September 3rd 2023 : On being the anthropologist of one's own life

This Sunday themes emerges as an invitation to observe and understand our own experiences, emotions, and paths with a compassionate and introspective lens. Just as anthropologists gain insights into cultures by immersing themselves and examining details, we can gain a deeper understanding of ourselves by exploring our inner landscapes, acknowledging our wounds, and purposefully carving out moments of solitude for self-discovery.

The First Reading is from Alice Walker, an American writer whose novels, short stories, and poems are noted for their insightful treatment. Her novels, most notably The Color Purple (1982), focus particularly on women. Walker was the eighth child of African-American sharecroppers. While growing up she was accidentally blinded in one eye, and her mother gave her a typewriter, allowing her to write instead of doing chores. 

Alice Walker, Taking the Arrow out of the Heart

“No one escapes a time in life when the arrow of sorrow, of anger, of despair pierces the heart. For many of us, there is the inevitable need to circle the wound. It is often such a surprise to find it there, in us, when we had assumed arrows so painful only landed in the hearts of other people. Some of us spend decades screaming at the archer. Or at least for longer periods than are good for us. How to take the arrow out of the heart? How to learn to relieve our own pain? That is the question. “

The Second Reading is from Carl Sandburg who was an American poet, biographer, journalist, and editor. He won three Pulitzer Prizes: two for his poetry and one for his biography of Abraham Lincoln.

“[One] must find time for [one]self. Time is what we spend our lives with. If we are not careful we find others spending it for us. . . . It is necessary now and then for [one] to go away by [oneself] and experience loneliness; to sit on a rock in the forest and to ask ... , 'Who am I, and where have I been, and where am I going?' . . . If one is not careful, one allows diversions to take up one's time—the stuff of life. “