Transcription of Vivian Franck for the show Wellness from Within #224
Dr. Lisa: At the age of 18 Vivian Franck left her home to become a nun in a French Canadian order. After 30 years of living as a nun, she realized it was time for her journey to being in the larger world and left the convent. She hasn’t regretted her decision once. Her book Forever Becoming is about her life long search for spiritual meaning, truth, and freedom. I love the fact that you have butterflies on the cover of your book. Thank you so much for coming in.
Vivian: You’re very welcome and thank you for having me.
Dr. Lisa: You were raised during an interesting time, and you’re from Northern Maine.
Vivian: Way up there.
Dr. Lisa: Way up there from a relatively small town.
Vivian: Yes, very small. I think not quite 5,000 people.
Dr. Lisa: From reading your book, it struck me that during the time that you became a nun, this was expected in French Canadian Catholic families.
Vivian: This was hope. People hoped that they would have either a priest or nun in the family, especially large families such as mine. My mother was really sold on that, and made me promise to become a nun when I was eight years old, but although I never said a verbal promise, I just smiled because you didn’t say no to my mother, and she took that for a yes. Then, she never let me forget. She would always introduce me as the one who is going to become a nun. That stayed with me.
Dr. Lisa: That seems a lot pressure on an eight year old?
Vivian: Yeah. I didn’t put too much attention to it. She would introduce me that way. Then, I’d go and do my stuff, and play, and all of that, but in my teen years, I started reading lives of saints, and I was very moved by the life of St. Therese of the Child Jesus, and I wanted to be like her. She was so loving and had so much confidence in God. She was a great influence in my life. I read her life, the l’Histoire d’une Âme every year for many, many years, and she was very, very helpful.
Dr. Lisa: You’re describing in your book a scene where you’re walking down the street with one of your sisters. It was a difficult conversation because she had a lot of frustration and anger about her life, and you wanted to be loving and supportive toward her because in part because of this whole idea that you should be loving and supportive toward everyone.
Vivian: Yes. I learned that art of loving very early on, and I think it was part of my nature too. When I had a sister who was pretty mean to me during the fifth and sixth grade, and the second year that I was there, I just did an act of kindness out of, and she turned around completely. Every time I’d see her, she had tears in her eyes. All I did was say a few words of kindness or she needed help, I could see, and we were in church, and I had seen her sit down, and her face was just as white as a sheet. Nobody else noticed so I went to one of the nuns and I said, “She is evil. Mother Maria Louise, Chanel.” That changed her. Isn’t’ that amazing? Just a little act like that. That encouraged me to be as loving as I could.
Dr. Lisa: That’s an interesting turn around. If you’re seeing someone that is one of the sisters that’s educating you, and you realize that nobody else is seeing what you’re seeing, and you’re a young child, this created a bridge between you and this sister which previously hadn’t existed.
Vivian: Yeah. When I become a nun later on, and I’d meet her occasionally because we didn’t live in the same house, she would always tear up, and I knew it’s just from that. That lasted the rest of her life. Isn’t that great?
Dr. Lisa: It is great and it’s also interesting. In your book, you called it Forever Becoming: The Ever Deepening Realization of Presence in my Life. What this says to me is that all of us are always in a state of becoming. We’re only wherever we are for whatever millisecond that is. Then, we move on. Whoever were interacting with similarly, they are just exactly where they are at that moment. All of us are constantly in a state of flux or forever becoming, but yours started when you were younger. It was more external. It was more what you are being told by the church you should believe in.
Vivian: Yes. It was mostly written stuff, and a lot of stuff didn’t make any sense to me, but there was nobody that I could talk to. That was the big thing in growing up. None of my teachers would have listened, none of the family. I would have really been hardly put down. That would have been the end of it. I kept everything to myself.
After being influenced by St. Therese’s book, then at some point, I realized that the best way for me to get out of that environment was to enter a convent. That’s the way God worked with me. I didn’t realize it until much later on but that’s the way I had to go because if had opted to marry, none of what happened would have happened because I had every opportunity to grow spirituality. There was some hard times especially at the beginning until I had this experience with Christ which pulled me right out of where I was.
Dr. Lisa: Describe to me what was going on in Northern Maine as you were growing up. Just the culture and the history, what was the time period and what was going on around you?
Vivian: It was the time of the depression. I was born in ’31, but we didn’t feel it too much in my family because my father had a grocery store. We never lacked of food, but I saw the kindheartedness of my father because he never refused anybody who couldn’t pay. Then, my older brother joined the marines, and there were no more young men in town. My father gathered the children together, and he said, “Which one of you would like to work with me at the store?” I raised my hand right away because I had a good relationship with him.
It was pleasant but it was very, very hard. Those days, nobody knew how to bend to lift up things and all this, I developed some physical problems which I found out later on probably stemmed from there. All in all, I had a pretty normal adolescence because there were boys. We had the boys’ school, high school, and the girls, and the priest were teaching at the boys’ school, but they had a dance one a month. That was good. Then, we were a group of boys and girls that played together so I never had a boyfriend but I had fun. It was fun. It was relaxed. It was a nice place to live. A nice place to grow up. It was easy in some ways. I had restrictions from both the church, and the school, and the home, and the neighbors who kept a strict eye on the children. If they saw you talking to a boy, your mother would know about it. That’s the way it was.
