One night, I was standing in the kitchen as Barbara and two of her daughters were helping prepare dinner. The other children were scattered all over the farm.

Suddenly, everyone was there, each carrying out a different task, almost as if it were choreographed. In a few minutes, someone was offering prayer, and everyone was sitting down and eating.

There was a spiritual feeling to it.

As I explore this peacefulness and contentment more deeply, I keep running into the idea of Glassenheit, something that is central to Amish life and explains so much about it.

There was also a peaceful coming together; everyone seemed happy to be with everyone else.

Evening meals are by lanterns. There is no sound of the TV, no glaze from computers.

When I was cooking dinner back in New Jersey, I always shouted for everyone to come down and eat.

Usually, I had to shout a few times. It was almost a joke, but I would sometimes get irritated.

I had been shopping and cooking, and the least everybody could do was come down when the food was ready.

Dinner was usually rushed, my daughter wanted to get back to her book or computer, my wife and I had lots of work to do. I always had the feeling all three of us were looking over our shoulders at the next thing we planned to do.

We loved each other, but dinner together was mostly because we needed to eat and because my wife and I wanted to know about my daughter’s life.

I thought of that because I never heard anyone in the Miller family shout in anger or irritation. There was no frustration surrounding dinner.

There is a gentleness to life on the farm, as busy as it is. They are known as plain people, but I have found they are also gentle people.

Everyone seems conscious of what everyone else needed or wanted; there is no need for shouting nor reason for irritation. Fighting at the dinner table would be unthinkable, I imagine.

Dinner, like work, had a mystical glow, as if it were treasured, comforting, and marked by love.

The atmosphere on the farm is quiet except for the sounds of saws and cooking and washing. And laughing, there is always laughing.

Because the children have never been on Facebook or Tik-Tok or the Internet, they have grown up speaking to one another and their families. Conversations are not awkward for them, even though some are shy. Most, I have found, are not.

They always make a point of speaking to me and asking how I am. And they appear to want to know the answer. Having little technology has given them no choice but to learn how to speak.

After lunch today, Moise rounded up the two big draft horses and took his son along, and the two of them rode off to the back pasture to plow together. Both of them seemed excited to be doing this together; it was a sweet and loving scene.

There was no question of inviting me, and I wouldn’t have gone. This was clearly something for the two of them to do together, and Moise always makes time for that.

People go about their business and their work, often working together. The animals were the same way. No one ever shouted at them, or handled them roughly, or worried about what they were doing.

Most days, several things would have made me nervous as a parent.

No one else is nervous. I have yet to hear a warning or alarm, and in my working life, a dozen people warn me about something every time I write.

It was almost as if every creature, human and animal,  on the farm accepted every other. It was striking, almost as if no one tried to manage fate.

In the English culture, death and illness, and trouble are seen as a shock, almost a betrayal. In this world, it’s life.

I couldn’t imagine how much work that must have taken. And I don’t mean to portray the Amish as perfect; that would horrify them and distort the truth.

But they are very different, and I am discovering one of the reasons.

Discovering Gelassenheit was a revelation to me; I found an explanation there for what I have been seeing.

Twice a week, I find the Amish women collecting, washing, and cleaning laundry.

Every day the men and the women are cooking, sewing, lifting, building, plowing, carrying, cleaning, sweeping.

There are carts to be cleaned, manure to be shoveled, soil to be turned, water and wood carried, brush to be cleared,  sheds and barns to be built, horses to be fed and brushed, seeds to be planted, vegetables and fruit to be watered and collected.

There are donuts and pies and cookies to be baked every day except Sunday.

I’ve never heard anyone complain about working so hard or anyone pushing, cajoling, or threatening to get everyone to work so hard.

It isn’t that they are silent; there is nothing grim about this work. There is laughter, kidding, talking, reading, letters to read, letters to write. And yes, fatigue.

I’ve been around Moise and his family many times in recent months; I am learning so many things and just beginning to understand.  This humbling is one of those things; people like me need to be reminded how little they know about the world.

So do many of the people I know or see on the news.

