UNFATHOMABLE INFINITY

We shall find peace.

We shall hear angels.

We shall see the sky sparking with diamonds.

-- Chekhov

At the point of unfathomable is where the miracle of God appears...infinity on the point of a pin. -- Blinding flash of the obvious.

Thank you.

JOY IN THE CAMP

When I meet a really rigid person (whether on the street or in my bathroom mirror), I try to remember to think: Your core must be a ball of insecurity right now because your surface is rigid, righteous and right. If I don't remind myself of that asap, I become rigid with my race-race, run-run mind actively and obsessively sitting there...in judgment. Another paradox.

That reminds me of Fr. Rohr's definition of paradox, which is "order within disorder, redemption through tragedy, resurrection through death, divinity through humanity."

My definition is nowhere near as good, as complete, just a lot simpler. To me, paradox is complete opposites getting the desired result. A simple example being, "You've got to give it away to keep it." Another (referring to character defects), "You've got to accept it as your own in order to let it go." And "You've got to kiss the unkissable right on the lips."

I was reminded of all that this morning when I read a Sufi epigram: When the heart grieves over what it has lost, the spirit rejoices over what it has found.

Realizing that this is exactly the gift we get upon entry into the Fellowship of which I am a member, my heart grins, sings, dances, laughs, shouts, hugs the moon, and wants to share it with my world.

In the words of the old gospel song: There's joy in the camp!

Thank you.

ON BECOMING ONED

When the external life and the inner life are working together, we always have beauty, symmetry, and actual transformation of persons—lives and actions that inherently sparkle and heal, in part because they can integrate the negativity of failure, sin, and rejection and they can spot their own shadow games. -- Fr. Richard Rohr, "Daily Meditations," August 28, 2014.

Becoming a fully integrated person is our journey. When our insides, God's world, become one with our outsides, ego's world, we become a fully integrated person. This cannot happen unless and until our ego bows to a power greater than itself...namely, God.

I tend to believe that takes many lifetimes to achieve, and we keep coming back until we get it right.

Now...what if that is true? What if that's not just me on a flight of fantasy, but it is true?

What if we keep coming back as each and every person we could/would not forgive? What if we are that person today, right now? Are we unforgivable...or do we think we are? What then?

What if we keep coming back as the person we once put upon a pedestal...had loved beyond reasoning? How well, if at all, are we showing forth the qualities we once adored?

When the external and the internal are oned, the external must needs have given over and the internal shines through, leading the way as peace, love and joy.

Thank you.

WE MUST SHARE IT TO GROW IT

I'm rereading the notes I wrote in a little book that I read from 1971 to 1991...my notes are enlightening to me. For instance, in 1989, I had underlined in the book the sentence, "Continue to watch for selfishness, dishonesty, resentment and fear."

I suspect, when I underlined that in 1989, that I understood that, and I thought by my understanding that I got it. Clearly (I say today)  "watch for" was what I got, never realizing that meant that we need to ever watch for all those things.

The core issue of our lives, then, is we watch for selfishness, dishonesty, resentment and fear because they are there...not were, are. They will be there until three days after we're dead. It is what we do with them when we find them yet again that determines our happiness or unhappiness.

Our level of happiness is determined by how completely we show forth peace, joy and love. It is in that act of giving that they grow within us...to share again.

Thank you.

SECRET, FEAR'S OTHER NAME

Mercy. I recently ran into a friend from some thirty years ago. He has not changed one iota...no wrinkles, no grey hairs, no hitch in his get-along, and I remembered that he had shared a secret with me all those years ago; namely, his age. He looked thirty then, he looks thirty now.

Interestingly, our conversation was all about age and aging, the effects of age on our thinking, feeling, doing and being. As we talked, it became clear to me that his secret was still his secret, as in he dodged mentioning That Number...and, therefore, so did I.

I thought he seemed to be a not unhappy man, and there are worse stages of life to live in, but happy is way better. I figure he is not unhappy because his secret is still protected, hidden, secure. But, oh my, the effort that takes...keeping the god of our understanding a secret is some kind of hard work. And that is what a secret is...our god. Our entire focus is on that secret, hiding it, protecting it, in effect nurturing it.