Dr. Lisa: The time that you were growing up, is it true that generally the way that if you were a girl, you could get married or you could go on and become a teacher or a nurse …
Vivian: Yes, that was about it.
Dr. Lisa: … or a nun?
Vivian: That’s it. That was about it, yes.
Dr. Lisa: You decided to become a nun in part because you had this early realization that you were connected spiritually to some higher, to God.
Vivian: Yes. At 14, I made up my mind. I had to make a decision. Was I going to go through with this? It’s what my mother wanted, and I said yes. I intended to join the same community that St. Therese was in but thankfully they said no because it would not have my type really.
Dr. Lisa: I was really interested to read about this because part of your journey was seeking the right community, the right spiritual community.
Vivian: Yes, it took me a while. Yes.
Dr. Lisa: You went actually between the United States and also Canada, and you were working with different orders along the way. Can you talk to me a little bit about that?
Vivian: I was very, very grateful to my original community who allowed me to search. I think they realized, at some point, that I was searching, and that I needed to find something else, and they had no answer for me, but they let me go to these different types of community like the one in Gloucester, Massachusetts which was a five-week period of nuns from different communities living together, seeing how they could live a deep, contented life together. All of these experiences was so beautiful, and the one in Canada and Ontario has opened my eyes to a lot of things, and I realized there that even though the head of the community there, they were not nuns, but boy, she was strict, and I said “No I don’t need that.”
Then, came the time when in my search I realized that I had to leave the convent, and they were open to that. I think they were relieved in a way because I was searching, and I hadn’t found what I needed. I went to a stricter community, contemplative monastery, and that’s where I walk up one night and I knew, I just knew it was time for me to move on, and to move out. During those whole 30 years, every once in a while, I would get the strong feeling that I didn’t belong there, but I had to wait for the right time. I just didn’t know it would take 30 years.
Dr. Lisa: Why do you think that it was that night that you woke up and that was the time?
Vivian: It was very clear. Some psychic said, somebody came to you, I was not aware. It was just so profoundly deep that this was the time to do it. When I went to the prioress the next morning in order that I wouldn’t back down, I went to her to let her know it was like this was meant to be, and it was fine with her and with the other sisters, and it was just I was being led, and I followed through, and everything fell into place.
Dr. Lisa: You also experienced some interesting church history as you were spending 30 years as a nun because during the time that you were doing this, the Vatican too came along, and really changed the landscape of the church.
Vivian: Yes. We were very hopeful. It happened, I think, probably in my late 30s, early 40s. The community had decided on a few changes. We were given $25 a month so we could buy our toiletries and stuff like that. The habit was modified so that it went only down to the cads, and the headdress was much lighter, but there was not much more that was done after that. They were reluctant to give too much freedom to the nuns. Most of the nuns accepted that, I did not.
Dr. Lisa: You also commented that one of the things that was challenging for you as a nun was that the priests, that the men were typically the ones that actually created the rules and the structure for the women, for the nuns, and that didn’t really work that well for you?
Vivian: No. That had always been the case through the centuries. The priests, the men were always the ones who regulated the nuns’ lives. The nuns had nothing to say with it about the book of rules and so on. It just added to my resolve that this was not right. It was not the way I wanted to live the rest of my life.
Dr. Lisa: Even as a nun, there weren’t that many different choices for you. You could be a teacher which is what you did become, you became a teacher, or you could be a nurse, or you could be a contemplative and beyond that.
Vivian: I did work with the children, the emotionally disturbed children which I loved. To be with children was so wonderful for me. Then, I did get involved with the charismatic movement with a nun from another community where we started an after-school for kids, and through store, and all that. That didn’t pan out. It fell through. Then, when that fell through, they didn’t have a job for me in the community so I had to look for a job which was the first time I’d ever done that, and found something up north in my home territory, and I had a wonderful two years there. It’s from there that I met one of the sisters from the Daughters of Wisdom which I went to. They were in New York, and talked with her, and my community was very open. They weren’t just accepting. That was good.
Dr. Lisa: I was struck by that that you spent all of these decades as a nun and when it came time for you to leave, they gave you their blessing.
Vivian: Because I think they sensed that I was not content. There was some dissatisfaction in that life for me, and I needed more freedom, I needed to look elsewhere, and that’s why they allowed me to. When it came time, it was after Vatican too. The rules had relaxed. All I had to do when they asked me to write, I had to get in contact with Rome and all of this while I was leaving the convent, and I started by saying, “When I was eight years old, my mother had me promised to become a nun.” That’s all I needed to say. That was enough. I didn’t go into too many details.
They were good to me. They were supportive. I was very, very pleased. When the work that I was led to after I left which I had no idea this was how things were going to happen because I had no money, I had no idea where I was going, what I was going to do, and I knew my family was not going to support me. I told the Lord, “You better take care of me.” That’s it and he has.
