The Body Remembers

After considering it for several years, I finally decided a few weeks ago to join the choir at our church. In high school and college, one of my greatest joys in life was singing in choirs. For nearly a decade, during the school year, I sang almost daily in a choir. Participating in those groups of quirky, musical people was richly formative.

High school and college, however, were a long time ago in my personal history, and so it was with a bouquet of nerves that I attended the first rehearsal at church.

I knew I’d be rusty, but then my voice actually sounded rusty (especially in those upper registers rarely used in my daily, non-singing life!) I had to recall my singing posture, and the tricks of good enunciation. I had to remember how to breathe – and how to not run out of breath in the middle of a long note. I had to think about just where I should position the music so I can also see the director. And, I remembered that I must keep my pencil in hand for any notations from the director

I was rusty, but I brought my music home for some extra practice, and then on Sunday, I wore a robe, and I stood in front of the congregation to sing with the choir. Thankfully, I not only remembered how to do it, but how much I love it.

The body remembers.

Last month, I shared about a friend’s son who is recovering slowly, but steadily and well, from a traumatic brain injury. He has moved to a special rehabilitation hospital where they are skilled at helping the body and the brain do the work of remembering. His body, with guidance and specific encouragement, is remembering how to speak, how to eat, how to walk. Time and again, as his body remembers and naturally does something like speak a whole, coherent sentence, or flip a paper over to see what is on the back, his audience is astounded at how his body remembers.

The fact that the body remembers, is one of the reasons that I love liturgical practices. I suppose not a lot of churches keep a very strong liturgical cadence these days, but for me, when I am in a service in which the pastor or worship leader says, “Our help is in the name of the Lord, maker of heaven and earth,” the word, “Amen,” just falls out of my mouth in response. In other words, I automatically agree with the pastor that my help comes from the very same God who made the universe.

In the same way, when a scripture passage is read aloud and followed up with, “This is the word of the Lord,” I cannot help but utter, “Thanks be to God.” I automatically give thanks to God for the reading of God’s word. And these are just standard, simple call and response portions of a worship service.

How about Easter Sunday’s exuberant exclamation, “He is risen!”
He is risen, indeed!
What does that call and response do to our body, to our psyche?

What does it do to our body to go through a liturgy that includes a prayer of confession, words of assurance, the Lord’s Supper, even a benediction? What does it do to us, body, mind, soul, to our very being, in fact, to do and say and receive these parts of a worship service?

These practices form us. And so much so that even if and when we step away from them for a period of time, for any kind of reason, the body will remember.

If an accident robs us of our regular, typical functioning, or life deals you new circumstances or hard times- or even if you willfully leave the practice behind- our bodies remember. That which we have been separated from has already been formed in us in a way that beckons an ingrained response.

As I’m finding myself in a new season these days, I’m feeling a bit bear-like. As though I’ve emerged from a cave after the cold, dark winter, and I’m standing here weakened, disoriented, and a little cranky in the blinding light of new spring.

The good news is that my body remembers.

One of the things that I’ve remembered, an ingrained response, is a short phrase that I once had at the top of a list. I’ve always been a list maker and a list keeper. For me lists aren’t just about things to do, or things to buy, though plenty of post-its and scraps of paper around my house would indicate otherwise. I also enjoy making lists of things I simply want to keep track of and remember, as is the case with the “title” of the list that has recently returned to my mind from years past.

Life is a celebration of many splendid things…

I don’t know when or why I came up with that line, but I believed it. I lived it. And I made and kept an ever-evolving list of many splendid things.

Now, squinting down across this new season, my body needed that good, rhythmic, almost liturgical remembrance of making a list, a list of splendid things. It orients me in the best kind of way to create a list of goodness, gratitude, beauty, and grace. I imagine you might feel the same way.

I’ll share the first ten on my list, but even better than reading my list, I commend to you this practice. Find a scrap of paper, write down some splendid things. And keep it for a cold, wintry day, or a humid, gray day, or any day when perhaps your body could have forgotten that it knows many splendid things.

(Katy’s current list)

Life is a Celebration of many splendid things… Mist rising off the morning lake… Singing in harmony… Petting the dog… Listening to a child tell a good story… A hummingbird at the feeder… Not running out of gas… Indian street food… A familiar bathrobe… Looking forward to the next part of the book… Laughing so hard you can’t speak…

Hummingbird photo by Jeremy Lwanga on Unsplash

Morning mist photo by dominik hofbauer on Unsplash