A secret is, in fact, just fear...pure and simple. Chances are (there are no guarantees), my friend could be a happy man if he'd loose his secret and let it go. Just to see what the feared consequences would actually be if for no other reason.

I thought about secrets this morning and keeping them. Because they are based entirely in fear, it is our ego's need to hide them . Our spiritual need is to disclose them...to exchange them for freedom, freedom from the fear we clothe ourselves in.

Take it over to Egypt and set it free. Loose it and let it go. Take it to the river, put it in a basket, and let it float away. All of these are my very imperfect images from the Bible, all referring to us being the god of our own understanding until we let that very idea go.

There is only one God. It is love, It is unfathomable, It is the air we breath, the light within us, without us...and so much more. It is I.

It is not fear, and that is no secret.

Thank you.

BECOMING A TRANSFORMER

From Fr. Richard Rohr: Until you find a way to be a transformer, you will pass the pain onto others.

There. That is the answer to why we constantly and consistently need still more spiritual growth. The reasoning mind gets just enough spiritual growth to know just a little and is satisfied to hunker down right there...enough is all to the ego-based reasoning mind.

As we grow in spiritual growth, however, we learn that there is no enough. There is only the need for still more spiritual growth...else our ego co-ops our spiritual growth as its own. I'm guessing that's why the ego named itself "i" after the I of our Father/Mother/Sister Moon/Brother Sun.

It is in the transmutation within our mind, our heart and our soul of "i" into "we" that our spiritual growth begins. We get a glimpse of "we" as our personal answer...which grows into I, the Father and I are one. And that includes you and them. One. Each is I. All one.

Transformers every One.

Thank you.

SPIRITUAL MATURITY II

Well, it's come to this. I'm now quibbling with my own blog...specifically, "Spiritual maturity is doing the next right thing, doing it with our whole heart, doing it with delight." (I found that in my notes from 2002 and have no idea where it came from...because I didn't have it in quotes or attributed, I assume it's mine.)

This morning my version is: "Spiritual maturity is doing the next thing, doing it with our whole heart, doing it with delight, and not having a hissy fit when it proves to be the not right thing."

That's where our spiritual maturity comes in. Our peace comes in knowing when (not if) we are wrong, to promptly admit it, to make our apologies and/or amends, and to keep moving forward with certain trust in our heart and our mind that God has our back even when we are apparently wrong.

We never need fret, worry, panic again...we never needed to in the first place, but that's a whole 'nother story. Not to mention that just because we don't need to now doesn't mean we won't...that's when the spiritual maturity come to save the day.

Thank you.

SPIRITUAL MATURITY

Spiritual maturity is doing the next right thing, doing it with our whole heart, doing it with delight.

Thank you.

LETTING GO OF WHAT I KNOW

[The following is a reprint of my blog of August 25, 2008.]

I know that seeking good, seeking peace, seeking to do the honorable thing are all acceptable, “the right stuff” so to speak.

Then I ponder a self-determined objective as opposed to God’s perfect objective…and I am reminded that seeking harmony is no better than seeking discord…it’s still a self-determined objective. For I have only my own idea of what harmony is, and whenever my wants bump up against your wants, my idea of harmony is usually getting you to agree with me…or, when I’m particularly spiritual in my own mind, letting you be right: Mouth agrees with you; mind thinks, “Oh, let it go;” ego says, “I’ll get you later.” And a resentment is born.

So the key, it seems, goes back to staying in the is-ness of now. Which sounds fanciful, but I am finding that it works when I remember to say “thank you” as whatever picture comes into my experience. And in that acceptance, I am open to doing what I need to do at the moment and letting it pass on by.

It is my old self-centered fear that is always in play…of not getting the respect due me or losing the respect I feel I've so rightly earned.

I realize anew that self-respect and self-centered fear cannot co-exist…respect is of God, fear is not. Like a hug, I cannot “get” it, I can only “give” it, at which point my own comes back to me.

Thank you.

