“The mountains . . . are a passive mystery, the oldest of all. Theirs is the one simple mystery of creation from nothing, of matter itself, anything at all, the given. Mountains are giant, restful, absorbent. You can heave your spirit into a mountain and the mountain will keep it, folded, and not throw it back as some creeks will. The creeks are the world with all its stimulus and beauty; I live there. But the mountains are home.” ~Annie Dillard, A Pilgrim at Tinker Creek

Today I heaved my spirit into a mountain. I kissed my 5-year-old at the door of preschool, drove 7 miles up the canyon with a friend, strapped my 1 year-old on my back, and hiked through the green pines and yellow aspens to a little waterfall. On the way we talked restoratively—about ideas and feelings and not just people or the weather.

One of the topics we talked about was the amount of people we know individually who have left the church during this past year—Is it because of the Internet? we asked. Or the questions raised more prominently by different groups over the past year? Or the age of the people themselves, in kind of a mid-life crossroads? We decided that all of these probably contributed, but that ultimately, it might be because it can be really hard to have spiritual experiences in different stages of life.

At least it is for me, at this stage in my life. We have church from 1-4, which means no nap for the 1-year-old and so no real church for me or my husband (usually me because of his calling). This same 1-year-old is also going through some crazy anxieties or having some kind of scary dreams at night and wakes up at least once, screaming uncontrollably, often not to go back to sleep for 2 hours. And the pre-teens with their homework and activities make an early bedtime difficult. All of this just means that I am exhausted. Exhausted to my bones. I function okay physically, but spiritually? It’s tough. And honestly, the thought that it was my turn to post today caused me major anxiety at first—I don’t remember when I had a deep, profound–or even coherent!–thought. I have been drawing lately on the thankfully deep well of my history of spiritual experiences. But, as Annie Dillard says in A Pilgrim at Tinker Creek, “I’m in the market for some present tense.”

But in the mountains today, even though my body was working, I felt restful and spiritually aware—of small changes I can, and should, make, and of the goodness of God.

Where do you “heave your spirit”? How do you stay in the present tense spiritually?