The Amish life is not simple, and so much it is shared and conducted below the surface and out of sight and sound. The teaching of Gelassenheit, I learn,  begins at birth and is nourished and polished every day, all day.

There is a gentleness to the Miller family that keeps calling out to me, a softness with each other, a lack of hurting or scolding that seems to go to the heart of what it means to be Amish.

There is also cheerfulness. I joked with Barbara one morning that they sometimes remind me of the Seven Dwarfs singing on their way to work.

The Amish men and women often sing as they ride their carts to work or into town. It is a mystical and beautiful sound.

They ignore or let go of things that would make me nervous or angry; they take life as it comes. God makes no mistakes.

The patriarchy that dominates Amish life is controversial and much criticized.

Yet, it seems to greatly reduce conflict and argument without fear, cruelty, or punishment.

People seem to know what is theirs and what isn’t. If you have questions about food or the household, go to Barbara.

If you want to talk about crops or buggy safety, go to Moise.

Life is not a free-for-all inside the Amish world, everyone stays in their zones, but their zones are pretty large.

The children are rarely if ever,  scolded, yelled at, urged to hurry up, wake up, come along or watch out.  There is no idle time. On an Amish farm, there is always something to do.

Except for the very young, there are no constant warnings about safety, traffic, food, technology, or money, or school that mark so many households.

These triggers – chafing – have either been removed from daily Amish life or accepted as a part of life.

The Amish take life as it comes,  learn to let things go, follow their faith no matter what.

That is what Gelasenheit is about.

Gelassenheit, says one Amish scholar, “is the deep taproot that nourishes the Amish way.” A german word that resists simple translation, Glassenheit roughly means “calmness, acceptance, and yieldedness,” says Amish Scholar Karen M. Johnson-Weiner and Steven M. Nolt.

Another explanation, writs Donald Kraybill, another Amish scholar, is that Gelassenheit means “to let go, quit trying to figure it out, let it alone.”

Spiritually, Gelassenheit means “let it be, stop trying to figure things out, let it alone.”

This state of being is bred into the Amish soul and family and is actually quite apparent if you spend any time with an Amish family. But they don’t speak of it; they live it.

They don’t dwell on sad or troubling things, harbor resentments or grievances, work things over and over. They accept God’s will and life for what it is.

There is little or no dissent in the Amish world, no atheists or advocates or rebels for change, no renegade journalists telling scandalous tales, no blockbuster interviews to shock the world.

Faith is not a divisive or political issue, each member of the faith supports every other.

They don’t speak negatively of one another or others. They don’t like gossip or send nasty e-mails (or any e-mails.). They don’t sue or argue.

That gives them the courage to take risks and reject some of the fear evident in our civilization.

My own conversations and those of my friends are filled with judgments, laments, complaints, or worry, and I have worked hard on acceptance.

Moise’s conversations are filled with his life – family, building projects, crops, plans, children, grandchildren. There are no complaints.

I was in the driveway yesterday, and I saw Tina the dog look up and discover a new goat. I was worried. I would have called the dog back, maybe put her inside for a while.

I went to tell the family that Tina was going up to see the goats – up here, lots of goats are killed by dogs – and Moise just nodded and puffed on his pipe.

Nobody got worried, anxious, or called out to Tina to stay away or come back.

Tina climbed up the hill and walked between the two tethered goats, sniffed the ground, and sat down between them.

She sat there for a few minutes and then came back down the hill. She is no stranger to new animals, and she is left to solve her own problems.

So this, I thought, is why the horses and dogs are so calm and accepting. They live with Glassenheit and have picked it up. Like children, they do what they see.

I’ve argued for years that dogs and working animals become what they need me to become; it’s how they survive and prosper when almost every other animal who lives around people is fighting for their lives around people.

Last week, I was at Jacob’s farm; he is Moise’s brother-in-law.

His young son hopped into a horse cart to bring it back into the horse corral. As he pulled out, the cart roof got caught in a low-hanging tree, and as the cart move, it pulled a branch down on the horse, who was startled and confused.

The large limb made a loud cracking noise as it was pulled apart from the tree.