GRATITUDE, HEADING IN THE RIGHT DIRECTION

Gratitude is not natural to a great many of us. When first we feel it, it almost feels phony...like we're being a phony. Then a feeling comes, and we're all but moved to tears...and may even feel embarrassed...but we know this is not phony.

It feels good, feels like peace, feels like low-grade joy (not ecstatic in our over-the-top, self-centered, look-at-me way), feels spiritual, which, when one has been a self-described atheist, or at least agnostic, is a wha?

Then we find we simply cannot hate gratitude...maybe our lips can and do for a time, but one day, out of the ether, whoa! We know: We're grateful and we're glad (or not mad) about it.

Once we've felt gratitude, once we've known gratitude for our own, we can only want more...and there's our turning point. We learn gratitude is like love in that we can't force it neither can we self will it. It is a gift of grace.

The great gettin' up morning is when we realize we can turn within to gratitude at any time...a simple "thank you," and we're going in the right direction...toward home.

Thank you.

PRAY FIRST; THINK LAST

From one of my spiritual readings today: "Your new freedom will depend on your ability to rise above earthly things."

I was gifted with a new realization of the meaning of that which is that earthly things are not just wars, depressions, famines, etc., which weigh on most peoples minds (but not like a personal insult does...no where near) but rising above earthly things can be rising above our own self.

My realization was that my incessant mental natterings about Gertrude's treatment of me, about Herkimer's disrespectful attitude toward me, about etc., etc., etc., to me are all earthly things that I can rise above...i.e., let go of.

I'm forever saying that I've never risen above anything, but just this week I had to check something in one of my older journals, and I found an example where I did, in fact, rise above my own self...or was lifted, more like.

On March 2, 2002,  I wrote in depth about the day before at a morning meeting when I was treated really badly by an acquaintance, and I pondered the entire hour how I could zing her back. The meeting ended and I was inspired to go to her and give her a hug. The lady was surprised, but pleasantly so, no words were exchanged, and we have been smiling acquaintances ever since.

The telling point to me as I continued reading was that her name was not mentioned again. If I had not gotten over that, "risen above that earthly happening," her name would have been written continuously and in my blood...not to be too dramatic about it.

A friend who has been given me mental fits of late called last night. We had a really warm and delightful talk, which we almost always do when talking either on the phone or face-to-face. I thought about that call after reading this morning about our new freedom, and I had a blinding flash of the obvious: In person = God; in my head = ego.

In thinking that over, I decided that means personal contact is of God and brings hearts together; mental natterings are of the ego which is the god of its own understanding and breeds resentment. Mental nattering is the home of ego...papered in resentment, draped in payback, carpeted in self pity.

That surely proves Fr. Richard Rohr's point that "The contemplative mind is really just the mind that emerges when you pray first instead of think first."

Thank you.

THERE IS NO GOD IN TOMORROW

Now. We may know that now is all the time there is, but it's hard to hold that in our reasoning mind what with all our wants and wishes, rues and regrets, what ifs and when, oh Lords?

It is helpful to realize and then to repeat...often: There is no God in tomorrow, there is no God in yesterday...for there is no tomorrow, no yesterday.

We can think of, picture if you will, tomorrow and what we plan for tomorrow, but there is no tomorrow. There is only today as we picture our tomorrow, but as soon as today ends, we are in today...there is no tomorrow.

Same goes for yesterday...we can regret what happened to us yesterday, but we are in today when we're regretting. We cannot stand in yesterday, we cannot be in tomorrow.

There is only today, and today means now...not this evening, because...aha! There is no "this evening." Now. There is only now. And God is here now. That is all.

As we give up our prayers of "Please, God, make this happen...make that un-happen," we learn to pray our "thank you" prayer..."Thank you for my everything just as it is right this very minute." For that is the only thing God can perfect...now. Which he perfects every single minute for every single living being, and our only job is to plug in and let it be.

What we must needs grasp unto breathing it: God is every single minute. God is now...All.

Thank you.

REALIZE THE HARMONY WITHIN

There is an invisible Something, and it is Its responsibility to provide, govern, maintain, and sustain the harmony of your being. -- Joel Goldsmith, "The Heart of Mysticism," at p. 1029

It is God's responsibility to provide and sustain the harmony of our being. That means God is already doing that, cannot NOT be doing that. God is the harmony of our being.

