JUST BY BEING GRATEFUL

It takes so little to turn my spiritually seeking thoughts around and zone right in on ego-victory thoughts. I'm reading my Goldsmith this morning, and the subject is thanksgiving...the necessity of setting aside a special time to give thanks for gifts received.

He writes: "Always evaluate your progress in terms of spiritual fruitage." And my elevated thoughts are of peace, love and joy, specifically pooh-poohing money, power and prestige.

Then his next words stop me cold: "But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith...." WAIT A MINUTE. How did longsuffering get in there? I check the end of his paragraph...that is a direct quote from Galatians 5:22,23. I can see it's no wonder I don't read the Bible. (Less wonder that I need to.)

But just think on that! Longsuffering as a fruit of the Spirit...longsuffering IS a fruit of the Spirit.

I certainly have had my moments into hours of feeling longsuffering. [As a matter of fact, back in the day a favorite lament of mind was, "I ask for so little and I get so much less than I ask for."] Who knew, all the while praying not to be longsuffering, that was the feeling that could lead me free? And for a fact it has taken all these years for me not to spit behind it right now...but I know it to be true from my own experience today. There's my glory.

But there it is. There's our gold, the acknowledged reason, the why for "thank you" as the prayer sufficient for all ways and days and things repellent and/or good to the reasoning mind.

It makes such sense now...just like if we can learn to love hell, we'll be in heaven. If we can learn to be thankful for longsuffering, we'll not live in our fear again. Just by being grateful.

Thank you.

LOVE AND LAUGH. THAT'S IT...AGAIN

Why does it need be true that no good deed goes unpunished? The answer to that question, of course, is so we can learn that the answer to life really is to love and laugh...that's all.

Love and laugh.

Love our persecutor and laugh with our enemy...then he's not our persecutor, she's not our enemy. They have become our buds.

Thank you.

OUR ROAD PAVED WITH GRATITUDE

There is no problem or question that we have now or will ever have that is not already fixed or answered within us right now...waiting to be released. It is infinity on a pinpoint within our own self and every fear or niggle of fear has no substance. It is ego-based, thus self-generated.

Living in the reasoning mind is living on the surface of life. It has been said, and I do believe, that living to get money, prestige, power is a life not worth living. But trying to be more unselfish, more giving, more loving? All are still just living on the surface of life...for they are all about lacking. We need to give that which we're seeking...we've got it, give it!

We must realize that for the truth that it is and then prove it. There is our life's work, and it is not ours, it is God's. There's the hard part...realizing THAT unto proving. The way there is a road paved with gratitude.

Give up trying. Do already. Be!

Thank you.

THE FREEDOM WITHIN US...LONGING TO FLY

Many of us come to believe in a power greater than ourselves...or we proclaim we do. If that be true, at some point we will meet the need to throw in with that power...in with, as in give over to, cede our very self to. We will no longer feel the only security is in holding tight to our own thinking, feeling, doing, being...our own boundaries in a word.

We "fly up" (an old Brownie into Girl Scout expression if I remember correctly which is always doubtful). We accept that we are children without borders, that God has our back. We know from our own experience that we must live by spiritual principles now or we will send ourselves back to the reasoning mind world of either/or, right/wrong, win/lose...the world of worry.

"We finally realize that others cannot meet our need for whatever our need declares itself to be...rather our own stability comes through giving and not demanding that the other receive. That may be the necessary crossover point to spiritual maturity for any of us." [Fr. Richard Rohr's "Daily Meditations" of June 27, 2014, paraphrased.]

Imagine the freedom of giving of your very self without feeling a need (which, in truth, is a want) that the other receive any part of it! There's the freedom we pray for...already within us, longing to fly.

Thank you.

OWNING OUR GOD-CENTERED MIND

We are only separated from God because the mind has become clouded by personal sense.... -- Joel Goldsmith, "The Heart of Mysticism" at p. 977

That is the key to our continuing unrest. Our attack thoughts cloud God's presence, block our hearing God's word so that we only hear our ego's voice which then does our thinking for us.

