Jun 25, 2010
Facing My Own Insignificance: How My Vacation Changed Me
Standing on top of a mountain looking down on the Northumberland Straight at Cape Breton Nova Scotia did something to me. When you’re a tiny bug of a person on a wild mountain with moose roaming about, clouds shrouding the sun, and waves rippling the vast sea below, you notice something about yourself.
I could do nothing to change the mountain, sea, or sky on my own from the little speck of dirt beneath my feet. I was helpless and at the mercy of my surroundings. Everything was large and powerful except for me.
Walking down the wooden steps to the various lookout points I felt dizzy at times, while other moments I felt the crushing power of my surroundings.
It was the perfect experience for the first few days of our vacation. In a sense, this holy moment on the mountain drove home the insignificance of my own worries, ambitions, and desires. They have their place, but they had been consuming me to the point of idolatry of some sort.
Perhaps this sense of awe and power is why God often met with his prophets up on mountains. The perspective is enlightening in and of itself. Hidden away in a cave or a snug valley, the effect on pondering one’s limitations is quite blunted.
On my way down the mountain I began praying the most important prayer I know that is also the easiest to forget: “Lord, what do you desire?” Throughout my vacation, as I’m sure I shall be for the rest of my life, I moved between this prayer of submission and my petitions.
I need to bring my petitions to God, but nothing quite puts them into perspective like a trip to a mountain top. From that mountain top I can see my plans and worries as mere specs in God’s creation, and once I receive the blow to my own ego, there is a comfort in knowing he can handle these larger matters, and as such, my own concerns are well within his abilities.
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What a moving post. I personally love Cape Breton and have been there several times. I really like what you shared about praying to know what God desires. That’s powerful!
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As You, and others may realize, out there in the simplistic wild, you were practicing the spiritual practice of detachment. (and probably also unplugging… maybe other ones too, like rest, and retreat.
Detachment is not a withdraw emotionally from people/relationships, or even a way of life, but instead, it is a chance to view one’s life from a different view, and purposefully disengage, in a healthy way, from the things that become distractions from God and his ways. It puts things in their rightful place, and people/relationships in better standing at the same time. (We sometimes have unhealthy (maybe co-dependant) attachments to people as well.)
Detachment helps rid us of idols, all of which contend for our love and loyalty. We come back from the experience renewed, energized, and better able to love properly and rightly, holding on to what we have in ways that are more pleasing to God, and produce more growth and abundance in us.
The practice of detachment should be a regular one!
Thanks for bringing this wonderful insight to our attention, Ed. I’m glad it was so helpful to you.
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Thanks Lisa! Great, great insights there. Can you do a post or a series of posts on this? I feel like more folks need to hear about this.
Blessings.
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