There. That is why we meditate...to plug into the harmony already within us.

God is love and harmony and gratitude and grace...AND MORE...within us this very second. We are running scared of whatever our self names...none of which can be fixed for they are of the ego, self-made...for our eyes only.

Loose them and let them go and realize the harmony of our Father within.

Therefore, your only responsibility is to demonstrate this Infinite Invisible which we call God. -- Ibid.

Thank you.

FEAR EXPOSED AS NOTHINGNESS

Never pooh-pooh nor make mock of a fear of our own or of another for we will only cling to it more in our attempt to prove its worth. No...honor it, letting it stand for God to do with as he will. Thus the fear exposes itself as nothingness.

Thank you.

RIGID, RIGHTEOUS, RIGHT AND JUSTIFIED...UH-OH

"He knows that if you see rightly, the actions and behavior will eventually take care of themselves." -- Fr. Richard Rohr, Daily Meditation, June 18, 2014

My eyebrows-up take on that: We learn that if we see rightly, the actions and behavior that we are bad-mouthing in others will eventually take care of themselves. We do not have to "set them straight" thereby planting the seeds for our next apology, our next amends.

There's a reason I reread the above this morning...I'd written it in my journal, and this morning, in a similar situation, I'm arm wrestling with God over my ego's need to chew 'em a new one, set 'em straight, make 'em sorry...and we (my ego and I) are justified.

A very many years ago, in a similar situation (!), God spoke in my ear and said, "Be very, very leery when you are rigid, righteous and right, and you know you are justified. There is never a good outcome for you there."

Thank you.

GRACE HAS JUST PICKED UP OUR CHECK

There comes a time in the life of every student of truth when s/he must live the words s/he declares because truth must be lived and not merely used as a shield or a cloak, or as a garment to be put on or off at will. -- Joel Goldsmith, "The Heart of Mysticism," at p. 1028

That very fact is true of any change in thinking, feeling, doing, being that we accept and wish to live by. We can say...and believe...we have made a decision to turn our will and our life over to the care of God, but until we start living like we have done just that, those are just words. Pretty words but just words nonetheless.

The really hard part comes in believing that we are doing it, living it, being it. It is the ego that interrupts, shouting us down, that we are powerless over. It is the ego that keeps us tied to the self-centered fear that we will never "get there."

We are already there. We have been there for sometime now. We live it usually unaware...with brief shining moments of God realization. It is that moment of realization that we hold to, because that is our base to build on.

When those temporary, fleeting flashes of "Oh no, I'll never get it" pop up, that is the exact time our "thank you" does its magic. It assures the ego that we hear it, which quiets the ego's fear that it is being ignored, and we move on...in that instant remembering, ever reminding ourselves, that grace has just picked up our check.

Thank you.

WHAT IF OUR STUMBLES ARE GOD'S GRACE?

In learning to realize the spiritual meaning in every daily happening, it is necessary to turn our thoughts back to God and the ways of God repeatedly. Our ego tells us we're getting nowhere if we err...no, WHEN we err. The ego never needs us to remind ourselves of its availability...it is there 24/7. The pearl beyond price is so is God. That's our only choice in reality: I just goofed...do I stay with ego and CYA or go with God and trust in grace?

We so often feel we're getting nowhere when we forget once again that our decision was made to live a turned over life. Our ego is right there always and ever to use our missteps and forgetfulness to assure us that God clearly is not there, but that it is.

God is there, too, but we need to make it known...to our ego and to ourselves. Our "thank you" is sufficient according to Meister Eckhart and that has become my truth.

It was Jung who said “where you stumble and fall, there you find pure gold.” I'm guessing that it is in the stumbling, the falling, that we finally surrender. We let go of our ego's certainty that "I can do it myself" or, more likely, our niggling fear that we should be able to do it ourselves. What if it is our falls that are the grace of God...bringing us home?

This morning I asked the Lord to sit shiva for my ego...or did the Lord promise that? I don't know, but I felt comforted beyond measure. I'm even more comforted in the knowledge that sitting shiva for my ego is going to take "seventy times seven."

