Lost is a Place Too

In her book, Survivor, Christina Crawford writes: “Lost is a place, too.”

Ron Rolheiser, OMI
LOST IS A PLACE TOO

That’s more than a clever sound bite. It’s a deep truth that’s often lost in a world within which success, achievement, and good appearance define meaning and value.

What can that phrase teach us? That sometimes it’s good   to be without success, without health, without achievements to bolster us, without good appearance, and even without meaning. Being down-and- out, alone, lost, struggling for meaning, and looking bad, is also a valid place to be.

One of the greatest spiritual writers of all time, John of the Cross, would tell you that this can be a good place to be, a biblical and mystical place. That doesn’t make it less painful or humiliating, it just gives you the consolation of knowing that you’re in a valid place, a necessary one, and that everyone before you, Jesus included, spent some time there and everyone, including all those people who seem to be forever on top of the world, will spend some time there too. The desert spares no one. Dark nights eventually find us all.

We have our good seasons, but we have seasons too where we lose relationships, lose health, lose friends, lose spouses, lose children, lose jobs, lose prestige, lose our grip, lose our dreams, lose our meaning, and end up humbled, alone, and lonely.

But that’s a place too, a valid and an important one. Inside that place, our souls are being shaped in ways we cannot understand but in ways that will stretch and widen them for a deeper love and happiness in the future.

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