Our ego-victory thinking is always directed outward...judging, denying, resisting. Our God-centered mind is always in a state of nonresistance...knowing the Father within is doing Its thing and for our benefit.

All we need to know and to show is: The Father within doth the works.

Thank you.

GOD IS...NOW TO TRUST THAT

[The following is a reprint of my blog of July 21, 2008.]

I was talking to myself this morning, rattling on about the fine line between my spiritual world and my ego-victory world, and it occurred to me that there is no fine line. There is a moment in time…that moment when I make my decision to throw in with God or to hold to my reasoning mind for my security. (That moment of time comes more than once, thank God.)

It’s akin to living at the Grand Canyon, living fully and happily on this earth, but seeking more. So I keep enough distance from the rim of the Canyon to be able to see it, risking nothing, but occasionally edging closer…then darting back, then venturing closer…and still closer. And there I am at the rim, looking down, stomach feeling like it has already jumped…and I know, if I am ever going to fully realize the God I seek, I’m going to have to take that leap of faith…trusting that I will be caught, held close, secure.

Then my reasoning mind, bolstered by fear, kicks in with all of its questions…how do I just DO it? What if my leap of faith is just another self-determined objective? What if God’s true way is something entirely different, and here’s me, hanging out there without a net?

Good news: there is no “without a net” when I’m seeking still more spiritual growth. Better news: God does not care how I come to him…just seek, keep seeking, seek some more. Best news: God already is…within me, without me.

Now to live that, trusting.

Thank you.

OUR ONLY PURPOSE

My blinding flash of the obvious in re my hospital visits: I never have an idea before walking in the doors what we'll talk about. I am simply the container, the watering can, that God is using to wet the seeds already planted in each person. I just need to take the can to them, and God will pour forth the water. Thank you.

We are each simply the container for God's use. That is our entire reason for being...to be a good and proper watering can to pore forth, not hold onto, as much water as flows into us. The water that flows into and out of the watering can is for the benefit of others to grow the seeds God has already planted.

The hardest part for us is not becoming enchanted with the outer appearance of the watering can...does it look as good as hers, is it bigger than theirs, better than his? Our focus needs be entirely on staying unclogged, rust free, fit for God's daily use in poring Itself through us into others.

Our only purpose on this earth is simply as the outlet for the presence and power of God.

Thank you.

BREAKING FREE OF ME

Vengeance is mine saith the Lord. -- somewhere in the Bible

That always seemed harsh to me...mainly because I always pictured my idea of vengeance which was indeed harsh.

The big reveal is that God's vengeance is loving, can be naught but loving since God is pure love. The problem is our interpretation of what God's love looks like.

In coming to us, the need for vengeance appears as a terrible thing. It may come as, say, a perceived enemy (or, worse, friend) getting over on us...through a lie. Our ego-victory mind can and will own us if we go with our idea of vengeance.

If, however, we practice saying nothing, stilling our attack mind, and trusting that God has our back, we will keep our faith in a loving power far greater than our imagining. (Repeating "Thank you" helps here...a lot!) When we come out the other side, we find that terrible thing to be our gold...our pearl beyond price that we could not have received in any other way.

There. That's how the "worst" happening in our lives reveals itself finally as the "best" happening...through God's vengeance. If/when we realize that unto living it, we'll be free from fantasizing our taking vengeance on our perceived persecutors...ankle-biters each and every one, in fact, with ego-victories as our goal.

This is also known as breaking free of me...a lifetime job with benefits!

Thank you.

DIVORCE OURSELVES FROM OUR OWN OPINIONS

I'm reading Goldsmith this morning, and his contention is that we must consciously take hold of our own mind by realizing that world beliefs, i.e., disease, famine, hurricanes and such, cannot enter our mind (thus our experience) from without because our mind is an instrument through which God functions. Which I interpret to mean, in short, that we don't have to ever experience those uglies. Well that's way over my head, and I'm not even sure I'd believe it if I understood it.

Then WHAM here comes my blinding flash of the obvious: Reasoning mind world beliefs aren't just disease, famine and hurricanes...they are attack-mind, self-center fear, personal paranoia, too.

Goldsmith says, "My mind is an instrument through which I function." I go with, "My mind is the instrument that I choose for God alone to use. You got the power, God, use it."