Thank you.

ON DIVORCING OURSELVES FROM OUR EGO SELF

The less you are bound by likes and dislikes, the more clearly you will be able to see the core of everyone, even in people who cause trouble...[there is] a phrase for difficult people: 'A lash in the eye.' ...this lash in the eye is an opportunity for learning the skills that matter most in life: patience, forgiveness, and freedom from likes and dislikes. -- Eknath Easwaran, "Words to Live By," August 13.

We not only need to divorce ourselves from our own opinions, we need to divorce ourselves from our self...our ego self.

When we know someone is judging us adversely...wrongly...we need to learn to think to ourselves, "That is not me...has nothing whatsoever to do with me. But if she needs to think it, let her...it is not mine to correct; if he needs to say it, let him...it is not mine to correct."

We can know and affirm daily that it is not us that is being judged. It is her interpretation, his out picture, her need that s/he is judging. We do not touch it, do not respond in kind to any of another's adverse words or actions else we will own the mistake...we will make it ours. (Here's where our mental "thank you" can save us a lot of angst...just keep repeating it with love in mind. It doesn't do us a lot of good to think, "Thank you, God, for this no good rotten so-and-so and his/her lies." That's just trying to have our grace and ego, too.)

When we try to correct another's mistaken judgment, that gives that judgment reality to us, and we react in anger unto resentment. It is in that itch to fight that we make our decision based on self that later (in the next instant) places us in a position to be hurt...and we lose every time by the deeper resentment that follows.

The less you are bound by likes and dislikes, the more clearly you will be able to see the core of everyone, even in people who cause trouble.

Thank you.

GOD HAS NO TIMETABLE

...later I realized that all may experience God, if so be they truly seek Him rather than seek that which may come through Him. -- Joel Goldsmith, "The Heart of Mysticism," at p. 1018.

I have had to accept that the reason my living daily by spiritual principles has been so difficult for me is purely and simply because my ego is so firmly entrenched. Yet, we cannot, by our self-determined efforts alone, uproot ego. I'm convinced that it is only through seeking God alone that ego is derailed...go to God for God, that is all.

I think of the promise, somewhere in the Bible, "Seek ye first the kingdom of heaven, and all these things shall be added unto you." I often wonder if  the last half of that sentence wasn't put there to tempt our ego. For years, it was nearly impossible for me to read that sentence without the last half springing forth with bright lights, party hats and bells a-ringing. "Seek ye first" kept getting lost in the glitter of the add-ons...and that can still take me unawares.

The kicker is learning that it is the ego that entraps us in trying to go to God for God and that is all...the key word is "trying." It is in the trying that we've thrown in with ego...trying to do His work for Him. It is not for us to wrest God unto ourselves, and God is not available on demand.

As Saint Augustine prayed, "Grant what thou commandest and then command what thou will." That's the ultimate security in living a turned over life, an essential if we are ever to live ego-free...if only for a day, or even momentarily! Because every moment if God-realized counts...God has no timetable, nor is He on the clock.

Thank you.

MY PEACE, THE HEALER

[The following is a (reworked) reprint of my blog of August 26, 2011.]

For if ye forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you: But if ye forgive not men their trespasses, neither will your Father forgive your trespasses. - Matthew 6:14, 15

Unforgiveness becomes our God, our entire focus. That very unforgiveness invites all the garbage, the attack tools, that resentment is. Attack invites counter-attack…a.k.a., karma.

Forgiveness dissolves anything between our Father within and us, leaving only peace…here and now. Forgiveness is a part of My peace, the dissolver of karma.

Thank you.

DO GOOD AND FORGET ABOUT IT

"No good deed goes unpunished." I have no idea who first said that, but the first time I heard it, I laughed. The second time, and thereafter, I wholeheartedly agreed...because it surely seemed to be true.

Now, however, I've come to believe that it is only true when the ego involves itself in the deed.

A good deed done with no thought of self is neither punished nor unpunished. It is momentary in the doing...that's all. Its effects may last for a short or long while for the receiver, but for the doer, no. It is finished.

