In Cynthia Bourgeault’s book, Wisdom Way of Knowing, she recounts a last conversation with a dying friend. He asks her, ‘Are you fearless yet?’ and adds ‘Fall fearless in love.’

In theory, I read the rest of the chapters that I was supposed to read for a conversation on a Zoom meeting. In truth, I stopped with that question and the counsel that followed it. Consideration on this over the days that followed led to this entry in my journal:

Such a great question. The simplest, most honest, answer is ‘No, not yet entirely.’

Before I sink into that too deeply, I find myself wondering about fearlessness…On the one hand, to be fearless is to be foolhardy—some measure of ‘fear’ keeps a person safe, or at least one step further on than the tentacled grasp of harm.

And at the same time, fearlessness is also about the greatest freedom to live into fullness of being. Those two things would-or could-seem to be somewhat opposing understandings and yet, I am not sure they are. Somehow, they go hand-in-glove with the idea that being original means not ‘being different’ but instead ‘being connected to the origin.’

The foolhardy interpretation is the call to consciously maintain the connection (though it can never truly be lost) and to understand the actions/choices that maintain a sensory awareness of the connection/relationship to Origin, to God. Somehow, I think that is key. It is true that sometimes within the culture of today, it is seen as foolhardy to maintain a faith in God—Am I fearless in my desire and choice to walk with eyes and heart and mind open to the revelation of Origin in all kinds of ways, in all kinds of places, with unknown invitations, calls, expansions, and trepidations along the way?

And then there is the greatest freedom piece. If I know of that connection to the Origin, to God, then the orientation of my being is toward that greatest fullness. For me to realize that fullness—to become, to bloom, into my manifestation of the image and likeness of God in all that wonder, nuance, and fullness…that takes and that is the greatest freedom.

Fearlessness is, then, me doing my part—the listening, choosing, responding, living aloud, that leans always toward the sunrise of grace and wholeness.

And if I bring in the second part of the quotation from WWOK, the counsel to fall fearless in Love… oh my glory. Fearless—state of being. Not fearlessly, description of action. Let fearless be my state of being, of wholeness, when I encounter Love. Let it be my disposition of mind and heart and being so completely that this encounter with Love IS the connection with Origin.

And I become Love in its fullness, and Love resonates entirely within and through my own image and likeness.

And there is no distance, no difference between there and here, origin and image…simply divine permeability. Stained glass telling stories of jumping far and jumping deep, fierce and fearless in love.

…May this be so…