By Andrea Lingle

Today my daughter and I punctuated our math lessons with leaf catching. Between our minus twos and times sevens, we stood under an oak tree, that had sprouted before airplanes took to the sky, and scurried to catch the twirling leaves. Sometimes they fell one by one and other times, when the wind would shiver the branches, they would fall in a pattering rain. There were shouts of triumph when a brown, papery traveler was snatched out of the air, and gusts of frustration when one would elude our fingertips. I could not suppress a smile as we danced back and forth under the November sky.

Joy under falling leaves.

Leaves fall from their twigs because it is the end of their sunshine gathering season. They die. Next they will settle to the ground and undergo the moldering season of fall and winter. Their bits and pieces devoured by insect and microbe and worm. This is the path of the falling leaf from sunshine gatherer to loam. The whole of its life nourishes the world around it.

One could find disappointment in the changing of seasons: summer can be delicious and beautiful after all, but how can we miss the lesson of the falling leaf? To change, to fall, to come apart, is to be most deeply what we are—a nourishment to the world.

The next stage in Erikson’s psychosocial stages is initiative vs. guilt. I find initiative to be sweetness personified. Community is buoyed by initiative—all participants being willing to invest not only time and effort, but the mental effort required to know what is needed next. Personal initiative is rooted in confidence about one’s place in a community, understanding of what needs to be done, and competence to do it. To take initiative and defy the march of chaos is intoxicating. It is a glorious drug. But, no one is every leaf on every tree.

We cannot do, fix, or save everything—possibly anything, really, even if we take initiative. How disappointing.

Sacred Disappointment is realizing that, in our inability, we are valuable, in our need we are valuable, in our changing seasons we are valuable and loved.

Jesus stood and wept outside Lazarus’s tomb. Why? Was he disappointed that even when God is near life hurts?

Jesus looked over Jerusalem and wept. Why? Was he disappointed that even when God is near chaos seems to write in boldface?

And yet, he descended the hill to pour his life and love out in Jerusalem.

That is the secret. Sacred Disappointment is forged in the “and yet” moments. What we still do when our hands fail and our hearts are moved to weep—when we know we are acting beyond our capacity.

Disappointment is rendered sacred when we are rendered into leaf litter and, in our inability, enrich the world.