Now, the test: Can we do good and forget about it? Can we even imagine really doing a good and honorable thing and not feeling ownership in any way? Ah...I'm feeling resistance. The reasoning mind's "Yes, but...." has joined with ego and is pushing back. Which proves the truth of my last thought as I drifted off to sleep last night; namely, that our ego is the root of all our woes...perceived, interpreted or imagined.

Yet, the answer remains the same as when first we learned it....ego deflation at depth is our necessary work if we are to know spiritual peace...or peace of any kind in fact.

It may be that ego is God's gift to us as our cross to bear. That which is necessary to us to keep us on the right road back to God. The necessary part being our chipping away at ego in order for us to get to God.

Sounds complicated enough to be of God, doesn't it?

Thank you.

BEYOND IMAGINING...AND IT IS GOOD

It is I, be not afraid. -- somewhere in the Bible (at the place in the New Testament where the Main Man is walking on water toward the fishermen in the boat, and they are some kind of scared when they see It coming.)

Those six words, it is I, be not afraid, are all we need to remember whenever our "worst" fear looms large. Our worst fear being whatever fear looms at the moment...a mouse in the house or bankruptcy closing in or a questionable mammogram. Makes no never mind...if fear is the response, it only grows if we start trying to talk ourselves out of it...make light, pooh-pooh, pretend it away...all are fertilizer to fear.

The instant fear inches its way into our consciousness what we need to do is exactly the opposite of what we want to do. We want to get shut of it, to close it out; we need to see it more clearly, to invite it out into the open, to look it in the eye, and to say to ourselves, out loud or silently, "It is I, be not afraid."

We are in the process of realizing our fear as God (or our good) appearing in the form of a mouse just to get our attention. Let's face it, we can believe in that which we can see, thus fear...the unseen, not so much. So as a starter, we say this to build our trust, to help us come to believe. If nothing else, it takes our minds off the mouse...and that in itself is a reason for trying it.

It is the holding on to this promise, repeating it repeatedly, that lifts our consciousness into the spiritual realm, away from the reasoning mind's fearful imagining. What we find in the spiritual realm is beyond imagining...and it is good.

Thank you.

TO LIVE IN GOD'S POCKET

It seems to me that spiritual intuition, coming from our center, is soft and brings peace. Intellectual understanding, born in our head, is hard and brings doubt. It takes the spiritually intuitive flash and breaks it down in order to be explained...or to be questioned, not provable or proven false.

To live in our head requires us to question spiritual intuition which is not explainable, and all the spiritual books, writings, materials will not...cannot...impart spiritual realization. They can, however, point the way, and as such surely are necessary to the rank beginners in this world like you and me. The spiritually inclined may or may not receive realization, but true seekers keep seeking.

As we come to rely on our intuition, it manifests as our good...even/especially when it arrives looking less than wonderful. That may well be how we come to trust paradox...it makes no reasoning-mind sense but it proves to be our good. Our head denies what our core welcomes.

The intellectually inclined may or may not receive the same understanding, but if and when they do, they stop and examine it. They pull it apart until their own mind proves its truth to their satisfaction which means they have their own interpretation of it. It is now an intellectual point that comforts the mind and leaves the heart and soul out of the mix. There is neither spiritual comfort nor spiritual growth there.

Those of us who are intellectually inclined and spiritually seeking get to make ourselves available to still more spiritual growth every day in every way. We will examine, will pull apart, will doubt and question...and in that very process, if we are willing, we begin to open. Open to the process of our inner self coming to blossom...not knowing when, where or how It will come, but accepting It as ours and preparing for It.

God-realization might not come in this lifetime since God has no timetable...It may happen the next instant having taken seed three or thirty lifetimes ago. To trust that we live in God's pocket NOW...always and ever NOW...is all we need.

Thank you.