It is when one of our reasoning mind world beliefs slams us that we need concentrate our efforts on consciously realizing only God/I can function in our mind for that is God's workshop. We consciously bring this to our activity in that minute of feeling personally attacked...or merely uncomfortable. We go back to it as needed throughout our day.

The "as needed" is when we're feeling (or remembering) how badly she/he/employer/family/et al. treat us. There, right there, is when we "consciously take hold of our own mind" and immediately turn our thoughts to God or things of God...rainbows, roses, gratitude for rainbows and roses. Just turn our mind away from our own disaster in the making...i.e., change our mind.

It may feel like "they" are shooting that gun, but it is our own interpretation of the activity that will take us down. We must remember the old adage that it is not what happens to us, it is our reaction to what happens that determines whether we know peace and sleep or fear and fret.

Thank you.

THE UTTER SAFETY IN LETTING IT BE

If 'thank you' is the only prayer you ever say, that will suffice. -- Meister Eckhart

....Until we get that spiritually, not just from our eyebrows up, but from our eyebrows down, away from our reasoning mind, we will never know true peace. If we only get it mentally, and act on it from that place without spiritual understanding, we will be doing no more than acting as if our lips were stapled shut, with our thoughts in silent turmoil, the very womb of resentments.

The purpose of spiritual work is not to teach us how to take care of ourselves. It is to teach us unto realization that we are being taken care of...in a far better way than our reasoning mind can comprehend...let it Be...let It be.

Our reasoning mind will never agree to that because our reasoning mind is the home of our ego. Never get in a debate with ego...we will not win, we will not even come out sore losers. We will become converts...away from spiritual growth into personal stagnation...away from giving into getting. There is no God-peace there.

That is the nature of our work today...learning, practicing, doing let it be. We know peace in the grace of gratitude and utter safety in letting it be.

Thank you.

NOT OUR WORDS BUT OUR WORKS

This morning's blinding flash of the obvious: It is not my words but my works that count with God.

In pondering that, the question occurs: Does everything begin with a single thought? That first thought over which we are powerless? It would seem so; indeed, that must be the case. Which sure does make the case for relying on God as our guide, for spiritual thoughts to be welcomed, for letting go of old ideas quick, fast and in a hurry...because there's a second thought a'coming.

It is that second thought that we are responsible for...and if we're still clinging to old ideas, we will still be acting in old ways. And if we're acting in old ways, those ways aren't old...they are current, and the way we are, not were.

Maybe it does not matter to God how pretty we sound, how profound our words, how sonorous our sermon. I'm guessing all that matters is what we do for God...through another.

Thank you.

TRUST AND LET GO...LET GO AND TRUST

Learning spiritual  truth, then doing it...now there's two different stories entirely. It being a given that we've got to know it before we can do it.

Learning spiritual  truth is when we get a blinding flash that when we're saying the 23rd Psalm, we can replace "enemies" with "ego" and be closer to our truth. "He prepares a place before me in the presence of my enemies [ego]...." Or, when praying the Lord's Prayer, "Lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil [ego]...." The learning is in the realization that our ego represents us...that what we see is always ourselves...that who or what we are resisting is our gold.

I'm guessing it's so hard because it requires us to just let go and trust...or trust and let go is more like it. Trust that the one we have just come to believe in, namely, God, can and will do all the things that it is said he can and will do: Go before us to make the crooked places straight. Perform that which is given us to do. Intervene in our lives in our behalf.

Without our telling him how! Or even thinking that we need to!

When we learn that unto believing it unto living it, we can be at peace when to our reasoning mind trouble in whatever form visits our friend, our spouse, our family, our un-friend even. We can know s/he has the same God we do whether s/he knows it or not. Here's the miracle: We can let that same God do his thing for that other with or without her knowledge...with or without his consent.

The key to living a complete and fulfilled life lies in the realization that there is a mystical, transcendental Presence within us that has already provided our infinite supply unto eternity, that contains within Itself our companionship unto eternity, and that has within Itself the power of fulfillment. -- Joel Goldsmith, "A Parenthesis in Eternity" at p. 269

I know that to be true...I'm still coming to believe unto living it but I know I'm heading in the right direction.

