do it and we’re not?

TUESDAY, DECEMBER 23: One of the major obstacles to saying “yes” to life may be that we mistake the accidentals of life for the essence of life. Or to put it another way: “Enjoy the little things,” Robert Brault says, “for one day you may look back and realize they were the big things.”

WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 24: It is not the thing itself that brings us either joy or pain. It is the attitude we bring to it. Thich Nhat Hanh says of it, “Sometimes your joy is the source of your smile, but sometimes your smile can be the source of your joy.”

THURSDAY, DECEMBER 25: God is not somewhere else. God is everywhere. God is here. With me. In me. Now. “We have what we seek,” the monk Thomas Merton wrote.

FRIDAY, DECEMBER 26: The presence of God in our lives affects everything else about it; it focuses our values; it directs our desires; it shapes our relationships with others; it simplifies our needs.

SATURDAY, DECEMBER 27: In the midst of pain and bleakness, do something good and joyful for yourself. It is important that we not let sorrow consume us.

SUNDAY, DECEMBER 28: An anonymous philosopher wrote once: “Anywhere is paradise; it’s up to you.”

MONDAY, DECEMBER 29: The person who is spiritually mature trusts in the presence of a loving God to bring this moment, whatever it is, to ripe in my soul. So as Pir Vilayet Khan says, “The only relevant spiritual question is: Why aren’t you dancing with joy at this very moment?”

TUESDAY, DECEMBER 30: This is a time for reflection on what we’ve lost in life, yes, and for what we have left in life, too. It’s time to begin to live life fuller rather than faster.

WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 31: To insist on living until we die may be one of life’s greatest virtues.

LET’S SHARE OUR THOUGHTS
The following discussion questions, Scripture echo, journal prompts, and prayer are meant to help you reflect more deeply on The Monastic Way. Choose at least two suggestions and respond to them. You may do it as a personal practice or gather a group interested in sharing the spiritual journey.

DISCUSSION QUESTIONS

1. Do you agree with Sister Joan’s assertion that it is our attitude, our willingness to say “yes” that most determines how things go for us? Or do you think attitude is less important than the circumstances in which we find ourselves? Has it been a challenge for you to embrace life’s changes with a positive attitude, or does it come naturally to you?

2. Which daily quote in The Monastic Way is most meaningful to you? Why? Do you agree with it? Disagree? Did it inspire you? Challenge you? Raise questions for you?

3. After reading The Monastic Way, write one question that you would like to ask the author about this month’s topic.

4. Joan Chittister uses other literature to reinforce and expand her writing. Find another quote, poem, story, song, art piece, novel that echoes the theme of this month’s Monastic Way.

5. Think of someone you know who has “lived life to the hilt,” as Sister Joan describes on December 5. Write them a letter explaining what their example has meant to you.

JOURNAL PROMPTS

Prompt 1: Here are a few statements from this month’s Monastic Way. Choose one that is most helpful to you and journal with it.

• The way we face the day is the kind of day it will be for other people around us.

• The truth is that no one has the perfect life—except those who are perfectly committed to make the best of the one they have.

• To insist on living until we die may be one of life’s greatest virtues.

Prompt 2: Spend a few minutes with this photograph and journal about its relationship to this month’s Monastic Way. You can do that with prose or a poem or a song or....

SCRIPTURE ECHO
“Mary answered the angel, ‘Behold, I am the handmaid of God. Let it be done to me according to your word.’”
- LUKE 1:38

PRAYER

My God, I am yours for all eternity. Teach me to cast my whole self into the arms of your Providence with the most lively, unlimited confidence in your compassionate, tender pity. Grant, O most merciful Redeemer, that whatever you ordain or permit may always be acceptable to me.
—from the Suscipe of Catherine McAuley