CLING TO NOTHING...SOAR

Today is the memorial service for my friend. I go with a peaceful heart...and an idea for my going-away party. And it is not morbid to have a plan, so here's mine:

1. Wrap me in a white cotton sheet and place me beneath a tree...a weeping willow would be ideal but not mandatory...for all the elements and animals to enjoy as my body returns to the earth and my Soul soars beyond.
2. When first you hear that I've left the room, say my "Thank you" for me. 
3. My friends, or those inclined to think of themselves as my friends, may...but it's not mandatory either...bow their heads and thank God for me being just exactly as I was in their lives...warts and all.
4. Somebody, somewhere think of me whenever you hear "In My Life," by the Beatles, "Bad Moon Rising," by CCR, and "Battle Hymn of the Republic" by the Mormon Tabernacle Choir.
5. Anyone who wants can lift a glass of root beer in my memory...Dad's Old Fashioned Root Beer would be nice but, again, not mandatory.
6. Release me, let me go.

Anything more than that is on you...and fine by  me. I'll be in no position to quibble.

Thank you.

LAUGH...OUT LOUD AND OFTEN

A friend called recently with a terrible problem. The problem has not occurred yet. But it is going to be terrible when it does occur. She is positive she will not be able to handle it plus she will be humiliated. She knows for a fact that there is no possible way to fix this because she has been thinking about it for weeks and found no answer.

So, her question: What is she to do? My answer: I don't know.

But I do know the mechanics of what we call "cleaning up the wreckage of the future." We doubt ourselves. We dread. We mentally write our own scripts. We put the other down. We push back with malice. We feel guilty. We repeat...incessantly.  

All, each and every one, is simply our attachment to our own ego-victory reasoning mind with its fear of failure riding herd. Fear demands that we get up in our heads and try to find a solution...which just breeds more fear because there is no mental solution to fear.

God's invitation is to simply let the fear fear while we remember, out loud and often: God has my back. God's hand is in this. God has already intervened in this in my behalf. Calmly repeat...remembering to love the cause for needing to repeat and to laugh, out loud and often.

Thank you.

OUR NEED IS GOD'S CALL

In the fourth century, St. Augustine said, “If you comprehend it, it’s not God,” which caused me to wonder if my pushing and preaching "thank you" as a cure-all isn't just my idea of God...my hopeful idea of God. Maybe my thank you is just my panacea to keep despair at bay.

How'd you like to wake up with that thought on your mind? It tells the tale of my mood earlier this morning. As I poured my coffee, I asked God when I'm ever going to have the feeling of him in my life. This is the same question I repeatedly asked in the early '70s until a friend said that he had the feeling of God in his life...had even spoken with God...had God speak directly to him...and every time it happened, he was in a straitjacket on his way to the insane asylum. Ba-da bing, ba-da boom. 

I am so grateful for humorous memories. It was that memory that turned my mood upward, and I could remind myself of the many...literally, countless...times God has shown itself in my life. I have experienced the wonder of God...it is my memory that is faulty. 

I then picked up my "God Calling" and my Eknath Easwaran daily reader, and...why am I still surprised?...their messages are direct answers to my squirrely thoughts. 

"God Calling" today is all about in our need is God's presence..."Your need is My Call."

Easwaran reminds us how to stay tuned, or to get back in tune: "Use your mantram...Aspirin works, but take plenty of mantrams too....one relieves fever in the body, the other, the fever of self-will." Ah, the fever of self-will...an excellent reminder that all our despairing, doubting, questioning God are simply self-will...refusing to give over to the fact of God.

I also must needs remember that I am in a period of grief right now. Just because my feelings do not have my departed friend's name on them, doesn't mean that I'm now grief-free. I need to remind myself of that...often.

My grief is God's Call.

Thank you. 

BETTER THAN I'VE EVER BEEN

I come again today in my Easwaran daily reader to the story about Saint Francis of Assisi, the story about a pupil of his asking how to find perfect joy.

Francis goes through a whole rigmarole about what perfect joy is not...it's not perfect holiness and the ability to perform miracles for others, nor is it the ability to speak with birds and beasts and know all the secrets of nature. No...perfect joy, he said, is being down and out and starving, asking for help, and getting cursed, beaten and throw out in the winter night, and being able to say with love in our hearts, "Bless you in the name of the Lord."