Thank you.

ON GETTING TO HEAVEN

And why call ye me Lord, Lord, and do not the things which I say?  Luke 6:46

We all learn, and fairly quickly, the good, decent, other-oriented "thing to do." And we mostly do it. It is our judgmental mind, our ego's mouthpiece, that is our tripwire. Unseeing, unheeding, we let our ego do our thinking for us, mentally setting others straight as we simply move forward. And our judging is not always in a "gotcha" way...we can be thinking of a beloved, just seeing how s/he can be happier, freer even, if only....

It is a hard lesson learning that even thinking good, or wishful, thoughts for another can be a subtle form of judgment. (Just as, according to Easwaran, avoiding those we don't take kindly to is a subtle form of of violence.)

The almost impossible lesson we must learn is to welcome bad news...personally bad news. It is not easy to thank God first thing the minute we become aware of a less-than-wonderful medical diagnosis, of our financial collapse, of our beloved pet's diagnosis...incurable. That is learning to swim against the flow, the flow of what our reasoning mind perceives as EEEK, No, Please God not this, not that.

What makes the learning possible is our experiencing the rewards of nonresistance. That is when we learn for a fact that we will never have and hold true peace of mind, or a joyful heart, until we cease fighting any and all, until we agree with our adversary quickly, until we resist not evil. These are spiritual principles that our ego knows not of and is not about to learn...for they each and all deny the ego its due. And it is the ego that fights, cannot agree, resists.

As Thaddeus Golas wrote in Lazy Man's Guide to Enlightenment, "When you learn to love hell, you'll be in heaven." Now that's ego deflation in depth.

Thank you.

RANDOM THOUGHTS

Goldsmith says that we each must serve at the present level of our consciousness. My present level of consciousness is floundering...probably just lazy, but floundering sounds at least like I'm trying.

Staying current with oneself is a spiritual discipline. Right this minute, anything requiring discipline makes my sensibilities dodge.

I suspect the main way I stay current with myself is by taking the inventory of friends and neighbors. All the while lecturing friends and neighbors that one must not take inventories.

We do the best we can with what we got and trust God...who will not clean up our mess but he sure knows how to make us uncomfortable enough to get cracking on it.

I wonder if all of us don't find solace in denial...even though we know better. Which (knowing better) doesn't kick in until after we've made it to the other side of whatever we're denying.

It's the weather...or the ten-story building being built right next door to me. The noise level is a personal insult.

It's the weather...the perfect denial of, "It's me." Which is different from "It is I, be not afraid." Way, way different.

Thank you.

PEACE, LOVE AND JOY FOR ALL

I was reading Richard Rohr and I came across this statement:  "Words and thoughts are invariably dualistic, but pure experience is always non-dualistic." Which immediately opened me to a deeper understanding of why it is our ego-wants, not theirs, that we need give over to God. It is theirs that we want to give over, but if we truly give ours over, then theirs will follow...in our experience.

Example: My ego has been in a mental fistfight with Gertrude's ego. I want A, she wants Z...for the good of our fellowship, don'cha know (as my grandma would say).

From my eyebrows up, I am very aware this is an ego-victory fight, signifying less than nothing to the winner or for that matter to the loser! Except for the feeling of superiority in winning...which I know from experience will immediately if not sooner be followed by feelings of guilt, shame and despair for ever getting into the dim-dam fight in the first place. I finally verbally and mentally gave the whole thing over to God to do with however he wills for the good of the whole, and my resistance to her ego-want was incorporated with my ego-want into God's whole. I knew I was free because I broke out laughing. I haven't felt so utterly open, so unrestricted...well since I got in a fistfight with me.

Our ego builds itself through resistance, its safety zone (a good example is the politics of no). Fear is the ego's only friend. The ego lives by constriction, resisting any and all things that are for the purpose of ego deflation...i.e., all things spiritual.  The soul lives by expansion, by opening with all things of God. We know it by our feelings of peace, love and joy for all.

Thank you.