Dr. Lisa: You end up in Portland initially. Now, you live in South Portland.
Vivian: Yeah, right. I went to school to take the massage course, met people from Portland, they loved my work, and they helped me here. I always had a lot of help from the late people. They just were motherly, and lovely, and caring for me because I was so green, oh my God.
Dr. Lisa: That must have been interesting that you are a fully grown adult when you came out into the world, but you really didn’t know anything of the real world at all.
Vivian: It was like starting life again at 18, and I was 50, and in a big city. Van Buren was a very small town. The first year, I remember thinking, I can’t wait for this year to be over so it’s not going to be completely new, I’ll have some, but people were very supportive. Even though it was difficult, even to open a checking account, I didn’t have any idea. One of the people at the center, the holistic center where I was working from, came to the bank with me, and spoke up for me so I was able to open a checking account. This is bizarre. I can’t even open a checking account. It was so very different.
Dr. Lisa: You were able to take some course work because even though you left with nothing or not much money, they eventually did give you something.
Vivian: The nuns gave me a $1000, and they said, “Don’t touch it.” That’s what I did. I just put it in savings. Then, I don’t remember if it was mutual funds first or I forget. Then, four years after I left, I changed too. Somebody spoke to me about AL Williams who is a mutual fund company, and he advised me to change, and go with them, and it was 15 or 18% interest in those days. Wasn’t that great? By the time it came to buy my house, I had grown to $10,000. I saw the guy after I took it out and that was 1987, and he said, “If you have not taken it out, you would have lost everything.” God was really taking care of me, Lisa, really every step of the way.
Dr. Lisa: Where did you get the money for the massage course that you took?
Vivian: Before taking the course, I wrote to the provincial in my original community, and just mentioned how much it costs, and I didn’t ask for it. Then, I had a dream that night that I was getting that amount in a check, and it arrived the next day. They were very, very good to me. It’s interesting because some of the nuns around have read my book, and they just know. Nobody knew what I experienced because there was just no way I could talk about it, and I only talked about my spiritual experiences when I left, when I met some people at the holistic center who were very open. It was easier for me to talk to them. It was interesting because people accepted it. It was like, “No big deal. You had this beautiful, wonderful, mystical experience, and that’s fine.”
Dr. Lisa: I like the fact that you didn’t have to be within the religious order to have a spiritual experience. In fact, your whole life was filled in very practical ways with spiritual experiences.
Vivian: Yes, they were. Yes, it was.
Dr. Lisa: You spent time within the church in a very structured way and outside of the church in a very different and not as structured way, but either way, you still have felt this presence in your life?
Vivian: Yes. More and more so too which is I’m always learning, I’m always becoming. If you go to my website, I feel like I shouldn’t have finished writing the book because I’m getting all these insights and these new revelations. I can put them on my blog and some people read them.
Dr. Lisa: Maybe you have a second book in you.
Vivian: I don’t know if I’ll go for that. It was a wonderful experience, but right now I don’t think I’ll ever come out of how much money it took, and I don’t think it will ever come back. I’m not ready to. I think I can sell the books. I’m going to be doing some readings eventually but the company is always after me to buy 100 books. No more. I’ve done it. I got about 275 and I still have about 75 left. That’s pretty good.
Dr. Lisa: I am guessing that there are people who are listening who want to read your book, and to learn more about your experiences. You said you have a website. Can you tell us what that is?
Vivian: Yes. www.vivianfranck.com.
Dr. Lisa: People should read this book because I enjoyed reading it, and I enjoyed how honest you were about the struggle that this was to go through because it was something. You’ve made a series of somewhat difficult decisions over the course of your life to get to this happy place that you are now or you continued to become, and to know that there is this presence in your life, but this didn’t come easily.
Vivian: No, it didn’t. No because I have four planets in Virgo. That’s pretty hard. It’s not easy. Then, I have a cancer moon. That’s the deep feelings and everything, and the Leo rising. This is quite a combination. It’s been fun.
Dr. Lisa: I love that you are former nun and also a fan of the stars.
Vivian: Could be exposed to east and mysticism. I didn’t know what was happening with me when some of these experiences I had even as a nun. What does this mean? This is not part of my Catholic faith at all. What do I do with it? That was the big thing always. Then, it became very clear. It’s like, “Yeah, there’s a melding of both, and both are right, and both are from God.” Somehow, sometimes, I feel that the mystical part I’m understanding better because it’s become more common for people to look at what the Buddhists are doing, and they were anyway. I don’t know how they are now because they get stuck also just like any other religion, but the idea that this is all illusion.
Therefore, yes. It’s your feelings, your experiences, your perceptions, they all pass away. Isn’t it great to know that you can look at that from here or from consciousness, and say, “Yeah, that’s not me. I don’t need that.” It’s a great way to live. I’m very thankful.
Dr. Lisa: We’ve been speaking with Vivian Franck who is the author of Forever Becoming. I really give you so much credit, and I thank you for the work that you have done to bring your book and this kind of knowledge into the world.
Vivian: Thank you. Thank you for giving me the opportunity, Lisa. I’m very grateful.