There. That's where "agree with your adversary quickly" gets you...that's the payoff for "if someone slaps your face, turn the other cheek." That's the answer to why we cease fighting everything and everybody. Perfect joy.

We know we can feel joy through other ways and means. But perfect joy? I'm guessing that's it, The Way...because it's such a paradox, and goes against our ego's every inclination. And from my eyebrows up, I get it.

Interestingly, it seems that every year when I come to this, I'm in the midst of feeling betrayed by yet another friend and mentally composing scripts to shame her, set him straight, make them all sorry.

Here's the measure of my spiritual growth today...that is absolutely true and it cracks me up. That may well be as good as I ever get, and, that's not all, it's better than I've ever been.

So be it, said the witch.

Amen.

WHEN SELF IS THE SHIELD

There are people we will meet in life with whom we have no affinity. We are advised that of those people are some few we simply cannot afford to have in our lives. It is really important to understand that it is not often...it is rare, in fact...that we come into contact with such persons. We must never let our ego decide this point.

Somewhere in the Bible it tells of coming into a village where we are clearly unwanted...we're told to shake the dust of the place off our feet and move on. Thaddeus Golas in "Lazy Man's Guide to Enlightenment" warns of such people, and he, too, tells us to move on...take nothing of the other with us (i.e., resentments), detach and move on.

I believe that their very self is their shield, and in that shield is our ego's almost irresistible temptation to try to remove/destroy it...for their own good, of course, or so says our ego. The attempt to destroy inevitably hardens both their perceived need for their false protection and our ego's perceived need to destroy it.

It is the "almost" wherein our answer hides...in the "almost irresistible temptation." In that one word, almost, is our release, our momentary escape hatch...God. In that instant, we learn to turn our thoughts to God, utter our thanks, and move on, taking nothing of the other with us.

Here's where our golden rule, "Don't be as nasty as you want to be," saves us. We have our permission to, as graciously as possible, say, "You may be right," and split.

And God grins.

Thank you.

A GREAT GETTIN' UP MORNING

I've just read of the Law of Three, a metaphysical principle first articulated by G. I. Gurdjieff. The main point I read that electrified me: “It is a great mistake to try to eliminate resistance." And, instantly, came a blinding flash of the obvious: To resist resistance is resistance.

Well, it's a great gettin' up morning for me!

Because I simultaneously read and realized a brand new concept...and understood in that instant that it is likely right...I know that I'm in for a deeper level of learning.

Almost my entire spiritual foundation is based in eliminating resistance...coming from the Sermon on the Mount, "Resist not evil."  To my ego, anything I come across that I disagree with translates as evil. So, if we don't resist evil (if we let whatever comes to us flow through us), what else matters?

I have that almost-forgotten eager feeling in my stomach. Here's something that seems to expand by contradicting my very belief system, and I am really excited to learn more.

It must be of God...my past pattern on hearing a differing, possibly contradicting, view on a belief of mine has been to deny its validity first and ponder it later...then deny it. Actually, I've not been that closed minded, but I have been known to analyze my "analyzations."

This “[i]t is a great mistake to try to eliminate resistance" just...well, it kissed ME on the lips...and I am grateful.

Thank you.

WILLINGNESS...ALL THAT IS NEEDED TO BEGIN

I've been feeling like I am arm-wrestling with God. God, who knows how to win, reminded me of an old blinding flash of the obvious.

Way back when many were fighting the attempt to continue flying the Confederate flag over the South Carolina state capitol, it came to me: If those opposing the flag would stop resisting...would change their minds...they could accept the flag as simply the so-called red flag that inspired the Union to win the war over slavery. Accepting the flag releases the resistance. Having nobody and nothing to resist, the other side could then think of the flag however they chose. Both sides could let the flag wave free.

The same is true of the swastika which started out in life, among other things, as a good-luck charm, as a religious symbol found in Navajo art, as a prized symbol among many other peoples of the world.

The fight is ever in our own heads.

A flag is simply a piece of cloth; a swastika is just a sign; whatever our momentary nemesis, by our thinking, we bring the symbology, the reason to resist. By our willingness, we can change our minds...for that is all that is needed to begin.

Thank you.