THE CHOICE IS OURS

The message is simple. Straight forward. No frills. The word is: Do not question what God can do for you. Just get out of the way, and let It.

It's the doing it that's so hard. And the reason why it is so hard is right there in the bathroom mirror. There is the face of ego staring back. With God shining through it all.

"Choose ye this day whom ye shall serve."

Thank you.

AGAIN, WE IS THE WINNER

Mercy. I do get righteously indignant at those who change the word "bread" in the Lord's Prayer to "strength." Not to mention their trying to update literature so there is no masculine...it's all neutral.

My head lectures, "'We have ceased fighting anything or anyone.' How hard is that to remember?" All the while forgetting it as I ignore the fact that I am fighting them!

Which leads me to my new puzzler: Reconcile "Resist not evil" with "All it takes for evil to prevail is for good men to do nothing."

I'm taken back to Lennon's "Imagine." What if each of the peoples of the world  imagined peace? Just imagine peace. Then imagine doing it. Then each of us actually do it...initiate and respond in peace. All the world could only be at peace...safe.

If all the world caught (and bought) the golden gift in resist not evil, then there would be no evil for good men to do anything about.

That can only start with ego deflation at depth. Richard Rohr maintains that ego leads with “no” whereas soul leads with “yes,” that "the putting together of the human and the divine is clearly our task and our supreme vocation."

So it begins with each individual realizing the Father within...each one's only goal being the realization of God within each of us, individually and as the whole universe.

For that I am responsible (...as are you). We know God's hand is in it because, again, we is the winner.

Thank you.

THE WHY FOR MEDITATION

I believe that the goal of life on the material plane needs be attaining conscious realization of God's presence. And that It must be released individually from within. That's the only place God is for us to individually realize It...in order, actually, for us to realize that It is everywhere. That is the why for meditation.

To prepare ourselves in hopes of communicating with God, we must still our thoughts, open ourselves to nothingness and let our senses be filled from within. That's just not doable as we walk the dog, chat on the phone, read the newspaper. No. We're pretty much required to sit down, shut up, breathe deeply and focus on, say, eternity on a pinpoint.

Since I do believe all things are possible to God, I say we "pretty much" are required to do these things...because if there is a need for God to get in touch with us, God can and will with or without our prepping for him.

For which I am seriously grateful.

Thank you.

GOD'S GARDEN WITHIN

There is something in you that is not touched by coming and going, by up and down, by for or against, by the raucous team of totally right or totally wrong. There is a part of you that is patient with both goodness and evil, exactly as God is. There is a part of you that does not rush to judgment or demand closure now. Rather, it stands vigilant and patient in the tragic gap that almost every moment offers. -- Fr. Richard Rohr, "Daily Meditations," June 12, 2014

I believe there is a place within me unreachable by my reasoning mind. That is God's place...my personal garden where I get to go to smell the lilies of the valley, to hug the pandas, to lie down with the lambs and the lions. 

If I take a problem there, the garden disappears. It becomes my ego-cave where I go to feel rigid, righteous and right, to set "them" straight, to feel unloved, unneeded, unwanted and unappreciated.

The question is why is the ego-cave so magnetic and God's place so easily passed by? 

The answer, of course, is with our reasoning mind which tells us if we can't see it, touch it, taste it, then it is not, cannot be, real. 

We must go beyond reason to love for love is the only safety. Love is the name of God's garden within. We must get out of our head, our ego-cave, and go into God's garden.

All we need do is love our enemy, do right by those who spitefully use us, look for a leper to hug.

Thank you.

KNOW IT OR NOT, GOD LIVES WITHIN

I love that, know it or not, God lives within me.

The trouble with running our attack minds over and over, setting another straight, is that we can think of such great put-downs. No mater how "good" we act then, those put-downs never leave...we just keep building on that first one, going for better, meaner, more cutting ones. We get ourselves stuck and curse our own darkness, calling it by that other one's name.

The good news/bad news is there is relief...only it is in inviting the slings and arrows of the other...welcoming those just as we welcome praise for they are all the same. Meaning, of no significance whatsoever. It's just that the ugly stays longer...like an oyster building its pearl, we give it 100% of our attention, tending it as if it were our child. Its name is resentment.

