hidden manna

Gil Jones, a phenomenal speaker on faith and life, spoke yesterday about this concept he called the “hidden manna,” and he finally put words to something I have been trying to get my mind around for over a year.  While it’s technically a “religious” concept, hidden manna is like yoga in that it transcends a specific belief system and is readily applicable to humanity as a whole.  I’ve struggled my whole life with the notion that there is some kind of “plan” out there for me and that everything bad “happens for a reason.”  This cavalier, blind-faith type of philosophy always struck me as naïve and often trite, especially in the face of catastrophe.  Admittedly, on a smaller scale, my type-A personality and I have had a hard time throwing up our hands and relinquishing that kind of control over our life.

What’s weird though, is that I believe it… I believe that there is a plan for my life and that bad things happen for a reason.  I do.  So why are these phrases like nails on a chalkboard for me?  How can it be that something I believe in is the absolute LAST thing I want to hear in times in crisis?  My mom recently experienced my wrath when she quickly dismissed important bad news with a wave of her hand and a simple “well, this is just part of God’s plan.”  And I let her have it… But then I was left wondering why, if I believed it, did I feel so strongly that she shouldn’t say it?   

It’s because the manna is hidden.

I’ll pare down the concept of hidden manna and make it less “Bible-y” so as not to alienate any of my readers.  Basically, manna is this sweet, honey bread that was (and probably still is) delicious and wonderful.  Hidden manna is quite literally, “sweet, yummy, warm gooey wonderfulness that you can’t see.”  I picture manna as the most perfect comfort food imaginable.  It’s basically monkey bread.  So for the sake of this description, just think of monkey bread.  During tough times, the monkey bread is hidden… literally impossible to see.  Telling someone who is going through a tough time that “bad things happen for a reason” and “this is part of a plan” is like telling a starving man that there’s fresh, warm monkey bread right there, but he just can’t see it (much less smell it, or taste it).  It's infuriating, regardless of whether it's true.

It’s only after everything happens and the difficult time passes that we can look back and see the manna in it all.

I rounded out my totally spiritual Sunday by going to yoga last night.  It was far and away one of the toughest yoga classes I’ve ever been to, and every muscle of my body aches today with wonderful exhaustion.  The instructor, Billy, was the Gil Jones of yoga.  Billy made me deeply question my life (and my decision to go to his class) at least 14 times over the course of an hour and a half.  He too talked of the hidden manna, although he didn’t quite use those words.  As our quads shook, our shoulders screamed and sweat rolled down our bright red faces, Billy calmly told the class: And isn’t this just like life?  What is torture now is really a gift… you just don’t know it yet.

And that was the missing piece for me.  Knowing that holding the most painful and difficult yoga pose would make me stronger in the end didn’t take away from the fact that it was painful, difficult and tortuous. 

Two days later, despite barely getting my suitcase into the overhead compartment, I can already taste the manna.  Namaste.