The Life of Graveyards
Rosedale Abbey Graveyard, North York Moors
I have a fondness for graveyards. As a child I used to walk through a beautiful wild Churchyard of tombs, sculptures, and gravestones to get to the Glebe Fields of my footballing days. And over the years I slowly pocketed a secret stash of the green stones that decorated the various graves. I thought they were emeralds – and I planned on trading them for a Chitty Chitty Bang Bang style invention when the time was right. But as the footballing stopped and the smoking started, I used to visit the graveyard to climb a beautiful tree and daydream about romance, song writing, and travel. I stopped stealing treasure and started seeking it. Funnily enough, my wife and I ended up kissing in that tree after hitchhiking from Edinburgh to London on one fateful odyssey.
In a lecture in 1961 the existentialist philosopher Martin Heidegger, in response to a question about achieving authentic being, famously advised us to simply aim to spend more time 'in graveyards'. I think it’s good practical advice, as well as a powerful symbol of Heidegger’s philosophy. In my understanding, Heidegger wants to help wake us up to the presence of authentic being, and shake us out of that scared stupor that seeks salvation from ‘They-Self’ (the familial, tribal and cultural force that dictate our primal instincts, values, and decisions). Sadly, it would seem that most of us are living most of our days listening to ‘The Chatter’ (the opinions, judgments, affirmations, and admonishments) of ‘They-Self’, not really showing up, but sleepwalking, following, shuffling like sheep to the slaughterhouse. We choose inauthentic sucking-up, fitting-in, and ducking-down over the living presence of authentic.
But if we spend more time in graveyards we will hopefully face the stark truth that all the inauthentic ‘Chatter’ of our culture, tribe, and tradition cannot save us from the grave. And those people we fear so much that they dictate our big decisions, relationships, and vocations, cannot save us either.
Today, I spent a couple of hours in Rosedale Abbey graveyard, and I became painfully aware of all those ghosts that have been haunting my life – ceaselessly chattering about how to spend my time, energy, and love. But the shadows of these blood-sucking vampires are a little more stark in the still solitary silence of a North York Moors graveyard – and with them, the insane absurdity of my own instincts to fear, obey, and comply. And yet, there is nothing to fear in the peaceful pathways between the gravestones and flowerbeds. There is nothing there - except the rejections, projections, and deceptions of They-Self. But the treasure won is freedom - and a Self-esteem not rooted in the shifting sands of The Chatter.
And so, today, I don’t leave this graveyard with a pocketful of emerald green glass chippings, but with a heartful of liberty and other precious treasures:
A reminder of values that are true, good and beautiful - not the packaged-deal hand-me-down-opinions of family, tribe, and culture
A profound sense of calling to manifest divine being through my own idiosyncratic and infinitesimal incarnation
A deep feeling of permission to take courageous risks in creativity, communion, and compassion
A reflective mirror that reminds me that the ending is not yet written despite knowing the end – that the final chapters of insight, consciousness, and final participation are yet to be fully realised in thought, and word, and deed.
A real life and death wake up call to write songs, stories, reflections and rituals – teaching, learning, and serving others in community
A perspective on what matters: love, truth, beauty and peace
A feeling of belonging – death connects us all
A meaning to life
Spend more time in graveyards
Amen