Without sincerely seeking help from our higher power, we can expect no release. And sincerely seeking help does not mean just asking God to relieve us of the bondage of self. It means seeking first to realize our Source, our Soul, the Father within us. For, according to Joel Goldsmith, 'The Spirit of God realized in consciousness has a way of searching out just the right place, the right person, the right way, or the right activity and of bringing it into our experience."  ("The Heart of Mysticism" at p. 958)

There is the secret of the Sermon on the Mount: By God's grace, turning from self for the benefit of others. Do that and live resentment free...I am told.

Know it or not, God lives within.

Thank you.

THANK YOU...REPEATEDLY AND FOREVER

Somewhere, probably in the Bible, it says that if we acknowledge God in all our goings and comings, he'll bless us richly.

I awoke this past weekend feeling all but crippled. I had a right knee replacement a couple years ago, and it's never been 100% since, on top of which I've now got a bum left knee. So it's no stretch for me to feel all but crippled, but this was can't-walk-unaided crippled.

So I got out my cane, shot a fairly wary "thank you," and, if I moved at all, I limped with cane in hand for the next few days. Yesterday morning I wasn't feeling any better...in fact, I was feeling pains up my neck...so I wrote in my journal: "God, my knee is your problem, lead the way. Whatever needs be done, you can and will work through me to achieve it in the best possible way for me. Thank you. Amen."

Having adverse reactions to most medications, I take none if I can at all help it, but in an emergency I will take aspirin. Yesterday noon, I found an unopened bottle of same in my medicine chest and I took two...I was tap dancing before nightfall. Possibly not tap dancing, but walking unaided for sure. And am feeling fine as frog's hair this morning.

Here's where "acknowledging God" in all we do comes in. My knee feels healed, our reasoning mind will not only give all credit to the aspirin, but get pretty sarcastic about giving any credit to God. But look back at what I journaled..."Whatever needs be done, you can and will work through me to achieve it in the best possible way for me."

"Take two aspirin, and thank me in the morning," is what I'm believing I got from God. And I do thank you...repeatedly and forever.

Thank you.

LOVE SEEKS US

A friend and I were talking recently about the power of love. I mentioned how important John Lennon's "Imagine" is to me and remembered a column of Bill Buckley's in which he was just raging against the song.

My memory (faulty at its best) is that Buckley's main contention was that if all America followed Lennon's suggestion that we imagine "nothing to kill or die for" that America would be overtaken by liars, cheats, thieves and terrorists in a heartbeat. Which, to my mind, is preposterous because the entire theme of the song is for the universe, not just America, to  "imagine all the people sharing all the world."

My beloved friend then gave the best ever example of the end-result of seeking love versus anger, peace versus war. He casually observed that people today are still leaving flowers in front of the Dakota in New York City on the spot where John Lennon died, but nobody goes out of his way to find Buckley's grave much less leave flowers there.

I choose to believe that's an indication that love seeks us.

Thank you.

CONSCIOUSNESS IS WHAT I AM

Spiritual power is always hidden inside of powerlessness. -- Fr. Richard Rohr

My morning's blinding flash of the obvious: A bomb can fall on me, it cannot destroy or touch my consciousness. Consciousness is what I am.

This manifestation that I appear as will disappear and still I will be reforming to appear in a new form for God 's use.

Thank you.

LOVING THE UNLOVABLE

By love may He be gotten and holden, by thought never. -- "The Cloud of Unknowing"

We learn Truth, we accept it and in the acceptance think we know Truth. No. We have taken but a single step toward our knowing Truth, it being a given it is the most important step.

Living Truth, however, living free of our reasoning mind dictates, our ego-victory drive, our very self is our Soul work.

It seems the minute we realize that, our reasoning mind gears up, already twisting, turning, trying to figure out how to...how to not think our way free by thinking about it.

Actually, the way free is simple, the doing not so much. For the answer is love...whatever we are thinking, feeling, doing, being...love it more. According to Joel Goldsmith, "We need only somehow to increase our capacity to love."