I watched his father watch this calmly and silently and without moving.  I knew if it were me, I would be running to stop the horse and pull the big branch off of the harness and shouting at the boy to jump off.

The horse whinnied a bit and then took off for the pasture, pulling the branch and the son. The son used the reins skillfully to slow the horse down and restore control of the cart.

Jacob didn’t say a word; he clearly didn’t want it to be a big deal. Most of the parents I know would have rushed over taking photos to post on Facebook.

I was thinking of myself at one point running ahead to stop the horse, but Jacob just watched and didn’t move. I took my cue from him.

“Well,” he said, “I better trim that tree.”

This was also Gelassenheit – acceptance, resignation, inner surrender, obedience, and the suppression of selfishness.

It is in God’s hands, and God does not make mistakes. Jacob was taking full responsibility; he left his son alone to learn what he needed to learn.

He let him solve his problem, build his confidence.

There were no recriminations, no blame, no drama.

When Moise comes trotting into my backyard two or three times a week, I remember being worried the first times this happened. How would the donkeys handle this?  The dogs?

Bud, our little warrior dog,  burst through the front door one morning, rushing a huge horse and barking furiously, nipping at the horse’s heels and charging.

The horse didn’t move; Moise didn’t seem to notice. I was the one who ate out shouting at Bud to get back into the house. I was face to face with Glassenheit.

Fate came out and ran right under the horse to get to the sheep. The horse didn’t flinch.

I’m not judging Gelassenheit.

It’s very different from what I have known.

I think arguments can be healthy and necessary; I don’t have the discipline or focus on embracing this behavior every minute of every day; screaming, shouting, grievance and tension every day in my house growing up.

Still, next to Moise, I’m volatile, anxious, and wary of leaving things to God. But I very much respect their way.

Etched into Amish consciousness, writes Donald Kraybill, “Glassenheit penetrates Amish life, from body language to social organization, from personal speech to ethnic symbolism.

How one smiles, laughs, shakes hands, removes one’s hat, and drove’s one’s horse all signal Gelassenheit or its absence.”

A laugh that is too loud or a smart ass retort can betray a cocky spirit.

Instead, a chuckle or hesitation before responding shows a spirit of humility, a cornerstone element of Gelassenheit.

The Amish are thought to give slow and thoughtful answers (Moise loves to smoke a pipe while talking), deference to other people’s ideas, and simple silence; this is the Amish Way.

Glassenheit is taught to Amish children every day. The lessons are about being reserved, modest, calm, and quiet. The values are submission, obedience, humility, and simplicity.

The spiritual structure of the church is small, informal, local, and decentralized.

Gelassenheit is one of the fascinating elements of Amish life. It explains so much.

It’s not for me to roll my eyes, judge it, embrace it or defend it.

It has brought them far and helped them survive when so many small groups have failed, and it does inspire me to be quieter and more humble myself. And to be more thoughtful about my life.

I was raised in a chaotic household; people were always shouting and were rarely nice to one another. We wounded one another; we didn’t heal or nourish each other.

I have a bias; I respect any philosophy that embraces humility, spirituality, and kindness. I have pursued all of those things.

I imagine it’s an important reason why I feel so close to these people.

Now that I get it, I hope to think more about it and write more about it.

There is a cultural grammar to Gelassenheit that seems to benefit the Amish families and their church and community. In so many ways, it is the opposite of the cultural thread of the United States.

I asked one Old Amish farmer about Gelassenheit, and he said it was, at its core, simple: it fuses God’s will, personal meekness, and small-scale, intimate organization.

I think that is their key to their unity and durability.

As Gelassenheit unfolds, the meek spirit of individuals yields to higher authorities: the will of God, church, elders, parents, community, and tradition.

Just a few years ago, Gellassenheit would have made me uncomfortable. I’m not meek or obedient by nature and am not at all sure about God, church, or elders.

I don’t follow my culture’s traditions, have broken away from my religion and family,  and resist submission to anyone.

Yet here I am, as comfortable with these people as I have ever been in my own world, and feeling to powerful call to listen and learn.

So that’s what I’m going to do.