This is especially true (and counter-intuitive) when we find our thoughts in a dark place, and we're feeling scared, repulsed, angry...resistant, in a word. The way out is to open our minds to the possibility of loving it. Our "thank you" will head us in the right direction, toward an open (non-resistant) mind.

Love is the highest and holiest action because it always contains that which is not love within itself, it always and ever moves to include the unloving. -- Thaddeus Golas, "The Lazy Man's Guide to Enlightenment"

Thank you.

THE ETERNAL ANSWER...LOVE MORE

We must learn to listen with an unhindered ear, divorced from all of our opinions, all of our preconceptions, all of our fears of the enemy.  Listen...and learn that our enemy is any person, place or thing that we are resisting at the moment. Listen...and learn to love our enemy as our self.

Once we learn that, we understand that the only thing that stands between the Power within us and loving our enemy is our self, our ego-victory self.

I believe it is true that we are born with just two emotions, i.e., love and fear, and all else stems from those two. If that is true, then why not choose love? (For that matter, even if it's not true, why not choose love?) Make our decision always and ever to choose not just to react with love but to act with love as our starting point.

This is a lifetime job and nothing is or can be more fulfilling. We reap what we sow, a.k.a., what goes around comes around; ergo, we send fear, we receive not good...we send love, we receive good. 

It is the love that we send out that returns to us, filling any self-perceived lack full to overflowing...with twelve bushels full left over.

Thank you.

WHEN WILL WE EVER LEARN?

My blinding flash of the obvious on awakening: I am wrapped in angel wings...thank you, thank you, thank you. Amen.

My angels guard you day and night and nothing can harm you. You would indeed thank Me if you knew the darts of frets and evil they turn from you. ("God Calling," June 5)

Here's a thought, a scenario: What if those "unknown darts of frets and evil" turned from us are our unanswered prayers?

What if our deepest desire, our oh-please-God-please prayer, is the one thing God knows would do us and all we love harm beyond measure?...and he protects us from it by denying it to us?

And what if we were able, through sheer self will, to get our self-determined objective, overcoming all obstacles, trampling all resistance, we got it. And after we got it, we thanked God and told all that clearly it was God's will because we had overcome so much until we got it.

What if it turned to dross a week after we got it? Would we ever think that all our woes were the result of our using our freewill to achieve the result we prayed for? Of course not. Chances are we would choose to take that as proof that there is no God, else he wouldn't have done this to us.

We are the source of all our woes. It may well be that the only thing standing between us and all our gifts is our self-will. If we will but turn that self will over to a power greater than ourselves, we can and will know that we are wrapped in angel wings and we will know peace.

We can fight no more forever, just like Chief Joseph.

Thank you.

GOD'S IMPERFECT MESSENGER

I take comfort in the fact that we are all God's imperfect messenger. The trick is to mentally move that comfort from me alone to you, too. To you when I see you as wrong and your wrong is butting up against my right. That's when you, as God's imperfect messenger, get a tish hazy in my mind.

We live in a world of personal prejudices...that's probably the human condition. The road to peace of mind, though, is to quit excusing our prejudices because "that's the human condition," and get on with doing our spiritual growth exercises. Quit talking, start walking.

I'm reminded of this because of a conversation I had just yesterday with a friend about one of my current bugaboos, a whole class of people, unfortunately. I heard myself saying that I could not love them as a whole...I could only love each one of them separately and personally as s/he came into my mind. Which is true, but I was brought up short when the thought occurred that I need to practice that on those who are a lot closer to me...as in, friends who tick me off. Unfriendly acquaintances whose actions I take personally. Purifying my thoughts, divorcing myself from my own opinions...that's where the spiritual work comes in.

Turning within to God with a full expectation of peace, love and joy flowing forth toward Gertrude who stepped on my toes...really hard and I know she did it on purpose...is a lot different from thinking of, say, Rush Limbaugh...who steps on my toes with every word he speaks...and imaging him with roses and rainbows around his being. Which I've never done in my life, I race to add, but that's the sense of it all.

Rush, too, is God's imperfect messenger...not one whit different than I am. Now that is humbling...which is a good start.

Thank you.

DO SOMETHING ABOUT SOMETHING

It is a fact that "any action, no matter how small, will help us to overcome deadly procrastination." Which reminds me of advice I got some 40 years ago...words that at the time I thought were utterly inane: "Just do something about something." I now call those words golden.

It is a fact that any action, that is any action, will break the seemingly iron-bound grasp of procrastination. The only reason that is so hard for procrastinators to believe is, not believing, they refuse to move.

We go back to the same old, same old: Feel the fear and do it anyway. For that is all procrastination is...fear. The smart thing is to accept that and move...do something about something. But, no. We'd rather hear that, doubt it, think about it, analyze it, ponder it...i.e., do nada...and let guilt hover over us, paralyzing us further.

That's why the reasoning mind needs spiritual help. The reasoning mind is a God-given tool, but on its own, it can do some serious harm...to us and to anybody around us.

We thank God we've learned to thank God, then pull up a spiritual passage to lift our thoughts out of self. A couple of goodies: "Came to believe that God can and will intervene in my life in my behalf." "He performth that which is given me to do."

Actually, any thought of praise will turn our thoughts away from guilt...then we are free to do something about something.

Thank you.

NOT MINE TO WORRY ABOUT...NOTHING IS

At some point, it occurs to us that the way to remember that which we seek we already have is to start giving away that which we are seeking...love, money, understanding, patience. If we will follow the natural line of thought, it becomes relatively easy to comprehend giving as a receiving action. A quick and easy reminder is always: You got to give a hug to get a hug.

Which pretty much explains away begging prayers as in, "Please give me X, Y and/or Z." Our need is to open our ears to hear, our eyes to see...we already have X, Y and Z. Many mystics teach that prayer is silent receptivity. Some also maintain that there is only one legitimate prayer and that is to attain God.

I get that...very possibly from my eyebrows up only, but I question it not at all. The way I walk it is to simply acknowledge God in everything that comes to me by a simple "Thank you," and if I don't feel the thank you, I let God know.

Just this morning, I got up and was faced with a couple problems, neither of my making, neither of which I know how to fix. I was UN-happy. So I said to the Lord, "You know the problems here, and you know how to fix them. You got the power, Lord...use it. Don't let it go to waste! That's what you got it for."

[Sidebar: There's a passage in “God Calling” where God tells us to “command” him...that he is ours to “command.” Since I started doing that, I have had A-MAZ-ING results. Just saying.]

Then I went about doing what I do. I kept reminding myself to listen...stop, shoot a "thank you," listen, move on. I know I will get a clue, if not an entire answer, as to where to start. It is not mine to worry about...nothing is. And I am grateful...which beats unhappy for sure!

Thank you.

QUIT THINKING, START DOING

I awoke this morning with this prayer in my thoughts:  If I get to choose between a healed knee and a healed relationship with my friend, I choose a healed  relationship with my friend.  Thank you. Amen.

I went into my quiet time and was led to the following:

It is not the avoidance of problems that makes you [free], but a daily holding of the problem, straight on (while not letting it hold onto you)—and finding a resolution in the much deeper and more spacious 'peace of Christ, which will guard your heart and your mind.' (Fr. Richard Rohr, Daily Meditations, November 27, 2013)

Then the next:

In personal relationships, we all get troubled when we do our best to be kind to someone and that person treats us with hostility or ill will in return. This is common in life today, and most of us quickly reach the end of our tether. 'I don't want to see you again,' we say. 'I want to get as far away from you as possible!'

All of us have these human impulses. But that is just where the Gita or Jesus or the Buddha would say, 'No. That is the way of the timid. That is the way of the weak.' Stick it out: not by becoming a doormat, not by blindly obeying whatever command the other person gives you, but by resolutely refusing to hurt anyone no matter how much you have been hurt. (Eknath Easwaran, "Words to Live By," June 1)

There...that's exactly how to find the spiritual resolution I pray for...which is certainly not news. What I love so much is that I prayed as if I didn't have a clue what to do and was immediately led to the answer which, let's face is, is the same old, same old. Boiled down it's simply, quit thinking and start doing; i.e., love and laugh.

As my friend Natalie says, "God's cute."

Thank you.